The Thurber Letters, page 4
This is as far as I have developed the wonderful thing yet, but in the next chapter, the royal palace is besieged by the noted bandit leader, Purple Jake and his wild band. Purple Jake’s lieutenant is the profligate and evil Earl of Pongee and Madras, a former court favorite, whose banishment had taken place 6 months before at the behest of the queen who complained to the King that the Earl had up and hit her with a croquet ball, during what she supposed was going to be a friendly game in the Palace Gardens. The Earl, eager for revenge, eggs Purple Jake to the attack on the palace, telling him he knows the secret panel where the royal jewels are concealed.
There is a wonderful heroine, and of course a wonderful hero, yet to appear, the latter none other than the Wine-Seller—altho’ events finally show he really isn’t a mere wine-seller at all. You can see at a glance that I have written the Great Armenian novel. But enough of the plot has been told to put you in a position to steal the thing and win an unjust fame, so I will try to get your mind off of it.
There is one sure way: only girls—nothing else.... So like the persistent spider I fashioned an October world for the Eva and me. October burning on the far hills at daybreak, October flaming all the ways at noon, October smoldering in the purple vales at twilight, October ashes red beneath the moon at night. Blooey, is the song of the Brick as it nears my frail October world, faster and faster.*
* Thurber alludes to a current comic strip, “Krazy Kat,” which featured a cat continually being hit by a brick, thrown by a mouse.
But one of these worlds will outlive the strong arm of old Percy Mike Fate, and one of these days, one of these days!
I see her mostly in blue, dark blue, with just the right dash of real red…. I have always had an almost irresistible desire to hug every pretty girl who has dark brown hair and wears one of those neat dark, navy blue suits. I’m afraid in this case it will really be irresistible. I imagine I will have to do something crazy and sudden, anyway, for time will be brief, too damn brief. Boy, can’t you see the lil golden shield, the greatest pin in the world, gleaming richly and austerely and yet debonairly from the folds of that Blue?...
I have received the news of the death of my grandfather—mother’s father—Tuesday. The end was long expected so comes as no shock. He has lingered near death for over two years.
My dad also enclosed a cut of the dear Minnette from the Ohio State Journal, which says she received her call for Red Cross training last week and leaves this week. It fails to say for what place she leaves. The letters of Minnette and I have dragged horribly—as to oftenness—in the last month—but when we do write we are as deep friends as ever—much more than friends. My folks are very strong for her, indeed I received some weeks ago a very remarkable letter from my father full of mellow advice, including the injunction that I do or say nothing to jeopardize my relations with Minnette and be not too sure of the felicity of things Eva. Letters forwarded via home drew from me a partial statement of feminine entanglements. The folks of course remember very clearly my terrible schooldays case on Eva, and it seems the fact that Eva’s past and present are more uncertain than Minnette’s calls up maternal fears. I have reassured home of my luck in handling the situation so far....
Heavens alone, I believe, know when, if ever, I shall leave here. I am totally resigned to permanency. Eventually, is all I can say. It may be months. I have no hunch now that it will be before November. And I am even building a December world for two already. The cold information via Journal type about Minnette’s going and the lack of word from her, altho’ she knew it 10 days ago, not only hurts a bit, but makes me realize I like Minnette. So we’ll close with her name instead of Eva’s. Minnette...
Immutably Thyne,
Jim
James G. Thurber, 5 Rue de Chaillot,
Paris, France
American Embassy, Paris
March 20, 1919
My dear old Nugey:
... March 20th probably means nothing in your young life. But to a true Parisian it is a date. The famous maronnier blooms in the Jardin Tuilleries today. That is, it is scheduled to. My guide book fails to state how many years in succession it has kept its Rendezvous with Life—but it says it’s famous—so I guess it blooms today all right. If it failed to bloom once, even once, on the 20th of March—it would surely become infamous. Such things are portentous to the emotional French nature. (Right here I should stop for half-a day). However, I’ll give her a little more gas, and stick awhile.
