Summer, 1969: Morocco

Anais is back in Morocco. Dates and figs. Copper tea sets. Veiled women. Desert quietness. Contemplation. Goats. Mountains. An oasis. Camel markets. Patient donkeys. Mint tea. Snake charmers. Couscous.

"Travel is seeking the lost paradise," she says. "Fez, the history that travels within you. Visit Fez, the spiritual and cultural capital of Morocco," says the ad in the New York Times.

Spring, 1969: Honey, Ping Pong, and Swimming

Some ideas to try -

Anais Nin recommends to her brother Joaquin that when he feels tired, "take a spoonful of honey after a meal. It is not fattening, and you'll be amazed at the effect."

Henry Miller's favorite pastime is playing ping pong - he has a table in his dining room. He can still play even when old and limping.

Anais's favorite pastime is swimming. She swims in her "Tahitian pool two or three times a day to keep fit" and because she loves to swim and feel the water and escape gravity.

Winter, 1968 - 1969: the Poet and the Scientist

"Only when the poet and the scientist work in unison will we have living experiences and knowledge of the marvels of the universe as they are being discovered," Anais Nin says.

Meanwhile, Diary Three is set to be published in September, 1969; The Novel of the Future, a book about writing, was published in 1968.

Fall, 1968: Japanese Literature

Anais Nin feels Japanese literature has "all the qualities lacking in Western literature. It has poetry, subtlety, psychological depths, aesthetic style, and a preponderance of light in the sense of illumination from within. I like so much its emphasis on inner states, moods, feelings, and the fusion of moods with nature. I liked the sensitivity in the meticulous study of relationships, the care for nuances, the beauty of the physical descriptions, and its clear, uncluttered quality, like that of Japanese prints, stating only the essential and suggesting a forest by the study of a branch."

Summer, 1968: Mexico and Asia

During a trip to Acapulco, having been to Asia between now and her last trip to Mexico, Anais Nin is aware of the similarities between the two: "passion for flowers and birds, arrangement of fruits and vegetables in the market, a sense of design." Manners, rituals, even the type of bed in which they sleep, all the same.