As I’ve said before on this blog, I enjoy reading letters. I bought a number of books of letter collections, used whenever I find them. Some of these are keepers, already read or waiting to be. Others are “nice to have to read once things” that will go in the donation box once read. The only thing keeping me from reading books in either category is time.
I recently decided to take time to read The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh, which I bought a number of years ago at a used bookstore. I’m not an artist, don’t care a whole lot about art, but I do care about letters and knew Van Gogh was famous (or perhaps infamous), so figured his letters would be interesting to read. Thus, after finishing another book, I scanned the bookshelves in my new office and this one jumped out at me. Perfect, I thought. An interesting read then a slight reduction in my library.
And that’s the way it turned out to be. First, I learned that all the letters in my paperback copy—340 pages set in 10 pt font, so a bit hard to read—were to his brother Theo, and it was an edited collection, not comprehensive. An editor selected the ones he thought best. There were a lot of them, representative of the full range of Van Gogh’s adult life. Normally, I prefer to read correspondence, the back and forth between two letter writers. But I’ll take letters, all outgoing, and find good reading in them.
That’s what these letters were. They mostly dealt with Van Gogh’s artist career. Theo was also involved in art, but as a dealer for an art brokerage house. Van Gogh mentioned a large number of contemporary artists and discussed their techniques and results. He did a lot of comparing himself to them. Sometimes he mentioned various masters of the past.
Much of his discussion had to do with what paintings or drawings he was working on at the moment. Since I don’t know a lot about his paintings, I’m sure some he discussed are famous. A student of Van Gogh as an artist would no doubt enjoy hearing what he thought of his own work at he produced it. He wrote about his techniques, problems he had procuring models, about finding lodging and space for a studio, about trying to get colors and perspective right. Fascinating stuff to this duffer on art.
Occasionally, Van Gogh spoke about family. He was thankful for Theo’s financial support, which was the only way he could do his art. Vincent sometimes mentioned other family members (parents, siblings, uncles, aunts), but less so than I would have expected in letters between brothers—unless the editor decided not to include mainly family letters.
About the demons that troubled Van Gogh his last couple of years, demons that led him to commit suicide at age 37, the letters say relatively little. The same about the famous incident with his ear. Included was a memoir of Vincent’s life written by Theo’s wife.
If you are into art, or a fan or student of Van Gogh, you likely would enjoy it. I did. But, even though I feel good rating it 3.5-stars, it’s not a keeper. To the donation box it goes, according to plan.
