To the north, at the entrance of the quartier, the Place de la Contrescarpe is a pleasant, paved square surrounded by cafes. It’s here that generations of French writers, thinkers, and creators, such as Ronsard and Rabelais, liked to meet and talk things out. And just off the Place, at #74 rue du Cardinal Lemoine, is the apartment building where Hemingway and his wife Hadley stayed from 1922-1923. It’s this period that Hemingway writes about in his memoir "A Moveable Feast", a book which has become more or less required reading for any would-be expat and/or Hemingway fan worth his or her salt.

Other parts of the area are home to schools (from pre- to universities), and plaques marking the former dwellings of philosophers and religious leaders. One could say that, while these streets lend themselves more to the idea of the scholarly aspect of the Latin Quarter (an area that’s been home to students since medieval times), the winding and cobbled rue Mouffetard is part of the Latin Quarter’s bohemian side. The street’s avant-garde boutiques, eclectic shops, galleries, variety of food for sale, not to mention a number of the pedestrians themselves, give it an artsy atmosphere that’s felt immediately.

It’s hard to deny the pleasant experience of walking around this area, gazing into the shop windows, and chuckling at amusingly descriptive street names that often date to the Middle Ages. While it may sometimes be hard to find a connection between a name like “la rue de l’Epée de Bois” (“the street of the wooden sword”) and the street today, others, such as the rue du Pot de Fer (“the street of the iron pot”), which is full of eateries, still make sense. The Rue Mouffetard area is a lively, lovely quartier that shouldn’t be missed. Judging from the books, treatises, and memoirs they’ve left behind, its many celebrated inhabitants would probably agree.