Snow in New York/Il neige à New York!

It's snowing in New York! Il neige à New York! No school. L'école est fermée. You can spy me below on my crosscountry skis. La silhouette emmitouflée sur mes skis ci-dessous, c'est moi.

Le paradoxe de l'art de la mémoire

Après ce passage si intéressant à Pondichéry et dans les îles de l'Océan Indien, je retourne brièvement à "The Art of Memory" de Frances Yates. Mon intérêt pour ce livre ne vient pas de ce qu'il offre une technique de mémorisation utile. Je suis sûre que, avec tous les manuels de ci et de ça offerts dans les librairies, vous en trouveriez une pléthore dédiés à toutes sortes d'inventions mnémoniques. Ce qui a retenu mon attention dans ce livre, c'est la thèse paradoxale que Yates développe: cette technique de mémorisation inventée dans l'antiquité et modifiée au moyenâge aurait influencé le dévelopement de la culture occidentale. Au moyen âge, au lieu d'utiliser un temple comme locus où situer des objets de mémorisation, on choisit le paradis. Ou l'enfer. Cet espace fut divisé en cercle, en loges, dans le but d'offrir les loci nécessaires. Et Yates offre comme hypothèse que cette structure élaborée comme outil de mémorisation, est entrées dans l'imaginaire en transformant la conception du paradis et de l'enfer. Et par extension, l'habitude occidentale de tout fragmenter et classifier. Voir par exemple les fresques et tableaux du moyen âge (ci-dessus, Maesta, de Duccio). L'Enfer (et le Paradis) de Dante. Je me délecte du paradoxe qu'une technique servant à mémoriser des productions culturelles ait évolué en un instrument de transformation de l'imaginaire et de ses oeuvres.


Cet imaginaire aurait par la suite bifurqué dans une direction plus spécifique à partir du XVIème siècle. Giulio Camillo construisit, sans jamais le finir, un Théâtre de la Mémoire (représentation ci-dessus élaborée par Yates). Ce demi-cercle en bois était divisé en sept parties qui étaient divisées en sept, et encore en sept pour donner 343 compartiments. Les divisions étaient astrologiques et portaient des emblèmes et symboles. D'un seul coup d'oeil, on pouvait voir toute la science ... des alchimistes. Ainsi, après avoir développé l'imaginaire religieux au moyenâge, l'art de la mémoire devint ésotérique avec la Renaissance..

Contribué par - - Arabella Hutter

A Breton native experiences French Indian creolization

Dominique Aupiais (seventh from left) and his band Renesens at the Théâtre de St-Gilles, Reunion

It's a joy and an honour to continue our conversation around Glissant and creolization. While getting to know unique individuals across the oceans, from one continent to the other. How more could this exchange be an illustration of Glissant's ideas? You will find below a message from Dominique Aupiais in response to Animesh Rai. As well as a biography where he describes his creolized life, as well as the great loss which has turned his life around.

In response to Animesh Rai, a message from Dominique Aupiais:

"I was thrilled to learn in your interview on Reunionnais du Monde that Edouard Glissant was your mentor as I share his ideas about the cultural and social practices of creolization. I hope, though in a somewhat humbler manner, that my own research will also bring about a better understanding of peoples' imaginary in all its diversity, in particular, that of the Celts which is particularly fertile, and resembles in this respect that of Indians. This particular creolization is shaped by the unique encounter of people that goes well beyond the notion of a simple cultural exchange. In spite of the distress caused by servitude and indenture in the Indian Ocean Islands and the hegemonist attitude of some of the French in India and Madagascar, deeply meaningful bonds were nevertheless created between very different civilizations. Their shared imaginary, fantasies, beliefs and cultural practices became factors of understanding, of mutual acknowledgment and of a common struggle against the rule of oppressors. Similarly, creolization today still represents an asset for social equilibrium and a model to be replicated. I thank you for spreading by your contribution the creole humanist values while at the same time preserving your Indian roots of which you can be proud as I am of my Breton roots."

