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Dearest Heart:
I am writing to you again because I am alone and because I find it embarrassing always to hold conversations with you in my head, without your knowing anything about them or hearing them or being able to answer me. Bad as your portrait is, it serves me very well and I can now understand how even the "Black Madonnas," the most vulgar portraits of the mother of God, find the most devoted admirers, and even more admirers than the good portraits. In any case, no such Black Madonna has been kissed more often, has been eyed and adored more often, than your photograph which is admittedly not black, but which is sour, and does not, by any means, reflect your dear, sweet, kissable, 'dolce' face. But I myself improve on the sun which is painted falsely, and I find that my eyes, so ruined by lamplight and tobacco, can still paint your face, not only in dreams, but even when I am awake. I have you before me in the flesh, I carry you on my hands and I kiss you from head to toe, and I fall on my knees before you and I groan, "Madam, I love you." And I really love you, more than the Moor of Venice ever loved...
There are indeed many women in the world and some of them are beautiful. But where shall I again find a face of which every lineament, every wrinkle even, reminds me of the greatest and sweetest memories of my life? Even my never ending pains, my irreplaceable losses I read in your sweet face, and I kiss until I have forgotten my pain when I kiss your sweet face…
Your _____
Hint: it was not originally written in English.
ReplyDeleteMy guess is based on a very little bit of info from the text. The reference to photography puts this in the mid-19th century, at the earliest. And Wikipedia tells me that the Black Madonna's reference could be to certain Catholic images of Mary, but I made a more immediate association with Eastern Orthodoxy. So, based on time, place, and the requisite amount of passion, I am going with Tolstoy.
ReplyDeleteWow. Good detective work. You are spot with mid-19th century. It was written on June 21, 1856.
ReplyDeleteI will give you two big hints: the writer was writing from Manchester, England, but would have been writing in German.
I meant to say you are spot-on, not you are spot.
ReplyDeleteAlright, then I guess it is either Engels or Marx. I was leaning toward Engels, because his father had the factory in Manchester, but then again his sweetheart was a local girl, so he probably would have wrote to her in English. Thus, I gotta say its Marx, writing to Jenny, maybe at a time when he was visiting Engels in Manchester.
ReplyDeleteGot it!
ReplyDeleteIt is Karl Marx writing to Jenny. I'm not sure if he was visiting Engels, but that seems like it would make a lot of sense.
In Terry Eagleton's book Marxism and Literary Criticism, which I finished recently, he contrasts Marxism's reputation for bland and facile approaches to art with the critical genius of Marx himself, who was apparently mad about literature and art of all kinds, and always approaches it with reverence and care. Apparently he could pen pretty stunning love letters, which, I think, says a lot.
Which reminds me: next summer be sure to catch the romantic comedy of the season, Marx in Love. Brought to you by the makers of Shakespeare in Love.
ReplyDelete