Looking for Ghosts
It would be easy to simply say that I believe in past lives. It’s really more a matter of something I’ve always known, since I was a very young child.
I was in Catholic school, in second grade. The priest came to visit our class and it was a free for all with all the “what if” questions.
“What if you are on the way to confession and you have a mortal sin on your soul and you get hit by a car and killed… Do you go to Heaven or Hell?” (What kind of mortal sin would a seven year old have committed?)
“When you die and you go to Heaven (we seven year olds seemed a bit obsessed with the idea of dying), how long are you there before you come back?” Father D: “You don’t come back. You are in Heaven (or godforbid Hell!) for an eternity.” Explain the concept of eternity to a seven year old.
I raised my hand: “You mean for a long, long, long time. And then you come back.” Father D: (exasperated) “No, you don’t come back ever. You stay in Heaven for an eternity. Forever.”
At that point my seven year old self knew better than to argue. He didn’t get it. We come back.
Through the years I started to find places where I knew I had been before; a window on the second floor of the California Gold Country. Another on the water front of a tiny Delta town. A particular alley in old Shanghai. A miniscule balcony above a narrow canal buried deep in the San Toma quarter of Venice. I had been to Paris many times before it happened to me here. I liked to say I slept around a lot in Paris. I stayed in all the usual tourist arrondissements over the years and even flirted with some of the further out neighborhoods. Once I found my home in the 18ème, I started to be surrounded by the ghosts of another time.
Every now and then I strayed; an apartment in the 8ème, a hip new hotel in So-Pi, but I always found my way back to my own special block in the 18ème; not just anywhere in the 18ème. On rue Caulaincourt, between 41 and 70, usually on a sunny terrass under the horse chestnuts at Cépage, now spoiled for me by Caroleen, but that comes later in my story.
I prowled around Cimetière de Montmartre, reading the inscriptions on tombs. For a brief time, I thought that maybe Marie Duplessis was whom I was looking for. Mais non, the tuberculin courtesan was a dead end.
It was after going down a string of rabbit holes, and digging deeper and deeper into the fascinating, grungy, smelly, ribald, fashionable, intellectual, seedy, drunken history of Paris that I discovered Ninon de L’Enclos. An educated woman in the 1600s! A self-proclaimed epicurean. A prolific writer. A courtesan of independent means!
Ninon
There is nothing more delightful in this world than a beautiful woman who has the same qualities of an educated man. In this way she has the best of both sexes. - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Ninon sat anxiously in the salon of the small convent where she had lived for the past year, following the death of her father.
At twenty two, Ninon was hardly young. Most girls would be married with numerous kids (and probably more lost before or during birth) by now. She had lost her own mother ten years earlier and had been left much to her own devices over the intervening decade. Her mother and her father could not have been more different from each other. Ninon’s mother raised her small pretty daughter with the presumption that the girl would eventually enter the convent. Her father, on the other hand, was an intellectual with a lofty position in society and entrée into the literary and artist salons of the times. He subscribed to an Epicurean philosophy and took care to press these opinions on his young daughter from her earliest infancy. It’s hardly surprising that young Anne, as she was known as a child, preferred this approach to life, leaving behind the distasteful fruits proposed by her mother for the more sumptuous feast of ideas offered by her father.
She happily used her time reading everything she could get her hands on, eavesdropping on the conversations and meetings her father had with colleagues and writing in her journal. She had a talent for playing instruments, most notably the lute and her ticket to these early salons was that musical ability. She played, she stayed and she listened. At first she just soaked it all in, like a thirsty sponge. But shortly she found herself debating some of the ideas of the old men, in her own mind, of course.
She was a careful and obedient girl, private with her developing views and opinions in those early years. However, in her private diary her mind was alive and challenging; challenging the ideas of the old men who expounded, at times ad nauseum, and documenting her challenges in her diary. One thing was certain. Ninon was committed to a life as prescribed by Epicurean philosophy. She pulled the small book from the side pocket of her small bag, a bag that held the meager belongings that she would take with her today.
She wrote: “Aujourd’hui, un nouveau soleil se lève pour moi; tout vit, tout est animé, tout semble me parler de ma passion, tout m’invite à le chérir!”
Today a new sun rises for me; everything lives, everything is animated, everything seems to speak to me of my passion, everything invites me to cherish it!
Tomorrow is truly a mystery. She had no idea what it, or the hundreds of tomorrows to come, would bring. They would be lived on her own terms. At that moment she resolved that she would forever remain unmarried and independent.
Fact vs Fiction: The Noctambule
Legend has it that a young Ninon was visited early on Sunday morning by a small man with white hair and black clothes known as Le Noctambule, the “sleepwalker”. He told the young woman that he was there to offer her a choice of three things; the highest rank in the land, great riches and fame or eternal beauty. He had been wandering the earth for 6,000 years, he said, and he had only offered this choice to five women and she would be the last. The others were Semiramus, the ancient queen of Assyria, Helen of Troy, Cleopatra and Diane de Poitiers, French Noblewoman and mistress to both Henry I and II. Upon choosing eternal beauty Le Noctambule had Ninon sign a contract of sorts and promised her she would always be young, charming and healthy and would win any heart she desired. He told her he would return three days before her death, claiming her soul. Then he disappeared with a whiff of smoke and the scent of sulfur.
