Word: loulou
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...novel begins and ends with an bit of literary taxidermy. The loose structure is contained within the story of Braithwaite's search for the stuffed parrot which served as the model for Loulou, the parrot of this housekeeper Felicite in Flaubert's tale "Us Center Simple" ("A. Simple Heart"). More than the trivial by-product of Braithwaite's loopy obsession, the quest for the real parrot becomes a tongue-in-beak metaphor for the essence of Flaubert...
...that the parrot, representing clever vocalisation without much brain power, was Pure Word. If you were a French academic, you might say he was symbole de Logos. Being English, I hasten back to the corporeal: to that svelte, perky creature I had seen at the Hotel-Dieu. I imagined Loulou sitting on the other side of Flaubert's desk and staring back at him like some taunting reflection from a funfair mirror. No wonder three weeks of its parodic presence caused irritation. Is the writer much more than a sophisticated parrot...
Huppert, too often the ice maiden of French movies (The Lacemaker, Loulou), merges sugar and steel to embody the superior, frustrated Lena. In her face and gestures, Miou Miou finds reasons for each of Madeleine's enigmatic quirks...
Saint Laurent is deeply devoted to his professional "family," which includes Bergé, his partner in private as well as business life; Loulou Klossowski, an associate who is particularly gifted at choosing accessories; and a few longtime assistants. Saint Laurent blames his depression on ambition and precocious success. Before leaving for New York City, he spoke with TIME Correspondent William Blaylock in his Left Bank mansion. "I never had an adolescence," he said. "I became famous right away, and being shy, I found it difficult to get involved with others. Suffering is a necessary part of the creative process...
...glaring irrelevancy of using Loulou de la Falaise as an example of someone "undoubtedly elegant, chic" may be excused if one keeps in mind the impossibility of defining the French in an uncontroversial way. One might paraphrase Antishthenes: One can know such and such a Frenchman, but never Frenchness. As Zeldin puts it, the book's intent is to show "what absurdities follow" when one sums up the French or any other culture in a phrase or epigram