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Reflecting on Anais Ninn's brief for the bar on the eve of our writers week

Posted on Thu July 25, 2024.

It's an Art hotel. But is it an Art bar ? The thoughts of Anais Ninn the famous mid 19th century writer and author of an outrageously erotic personal diary that shocked society gave us some direction.

I saw a beautiful quote about writing attributed to Anais Ninn emblazoned across a 2nd hand coffee cup in a Kalk Bay bric a brac shop; "I write so that I might have a place to live". It was actually a misquote but for me it sums the attraction of writing up perfectly. Then more recently I came across another quote - this one specific to place;

Author and erotic diarist Anais Ninn

“I need a place where I can shout and weep, I have to be a Spanish savage at some time of the day. I record here the hysteria life causes in me. The overflow of an undisciplined extravagance. To hell with taste and art, with all contradictions and polishings. Here I shout, I dance, I weep, I gnash my teeth, I go mad – all by myself, in bad English, in chaos. It’ll keep me sane for the world and for art”.

Anais Ninn. Incest: From “A journal of love”. 27 October1933.

"To hell with taste and art".