[He] had all the bad traits of the Poles. He was vain, vitriolic, violent, generous in a false way, romantic as a broken-down hack, loyal as a fool and deeply treacherous to boot. Above all he was simply corroded with envy and jealousy.
There is one thing I like about the Poles – their language. Polish, when spoken by intelligent people, puts me in ecstasy. The sound of the language evokes strange images in which there is always a greensward of fine spiked grass in which hornets and snakes play a great part. I remember days long back when Stanley would invite me to visit his relatives; he used to make me carry a roll of music because he wanted to show me off to these rich relatives. I remember this atmosphere well because in the presence of these smooth-tongue, overly polite, pretentious and thoroughly false Poles I always felt miserably uncomfortable. But when they spoke to one another, sometimes in French, sometimes in Polish, I sat back and watched them fascinated.  They made strange Polish grimaces, altogether unlike like our relatives, who were stupid barbarians at bottom. The Poles were like standing snakes fitted up with collars of hornets. I never knew what they were talking about but it always seemed to me as if they were politely assassinating someone.  They were all fitted up with sabers and broadswords which they held in their teeth or brandished fiercely in a thundering charge. They never swerved from the path but rode roughshod over women and children, spiking them with long spikes beribboned with blood-red pennants. All this, of course, in the drawing room over a glass of strong tee, the men in butter-coloured gloves, the women dangling their silly lorgnettes. The women were always ravishingly beautiful, the blond houri type garnered centuries ago during the Crusades. They hissed their long polychromatic words through tiny, sensual mouths whose lips were soft as geraniums. These furious stories with adders and rose petals made an intoxicating sort of music, a steel-gibber which could also register anomalous sounds like sobs and falling jets of water.


Henry Miller, Sexus