Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Thursday, 8 November 1877

There is only one thing that could have dragged me from the studio before time and for the whole afternoon, and that is Versailles. As soon as the tickets arrived, Chocolat was dispatched to fetch me and I went home to change my dress. On the stairs I met Julian, who was astonished to see me leaving so early; I explained and repeated that nothing but Versailles could have made me quit the studio. He told me that this was all the more admirable given how easily I could go off to amuse myself.
— I only enjoy myself here, Monsieur.
— And how right you are! You will see what pleasure it will bring you in two months.
— You know that I wish to become very accomplished, and that I do not draw for... fun...
— One must hope so! It would be treating a bar of gold like copper — it would be a sin. I assure you, with the gifts you have — I can see it in the astonishing things you do — well, it will take you no more than a year and a half to have a real talent!
— Oh!
— I say it again — a real talent!
— Take care, Monsieur — I shall leave in a state of enchantment.
— I speak the truth — you will see for yourself. By the end of this winter you will produce drawings that are altogether fine; then you will draw more, and I give you six months to grow familiar with colour — to possess a real talent, in short!
Heavens above! All the way home in the carriage I was smiling and weeping with joy and dreaming that people were paying me five thousand francs per portrait.
Ladies alone at the station, and... until we are settled in our wretched gallery, it is absolute hell.
It is raining.
Nothing was spoken of but the validations. But the validations produced incidents such that the session was fairly interesting. The great attraction was seeing my big brother at the tribune. He mounted it calm, dignified, magnificent, to defend the official candidacies that some wretch from the left had just accused of pressure, machinations, and so forth. My big brother is on the verge — if not already there — of becoming the leader of his party. My big brother, despite certain outbursts, is worth many of the people history holds in esteem.
He has a fine character — and the proof is that people speak a great deal of ill of him, but the good kind of ill, if one may put it that way.
I must not go to the Chamber too often — it might detach me from the studio; one becomes absorbed and goes, goes again, each day a new page of the same book. I could become so impassioned [sic] by politics as to lose sleep over it... but my politics is over there, in the rue Vivienne; it is through that path that I shall arrive at going to the Chamber in some other capacity than at present. A year and a half — but that is nothing!
So much happiness frightens me.
A year and a half for portraits — but paintings?... Let us say two or three years... we shall see.
I was pretty, but by eight o'clock very tired — which did not prevent me from going to draw for at least an hour.
Marcuard writes to tell us he is in despair at leaving Paris, that his father's illness and business matters call him away, that he hopes to return within a fortnight. The letter bears the same stamp of sadness he has worn since I saw him again. He may be unhappy — and he has no studio.

Notes

Parliamentary validations: the Chamber's review and ratification of contested election results, a heated process following the October 1877 elections. ↩