The Public Paperfolding History Project

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Revue des Deux Mondes, 1924
 
The 1st May 1924 issue of the French periodical 'Revue des Deux Mondes' contained an article titled 'Avec Miguel de Unamuno a Salamanque' by Andre Corthis. It contains a description of Don Miguel's study which mentions the vulture which sits on his inkwell. Roughly translated, the relevant passages say:

Pages 175 and 176:

'At the edge of the inkwell was perched a vulture of white paper, a "folding" made like those cocottes and small boats which children have fun with, but with what complicated science, what delicate perfection, the collar tucked in, the sad beak, swelling its wings and posing solidly on his claws. Don Miguel showed it to me with pride. That one, he says, I invented it. He explained to me that folding was his mania, his passionate entertainment. In the pulpit itself, during classes, his fingers do not cease to make some paper object or some small animal. And he calls it so strangely – Cocotology.

Under the amusing appearance of a childish and delicate toy, was it a symbol, this melancholic white bird, perched on the inkwell? I asked myself this when I reread, in the collection of the lyrical sonnets, the poem called "To my vulture.'

Page 179:

'During that afternoon when one could hear nothing but the sound of the bells, while the little vulture in white paper was gilded at the edge of the inkwell, all penetrated by reflections, I asked Don Miguel, whose work I knew only very imperfectly, which of his books he preferred.'

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