James Baldwin Adjective Stew

The book is called Tell Me How Long the Train's Been Gone.

He’s describing a woman who with her husband runs an important acting workshop, Lola San-Marquand.

I liked her at once. I liked her enormously… made me feel immediately, and with great force, that she was a sad woman, a lost and ruined woman, and, even, a gallant one.

…Her hair, which was very beautiful, very blond, and very long, was severely, impeccably even, perhaps masochistically pulled back from a rather stunning brow…she impresses me still–as one of the most curious, most loving, devious, ruthless, and single-minded people I have met in all my life. She was brilliantly and brutally manufactured: she had not grown into her present shape, but had been hammered into it, of perhaps, as in some unspeakable vat, been lowered.

How the fuck do you write that?

Curious, most loving, devious, ruthless, brilliantly and brutally manufactured. Severely impeccably masochistically pulled back hair.

Shit is intimidating.

17/10/2024