New-York tribune., 1922-07-09

IVA FTencHWoman OF letters who
" published, so far as I am
II III able to learn, volume of
plays and q life of Saint
Just. follower of Robespierre. She
was born in 1875, died in 1918 and was
deaf the greater part of her life. A
number of friends have written re-
Gently OF her engaging, even magnetic,
personality. In her tenth year she
commenced diary, which she contin-
ued until she was fourteen. Follow
ing lapse of three years of which she
made no record, the diary is resumed,
and entries are made at spasmodic in
tervals until her death. This journal
Is now published by Cres In two small
volumes which, consecutively numbered.
cover scarcely more than 500 pages.
How shall begin to write about the
journal? Marie Leneru is one of the
nost complicated personalities ] have
9Fer encountered. In his introduction
Francois de Curel compares her with
Marie Bashkirtseff, a parallel "qui
saute aux yeux,' but they are far from
being alike. The Russian child was a
prodigy IN search of glory; the French
woman is q frustrate erudite. The
first had genius; the second was has
bieu Of uncommon intelligence. In
deed, in her nineteenth year Marie
Leneru recognized the fact. "Study!'
she wrote, without it 1 should he a
mediocrity, and to this will never re-
sign myself" If the two diarists have
characteristic in common, it is their
| desire to live. 81 love life" writes the
French girl, II love life prodigiously.
Everything about it intoxicates me.n
And on another day she wrote, Rather
than all the talent and ugliness Of the
Staels and the George Euss, I prefer
to be inimitable by the fashion in
which l wear gown from Chevert's. -
. or her journal she said: "Ces
cahlers: la collection de mes migraines
mentales." All her life she suffered
and desired passionately. "Je voudrais.
Je voudrais, je voudrais," is her un-
ending cry. Despairingly she laments: ::
Il want to live; Oh God, nothing on
earth is made for mel" But the love
of life is stronger than all else. "Il
me faut une vie eloquente, brt1ler de
nude. Oui, Jaime la vie CONNIE
elie est And then once more the
wave falls, and she says, "Books, books,
the only thing in the world that has
come to my aid. To read as I do!
TO read more than one speaks, more
than one moves, more than one OBJ
serves; to read from fifteen until one
is twenty-six." What a lifel
Pride, she says, is sin which she
ignores, but it shines through every
page. II have always loved violence.
and pride is an aesthetic law. |
will not be resigned. shall
never capitulate. l shall live
in my immobility more than hundred
others in their movement; in my soli-
tude more than a thousand others in
their loves. I have never de-
sired death; I have none of those easy M
tastes that simplify life.''
One might Gull small book of
aphorisms from her journals. AS a
young girl she was reading Nietzsche
assiduously and his influence is patent
upon the passionate asceJic.
"To judge people with indulgence,
put yourself in their place. Precisely
what one shouldn't do. There is no
reason why we should exact from
others that which we have the habit
Of expecting from ourselves"
"Imbeciles are convex and fools are
concave: never look into them"
Intelligence should be a physical
beauty, otherwise 1t is 8 mediocre
thing. Its role is to eclipse all else.''
ooh, the enraging banality of beau
| tiful souls'"