Meeting an American Author in a Paris Bookstore

 

Author, professor Nita Wiggins at 

The Red Wheelbarrow bookstore opposite Jardin Luxembourg in Paris.   

My first full day in Paris, I walked to Jardin Luxembourg to visit The Red Wheelbarrow bookstore.  I have visited the store several times since 2018 when Penelope bought the store and moved it to this lovely location near the Pantheon and the Sorbonne.  

Penelope, owner of The Red Wheelbarrow

When I arrived at the store it was not open. A woman was waiting outside and said the store would open soon in English that was very American.  Penelope arrived a few minutes later.  While we waited outside the store, Nita Wiggins and I began talking about The Red Wheelbarrow and the beautiful day in Paris.

As we talked I learned that Nita is a professor. She teaches journalism in Paris at l’Ecole Supérieure de Journalisme de Paris. she moved to Paris in 2009 to teach journalism and has lived here ever since.  

Before moving to Paris, she was a sports reporter for all of the major US networks. Her book: 

Civil Rights Baby: My Story of Race, Sports, and Breaking Barriers in American Journalism

was published in March 2019.  It is the story of her career as a sports reporter and all of the difficulties she faced in the very-white-male-dominated world of sports reporting.   

Nita and I talked about living in Paris, loving Paris, journalism on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, and how badly American journalism failed in predicting the rise of Trump and the cult he created.  I am looking forward to reading the book on the plane back to America.  

For more about the book and the author, her web page is here.