It is smothered in trees which curve over it, and as you enter the gate the gloom of dense oleander branches envelops you; I can't tell you what wonderful peace and quiet it is. Life at times begins to get its old prismatic hue.

— Lawrence Durrell

Villa Cleobolus
Rhodes
Hogarth

Rhodes might be a flint arrowhead; Cos a sperm whale; Leros an octopus; Patmos a seahorse; Symi an expended meteor rubbed smooth with air; Kalymnos a mussel.

— Lawrence Durrell

I return link by link along the iron chains of memory to the city which we inhabited so briefly together: the city which used us as its flora — precipitated in us conflicts which were hers and which we mistook for our own: beloved Alexandria!

Lawrence Durrell
Alexandria Quartet

Lover, cut the rational knot
That made your thinking rule-of-thumb
And barefoot on the plum-dark hills
Go Wander in Elysium.

— Lawrence Durrell

Private Drafts (1955)
Nicosia, Cyprus

Corfu town in full bloom

E buongiorno!
#Napoli

J’aime absolument les bistrots au matin. Les croissants frais dans une corbeille posée sur le comptoir.

Avignon! Its shabby lights and sneaking cats were the same as ever. It had always waited for us, floating among its tenebrous monuments, the corpulence of its ragged bells, the putrescence of its squares.

— Lawrence Durrell

l'écrivain Lawrence Durrell, l'auteur du Quatuor d'Alexandrie

Le sel de la semaine (1968) / Fernand Seguin (Animateur)

youtu.be/d29KpeXpo3w?si…

What we need, brothers, is this. Right in the middle of the city, so that it will be near everyone, we ought to build a big wooden house where we would gather. We ought to buy a big table and a big samovar and drink a lot of tea, and talk about painting and art.

— Pirosmani

I miei gelsomini nel profilo

Lover, cut the rational knot
That made your thinking rule-of-thumb
And barefoot on the plum-dark hills
Go Wander in Elysium.

— Lawrence Durrell

Private Drafts (1955)
Nicosia, Cyprus

It is smothered in trees which curve over it, and as you enter the gate the gloom of dense oleander branches envelops you; I can't tell you what wonderful peace and quiet it is. Life at times begins to get its old prismatic hue.

— Lawrence Durrell

Villa Cleobolus
Rhodes
Hogarth

“Mientras el mar alzaba sus flechas y remolinos bajo la casa, yacíamos allí, en la cama, estaba tan oscuro como cualquier mazmorra y nos sentíamos tristes por la pérdida del Mediterráneo.”

Lawrence Durrell
—El libro negro

Gracias Ana Gavilá Valls

📷Herbert List

Cos is the spoiled child of the group. You know it at once, without even going ashore. It is green, luxuriant and a little dishevelled. An island that does not bother to comb its hair.

— Lawrence Durrell

Fountain of Hippocrates, Cos (Allan, 1843)

What we need, brothers, is this. Right in the middle of the city, so that it will be near everyone, we ought to build a big wooden house where we would gather. We ought to buy a big table and a big samovar and drink a lot of tea, and talk about painting and art.

— Pirosmani

Whatever wars there may be and whatever crises, there will still, please heaven, be the diplomatic corps, with its protocol and formalities and a field of humour which I have never seen better used than in these stories.

— John Betjeman, on Lawrence Durrell's Antrobus Stories