Mine is absolutely different

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 1st half February 1886

Just yesterday I finished the drawing I made for the evening class's competition. It is the figure of Germanicus that you know. Well, I am sure I shall place last, because all the drawings of the others are exactly alike, and mine is absolutely different. But I saw how that drawing they will think best was made. I was sitting just behind it, and it is correct, it is whatever you like, but it is dead, and that's what all the drawings I saw are.

Enough of this, but let it annoy us so much that it makes us enthusiastic for something nobler, and that we hasten to achieve this.

You, too, need a more vigorous life, and if we might succeed in joining hands, together we should know more than each separately, and should be able to do more.

Letter 452
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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If I could go my own way

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 1st half February 1886

I must also tell you that, although I keep going there, that nagging of those fellows at the academy is often almost unbearable, for they remain positively spiteful.

But I try systematically to avoid all quarrels, and go my own way. And I feel I am on the track of what I am seeking, and perhaps I should find it the sooner if I could go my own way.

Yet I irritate them even though I don't say anything; and they, me.

But this doesn't matter so much, the problem is to go on trying to find a better working method. So - patience and perseverance.

Letter 452
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Please allow me to come

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 1st half February 1886

Just think, if all goes well, and if I had good food, etc., all that time, which certainly will leave something to be desired, even in that case it will take about six months before I shall have recovered entirely.

Now, at this moment, I am feeling terribly weak, even worse than that, from reaction after overwork, but that is the natural course of things and nothing extraordinary; but as it is a question of taking better nourishment, etc., you see in Brabant I shall again spend my last penny on models; it will be the same story all over again, and I do not think that will be right. In that way we stray from our path. So please allow me to come sooner, I should almost say at once.

Letter 452
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Those who have dared something

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early February 1886

Founding a studio together would perhaps be a good thing, but we must feel sure that we can carry it through - and we must know our own minds perfectly, and once we begin it, we must have a certain confidence after all, left us after a long series of lost illusions.

And such a studio - in starting it one must know that it will be a battle and that people in general will be absolutely indifferent, so one ought to begin it feeling confident of some power - wanting to be somebody, wanting to be active - so that when one dies one can think, I go where all those who have dared something go - well, we shall see.

Letter 448
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Not to be discouraged

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early February 1886

More and more I believe that l'art pour l'art, to work for work's sake, l'energie pour l'energie - is after all the principle of all great artists, for in the case of the de Goncourts one sees how necessary obstinacy is, for society will not thank them for it.

But in painting one finds a certain rest in the histories of those painters who aimed at the most sublime through it all.

Israels himself, for instance, was still quite unknown and poor, even to the extent of having nothing to eat but dry bread - when he nevertheless wanted to go to Paris, though the circumstances were discouraging enough.

Not to be discouraged, even though one is almost starving, and though one feels one has to say farewell to all material comfort in life!

Letter 448
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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The work need not suffer

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 3 February 1886

But, Theo, this indisposition is a damn bad thing just now; I regret it terribly, but yet I keep courage. It will right itself.

One must not think that people whose health is impaired, wholly or partly, are no good for painting. It is necessary to reach the sixties, or at least the fifties, if one begins at thirty. But one need not be perfectly healthy, one may have all kinds of ailments. The work need not suffer from it. On the contrary, nervous people are more sensitive and refined.

But, Theo, just because my health is decidedly impaired, I am resolved to apply myself to the higher figure, and to try to refine myself. It overtook me so unexpectedly, I had been feeling weak and feverish, but I went on anyway; but I began to feel worried when more and more of my teeth broke off and I began to look more and more sick. Well, we will try to remedy it.

Letter 449
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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It is no bad sign

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 3 February 1886

For speaking of Cormon, I think he would tell me much the same thing as Verlat, namely that I must draw from the nude or plaster casts for a year, just because I have always been drawing from life.

And when people like Verlat or Cormon, for instance, demand this of a fellow, I assure you it is no bad sign. For there are plenty of those whom Verlat simply lets drudge on, for they will never attain anything. You speak of clever fellows in that studio of Cormon's - just because I would damn well like to be one of them, I feel for myself that I must insist on devoting at least a year in Paris to drawing from the nude and from plaster casts. And do not think this is a long way, for it is a short one. One who can draw a figure from memory is much more productive than one who cannot. And you will see how productive I shall become by taking the trouble to draw for a whole year.

Letter 449
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I cannot master the rest

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, February 1885

When there was snow, I also painted a few studies of our garden. The landscape has changed much since then; now we have splendid evening skies of lilac with gold over dark silhouettes of cottages between the masses of ruddy-colored brushwood - above which rise the spare black poplars, while the foregrounds are of a faded and bleached green, varied by strips of black earth and pale withered rushes along the ditch edges.

I certainly see all this too - I think it just as superb as anybody else, but I am even more interested in the proportion of a figure, the division of the oval of the head, and I cannot master the rest before I have a better grip on the figure.

Well - first comes the figure; I personally cannot understand the rest without it, and it is the figure that creates the atmosphere.

Letter 394
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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My work is valuable

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, early February 1885

I think I am working a bit too hard to doubt that it will not be long before I shall be able somewhat to lighten the financial burden I am imposing on you. Maybe it will take longer than I think agreeable, to you as well as to me, but plodding on is a way that will not lead to complete failure.

And if I insist on taking vigorous measures, it is to obviate the possibility of quarreling. For the possibility of a quarrel is gone at the very moment I find the means to cover my financial needs. Then my work will no longer be at issue, and now it is.

Therefore don't despair. But now it's wretched for both of us.

And to me my work is valuable; I must paint a lot - and therefore I am continually in want of models, which - at a time when my work is difficult and exhausting - is an additional reason for thinking it rather dismal to get suspicions in exchange. Never mind, it is a period I have to go through, and one does not paint in order to have an easy time of it.

Letter 388b
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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What I lack is practice

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 28 January 1886

When I compare a study of mine with those of the other fellows, it is curious to see that they have almost nothing in common. Theirs have about the same color as the flesh, so, seen close up, they are very correct - but if one stands back a little, they appear painfully flat - all that pink and delicate yellow, etc., etc., soft in itself, produces a harsh effect. The way I do it, from near by it is greenish-red, yellowish-gray, white-black and many neutral tints and most of them colors one cannot define. But when one stands back a little it emerges from the paint, and there is airiness around it, and a certain vibrating light falls on it. At the same time, the least little touch of color which one may use as highlight is effective in it.

But what I lack is practice, I must paint about fifty of them; I think I shall have reached something then. Now I put the colors on somewhat too painstakingly, because I haven't had enough practice; I must hesitate too long, and so I work the life out of it. But that is a question of time, of exercise, till the touch becomes more immediately correct, the better one has it fixed in one's mind.

I find here the friction of ideas I want. I get a fresh look at my own work, can judge better where the weak points are, which enables me to correct them.

Letter 447
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Mine are totally different

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, mid-January 1886

I have arranged with Vinck (a pupil of Leys's by whom I saw things in the manner of Leys, medieval) to draw works of antiquity in the evening.

I have been drawing there for two evenings already, and I must say that I believe that just for the making of, for instance, peasant figures, it is very useful to draw from the plaster casts. But for goodness' sake, not the way it is usually done. In fact, in my opinion the drawings that I see there are all hopelessly bad and absolutely wrong, and I know for sure that mine are totally different. Time must show who is right.

The feeling of what ancient sculpture is, damn it, not one of them has it.

Well, probably the academic gentlemen will accuse me of heresy, but never mind.

Letter 445
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Freedom of action

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 12-16 January 1886

I begin to object more and more to your pretending to be a financier, and thinking me exactly the opposite. All people are not alike, and if one does not understand that in drawing up accounts some time must have passed over the account before one can be sure to have counted right, if one does not understand this, one is no calculator. And a broader insight into finances is exactly what characterizes many modern financiers. Namely not pinching, but allowing freedom of action.

I know, Theo, that you may also be rather hard up. But your life has never been so hard as mine has these last ten or twelve years. Can't you make allowances for me when I say, Perhaps it has been long enough now? Meanwhile I have learned something that I did not know before, that has renewed all my chances, and I protest against my always being neglected. And if I should like to live again in the city for some time, and afterward perhaps to work in a studio in Paris too, would you try to prevent this?

