Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Tuesday, 21 August 1883

Bojidar, returned from Aix via Le Havre. He has a melancholy air — it will be love for Sarah that has seized him again.
Julian writes to me — he thinks I have been rejected. The fool.
Read his letter. I reply at length, and since my handwriting is large, it comes to more than eight pages.
Tattegrain, Rochegrosse… Rochegrosse is twenty-four, and has been lingering at the School or the studio for ten years…
But there will never be anything beyond words or letters… Besides, I cough so much that… No — I shall not die until around forty, like Mlle Collignon.
Around thirty-five I shall be very ill, and at thirty-six or thirty-seven, bedridden one winter — all will be over. And my will. It will consist of a statue and a painting by Saint-Marceaux and Jules. In a chapel in Paris, surrounded by flowers, in a prominent location — and at each anniversary they shall sing masses by Verdi and Pergolesi and other music, every anniversary in perpetuity, performed by the most celebrated singers.
In addition I shall establish a prize for artists — men or women. Three thousand francs for three years.
Instead of occupying oneself with such things… I want to live. But I have no genius at all, and it is still better to die.
Ah! My God, why do you not make me happy — no one would be more grateful or more joyful… I would love you so…
Dina tells me that Jules makes her uncomfortable as well: "When I see you upside down, I do not know what to do with myself — if The Head is troubled, what becomes of the rest? For we take him for God and do not know what to do."
That may be true. But even so. And this architect who plays the victim before him here. Last time he went so far as to lift me off the ground by my elbows, in the studio. And that vexed me. Jules, who as you know rarely honours us with his presence, made himself entirely at home as if among friends — yet despite this, everyone was ill at ease. And the architect, to break the ice, played the part of the man who is perfectly comfortable… After dinner we had gone up to the studio (I am still speaking of the other day, but I live as one does in the provinces, where events are so rare they last a long time) — Jules stretched out on the sofa, Émile on the other, Dina in an armchair, and I on the floor. Then the ignoble architect came and planted his foot on my back as in a melodrama, and lifted me off the ground so that my mules remained on the carpet. I am displeased, in retrospect… But there is nothing to be done about it… Yes there is… No.
Well — yes, there is. Only… It comes back to me now, as always. Besides, I told him at the time: you know I shall be very angry in a few days, for I cannot account for this strange behaviour.
And Jules… And Jules… I no longer think of him, nor of the Triennial…
I think that I am young and that one ought to live.