One of those "delicious do-nothing" afternoons. I am poring over past correspondence (admiring chance cadences, the spirited loops and writhing strokes of unretouched handwriting), the chaotic scrawl of writing drafts (furiously and densely annotated; a stray beautiful thought being framed and shaped, fugitive impressions rescued and preserved). But also performance programmes, tickets, receipts...compulsively hoarding the accumulated detritus of my life, objets retrouvés, reclaimed beached treasures, shell necklaces, bottled ships, "the refuse of my profession" (Updike).

I need a fresh idiom, wafting forth exoticism and otherness. But not the bad-translation sort. Who should I attempt to imitate next?