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Introducing the New, Older & Wiser Claire
Ladies and Gentlemen of Ricochet:
Please meet my new photo. Let me reassure you that I have not changed the secret formula. I am, of course, exactly the same Claire flavor you grew up with. Take the Claire-Cola Challenge and see. I felt rebranding was in order, though, for it struck me this morning that the photo you have been looking at was taken in 2008. It does not reflect the maturity, wisdom, and insight I have acquired since then.
Nor does it convey the deep and appropriate alarm I wish to suggest when discussing profoundly important geopolitical events such as the rise of ISIS, the return of Russian Imperialism, the criteria I will use to select my next Commander-in-Chief, and the incentives we are creating to rapid nuclear proliferation. Nor, above all, does it convey the most significant geopolitical event of my life: my catastrophic realization that I may have been wrong in my assessment of French demographic trends. So I believe this photo more accurately conveys “the deep and serious questions we must all ask ourselves.”
It also properly suggests that I am older and more knowing. Now, of course it would be beneath me to exploit, for political purposes, my opponents’ youth and inexperience. Nor is it my intention to do so. I am merely concerned about truth in advertising: I am 47 years old. Were you to consider a photo of me at age 39, is might mislead you. You would be ill-served by underestimating my wisdom and gravitas.
Moreover, it would be quite unfortunate were you to meet me in person and think, “But Claire looks older than her photo.” Clearly, it is much more important that you meet me and think, “Goodness. Claire looks even better than her photo.”
And in fact, I do. Because you see, when I searched for a recent photo of myself, I was unable to find one in which I was smiling. I confess that I was too lazy to bother to look very hard. However, I think this stern expression is fully suitable for Ricochet. After all, you must never forget that I am a joyless, conservative prude who finds unbearable the idea that anyone, anywhere, might be having fun; and faints promptly at the merest hint of an impropriety. I judge each and every one of you from my elite perch in Paris, where I live on a diet of Proust and Madeleines and never get fat. I feel nothing but intellectual contempt for a logical blunder such as an ad hominem attack. It is quite important that you be awed and intimidated by me, and deeply uneasy when you consider me looking down upon you–with precisely the expression you see in that photo–should you violate our Code of Conduct.
I think my new look of severity and concern suits our political age. I’m afraid that if you want the old Claire back, that is anonymous’s department. For those of you keen to look back in time, consult this thread. The state-of-the-art way to do it, I am reliably informed, requires a definition of time based upon an electron shell transition in the cæsium-133 atom. (That’s only one way, of course. When I look back in time, I do it the conservative way: I consult my well-worn copy of The History of the Peloponnesian War. I have had it surgically stapled to my left ankle. On the right ankle is Boswell’s Life of Johnson.) Otherwise, I don’t look back. Nothing but a pillar of salt that way, I am told.
I do, however, stress that the photo you see is recent. And entirely unretouched. And clearly not taken by a professional, that’s obvious. I was forced to look back in time by the obvious moral imperative: “Tell the truth, always, to the best of your knowledge.” But I cannot tell a lie: I must say that it looked quite as if I had gained wisdom, maturity, and experience while losing none of my astonishing sex appeal.
Still, I won’t tempt fate. If you make it to 47, you already know for whom that bell is tolling. Nor is it a quaint and distant little piccolo kind of wind-chime on the other side of the neighborhood. It’s more like a non-stop, clanging timpani accompanied by a boastful choir singing in unison: “You’re pushing your luck, kiddo. Don’t you dare spend even one more minute looking at photos of yourself. Pick the first one you see. You’re supposed to be doing something a lot more useful than that, and you know it.”
Now, let us discuss Proust. Do you have any idea why they love him so much over here? I know better than to dismiss a literary classic out of hand, but mon dieu, I find him boring. I shall keep trying.
Published in General
I was just going to say “No one gets fat on an asensual diet of Proust.”
As for the picture: honest? Absolutely. Projecting concern? Indubitably. Beautiful? Of course.
I’m soon to be faced with a similar problem: I no longer wear facial hair, and as I apparently am not making good on my threat to cease public speaking, I’m in need of photographs that actually resemble me. Since I will be half a century old in July, it seems fitting anyway. But every recent picture I have of me looks positively insipid.
I wouldn’t call that a stern look. I had nuns for teachers all through grade school. I know the stern look.
Honestly, no one cares about the photo. I wouldn’t advise selling oneself on the photo–or even thinking about it much. I’d focus on making sure you’ve got something truly interesting to say.
Trust me, if my face gets sterner than that, you don’t want to be looking at it. You want to be looking at my hands, because I might be about to shoot you.
I only read Proust in translation and then it was many years ago but I remember a few scenes of stark clarity that were very funny. Madame Verdurins salon and Swan chasing around Odette. I can’t remember which critic called his characters Dickensian but that seemed apt at the time. As you get older maybe you’ll appreciate the tenuousness of vivid memory.
In all seriousness, your face looks very youthful for a 47 year old.
