D
DesEsseintes
Guest
<A large fireplace burns sandalwood, sending diffident curls of scented smoke spiralling to the fine ceiling. Around the plasterwork, a frieze depicting civilisational triumphs, from Gilgamesh to Wikipedia and everything in between marches confidently from corner to corner. The eye of a visitor, naturally drawn to decipher the significance of such a dominant feature, is drawn inexorably upwards: the pleasing and intended result is that those who enter the room have their eyes fixed, literally and metaphorically, on higher things. The living bodies thus become a tableau in their own right.>
<The walls are duck egg blue, and filled to the ceiling with bookshelves. Only finely bound first editions adorn the subtle Gothic lines of the rosewood shelves, but no glass shield intervenes between the idle browser and the volumes: all are free to pick and drift through the corridors of knowledge and beauty at leisure. A series of small speakers, disguised to look like Moorish fretwork piercing the walls at patterned intervals, pour music from Tallis, Byrd, Palestrina and Gesualdo into the room. The music stops at a wave of the hand, but so subtle is the sound, and so matched to the rarified atmosphere, that few choose even so languid a gesture for long.>
<The furniture is select: a scrolled chaise, with quiet Art Nouveau lilies the only decoration to otherwise flowing lines, lines one wall, and two high backed club chairs guard the fire. An eighteenth century Persian carpet muffles the footsteps at the centre, which otherwise resound softly against old oak flooring, hallowed by centuries. Two tall lamps illuminate the scene, and the old globe on a Louis XV occasional table completes the ensemble. Outside, in the wilder corridors of Literotica, shouts are heard, frenzied voices raised, and futile controversies rage on. Here, the conversation is murmured, elegant, and only saved from unpardonable mannerism by the fundamental seriousness of its frivolity. For here, the serious is treated lightly and the frivolous dealt with in great seriousness of manner.>
<Des Esseintes saunters over to the bookshelves and selects a sixteenth century edition of Suetonius. Lighting a Sobranie, he settles himself in the chaise, rings the bell for his manservant to bring him a small plate of muscat grapes, and eyes the door expectantly, as if hoping for visitors to cheer his luxuriant hermitage.>
<The walls are duck egg blue, and filled to the ceiling with bookshelves. Only finely bound first editions adorn the subtle Gothic lines of the rosewood shelves, but no glass shield intervenes between the idle browser and the volumes: all are free to pick and drift through the corridors of knowledge and beauty at leisure. A series of small speakers, disguised to look like Moorish fretwork piercing the walls at patterned intervals, pour music from Tallis, Byrd, Palestrina and Gesualdo into the room. The music stops at a wave of the hand, but so subtle is the sound, and so matched to the rarified atmosphere, that few choose even so languid a gesture for long.>
<The furniture is select: a scrolled chaise, with quiet Art Nouveau lilies the only decoration to otherwise flowing lines, lines one wall, and two high backed club chairs guard the fire. An eighteenth century Persian carpet muffles the footsteps at the centre, which otherwise resound softly against old oak flooring, hallowed by centuries. Two tall lamps illuminate the scene, and the old globe on a Louis XV occasional table completes the ensemble. Outside, in the wilder corridors of Literotica, shouts are heard, frenzied voices raised, and futile controversies rage on. Here, the conversation is murmured, elegant, and only saved from unpardonable mannerism by the fundamental seriousness of its frivolity. For here, the serious is treated lightly and the frivolous dealt with in great seriousness of manner.>
<Des Esseintes saunters over to the bookshelves and selects a sixteenth century edition of Suetonius. Lighting a Sobranie, he settles himself in the chaise, rings the bell for his manservant to bring him a small plate of muscat grapes, and eyes the door expectantly, as if hoping for visitors to cheer his luxuriant hermitage.>
... but never mind ... 
