Diary of Marie Bashkirtseff
CZENUKFR

Sunday, 6 April 1884

The Canroberts come to see me and propose going to the horse show on Monday. I refuse, naturally. And being as intimate as we are, I have often let slip words of discontent and allusions against my family — and against my aunt, whom people in Paris believe to be under the shadow of some infamous lawsuit, cited as a witness because her brothers thrashed a government official...
Left alone with that little fool Claire I begin to say that... We first note that people believe me ill and reproach me for not being good to my family, who adores me, adores me! Whereupon I say — after much: "it is stupid to say, it is no one's business, and if I don't tell it people will think I am truly mad to rage for nothing" — well, here it is: twenty years ago one of my uncles thrashed a man; you know how things drag on in Russia, and this matter is sent to the embassy, and people believe God knows what...
And with that, great tears; [blacked out: illegible] "But is it possible that for so little your aunt — and why does she not wish to?" "Ah! that is exactly it — out of selfishness, out of nonchalance; she tells herself it is a trifle, that it does not matter; she does not want to make this journey and endure a small inconvenience, and I, I..."
It was needless to tell it — and yet it is better to tell the truth... But no one will believe it.
Who will believe it — that a beloved being like me should be tortured over such a trifle? People will think my aunt is about to face a penal colony.
I can no longer think about this subject without tears pouring from every corner of my eyes like a torrent.
[In the margin: my dear adored child, all this because you are ill and your nerves are at the end of their strength. (Mme Bashkirtseff's handwriting)] [Two pages torn out]
My aunt's departure, and I tell her things... She concedes I am right but cannot understand how it could be so, since people love me so much. Well...
Rodolphe Julian dines with us — only three of us, Maman keeping to her bed. I retell the story recounted to Villevieille, then we return to Bastien; I want things to be more cheerful.
This Julian takes extreme pleasure in saying dreadful things to me about myself.
Well, there is in me only one interesting aspect — the work. As for the rest! I am wicked, I am heartless. Nothing of the woman, nothing tender, nothing loving. Perfidies, perversities, a fantastic brain — but nothing but brain, no heart, only the head. A demoniac's head — and that is why the man of my dreams, the one I should want entirely, will not love me. He will be attracted but never completely.
Yes — he will give his deepest self to his cook.
"It is possible — but in short, you lack that feminine side, simple, appealing, calm — and you will always be alone on your height; for I do not contest the height..."
"Thank you — but that speech was already given by Claude Vignon to Mlle des Touches, and there is nothing in it that humiliates me."
"Agreed — only the great man you will notice, for he will be great..."
"Do you know any? I am speaking of a young Gambetta..."
"He is dead."
"Or a Bismarck."
"He is seventy."
"That is precisely what I think — for apart from that, who? To seize you entirely? I see very few."
"That is true."
"In... Claude and Mlle des Touches — but Mlle des Touches resembled a man; whereas you do not even resemble a man. You are a woman — and yet there is nothing."
"So he will not love me?" "No. For a man of that kind one would need either a beauty... one of those beauties that make the stars pale, whose taking a man's arm would make a million jealous of him. Or millions like Mme Mackay — sixty million in income, a fortune that nothing resists... Or else a talent — but a talent so incontestably great, at such a height, that it is truly difficult to attain..."
"But that last point is not desperate... Besides, you are giving me three infallible means of winning this man — why leave nothing to the chance of the heart?"
"The heart? Yours?" "His."
"But I do not see the man."
"That is true."
"Bastien is only a limited admiration — have you ever thought of him as a man?" "Upon my word, no — never." "And the lady — have you ever imagined Bastien at her feet?" "Oh! as to that, I assure you it is all the same to me. That is true."
I no longer remember all the flattering horrors he poured out — he gives himself over to it with abandon, laying out all manner of observations on my nature with delight, with relish.
"Well, M. Julian — if He prefers a turkey or the woman who roasts it, I shall console myself by inspiring feelings in lesser men."
"You will not want them!" "That is another question — but well, I shall marry a dummy and..."
"No — you will be virtuous."
"Not even that?" "Nothing — the head alone, and work."
And then we speak of Bastien; he says one cannot even in thought surpass him — cannot see beyond what he does. That is very true. Before everything one sees, one can think: I should like to go further, to glimpse the possibility of going further — but before a Bastien, no. One can compose differently, can see other subjects, each according to one's nature — but to surpass his execution even in dream, no; one cannot dream further. It is nature. And he is a God.

Tuesday, 8 April 1884

The weather is stormy and I am sketching an Andromeda!

Notes

In Balzac's novel Béatrix (1839), Claude Vignon analyses the distinguished writer Camille Maupin (Mlle des Touches) in terms strikingly similar to Julian's portrait of Marie: brilliant, formidable, but lacking the tender feminine qualities that inspire great love. Marie's allusion is pointed. ↩