Dominique Aupiais

The unique trajectory of Dominique Aupiais:

Born May 13, 1954 in a small Breton village, near St-Nazaire. Emigrated to Reunion Island in 1974. Marries a Reunion Islands native in 1976. Three sons. Various employment in agricultural development, then teacher until 1990. Settles as a farmer on a small multi crop/breeding farm as well as bed and breakfast in Ste Suzanne. Still my main activity.

Primarily an artist, I have written seven books published by the Editions du Grand Océan in Reunion Islands. The first one, "Between Creole and Breton, these roots which free us" is an ideological (regionalism) autobiography. The next ones are collections of poems, short stories, and philosophical activist writings. In 1998 I started a band, RENESENS, of Creole-Celtic music. You'll find many sites which refer to it on the Internet.

In 2005, my youngest son Damien (23) dies in a crash in a taxi in Madagascar, as we were going to the Nosy Bé Festival. The loss was devastating. My friend Professor Sudel Fuma, who holds the UNESCO chair for the Indian Ocean, invited me to go back to my studies and finish Damien's curriculum. He was working on his Master at the University of Reunion. I threw myself into that new challenge, getting my Master with honours in 2007. My thesis's title was "The propositions of political status for the French colonies by R.F. Francis Aupiais, from 1925 to 1945". It was published under the title "Reverend Father Francis Aupais, a Breton humanist in favor of the recognition of Africa". My great uncle was amongst the first anthropologists of sub Sahara Africa. While the importance of his films about voodoo ceremonies in Dahomey (now Benin) is significant, he also fought for the acknowledgment of African cultures in Europe. I am now working on a PhD in Reunion, again under the guidance of Professor Fuma.

Contributed by Dominique Aupiais, published by Arabella Hutter

Un Breton à l'Ile de la Réunion et sa version de la créolisation, en réponse à Animesh Rai

Nous sommes ravis de continuer cette conversation autour de Glissant et de la créolisation. Tout en découvrant des personalités uniques à travers les continents, par-dessus les océans, comment cet échange pourrait-il être plus apte? Trouvez ci-dessous un message de Dominique Aupiais (troisième depuis la gauche avec son groupe Renesens au Théâtre de St-Gilles à la Réunion) en réponse à Animesh Rai, ainsi qu'une biographie dans laquelle Dominique Aupiais raconte sa vie créolisée, ainsi que la grande perte qu'il a subie et qui a redirigé le trajet de sa vie.

En réponse à Animesh Rai, voici un message de Dominique Aupiais: "En lisant votre interview sur Réunionniais du Monde, j'ai appris avec bonheur que votre directeur de recherche avait été Edouard Glissant dont je partage les idées concernant la pratique culturelle et sociale des créolisations. Comme lui, à mon petit niveau, je souhaite par ma recherche actuelle favoriser la connaissance de l’imaginaire des peuples dans leur diversité, notamment celui des peuples d'origine celtique dont l'imaginaire est particulièrement fécond, et se rapproche en cela de celui des Indiens. La créolitude est très marquée par cette rencontre particulière des hommes qui dépasse le simple contact culturel et a permis, malgré les affres de la servitude et de l'engagisme dans les Mascareignes, mais également malgré l'esprit hégémoniste de certains Français en Inde et à Madagascar, de créer des liens profonds entre des civilisations très différentes. L'imaginaire, le rêve, les croyances, les pratiques culturelles partagés furent facteurs de compréhension, de reconnaissance mutuelle, de luttes communes pour résister à la loi implacable du plus fort, du dominant. En cela, la créolisation reste encore aujourd'hui un atout pour l'équilibre social et un exemple à suivre. Je vous remercie de votre contribution à faire connaître cette valeur humaniste créole, tout en conservant vos racines indiennes dont vous pouvez être fier, tout comme je le suis de mes racines bretonnes. "

