Read Online Against Nature by Joris-Karl Huysmans - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Joris-Karl Huysmans
Ads: Link
flickered in the chandeliers.
While a hidden orchestra played funeral marches, the guests were waited on by naked negresses wearing only slippers and stockings in cloth of silver embroidered with tears.
Dining off black-bordered plates, the company had enjoyed turtle soup, Russian rye bread, ripe olives from Turkey, caviare, mullet botargo, black puddings from Frankfurt, game served in sauces the colour of liquorice and boot-polish, truffle jellies, chocolate creams, plum-puddings, nectarines, pears in grape-juice syrup, mulberries and black heart-cherries. From dark-tinted glasses they had drunk the wines of Limagne and Roussillon, of Tenedos, Valdepeñ as and Oporto. And after coffee and walnut cordial, they had rounded off the evening with kvass, porter and stout.
On the invitations, which were similar to those sent out before more solemn obsequies, this dinner was described as a funeral banquet in memory of the hostâs virility, lately but only temporarily deceased. 3
In time, however, his taste for these extravagant caprices, of which he had once been so proud, died a natural death; andnowadays he shrugged his shoulders in contempt whenever he recalled the puerile displays of eccentricity he had given, the extraordinary clothes he had worn and the bizarre furnishing schemes he had devised. The new home he was now planning, this time for his own personal pleasure and not to astonish other people, was going to be comfortably though curiously appointed: a peaceful and unique abode specially designed to meet the needs of the solitary life he intended to lead.
When the architect had fitted up the house at Fontenay in accordance with his wishes, and when all that remained was to settle the question of furniture and decoration, Des Esseintes once again gave long and careful consideration to the entire series of available colours.
What he wanted was colours which would appear stronger and clearer in artificial light. 4 He did not particularly care if they looked crude or insipid in daylight, for he lived most of his life at night, holding that night afforded greater intimacy and isolation and that the mind was truly roused and stimulated only by awareness of the dark; moreover he derived a peculiar pleasure from being in a well-lighted room when all the surrounding houses were wrapped in sleep and darkness, a sort of enjoyment in which vanity may have played some small part, a very special feeling of satisfaction familiar to those who sometimes work late at night and draw aside the curtains to find that all around them the world is dark, silent and dead.
Slowly, one by one, he went through the various colours.
Blue, he remembered, takes on an artificial green tint by candlelight; if a dark blue like indigo or cobalt, it becomes black; if pale, it turns to grey; and if soft and true like turquoise, it goes dull and cold. There could, therefore, be no question of making it the keynote of a room, though it might be used to help out another colour.
On the other hand, under the same conditions the iron greys grow sullen and heavy; the pearl greys lose their blue sheen and are metamorphosed into a dirty white; the browns become cold and sleepy; and as for the dark greens such as emperor green and myrtle green, they react like the dark blues and turn quite black. Only the pale greens remained â peacock green, forinstance, or the cinnabar and lacquer greens â but then artificial light kills the blue in them and leaves only the yellow, which for its part lacks clarity and consistency.
Nor was there any point in thinking of such delicate tints as salmon pink, maize and rose; for their very effeminacy would run counter to his ideas of complete isolation. Nor again was it any use considering the various shades of purple, which with one exception lose their lustre in candlelight. That exception is plum, which somehow survives intact, but then what a muddy reddish hue it is, unpleasantly like lees of wine! Besides, it
While a hidden orchestra played funeral marches, the guests were waited on by naked negresses wearing only slippers and stockings in cloth of silver embroidered with tears.
Dining off black-bordered plates, the company had enjoyed turtle soup, Russian rye bread, ripe olives from Turkey, caviare, mullet botargo, black puddings from Frankfurt, game served in sauces the colour of liquorice and boot-polish, truffle jellies, chocolate creams, plum-puddings, nectarines, pears in grape-juice syrup, mulberries and black heart-cherries. From dark-tinted glasses they had drunk the wines of Limagne and Roussillon, of Tenedos, Valdepeñ as and Oporto. And after coffee and walnut cordial, they had rounded off the evening with kvass, porter and stout.
On the invitations, which were similar to those sent out before more solemn obsequies, this dinner was described as a funeral banquet in memory of the hostâs virility, lately but only temporarily deceased. 3
In time, however, his taste for these extravagant caprices, of which he had once been so proud, died a natural death; andnowadays he shrugged his shoulders in contempt whenever he recalled the puerile displays of eccentricity he had given, the extraordinary clothes he had worn and the bizarre furnishing schemes he had devised. The new home he was now planning, this time for his own personal pleasure and not to astonish other people, was going to be comfortably though curiously appointed: a peaceful and unique abode specially designed to meet the needs of the solitary life he intended to lead.
When the architect had fitted up the house at Fontenay in accordance with his wishes, and when all that remained was to settle the question of furniture and decoration, Des Esseintes once again gave long and careful consideration to the entire series of available colours.
What he wanted was colours which would appear stronger and clearer in artificial light. 4 He did not particularly care if they looked crude or insipid in daylight, for he lived most of his life at night, holding that night afforded greater intimacy and isolation and that the mind was truly roused and stimulated only by awareness of the dark; moreover he derived a peculiar pleasure from being in a well-lighted room when all the surrounding houses were wrapped in sleep and darkness, a sort of enjoyment in which vanity may have played some small part, a very special feeling of satisfaction familiar to those who sometimes work late at night and draw aside the curtains to find that all around them the world is dark, silent and dead.
Slowly, one by one, he went through the various colours.
Blue, he remembered, takes on an artificial green tint by candlelight; if a dark blue like indigo or cobalt, it becomes black; if pale, it turns to grey; and if soft and true like turquoise, it goes dull and cold. There could, therefore, be no question of making it the keynote of a room, though it might be used to help out another colour.
On the other hand, under the same conditions the iron greys grow sullen and heavy; the pearl greys lose their blue sheen and are metamorphosed into a dirty white; the browns become cold and sleepy; and as for the dark greens such as emperor green and myrtle green, they react like the dark blues and turn quite black. Only the pale greens remained â peacock green, forinstance, or the cinnabar and lacquer greens â but then artificial light kills the blue in them and leaves only the yellow, which for its part lacks clarity and consistency.
Nor was there any point in thinking of such delicate tints as salmon pink, maize and rose; for their very effeminacy would run counter to his ideas of complete isolation. Nor again was it any use considering the various shades of purple, which with one exception lose their lustre in candlelight. That exception is plum, which somehow survives intact, but then what a muddy reddish hue it is, unpleasantly like lees of wine! Besides, it
Similar Books
