“Dear Francine du Plessix Gray” by Candace Walsh (fiction ’19)
An excerpt from “Dear Francine du Plessix Gray” by Candace Walsh (fiction ’19), published by New Limestone Review.
Dear Francine du Plessix Gray
Dear Francine du Plessix Gray:
I am writing to inform you that The New Yorker search field’s autocorrect changed Plessix to Pelisse before my very eyes. Dictionary.com definitions for pelisse describe “an outer garment lined or trimmed with fur” or “a woman’s long cloak with slits for the arms.” Contextually, I thought a pelisse was a bit like a camisole, or maybe even a plimsoll, which is a fancy British word for a sneaker. I need to know this, or one third of me needs to know this, as I have applied as a graduate student to one British university, one university in Ohio, and I’ve also applied for a teaching position at a university in New York. Then again, in all of those potential fates, knowing what plimsoll means is better than the alternative.
