circles. Laura would understand, I guess.’
‘I don’t care about Laura. I don’t like her.’
‘You don’t know her: every man falls for her.’
‘You’re not like other women,’ he said.
‘I know better than to ask how. And what about the rich witch you’re all but engaged to? And that respectable, highborn cousin with the moolah—in England?’
‘I’ll write to your parents if you like.’
‘My mother died long ago. I had a stepmother. My father’s a pillar of small town society, makes ovens. I have a brother Arnold, who is younger and married and prolific. You better write to me. If you write to them, they’ll think their living’s gone. Besides, what do you want to write for? To find out if I’m married? Or been in jail or am a dangerous red or have debts?’
‘To tell them we’re going to get married.’
‘Oh, golly—my goodness. That’s what happens to Laura.’
‘Oh, down with Laura—whoever she is.’ They got out of the taxi at the church of St-Louis-en-l’Ile and walked down the narrow high-banked street.
‘Am I walking? I must be floating,’ she said. ‘How did we get here?’
He looked down at her, touched. She looked up, ‘You look really beautiful here; it suits your El Greco face.’
‘You can’t tell a man he’s beautiful,’ he said.
‘I can. The first time I looked at you, the light from the ocean was shining on your face, while you were speaking at table: and you had a toothpick in your hand. I thought, What a saintly face!’
‘God forbid.’
‘An El Greco saint, I saw later—those long folds and lemony look.’
He laughed, was pleased. ‘There is some distant Spaniard in my family. You may see a little of him in Uncle Maurice. You’ll understand him and he’ll understand you. He lives in a spindling reflected light from all the windows in his museum of a home; but he understands people, he never interferes, never criticises, always knows what to do to help—if he likes you. A sort of Cousin Pons, too.’ He had to explain that.
She exclaimed, ‘Oh, my, oh, my, my neglected education. Oh, will I have to sit up all night on the kitchen chair, trying to catch up with you and your sister Florence and sister Brenda and Uncle Maurice?’
‘Shut up,’ he said in an undertone ‘and here we are.’
She usually spent half a day sightseeing, half a day at the congress. She arrived at its doors each day very elated—from the faubourg St-Antoine, from the Luxembourg, from the Ste-Chapelle—what a city, what people, and here in the hall, what freedom lovers; ‘the Hall of Fame on roller-skates from all points of the compass,’ she said.
Programmes, meetings, subcommittees, reports, lunches, dinners given by the Americans to foreign writers, and by others to them, the great reception at the Opéra with the Garde Républicaine in full dress, boots, Roman helmets, plumes, brass, straps, lining the staircase. Passing them, irregular clouds of visitors in simple clothing, street dress, the garments they wore in their rooms, at artists’ parties, people whose faces shone or looked away diffidently at the shine of the brasses and arms; gauds put out by the gallant French Republic, where literature is always honoured—for the shy, awkward, touchy, nondescript but acutely observant citizens of the Republic of Letters.
Tom Barrie made a speech. The shambling, flask-faced workman appeared on the planks while the photographers crowded between legs and desks. He said, ‘Our writers must learn that the working class which has created a great civilization in the Soviet Union is capable of creating a similar civilization in our own countries. The working class has heroism, intelligence, courage. We must never forget that a class which has such depths of creative power deserves only the best literature we can give.’
Louis Aragon, the French writer, said, ‘I returned from the Soviet Union and I was no longer the same man. However, there remained a thousand
‘I don’t care about Laura. I don’t like her.’
‘You don’t know her: every man falls for her.’
‘You’re not like other women,’ he said.
‘I know better than to ask how. And what about the rich witch you’re all but engaged to? And that respectable, highborn cousin with the moolah—in England?’
‘I’ll write to your parents if you like.’
‘My mother died long ago. I had a stepmother. My father’s a pillar of small town society, makes ovens. I have a brother Arnold, who is younger and married and prolific. You better write to me. If you write to them, they’ll think their living’s gone. Besides, what do you want to write for? To find out if I’m married? Or been in jail or am a dangerous red or have debts?’
‘To tell them we’re going to get married.’
‘Oh, golly—my goodness. That’s what happens to Laura.’
‘Oh, down with Laura—whoever she is.’ They got out of the taxi at the church of St-Louis-en-l’Ile and walked down the narrow high-banked street.
‘Am I walking? I must be floating,’ she said. ‘How did we get here?’
He looked down at her, touched. She looked up, ‘You look really beautiful here; it suits your El Greco face.’
‘You can’t tell a man he’s beautiful,’ he said.
‘I can. The first time I looked at you, the light from the ocean was shining on your face, while you were speaking at table: and you had a toothpick in your hand. I thought, What a saintly face!’
‘God forbid.’
‘An El Greco saint, I saw later—those long folds and lemony look.’
He laughed, was pleased. ‘There is some distant Spaniard in my family. You may see a little of him in Uncle Maurice. You’ll understand him and he’ll understand you. He lives in a spindling reflected light from all the windows in his museum of a home; but he understands people, he never interferes, never criticises, always knows what to do to help—if he likes you. A sort of Cousin Pons, too.’ He had to explain that.
She exclaimed, ‘Oh, my, oh, my, my neglected education. Oh, will I have to sit up all night on the kitchen chair, trying to catch up with you and your sister Florence and sister Brenda and Uncle Maurice?’
‘Shut up,’ he said in an undertone ‘and here we are.’
She usually spent half a day sightseeing, half a day at the congress. She arrived at its doors each day very elated—from the faubourg St-Antoine, from the Luxembourg, from the Ste-Chapelle—what a city, what people, and here in the hall, what freedom lovers; ‘the Hall of Fame on roller-skates from all points of the compass,’ she said.
Programmes, meetings, subcommittees, reports, lunches, dinners given by the Americans to foreign writers, and by others to them, the great reception at the Opéra with the Garde Républicaine in full dress, boots, Roman helmets, plumes, brass, straps, lining the staircase. Passing them, irregular clouds of visitors in simple clothing, street dress, the garments they wore in their rooms, at artists’ parties, people whose faces shone or looked away diffidently at the shine of the brasses and arms; gauds put out by the gallant French Republic, where literature is always honoured—for the shy, awkward, touchy, nondescript but acutely observant citizens of the Republic of Letters.
Tom Barrie made a speech. The shambling, flask-faced workman appeared on the planks while the photographers crowded between legs and desks. He said, ‘Our writers must learn that the working class which has created a great civilization in the Soviet Union is capable of creating a similar civilization in our own countries. The working class has heroism, intelligence, courage. We must never forget that a class which has such depths of creative power deserves only the best literature we can give.’
Louis Aragon, the French writer, said, ‘I returned from the Soviet Union and I was no longer the same man. However, there remained a thousand
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