THIS MUST BE THE PLACE Memoirs of Montparnasse by Jimmy “The Barman” Charters <i> as told to Morril Cody Introduction by Ernest Hemingway (Colliers: $12.95, illustrated) </i>

This collection of anecdotes and fond reminiscences is ideal for readers who regard Paris in the ‘20s as the apex of 20th-Century literature and glamour. A popular bartender, Charters served as de facto confidant to many literary and artistic figures--who drank on a scale that seems staggering by today’s health-conscious standards. (Even the ones he describes as “moderate drinkers” appear to have treated their livers as sparring partners.)

Because he uses so much slang, Charters’ ingenuous prose seems terribly dated. “The gayest parties” no longer means what it did when the book was first published in 1934, and his patronizing attitudes toward women, blacks and homosexuals seem hopelessly antiquated, if not offensive. But anyone who daydreams of Parisian cafes, c. 1925, can indulge his fantasies with these tales of Hemingway, Ford Maddox Ford, Sylvia Beach et al.