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The Deux Magots literary prize (Prix des Deux Magots) has been awarded to a French novel every year since 1933 at Les Deux Magots.
Origin of the name
"Magot" literally means "stocky figurine from the Far East".[4] The name originally belonged to a fabric and novelty shop at nearby 23 Rue de Buci. The shop sold silk lingerie and took its name from a popular play of the moment (19th century) entitled Les Deux Magots de la Chine. Its two statues represent Chinese "mandarins", or "magicians" (or "alchemists"), who gaze out over the room. In 1873, the business moved to its current location in the Place Saint-Germain-des-Prés. In 1884, the business changed to a café and liquoriste, but kept the name.
Auguste Boulay bought the business in 1914, when it was on the brink of bankruptcy, for 400,000 francs. Auguste Boulay's son added glass walls to allow more light into the café. The statues remained the same since the store opened (they were not replaced by copies).[5] A café Les Deux Magots opened in Tokyo in 1989.[6]
Catherine Mathivat, great-great-granddaughter of Auguste Boulay, started to work in the café in 1993, and took over when her father died in 2012.[5] In 2016, the café led a study revealing that 60% of its clientele were international tourists. In 2017, Mathivat partnered with her cousin Jacques Vergnaud to redesign the café and reclaim its Parisian clientele.[7] In 2022, the Saint-Germain café alone made a revenue of 15 million euros.[6] In 2023, a café Les Deux Magots opened in Riyadh (Saudi Arabia)[6] and another one in Tokyo. In December 2023, it opened a unit in São Paulo. There are more plans to new units in Cape Town,Prague,London and Guangzhou.
References in literature and popular culture
In literature
Les Deux Magots appears in The Chariot Makers, by Steve Matchett, in which the author describes Les Deux Magots as: "the first café in the quarter to be blessed by the morning sun. Its clientele pay a healthy premium for drinking there, it’s only fitting they should be the first to catch the warmth of the new day."[citation needed]
The café figures prominently in Abha Dawesar's novel That Summer in Paris (2006).
The café is the setting for a pivotal scene in the 1998 novel The Magic Circle by Katherine Neville. The novel was displayed for several months in the windows of Les Deux Magots.[citation needed]
In the 2009 novel El hombre que amaba a los perros (The Man who Loved Dogs) by Leonardo Padura it is one of the places where Trotsky's assassin, Ramon Mercader, spends time while waiting to be sent to Mexico to complete his assignment.[citation needed]
The café features prominently in Marco Missiroli's Atti osceni in luogo privato, about the early life of "Libero Marsell", whose father will be a patron of the cafè and will befriend writer Albert Camus before the author's death.
The café features in the 2011 film The Intouchables, in a scene in which Philippe (François Cluzet) and Driss (Omar Sy) stop there after a wee-hours stroll along the Seine, meant to ease Philippe's suffering in the middle of the night.
In television
The café features in a scene in the final episode of NBC sitcom The Good Place.
The café features centrally as the main location of the tale told in the song “A Rose Is A Rose” by singer Poe, with many of the café‘s more famous clientele name-checked in the lyrics, each enraptured with the enigmatic Jezebel.
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Les_Deux_Magots, and is written by contributors.
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