Sublime

that the most beautiful poem in the world was written by somebody who knew of nothing larger than such little towns is a historical fact. It is said that the poem came at the end of the period; that the primitive culture brought it forth in its decay; in which case one would like to have seen that culture in its prime.

Entre 1900 et 1914, je n’ai jamais vu mentionné le nom de l’écrivain Paul Valéry ni dans Le Figaro ni dans Le Matin, Marcel Proust passait pour un salonnard, Romain Rolland pour un savant musicologue ; ils atteignirent presque cinquante ans avant qu’un pâle rayon de gloire atteignît leur nom, et leur grande œuvre était plongée dans l’obscurité au b

When he died in 1934 at the age of fifty-two, he left a fortune so large that my father and my uncle never managed to find their way to the end of it, in spite of a long succession of failed business ventures.

A poor woman in a poor public-house was broken with a ruinous fine for giving a child a sip of shandy-gaff. Nobody supposed that the law verbally stigmatised the action for being done by a poor person in a poor public-house. But most certainly nobody will dare to pretend that a rich man giving a boy a sip of champagne would have been punished so he

Human property

we had long admired photographs of Nanita Kalaschnikoff among the world's most wicked and wonderful; we would read about her husband's origins in the Russian nobility, his connection with that awful gun so beloved by terrorists. She was a Princess, a Spanish beauty with an uncanny resemblance to the Bourban monarchs and, in the Court of Salvador Da

“Yes but not for long. Poor Scott. Terribly black-ass. He’d come to collect some things he’d left in storage.” “Was he with Zelda?” “No, he had to put her somewhere for safekeeping. He was feeling bereft and sorry for himself, and for her. We were having dinner at the Closerie. ‘Just imagine,’ he said, ‘ten years ago we were the Golden Girl and her