Be honest enough to let me go my own way, for I tell you that I do not want to quarrel, and I will not quarrel, but I will not be hampered in my career. And what can I do in the country, unless I go there with money for models and colors? There is no chance, absolutely none, of making money with my work in the country, and there is such a chance in the city. So I am not safe before I have made friends in the city - and that comes first. For the moment this may complicate things somewhat, but after all it is the only way, and going back to the country now would end in stagnation.

Letter 444
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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It has been too hard for me

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 12-16 January 1886

And I wish I could make you understand how probable it is that there will be great changes in the art trade. And, consequently, many new chances will present themselves too if one has something original to show.

But that is certainly necessary if one wants to be of some use. It is no fault or crime of mine if I must sometimes tell you we must put more vigor into such and such a thing, and if we haven't got the money ourselves, we must find friends and new relations. I must earn a little more or have some more friends, preferably both. That is the way to success, but recently it has been too hard for me.

At present I am losing weight, and moreover my clothes are getting too shabby, etc. You know yourself that it isn't right as it is. Yet I feel sort of confident that we shall pull through.

Letter 444
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I shall always have an aim

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 12-16 January 1886

When you get right down to it, I'll admit that when one is working exclusively from nature, something more is needed: the facility of composing, the knowledge of the figure, but, after all, I do not believe I have been drudging absolutely in vain all these years. I feel a certain power within me, because wherever I may be, I shall always have an aim - painting people as I see and know them.

Whether impressionism has already had its last say or not - to stick to the term impressionism - I always imagine that many new artists in the figure may arise, and I begin to think it more and more desirable that, in a difficult time like the present, one seeks one's security in the deeper understanding of the highest art.

For there is, relatively speaking, higher and lower art; people are more important than anything else, and are in fact much more difficult to paint, too.

Letter 444
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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What I seek is so straightforward

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early January 1886

I must finish. What color is in a picture, enthusiasm is in life, therefore - it is no little thing to try to keep that enthusiasm.

You may be of the opinion that I am an impossible character - but that's absolutely your own business. For instance, I need not care, and I am not going to. I know that your business routine induces you again and again to lapse into the old evil with regard to me. What I seek is so straightforward that in the end you cannot but give in. So let's conclude by saying, The sooner the better.

Letter 443
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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The estrangement drove me crazy

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early January 1886

If I had some friends, if I were a little known, yes, then it would be easier; but I have no friends, and my job is to try and make them.

I cannot tell you how glad I am that I went to Antwerp, and how many remarkable things there are here for me, who has been out of it all for so long.

How glad I am to see the city again, much as I like the peasants in the country. How the bringing together of contrasts gives me new ideas - the contrasts between the absolute quiet of the country and the bustle here. I needed it badly.

Always to be in a state of exile, forever having to make great efforts, always half measures. But never mind - the family "stranger than strangers" is one fact - and being through with Holland is a second fact. It is quite a relief.

That is my only feeling, and yet I have been so deeply attached to it all that at first the estrangement drove me crazy. But I have looked over the cards too narrowly to let myself hesitate now. And I have got my self-confidence and my serenity back. The secret of that clique - Delaroche-esqueness, mediocrity. Retrogression - I abhor it!

Letter 443
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I must paint

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early January 1886

Are you quite satisfied with your own argument when at the beginning of the year you say, to my disappointment, "I have so much to pay, you must try to manage till the end of the month."

Am I less than your creditors? - who must wait, they or I??? If one of us must wait, which belongs to the human possibilities.

Do you realize how heavy are my burdens which the work demands every day, how difficult it is to get the models, how expensive the painting materials are? Do you realize that sometimes it is almost literally impossible for me to keep going? and that I must paint; that too much depends on my continuing to work on here with aplomb immediately and without hesitation?

Too much hesitation might make me fall in a way which I could not redress for a long time. My situation is threatened from every side, and it can only be saved by working on vigorously.

The only way to win at present is with very good work, with something that is not ordinary. That higher work costs more in money, in trouble, and in strenuous exertion; but now more than ever it is the only way.

Letter 443
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Simple and true

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early January 1886

I am working on my portraits all the time, and at last I have made two which are decidedly good "likenesses" (one profile and one three-quarter). That isn't everything, it isn't even the most important thing. But it still seems to me worth while to aim at it, and perhaps it teaches one to draw.

In "The Deposition from the Cross" by Van Dyck, the large one, that one high up - there is also a portrait, decidedly a portrait - not only of a head, but, thank God, of a whole figure, splendid in yellow and lilac, a weeping woman bending over, the torso and the legs under the clothes well and intimately felt and expressed. Then art is high, when it is simple and true.

Letter 443
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I am not satisfied

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, early January 1886

Let me begin by answering your question of some time ago, about the picture by Francken at St. Andre, which I saw today. I think it is a good picture - especially fine in sentiment - the sentiment is not very Flemish or Rubens-like. It reminds one more of Murillo. The color is warm, in a reddish color scheme like Jordaens sometimes is.

But l imagine I can also do it in that way, and the picture did not tell me anything new. And as I am not satisfied with what I can do now, and try to make progress - enough - let's talk about other pictures.

Letter 443
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I think differently

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 31 January 1885

You commit an error if on your part you are unable to understand that your being suspicious of me is positively improper. Most certainly I think differently, I feel differently, I act differently. But it is quite consistent when viewed in its proper relation.

And considering that when I was in Drenthe and I advised you to become a painter, you wrote me that I was speaking about your affairs from afar and I conceded this point, the reverse is most certainly true too, namely that you can only make a wild guess about my doings here. So give up your suspicions, for they are simply improper. And the means must be found in the good progress my work is making - leaving the matter of more or less mutual sympathy out of the question - to be at least inoffensive to each other, however much our ways may run in opposite directions.

Letter 388a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I shall keep a straight course

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, c 24 January 1885

Though the month is not quite over, my purse is quite empty. I work on as hard as I can, and I for my part think that by constantly studying the model, I shall keep a straight course.

I wish you could send me the money a few days before the 1st for that same reason, that the ends of the month are always hard, because the work brings such heavy expenses, and I don't sell any of it. But this will not go on so for ever, for I work too hard and too much not to arrive eventually at the point of being able to defray my expenses, without being in a dependent position. For the rest, nature outside and the interiors of the cottages, they are splendid in their tone and sentiment just at present; I try hard not to lose time.

Letter 393
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I know no other way

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, c 24 January 1885

All the time I am working at various heads and hands.

I have also drawn some again, perhaps you would find something in them, perhaps not, I can't help it. I repeat, I know no other way.

But I can't understand that you say: perhaps later on we shall admire even the things done now.

If I were you, I should have so much self-confidence and independent opinion that I should know whether I could see now what there was or was not in a thing.

Well, you must know those things for yourself.

Letter 393
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Get a faith

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, c 24 January 1885

What Michelangelo said in a splendid metaphor, I think Millet has said without metaphor, and Millet can perhaps best teach us to see, and get "a faith." If I do better work later on, I certainly shall not work differently than now, I mean it will be the same apple, though riper; I shall not change my mind about what I have thought from the beginning. And that is the reason why I say for my part: if I am no good now, I shall be no good later on either, but if later on, then now too. For corn is corn, though people from the city may take it for grass at first, and also the other way round.

In any case, whether people approve or do not approve of what I do and how I do it, I for my part know no other way than to wrestle so long with nature that she tells me her secret.

All the time I am working . . .

Letter 393
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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By truly following nature

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, c 24 January 1885

When I think how Paul Renouard rose to such a height by working from the very beginning from nature, without imitating others, and how he is none the less in harmony with the very clever people, even in technique, though from the very first he had his own style, I find him again a proof that by truly following nature one's work improves every year.

And I am daily more convinced that people who do not in the first place wrestle with nature never succeed.

I think that if one has tried to follow attentively the great masters, one finds them all back at certain moments, deep in reality - I mean that their so-called creations will be seen by one in reality, if one has the same eyes, the same sentiment as they had. . . . One must look much and long at nature before one comes to the conviction that the most touching things the great masters have painted still find their origin in life and reality itself. A basis of sound poetry, which exists eternally as a fact, and can be found if one digs and seeks deeply enough.

"The durable within the transitory," it exists.