A maronnier is a chestnut tree. The reason I have devoted so many pages of this diary, so many feuilles roses, to this particular chestnut tree—is because the thing appeals to me. Imagine running across such a thing in a guide book, all stiff and starched in statistics. The Maronnier of the Tuilleries Garden that blooms on the 20th of every March belongs in a sheaf of songs.
(Editor’s note: the famous marronier should not be confused with the ancient mariner.) Ils ne sont pas le meme chose.
My pension rears its square bulk on the Avenue President Wilson, formerly the Avenue Trocadero (important point). I have read in Edith Wharton and 10 or 12 others of pale poets, of little seamstresses, of American students living in pensions in Paris. There was always a bit of fascination in the thing. And now I have been living in one for four months. Some of the pensions of Paris are famous—Gambetta and Francois Coppu and a host of other noted Francaises lived chez les pensions. My pension bids fair never to turn me out famous. My pension is a mess—I think all Paris pensions are. Of course there is a certain charm in the dark, old stairways—the high French windows. But gradually inconvenience and discomfort overcast fascination and charm. And there is no charm—even in the first week—of carrots 3 times le semaine. Nor in the utter absence of running water.
Half a square back of my pension curves the Seine. I can stand on the little iron balcony of my room and see, through a wide screen of tall old sycamores lining the parapet, fast little tugs steaming upstream, heavy, dirty barges crawling by. Just over the river, the Eiffel tower—like a giants’ toy, plunges the tiny French tri-color on its peak almost into the clouds. Across streams in the other direction—the vast esplanade of the Invalides and the dome that rises above the porphyry vault that encloses the dust of Napoleon, sleeping, as he asked to sleep, “on the banks of the Seine, in the midst of the French people he loved so well.”
There is a little cafe on a corner of the quai—”Aux Trois Maronniers”—and three craggy, little chestnut trees stand in its impossibly narrow little terrace.
Five minutes walk up Avenue Marceau just opposite, to the Arch of Triumph. And from it, the amazing perspective down the famous Avenue des Champs Elysees to where the obelisk from Thebes points the center of the Place de la Concorde. Stand on one of the little stone rectangles—islands of safety in a swirling sea of traffic—that mark official crossings—(it costs you beaucoup francs if you are injured while crossing the Boulevards at random places). Standing there you are in the direct “milieu” of the most cosmopolitan city in the world. Officers and soldiers of 10 nations weave lines of many colors in the moving pattern of the crowds on either side. The sky—blue and brilliant red of French officers’ uniforms—or the dark, close-fitting blue of the Blue-Devils—the sedate-cane-swinging English—immaculate, posers— figures in a revere ensemble—the hideous yellowish-green cloaks and red fezes of bedraggled Algerians, puffing forlorn cigarettes—the stocky, colorless Polonaise, distinguished by their square, four-cornered hats—the graceful Italians with their high round caps—their superfluity of cape, flung with studied carelessness about them—debonair, attractive chaps, part cavalier-part troubador, with the music of Italy in their usually fine eyes.
March 22
... On re-reading the pages of yesterday I see the necessity of some footnotes....
... Perhaps you wonder why I cling to a pension, and infest not one of the famous hotels—or rather live chez la chambre and chercher toujours some of the even more famous restaurants. “C’est la paix”. (pronounced “pay”) However, do not surmise that I have not enjoyed the cuisine, wines and filets of the more noted restaurants which education I am still pursuing—when francs accumulate a bit. Living is steep in Paris. La vie chere is a topic of moment. So that even my millionaire’s ducat supply of $2250 (God’s coin) or about 1000 francs per month (French money) doesn’t call for the erection of a lead-walled compartment in my room in which to shovel lucre from a mobile derrick. To the noted Voisin’s I have been twice (once with a pretty, clever little Red Cross Girl from Columbus, Ohio),—and to the Cafe de la Paix, the Cafe de Paris (of Castle’s fame) quite now and then. But a history of cafe nights would fill a monograph all by itself.
