Saturday, 14 July 1883

We go for a drive to see the city decked with flags. I enjoy it. And then I continue yesterday’s meditation.

Have you read Stendhal’s On Love¹? I am reading it now.

I have never loved in my life — or I have never ceased being in love with an imaginary being. Let us see?

Read this book. It is even more delicate than Balzac, more truthful, more harmonious and more poetic. It expresses divinely what everyone has felt — even I. Only I have always been... too much of an analyst. I was truly in love only with Audiffret in Nice — and even then, through ignorance.

A love at fifteen, and then a morbid infatuation with that horror Larderel. And then? Cassagnac? I have forgotten him, and besides, he attracted me only through his celebrity — the crystallisation² was posthumous, if I may express myself thus. I loved him (??) from memory.

So am I going to love?

Stendhal speaks of women as delightful creatures who do embroidery on a frame, and analyses their feelings accordingly. I am evidently an exception; those reflections cannot apply to me. I recognise myself rather in his personal impressions — those of a busy man, a man of talent... In short. So I am going to love one day? Whom? And it is going to overwhelm me?

And shall I lose my head? That will be very curious. It would be a pity to fall upon some coarse creature. I remember once in Naples — alone on the balcony, listening to a serenade... truly delicious moments: feeling transported and in ecstasy, with no object and no other cause than the country, the evening, and the music. I have never found those impressions again in Paris or anywhere but in Italy. If I did not fear what people say, I would marry Saint-Amand at once and be free and at peace while waiting to meet the supreme... being.

But people would talk, would invent some sordid mystery — for it is known that Saint-Amand is not complete. And on the other hand, to marry an ordinary man who, having nothing to reproach himself with, would make me unhappy or bore me.

As for finding the dreamed-of ideal — I count on that very little. For if there is the soul there may not be the necessary position in the world, etc... For the present I settle on a Saint-Amand marriage.

He is a baron, minister plenipotentiary, deputy-head or head of something at the ministry; a passable talent as a writer, above all as a compiler — with time, a fortune, good dinners, he would certainly go to the Academy. He would be a very brilliant M. Roland or a M. Récamier³.

He speaks to me often of work and art — that is all he talks of. He says he understands me; that we should associate; in short there is no advance for me to make. But if what people say is true — what does he think of me? Does he truly believe I am entirely devoted to Art and forever? Or does he think I believe myself entirely given to Art, and wishes to profit from that disposition to make a marriage beyond his hopes?

Afterwards he would no doubt accommodate himself to a change in my ideas... I told him one day that the important thing was not to have an absolutely virtuous wife, but a woman clever enough always to appear to be one. He did not say no. It is impossible to imagine a marriage more suited to me. Only one would have to make the world believe all is well. To have a child, for instance, in the first year. But how? And what would people say?

No — rather simulate a thing... approximately; the true expression revolts me; a false one, etc. That would be easy, and he would be a party to the scheme. Well, I am telling very fine tales here — my God, these are schemes of practical arrangement, to enjoy my work in peace and perhaps some happiness that might come one day...

It has not been a month since my father died, and I do not think of him... Sometimes, yes — and rather with regret, for when he was agreeable he was entertaining: a certain wit, rather bantering; he had much of me in him, and would sometimes say things exact and cutting.

I am more and more convinced that I ought to write — it is an invincible need, and since I was five or six years old: at that age I was writing letters, and at eleven noting impressions. In short it is to me not only natural but indispensable...

And I am tormented, not knowing what form to give all these confused ideas... For this is a jumble into which I throw everything pell-mell. But apart from it there is a novel... Things of which the beginnings have happened to me. I start from some personal event or feeling, and on that a novel constructs itself — one I see, that I live, and that I copy from life...

This journal would be of prodigious interest after my death if during my lifetime I were to write some good books... I have had for the past few days an idea for which I shall make use of Saint-Amand — but I must first write that book. And I have two things underway that interest me greatly...

And painting and sculpture. And music? But all of that together. That is what makes me lose my head a little. I can write only in the evening and for two hours at most. But I feel that this is what preoccupies me most... Along with the rest.

It is my admiration that has driven Bastien-Lepage away.

It is understood that in speaking of love one is never speaking of definitive love. You understand me — it is a question of feeling only, for Stendhal distinguishes several kinds of love, and taste-love⁴ seems to be the feeling I have sometimes experienced. But the real thing, passion-love⁵ as he calls it, is still to come.

But that is not what I came to say. I wanted only to note a very just observation that explains the great painter’s coldness toward me. “One must take great care not to present openings for hope before being sure that there is admiration. One would give rise to that insipidness which makes love forever impossible — or at least which can only be cured by the sting of wounded pride.” That remedy is to be employed, and I shall try it.

Not that there is any question of love between us — but... Besides, it is always more or less a question of that... In any case, Stendhal describes the birth of love thus: 1) admiration; then the happiness one would have in being loved by this woman or this man; 2) Hope.

It is Hope after admiration that determines love; withdraw hope after a day, and love is born no less. What does hope mean? Hope of being loved — or simply of pleasing — or even less: of being found likeable.

Here then is what might have passed between us — but only before he admired me; I showed him that I admired him as a hero, and men are vain and so are women: he may have believed that was “opening the door to hope.” Hence no crystallisation.

Read this book of Stendhal’s — it is ravishing, and you will understand me better. So all that remains to me is the sting of wounded pride. That will be easy — I had already thought of it before Stendhal. I adore him, Stendhal — and Balzac too — because they express my thoughts in a clear and admirable language.

I do not say that this sly little one from Damvillers will love me for it, but at least he will esteem me more. He thinks me at his feet — for he would not think of the abyss there is between my admiration for his talent and a complete infatuation.

When I was in love I felt no hatred toward the woman I knew to be the mistress of M. X — of the Duke of Hamilton, of little Audiffret, or of the insignificant Larderel. On the contrary, the sight of those people was pleasant to me — those ladies were almost dear to me on account of Him. I noted this impression at the time in this illustrious journal, and I think of it now apropos of Stendhal, who says that when he sees his cruelest enemy but one who continually approaches his idol, he cannot manage to hate her — so much does she remind him of his object.