The Marquis de Sade Tells His Version of the Aristocrats Joke
He raises a moiré handkerchief to dab at the symptom. “Yes, unpillaged, undamaged, the precious scroll will remain in its chink, no matter what chaos might descend upon this frangible fortress. Covered, front and back, with exquisitely minuscule calligraphy, nary a correction nor striking-out, it is the manuscript of my chef d’oeuvre: a hundred thousand words of the most impure tale ever told, stretching no fewer than eleven-point-nine of the ‘meters’ lately calculated by Messrs. Delambre and Méchain.
By Tom Bradley.