Letter 393
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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For the sake of my progress

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, January 1885

You may look upon my having been at home so long without paying for my board as arrogance or indiscretion on my part. I did this for the sake of my progress in painting, and have not profited from it personally, inasmuch as I still have to pay a rather heavy bill for colors, an extra expense. For the rest, I acknowledge that after all it has been advantageous to me. The reason why I cannot regard the present moment as propitious for making a kind of contract with Father is that under the circumstances it cannot be my intention to stay here much longer. Which I should very much like to do, but I am afraid it will prove impossible. If, however, you should want to make an arrangement with Father of the kind indicated in your letter, then leave me out of it - in other words, let it be purely a matter between you and Father, in which I am not involved.

This letter is meant to tell you explicitly that I utterly refuse to have anything to do with any agreement you might make with Father on the possible payment of board.

Letter 355a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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On the brink of a mental revolution

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

Until late in life one may have, surely as an artist no less than as a "human being" - until late in life one may have a certain stiff, rigid, let's say iron-like way of doing things, and of looking at things, and of working, too - but for all that one may gain, later on in life, gentler, more intelligent, more reasonable, more humane views.

I only want to point out that it is quite possible that as a human being and as a workman you will acquire more of nature, more tranquility, that you will get to be more "your own self." I want to point out that now and then I do think you unnatural. At present this means nothing - and I don't in any way look upon this as your fixed and unchangeable character or state of mind, but as a curious phenomenon. Which I observe with interest and attention for the very reason that I myself have known moments of this state of mind just at a time when I was on the brink of a mental revolution. Ah, well…

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Keeping silent is nearly dissimulation

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

Saying a few words about things is different from forcing them - at certain moments keeping silent about something is nearly identical with dissimulation. I just did not want to do that.

As for the rest, whether isolated or not, I will try to manage so that I can work on; and as to my opinions - I sometimes think of what Taine says, "It seems to me that as far as the worker is personally concerned, he can keep that to himself," so it was probably a mistake on my part not to keep things strictly to myself. And bear in mind that I do not want you to consider the help you give me as a thing you are obliged to do, for you were not obliged to do it in the past, nor are you now, it has been a voluntary thing on your part for which I, for my part, feel, and I repeat, shall certainly always feel, a real obligation to you.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Two brothers

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

I know of an old legend, I don't know of what people, which I love; of course it did not happen literally, but it is a symbol of many things.

In that story, it is said that the human race descends from two brothers.

These two were allowed to choose what they wanted above all things. The one chose gold, and the other chose the book.

The first, who had chosen gold, became prosperous; but the second one fared poorly.

The legend - without explaining exactly why - tells how the man with the book got banished to a cold and miserable country, and got isolated. But in his misery he started reading that book, and he learned things from it. So he managed to make his life more bearable, and invented several things to get out of his difficulties, so that at last he acquired a certain power, but always by working and struggling.

Then afterward, just when he had become stronger with the book's help, the first one grew weaker; and so he lived long enough to learn that gold is not the axis round which everything turns.

It is only a legend, but for me there is a depth in it which I find true.

"The book" does not mean all books or literature, it is at the same time conscience, reason, and it is art.

Gold does not stand for money alone, but it is at the same time a symbol of several other things.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Things as old as humanity

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

I do not know whether you will understand me, but I wanted to make clear to you that I - thinking as I do - could hardly get cross with anyone merely on account of an opinion. Not counting my own opinions for much. But my not being able to resign myself to the fact that I see many persons lead a life, rather rashly I think, too far removed from what is true for all is quite another thing. So if I get cross, it might be because of something that has nothing whatever to do with my having a high opinion of myself.

There are things as old as humanity itself, and which will not disappear in a hurry.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Nor can opinions make the truth true

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

I wish you could understand that if at times I wish you had other thoughts about some questions than you have at present, I do so only because I believe you would profit by it, and not because I should want to make a proselyte for my own opinions. I do not believe my opinions to be better than those of other people. But more and more I begin to believe that there is something compared to which all opinions, mine included, become as nothing.

Certain truths and facts, which our opinions can change little or not at all, and which I hope not to mistake for my or other people's opinions, as this would be an error on my part.

Opinions can as little change certain standard truths as weathercocks can change the direction of the wind. The weathercocks do not make the wind east or north, nor can opinions make the truth true.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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It's lucky for me

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

As to what you say about my perhaps becoming quite isolated, I do not say that this will not happen, I expect little else, and shall be content if life remains possible and bearable for me.

But I declare to you that I should not consider this a deserved fate, for I believe that after all I have never done, and shall never do, anything to make me lose the right to feel one with my fellow creatures.

Others would be greatly to blame for it too. Well, I try to look at myself as if I were somebody else, that is to say, objectively, so that I try to see my own shortcomings as well as perhaps their compensations.

Isolation is bad enough, it is a kind of prison. To what extent I shall become so cannot be guessed now with any degree of certainty. Nor do you say so, in fact.

I for my part often prefer to be with people who do not even know the world, for instance the peasants, the weavers, etc., rather than being with those of the more civilized world. It's lucky for me.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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What I think is right

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 2 January 1884

With regard to being brotherly it would appear to me that this is dependent on taking the same view of things or not - which I pointed out to you - seeing that it seemed to me that perhaps our opinions were going to deviate considerably - if they haven't already. I mention it because with you I do not want to pretend to be different from what I am, and because of the very fact that I do not want to quarrel. In the long run I should prefer to do without your support, however much your help means to me, to keeping it on condition that I act contrary to what I think is right.

Letter 351
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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To lead a hard life

Vincent van Gogh to his mother, from Saint-Remy, 20 December 1889

As I told you, I am sometimes sorry that I am often so absent-minded, I struggle against it, but it makes me unable to do many things I ought to do. As for my health, there is literally nothing the matter with it, but the shock of last year makes me feel like not leaving the hospital. Sometimes I imagine that if I gave up painting and had to lead a hard life, say, as a soldier in the East, it would cure me. But it is somewhat late for that, and I am afraid I should be refused. I am thinking this half in jest, half in earnest.

For the present my work is going well, but of course my thoughts are always directed on the colors and on drawing, going around in a rather small circle. So I want only to live by the day - trying to get on from one day to the other. And besides, my painter-friends also often complain that the profession makes one so powerless, or that it is the powerless who follow it.

Letter 619
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I am still full of remorse

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Saint-Remy, 15 December 1889

If I could one day prove that I have not impoverished the family, that would comfort me. For now I am still full of remorse at spending money with no return. But as you say, patience and work are the only chance of getting away from that.

However, I often think that if I had done as you did, if I had stayed with Goupils', if I had confined myself to selling pictures, I should have done better. For in business, even if you yourself do not produce, you make others produce. Just now so many artists need support from the dealers, and only rarely do they find it.

Letter 617
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I feel in my element

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 4 December 1888

Our days pass in working, working all the time, in the evening we are dead beat and go off to the cafe, and after that, early to bed! Such is our life.

I have made portraits of a whole family, that of the postman whose head I had done previously - the man, his wife, the baby, the young boy, and the son of sixteen, all of them real characters and very French, though they look like Russians. You know how I feel about this, how I feel in my element, and that it consoles me up to a certain point for not being a doctor. I hope to get on with this and to be able to get more careful posing, paid for by portraits. And if I manage to do this whole family better still, at least I shall have done something to my liking and something individual.

Letter 560
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I want to be myself

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 28 December 1884

I think you value the truth enough for me to speak freely to you. For much the same reasons that if I paint peasant women I want them to be peasant women - so I want to get a whore's expression when I paint whores.

That is precisely why a whore's head by Rembrandt struck me so forcefully. Because he had caught that mysterious smile in such an infinitely beautiful way, with a gravity of his very own - the magician of magicians.

This is something new for me, and I want to achieve it at all costs. Manet has done it and Courbet - well, sacrebleu, I've the same ambition too, the more so as I've felt the infinite beauty of the study of women by the giants of literature - Zola, Daudet, de Goncourt, Balzac - in the very marrow of my bones.

Well, be that as it may - I want to get on at all costs, and - I want to be myself. I am feeling obstinate, too, and no longer care what people say about me or about my work.

Letter 442
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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One should aim at something lofty

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 28 December 1884

As far as my present work is concerned, I feel I can do better - however, I do need more air and space, in other words I must be able to spread my wings a little. Above all, above all, I still haven't enough models. I could soon produce work of higher quality, but my expenses would be heavier. Still, one should aim at something lofty, genuine, something distinguished, shouldn't one?

