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Thursday, 24 May 1877
Two eyes are too few, or else one must do nothing at all. Reading and drawing are enormously tiring, and in the evening, writing these wretched lines, I am sleepy. Ah! what a fine time youth is; how happily I shall remember these days of study, of art. If only I worked like this all year round!... but one day, one week, by chance... Natures!... to which God has given everything wear themselves out doing nothing. I try to calm myself by thinking that this winter I shall certainly set to work, but my eighteen years make me blush to the roots of my hair: eighteen, and what have I done? Nothing. It is crushing. To console myself I look among the famous for those who began late; yes, but a man of eighteen is nothing, whereas a woman of eighteen would be twenty-three if she were a man.Jeudi 24 mai 1877
Madame Anitchkoff and her children have just left; I am alone and happy...
Madame Anitchkoff et ses enfants viennent de partir, je suis seule et heureuse...
To go and live in Paris... in the North, after this lovely sun, these nights so pure and so soft! What can one desire, what can one love after Italy! Paris, the heart of the civilised world, of intellect, of wit, of fashion, no doubt; one goes there, one stays there, one enjoys it; one must even go there for... a whole host of things, so as to return with all the more pleasure to God’s own country, the land of the blessed, a land enchanted, marvellous, divine, whose supreme beauty and mysterious charm nothing one can say will ever equal! One arrives in Italy and laughs at its hovels, its lazzaroni; one is even very witty in laughing at them, and one is often right to laugh; but forget for a moment that you are a person of wit and that it is great fun to mock everything, and you will be like me, in ecstasy, weeping and laughing with admiration... Rosalie wants to put me to bed; that is always the way in this world; but one of these days I shall give you a translation of our Gogol, which will explain what I am trying to say.
Aller vivre à Paris... dans le Nord, après ce beau soleil, ces nuits si pures et si douces ! Que peut-on désirer, que peut-on aimer après l’Italie ! Paris, le cœur du monde civilisé, de l’intelligence, de l’esprit, des modes, sans doute, on y va, on y reste, on s’y plaît, il faut même y aller pour... un tas de choses, pour retourner avec plus de plaisir dans le pays de Dieu, pays des bienheureux, pays enchanté, merveilleux, divin et dont tout ce qu’on peut dire n’égalera jamais la suprême beauté, le charme mystérieux ! On arrive en Italie et l’on se moque de ses bicoques, de ses lazzaroni, on a même beaucoup d’esprit en se moquant et l’on a souvent raison de se moquer, mais oubliez un instant que vous êtes une personne d’esprit et qu’il est fort amusant de se railler de tout, et vous serez comme moi en extase, pleurant et riant d’admiration... Rosalie veut me coucher, c’est toujours ainsi dans ce monde, mais un de ces jours je vous donnerai une traduction de notre Gogol qui vous expliquera ce que je tâche de dire.