A. Karen Blixen wrote to the American author, Fleur Cowles Meyer:
"I
think Marilyn is bound to make an almost overwhelming impression on the
people who meet her for the first time. It is not that she is
pretty,--although she is of course almost incredibly pretty, but
she radiates, at the same time, unbounded vitality and a kind of
unbelievable innocence. I have met the same in a lion-cub, which
my native servants in Africa brought me. I would not keep her, since I
felt that it would in some way be wrong. . . I shall never forget the
almost overpowering feeling of unconquerable strength and sweetness
which she conveyed. I had all the wild nature of Africa amicably gazing
at me with mighty playfulness." [21 February 1961, Breve 1931-62.]
None
of several third-hand accounts about Karen Blixen's [Isak
Dinesen's] putative dancing on a table with Marilyn Monroe seems to present a realistic picture. Their meeting is
described in two books by authors who were present at the meeting: Notater om Karen Blixen by Clara Svendsen (her
secretary and companion on her trip to the United States), and
Illumination and Night Glare, the unfinished autobiography of Carson
McCullers.
Clara Svendsen says that, on February 5, 1959, Arthur Miller and
Marilyn Monroe came to collect Karen Blixen and herself in a small
foreign car and drove them from New York City to Nyack-on-Hudson, New
York, to the home of Carson McCullers for lunch. She notes that photos were taken "both before and after the lunch" by the press--and also by some of the serving staff in the house.
Carson McCullers says Karen Blixen ate only oysters and drank only champagne. McCullers goes on to say:
"I
was afraid that the reality would not match my dream. . . She used lots
of kohl with bright lipstick on her mouth. Her appearance was more
consciously artificial than I expected, but I soon got used to this and
I was left with the impression of unselfconsciousness and absolute
charm."
No first-hand account mentions any dancing. Karen Blixen was so frail
at the time that she was able to walk only by holding on to someone
else. Clara Svendsen mentions that Marilyn Monroe insisted on being
dropped off at the office of her physician on the way home. [One
wonders if the visit to her doctor was related to her reported drug
dependency. On this day she told the others she had "a splitting
headache."]
| Coulsong