Paris was a woman : portraits from the Left Bank by Weiss Andrea

Author:Weiss, Andrea [Weiss, Andrea]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Women intellectuals
ISBN: 161902179X
Publisher: San Francisco : HarperSanFrancisco
Published: 1995-05-27T19:00:00+00:00

AMAZONES ET SIRENES

There is no question that Natalie's political views were indefensible.She was always muddled and misguided when it came to politics, but clearas a bell when it came to friendships and personal loyalties. Her anti-semitic views were abstractions, incongruous with her feelings aboutpeople she knew (including her beloved mother, who was half-Jewish).From Italy she sent poems and letters to Gertrude and Alice, signing them'with love to you both, from both [her and Romaine], your not unhappyexile (as the verses enclosed prove!)'.

Many decades later, when Alice died, she was buried in the samegrave Gertrude occupied in Pere Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Romaine andNatalie found this so romantic that they devised a similar joint-burial plan -but it never came to pass since Natalie, whose art was love, had one moremasterpiece in mind. She fell in love with lanice Lahovary, wife of adiplomat, who left her husband and two sons in order to care for Natalie inher old age.-The novelist and journalist Germaine Beaumont found it'marvellous, not to find love at 88, but to find a co-respondent'.Romaine,who nad put up with Natalie's infidelity for over fifty years, was lessenthusiastic. Initially she tolerated the arrangement, and even visitedNatalie at Janice Lahovary's home (where a lift was installed for Nataliewho could no long climb stairs). But one day she finally had had enough.

Romaine told Berthe, who was still Natalie's housekeeper andconfidante: 'It was all over from the minute that creature managed to slipbetween us. I thought 1 was going to end my days with Miss Barney. Nowit's Impossible. Let her leave me in peace!' Both women were in theirnineties when Romaine broke off the relationship, refused Natalie'sdesperate apologies and love letters, and died alone in the south of France.

Natalie's tireless heart, which had long ruled her body, mind, andsoul, was finally broken. She might otherwise have lived forever, but diedsoon after her beloved Romaine.

LEFT Natalie Barney in middle age, still the Amazon.

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