She delivered them all here under her fish-stand, and all had been stillbirths or...

Narrator: In the period of which we speak, there reigned in the cities a stench barely conceivable to us modern men and women. Naturally, the stench was foulest in Paris, for Paris was the largest city in Europe. And nowhere in Paris was that stench more profoundly repugnant than in the city's fish-market. It was here then, on the most putrid spot in the whole kingdom, that Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was born on the 17th of July, 1738. It was his mother's fifth birth: she delivered them all here under her fish-stand, and all had been stillbirths or semi-stillbirths. And by evening the whole mess had been shoveled away with the fish-guts into the river. It would be much the same today, but then... Jean-Baptiste chose differently.

In the period of which we speak, there reigned in the cities a stench barely conceivable to us modern men and women. Naturally, the stench was foulest in Paris, for Paris was the largest city in Europe. And nowhere in Paris was that stench more profoundly repugnant than in the city's fish market. Here we are. I'll get another box. It was here, then, on the most putrid spot in the whole kingdom, that Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was born on the 17th of July, 1738. It was his mother's fifth birth. She'd delivered them all here under her fishstand, and all had been stillbirths, or semi-stillbirths, You all right? And the whole mess was shoveled with the fishguts into the river. It would be much the same today but then, Jean-Baptiste chose differently. What's that noise? It's a baby. -What's going on here? It's a newborn. Where's its mother? She was just here. She tried to kill it. Her own child. She tried to kill her baby!