The Golden Age
The seventeenth century in Paris was special. In the largest European capital, French literature and the arts flourished; the era of Louis XIV, the Sun King. It was during this time that we find the enduring works of Molière, La Fontaine, Pierre Corneille, Jean Racine and a long list of others. French Science and Arts were given the opportunity to develop. The Paris Observatory, the French Academy of Sciences, the Botanical Garden, all were born during this time of openness and freedom, of literature, of art, of science and of love. Opera and ballet held their debut, the Comédie Française first opened its doors.
Versailles was being built. Le Palais du Louvre was home to the Court, but Le Palais Royal, built by and for Cardinal Richelieu, was a center of activity. This remarkable edifice, with its magnificent Queen’s Palace across the square from the equally glorious King’s Palace, was where private Salons hosted writers, artists, members of the Court and beautiful women. Ironically neither the King nor any Queen inhabited the palaces which today surround La Place des Vosges. La fronde was beginning to take root as taxes buried the little guy and the wealthy lived crazy austentatious lifestyles but revolution was yet to change the face of Paris and France forever.
Of course men predominated during the day. Women were born to be wives and mothers. Women who could not be wives or mothers could be nuns or whores. Prostitution was illegal in France. Courtesans were a whole other class of women; technically prostitutes but regarded differently because they generally saved their graces for one man at a time, their patron.
Religion dictated that sexual relations between a man and a woman were for the sole purpose of procreation. As such couples did not have sex for recreation. Men who could afford it kept a courtesan for pleasure. It was into this world that young Ninon de l’E
nclos had her personal choices to make. And she not only made them in the fashion that suited her, but in a manner that would change Paris in the Golden Age.
Beauty Secrets
“Louis XIV, believing that bathing removes a protective layer that keeps out disease, has washed only three times in his life. Instead, the scent of roses permeates the newly built palace of Versailles. Visitors are sprayed with rose water, with which the king also douses his shirts. In each room rose petals float in bowls of water, and courtesans anoint themselves with rose oil, each gram of which uses thirty kilos of flowers.”
“A Year in Paris” John Baxter
Ninon may have had help from Le Noctambule, but she knew it didn’t hurt to intervene on the behalf of beauty. Ninon’s beauty secrets were not only unusual for her time, but the centuries have proven her to be spot on.
In the Golden Age, people seldom bathed. It was generally believed that water was dangerous and brought illness through the pores. So even the wealthiest and highly born of the time employed a toilette seche; powdered and perfumed but rarely washed their clothing and even more rarely bathed.
Ninon on the other hand, washed regularly and liberally with water. All of her. Her bidet rendered even her private places sweet and lovely. She also drank water liberally. She was religious about staying out of the sun and maintaining her alabaster complexion. She regularly employed a concoction of onion, rose water, oils and potions made from ambergris, a rare and costly substance coming from the sperm whale. Of course she used neither tobacco nor drugs of any kind so her skin glowed with health and wellness. She took care to get a good night’s sleep.
Her diet was light and healthy which kept her slim. She didn’t drink alcohol but instead drank tea with violet or very occasionally hot chocolate.
She was a woman who indulged in a lifetime of carnal love and yet only had two pregnancies, neither unwanted. As a contraceptive she would use a wool sponge soaked in wine, a type of early times diaphragm.
All of this contributed to a loveliness that was capped with black eyes that sparkled with passion and a beauty that was impossible to resist.
First Love
Armed with a pitiful inheritance but more importantly the network of political, artistic and social contacts her father had introduced to her, Ninon began on the path to a life as an independent woman.
She quickly captured the eye of the great Cardinal Richelieu who had all of France at his fingertips. Trying to impress and seduce the beauty, he hosted grand fêtes at the Palace at Rueil. Immediately comfortable in these grandiose and elaborate venues, Ninon was the toast of every event. She used her inheritance wisely to accumulate a wardrobe and some very carefully selected jewels to showcase her natural beauty; her clear white skin, her big black eyes, her open and generously bestowed smile with its row of pearly straight teeth. There was not one of Paris’s noble men and not so noble men who did not notice and try to spend at least a moment in her presence. But they had to get behind the Cardinal in line. He was intent on taking her first “bloom”.
“Ah, lovely Ninon!” the Cardinal exclaimed at the third of such fêtes at the palace. “Please, sit with me tonight.”
How could anyone deny the man who was arguably the most powerful man in France? Of course she sat with him.
The man had deplorable manners. He ate with his fingers, grabbing half a pheasant from the platter at the center of the table and taking a greedy bite. He guzzled wine like there was no tomorrow. And the more he drank the more liberties he took. A hand snaked over and landed on Ninon’s knee. She adjusted herself on the settee to move said knee out of arm’s reach. By this time the Cardinal was perhaps a bit too tipsy to really notice. But his ardour was not diminished. He scooted over and placed his greasy fingers on Ninon’s upper thigh. Ninon grimaced at the prints left by his foul digits on the expensive fabric of her dress.
