Basically Orwell’s response to the Spanish Civil War.
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Along with Gillray or maybe Hogarth,
we like rude cartoons of old kings;
overweight, overbearing and bewigged,
breeches bursting, waistcoats straining at buttons
at table, grasping forks thrust
into grotesquely large mouthfuls of whole chicken.
Thus has our Royal Family delighted us
and so it was today as I sat beside
a girl bearing a willow branch or some such.
Behind me a conversation struck up
in praise of books yet denigrating kindles.
Someone spoke of her favourite detective stories,
“Its a pity when you do know,
half way through who done it,” she paused
“but you have to keep onto the end in case
-you haven’t got it right.”
“I like turning the pages,”
replied he who disparaged modern technology.
“Did you see that programme last night?”
“The Windsors”, “The Palace” or some such
“What he got up to – the ageing Duke
and that other one, the Princess-
No!” and he named her Aunt instead
I began to imagine islands, sun-tanned cougars
behind sunglasses…..
He continued in a sadder tone,
“Yes, she couldn’t be with the one
she wanted to be with…” and went on
plaintively and regretfully describing the Royal lady’s lifestyle
and jazzed up episodes and finished somewhat mournfully,
“One or two people got hurt in the meantime, didn’t they?”
And the bus stopped and I got out and walked away pensively.
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#Classic The Quiet American
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Maigret and the Wine Merchant
Paris bistros and good reading- formidable!!
If only I could drink like Maigret. Rum for his colds, beer for his thirsts, plum brandy when he feels a bout of the flu coming on. And he eats like a horse. A thoroughbred horse with his own private chef, that is. Madame Maigret sounds like a wonderful chef.
This novel is about work and how we compensate ourselves for the time we spend at the office. The murder is all about the company run by the victim, the solution is to do with the way the business was run and most of the red herrings come from employees. People often say these books are excellent at describing ordinary melancholy, but Simenon is also sharp to the daily grind and the petty reality of office politics. It’s a very #metoo novel.
Maigret is always at work, in a way few literary characters are. He dreams about his case. He…
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Vaugment cool et tranquille!
Il y a quelques jours, l’artiste Japonais Toku était à Paris pour un concert très intimiste avec le public français. Il a commencé la soirée par quelques mots en français, puis s’est lancé en anglais en s’excusant de ne pas être très bon francophone.
Les reviews de concert ne sont pas vraiment notre spécialité, mais nous avons apprécié ce moment particulier : dans une salle où tous les spectateurs fermaient les yeux et savouraient chacune des notes qui s’envolaient dans l’espace.
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These look great- most interesting.
The Liberation Collection consists of over 3000 books published in French between 1944 and 1946. They all share a common subject – the Second World War – and reflect the interest of the collector for book history (quality paper, limited editions, signed copies, etc.); this aside, they differ widely from each other in the way they treat the subject, what they talk about (or don’t talk about), their format, pictorial content, audience, tone and genre. One way to give an insight into the variety of the collection is through its most striking book covers, most of them having been photographed for our thumbnail project. Here is a random sample taken from books catalogued in 2019:
Fiction
Fiction represents nearly one sixth of the collection. Below are a spy novel, an adventure tale about the life of a fighter pilot and a theatre play about the army draft in France.
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Some interesting lines here.
Sometimes, it’s just a case of being in the right place at the right time…
The Spouse and I went to a book launch today at the Victorian Artists’ Society in East Melbourne. The book is called Pictures and Prose, Existentialists and Atheists Speak, and the reason we were interested in this somewhat esoteric publication was because The Spouse is included in it. As I’m sure readers have gathered by now, he is a man of many interests and from time to time he has given a talk at the Existentialists’ Society (even though he isn’t one of them). And he was giving a talk there when Melbourne painter, printmaker and photographer Raffaella Torresan was there sketching the presenters and that is why he is in the book which is a collection of talks given at the society.
His talk was titled ‘Skepticism, Science and Scientism, and I don’t…
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Sounds sweet!!
«Dans les moments où j’ai eu du mal à trouver l’acceptation en moi-même, je me suis appuyé dans le passé sur l’amour et la validation d’une autre personne pour combler ce vide. Ce genre de besoin est insoutenable, mais humain. Sa douleur, sa tristesse, son désir – un besoin de validation de la valeur. C’est de ce sentiment que dérive cette chanson.»
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Again on business 😙
Lovely and superb sketches!!
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Les Yeux Noirs- Élisabeth Anaïs
Avec Pomplamoose https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomplamoose
Dans tes grands yeux noirs
Je me suis perdu
J’attends un regard
Le coeur suspendu
Je t’aime tellement fort
Toi qui me fais si peur
Est ce un mauvais sort
Ou la mauvaise heure
Et autour de nous
Chantent les tziganes
Tout le monde s’en fout
S’enivre au champagne
Dans tes beaux yeux noirs
Je sombre, mon amour
Et mon désespoir
A leur chant est sourd
Je perds la raison
A chercher tes bras
Brûlant de passion
Viens, embrasse moi
De tes grands yeux noirs,
L’étrange lumière
A nimbé le soir
De tous les mystères
C’est toi que je veux
Je sais que j’ai tort
Je suis malheureux
De t’aimer si fort…
tziganes=Hungarian Gypsy (cf Zigeuner auf Deutsch)
A nimbé le soir= shrouded the evening
penwithlit 