| | 12 letters relate to feelings - love... | Excerpt length: shorter longer | |
| Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh
(6 July 1882)
... else - there is no trickery about
it. And no matter what Sien's past may have been, I know no
other Sien than the one from last winter, than that mother in
the hospital whose hand pressed mine as we looked with tears in
our eyes at the baby for whom we had both been toiling all
winter.
And look here - entre nous, soit dit [just between us] -
without sermonizing - if there is no God, there is nevertheless
one very close by somewhere, and one feels His presence at
moments like this. Which is tantamount to saying something for
which I would happily substitute the straightforward statement:
I believe in a God, and that it is His will that man does not
live alone but with a wife and child, if everything is to be
normal.
And it is my hope that you will understand the way I have
behaved and take it for what it is, namely natural, and that
you will not think of it as tricking me or being tricked. And,
my dear fellow, when you do come - and if you can, come soon to
have a look... | Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh
(21-28 March 1883)
... acquired a few new ones since last time.
It may well seem to you that the sun is shining more
brightly and that everything has taken on a new charm. That, at
any rate, is the inevitable consequence of true love, I
believe, and it is a wonderful thing. And I also believe that
those who hold that no one thinks clearly when in love are
wrong, for it is at just that time that one thinks very clearly
indeed and is more energetic than one was before. And love is
something eternal, it may change in aspect but not in essence.
And there is the same difference between someone who is in love
and what he was like before as there is between a lamp that is
lit and one that is not. The lamp was there all the time and it
was a good lamp, but now it is giving light as well and that is
its true function. And one has more peace of mind about many
things and so is more likely to do better work.
How beautiful those old almshouses are, I can't find words
to describe them. And though Israëls does... | Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh
(2nd half September 1884)
... in speaking to her the way
they did. This had no effect, at least no other than that they
told me to wait two years, which I decidedly refused to do,
saying that if there was a question of marriage, it had to be
very soon or not at all.
Well, Theo, you have read Mme. Bovary - do you remember the
first Mme. Bovary who died in a nervous attack? Here it
was something like that, but complicated by her having taken
poison.
When we were quietly walking together, she had often said,
“I wish I could die now” - I had never paid any
attention to it.
One morning, however, she slipped to the ground. At first I
thought it was just a weakness. But it got worse and worse.
Spasms, she lost her power of speech, and mumbled all kinds of
things that were only half-intelligible. She collapsed
completely with many jerks and convulsions, and so on. It was
different from an epileptic fit, though there was a great
similarity, and suddenly I grew suspicious, and said,
... | Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh
(2nd half September 1884)
... down, to
the usual way of life.
You will understand that the whole thing upsets me greatly
when I tell you how, in that very letter I received today, she
says that “not one of her family understands her real
anguish of mind, that she tries to find distraction, but that
she hardly succeeds in this, and that most of the time sits
quietly in her room with a book or something or other that she
has got from me.”
I am blessed if I know what to do about the B. family - at
first they were extremely unkind to her - and even on the day
of her departure they did not act lovingly or even
good-naturedly, although in point of fact they did not know
what it was all about. Through her brother I have let her
sisters know that I was forced to advise them urgently to
apologize to their sister for their groundless and malicious
distrust and certain equally unfounded suspicions, which in the
first place it was untimely for them to express and in the
second place utterly erroneous... | Letter from Vincent van Gogh to Theo van Gogh
(2nd half September 1884)
... be best for her, separation or
not.
Of course I shall always remain her friend, mutually
we are perhaps too much attached to each other.
I spent almost the whole day with her then.
I went to see Rappard for a moment, but he wasn't in
town.
Last week I made the sketch for the last of the six pictures
for Hermans.
Wood-gatherers in the snow, so he has all six of them to
copy; when he has finished this one and they are thoroughly
dry, I shall work them up into pictures. I wish you could see
all six of them together in the panels for which they are
destined. His copies are very correct as to the drawing, but I
think his colour is bad; and as for mine, the warm grey, often
bituminous, tone in which I kept the whole thing harmonizes
with the woodwork and the style of the room. Goodbye.
You should not have the impression that what you write,
“that it is evident she is like an angel of
patience,” is correct.
This is decidedly not... |
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