The gardener and I went to a Halloween party over the weekend. Our costumes were meant to be Marie de France and her Unknown Lover. Unknown because nobody even knows Marie’s identity, just that she was the first female poet of France, living in the 12th century.
Here she is in an illuminated manuscript:
Among other texts, Marie wrote one of the early Arthurian tales about Guinevere, Lancelot, and Arthur.
Marie wrote about these characters in the literary form the Breton lai. According to Wikipedia:
A Breton lai, also known as a narrative lay or simply a lay, is a form of medieval French and English romance literature. Lais are short (typically 600–1000 lines), rhymed tales of love and chivalry, [and focused on the Arthurian tales].
In other words, lais are poems.
Here are the gardener and I in costume:
Third time in my life I remember being the subject of a caricature.
The first was this one that is on the cover of Scrap. My father’s co-worker made this for him when I was born. Pretty sure I look like Tweety Bird here.
The second time someone drew a caricature of me was at Expo 67 in Montreal. The artist drew me as a nerd girl reading a book. Because what else?
The gardener and I went to a lovely Halloween costume party. I wanted to go as Edgar Allen Poe with a raven on my shoulder. That would have been soooo cool. The gardener would have been my editor, which would have fit him just fine hahaha. But after looking at all the photos of Poe with that high tight collar I knew this hot-blooded person could not wear an outfit like that in Arizona.
I wanted another poet, but it needed to be somebody who lived to be as old as me, so Sylvia Plath was out. A friend suggested Edith Sitwell because she dressed eccentrically in turbans and caftans. She was a well-known British poet active in the 1910s to 1960s. She was an aristocrat and her two brothers were also poets. So I put together a costume as Dame Edith Sitwell, and the gardener dressed as Sir Osbert Sitwell. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edith_Sitwell
Of course, the gardener won’t let me post his photo on here ;). But here is an image of the vintage purse I carried (that belonged to his aunt) and the calling cards I had made! Just so you know how color-coordinated I was, the pattern of my caftan has lots of yellow from the waist down.
On the back side of the calling card it says: I will be working on my American accent this evening. [I don’t do accents.]
