The
Last Tuesday Society's two day Halloween mask ball will launch A
Curious Invitation by Suzette
Fields. Contents: the forty greatest parties in literature.
How
fun would it be to sneak into a novel right when the party starts, to
leave after a few pages and enter another one, and then another, and
another one more. I suppose we could at least try a few, starting
from some Classics… shall we?
 |
| Still from Baz Luhrmann's Great Gatsby (2013) |
"In his blue gardens men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars."
The
Twenties were pretty much about partying: Charleston, embedded dress,
no financial crash on sight and Prohibition Laws, which just made
drinking even more fun. Gatsby embraces all of this by throwing all
night long parties in his luxurious villa. I honestly think this is
what makes the book: who the hell cares about the fact that he did
all of this to get close to his beloved Daisy, that she doesn’t
leave her cheating husband and that he dies more or less as a
consequence of protecting her? Nobody really, but we all remember the
champagne, the tux and the Rolls-Royce as if we were there.
The
Master and Margarita by Mihail Bulgakov
“ 'Dostoevsky's
dead,' said the citizeness, but somehow not very confidently.
'I
protest!' Behemoth exclaimed hotly. 'Dostoevsky is immortal!’ ”
The
most fascinating host in the history of literature is the Devil, here
disguised as Professor Woland; which counts as a costume and makes
him even cooler. The guests are all deceased sinners, they don’t
show up before midnight and the orchestra is directed by Strauss.
What is very very wicked is the fact that this scene was inspired by
a real Spring Festival held at the residence of the US Ambassador in
Moscow. Literally a hell of a party.
 |
| Illustration by Lynn Hatzius |
Vanity
Fair by William Makepeace Thakeray
"I
have heard from ladies who were in the town at the period, that the
talk and interest of persons of their own sex regarding the ball was
much greater even than in respect of the enemy in their front."
What
should you do if you live in Brussels and it is the eve of the battle
of Waterloo? Get wasted and dance! This is what the Duchess of
Richmond thought, and Thackeray can’t but tailoring this to the
story of socialite Becky Sharp. Too bad the party was crashed by news
of battle.
Macbeth
by Shakespeare
“Fortune,
on his damned quarrel smiling, Showed like a rebel's whore.”
It
could be written a whole article only mentioning parties in
Shakespeare. It is quite logic, since he wrote more than the average
person could possibly read in a lifetime. My all times Shakespeare’s
favourite is Macbeth and I’d like to call this episode
‘dinner with the murderer’. What is worse than an uninvited
guest? A dead uninvited guest, whose assassination you ordered. So
when Macbeth joins the banquet, he finds sitting at his place
Banquo’s ghost. The play also constitutes the first written record
of the word ‘assassination’ in the English language. The devil’s
in the detail.
Alice’s
Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
“It’s
always tea time!”
Madness,
a nice hat and nonsense conversations: the Mad Tea Party is the
party. Timeless is the best of times.
No comments:
Post a Comment