“Mademoiselle, humor me.” the Cardinal admonished.
“Monsieur, I have tremendous respect for you. You are a very powerful man. But I am not highly enough positioned to be worthy of your attention.”
“Nonsense!”ejaculated the Cardinal. “You are bright, you are beautiful, and you are what I want right now!”
“But you, kind sir,” Ninon hissed, “Are not what I want.” And she gathered her sadly stained skirts and removed herself to the toilette.
That very bold move was truly unprecedented. Cardinal Richelieu was simply not a man to be refused. But rather than incense the Cardinal, Ninon’s refusal increased his ardour. He requested her presence at another banquet a week later. For most of Paris society, an invitation like this was received with great joy. For Ninon it was more a command than a request. She knew she had to go and in retrospect it was a very good thing that she did.
It was a lovely evening and Ninon got to the Cardinal’s grand palace at Reuil fashionably late, which by Parisian standards meant very late. She looked ravishing, as always. Cardinal Richelieu had been alert, watching for her arrival. He was well oiled with the palace’s best wines by the time she made her entrance. It was nearly time for the guests to be seated for dinner, but the Cardinal delayed the call to the massive table and sent bottles of champagne around for all of the guests, indicating his willingness to spare no expense; the people’s expense of course.
The delay gave Ninon a chance to circumnavigate the room, carefully keeping the Cardinal out of arm’s (and finger’s) reach. She graciously greeted the who’s who of Paris, frankly a little weary of this scene. But wait! Who was that? Barely out of his teens and sporting just the earliest suggestion of a beard, Ninon spotted the young Gaspard de Coligny. It can clearly be said that Monsieur Gaspard fell immediately and desperately in love with Ninon. And to be frank, it was not long before Ninon shared his sentiments.
Ninon made her way towards Gaspard. As her target, Gaspard was a dead duck. The young man stuttered and turned a bright red. He had certainly experienced the pleasures of the female body, but Ninon was no everyday female. He was immediately under her spell. And Ninon decided that Gaspard was exactly what she was looking for.
We will give the young couple their privacy as they do their mating dance for the evening, all the while under the watchful and angry eye of the Cardinal. Suffice it to say that before long the two were lovers.
Cardinal Richelieu had never been particularly good at not getting what he wanted; it was just a fact of life. He had never had to be particularly good at strategizing how to get what he could not get other than by virtue of his lofty position. That night he retaliated by trying to make Ninon jealous. He flirted blatantly with Ninon’s dear friend, Marion de Lormes. Marion, a pretty but slightly tired Parisian courtesan was delighted but not as delighted as Ninon who found her to be a wonderful escape. Let Marion endure the greasy gropings of the Cardinal!
Ninon and Gaspard enjoyed several blissful months of amour. As all new lovers they declared their neverending devotion and commitment to each other. It was a glorious time for Ninon. Her epicurean philosophy as well as an insatiable appetite for life made their time together very agreeable.
As time passed, the flame dimmed on Ninon’s ardor if not her enjoyment of the physical moments of her time with Gaston. Certainly the physical and mechanical aspects of their coupling were spectacular. But that is what it became to Ninon; mechanics. She felt that it was time to move on; to embrace something bigger. She adored young Gaspard but he was so young. And so needy. And so she broke his heart. The first of many. But she did it ever so kindly, pledging that they should be friends for a lifetime. Ninon was to honor this commitment to each of her lovers; friendship for a lifetime. For poor Gaspard, a lifetime was not so very long. But it was long enough for him to marry two women, have four children and secure an important place in the annals of French history, being brought down during the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre, stabbed to the heart, thrown from a window and his head cut off.
For her part, following the relationship with Gaspard she declared: “I have noticed the most frivolous things are charged up to the account of women, and that men have reserved to themselves the right to all of the essential qualities; from this moment on I will be a man.”
And So It Begins
Le Grand Comptoir d’Anvers was becoming very familiar. The staff always greeted me like a friend. I finally managed to get Philippe to call me by my name, instead of Madame W. We chatted about our week. In the evenings it can get rather busy; especially on jazz nights which was how I discovered the place. Today at 1:00 it’s not too crowded. Could this be my writing place?
No ersatz Hemingways lurking. But there’s a first for everything. Would they look kindly on me if I took a table for several hours?
My plan to use Cépage, my neighborhood café, was spoiled by Caroleen, who I eagerly befriended a couple of years ago. Une amie française! Someone to help me understand the psyche of a French woman. And maybe shed some light on French men as well. While not technically a French woman. Caroline moved to Paris where she became Caroleen (because it sounds so much more French) some thirty years ago and has been married to a French man for the last twenty five of them. As such, she was a self-described French woman. I had a hundred questions. Did all French men really cheat? Was the “cinq à sept” a real thing? And more recently, if you are invited to someone’s home at 7 pm, should you really show up at 7:20 pm? Does the same rule apply if the invitation comes from an expat? (Caroleen’s answer: Yes! The Americans always come traipsing up to the door at 7 pm on the dot! So inconvenient!)
Ninon and Me at the Grand Comptoir Page 2
