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The Swedish
John Cowper Powys Society
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First page ► About the society
► Newsletters ► Biography ► Bibliography ► John Cowper Powys
Contact ► In Swedish ► |
Newsletter Nr 9: A SHORT EXTRACT FROM THE
NINTH CHAPTER OF AUTOBIOGRAPHY BY
JOHN COWPER POWYS But I remember how, when wandering with Willy [the younger brother of JCP] in the neighbourhood of Les Halles, down in some narrow streets among tall, ancient, very Gothic-looking houses, houses that had that dim, rich, massive, intricate appearance, which, of all things in an old historic city fascinates me the most, we both looked up, just as a couple of Pantagruelians, and caught sight of a lovely sylph-like figure looking down upon us with intense interest from a mediæval casement high up above our heads. This visions, I recollect, was as disturbing to William as it was to John, but whether it was John or William who made the gesture that caused the figure to disappear I cannot tell. Its vanishing was clearly not followed by any descent to the street-door; and, though we could not help lingering there a while, she never came back to that high mediæval window. Even now, as I think of this incident, an indescribable sensation, like that of some old romance of a thousand years ago, steals over me. If you cannot follow me, reader, in this, I have no more to say: but I am certain that my own secretest happiness, as I go about the world, comes from certain revelations of this kind to which I am porous, and to which I am continually struggling to make myself more porous. [P. 435 Colgate Edition 1994] |
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updated 4 April 2012.