I am again reading de Goncourt's book, it is first-rate. In the preface to "Cherie," which you should read, there is an account of what the de Goncourts went through - and of how, at the end of their lives, they were pessimistic, yes - but also sure of themselves, knowing that they had done something, that their work would last. What fellows they were! if only we got on together better than we do now, if only we too could be in complete accord - we could be the same, couldn't we?

Letter 442
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Beginning with practically nothing

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, c. 19 December 1884

Trade is so old-fashioned and…three times moldy.

There must be renovation, for the old systems no longer work.

The prices, the public, everything needs renovation, and the future is to work cheaply for the people, because the ordinary art lovers seem to get more and more tight-fisted.

Starting with capital so very often leads only to losing everything at first, including one's courage and energy; whereas beginning with practically nothing rather makes one's character firmer and more decided.

Letter 441
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Straight from the painter's soul

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Antwerp, 8-15 December 1884

I won't let that idea of painting portraits go, for it is a good thing to fight for, to show people that there is more in them than the photographer can possibly get out of them with his machine.

I have noticed the great number of photographers here, who are just about the same as everywhere, and seem to be pretty busy.

But always those same conventional eyes, noses, mouths - waxlike and smooth and cold.

It cannot but always remain lifeless.

And the painted portraits have a life of their own, coming straight from the painter's soul, which the machine cannot reach. The more one looks at photographs, the more one feels this, I think.

Letter 439
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I will try to keep a straight course

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 15-17 December 1884

Do you remember how in the very beginning I always spoke to you about my great respect and sympathy for the work of Father de Groux? Of late I think of him more than ever. De Groux is appreciated as little as, for instance, Thijs Mans. He is different though, but this they have in common, that they met with violent opposition.

In these days - whether the public is wiser now I can't tell, but this much I know, that it is not at all superfluous to weigh seriously one's thoughts and one's actions.

If it had pleased de Groux at that time to dress his Brabant characters in medieval costumes, he would have run parallel with Leys in genius, and also in fortune. However, he did not do so, and now, years afterwards, there is a considerable reaction against that medievalism. But the realism not wanted then is in demand now, and there is more need of it than ever. The realism that has character and a serious sentiment.

I can tell you that for my part I will try to keep a straight course, and will paint the most simple, the most common things.

Letter 390
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A certain obstinacy

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 7 December 1884

I let people say and think what they like of me, more than you perhaps suppose, but be sure of this, when a thing turns out wrong, that's no reason for me to admit that I ought not to have begun it; on the contrary, if it fails many a time, it is a reason for me to try again if the very same thing is not possible yet, and always in the same direction, as my views are well considered and calculated, and in my opinion have their raison d'etre.

I cannot bother about what people think of me, what I have to think of is getting on.

So I go my own way with a certain obstinacy, believing in some things and not believing in others.

Letter 388
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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To stand completely outside

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 15-20 November 1885

As I have been working absolutely alone for years, I imagine that, though I want to and can learn from others, and even adopt some technical things, I shall always see with my own eyes, and render things originally.

But when I got off to Amsterdam for a few days, I enjoyed seeing pictures again immensely.

For sometimes it is damned hard to stand completely outside the world of painters and pictures, and to have no contact with others. Since then I have felt the longing to go back to them, at least for a time. Having been entirely out of it for a few years and having wrestled with nature sometimes helps, and one may get a new store of courage and also of health by it, of which one can never have too much, for a painter's life is often hard enough.

Letter 434
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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The greatest chance of remaining strong

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, mid-November 1885

Being a little better off helps so little after all. Anyhow, we cannot prevent the days of our youth slipping from us. If that were possible! But the real thing that makes one happy, materially happy - being young, and remaining so a long time - does not exist here - that doesn't even exist in Arabia or Italy, though it is better there than here.

And I personally think that one has the greatest chance of remaining strong and renewing oneself under the present-day "third state." Well, so I say that I try to find it in painting without any thoughts on the side.

Letter 433
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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One's whole spirit and attention

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 8-12 November 1885

One doesn't become a painter in one year, nor is it necessary.

But there is already one good thing among the lot, and one feels hopeful, instead of feeling helpless before a stone wall.

I do not know how I shall fare in the future. At present when I read of that splendid devil, that famous Latour, by God, how real it is, and how well that fellow, except for his enormous passion for money, has attacked life and painting.

Only recently I saw Frans Hals. Well, you know how enthusiastic I was about it, how I immediately wrote you a long letter about painting in one stroke. How great is the similarity between the ideas of Latour, for instance, and Frans Hals, when they express life with pastel which one could almost blow off. I don't know what I shall do and how I shall fare, but I hope not to forget the lessons which I am thus learning these days: in one stroke - but with absolutely complete exertion of one's whole spirit and attention.

Letter 431
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I could not sell it

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, 8-12 November 1885

You know those three pollard oaks at the bottom of the garden at home; I have plodded on them for the fourth time.

The difficulty was the tufts of havana leaves, to model them and give them form, color, tone. Then in the evening I took it to that acquaintance of mine in Eindhoven, who has a rather stylish drawing room, where we put it on the wall. Well, never before was I so convinced that I shall make things that do well, that I shall succeed in calculating my colors, so that I have it in my power to make the right effect.

Now, though that man has money, though he took a fancy to it, I felt such a glow of courage when I saw that it was good that, as it hung there, it created an atmosphere by the soft melancholy harmony of that combination of colors that I could not sell it.

But as he had a fancy for it, I gave it to him, and he accepted it just as I had intended, without many words, namely little more than, "The thing is damned good."

I don't think so yet myself.

Letter 431
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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My affairs can prosper

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, November 1884

I do not know how you have taken my last letter, which was not meant unkindly. My affairs can prosper, and in both our interests, I wish we could concentrate all the power a our disposal.

I believe it possible to be on better terms with you too than we are at present.

But speaking frankly - I think you have been too neutral toward me this past one and a half or two years, and above all things I desire more cordiality, our friendship having been too cool and too inactive for my taste. You may find this conceited if you like, but it isn't; I pointed this out to you before, and again now, for serious, practical reasons.

Letter 385
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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With passion rather than prudence

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, mid-November 1884

A change has come into my color since you were here; I already had a presentiment of it when you were here, and you will see that - with some more studies, those which I am writing about now, which must be finished within a couple of months - it will be proved beyond a doubt that, exactly in the matter of color, I have achieved something. It is not my fault, but at the moment I am short of money, just because I have painted more than I could really afford, and there can be no economizing now, for we can gain important points by striking while the iron is hot. I remember having said in my last letter: "that I no longer care what your opinion is"; I don't mean that as rudely as it sounds, I only mean that in some respects I have decided to push on with passion rather than prudence, because this is more in character.

Letter 386
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I shall feel my strength grow

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, mid-November 1884

You must not suppose that I am so eager for people to approve of my work and my actions in general. On the contrary, for the moment, for instance, I am almost more glad that Mauve and Tersteeg have refused me than if it had been the reverse. Understand me well! It is because I feel within me the power to win them over in the end, notwithstanding everything.

I should not have applied to them again if I didn't feel that I had gained a fixed point by drudging these last years on the ABC of drawing and painting - drudging harder than they can imagine - and I should not have started a new fight if I didn't feel sure of the possibility of winning it.

I am not sure of the certainty of winning it, however, but I dare speculate on its chance, so I am none the worse for it now that I have begun to appeal to the public. In the very fight I shall feel my strength grow, and I shall learn more by criticism, by ill will, even by opposition, than by resignation.

Letter 386
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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No one falls before his tim

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 26 November 1883

There are things which, as one ought to know, can gradually cast a spell on a man and make him change his course in a direction diametrically opposed to the course he took as long as he was honest.

My words may sound gloomy, very well. For myself, there are moments when my own prospects seem very dark to me - but as I already wrote you, I do not believe that my fate depends on what seems against it. All kinds of things may be against me, but there may be one thing more powerful than what I see threatening me. I used the word fatality for lack of a better word - no one falls before his time - so as for me, I resign myself to fate, and act as if nothing were the matter.

As for the calamities, I am not particularly afraid of them - in general one should be afraid of nothing except of deteriorating as a man.

Letter 342
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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It will not keep silent within yourself

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 19 November 1883

After all, no matter how much we may be our own enemies, I am beginning to realize more and more: "Man proposes and God disposes." An infinitely powerful force prevails over our doing right and wrong. . . . Ultimately I should feel so reassured were you to take up a brush that I should consider the momentary calamity and shipwreck of lesser importance than the certain knowledge that your future is moving in a direction you will never regret. . . .

