In January 1902 Enoch Bennett died, after a decline into dementia.Drabble, pp. 88–89 His widow chose to move back to Burslem, and Bennett's sister married shortly afterwards. With no dependants, Bennett − always a devotee of French culture − decided to move to Paris; he took up residence there in March 1903.Pound, p. 127 Biographers have speculated on his precise reasons for doing so. Drabble suggests that perhaps "he was hoping for some kind of liberation. He was thirty-five and unmarried"; Lucas writes that it was almost certainly Bennett's desire to be recognised as a serious artist that prompted his move; according to his friend and colleague Frank Swinnerton, Bennett was following in the footsteps of George Moore by going to live in "the home of modern realism";Swinnerton (1950), p. 14 in the view of the biographer Reginald Pound it was "to begin his career as a man of the world".Pound, p. 127 The 9th arrondissement of Paris was Bennett's home for the next five years, first in the rue de Calais, near the Place Pigalle, and then the more upmarket rue d'Aumale.Drabble, pp. 109 and 150; and Pound, p. 156
