her resplendent skin
“Chrysis had appeared through the western door on the first terrace of the ruddy monument. She was naked, as was the goddess. In each hand she held a corner of the scarlet veil which the wind raised against the evening sky while the mirror, held in her right hand, reflected the setting sun.
Slowly, her head bowed, moving with infinite grace and majesty, she went up the outer steps which wound like a spiral around the high vermilion tower. Her veil trembled like a flame. The fiery afterglow reddened the pearl necklace so that it seemed a river of rubies. She mounted, and in this glory her resplendent skin took on all the magnificence of flesh, blood, fire, blue carmine, velvety red, bright pink. Revolving upwards with the great purple walls, she took her way towards the sky.”
—Pierre Louys, Aphrodite, 1896; translated by Lewis Galantiere, 1933.
her millions of lights
“It was a lovely starlit night. They were on top of the Villejuif hill, when Paris appeared like a dark sea, and her millions of lights like phosphorescent waves; waves which were more clamorous, more passionate, more greedy than those of the tempestuous ocean; waves which are ever raging, foaming, and ever ready to devour what comes in their way.”
—Alexander Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo, 1845; anonymous translation, Barnes and Noble Classics, 2004.
Charles Barbier
THE VISUAL LANGAUGE OF HERBERT MATTER
ETAOIN SHRDLU
frim-fram sauce
“I want the frim-fram sauce with the ausen fay
With chafafa on the side.”
—Redd Evans & Joe Ricardel, “The Frim-Fram Sauce”, 1945.
multi-colored scorpenae
“The table was strewn with garlands and flowers, and laden with tankards and pitchers. . . . There were terra-cotta platters of plump eels sprinkled with seasoning; there were wax-coloured alphestae, and sacred beauty-fish. Besides these there was a pompilus, a purple fish said to have been born of the same foam as Aphrodite, boopoe, bebradons, a grey mullet served up with calmars, and multi-colored scorpenae. Certain dishes were served in little saucepans in order that they might be eaten foaming hot, and among these were a great slice of myra, fat tunny-fish, and hot devil-fish with tender tentacles. Finally came the belly of a white electric eel, as round as the belly of a beautiful woman.
Such was the first course.”
—Pierre Louys, Aphrodite, 1896; translated by Lewis Galantiere, 1933.
etaoin shrdlu
meep