At all events, I count it among the possibilities that you yourself may become conscious that painting is your vocation, and then, dear brother, Puritan "without knowing it", it might be that your days in Paris were numbered, that an old world closed itself to you, in a rather ungenerous way - but that at the same time a new world opened itself to you.

Well, think it over, a long or a short time. But it would be of little use if you said, Vincent, keep silent about it; for to that my answer is: Theo, it will not keep silent within yourself.

It is more difficult to repress
Than the source of great rivers.

Letter 338
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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"Am I an artist or am I not?"

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 19 November 1883

In the same way, in the matter of art, the problem, "Am I an artist or am I not?" must not induce us not to draw or not to paint. Many things defy definition, and I consider it wrong to fritter one's time away on them. Certainly when one's work does not go smoothly and one is checked by difficulties, one gets bogged in the morass of such thoughts and insoluble problems. And because one feels sorely troubled by it, the best thing to do is to conquer the cause of the distraction by acquiring a new insight into the practical part of the work.

Letter 338
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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My aim is to make pictures

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 19 November 1883

As to doubting whether one is an artist or not - that question is too much of an abstraction.

I confess, however, that I don't object to thinking it over, provided I can draw and paint at the same time.

And my aim in my life is to make pictures and drawings, as many and as well as I can; then, at the end of my life, I hope to pass away, looking back with love and tender regret, and thinking, "Oh, the pictures I might have made!" . . .

Theo, I declare I prefer to think how arms, legs, head are attached to the trunk, rather than whether I myself am more or less an artist or not.

Letter 338
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A path to travel through life

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 19 November 1883

When I consider our temperament and type of physiognomy, I find similarity, and a very pronounced resemblance between, for instance, the Puritans and ourselves besides. I mean the people in Cromwell's time or thereabouts, the little group of men and women who sailed from the Old World to America in the Mayflower, and settled there, firmly resolved to live simple lives.

Times are different - they cut down forests - we would turn to painting. I know that the initiative taken by a small group, called in history The Pilgrim Fathers, however small in itself, had great consequences; and as to ourselves, I think that in the first place we should philosophize but little about great consequences, and only try to find a path for ourselves to travel through life as straightforwardly as possible. To meditate on consequences is not our way, neither yours nor mine.

Letter 338
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Risk too much rather than too little

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 17 November 1883

Fortune favors the bold, says the proverb, and though something may perhaps be said against it, I decidedly believe its basis to be a fact, in the same way as the opposite: that moral weakness or want of courage brings a kind of fatal doom in the end.

So my plan is always to risk too much rather than too little; if one is defeated by too much, well, so be it.

Letter 341
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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"I shall grow in the tempest"

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 17 November 1883

Well, I repeat, let us possess our souls in patience, let things decide themselves. . . .

I admit it is very difficult to know what one has to do. Money plays a brutal part in society, and I partially share your feelings in that respect. But then, I feel such a vivid hope that painting will set our real energy free, and yet keep us afloat, though the first years may be very difficult. If I have to perish, then I shall perish, is the only thing one can say. As to my saying, If you stay with Goupil for good, I shall be obliged to refuse your help, do not suppose I think too highly of my present work.

No, I am well aware it had no market value, but my idea is that I want to work without any more protection than others have, and I shall throw myself into it headlong, not because I think I have arrived, but because I believe: "I shall grow in the tempest."

Letter 341
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I think Paris enervating

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 17 November 1883

And, for myself, I think Paris enervating, and I see no good in living there permanently, neither for myself nor for you.

As for me, perhaps I shall have to be there for a time in order to make some contacts (made impossible for me at The Hague), but I will stay in the country as much as I can, and the only thing which counts with me is painting or drawing. . . .

How inexpressibly beautiful it is here!

You cannot see it at all from my studies yet; I still have much to learn before I can express how it really is here, and it is also a question of time.

One thing I declare, that this country had an influence of calm, of faith, of courage on me, and I believe you need that influence too - it would be the very, very best thing for you; it would make you discover yourself again, your soul, but in a more genuine and complete way than at the time of drawing mills. But I am afraid you consider what I say as the product of my imagination, my words as idle and without foundation.

Letter 341
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Get to work now

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 3 November 1883

Well, dear fellow, what I advise you is something quite new. "The faith of a coalminer" in art, instead of saying (and to me it is twaddle), I can't do anything, I am not an artist, do not attribute qualities to me that I do not possess, and all that rubbish. I tell you this is a delusion, and now, my dear fellow, things are so serious, and your future and mine are so terribly dependent on them that you must not take it amiss if I tell you a little baldly that the right thing to do under the circumstances is to undertake painting with the faith of a coalminer. . . .

Perhaps, or rather, assuredly, we were mistaken in not starting on it sooner, but this mistake is understandable on account of our education and the influences we were submitted to; but this is all the more reason to get to work now with a steadiness and a resolution which I doubt we should have had at our disposal in our younger days. So it appears to me that we must concentrate our whole energy on painting with the utmost singleness of purpose - it being the raft that will take us safely to shore after the shipwreck - undertaking it in all cheerfulness.

Letter 339b
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Standing behind another counter

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 3 November 1883

Then be wise, you, then be sensible, and listen to what I tell you about the thorny little path of painting, which at first leads to all sorts of humiliation, etc., but which for all that will eventually lead to a more lasting victory and a more definite peace than commerce can ever give. . . .

Theo, at times I think that for an artist the utmost poverty would be bearable (and productive too) if only he were not alone. . . . It has become an idee fixe of mine that you will feel so uprooted, so disoriented, so defeated that as for standing behind another counter you will simply say, "I can't do it," "It would certainly be a failure." . . . There, my presentiment tells me that this is approximately how you feel at heart.

In this case I see nothing reckless, nothing unpractical, nothing foolish in our wanting to feel our energy, to feel ourselves. Let our love of art inspire us with a "faith of the coal miner," inspire us to say what others have said before us, and will say after us, namely, Though circumstances may be ominous, and though we may be very poor, and so on, yet we have one thing to cling to tenaciously - painting, of course.

Letter 339b
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Just slap anything on

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, October 1884

Just slap anything on when you see a blank canvas staring you in the face like some imbecile. You don't know how paralyzing that is, that stare of a blank canvas is, which says to the painter, You can’t do a thing. The canvas has an idiotic stare and mesmerizes some painters so much that they turn into idiots themselves. Many painters are afraid in front of the blank canvas, but the blank canvas is afraid of the real, passionate painter who dares and who has broken the spell of "you can't" once and for all.

Life itself, too, is forever turning an infinitely vacant, dispiriting blank side towards man on which nothing appears, any more than it does on a blank canvas. But no matter how vacant and vain, how dead life may appear to be, the man of faith, of energy, of warmth, who knows something, will not be put off so easily. He wades in and does something and stays with it, in short, he violates, "defiles" - they say. Let them talk, those cold theologians.

Letter 378
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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One must not be afraid

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, October 1884

Oh, Theo, why should I change - I used to be very passive and very gentle and quiet - I'm that no longer, but then I'm no longer a child either now - sometimes I feel my own man.

Take Mauve, why is he quick-tempered and difficult to get on with at times? I haven't come as far as he has, but I, too shall go further than I am now.

I tell you, if one wants to be active, one must not be afraid of going wrong, one must not be afraid of making mistakes now and then. Many people think that they will become good just by doing no harm - but that's a lie, and you yourself used to call it that. That way lies stagnation, mediocrity.

Letter 378
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Something "awful"

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

What is before you is something terrible, something "awful" - those things are so inexpressible that I can find no words for them; and if I were not your brother and your friend, who considers being silent ungrateful as well as inhuman, I should say nothing. But seeing that you say, First, inspire me with courage, and second, do not flatter me, I say now, Look, I see all these things here on the silent moor, where I feel God high above you and me.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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The Last Word

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

One is not sure of things all at once, one cannot foresee things except very vaguely, but there is something called conscience after all, a kind of compass by which one can distinguish between this direction and that - between North and South - between right and left - at least broadly speaking. Which means - notwithstanding fortuitous currents and certain deceptively inviting coasts - being able to say, This is not the right course for me after all. And look, earning money in Paris, even for others' sakes, would, seem to me such a deceptive fata morgana: a coast that recedes more and more when you approach to make a landing there, at the same time causing you to be driven farther and farther off your course.

