Talking of smoking opium, the comfort and luxury, the sort of glory in which H.G.T. moves and the fairly strong doses of flattery that his visitors bring for him — those are things that perhaps befuddle His Hon. now and again more than he realizes.
In short, with all his superficially refined politeness, with his superficially civilized manners, his smart clothes and so on and so on, on consideration and also looking back on it, I find something malicious in His Hon.’s character. I wish it weren’t so, but I can’t say otherwise. I don’t doubt for a moment that His Hon. is a clever man, but another question comes first before I can respect him: is he a good man? Namely someone who doesn’t deliberately and on principle cultivate hatred, rancour, bickering and sarcasm inside himself. That is the question.
I haven’t replied to C.M.’s last letter, nor shall I. I appreciate His Hon.’s telling me that he’ll also take something else later, no doubt out of interest too, but especially if he means it, which time will tell.
Another reason for not regretting lying here quietly for a few days is that, should I need it, I can get an official statement from the doctor here that I’m absolutely not the sort of person who should be sent to Geel or made a ward of court.
And if that isn’t enough, I can also get another, if I make an effort, from the professor in charge of the lying-in clinic in Leiden.
But perhaps those people who might possibly get it into their heads to declare that the family or society would be so much better off if someone like me were to be declared mad or made a ward of court are so extraordinarily brilliant that in such cases they know far better than, for example, the doctor here.
Anyway, a letter from you would of course give me great pleasure at the moment.
Sien is getting ready to leave. I think of her a great deal — I expect her again later. May she come through it safely.
I resisted as long as I could and carried on working, but in the end I realized I needed to see a doctor urgently. But he told me just this morning that I would soon be rid of it. Did you get the two little drawings?
Adieu with a handshake, and wishing you as much good fortune as anyone could deal with.
Ever yours,
Vincent
I must tell you again that the precedent of Geel, at which time they were minded to make me a ward of court on physical grounds, makes it difficult for the family suddenly to change their story now and look for financial rather than physical reasons. Such arguments won’t hold water. Again, I hope they won’t go that far.
But write soon, for I’m longing for a letter.
You do understand, Theo, that I don’t discuss family matters with the doctor here or the professor in Leiden — but because I’m being treated by the former and Sien by the latter, it will only take a word from me in the last resort to secure the testimony of these two gentlemen to set against any possible statements by a few people of which you spoke.
242 | The Hague, Sunday, 2 July 1882 | To Theo van Gogh (D)
Sunday afternoon
My dear Theo,
As I wrote to you yesterday, I went to Leiden. Sien gave birth last night, had a very difficult delivery but thank God she survived, together with a jolly nice little boy. Her mother and child and I went there together — you can imagine how tense we were, not knowing what we’d hear when we enquired after her from the nurse at the hospital, and how delighted we were to be told: gave birth last night . . . . . but you mustn’t talk to her too much … I shan’t soon forget that ‘you mustn’t talk to her too much’, because that meant ‘you can still talk to her’ and might equally well have been ‘you will never speak to her again’. Theo, I was so happy when I saw her again, and she was lying right by the window with a view of the garden full of sun and greenery in a sort of exhausted drowse in between sleeping and being awake, and then she looked up and saw us all. Ah, old chap, she had such a look on her face and she was so glad to see us, and because by chance we were there exactly 12 hours after it happened, while visitors are allowed only 1 hour a week. And she was so cheered up and came to her senses in every respect in a second, and asked about everything.
But what I can’t get over is the child, in particular because although it was delivered with forceps it wasn’t the least bit harmed, and lay in its cradle with a sort of air of worldly wisdom. They’re so clever, those doctors. By all accounts it was a critical situation. There were 5 professors present when it happened, and she was given chloroform. Before that she had endured an enormous amount because the baby was stuck from 9 in the evening until half past one. And she’s still in considerable pain. But she forgot it all when she saw us, and even said to me that we’d soon be drawing again, and I have absolutely no objection if her prediction proves entirely accurate. There’s no tearing or anything, which can easily happen in such a case.
By Jove, I’m so thankful. But the sombre shadow still threatens, and the master Albrecht Dürer knew that when he placed Death behind the young couple in the wonderful etching you know. But we must hope that the sombre shadow remains only a shadow that will pass. Well, Theo, as you well know, if I hadn’t had your help Sien probably wouldn’t be here. Another thing — I asked Sien to ask the professor to give her a proper examination, because she often has what they call a white discharge. He did so, and advised her on what she must do to be completely cured.
And he says that she had been at death’s door more than once, especially during her previous throat illness, in an earlier miscarriage, and then last winter, that she has been profoundly weakened by a life of turmoil and agitation, year after year, that now that she no longer needed to lead that life she’d recover of her own accord, provided there are no complications, with rest, tonics, plenty of fresh air and no heavy labour.
