MON CHER AMI…..A BIENTÔT

The Correspondent, I have noticed, seems to have disappeared from the social scene. On a recent visit to certain Musées in Paris, I have noted on display various letters or written comments by persons concerned in the exhibitions. These have been on the whole 18^th, 19^th and early 20^th century letters sent by individuals whose correspondence has been saved over the years. People saved letters. I wonder how many do that now. The handwriting of some can be difficult to decipher, but with care and diligence one can make out the gist. It is really just a matter of time, which is not always easy when there are a number of people trying to look at the same exhibit. Nonetheless, little things spring out revealing nice little bits of the life behind the letter.

Eugene Delacroix

Celia and I recently visited the Eugene Delacroix museum in St. Germain, just off the Rue Jacob. Eugene was a great friend of George Sand. In one letter to him from her she states “ je suis interrompue par Chopin qui…” It was difficult to make out just what Chopin was after with his interruption, whilst she was writing to Eugene, but just that little phrase conjures up a domestic picture of Ms Sands sitting in a room, along with Chopin (possibly tinkering on the piano) writing to her friend and filling him in with current goings on. It is also interesting to note that she does not say Frédéric, Fred or even Freddie, but Chopin. But then, on reflection, that is a very French thing to do. I can recall at school that we called each other by our surnames, and hardly ever used first names, even among close friends. Nonetheless, it is perhaps time to bring back the letter, not necessarily handwritten but certainly posted. Our friend Emma Piper still sends letters, although she has also taken to emails, but letters do still appear. This is a nice thing.  

Atelier of Eugene Delacroix

I am interrupted, at this very moment, 12:32 PM, Paris, Tuesday 14^th February, by a text message from Specsavers telling me that an eye test is due and that I can book an appointment on line. The text message has come to overtake letter writing as a means of correspondence. It is certainly quicker and clearly can be generated automatically by commercial enterprise and technology, but it is not the same as a letter. My parents used to go on at me, as probably yours did, to write, send a letter a post card or even a phone call, just so they knew I was alive. I should have paid more attention. But the age of IT has changed all that. What did we do before the mobile phone? How did we manage to live? Questions we have all pondered on from time to time. By all, I refer to people born well before the advent of the portable telephone, who were capable of interacting with others, and to whom technology came as a bit of a surprise, but who embraced it with vigour nonetheless. Dick Tracy's two-way wristwatch radio is no longer a comic book fiction.

Sculpture by Stéphane Thidet – Une Histoire Vraie

2016 –Néon, structure métallique in the Garden of 

Atelier Delacroix

On the whole though, people who saved letters were people whose correspondence was more of an exchange of ideas. Leibniz (who features in my current course of study) was a prolific letter writer. Indeed he wrote a prodigious amount of stuff, mostly in correspondence with just about anybody he thought might be interested in what he had to say. Professor John M. DePoe, at Marywood University claims that it could take 100 years to go through Leibniz’s correspondence in trying to understand it. He gives an interesting lecture on Leibniz on YouTube.  Indeed, there are a number of lectures and thoughts on the subject of Leibniz and many others on YouTube uploaded by a number of academicians. Perhaps this is a way of animating a correspondence; but that is not the same as a personal exchange created by a series of letters; letters developing a proposition about who and why we are, and elaborating upon it with a multiplicity of possibilities and speculations. Not necessarily asserting that a proposition is the only correct way of looking at the matter, but at least putting forward a suggestion.  This is now usually done in the form of a paper presented at some academic gathering, by learned colleagues to learned colleagues. My suggestion would be to bring back the notion of an exchange of letters between just people, and to do it as Leibniz did, by simply writing to someone and asking for a view. I am sure there are people who do that now and that my suggestion is nothing new. Donc, néanmoins I hope to give it a try. Please be prepared to respond. NB: Note the piece of performance writing in Delacroix's garden, there's a real story.