Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Friday, 5 October 1877

— Did you do this alone? asked Monsieur Julian as he entered the atelier.
— Yes, Monsieur.
I was as red as if I had been lying...
— Well then... I am very pleased, very pleased.
— Yes?
— Very pleased.
And I even more so!
There follow the pieces of advice he gave me.
I am still dazzled by the superiority of the others over me, but I am already less afraid.
These are women with three, four years in the atelier, of copying at the Louvre, of serious study. And I... Larderel and that is all.
Poor Rosalie is ill — I shall do everything to keep her, ill or not. The idea of being without Rosalie! Since she has been with me she has had a place in everything, beginning with Alexandre.
I should be less happy about returning to Italy if she were not to accompany me.

Notes

Count Alessandro (Alexandre) de Larderel, the Florentine with whom Marie was infatuated in Naples in 1876–77, not a teacher: the print index lists this page under his entry “Larderei (Alexandre) [Bijou]” (Mon Journal vol. 11, p. 17). Against the other students’ years of serious study, Marie sets her infatuation. ↩