Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion of Walker Percy

[Marcus Smith <marcus AT loyno.edu>]

Still a lot of visible smudges moving around on Ash Wednesday.  Sunny day.  Trees on St Charles below Napoleon twinkling with stranded plastic beads.  Raw oysters after Mass but they cost $25 for a dozen.

On Fri, Feb 16, 2024 at 11:00 AM <percy-l-request AT lists.ibiblio.org> wrote:

percy-l digest Fri, 16 Feb 2024

Table of contents:

* 1 - [[percy-l] ] Evelyn Waugh: Ash Wednesday in New Orleans -
  lowry.charles AT gmail.com

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Message-ID: <585EB1D8-84CF-4C60-A85C-5C3E95F82B29 AT gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 14 Feb 2024 15:44:47 -0500
From: lowry.charles AT gmail.com
Subject: [[percy-l] ] Evelyn Waugh: Ash Wednesday in New Orleans

Evelyn Waugh did not particularly like the United States, but he discovered
that when he was short of funds, a North American lecture tour was an
excellent tonic.  As part of the tour, he arranged to be in New Orleans on
Mardi Gras and Ash Wednesday.  After the merriment of the former, he spent the
latter in front of his hotel, the Roosevelt, or maybe the Fairmont—I’m not
sure when the name changed.  The hotel sits across Baronne Street from
Immaculate Conception, known as Jesuit Church.  This was his reflection:

“The Jesuit church was teeming with life all day long, a continuous dense
crowd of all colors and conditions moving up to the altar rails and returning
with their foreheads signed with ash….  All that day, all over that light-
hearted city, one encountered the little black smudge on the forehead which
sealed us members of a great brotherhood who can both rejoice and recognize
the limits of rejoicing.”

Happy Birthday, Binx!


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End of percy-l Digest Fri, 16 Feb 2024