Anaïs Nin through the years

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) in the snow wearing wool cap, 1911 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) in white dress (studio photograph with studio stamp), Barcelona 1910 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) wearing a jacket and a beret, 1915 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) sitting at a desk, writing, 1914 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs and her two brothers, Thorvald and Joaquín Nin, 1913 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) sitting on bench wearing hat, 1919 | src The Anais Nin Trust

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977) wearing hat adorned with flowers, studio portrait, ca. 1920 | src The Anais Nin Trust

A Gothic visual dialogue

Film still from The Sorrows of Satan (D.W. Griffith, 1926), starring Adolphe Menjou, Carol Dempster, Ricardo Cortez and Lya de Putti
The screenplay was based on the Victorian gothic novel by Marie Corelli (1895)

Watch the film on YouTube ~ link to this scene : here

Nevertheless, our favorite scene takes place a few minutes before during the night in Geoffrey’s ominous mansion. Geoffrey’s wife, an exotic Russian princess in exile (Lya de Putti) confess Prince Lucio that she married Geoffrey only to be near him (Satan). Geoffrey awakens and creeps down the stairs to find his wife throwing herself at Lucio’s feet. It’s a suspenseful sequence with shadowy shots of the mansion that looks menacing. Link to scene

Read the novel on Project Gutenberg : The Sorrows of Satan or, The Strange Experience of One Geoffrey Tempest, Millionaire, A Romance : eBook

Cover design for Bela Lugosi’s Dead, the first single by the English post-punk band Bauhaus, released on 6 August 1979
It is often considered the first gothic rock record

Listen to «Bela Lugosi’s Dead» on Bauhaus Official YouTube channel