today the sound of firing came nearer and nearer

'stop philosophising and get on with the story!' - footnote p.44, the makepeace experiment, avram tertz. 

'at daybreak I fell into a sleep haunted by nightmares and explosions... today the sound of firing came nearer and nearer...' - journal of edmond de goncourt, night 22nd/ morning 23rd may 1871.

on this day in 1791 edmond de goncourt had gone over to visit the art critic philippe burty and had ended up trapped inside his house as a result of shelling and national guardsmen press-ganging anybody out on the street into building barricades. by today  versailles troops (those of the french republican government) take the street. the dead body of a national guardsman left lying in the road views it all dispassionately. this will be the start of la semaine sanglante (bloody week) when the french republican forces will massacre the communards and exile many thousands of them. 

meanwhile edmond de goncourt and  philippe burty will be  early adopters of the japonism style of art (burty coins the term in 1792), like french william morrises they see in japanese handicraft construction, the support for artists under the feudal system, the aestheticisation of life (for the upper classes) the hope of relaunching french society and french arts and crafts. 

there's a similar movement in music with debussy. 

burty was also the populariser of an etching revival. he wrote a book promoting the work of charles meryon ('sailor, engraver and etcher'). meryon born in paris with an english father and a (probably) spanish mother. meryon enlisted in the french navy and travelled widely. 

as a child he attended a theatre performance in which two skeletons were out in the fields digging, this so horrified him he had to leave the theatre, outside he asked his mother.

'mama. is it in order to disgust men with agricultural pursuits that the government sends skeletons onto the stage.' 

yesterday horsemouth did not get much done. he wandered out into the marshes. there a group of students all practiced the sword with wooden swords. ichi, ni, san, shi.  a bit more artful composing and costuming and it could have been a shot from one of the lone wolf and cub episodes horsemouth has been watching lately. that people are properly buried, named, revenged, seems to be important (which is strange in a show that regularly leaves stacks of dead bodies all over the place). 

the numbers 4 and 9 are apparently considered unlucky in Japanese: 4, pronounced shi, being a homophone for death (死), and  9, when pronounced ku, is a homophone for suffering (苦). 

horsemouth is not sure what he will be up to today.