I sure do pine sometimes for the Nugent’s engaging and inspiring presence here amongst all that is Paris. What I lack more than anything else here is a kindred spirit—it’s a lack that detracts from the enjoyment and appreciation of almost everything. Still I can’t kick too much—for I had a few days with Roland Hunter—a few more with Carson Blair—and just a week or so ago 3 days with one of my friends of grammar school days, Ed Morris, 1st lieutenant and erstwhile Chi Phi. I wrote you about the visits of Roland and Carson, I believe, altho’ it’s impossible to remember very much for certain out of the endless stuff I have written home—and to 10th Ave., Zanesville and other places. One could devote every hour of every day to letters—and then get occasionally inquiries from neglected aunts or 3d cousins.
I wander up Montmarte way quite frequently. Montmarte, the once famous, then notorious—now rather colorless and hectic, but Montmarte of a thousand legends and a hundred noted cabarets and cafes that contain them. They sing pretty French ballads in The Black Cat and serve vile beer. The April Moon has a catchy, tuneful revue. But most of the others haven’t yet revived from the war. The Moulin Rouge is battered and rusty. I think it’s closed for good. I wanted a night at the Moulin Rouge. And the Dead Rat is sure life-less. Not a creature is stirring—not even—however—
Notre-Dame always lures. I have been there five or six times—once with each of my Ohio State visitors, of course. Notre Dame is the first pilgrimage of all sightseers. Seemingly nine tenths of these sight-seers are Americans—the boys in the khaki and the gobs. You see them everywhere—they throng the boulevards—they crowd the restaurants—you can find them down the remotest rues—in the most secluded squares. Rushing about trying to cover the itinerary of “Paris in a Week” in their 3 day leaves—trailing guide books and maps, besieged by the army of post-card and souvenir hawkers. The “Y” conducts countless tours for them. I have never been in Notre Dame that the “gothic coolness” of it was not warmed by the speeding platoon of Americans in the wake of their Y guide who trolls an endless chant of dates, figures and statistics. And so it is in the Pantheon, the Tuilleries and Luxembourg gardens—at the Arch, the Madeleine—everywhere. An American army of occupation has certainly taken Paris. And they fling the festive franc with a gay abandon that startles the Parisian, and warms the cockles of the bourgeois shop keeper’s heart—and causes his palm to itch—and his prices to mount....
* * *
... I went to Reims by way of Chateau Thierry. I didn’t stop off at this monument to America, because I intend to make a special trip up there soon. In Reims I saw the cathedral first of course—and took a walk about the city— rather the shambles that were a city. And then out to the trenches. I didn’t reach the Hindenburg line, but I clambered into and out of trenches about 2 miles from the city which the Germans evidently took from the French. I ruined one shoe and one trouser leg scaling, descending, hurdling and floundering over and thru the world’s greatest supply of barbed wire. And incidentally set off a hand-grenade, evidently attached to a strand of wire to form the fiendish hun contraption known as a “booby trap”. Fortunately I didn’t step on the primed wire very close to the grenade—it went blooey about 50 feet away. There wasn’t much of an explosion—a sharp report like a pistol—and no pieces of the stuff fell very near. I think the thing was sort o’ dead from the constant rain and mud. But I’m admitting herewith quite frankly that I was scared bad. With the guerre fini there is no glory in becoming mort pour la patrie on some dead, abandoned battlefield. Furthermore, I wasn’t in the least worked up that moment into a careless over-the-top spirit of go-get-’em.
March 29
Another one of those weeks that will slip away with nothing much accomplished, lots of resolutions made, and 3 million more letters owed.
We’ll have to abandon the Reims narration for a time. Day before yesterday I got a most wonderful letter from Zanesville, enclosing the most wonderful picture you ever saw—well, at least, that I ever saw....
