Quills

This blog is dedicated to the character Madeleine from the famous play and movie, “Quills.”  She is a linen maid in an insane asylum who has become friends with the Marqius De Sade and even helps him publish some of his filthy writings from his prison. 

Madeleine: If I wasn't such a bad woman on the page, I couldn't be such a good woman in life. –Quills.

We once had an old friend over for dinner and he looked up at my bookshelf and laughed.  When I asked him what he found so amusing, he noted that the Holy Bible and the Collected Works of the Marquis De Sade were stacked on top of each other.  Last night, I was up with the cough and had trouble sleeping.  My husband couldn’t help noticing that if I wasn’t lulling myself to sleep with some moral or spiritual text written by the Dali Llama or Ghandi or what not, I was escaping into a fantasy world of horror or erotica.  I told him I had been reading a short story about an obsessive compulsive who was sewing up the artery of a victim he had found, or did he kill her?  It was very gory and intricate.  “This is what lulls you to sleep at night?” he asked.  

“Yes, but right next to it is the autobiography of Ghandi and His Experiments With Truth.  I’m reading that too.”  
“You’re weird,” he sighed, shaking his head.

Coulmier: But why must you indulge in his pornography? 
Madeleine: It's a hard days' wages slaving away for madmen, what I've seen in life - it takes a lot to hold my interest. –Quills

When I was a young girl in the summertime and I didn’t have to worry about going to school the next day, I amused myself by watching midnight episodes of The Twilight Zone while the rest of the family was asleep and could no longer fight me over what channel to watch on the set.  Those were my times of peace as I got as far away from reality I could to journey into a world beyond space and time. 

“But what about reality?” people ask.  “You must keep your head out of the clouds.”  Anyone who is acquainted with my life knows that my reality is quite clear.  I have my duties as a working mother and my life is run like a factory.  I have read my share of self help books and professional literature and I work very hard at my business. So when I do have time to myself, I think I deserve escaping into a dark world where I can be shocked and amused by monsters and ghosts.  I don’t scare easily, never have.  I’m not afraid of adventure and I think I’m a better person for it.  Fairy tales were once dark fiction about a castle and an evil queen and a young girl thrown into a horrifying adventure.  Stories we told when our cousin’s came over or around the campfire highlight some of the happiest times of my life.  There’s nothing like a good scare.  It takes me far away from my worries and puts me right to sleep. If I’m lucky, it might just keep me up all night.

Madeleine: Some things belong on paper, others in life. It's a blessed fool who can't tell the difference. –Quills

Madeleine: Your publisher says I'm not to leave without another manuscript. 
Marquis de Sade: I've just the story. It's the unhappy tale... of a virginal laundry lass. The darling of the lower wards where they entomb the criminally insane. 
Madeleine: Is it awfully violent? 
Marquis de Sade: Most assuredly. 
Madeleine: Is it terribly erotic? 
Marquis de Sade: Fiendishly so. But it comes with a price. A kiss for each page.  --Quills