"A woman knows the face of the man she loves like a sailor knows the open sea." - Honoré de Balzac
I stumbled upon this quote today and I simply love it. I love it for the drama and the romanticism and the absurdity. I love it for the gender stereotype of it that I usually protest against in earnest. What's funny is that Balzac (who adopted his surname for the formality and panache) is credited as being a naturalist writer; a writer who sees the world through a clear-glass and not a rose-colored lens. What a contradiction! The more I read about Balzac and his tortured, arduous relationship to the pen, I learned that he wrote in piecemeal, balancing an intriguing mix of passion, propriety and patience. I find that relevant to today's modern age. Piecemeal communication in bursts across different media is what constitutes communication. It's a wonder anyone knows what time it is or where (in terms of place) a person is really "coming from" to gain any context whatsoever! I love thinking about how meaning (in writing and really all communication) is less fixed now-a-days than ever and I wonder if writers from long ago felt the same... Critics repeatedly comment on Balzac's attempt to stabilize the extraneous realities of his own life by committing them to fiction. It was his way to stay on course. For me, this is a comforting notion, and it ushers us back to the quote above. Reading the sea...open and clear...like reading the face of a lover. AWESOME.
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