Dominique Aupiais

Le parcours unique et original de Dominique Aupiais:
Né dans un petit village de Bretagne, près de Saint Nazaire, le 13 mai 1954.
Immigré à La Réunion en 1974. Marié à une Réunionnaise en 1976. Trois garçons. Divers emplois au service du développement agricole puis enseignant jusqu'en 1990. Installation comme agriculteur sur une petite exploitation de polyculture élevage et quelques gîtes ruraux à Ste Suzanne. C'est toujours mon activité principale.
Artiste dans l'âme, j'ai écrit sept livres édités par les éditions du Grand Océan à l'île de La Réunion. Le premier, paru en Bretagne, "Entre Créole et Breton, ces racines qui nous libèrent" est autobiographique et idéologique (régionalisme). Les suivants sont des recueils de poésies, de nouvelles et de textes philosophiques engagés. J'ai aussi fondé en 1998 le groupe de musique créoloceltique RENESENS dont vous trouverez de nombreuses références sur Internet.
En 2005, je perds mon fils cadet Damien (23 ans) dans un accident de taxi à Madagascar, alors que nous nous rendions au festival de Nosy Bé. C'est un coup très dur. Mon ami Professeur Sudel Fuma, directeur de la chaire UNESCO de l'océan Indien, m'invite alors à reprendre mes études universitaires afin de poursuivre le cursus de Damien qui était inscrit en Master II à l'université de La Réunion. Je me lance dans ce nouveau challenge, obtient mon Master (mention TB) en 2007 avec un mémoire s'intitulant "Les propositions de statut politique des colonies françaises par le R. P. Francis Aupiais, de 1925 à 1945" et publié sous le titre "Le Révérend Père Francis Aupiais, un humaniste breton pour une reconnaissance africaine". Mon grand oncle est un des premiers ethnographes de l'Afrique noire. Il a réalisé des films de valeur reconnue sur les cérémonies vodoun au Dahomey (actuel Bénin) et s'est battu pour la reconnaissance en Europe des cultures africaines. Depuis, je poursuis un doctorat à La Réunion, toujours sous la direction du Professeur Fuma.

Contribué par Dominique Aupiais, publié par Arabella Hutter

Animesh Rai nous raconte la commémoration de la diaspora indienne

(Ci-dessus et ci-contre, peintures Rangoli, art féminin qui a pour but de célébrer des occasions spéciales)

Animesh Rai, depuis Pondichéry, nous livre avec sa perspicacité habituelle ses commentaires et impressions de la Conférence sur la Diaspora Indienne dans l'Océan Indien. Un texte très intéressant, dépeignant le sens fluctuant que peut prendre l'identité. Les questions d'identité et d'influences culturelles nous concernent tous dans le monde contemporain. D'autant plus à New York, avec ses millions d'immigrés, d'enfants et de petits-enfants d'immigrés qui ont tous des identités culturelles différentes. Dont moi. Et mes enfants.
______________________________________________






(ci-contre panel comprenant Dr. Rai, deuxième à partir de la gauche)

Animesh Rai:
"La conférence, très stimulante, a apporté de nouveaux éclaircissements sur le sujet. Bien qu'elle ait couvert surtout la diaspora indienne vers l'Ile Maurice, l'Afrique du Sud, la Guadeloupe et l'Ile de la Réunion, la délégation de cette dernière était particulièrement nombreuse. Par conséquent, les aspects culturels de la migration indienne vers cette île ont formé une part importante de la conférence, ma présentation inclue, puisqu'elle traitait du rapport à Pondichéry du point de vue de la créolisation.

Alors qu'elle présente diverses facettes, j'ai abordé la question de la migration pondichérienne à l'Ile de la Réunion (elle consiste principalement de travailleurs engagés qui émigrèrent à partir de la deuxième moitié du XIXème siècle, et de leurs descendants) en la comparant avec la population indienne des Caraïbes qui a aussi migré pendant cette période. J'ai observé que les Indiens des Caraïbes ont subi une érosion supérieure de leur culture dûe à la plus grande distance avec l'Inde, mais ce qui restait de leurs origines indiennes était peut-être plus "essentiel" que chez les émigrants dans les îles "avoisinantes" et les pays de l'Océan Indien.