I see everything except fatality against painting; for Paris I see everything except fatality!

Fatality, in which with an unutterable feeling I see God, Who is the White Ray of Light, and Who has the last word; what is not good through and through is not good at all, and will not last - He, in Whose eyes even the Black Ray will have no plausible meaning.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Fix the heart on high

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

In short, Theo, I have a vague but firm feeling that it is our first duty to fix the heart on high, and this feeling forces me to recommend to you, brother to brother, friend to friend, preparing yourself for a life based on simpler principles. Principles which I am unable to define for others, but which I feel; one can hardly imagine duty commanding one to do business in Paris; rather, it will induce one to retire from it.

Can you share these feelings to a certain extent? Think it over, deliberate on it; if you want time, search your heart, and take your time. All hesitation based on the objection "I am not an artist" seems reasonable to me only as long as you do not prevent yourself from becoming one. To what degree we are or are not artists, neither we ourselves nor others can definitely ascertain. However, the How-to-do-it system entails saying, I shall do my best to do it, without asking any such questions; on the other hand, it seems to me that it is the How-NOT-to-do-it system which says, "I know in advance I shall not be able to do it."

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Our aim is walking with God

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

Our purpose is in the first place self-reform by means of a handicraft and of intercourse with nature, believing as we do that this is our first duty in order to be honest with others and to be consistent - our aim is walking with God - the opposite of living in the midst of the doings of the big cities.

We shall not harm anybody by this.

Though some people may think it hypocritical to say so, our belief is that God will help those who help themselves, as long as they turn their energy and attention in this direction, and set to work to this end.

I see that Millet believed more and more firmly in "Something on High." He spoke of it in a way quite different than, for instance, Father does. He left it more vague, but for all that, I see more in Millet's vagueness than in what Father says. And I find that same quality of Millet's in Rembrandt, in Corot - in short, in the work of many, though I must not and cannot expatiate on this. The end of things need not be the power to explain them, but basing oneself effectively upon them.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A hard life with a purpose

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

I see that Paris will put you into what I would call a crooked position in regard to your own duty. Leaving your being useful to others out of it for the moment, seeing that I do not know if in the long run I myself should remain truly firm, because you are directing the simpler minds of others toward Paris, a thought which will disturb exactly these people because they might be intoxicated by it.

Understand clearly what I say: Until now everything has had its reason, but now the signs of the times suggest a change of direction, as I see it, in a way quite different from and far more decisive than anything in the past.

There is no question of slackening or giving in here; on the contrary, in this there is an attacking the calamity at the core: the same energetic principle as that of sowing superior plants in better soil.

The calamity leaves us our old courage and our old earnest energy. Let the world say venomously what it cannot refrain from saying; it will leave you and me cold. On the contrary, we are counting on the possibility of a hard life which will have a purpose other than earning as much money as possible.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Radical renewal

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

To me painting is too logical, too reasonable, too straightforward to allow me personally ever to change my course. Besides, you yourself helped me realize the idea of a handicraft, and I know that basically it is your idea too, so I think we ought to cooperate from now on.

My reason, my conscience, compel me to tell you what is partially your own view too; there is nothing to fall back on but a radical renewal.

I do not wish to flatter you, all right, I do not flatter. As to rousing your courage, yes, I dare to, I dare rouse the very highest courage and serenity in you, but only as regards painting.

As far as I can see, going on in Paris, even if you were able to stick it out for many years, will not grant you peace, and there would not be so much opportunity for being as useful to others as if you were a painter.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A very clear duty

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

Leave the sinking ship, and concentrate your mind and energy, not on clinging to your present position, but on creating something wholly new. For a long time your duty has seemed too complicated to me; your duty ought to be something simple, and your present duty would grow more and more involved and doubtful, leaving the question of whether I think it is really and truly your duty out of it. By starting to paint, you will find a very clear duty and a very simple, straight path for your feet.

My idea is that going on in your present situation would prove to be not only more and more unbearable, but also less and less profitable. . . . I do not say that you and I will get rich together, but in any case we shall be able to preserve our aplomb and our balance, although - I cannot deny this - we shall have a very hard time of it during the first few years.

Letter 337
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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As you are, so you paint

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

I am so deeply convinced of your artistic talent that to me you will be an artist as soon as you take up a brush or a piece of crayon and, adroitly or maladroitly, make something.

Before you are able to express yourself, that is, your plain-thinking virile soul - peaceful, good - before you can express this in your work, quite a lot of things must happen; but it will come, for as you are, so you paint - not in the beginning, assuredly, if one is good.

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Risk

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

I have no patience with "so-called" common sense (a spurious article, unutterably different from the genuine one) one is told to use, and which they say one does not use as soon as one deviates from the ordinary course and takes a risk. I repeat, I have no patience with it. I have no patience with it for the very reason that my own natural common sense, if I reflect, leads me to wholly different results than the conclusion of narrow-minded worldly wisdom and prudent, halfhearted righteousness.

Oh, that dawdling, oh, those hesitations, oh, that not believing that good is good, that black is black, that white is white.

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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This hopeless absurdity of public opinion

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

And when speaking of your being a painter, they would describe your state of mind as that of a dreamer, imagining himself on a bed of roses. I ask you, what do those who represent things that way know? But people being what they are, this is only one of their enormities and not even the worst by a long shot. This hopeless absurdity of public opinion makes it only natural for one to want to avoid the world.

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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They would think it madness

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

And I believe not being absolutely alone does a lot of good, as one is apt to become absorbed in one's work; but this should not lead to losing one's way, and by taking each other's advice the right way can be followed steadily. If you talked it over with other people, they would say, What are you thinking of? - how wild a venture to give up this, that and the other! In short, they would think it madness - a blunder. As for myself, I find wildness in a conception of life other than the one I am talking about - i.e. being a painter - I think it wildly reckless to tie oneself down irrevocably to the city and the affairs of the city. They will tell you that you are a fanatic, but most certainly you - after having undergone so many mental trials - will know that it is impossible for you to be fanatical, for you are in a period of disenchantment. Don't let them try to turn things upside down, that won't do for me!

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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One cannot lose one's way

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

This is my firm belief. Whether one is more or less clever at the start, whether one has the advantage of favorable circumstances to a greater or to a lesser extent, is, to my way of thinking, far from being the main thing. One should start with the conviction that one is in need of intercourse with nature, with the conviction that one cannot lose one's way by taking this road, and that one's course will be straight. And ... there is that other important thing: if one should have an easy time of it, like a man living on his private means, it would be of very little help; the very fact that there is many a hard day and many an "effort of lost souls" will make one a better man.

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Having a handicraft

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 29 October 1883

What life I think best, oh, without the least shadow of a doubt it is a life consisting of long years of intercourse with nature in the country - and Something on High - inconceivable, "awfully unnamable" - for it is impossible to find a name for that which is higher than nature. Be a peasant - be, if it could be considered possible nowadays, a village clergyman or a schoolmaster - be - and in my opinion this ought to be thought of first, the present times being what they are - be a painter, and as a human being, after a number of years of living in the country and of having a handicraft, as a human being you will in the course of these years gradually become something better and deeper in the end.

Letter 339a
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A revolution

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

I don't suppose I'm telling you anything at all new, I only ask, Don't thwart your own best thoughts. Think that idea over with a certain good-humored optimism instead of looking at things gloomily and pessimistically. I see that even Millet, just because he was so serious, couldn't help keeping good courage. . . .

Those who seek real simplicity are themselves so simple, and their view of life is so full of willingness and courage, even in hard times.

Think these things over, write me about them. It must be "A revolution that is, because it must be."

