Your eye, first of all, would glide over the grey fitted carpet in the
narrow,
long and high-ceilinged corridor. Its walls would be cupboards, in
light-
coloured wood, with fittings of gleaming brass. Three prints,
depicting,
respectively, the Derby winner Thunderbird, a paddle-steamer
named
Ville-de-Motitereau, and a Stephenson locomotive, would lead
to a
leather curtain hanging on thick, black, grainy wooden rings
which
would slide back at the merest touch. There, the carpet would
give
way to an almost yellow woodblock floor, partly covered by
three
faded rugs. It would be a living room about twenty-three feet
long
by ten feet wide. On the left, in a kind of recess, there would
be a
large sofa upholstered in worn black leather, with pale
cherrywood
bookcases on either side, heaped with books in untidy piles.
Above
the sofa, a mariner's chart would fill the whole length of that
sec-
tion of the wall. On the other side of a small low table,
and be-
neath a silk prayer-mat nailed to the wall with three
large-
headed brass studs, matching the leather curtain, there
would be another sofa, at right angles to the first,
with a light-brown velvet covering; it would
lead on to a small and spindly piece of
furniture, lacquered in dark red and
providing three display helves
for knick-knacks: agates and
stone eggs, snuffboxes, candy-
boxes, jade ashtrays, amother-
of-pearl oystershell, a silver
fob watch, a cut-glass glass, a
crystal pyramid, a miniature in
an oval frame. Further on, beyond
a padded door, there would be shelving
on both sides of the corner, for caskets and
for records, beside a closed gramophone of
which only four machined-steel knobs would
be visible, and above it, a print depicting The Great
Parade of the Military Tattoo. Through the window,dra-
ped with white and brown curtains in cloth imitating Jouy
wallpaper, you would glimpse a few trees, a tiny park, a bit
of street. A roll-top desk littered with papers and pen-holders
would go with a small cane-seated chair. On a console table
would be a telephone, a leather diary, a writing pad. Then, on
the other side of another door, beyond a low, square revolving
bookcase supporting a large, cylindrical vase decorated in blue
and filled with yellow roses, set beneath an oblong mirror in a
mahogany frame, there would be a narrow table with its two ben-
ches upholstered in tartan, which would bring your eye back to the
leather curtain. It would be all in browns, ochres, duns and yellows:
a world of slightly dull colours, in carefully graded shades, calcu-
lated with almost too much artistry, in the midst of which would be
some striking, brighter splashes - a cushion in almost garish orange,
a few multicoloured book jackets amongst the leather-bound volumes.
During the day, the light flooding in would make this room seem a little
sad, despite the roses. It would be an evening room. But in the winter,
with the curtains drawn, some spots illuminated - the bookcase corner,
the record shelves, the desk, the low table between the two settees, and
the vague reflections in the mirror — and large expanses in shadow,
whence all the things would gleam - the polished wood, the rich, heavy
silks, the cut glass, the softened leather — it would be a haven of
peace,
a land of happiness. The first door would open onto a bedroom, its floor
covered with a light-coloured fitted carpet. An English double bed would
fill the whole rear part of it. On the right, to both sides of the
window,
there would be tall and narrow sets of shelves holding a few books, to be
read and read again, photograph albums, packs of cards, pots,
necklaces,
paste jewellery. To the left, an old oak wardrobe and two clothes horses of
wood and brass would stand opposite a small wing-chair upholstered in
thin-
striped grey silk and a dressing table. Through a half-open door giving
on
to a bathroom you would glimpse thick bathrobes, swan-neck taps in solid
brass, a large adjustable mirror, a pair of cut-throat razors and their
green
leather sheaths, bottles, horn-handled brushes, sponges.
On the wall, above the bed made up and turned down for the night,
between
two small wall lamps, the astonishing, long, narrow black-and-white
photo-
graph of a bird in the sky would surprise you by its slightly formal
perfec-
tion. The second door would reveal a study. From top to
bottom the walls
would be lined with books and periodicals with,
here and there, so as to
break the continuity of bindings and
jackets, a number of prints, drawings
and photographs - Antonello da Messina's Saint Jerome, a detail from The
Triumph of Saint George, one of Piranesi's dungeons, a portrait by
Ingres,
a little pen- and-ink landscape by Klee, a sepia-tint
photograph of Renan
in his room at the Collège de France, a
Steinberg department store, Cranach's
Melanchthon - pinned to
wooden panels set into the shelving. Slightly to
the left of the
window and at a shallow angle would be a long country table
covered with a large red blotter. Wooden boxes, flat pen-holders
and pots of
all kinds would hold pencils, paper-clips, staples
large and small. A
glass tile would serve as an ashtray. A
circular black leather box
decorated with gold-leaf arabesques
would be filled with cig-
arettes. Light would come from an old
desk-lamp, ad-
justable only with difficulty, fitted with a green
opa-
line lampshade shaped like a visor. On each side
of the table, virtually facing each other,
would be two
high-backed wood and
leather armchairs. Still further to
the
left, along the wall, would be
a narrow table overflowing with
books. A wing-chair in
bottle-green
leather would lead to grey metal filing
cabinets and light wooden
card-index
boxes. On a third, even smaller table
would be a Swedish lamp and
a type-writer
under its canvas dust-cover. Right at the back
would be a narrow bed covered in ultramarine velvet
and stacked
with cushions of all colours. On a painted wooden
stand, almost in the middle of the room, there would be a globe
made of papier-mâché and nickel silver, illustrated in naïf style,
a
fake antique. Behind the desk, half-hidden by the red curtain at
the
window, would be an oiled-wood ladder which could slide on a
brass
rail all the way round the room. There, life would be easy,
simple. All
the servitudes, all the problems brought by material
existence would
find a natural solution. A cleaning lady would
come every morning. Ev-
ery fortnight, wine, oil and sugar would be
delivered. There would be a
huge, bright kitchen with blue tiles
decorated with heraldic emblems, three
china plates decorated with
yellow arabesques in metallic paint, cupboards
everywhere, a
handsome whitewood table in the middle with stools and
bench-seats. It would be pleasant to come and sit there, every
morning, after
a shower, scarcely dressed. On the table there
would be a sizeable stoneware
butter dish, jars of marmalade,
honey, toast, grapefruit cut in two. They would
open the mail,
they would open the newspapers. They would light their first
cigarette. They would go out. Their work would keep them busy for a few
hours
only, in the morning. They would meet for lunch, a sandwich
or a steak, accord-
ing to their mood; they would have coffee at a
street café and then go home, on
foot, slowly. Their flat would
rarely be tidy, but its very untidiness would be its
greatest
charm. They would hardly bother themselves with it: they would live
in it. The comfort of their surroundings would seem to them to be an
established
fact, a datum, a state of their nature. Their
attention would be elsewhere: on the
book they would open, on the text they would draft, on the record they
would
listen to,
on their dialogue engaged afresh each day. They
would work for a long
while. Then they would dine, or go out for
dinner; they would see old friends;
they would walk together.
Sometimes it would seem to them that a whole life could
be led
harmoniously between these book-lined walls, amongst these objects so
perfectly domesticated that they would have ended up believing
these bright, soft,
simple and beautiful things had only ever been
made for their sole use. But they
wouldn't feel enslaved by them:
on some days, they would go off on a chance
adventure. No plan
seemed impossible to them. They would not know rancour, or
bitterness, or envy. For their means and their desires would always
match in
all ways. They would call this balance happiness and, with their
freedom, with
their wisdom and their culture, they would know how to retain and to
reveal it in
every moment of their living, together.