SOURCE: “Adult Fables,” in Commonweal, Vol. LXIX, No. 21, February 20, 1959, pp. 550–51.

In the following essay, Dunlea praises Across Paris and Other Stories for Aymé's ability to defy twentieth-century scientific and psychological analysis with his magical fables.

The novels of Marcel Aymé are all things to all readers, and the same may be said of his stories; they are adult fables, fantasies, fairytales, and seldom short. Superficially they are intellectual gags, the quintessence of his farcical expertise; but this is more than expertise playing at art, and like the most authentic art it is finally irreducible. In fact, such is the ease of Aymé's legerdemain, he nourishes the suspicion that perfection can be a gift.

Aymé is as capable of unadulterated charivari as of sheer sorcery. A sentimental mocker who lets the moral take care of itself, he is sly but he never really pinks. He evokes masterfully...