30 April 2014 Binary Star System Èlisabeth de gramont and natalie Barney 115 years ago today in Paris, two remarkable women were rummaging through their wardrobes looking for something to wear on their first date. Both were in the avant-garde. Radical elites. First-born daughters. Élisabeth de Gramont, the married mother of two daughters of
April is said to be the cruellest month. And so it was for Renée Vivien in 1909.
Years of Plenty Memoirist Élisabeth de Gramont, born this day in 1875 April 23 is the birthday Élisabeth de Gramont was forced to share with William Shakespeare, and as far as I can tell, she never held it against him. Today is Shakespeare’s 450th birthday, Lily’s 139th. What’s an age gap of 311 years to
NOBLE SPIRITS Cognac’s Golden Ratio April 23 is the birthday of Epicurean author, sculptor and political activist Elisabeth de Gramont (1875-1954), who made the first French translations of poems by John Keats. Somebody once asked Lily de Gramont how to translate literature. She said that the artistry’s in imagining how the author would express herself,
Screenwriter’s Notebook Garbo Slept Here I was working in Los Angeles last week, which played havoc with my writing routine. To clear my mind and reset, it helps to lose track of time. Back when Paris was a woman, Natalie Barney reported “getting more out of life than it perhaps contained.” And that’s just what
Pour ou Contre (For or Against)Suzanne Stroh: Jean-Loup, you were born in France, raised in Paris, escaped Nazi occupation through north Africa, grew up in New York, came of age at the U.S. Naval Academy and spent much of your career in a submarine before turning to editing and publishing. How many languages did you pick up along the way?
Jean-Loup Combemale: I think the operative words here are “pick up.” I was five, six, seven years old when we were scurrying around leaving France, so I got dipped into languages and pulled right back out. What it did was, even then, show me how much fun it was to talk and connect to people–that’s a great gift to give a child. I learned Italian and French from my nanny and my mother; basic German from soldiers in the streets of Paris, Arabic from street kids in Oran and Casablanca. When our Portuguese ship stopped in Bermuda on the way to the U.S. I learned my first words of English–“Thank you.” And when we got to the U.S. I learned English and promptly forgot everything except my French, which we spoke at home.
My new story set in London and Chicago is inspired by efforts to end inheritance inequality in Britain.
April 30, 1909: a daughter of France was coming over. Miss Barney gathered the plover’s eggs and put the Château Yquem on ice, betting on another comet year.
April 23 is the birthday of the Modernist author, sculptor and music patron Élisabeth de Gramont. More than 500 passionate letters exist between Élisabeth and her lifelong lover and “eternal mate,” Natalie Barney. Nobody’s read them in English. Till now.
