RACHILDE - Truculent autograph letter to Ernest Lajeunesse. 1908.

Marguerite Eymery , known as RACHILDE (1860-1953)

Autograph letter signed to the writer Ernest Lajeunesse.

Four pages in-8° on Mercure de France letterhead .

Paris, November 13, 1908. Autograph envelope.

Truculent and cynical letter from Rachilde.

“But yes, Mr. Lajeunesse, it is indeed to you that I am writing this long letter…. And this to try to prove to you that I did not deceive you ! – (it is certain that if you read this sentence out loud it will produce a strange effect, eh?). Listen to me and put aside your unbearable bullshit for a moment: I don't need you for an article at the Academy because I have every reason to believe that I shouldn't enter, I don't want to at all to your literary voice for the day, soon to come, when I will be given half a prize , and, more, or less , as you please, I don't even want your good companionship. However, I can't get over the idea of ​​having deceived ! It's stupid but it's tenacious like remorse would be if I were guilty. Mr. Lajeunesse, despite your rosiness, despite your brutal language and your essentially unpleasant expressions, you possess or, better, you are possessed by a marvelous artistic sensitivity and it is this marvelous sensitivity that I do not want to have betrayed. While we were reading the “ Vivante ” you were under the spell of this work, imperfect perhaps according to Mendès but certainly alive , vibrant with the only life possible in art, with the interior life. You perhaps esteemed me a little for having understood it. Afterwards you despised me, didn't you, because, like the others , I also had my candidate ? Go ahead and admit it? (…) I thought (like Mr. Gregh) I would vote for Jules Romain!!! Only, what I am telling you here you cannot, you should not even believe it…. Nothing can make you believe it and there are many of you who could not believe it… – (… Which indicates to me, in a very precise way, that a Dreyfus could well, after all, be innocent! ) – Comically, I do not want to convince Mr. Mendès, any more than my other friends who also voted in complete innocence…. What touches and torments me is that I keep the appearance of having stolen a minute of your trust , of having tarnished, for a second, the flash of ingenuity that shone in you. I don't care about anything because I don't need anything ... And I can't make fun of you for the sake of a conscientious scruple, it keeps me from sleeping, me, who is a "bit of a mess", according to your expression clean, sleeps so well. I lived with the “ Vivante ” for 15 days and I was happy. My little artistic household was as well-kept as anything! I lovingly dusted off the words and syllables that I had put on my shelf ... I had discovered the little pot full of ideals and it was boiling, boiling on my fire without spilling, without extinguishing it, with good smell of beyond ... And then Gregh arrives (whom I didn't know other than by name either) and exclaims: “it's a masterpiece! » It made me feel like someone wanted to eat my soup! For his part, he had felt, without calculation, without prior agreement, the good smell of beyond . Already, there was overflowing enthusiasm outside . Dirty story ! Do you understand? Now I'm flat. There are 20 of them who imagine that we were marching with a slogan... There is the sentence (fatal among all) from Payen's letter, the one where I said: "Mr. Mendès will know very well what is going on ! » in fact I can't convince anyone and I don't care... perfectly... But, there is the Lajeunesse from the corner who would say: it's beautiful, purring like a cat and the other Lajeunesse from the other corner who said: “ It’s beautiful , yes, but I was made to walk in the suit! " Damn ! – and Damn doesn’t capture all my thoughts. So, Mr. Lajeunesse, I would not want, for anything in the world, to have betrayed your trust. I myself am frightened of this machinery ... especially since I don't like mechanics enough to allow it to have a supernatural appearance, oh! No ! (…) You will look for the interest in my letter and you will soon discover one, very ridiculous or very appalling, depending on your mood. You will be wrong. – And yet, Lajeunesse, the only redemption of our literary life which is not “ alive ” in the true sense, the noble sense, would be to have, very humbly and very stupidly, such little remorse …. Especially when we are innocent. Goodbye, Sir, and my apologies for this unnecessary letter . Rachilde. »