THE CLOCK

A magnificent timepiece witnesses a train station’s transformation into an art museum in this blithely told tale.

Chronicling the true story of the Gare d’Orsay’s renovation into the Musée d’Orsay, Fong focuses on the station’s only permanent resident: a clock. In Paris at the turn of the 20th century, the elegant clock is charged with keeping everything on schedule. At a time when few people could afford watches, “the clock [keeps] a station humming, and the world moving.” Yet as decades pass, the station is abandoned and, with it, the clock. It could easily have been reduced to rubble if people hadn’t been dedicated to saving it. “There were those who remembered the clock…. Who admired the clock for withstanding time.” Under their guidance, the clock—never anthropomorphized—is repaired, refurbished, and put on display as the train station finds new purpose as a museum. Surprisingly poetic, even philosophical, language peppers the pages: “This clock keeps a world-class art museum humming…and stops the world from moving.” The clock and station are rendered with pride and dignity; Fong captures soaring steel and glass arches and striking facades, though human figures, who diversify over time, are drawn with less personality than their surroundings. Backmatter offers additional details about the Gare d’Orsay and the clock; no bibliography or further reading is included.

A joyful traipse into the past.