he laughs – rather endearing, but odd. Yet perhaps no odder than Rab’s [Butler] strange hooting.
Cynthia Gladwin
13 February
1684
Dr. Tenison communicating to me his intention of Erecting a Library in St. Martines parish, for the publique use, desird my assistance with Sir Chr: Wren about the placing and structure thereof: a worthy and laudable designe: He told me there were 30 or 40 Young Men in Orders in his Parish, either, Governors to young Gent: or Chaplains to Noble-men, who being reprov’d by him upon occasion for frequenting Taverns or Coffè-houses, told him, they would study and employ their time better, if they had books: This put the pious Doctor upon this designe, which I could not but approve of, and indeede a greate reproach it is, that so great a Citty as Lond: should have never a publique Library becoming it: There ought to be one at St Paules, the West end of that Church, (if ever finish’d), would be a convenient place . . .
John Evelyn
1874
Yesterday I spent the whole day in the studio of a strange painter called Degas. After a great many essays and experiments and trial shots in all directions, he has fallen in love with modern life, and out of all the subjects in modern life he has chosen washerwomen and ballet-dancers. When you come to think of it, it is not a bad choice.
It is a world of pink and white, of female flesh in lawn and gauze, the most delightful of pretexts for using pale, soft tints.
He showed me, in their various poses and their graceful foreshortening, washerwomen and still more washerwomen . . . speaking their language and explaining the technicalities of the different movements in pressing and ironing.
Then it was the turn of the dancers. There was their green-room with, outlined against the light of a window, the curious silhouette of dancers’ legs coming down a little staircase, with the bright red of a tartan in the midst of all those puffed-out white clouds, and a ridiculous ballet-master serving as a vulgar foil. And there before one, drawn from nature, was the graceful twisting and turning of the gestures of those little monkey-girls.
An original fellow, this Degas, sickly, neurotic, and so ophthalmic that he is afraid of losing his sight; but for this very reason an eminently receptive creature and sensitive to the character of things. Among all the artists I have met so far, he is the one who has best been able, in representing modern life, to catch the spirit of that life.
The Brothers Goncourt
1902
Before me on my table there are Christmas roses in a chased metal bowl. Although this clearly sounds a very stylish note and though I have always imagined it as something very pretty I feel nothing, nothing at all.
And it’s the second day that the Christmas roses have stood before me.
Robert Musil
1926 [Berlin]
At one o’clock, just as my dinner-party guests were gone, a telephone call from Max Reinhardt. He was at [Karl Gustav] Vollmoeller’s and they wanted me to come over because Josephine Baker was there and the fun was starting. So I drove to Vollmoeller’s harem on the Pariser Platz. Reinhardt and Huldschinsky were surrounded by half a dozen naked girls, Miss Baker was also naked except for a pink muslin apron, and the little Landshoff girl was dressed up as a boy in a dinner-jacket. Miss Baker was dancing a solo with brilliant artistic mimicry and purity of style, like an ancient Egyptian or other archaic figure performing an intricate series of movements without ever losing the basic pattern. This is how their dancers must have danced for Solomon and Tutankhamen. Apparently she does this for hours on end, without tiring and continually inventing new figures like a child, a happy child, at play. She never even gets hot, her skin remains fresh, cool, dry. A bewitching creature, but almost quite unerotic. Watching her inspires as little sexual excitement as does the sight of a beautiful beast of prey.
Count Harry Kessler
1951
It must be told that my second work day is a bust as far as getting into the writing. I suffer as always from the fear of putting down the first line. It is amazing the terrors, the magics, the prayers, the straightening shyness that assails one. It is as though the words were not only indelible but that they spread out like dye in water and colour everything around them. A strange and mystic business, writing. Almost no progress has taken place since it was invented. The Book of the Dead is as good and as highly developed as anything in the 20th century and much better than most. And yet in spite of this lack of a continuing excellence, hundreds of thousands of people are in my shoes – praying feverishly for relief from their word pangs.
And one thing we have lost – the courage to make new words or combinations. Somewhere that old bravado has slipped off into a gangrened scholarship. Oh! you can make words if you enclose them in quotation marks. This indicates that it is dialect and cute.
John Steinbeck
1965 [Singapore]
At 2100 the whole of our party went to the fantastic home of Run Me Shaw, the brother of Run Run Shaw of Hong Kong. The story goes that the elder brother used to hang about for messages, saying ‘Run run?’, and when he had been sent on a message the younger brother would say ‘Run me?’ At all events they are both multi-millionaire magnates now.
The house is set in an elaborate garden with a large swimming pool, fountains, etc., with continually changing lighting systems. We were shown into an immense private cinema and then with evident pride he said to Patricia, Solly and me, ‘Now I will show you my wonderful pink Toyland.’
Solly and I expected to see a display of toys, but in fact it was the most luxurious ladies’ loo imaginable with two pink WCs at the far end, indeed a pink toilet.
Earl Mountbatten of Burma
14 February
1752
This being Valentine Day gave to 52 Children of this parish, as usual 1 penny each 0. 4. 4. Gave Nancy this morning 1. 1. 0.
The Rev. James Woodforde
1941 [POW camp, Germany]
How sick and tired I am of the nightly visitors’ excited entry with ‘What’s the news?’ As if we knew any. To make matters worse I heard somebody in the room talking defeatism – ‘if we lose’ and ‘when we lose’. Slaving in salt mines in Silesia, etc. Hell, one tries to think of home, etc., to keep cheerful if possible, but it would drive one permanently mental if one had to contend with defeatism. Actually, I think half of us, if not the majority, are slowly going mental – tho’ we think we’re sane.
Captain John Mansel
1980 [Düsseldorf]
We had to take Hans Mayer’s car and drive out to the country to a small town to photograph a German butcher. His company is called Herta, it’s one of the biggest sausage companies in Germany. He was a cute guy. He had this interesting building. You could see all the employees. He had my Pig on the wall. Junk everywhere. A lot of toys. A lot of stuffed cows, stuffed pigs. Pigs, pigs, pigs all over the place. And there was art. There were funny things hanging from the ceiling. There were