J'ai aussi remarqué, sur l'Ile de la Réunion, l'apparition d'une prise de conscience, à savoir que les valeurs et traditions des descendants des travailleurs engagés (qui, en réalité, n'étaient pas traités tellement différemment des esclaves) qui avaient acquis un stigmate pesant au cours des ans, ont évolué maintenant vers une glorification des idéaux et de la culture traditionnels indiens, et du rôle primordial de l'Inde en tant que nation à égalité avec l'Occident (il semble que le cinéma de Bollywood ait stimulé significativement une curiosité nouvelle et un intérêt, particulièrement chez les jeunes Réunionnais, pour le style de vie indien, offrant aussi une synthèse de ce qui est traditionnel et ce qui est moderne en Inde de nos jours). De fait, on peut discerner, dans la population indienne de l'Ile de la Réunion, une tendance à nier des liens avec leurs parents et leurs grands-parents, pour leur préférer des liens plus explicites avec l'Inde de leurs ancêtres originels. Ceci contribue à expliquer leur retour au pays natal et peut-être la raison d'être de cette conférence."

Contribué par -- Animesh Rai, présenté par Arabella Hutter

Photos prêtées gracieusement par Debasis Nandy

Ci-dessous, stèle commémorative de la diaspora indienne, avec cérémonie de dédication et conférence

Straight from Pondicherry: Indian diaspora in the Indian Ocean

Animesh Rai, who was at the conference in Pondicherry, shares his views on the subject of the Indian diaspora in the Indian Ocean. (above: photos from the conference, including the installation of a commemorative stele to the displaced workers from India) A very interesting read. Questions of identity and cultural influences concern all of us nowadays. Certainly New York City, with its millions of immigrants and children of immigrants and grandchildren who all have various senses of identity. That includes me. And my children.

The conference was highly stimulating and illuminating. While it covered questions of the Indian diaspora principally in Mauritius, South Africa, Guadeloupe and Reunion Island, there was an exceptionally large delegation from the latter and, hence, cultural aspects of Indian migration to that island was an important element that was explored by the conference participants and my own paper addressed the Pondicherrian link to it in terms of creolization.

While there are multiple facets to it, I approached the question of Pondicherrian migration to Reunion Island (consisting principally of indentured laborers from Pondicherry who migrated starting in the the second half of the nineteenth century onwards and their descendants) by making a comparison with the Indian population in the Caribbean who also migrated around the same time. I expressed the observation that while the Caribbean Indians experienced a greater erosion of their culture due to the larger distance which they had travelled from India, what remained of their Indianness was perhaps more "essential" than the Indianness of the migrants in the "neighboring" islands and countries of the Indian Ocean.

I also remarked that on Reunion Island today, there seems to be a new awareness whereby the values and traditions of descendants of the indentured laborers (who, in reality, were treated not very differently from slaves) which had acquired a burdensome stigma over the years has now evolved towards a glorification of the ideals of Indian tradition and culture and the "greatness" of India as a nation on a par with the West (interestingly, it seems that the film industry of Bollywood has also played a significant role in fostering a greater curiosity and interest especially among the youth of Reunion Island about Indian lifestyles as well as in synthesizing what is traditional as well as what is modern in India today); hence, one can discern, among the emigrant Indian population on Reunion Island, a shying away from espousing overt links to their parents and grand-parents to more explicit ones to India of their original ancestors which also helps to explain their return to their native land and perhaps the 'raison d'être' of this conference.

Contributed by -- Animesh Rai

All photos courtesy of Debasis Nandy

Below, photo of a conference panel, including Animesh Rai, second from left

Nouveaux déroulements/New events in Pondicherry

Vous savez qu'il y a différents fils dans ce blog au fil de ma curiosité. En ce moment, l'Art de la Mémoire m'intrigue, j'y reviendrai. Et le fil de la diaspora indienne dans les Caraïbes apparaît, disparaît, et reparaît. Aujourd'hui, je vous fais part d'une invitation à un ensemble de cérémonies et d'événements culturels à Pondichéry qui commence aujourd'hui et qui commémore ces liens intercontinentaux et transocéaniques. Je n'y serais pas. Je le regrette beaucoup. Vous me raconterez. Ou du moins, je compte sur Animesh Rai!