So I am told, and that is why I am trying. What’s worse, I am able to read in French, and thus, clearly, must. I’ve just got to stop every loophole, close the shutters, and dig my own grave as I turn down the bed-clothes and wrap myself in the shroud of my nightshirt. But before burying myself in the volume of Proust which I placed there because, on spring nights, I felt too guilty that I’d just never read it among the red curtains of the four-poster–or anywhere, frankly–I was stirred to revolt, and attempted the desperate stratagem of a condemned prisoner: Changing my photo on Ricochet.
So I took the easy way out. But I’ll keep working on it. Damned if I won’t finish it before that bell tolls for me.
Well I hope you’ve got plenty of time.
I attribute it to smoking, a diet of little but sugar and caffeine, and unrelenting stress. If you follow my advice and spend your days and (often sleepless) nights worrying about paying your bills and the Bomb, you too will enjoy the blessings of eternal youth.
The really amazing thing about that photo? That’s “after.” I took it to send it to the surgeon in Delhi who sewed my nose back on after that little mishap with the dog. To thank him and let him know how much I appreciated still having a nose. It wasn’t attached to my face when I walked into his office, you see. It was in a paper cup.
No, I’m not kidding.
It’s like a Manet portrait. Drop in a background of a Parisian cafe, or an opera box, and you’d have it. You might need a fur, or a hat with a feather. It’s beautiful, and astute.
You and me both. Tables say I’ve got a mean life expectancy of 35 more years, median life expectancy of 37 more years, standard deviation of 13.5 years. So I figure I can get through the Proust. I will not walk in front of a bus just to get out of that, however much I’m tempted.
Last thing I need. Believe me. We’re not just talking “a fur” chez Claire, we’re talking “only fur.” There’s no way to take a fur-free photo in my apartment. Most of it is attached to the cats, but they leave enough everywhere that if I wanted to, I could build three new cats every day.
I once got the bright idea of collecting it to see if maybe I could knit something out of it, and then I discovered why no one treasures a hand-knit, pure cat-wool sweater.
All the stuff is good for is breaking one vacuum cleaner after another.
Do you make your own Madeleines? Oh. wait. You’re in Paris. They probably have them in the stores.
Perhaps a little Madeleine Peyroux to go with your Proust?
Ahhh, my day consists of much of that diet.
That is quite an interesting story. Though my nose was left intact, my face healed up very nicely without scars from trying to pet a mother dog while she was nursing her newborn pups when I was about 3. I had been forewarned just minutes before the incident. My mother’s reference to me was tete du bois my entire life.
Having read the whole of the first book in French, and remembering absolutely nothing, I strongly believe that life is too short for Proust.
Tête de bois, if I’m determined to be all tête de bois about it. That story gets much more interesting, but it’s promised already to City Journal. When they publish it (I hope), we can have a really interesting conversation about it here.
The moral’s not about dogs (I was an idiot to get between Cujo and his dinner)–it’s about the health care sector in India. That’s in fact what I was there to report on. But I didn’t quite intend to run my own totally randomized trial of it. Anyway, end result was that–thank God–it seems I may have correctly interpreted the data and had the right instincts about that story.
So the premise of How Proust Can Change Your Life (which I have not read; Proust neither) is: “suck it dry and lay to waste”?
And now the men of Ricochet will lineup for their chance to play Harold Hill from The Music Man:
I flinch, I shy
when the lass with the delicate air goes by
I smile, I grin
when the gal with a touch of sin walks in
I hope and I pray
for Hester to win just one more “A”
The sadder but wiser girl for me
(Oh, yeah)
The sadder but wiser girl for me!
Okay, suppose I have 24 hours to live and must devote it to French literature. What’s your call.
Beautiful, but you look hungry. I hope you’re having a proper breakfast, it’s the most important meal of the day.
Asterix. No? (I mean: Non?)
Oh, right. As if I’m going to read that instead of reading Proust himself. What’s the rest of the series–How Dostoyevsky can Depress You and How Plato Will Make You Realize You’re a Footnote?
It’s…OK.
You’re using too wide of a lens and either not focusing or not holding the camera still. Maybe we need “11 Tips on How to Take a Great Selfie.”
Here is one of the best things I have ever seen. How to not look insipid.
Lovely, as ever.
Or that life wasn’t short enough for Proust.
Nyquil.
It’s just not. I made it this far on “coffee for breakfast,” and so far no scurvy or rickets. Anyone hoping to see me eat a proper meal had best be prepared to wait for lunch. (And if you imagine I don’t eat properly at lunch, all I can say is you’d best not delude yourself so much on that score that you invite me to an expensive restaurant and urge me to order anything I like. Others have made that mistake.)
Claire Berlinski
Gaby Charing:Having read the whole of the first book in French, and remembering absolutely nothing, I strongly believe that life is too short for Proust.
Okay, suppose I have 24 hours to live and must devote it to French literature. What’s your call.
Only one acceptable answer on R>. “The Stranger”
aka “Killing an Arab.”
I’ll withhold judgment until I meet you in person.
You still owe us a post on your Mom.