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Look forward to victory

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

If there were only half a possibility, I believe you would do well to risk the venture. I do not think you would ever regret it. You would be able to develop the best that is in you, and have a more peaceful life altogether. Neither of us would be alone, our work would merge. In the beginning we should have to live through anxious moments, we should have to prepare ourselves for them, and take measures to overcome them; we should not be able to go back, we should not look back nor be able to look back; on the contrary, we should force ourselves to look ahead. But it's in this period that we shall be far removed from all our friends and acquaintances, we shall fight this fight without anybody seeing us, and this will be the best thing that can happen, for then nobody will hinder us. We shall look forward to victory - we feel it in our very bones. We shall be so busy working that we shall be absolutely unable to think of anything else but our work.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Learn patience

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

There is a saying of Gustave Dore's which I have always admired, "I have the patience of a cow," I find a certain goodness in it, a certain resolute honesty - in short, that saying has a deep meaning, it is the word of a real artist. When one thinks of the man from whose heart such a saying sprang, all those oft-repeated art dealer's arguments about "natural gifts" seem to become an abominably discordant raven's croaking. "I have patience" - how quiet it sounds, how dignified; they wouldn't even say it except for that very raven's croaking. I am not an artist - how coarse it sounds - even to think so of oneself - oughtn't one to have patience, oughtn't one to learn patience from nature, learn patience from seeing the corn slowly ripen, seeing things grow - should one think oneself so absolutely dead as to imagine that one would not grow any more? Should one thwart one's own development on purpose? I say this to explain why I think it so foolish to speak about natural gifts and no natural gifts.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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One is one's own horse

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

I know the soul's struggle of two people: Am I a painter or not? Of Rappard and of myself - a struggle, hard sometimes, a struggle which accurately marks the difference between us and certain other people who take things less seriously; as for us, we feel wretched at times; but each bit of melancholy brings a little light, a little progress; certain other people have less trouble, work more easily perhaps, but then their personal character develops less. . . .

If you hear a voice within you saying, "You are not a painter," then by all means paint, boy, and that voice will be silenced, but only by working. He who goes to friends and tells his troubles when he feels like that loses part of his manliness, part of the best that's in him; your friends can only be those who themselves struggle against it, who raise your activity by their own example of action. One must undertake it with confidence, with a certain assurance that one is doing a reasonable thing, like the farmer drives his plow, and even drags the harrow himself. If one hasn't a horse, one is one's own horse.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Aim at the very heart of the profession

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

It seems to me that you, who are very young, do not act recklessly when you argue, I have had enough of the art-dealing business but not of art; I'll drop the business, and aim at the very heart of the profession.

That is what I ought to have done at the time.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I should be more myself

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

I know all these things have a perilous money side, but what I say is, let's weaken this perilous money side as much as possible, in the first place by not being under its sway too long, and then by feeling that if one will only set about things with love, with a certain understanding of each other and cooperation and mutual helpfulness, many things which would otherwise be insupportable would be softened - yes, even totally changed.

As for me, if I could find some people whom I could talk to about art, who felt for it and wanted to feel for it - I should gain an enormous advantage in my work - I should feel more myself, be more myself. If there is enough money to keep us going in the very first period, by the time it is gone I shall be earning money.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A spark of genius

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

Live - do something - that is more amusing, that is more positive. In short - one must of course give Society its due, but at the same time feel absolutely free, believing not in one's own judgment, but in "reason" (my judgment is human, reason is divine, but there is a link between the one and the other), and that my own conscience is the compass which shows me the way, although I know that it does not work quite accurately.

I should like to refer to the fact that, whenever I recall the past generation of painters, I remember an expression of yours, "they were surprisingly gay." What I want to say is that, if you become a painter, you should do it with this same surprising gaiety. You will need this to offset the gloomy circumstances. It will be a greater help to you than anything else. What you want is a spark of genius; I know no other word for it, but what I mean is the exact opposite of "being ponderous," as people call it. Please don't tell me that neither you nor I could have this. I say this because I am of the opinion that we must do our best to become like that; I do not claim that either I myself or you have sufficiently captured it - but what I say is, Let's do our best to get it.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I shall do as I think best

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Drenthe, 28 October 1883

Is it a loss to drop some notions, impressed on us in childhood, that maintaining a certain rank or certain conventions is the most important thing? I myself do not even think about whether I lose by it or not. I know only by experience that those conventions and ideas do not hold true, and often are hopelessly, fatally wrong. I come to the conclusion that I do not know anything, but at the same time that this life is such a mystery that the system of "conventionality" is certainly too narrow. So that it has lost its credit with me.

What shall I do now? The common phrase is, "What is your aim, what are your aspirations?" Oh, I shall do as I think best. "How?" I can't say that beforehand - you who ask me that pretentious question, do you know what your aim is, what your intentions are?

Now they tell me, "You are unprincipled when you have no aim, no aspirations."

My answer is, I didn't tell you I had no aim, no aspirations, I said it is the height of conceit to try to force one to define what is indefinable.

Letter 336
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I only ask for time to study

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 17 September 1888

It is true that in impressionism I see the resurrection of Eugene Delacroix, but the interpretations of it are so divergent and in a way so irreconcilable that it will not be impressionism which will give us the final doctrine.

That is why I myself remain among the impressionists, because it professes nothing, and binds you to nothing, and as one of the comrades I need not declare my formula.

Good Lord, how you have to mess about in life. I only ask for time to study, and do you yourself really ask for anything but that? But I think that you also, like me, must long to have the quiet necessary to study without prejudice.

And I am so afraid of taking it away from you by my demands for money.

Letter 539
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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I am so happy

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 17 September 1888

As long as you can manage to bear the burden of all this paint and canvas and all the money that I spend, keep on sending it. Because the stuff I am getting ready will be better than the last batch, and I think we shall make something on it instead of losing. If only I can manage to do a coherent whole. That is what I am trying to do. . . .

I am so happy in the house and in my work that I even dare to think that this happiness will not always be limited to one, but that you will have a share in it and good luck to go with it.

Letter 539
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Never thinking of a single rule

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 17 September 1888

I wrote to you already, early this morning, then I went away to go on with a picture of a garden in the sunshine. Then I brought it back and went out again with a blank canvas, and that also is finished. And now I want to write you again.

Because I have never had such a chance, nature here being so extraordinarily beautiful. Everywhere and all over the vault of heaven is a marvelous blue, and the sun sheds a radiance of pale sulfur, and it is soft and as lovely as the combination of heavenly blues and yellows in a Van der Meer of Delft. I cannot paint it as beautifully as that, but it absorbs me so much that I let myself go, never thinking of a single rule. . . .

I am beginning to feel that I am quite a different creature from what I was when I came here. I have no doubts, no hesitation in attacking things, and this may increase.

Letter 539
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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My revenge

Vincent van Gogh to Wilhelmina van Gogh, from Arles, 16 September 1888

My dear sister, it is my belief that it is actually one's duty to paint the rich and magnificent aspects of nature. We need gaiety and happiness, hope and love.

The more ugly, old, mean, ill, poor I get, the more I want to take my revenge by producing a brilliant color, well arranged, resplendent. Jewelers too get old and ugly before they learn how to arrange precious stones properly. And arranging the colors in a painting in order to make them vibrate and to enhance their value by their contrasts is something like arranging jewels properly or designing costumes. You will see that by making a habit of looking at Japanese pictures you will love to make up bouquets and to do things with flowers all the more.

Letter W07
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Color to suggest some emotion

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 8 September 1888

It is color not locally true from the point of view of the trompe d'oeil realist, but color to suggest some emotion of an ardent temperament.

When Paul Mantz saw at the exhibition the violent and inspired sketch by Delacroix that we saw at the Champs Elysees - the "Bark of Christ" - he turned away from it, exclaiming in his article: "I did not know that one could be so terrible with a little blue and green."

Hokusai wrings the same cry from you, but he does it by his line, his drawing; as you say in your letter - "the waves are claws and the ship is caught in them, you feel it."

Well, if you make the color exact or the drawing exact, it won't give you sensations like that.

Letter 533
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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A real painter's career

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 4 September 1888

I am writing you as I wait for Bock, the Belgian, who is leaving early this morning. He is already thirty-three; he has spent ten years in Paris and in traveling; his sister is older than he is. Although so far he hasn't been up to much as a painter, if on his return to his own country he can at last shake off his slackness, brought about by the enervating influence of Paris and hanging about with slackers, he will be fairly on the threshold of a real painter's career.

Letter 532
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Something of the eternal

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Arles, 3 September 1888

Oh, my dear boy, sometimes I know so well what I want. I can very well do without God both in my life and in my painting, but I cannot, ill as I am, do without something which is greater than I, which is my life - the power to create.

And if, defrauded of the power to create physically, a man tries to create thoughts in place of children, he is still very much part of humanity.

And in a picture I want to say something comforting as music is comforting. I want to paint men and women with that something of the eternal which the halo used to symbolize, and which we seek to confer by the actual radiance and vibration of our colorings.