There are several streaks in this blog, shaped by my curiosity. At the moment, I am intrigued by the Art of Memory, which will be featured again soon. Another streak, that of the Indian diaspora in the Caribbeans, comes and goes. It's back! I would like to share with you an invitation to ceremonies and cultural event about to take place in Pondicherry. They celebrate these lasting ties across the oceans, between continents. I'm going to miss it. Wish I could be there. You'll keep me posted. I'm hoping I can count on Animesh Rai for an interesting report!










Contribué par Arabella Hutter avec l'aide d'Animesh Rai

Glissant forgotten?

You did not think I had forgotten Glissant, did you?! Here's a good occasion to meander on the Glissant side.

You might remember I find reading his texts, or rather understanding their meaning, rather difficult. The language is poetic, dense, flowery. I have discovered the best approach to his thinking: hearing Glissant read his texts. Check out the extraordinary reading in the clip below (you need to fastforward the introduction which is not relevant). The voice and accent are uniquely poetic, communicating through our ears and our eyes the essence of the text.

Edouard Glissant reads his text.

Glissant oublié?

Un petit crochet du côté de Glissant, n'allez pas croire que je l'ai oublié si facilement. Et si Glissant vous intéresse tant soit peu, il vous faut absolument regarder/écouter ce clip - en ignorant l'introduction du début qui est sans rapport. J'ai déjà discuté dans ce blog du fait que ses textes ne sont pas faciles. Pas de tautologies immédiatement assimilables chez cet auteur. La langue est touffue, dense, en acrostiches et acrochecoeurs. Je découvre que la meilleure manière d'aborder ses écrits, c'est d'entendre Glissant les lire. Témoin ce passage extraordinaire, lu avec cette voix et cet accent uniquement poétiques.

Glissant nous lit un de ses textes.



Contributed by -- Arabella Hutter

Passion, eroticism, daring: O'Keefe

I had promised myself not to blog about the O'Keefe exhibit at the Whitney. But I just can't help it, I have to share. I'll keep it short. My kids learn at school that a text should have an introduction, a middle that goes into details and a conclusion. I'll limit myself to the middle bit with details.

One of the texts written on the wall of the exhibition (I should ask my grandmother, but I think there was a time where nothing was written on the walls of exhibitions? Anybody?) talked of Georgia O'Keefe paintings' "gently pulsating... " something something. Gently?! O'Keefe? Some of her work might be pulsating, but there is strictly nothing gentle about Georgia O'Keefe. Thank god. Her vibrant passion is everywhere.
Every time I see I read I feel women's passion which has been so under expressed over the centuries, I vibrate in unison: The Brontë Sisters, Frida Kahlo, Jane Campion, Agota Kristof. Their passion is different, I think, from the male version, though this is dangerous terrain that can slip quickly into stereotypes. A feminine passion with nothing gentle about it, but strength, transcendence, intensity. And for O'keefe's work, drama, and daring, present in so many of her paintings.

We are often served over and over the same type of paintings by one artist. For O'Keefe, the desert and the flowers. But there is so much more to her work, so many paintings which don't look like "an O'Keefe" where she tries, she experiments, she probes.
A company which produced fabric asked her to create paintings in the 1920s to advertise for their wares, something in the erotic vein of her abstract paintings. I was floored. Which company nowadays would ask an artist to create paintings with obvious references to the female sexual organs? Such a far cry to the exploitative approach of American Apparel's teen porn. It's discouraging sometimes to feel we're going backward in terms of feminine emancipation and of breaking away from stereotypes.

That's it. There. Full stop.

Contributed by - Arabella Hutter

Haiti all broken up

Sad about Haiti. As if they needed one more problem. Could something good come out of the catastrophe, a new sense of cohesion, in this country racked by violence and corruption? But probably not, say Schopenhauer, Maupassant and the pessimist in me.

Feels also weird, absurd to think we are so connected by the event right now and to the Haitians - and in a few months, a few years, it will be a vague memory. "Wasn't there a big earthquake in Haiti? A big earthquake in Turkey? A mudslide in Colombia? A collapsed bridge in India?" To many Haitians, it will not be a vague memory but family they've lost, a physical mutilation, a further impoverishment.

