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he gave one a heightened sense of life. I saw him in his studio in the Rue Saint Augustin, an old, old studio, and there was nothing in it except a few paintings of his own, a newspaper with orange peels arranged on it in such a way that it made a composition, an interesting composition, and a painting by Matisse that he liked, that he'd gotten during the war.

After that, I had a very sad experience. I was in the south of France and asked Pierre Matisse if I could go to see Picasso with him. Maybe this was in 1959. He said, “Yes, I'll ask him.” At the same time, I had some friends who were friends of Winston Churchill, and they asked me one day if I would eat lunch with Churchill. Well, I was delighted and said I would. Pierre Matisse telephoned me and asked would I eat lunch with Picasso, the same day.

I had to choose between Churchill and Picasso. I chose Churchill, which seemed perfectly natural to Churchill when I told him about it. He thought Picasso was a terrible painter, totally negligible. But Picasso was offended, so I've been afraid to be in touch with him since. However, I have recently received a message that he would like reproductions of the paintings that I own by him. So I'm going to send the reproductions -- I have some color reproductions of his paintings -- and write him a nice note and hope I can go to see him.

The book called Life of Picasso by his mistress, Francoise Gillot, is extremely entertaining, but it shows that he is an extraordinary cruel man, as one would think from some of the pictures. Cruel in his human relationships. Have you read it?