Diotimos Library · Journals, Notebooks & Fragments Collection · Bilingual Edition
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English Page · Branch 43 of 121
1833 · June 13, 1833
French
p. 85Le 13.
Sans la verdure, on se croirait en décembre. La belle saison s’en est allée je ne sais où. Le soleil y perdra son nom, il fait froid à grelotter. Ce maudit vent d’ouest a envahi le ciel avec ses innombrables troupeaux de nuages et nous inonde de pluie. On croirait voir passer l’hiver là-haut, avec son triste cortège. Rien de plus affligeant que ce contraste de la terre verdoyante, de ce tapis si riche, si merveilleusement diapré que le printemps a tendu sur la surface de la terre pour y poser ses beaux pieds, avec la voûte céleste toute noircie par des nuages pluvieux. Je me figure un mariage célébré dans une église tendue de noir. Oh! d’ailleurs, même dans les plus beaux jours, quelle différence du ciel breton à celui de notre Midi! Ici l’été dans ses jours de solennité a toujours quelque chose de triste, de voilé, de borné. C’est comme un avare qui se met en frais, il y a de la ladrerie dans sa magnificence. Vive notre ciel du Languedoc, si libéral en lumière, si bleu, si largement arqué!
The Green Notebook: 1833
p. 86June 13, 1833
Without the greenery, one would think it December. The fine season has gone away I know not where. The sun will lose its name here; it is cold enough to make one shiver. This cursed west wind has invaded the sky with its countless flocks of clouds and floods us with rain. One might think winter were passing up there with its sad procession. Nothing is more distressing than the contrast between the green earth, that carpet so rich, so marvelously varied which spring has spread over the earth’s surface to place her lovely feet upon it, and the vault of heaven all blackened by rain clouds. I picture a wedding celebrated in a church hung with black. Oh, besides, even on the finest days, what a difference between Brittany’s sky and that of our South! Here summer, on its days of solemn splendor, always has something sad, veiled, confined. It is like a miser going to some expense; there is stinginess in its magnificence. Long live our Languedoc sky, so generous in light, so blue, so broadly arched!
Socrates
Reading The Green Notebook · 1833 · June 13, 1833
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Maurice de Guérin’s journal moves between close attention to nature, friendship, faith, and the inward demands of poetry. This bilingual edition presents the complete Journal section of the 1864 printing, with a separate appendix of earlier printed passages from 1861.
Historical Text and Translation
The French follows G. S. Trébutien’s sixth edition of Journal, lettres et poèmes (Paris: Didier et Cie, 1864), pages 3–126. Its 116 dated entries run from July 1832 to October 1835. Five earlier passages from Reliquiae (1861) appear separately in the appendix. Completeness refers to the printed Journal, rather than the autograph notebook; the following letters and poems are outside this edition.
About Diotimos Editions
Diotimos Editions prepared this independent English translation directly from the French, preserving Guérin’s imagery, repetitions, intimate voice, and original paragraph divisions. French and English remain aligned for comparison. Translator’s notes clarify words, quotations, and allusions, while historical editor notes retain their separate attribution. The Essential setting keeps explanations useful to reading; All also includes the note on the edition’s typographic treatment.
Rights
The historical French printings are in the public domain in the United States. The independent English translation and new editorial notes are © 2026 Diotimos Editions. The linked facsimiles identify the printed witnesses used for this edition. Historical annotations and editorial conjectures remain attributed to their source editors, and the earlier variant passages are presented separately from the later Journal text.