Contributed by - Arabella Hutter

Un truc infaillible de la Grèce ancienne

Vous aurez sûrement vu des livres qui promettent des techniques infaillibles: "Améliorez votre mémoire!" C'est en fait un art ancien. Quand les livres étaient rares, et le papier encore plus, il était avantageux de pouvoir mémoriser de longs textes ou discours. Un art mnémonique se développa en Grèce et à Rome, repris ensuite au Moyen Age et à la Renaissance (cf The Art of Memory, by Frances A. Yates). La tradition attribue la création de cet art au poète grec Simonides de Ceos. On raconte qu'il assistait à un banquet quand le toit s'est effondré. Il a survécu mais la plupart des autres convives furent tués. Les corps étaient si mutilés qu'il était impossible de les identifier. Simonides aida les parents des morts à les retrouver parce qu'il se rappelait parfaitement où chaque homme avait été installé. Ce qui lui aurait donné l'idée de "placer" des objets mnémoniques. Le principe est simple, on visite par l'esprit un lieu connu comme un temple ou sa cuisine, on crée une image pour chaque point que l'on souhaite se rappeler et on place cette image dans l'espace: dans le four, sur la planche à pain, suspendu au robinet. Des arguments si l'on est un politicien, des preuves si l'on est avocat, ou une liste pour les courses. Essayez! C'est assez surprenant. Et amusant de placer une ampoule en équilibre sur le dos d'une chaise ou une cartouche d'encre dans le four. Stimule l'imagination, d'une manière si marquante que nous en reparlerons.

One ancient Greek's trick to memorize. For free!

You've seen self help books promising "Improve your memory! This is actually a very old art. When books were rare, as was paper, it was an advantage to memorize. An art of memory was developed in Greece and in Rome, and later in Europe (described in The Art of Memory, by Frances A. Yates). The tradition attributes the creation of this art to Simonides of Ceos, a Greek poet. He is said to have been at a banquet when the roof collapsed. He escaped, but many died. The corpses were mangled beyond recognition. He helped their relatives identify the remains because he remembered where everyone was sitting. This would have given him the idea of "placing" memories.

Basically you visit in your mind a place you know, for example a temple or your kitchen, and you create an image of each thing you want to remember and place it in a specific area: on the stove, in the refrigerator's door, in the sink, hanging from the tap. It could be arguments if you were a politician, facts, if you were a litigator, or a shopping list. Try it! It's actually fun. Helpful also if you are going to the Prospect Range event in Brooklyn, January 30th, and need to memorize a poem.

I will return to the Art of Memory soon, because there is more to it than a simple trick.

Contributed by -- Arabella Hutter

Arshile Gorky and fauvism, cubism, surrealism, expressionism, etc.

Gorky is such a talented painter. His composition are stunning. His palette in mind blowing. And he never quite grew up to be his own painter. Going through the exhibition, you get the Cézanne period, the Fauvist period, the Picasso monumental mythological women period, then the Picasso cubist period - my favorite, while the painting of himself and his mother is incredibly powerful (The artist and his mother, below).































Above: Organization, below: Virginia landscape

Then you get the feeling he saw a Kandinsky while in his surrealist period, and then you wonder how much he was influenced by De Kooning, how much they built up their expressionist style together. Maybe that's the most personal of his style, but it didn't impress me most, the compositions didn't seem as assured as during his previous periods. It still gives the impression he never came to his own, as if he couldn't own painting.

I felt like saying, go for it, Gorky, you can do it. The last years of his life were marked by personal tragedy, as they say, which is unlikely to have helped him reach maturity. But altogether, through all the different periods, the work is really beautiful, with plenty of drama in them..

Contributed by - Arabella Hutter

Maupassant and Schopenhauer

Anybody who has read the often cruel, dire short stories by Maupassant will be easily convinced that he was an adept of Schopenhauer's pessimistic philosophy. Maupassant described people in France at the end of the 19th century as greedy, cowardly, corrupt or plain stupid. Referring to an earlier blog about pink vs black vision of life, I would like to remind you that Schopenhauer and Maupassant are right according to that theory. But am personally still looking to buy a pair of pink glasses if you can recommend a source. Interestingly the most pessimistic writers in the 20th century have to be the Italians: Vega, Pirandello as well as the film directors of Italian realism, Dino De Risi being the most ferocious. Their vision of humanity is even starker than that of Maupassant, without such redeeming figures as the prostitute in "Boule de Suif" offering to share her lunch with the bourgeois who are snobbing her on a stagecoach trip.

