August 7, 1938, Sunday

Paris. Bruno Schulz leaves L’Hôtel d’Orient after seven days and moves to Louis Lille’s for a while but books a room at the American Hôtel the same day. 

Lille* was a co-founder of the “Artes”1 group operating in Lviv. He had lived in Paris since 1937. He had known Schulz since at least May 1930, when they both participated in the Lviv Spring Salon*. As chairman of the Trade Union of Polish Visual Artists, Lille organised an exhibition of Schulz’s works in December 1935. Both artists were friends. Ignacy Witz, who knew them at that time, wrote years later: “[Schulz] was friends with many painters with whom he established a very close contact, such as Włodarski, Lille, Janisch (especially him)”2. However, it is not known if Schulz made any contacts with Lille before coming to Paris. The fact that they met is evidenced by letters written to him by Schulz after his return to Drohobych. Years later, Lille described their Paris meeting as follows: “A year before the war, someone knocked at my studio. Unexpectedly, I saw a familiar figure in the doorframe. A few arm pulls, a few hand movements as if they were sails and Bruno was standing in the studio”3. If this literary description of the events is to be believed, Schulz showed up at Lille’s house unannounced, which rules out the version that on July 31 Lille was waiting for him on the platform of Gare du Nord4. The meeting probably took place before August 7. It is possible that Schulz got persuaded to live with him for a while. On the same day, however, he would book a room at the American Hôtel5, where he would move before August 12.

For a few days, Lille’s address – 51, Boulevard Saint-Jacques – is the new Parisian address of the newcomer from Drohobych6. About the course of the following days we only know that the Schulz, at the request of Lille (or on his own initiative), wrote a letter the following day to Wacław Czarski*, editor of Tygodnik Ilustrowany*, recommending Lille as a collaborator. Lille, in turn, undertook some activities related to the French edition of Schulz’s prose. This is evidenced by the mention in the letter from September 18: “Thank you for further efforts to translate my things”7. However, what these efforts consisted of remains unknown8. If, to some extent, Lille became a guide to the Parisian artistic milieu for the visitor from Drohobych, it was probably primarily to its Polish-speaking part.

Schulz spends no more than four nights in Lille’s studio. On August 11, he mentions a different address: American Hôtel, 15, rue Bréa. He probably lives in this hotel until the end of his stay in Paris. After returning to Drohobych, thanking Lille for his hospitality and help, he would write: “I felt good and safe with you”9. (sr) (transl. mw)

  • 1
    On Lille and the “Artes” group see Piotr Łukaszewicz, Zrzeszenie artystów plastyków Artes. 1929–1936, Wrocław 1975.
  • 2
    Ignacy Witz, Obszary malarskiej wyobraźni. Eseje, Kraków 1967, p. 40. Similarly, in Łukaszewicz’s monograph: Schulz was “friends not only with Włodarski, but also Janisch and Lille” (op. cit., p. 92).
  • 3
    Ludwik Lille, “O Brunonie Schulzu, Poecie i Malarzu”, Oficyna Poetów 1969, no. 4, pp. 12–14, cited according to the version published on the basis of the original manuscript by Ariko Kato (“Schulz i Lille”, Schulz/Forum 3, 2014, pp. 126–134).
  • 4
    Such a version was given by Wiesław Budzyński – see his book Schulz pod kluczem, Warszawa 2013, p. 188.
  • 5
    Schulz’s confirmation of booking a room at the American Hôtel, dated August 7, has been preserved (Museum of Literature, inv. 5908). It shows that Schulz made an advance payment of 90 francs for booking room 19. The cost of a week’s stay was to be 110 francs. The amount of the advance payment indicates that the agreed booking period of the room at the American Hôtel must have been longer than a week. 
  • 6
    Schulz mentions this address in a letter to Wacław Czarski. Budzyński presents the dates and sequence of Schulz’s moves in Paris in a different way: “On July31, Schulz already stayed in the Orient Hotel [...], where he was booked until August 7; and on August 7 already in the American Hôtel, where he probably stayed one day, and only then, on August 8 or even later, did he stay with Lille” (ibidem, p. 371).
  • 7
    Letter from Bruno Schulz to Ludwik Lille dated September 18,1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, Dzieła zebrane, volume 5: Księga listów, zebrał i przygotował do druku Jerzy Ficowski, uzupełnił Stanisław Danecki, Gdańsk 2016, p. 132.
  • 8
    The only clue is the mention in Maria Chasin’s letter about Kracauer of “Recommending [Schulz] to Mrs. Adrenne Mounier” – see: letter from Maria Chazen to Bruno Schulz dated July 26, 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, Dzieła zebrane, volume 5: Księga listów, zebrał i przygotował do druku Jerzy Ficowski, uzupełnił Stanisław Danecki, Gdańsk 2016, p. 299.
  • 9
    Letter from Bruno Schulz to Ludwik Lille dated September 2, 1938, [in:] Bruno Schulz, op. cit., p. 131.