Paul Morand is a writer who is today considered of the second rank. His literary activity spanned about sixty years; he wrote over sixty volumes. He remains best known for his early writings, in particular the short stories published in the 1920s. At the time when he began to write, Morand was greeted as a modernist par excellence. He introduced a new tone in French literature, a new style which represented a complete rupture with the polished works of the previous generation, as well as a refreshing and direct vision--brutal at times--of the modern world. Morand, however, was not a writer of ideas nor a theoretician of the novel. He was a witness: for him it was the eye that counted most. In Papiers d'identité (Identification Papers, 1931), he goes as far as to say, "Je me défends d'avoir des théories: les thé...