Colette’s essence was one of greediness, and by that I don’t mean anything negative. Rather, I mean that she fully embraced life, and all of life’s pleasures. She spent most (if not all) of her life, from her engagement at only 17 years old, in relationships; as one relationship ended, so another began. I suspect that she was never single for very long (if at all), and that there was often an overlap between relationships, as being in a relationship didn’t stop her from having lovers.
Colette argued that having lovers was part of her “gourmandise” (greedy nature). Taking one or several lovers at a time was not manipulative or selfish; it was part of her pure nature, something she did for the pure sake of sexuality and enjoyment, “par folie, par emballement, par… gourmandise” (through madness, enthusiasm… greediness) (“Lettres à Missy” edited by Samia Bordji and Frédéric Maget, p.207). Some writers are greedy for the altered states of alcohol or drugs; Colette was famously greedy for good French food and sex.
When her most famous character, Claudine, cuts off the plaits that used to whip around her knees into a short, curly bob, many of her acquaintances assume that her short hair is a sign that she is attracted to both men and women. We later find out that they are right, when Claudine has an affair with the beautiful, irresistible Rézi. As many of Claudine’s adventures mirror those of the real Colette, it is easy to assume that this was Colette’s experience of having short hair in the 1900s, when gender roles were very defined, and a respectable woman would no more dare to cut off her hair than go out in public without a corset.
At a dinner party, the newly married Claudine is “politely pursued by a young and attractive literary man” with “caressing, long lashed eyes”. This description is probably code for a gay or effeminate man, as he reminds her of “Luce and Marcel” (a friend who had a crush on her, and her gay step-son), and she tells us that (heterosexual) “men do not make up to (flirt with) me. My recent marriage still keeps them at a distance.”
The enamoured young man compares her to “a young Hermes… an Eros… hermaphroditic masterpieces… Narcissus”, but the litany of flattery ruins her enjoyment of a “heavenly cassoulet… served in little silver-handled cocottes.” (Here, a “cocotte” is a mini casserole dish, rather than a lady of pleasure!) Unimpressed, she firmly tells him that he is mistaken: “My soul is full of nothing but haricot beans and little strips of bacon” (Claudine Married, pp.51-52).
Clearly, when a delicious dinner is at stake, nothing should interrupt, not even the most ardent flattery! A cassoulet is a simple yet delicious stew of white kidney beans and bacon and/or sausages, thrown together in one pot and baked in the oven for a couple of hours, until the beans are fat and juicy from soaking up the flavour from the bacon and sausages. And, as the character Maugis (an ill-disguised Willy — Colette’s real-life husband) comments, the advantage of serving cassoulet in individual cocottes at a dinner party is that “one can be sure of getting enough to eat” — something that would be important to Colette!
