Loquet Loves: April 2018
Spring
A Moveable Feast
Reading Ernest Hemingway's A Moveable Feast for the first time on the Eurostar from London to Paris early one April morning, is the best kind of anticipation for a day spent alone exploring the city. Leaving behind the inevitable dreariness of your own city waiting for spring, Hemingway's delight at the changing of the season in Paris is amplified by yours, and you cannot help but agree that 'When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest.'
As you walk, let your appetite be guided by Hemingway's, stopping for an oyster, a coffee, a simple meal followed by wine, but noting as Hadley does, 'There are so many sorts of hunger. In the spring there is more.'
A Tale of Springtime
In Eric Rohmer's A Tale of Springtime, unsurprisingly, spring is everywhere. In the fresh, white interior of Jeanne's apartment, with its signifying pops of Matisse; in the light on the Paris streets; in Natasha & Igor's country garden in which countless flowering shrubs are observed and discussed. More so, as personal dramas are played out against the simple acknowledged pleasures of order and routine, spring's charm is clear. Without the heaviness of winter, or the languid ease of summer, spring's gentle nudge can bring new perspective to the daily.
If nothing else, A Tale of Springtime, reminds us that it is now the season for cherry blossoms and reading in the garden (albeit in a coat and boots, with a pot of tea close by).
Virginia Woolf: An Exhibition Inspired by Her Writings
Visiting Cornwall is always a pleasure but even more so at the moment as the Tate St. Ives hosts an exhibition of artists who have been guided by Virginia Woolf's writing.
As we struggle to reconcile our hopes for equality within the current framework, and our even larger hopes of remaking society and its values anew, Woolf's consistent and simultaneous desire to achieve freedom within 'A Room of One's Own', and freedom outside, are as pertinent now as they were then.
Celebrating Woolf's writing and ideas, her beloved St. Ives, and the artists who have been inspired by it all, the exhibition continues until 29th April 2018. We recommend reading exhibition curator Laura Smith's essay Thinking Back Through Our Mothers before your visit.