Friday, April 05, 2019

A to Z Cite de L'Ecrit


A to Z Challenge HERE



Ecrire = French for “to write.”
Last year, I had the great good fortune to visit a city in France named the City of Writing, Cite deL’Ecrit, (Montmorillon). The sign in torn reads, “To dive into the universe of the Book.” Lovely, fascinating and picturesque.

Even in the off season, a few of the “Libraries” the bookstores, and the writing, printing, and artisan shops were open. The majority were closed but it was easy during our walk through the town to see how wonderful this town would be to visit in the warmer months, whether a writer or a reader or both. Anything relating to books is found here.

In the tourist information center/museum, the exhibition for the history of typewriters and calculating machines was overwhelming. So much information in a relatively small space, I could have stayed there hours and still not seen/read everything. I took far too many photos, but it was so interesting, and I didn’t want to forget anything. My husband being a math teacher made the photos of the calculating machines a must, since he wasn’t there to share that experience with me. I had no idea the typewriter had such a wide and varied history in so many different countries.
Notice the "open" (Ouvert) sign is a writing quill? They are all over the city

"The adventure of the Machine for writing and calculating"

A classing of the writing machines

"70 years separate these two eras"

A history of the means of calculation machines

A young woman who wanted to write, A corona at last, I always dreamed of one!

A music typewriter!

Yeah, right!

"I prefer to travel without a ticket than to be without my Underwood"

The displays nicely done and easy to read
Montmorillon itself is beautiful and has been (re)designed to host the hordes of pedestrians who invade when the weather warms. I’m sure locals both appreciate the business and regret the amount of foot traffic through the town which spans both sides of the river.
In the public toilets!

See what I mean? The quills are everywhere, even the toilets

And on the pavings all over town.

Walking down toward the river

"Books for You!" "To read is the only way to live many lives"

Notice all of the tools of writing in this poster?

On the bridge spanning the river is an old printing press

A shop for calligraphy supplies

"Le Grimoire" means the "Book of Spells" or sorcery, like in Harry Potter. This is a pub/cafe!
Le pèlerinage de Saint-Jacques-de-Compostelle
It also just happens to be on one of the pilgrimage routes to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. What a special treat, off of the “beaten” path…


Missed some of my A to Z 2019 posts? Well look no further...


All photos by Buie-Collard

4 comments:

  1. Very cool! Wish more cities here in the states focused that much on writing and reading.

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  2. A "city of writing" sounds pretty neat. I don't guess there is any City of Writing in the U.S. If there were I'd want to visit.

    Arlee Bird
    Tossing It Out

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  3. Love all the writing machines and supplies! Looks amazing :)

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