However, there is no use to rave.... I can only say that June will probably see me in Zanesville. I can’t, I believe, possibly stay here any longer than the last of May. As much as I would like to, in many ways. It’s a wonderful place to study in. And you don’t have to go to the Sorbonne or the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Every one is a school. Every museum a college—and the whole of Paris a vast university of Art, Literature and Music. So that it is worth anyone’s while to dally here for years. Paris is a seminar, a post-graduate course in Everything.
But, Nugget, old guy—the thing is simply this: All such stuff is dead compared to her picture. Paris is a swirl of dead leaves and she is a garden new in bloom. Paris is a comical laugh, she is the music of angels’ songs. Paris is a steady gaze of sagacity—a penetrating look of analysis—her eyes are the eyes of youth. Hell, that’s idiotic! Anyway, Paris is a cloyed Roue, charming, learned, gifted, if you will, but a Roue whose youth is dead at the roots. Paris is also a Pierrot—and that means youth and gaiety and love. But the Pierrot of Paris is a bit too sophisticated, a bit too satiated with life—the world is too much with him. Call Paris wonderful, amazing, charming—the capital of the world, the center of Art. It is all that. But it’s too wise, too old in many ways. And even in its youthful, reckless moods, it lacks the clear vision, the true joy of love and life that is American. That’s the big failure of Paris. Paris doesn’t whistle ragtime, Paris doesn’t walk with her eyes in the sky—and a dreaming gaze of hope and faith. Worst of all, Paris has a horrible sense of values. She is pagan—with a pagan love of beauty—but with a pagan “love” of women also. I have been calling Paris “her”. It should be “him”. French morals—rather Parisian morals—are to Americans impossible. In a recent Collier’s, Mark Sullivan, in an article opposing entangling ourselves with Europe, and advocating the sending of the boys back home at once, says, “send them back before they acquire the European attitude toward women”. Thank the Lord, I can say with an absolute conviction that it is true—the European attitude towards women will never be acquired by Americans. There are sporadic cases of the acquisition—no doubt about that. There are those who compare French and American girls. There has been a voice or two suggesting that American girls are too reserved—have a little too much of the Puritanical in them. But these are scattering voices in a vast multitude.
The A.E.F. in France has learned to respect American womanhood, to revere—to worship the clean, fine morals of American womanhood, to idealize American girls—and to worship them with a fire that burns brighter and steadier than ever before—and that will never die down. Things they have seen and heard and felt here, these American boys, have not added fuel to any base fire, or kindled any new and regrettable flame. And they never will.
Boy, it makes you love America and Americans, to see them here, in immediate contrast to 13 other nations’ people! They are younger, they are happier, they are more hopeful, more confident, more full of the keen zest of life, than any others. And best of all, they are cleaner, finer than any others. Of course many of them have slipped. And there is much woe in many a sector. Physical. Morally and mentally, still American and always will be.
* * *
... Please write a hell of a lot, old guy, and tell me everything. You know what I want. Things Ohio State and Phi Psi. Who’s back in school—especially who’s back at the house? Give my deepest and best to ‘em all. Next to about one or two other calls—the call of Phi Psi and the Lads is sure most luring....
I am almost sure I will go back to State next fall. I want to take Cooper’s drama course—and a few others I have decided on....
Let me hear all about yourself and the One.
Minnette writes she let you read a typewritten letter I sent her.
(Please observe following line closely.) I still am highly in favor of Minnette. She regrets that a Chi Phi dance prevented her from holding a dope-session with you. I understand you and she are taking Joey’s novel course. Minnette doesn’t say much about Joey [Professor Joseph Taylor]. Doesn’t she like his line? That wouldn’t do at all. You know my sentiments along the Joey line.
Need I point out to you how utterly superfluous it would be for you to let Minnette read this letter—unless of course it were merely the lines referring to Zanesville.
One thing is sure sure. I gotta get back pretty soon, and make a few decisions, or I’ll be quite thoroly S.O.L.
Meet me in June Somewhere.
For always,
Jim
