Shakespeare and Company is an iconic English-language bookstore located on Paris’s Left Bank, opposite Notre-Dame. Founded in 1951 by George Whitman, the bookstore was named after Sylvia Beach’s original Shakespeare and Company, which operated from 1919 to 1941.
The bookstore is more than just a place to buy books—it’s a literary sanctuary that has hosted numerous famous writers like James Baldwin, William Burroughs, Anaïs Nin, and Allen Ginsberg. Whitman created the store “like a man would write a novel,” inviting writers and artists to sleep among the shelves for free