Above: The
Innocents,
by Honoré Daumier

On the
right:
Being
tired, by Walter
Gramatté.

Here's the end of one of Maupassant's short story, should we say, sardonic?

"Schopenhauer had just died, and it was arranged that we should watch, in turn, two by two, till morning.He was lying in a large apartment, very simple, vast and gloomy. Two wax candles were burning on the stand by the bedside. It was midnight when I went on watch, together with one of our comrades. The two friends whom we replaced had left the apartment, and we came and sat down at the foot of the bed.

The face was not changed. It was laughing. That pucker which we knew so well lingered still around the corners of the lips, and it seemed to us that he was about to open his eyes, to move and to speak. His thought, or rather his thoughts, enveloped us. We felt ourselves more than ever in the atmosphere of his genius, absorbed, possessed by him. His domination seemed to be even more sovereign now that he was dead. A feeling of mystery was blended with the power of this incomparable spirit.

The bodies of these men disappear, but they themselves remain; and in the night which follows the cessation of their heart's pulsation I assure you, monsieur, they are terrifying.

And in hushed tones we talked about him, recalling to mind certain sayings, certain formulas of his, those startling maxims which are like jets of flame flung, in a few words, into the darkness of the Unknown Life.

"'It seems to me that he is going to speak,' said my comrade. And we stared with uneasiness bordering on fear at the motionless face, with its eternal laugh. Gradually, we began to feel ill at ease, oppressed, on the point of fainting. I faltered:

"I don't know what is the matter with me, but, I assure you I am not well.'

And at that moment we noticed that there was an unpleasant odor from the corpse. Then, my comrade suggested that we should go into the adjoining room, and leave the door open; and I assented to his proposal. I took one of the wax candles which burned on the stand, and I left the second behind. Then we went and sat down at the other end of the adjoining apartment, in such a position that we could see the bed and the corpse, clearly revealed by the light.

But he still held possession of us. One would have said that his immaterial essence, liberated, free, all-powerful and dominating, was flitting around us. And sometimes, too, the dreadful odor of the decomposed body came toward us and penetrated us, sickening and indefinable. Suddenly a shiver passed through our bones: a sound, a slight sound, came from the death-chamber. Immediately we fixed our glances on him, and we saw, yes, monsieur, we saw distinctly, both of us, something white pass across the bed, fall on the carpet, and vanish under an armchair. We were on our feet before we had time to think of anything, distracted by stupefying terror, ready to run away. Then we stared at each other. We were horribly pale. Our hearts throbbed fiercely enough to have raised the clothing on our chests. I was the first to speak:

"'Did you see?'

"'Yes, I saw.'

"'Can it be that he is not dead?'

"'Why, when the body is putrefying?'

"'What are we to do?'

"My companion said in a hesitating tone:

"'We must go and look.'

I took our wax candle and entered first, glancing into all the dark corners in the large apartment. Nothing was moving now, and I approached the bed. But I stood transfixed with stupor and fright: Schopenhauer was no longer laughing! He was grinning in a horrible fashion, with his lips pressed together and deep hollows in his cheeks. I stammered out:

"'He is not dead!'

But the terrible odor ascended to my nose and stifled me. And I no longer moved, but kept staring fixedly at him, terrified as if in the presence of an apparition. Then my companion, having seized the other wax candle, bent forward. Next, he touched my arm without uttering a word. I followed his glance, and saw on the ground, under the armchair by the side of the bed, standing out white on the dark carpet, and open as if to bite, Schopenhauer's set of artificial teeth.

The work of decomposition, loosening the jaws, had made it jump out of the mouth.

From "Beside Schopenhauer's Corpse"

contributed by -- Arabella Hutter