Between the Bateau-Lavoir and the Closerie des Lilas flows the Seine, and the history of modern art. Thus begins Dan Franck's book on the bohemians who flourished when Paris was the creative capital of the world in the early 1900s. Franck's book covers the first thirty years of the century, when Montmartre and Montparnasse were filled with glorious subversives who were inventing modern art and the literary language of the century: Jarry with his owl and his revolvers, Picasso the gentle anarchist, Apollinaire the eroticist, Modigliani and his women, Max Jacob and his men, the fiery Aragon, the solitary Soutine, Man Ray, Gertrude Stein, Henri Matisse, Andre Breton and many others. They came from many different countries. They were painters, poets, sculptures, musicians, and began seminal movements such as fauvism, cubism and surrealism. For three decades they led the way in literature and painting."