When she’s past her old misery, there will be a completely new period in her life: she won’t get back her spring — that is over, and was cruel anyway — but her second growth can be all the fresher. You know how, in the middle of summer when the greatest heat has passed, the trees throw out fresh young shoots, a new layer of young green over the old, faded one.
I’m sitting writing to you next to Sien’s mother at a window looking out on a sort of courtyard. I’ve drawn it twice, once large and once smaller. C.M. has both and they were the ones, especially the large one, that Rappard liked. I’d like you to see them if you visit C.M. because I would particularly like to know what you think of the large one. When are you coming?
I long to see you. Well brother, you have it on your conscience that I’m so happy today that it made me cry. Thanks for everything, old chap, and believe me, with a handshake in thought,
Ever yours,
Vincent
244 | The Hague, Thursday, 6 July 1882 | To Theo van Gogh (D)
Dear brother,
Having received your letter and the 100 francs enclosed, I thank you most sincerely and feel the need to write to you again straightaway. Because I think it would be a good idea if I explained, honestly and to the best of my knowledge and with all the earnestness in me, some matters which it’s important you should be fully aware of and understand. So I hope that you’ll read this letter at your ease and with patience, because for me so much depends on it. Tomorrow morning I’m going back to the hospital and I’ll lay my head down there calmly if I know that you’ve been informed about everything as fully and clearly as the distance permits.
I would much, much rather that you’d been present, so that I could have shown you everything here this afternoon and discussed it with you. But let’s hope that will happen in August. Before going on to various other matters, I must tell you that I was very taken by one passage in your letter describing Paris by night. Because it evoked a memory of myself when I too saw ‘Paris all grey’ and was struck by that so very curious effect, with the little black figure and the distinctive white horse that brings out the delicacy of those curious greys exactly like that. That touch of dark and that tonal white are the key to the harmony. But in the hospital jus
t recently, as it happens, an artist who described that Paris all grey with the hand of a master made a great impression on me. In ‘Une page d’amour’ by Emile Zola I found several townscapes painted or drawn in a masterly, masterly fashion — entirely in the sentiment of the simple passage in your letter. And that small book by him is why I’m very definitely going to read everything by Zola, of whom I had only known a few fragments up to now: 1 for which I attempted to make an illustration, ‘Ce que je veux’, and another piece describing an old peasant that was exactly like a drawing by Millet. You have something mightily artistic in you, brother — cultivate it — let it first put down roots one way or another and then flower — don’t give it to just anyone — but seriously, for yourself, think about it, and don’t consider it a misfortune if it concentrates itself through that thinking and comes to occupy quite an important place in your activity. But I may be venturing into forbidden territory, so no more about that for today. Only, again, there is ‘drawing’ in your short description — for me palpable and comprehensible, even though you haven’t yet pursued your impression to the point where it would acquire a more robust body and stand on its feet visibly or palpably for everyone. The true pain and tension of creating begins at the point where you let go of the description — but you have the intelligence of creating in damned good measure. Now you can’t go any further because you don’t yet believe in yourself in this respect, otherwise you would take the plunge, that’s to say venture further. But enough. There’s a certain je ne sais quoi in your description, a scent — a memory — of a watercolour by Bonington, for example, only it’s still faint as if in a mist. Do you know that drawing in words is also an art, and sometimes betrays a hidden force latent inside, just as the blue or grey cloud of smoke betrays the hearth?
I most certainly do appreciate what Pa and Ma did during my illness — you remember I wrote to you about it right away — as much as I value the visit by H.G.T. However, that’s not why I didn’t immediately write to Pa and Ma about Sien or anything else, and only sent a brief word to tell them of my recovery. And here’s why. Because something is left of what happened last summer and this winter that marks the line between past and present like an iron barrier.
It isn’t in the least my intention to go in the same manner as last year to Pa and Ma to ask their advice or opinion, because it became clear to me then that there was a sharp difference in way of thinking and attitude to life. Nonetheless, it is my ardent desire to keep the peace and to convince Pa and Ma that it wouldn’t be right if they were to turn against me, in the belief that I was someone who only dreamed and didn’t know how to act — that, I say, they are mistaken in their view that my approach to situations is so impractical as to make it necessary for them to ‘guide’ me.
You see, Theo, believe me, I don’t say this out of bitterness, contempt or disdain for Pa and Ma — or to glorify myself — but only to help you grasp one fact, namely this. Pa and Ma aren’t the sort of people to understand me — neither my faults nor my better side — they can’t put themselves in my position. Reasoning with them only leads to quarrels. What’s to be done??? Here’s my plan, which I hope you will approve. I hope to arrange things so that, next month for example, I can put aside 10 guilders, or preferably 15. Then — but not before — I want to write to Pa and Ma that I have something to say to them, that I invite Pa to repeat his journey at my expense and to stay with me for a few days.
I want to show him Sien and her baby, which he won’t be expecting, as well as the house bright and the studio with all manner of work in progress, and myself, by then fully recovered, I hope.
