...that I came across recently in his novel Beatrix, where he describes a jilted society husband (translation by Rosamond and Simon Harcourt-Smith):
He followed the same principle in everything; Nature had bestowed upon him a handy talent for imitation; but he was no monkey; his imitation was deadly serious. Thus it was that, though lacking any natural taste of his own, he was adept at adopting new fashions, and being the first to drop them. The unkind accused him of giving too much time to his dress and of wearing stays; nevertheless he was the perfect type of those characters who by dint of embracing the notions and the imbecilities of the commonality, give offence to no one, and[,] who moving always with the times[,] never seem to grow old. Such are the fine flower of mediocrity.
Just delicious, and, as my one (professor) friend who studies (modern) (Czech) literature has observed, probably so much better in the original (French).
I also texted a photo of this passage to my one (grad school) colleague who went into social work, and he immediately texted back --
Why is this novel describing [a young tenured professor at where we went]?
. . .
No comments:
Post a Comment