Here's A Rare Glimpse Inside Salvador Dalí's Unpublished Diaries

Salvador Dalí, the great Surrealist painter and bombastic lover of ocelots, is widely known for his nightmarish depictions of melting timepieces, nesting tigers and spindly-legged elephants. He's less revered for his ability to meticulously monitor his daily expenses.

Thanks to a recent auction at Sotheby's in Paris, the mustachioed master's humdrum knack for documenting his spending, listing each and every transaction amidst a flurry of horse head illustrations and erotic doodles, has finally come to light. Not only did the artist hide original drawings, arbitrary criticisms and spontaneous thoughts inside his journal, he kept his endless charts of numbers -- a peseta here, a few hundred pesetas there -- locked away too.

In a sale this week, Dalí's unpublished diary -- produced sometime between 1930 and 1935 -- sold to an online bidder for €91,800 ($104,000). "This exceptional manuscript in minuscule writing in pink and black ink running from day to day," Sotheby's notes in a press release, "contains notes, criticisms, impressions of art and numerous everyday expenses." It's also littered with his signature drawings: figures, nudes, erotic work, colonnades, horses and heads, mixed together in a fever dream aesthetic not unlike his art.

Below is a preview of Dalí's personal pages, now in the hands of some lucky, nameless collector. While we can't all own a pricey, one-of-a-kind Dalí diary, we can at least digitally pore over the pages, wondering just how extravagant Dalí's budget (category: facial hair grooming) once was.