To Maria Cosway

Paris Octob. 13. 1786

My Dear Madam

Just as I had sealed the inclosed I received a letter of a good length, dated Antwerp, with your name at the bottom. I prepared myself for a feast. I read two or three sentences: looked again at the signature to see if I had not mistaken it. It was visibly yours. Read a sentence or two more. Diable! Spelt your name distinctly. There was not a letter of it omitted. Began to read again. In fine after reading a little and examining the signature, alternately, half a dozen times, I found that your name was to four lines only instead of four pages. I thank you for the four lines however because they prove you think of me. Little indeed, but better a little than none. To shew how much I think of you I send you the inclosed letter of three sheets of paper, being a history of the evening I parted with you. But how expect you should read a letter of three mortal sheets of paper? I will tell you. Divide it into six doses of half a sheet each, and every day, when the toilette begins, take a dose, that is to say, read half a sheet. By this means it will have the only merit it’s length and dulness can aspire to, that of assisting your coëffeuse to procure you six good naps of sleep. I will even allow you twelve days to get through it, holding you rigorously to one condition only, that is, that at whatever hour you receive this, you do not break the seal of the inclosed till the next toilette. Of this injunction I require a sacred execution. I rest it on your friendship, and that in your first letter you tell me honestly whether you have honestly performed it.—I send you the song I promised. Bring me in return it’s subject, Jours heureux! Were I a songster I should sing it all to these words ’Dans ces lieux qu’elle tarde à se rendre’! Learn it I pray you, and sing it with feeling.—My right hand presents it’s devoirs to you, and sees with great indignation the left supplanting it in a correspondence so much valued. You will know the first moment it can resume it’s rights. The first exercise of them shall be addressed to you, as you had the first essay of it’s rival. It will yet, however, be many a day. Present my esteem to Mr. Cosway, and believe me to be yours very affectionately,

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Days are endless. My companions at the darkest hour before dawn are perhaps equally perturbed as I am. I don’t know if they acknowledged my existance, I don’t know if they had the heart to. Thoughts have been surging through my mind like the pages of my scripts caught in the storm brewing in the distance. I can’t think about you when I’m like this. My mind is crowded, congested and diseased.

My soul was embraced in the secret quivering of a pleasure that cannot be experienced on this earth. Lord! The labor I am now engaged in (Dead Souls), which was inspired by him, his creation- I do not have the strength to go on with it. Several times I have taken up my pen, and it has fallen from my hand."

Gogol's reaction to Pushkin's death in a letter to Pletnyov, on 28 march 1837, while he was in Rome.

"My loss is greater than anyone else's... my life, my most sublime delight has perished with him... I undertook nothing, I wrote nothing without his advice. For everything good that is in me, I am indebted to him... What does my life mean now!"

Gogol's letter to Pogodin on 30 march 1837

"Oh Pushkin, Pushkin! What a beautiful dream I dreamt in life!" Gogol exclaimed in a letter to Zhukovskij on october 30, 1847

To homosexuals (lesbian and gay),

You aren’t just ‘going through a phase’, your sexuality is valid. And even though people say that you have to find the ‘right guy’ or ‘right girl’, you don’t need to, because The One can be a girl/guy too. If people call you a ‘dyke’ or ‘fag’, you need to know that you aren’t what they say. Don’t let them minimize your entire personality into a label. You need to know who you are and that it isn’t sinful or unnatural or bad. You are so much more than that label they stamped on you. Being homosexual doesn’t make you a ‘dyke’ or a ‘fag’, it makes you, you. And you are great, okay?

To bisexuals/pansexuals

The world is in debate on whether you are LGBT or not, because all they see is gay or straight. They say that you are ‘just confused’. They say that you are ‘straight’. They think that you will cheat. Some lesbians won’t date you if you have been with a man, and they think that you are impure. Let me tell you something—-they are wrong. You don’t have to choose one gender. You don’t have to lie to stay with someone. You are real and valid, and don’t let no one take advantage of you because of your sexuality.

To my transgender people,

This isn’t just a ‘phase’. You aren’t just a ‘tomboy’ or a guy who likes feminine things. You aren’t a ‘tranny’.

You are a real girl. People have said that you are a ‘man in a dress’ or that you are ‘trying to take womanhood from ‘real women’ ‘. But you aren’t. You are as much as a girl as them and though they discriminate, hate, stare, you are real. And don’t forget that you are beautiful 🌟

You are a real boy. You aren’t a fetish. You don’t have a mental disorder. People say things like ‘Why do such pretty girls want to be boys?’ and ‘Such a shame. She was so pretty.’ but you aren’t a disappointment for coming out, you aren’t bad for not being a girl. Don’t let them guilt trip you. You are a boy. Don’t let the dysphoria get you down, you are a stud ✨