Ah! portraiture, portraiture with the thought, the soul of the model in it, that is what I think must come.

Letter 531
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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By heart

Vincent van Gogh to Anthon van Rappard, from Nuenen, September 1885

Then I read somewhere else, "When Delacroix paints - it's like a lion devouring a piece of meat." . . . .

Another thing about Delacroix. He had a discussion with a friend about the question of working absolutely after nature, and he said on this occasion that one must get one's studies from nature but that the ultimate picture ought to be made from memory. That friend was walking with him on the boulevard when they were having this discussion - which had already become pretty vehement. When they parted company, the other one still wasn't entirely convinced. Delacroix let him toddle on for a bit after he took his leave, and then (using his two hands as a speaking trumpet) he roared after him in a lusty voice, to the consternation of the respectable citizens passing by, "By heart! By heart!"

Letter R58
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Even at the risk of my own life

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, September 1885

But tonight I am much too occupied with Lhermitte's drawings to go on writing about other things. When I think of Millet or of Lhermitte, I find modern art as great as Michelangelo and Rembrandt - ancient art is infinite, modern art infinite too - the ancient masters are geniuses - the modern ones are geniuses too. A person like Chenavard does not think so perhaps. But I, for my part, am convinced that in this respect one can have faith in modern art.

The fact that I have a definite belief about art makes me sure of what I want in my own work, and I shall try to reach it even at the risk of my own life.

Letter 423
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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"The excellent always escapes them"

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, September 1884

Just listen, Theo, as to that barricade, you know there was a time in my life when I also stood with the Guizots, etc.

But as soon as I had enough of it, you know how I turned away with energy and persistence.

The younger people now do not want me, however; all right, I don't care; as men, and as painters, I like the generation of about '48 better than those of '84; but from those of '48, not the Guizots, but the revolutionaries, Michelet - and also the peasant painters of Barbizon. . . .

I believe that Millet and Daumier were ignored by practically all art dealers. Once an art lover said of the way the dealers acted with Corot's studies the excellent always escapes them. And this remark is shrewd.

Letter 380
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Be daring like a young man

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, September 1884

If only a number of Mourets would come forward, who would buy and sell in a way different from the old routine, it would be excellent - then there would be more and more work to do. But if no Mourets came forward, then the trade may undergo a complete change because the painters themselves might put it on a new basis by starting permanent exhibitions without the old intermediary. I so much wish you knew and felt how young you are still, if only you would act and be daring like a young man.

If you are no artist in painting then try to be an artist as a dealer like Mouret. As for myself - though at present I am on ne peut plus hard up - yet I feel that within a few years I shall blithely dare to undertake running up much bigger bills for colors and other things. I want to have a lot of work to do - believe me - and I don't intend to be bored - do a great deal or drop dead.

Letter 379
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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An underhand expedient

Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh, from Nuenen, September 1884

It was mere chance that recently I happened to be asked to do a drawing or a painted study for 20 guilders. I acceded to this request, but seeing that I suspected (a suspicion which, on investigation, proved to be well founded) that Margot Begemann was behind it all, and that indirectly she wanted to make me a present of the money, I most resolutely refused to accept payment, but not to do the drawing, which I sent. It is no easy matter, when one is sorely pressed for money, to refuse it. But it would have been a pons asinorum, and underhand expedient - so - instead of such underhand expedients - is there nothing better to do? I am convinced of it. For your sake as well as mine, and for the sake of many others, I wish that we had Mourets in the art trade, who would know how to create a new and larger buying public.

Letter 379
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Following one's nature

Vincent van Gogh to Wilhelmina van Gogh, from Paris, Summer-Fall 1887

Anyway, do weigh up carefully if those with a feeling for art, and trying to work at it, wouldn't do better to declare that they are doing it because they were born with that feeling, cannot help themselves and are following their nature, than make out they are doing it for some noble purpose. Doesn't it say in "A la Recherche du Bonheur" that evil lies in our own nature - which we have not created ourselves? I think it so admirable of the moderns that they do not moralize like the old ones. Thus many people are appalled and scandalized by "Vice and virtue are chemical products, like sugar and vitriol."

Letter W01
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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What is in will out

Vincent van Gogh to Wilhelmina van Gogh, from Paris, Summer-Fall 1887

I don't want to be included among the melancholy or those who turn sour and bitter or ill-tempered. "To understand everything is to forgive everything," and I believe that if we knew everything we should attain some serenity. Now, having as much of that serenity as possible, even when one knows little or nothing for certain, is perhaps a better remedy for all ills than what is sold in the pharmacy. Much of it comes by itself, one grows and develops of one's own accord.

So don't study and grind away too much, for that makes one sterile. Enjoy yourself too much rather than too little, and don't take art and love too seriously - there is very little one can do about it, it is mainly a question of temperament. . . .

Anyway, it's not a bad idea for you to become an artist, for when one has fire within oneself and a soul, one cannot keep bottling them up - better to burn than to burst, what is in will out. For me, for instance, it is a relief to do a painting, and without that I should be more miserable than I am.

Letter W01
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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If I were not as I am

Vincent van Gogh to Wilhelmina van Gogh, from Paris, Summer-Fall 1887

My own adventures are confined chiefly to making swift progress toward growing into a little old man - you know, with wrinkles, a tough beard and a number of false teeth, and so on. But what does all that matter? I have a dirty and difficult trade - painting, and if I were not as I am, I should not paint; but being as I am, I often work with pleasure and can visualize the vague possibility of one day doing paintings with some youth and freshness in them, even though my own youth is one of the things I have lost.

If I didn't have Theo, I should not be able to do justice to my work, but having him for a friend, I'm sure I shall make progress and things will fall into place. As soon as possible I plan to spend some time in the south, where there is even more color and even more sun.

But what I really hope to do is to paint a good portrait. So there.

Letter W01
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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Unwilling to relinquish self-confidence

Vincent van Gogh to Wilhelmina van Gogh, from Paris, Summer-Fall 1887

By far the greatest number of grains of corn do not develop fully but end up at the mill - isn't this so? To compare human beings with grains of corn, now - in every human being who is healthy and natural there is a germinating force, just as there is in a grain of corn. And so natural life is germination. What the germinating force is to the grain, love is to us.

Now we tend to stand about pulling a long face and at a loss for words, I think, when, thwarted in our natural development, we find that germination has been foiled and we ourselves placed in circumstances as hopeless as they must be for a grain between the millstones.

When that happens to us and we are utterly bewildered by the loss of our natural life, there are some amongst us who, though ready to submit to the inevitable, are yet unwilling to relinquish their self-confidence, and determine to discover what is the matter with them and what is really happening.

Letter W01
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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An adventurer by fate

Vincent van Gogh to Horace M. Livens, from Paris, August-October 1886

But for the present things are awfully hard. Therefore let anyone who risks to go over here consider there is no laying on roses at all.

What is to be gained is progress and what the deuce that is, it is to be found here. I dare say as certain anyone who has a solid position elsewhere let him stay where he is. But for adventurers as myself, I think they lose nothing in risking more. Especially as in my case I am not an adventurer by choice but by fate, and feeling nowhere so much myself a stranger as in my family and country.

Letter 459a
Written in English.
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I feel my own self more

Vincent van Gogh to Horace M. Livens, from Paris, August-October 1886

With regard my chances of sale look here, they are certainly not much but still I do have a beginning.

At the present moment I have found four dealers who have exhibited studies of mine. And I have exchanged studies with many artists.

Now the prices are 50 francs. Certainly not much - but - as far as I can see one must sell cheap to rise and even at costing price. And mind my dear fellow, Paris is Paris. There is but one Paris and however hard living may be here, and if it became worse and harder even - the French air clears up the brain and does good - a world of good. I have been in Cormon's studio for three or four months but I did not find that so useful as I had expected it to be. It may be my fault however, anyhow I left there too as I left Antwerp and since I worked alone, and fancy that since I feel my own self more.

Letter 459a
Written in English.
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Even bolder things

Vincent van Gogh to Anthon van Rappard, from Nuenen, second half of August 1885

When I tell you - and I mean it - that I want to remain friends with you, it is because I observe in you an endeavor which I highly esteem. You penetrate the heart of the common people deeply, and you have the will power to carry it through. When I say that we may be useful and give support to each other, I say so because, if you don't give in to convention, you will probably, when you are better known, do even bolder things.

Letter R57
Translation courtesy of Robert Harrison.
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