“The whole earth seemed to come to life at once. Now
that [Francis] Starwick was here, this unfamiliar world, in whose alien life he
had struggled like a drowning swimmer, became in a moment wonderful and good.
The feeling of numb, nameless terror, rootless desolation, the intolerable sick
anguish of homelessness, insecurity, and homesickness, against which he had
fought since coming to Paris, and which he had been ashamed and afraid to
admit, was now instantly banished. Even the strange dark faces of the French as
they streamed past no longer seemed strange, but friendly and familiar, and the
moist and languorous air, the soft thick grayness of the skies which had seemed
to press down on his naked sides, to permeate his houseless soul like a
palpable and viscous substance of numb terror and despair, were now impregnated
with all the vital energies of living, with the intoxication of an unspeakable,
nameless, infinitely strange and various joy. As they walked across the vast
court of the Louvre towards the great arched gateway and all the brilliant
traffic of the streets, the enormous dynamic murmur of the mysterious city came
to him and stirred his entrails with the sensual premonitions of unknown,
glamorous and seductive pleasure. Even the little taxis, boring past with
wasp-like speed across the great space of the Louvre and through the sounding
arches, now contributed to this sense of excitement, luxury and joy. The shrill
and irritating horns sounded constantly through the humid air, and filled his
heart with thoughts of New Year: already the whole city seemed astir, alive now
with the great carnival of New Year's Eve.”— American novelist Thomas Wolfe (1900-1938),
Of Time and the River: A Legend of Man’s Hunger in His Youth (1935)
This description of Paris at New Year’s Eve reflected
Wolfe’s own time in the city in December 1924.
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