In my view all this will have a better and deeper and more desirable effect than words or writing. I’ll tell him briefly how Sien and I struggled through her anxious pregnancy last winter — how you helped and still help us loyally, even though you only heard about Sien later. That for me she is priceless, first through the love and attachment between us that circumstances have strengthened, and second because from the start she has devoted herself utterly, with great good will, intelligence and practical skill, to helping me in my work. And that she and I dearly hope that Pa will approve of my having taken her as my wife. I can’t put it any other way than ‘having taken’, because the formality of marriage is not what makes her my wife, since this is a bond that already exists — a feeling from both sides that we love, understand and help each other. As for what Pa will say about marrying itself, I believe he’ll say, ‘Marry her’.
I would like Pa to have a fresh and clear impression of a new future for me, to see me here in surroundings very different from what he may imagine, for him to be completely reassured about my feelings towards him, for him to have confidence in my future and put wardship or Geel a thousand miles from his thoughts. You see, Theo, I know of no more direct or honest way or means than what I’ve described to restore relations soon and in a practical fashion. Write and let me know your feelings about this.
Now, furthermore, I don’t think it superfluous to tell you again, although it’s difficult to express, what I feel for Sien. I have a sense of being at home when I’m with her, a sense that she brings my ‘hearth and home’ with her, a sense that we have grown together. This is an intensely deep feeling, serious and not without the dark shadow of her and my fairly sombre pasts, a shadow I’ve written to you about before, as if, indeed, something sombre continues to threaten us against which our life must be a constant struggle. At the same time, though, I feel a great calm and clarity and cheerfulness at the thought of her and of the straight path lying before me.
You know that last year I wrote to you a great deal about Kee Vos — so that, it seems to me, you have a clear picture of what took place within me. Don’t think that I exaggerated my feelings to you — it was a strong, passionate love I felt for her, unlike that for Sien. When I discovered in Amsterdam that she had a sort of dislike for me, which I didn’t think was the case, to such an extent that she regarded my behaviour as coercion and wasn’t even prepared to see me, but ‘that she went out of the door of her own house as long as I was inside it’, then — but not before — my love for her received a mortal blow. Which I first became aware of when, recovering from my intoxication as it were, I was in The Hague this winter. At that time there was a sense of inexpressible melancholy in me which I find impossible to describe. I know that I then thought very, very often of a manly remark by père Millet: ‘It has always seemed to me that suicide is the act of a dishonest man’.
The emptiness, the inexpressible wretchedness inside, made me think — yes, I can understand why there are people who jump into the water — it’s just that I was far from approving of what those people did, and I found solidity in the words I’ve quoted, and thought it much the better approach to get hold of oneself and seek a medicine in work. The way, as you know, I tackled it then.
It’s difficult, terribly difficult, indeed impossible, to think of something like my passion of last year as an illusion. That’s what Pa and Ma do, but I say, ‘Even if it will never be, it could have been’. It wasn’t an illusion, but the attitudes differed and the turn taken by circumstances was such that the ways diverged further and further instead of coming together.
This is how I see it — these are my clear and honest thoughts — it could have been but now it never can be. Was Kee Vos right to have a dislike for me, was I wrong to persist? I declare I do not know. And it isn’t without pain and sorrow that I think back on it and write about it. I would like so much to understand better why Kee Vos was like that then and how it was that my parents and hers were so adamantly ominous and opposed, not so much through their words — although very certainly through them too, above all indirectly in the meaning more than the form — as through their complete lack of genuine, warm, living sympathy. I can’t soften these words, but I think of it as a mood of theirs that I would rather forget. Now, in the circumstances, it’s like a large, deep wound in me that has healed but is still palpable.
At that
time — in that winter — could I feel ‘love’ again straight afterwards? Certainly not. But was it wrong that the human feeling in me wasn’t extinguished or numbed, and that my sorrow indeed aroused a need for compassion with others??? I think not. So at first Sien was a fellow human being to me, as alone and unhappy as I was. Yet, not being in despair, I was in the right state of mind to be able to give her some practical support, which at the same time was a stimulus to me to carry on. But gradually, slowly, something else developed between her and me. A certain need for each other. So that she and I stayed close together, entering each other’s lives more and more, and then it was love.
Theo, I must perhaps touch on a point that may be painful for you that may make you understand what I mean. In the past you had what Pa and Ma also call an ‘illusion’ for a woman of the people, and the fact that nothing came of it wasn’t because you couldn’t take that path in life but because things took a different course, and you have since adapted to life in another class where you are now firmly established, so that for you it wouldn’t again be an illusion if you wanted to marry a girl from your class. In your case that wouldn’t arouse any comment, and although nothing came of that first love, something might come of a new love, and you would succeed. In my opinion, your way is definitely not to take a woman of the people: with you the so-called illusion was the woman of the people; the reality for you has now become the woman from the same kind of class as Kee Vos.
Ever Yours Page 32