“my own portrait in writing” cultural dialectics Series editor: Raphael Foshay The difference between subject and object slices through subject as well as through object. Theodor W. Adorno Cultural Dialectics provides an open arena in which to debate questions of culture and dialectic — their practices, their theoretical forms, and their relations to one another and to other spheres and modes of inquiry. Approaches that draw on any of the following are especially encouraged: continental phil- osophy, psychoanalysis, the Frankfurt and Birmingham schools of cultural theory, deconstruction, gender theory, postcoloniality, and interdisciplinarity. series titles Northern Love: An Exploration of Canadian Masculinity Paul Nonnekes Making Game: An Essay on Hunting, Familiar Things, and the Strangeness of Being Who One Is Peter L. Atkinson Valences of Interdisciplinarity: Theory, Pedagogy, Practice Edited by Raphael Foshay Imperfection Patrick Grant The Undiscovered Country: Essays in Canadian Intellectual Culture Ian Angus The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh: A Critical Study Patrick Grant “My Own Portrait in Writing” : Self-Fashioning in the Letters of Vincent van Gogh Patrick Grant “My Own Portrait in Writing” s elf-fashioning in the letters of Vincent Van gogh p atrick grant Copyright © 2015 Patrick Grant Published by AU Press, Athabasca University 1200, 10011 – 109 Street, Edmonton, Alberta t 5J 3s8 doi: 10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 Cover and interior design by Natalie Olsen, Kisscut Design Cover image: Road with a Man and Pollard Willows, from letter 175 (1:295), Vincent Van Gogh to Theo Van Gogh, ca. 12–15 October 1881. Etten. Pencil, pen and ink, 18.3 x 11.7 cm (JH 58). Van Gogh Museum (Vincent Van Gogh Foundation), Amsterdam, b172/1962. Printed and bound in Canada by Marquis Book Printers Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication Grant, Patrick, author “My own portrait in writing” : self-fashioning in the letters of Vincent van Gogh / Patrick Grant. (Cultural dialectics ; 1915-836X)Includes bibliographical references and index. Issued in print and electronic formats. ISBN 978-1-77199-045-5 (pbk.). — ISBN 978-1-77199-059-2 (pdf). — ISBN 978-1-77199-060-8 (epub). — ISBN 978-1-77199-058-5 (mobi) 1. Gogh, Vincent van, 1853–1890 — Criticism and interpretation. 2. Gogh, Vincent van, 1853–1890 — Correspondence. 3. Letters in literature. i. Title. ii. Series: Cultural dialectics ; 1915-836X ND653.G7G833 2015 759.9492 C2015-900617-1 C2015-900618-X We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund (CBF) for our publishing activities. Assistance provided by the Government of Alberta, Alberta Multimedia De- velopment Fund. This publication is licensed under a Creative Commons licence, Attribution– Noncommercial–No Derivative Works 4.0 International: see www.creative commons.org. The text may be reproduced for non-commercial purposes, provided that credit is given to the original author. To obtain permission for uses beyond those outlined in the Creative Commons li- cence, please contact AU Press, Athabasca University, at [email protected]. For Gloria Tomorrow morning I’ll go to the little English church you know, it lies there so peacefully in the evening in that quiet Begijnhof between the thorn hedges, and seems to be saying, “In loco este dabo pacem,” that is, “in this place will I give peace,” saith the Lord. Amen, be it so. ViC N eNt VaN GoGh, Amsterdam, 1877 doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 I’d also like to see if I can’t make my own portrait in writing. First I start by saying that to my mind the same person supplies material for very diverse portraits. ViC N eNt VaN GoGh, Arles, 1888 doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 contents List oF illustratioNs xi PreFaCe xiii Introduction: The Dialogical Structure of Self-Fashioning 3 Van Gogh Old and New: Reading the Letters as Literature 3 What Is Literature Anyway? Cultural Codes and Timeless Truths 6 Bakhtin, Dialogue, and the Self Interrupted 9 Embodied Intentions: The Textual Dynamics of Self-Fashioning 13 Conclusion: Van Gogh’s “Double-Voiced Discourse” 15 1 The Painterly Writer 19 Dissolving Boundaries: Word-Painting and the Sister Arts 21 Ideal Space, Existential Time 27 Drawing and Painting: From Morality to Aesthetics 32 Thinking About Colour and Seeing Beyond It 44 Conclusion: Dialogical Means and Personal Ends 47 2 Binaries, Contradictions, and “Arguments on Both Sides” 51 Contradiction, Paradox, and the Shaping of Commitment 52 Half-Measures and Negative Contrasts 57 Deconstructing the Binaries 64 The Sower: A Dialogue of Life and Death 70 Conclusion: Contradiction and the Quest for Meaning 76 doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 3 Reading Van Gogh’s Letter-Sketches 79 The Letter-Sketches and the Letters 79 Narrative Dimensions 87 Representing the Sacred 113 Homo Viator 128 Conclusion: Enhancing the Text 141 4 Imagination and the Limits of Self-Fashioning 145 Open Sea and Enchanted Ground: The Perils of Commitment 146 Imagination: “Impossible Windmills” 151 Imagination: “That’s Rich, That’s Poetry” 156 Safe Enough to Let Go: On Perseverance and Spontaneity 159 Conclusion: Managing the Dialogue 163 Conclusion: Envoi 165 Notes 173 IndeX 179 doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 illustrations 1 The Cave of Machpelah (116/1:163) 81 2 Beach with Fishing Boats (255/2:130) 82 3 Ears of Wheat (rM23/5:323) 84 4 Man Pulling a Harrow (400/3:52) 85 5 Soup Distribution in a Public Soup Kitchen (324/2:2) 89 6 Woman Digging (331/2:313) 90 7 The Poor and Money (270/2:167) 92 8 Women Working in the Peat (393/3:29) 94 9 Churchyard (387/3:15) 96 10 Head of a Woman (Gordina de Groot) (505/3:246) 100 11 Cicada (638/4:169) 103 12 Starry Night on the Rhône (691/4:293) 104 13 The Seine with the Clichy Bridge (589/4:35) 105 14 The Garden of the Asylum with Dandelions and Tree-Trunks (868/5:230) 108 15 The Raising of Lazarus (After Rembrandt) (866/5:225) 110 16 Small Churches at Petersham and Turnham Green (99/1:134) 114 17 Map of Etten and Environs (145/1:228) 117 18 Café ‘Au charbonnage’ (148/1:233) 119 19 The Yellow House (691/4:294) 121 20 On the Road (a) and In Front of the Embers (b) (162/1:263) 124 21 Tree-Lined Avenue (24/1:48) 129 22 Westminster Bridge (39/1:67) 131 23 Road with a Man and Pollard Willows (175/1:295) 132 24 Pollard Willow (252/2:123) 135 25 Avenue of Poplars (542/3:315) 137 26 Couple Walking Between Rows of Poplars (896/5:282) 140 Xi doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 preface Although the present book stands on its own, it can also be read as a companion to The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh: A Critical Study (Athabasca University Press, 2014). Together, these two books offer a response to the surprising fact that, despite many scholarly and critical acknow- ledgements of the extraordinary literary distinction of Van Gogh’s collected correspondence, there has been no extended study of his letters as literature. As a way of addressing this gap in the assessment of Van Gogh’s work as a whole, my earlier book focused on the imaginative and conceptual coherence of the collected correspondence, but I made no attempt at any detailed consideration of Van Gogh’s writing from a theoretical perspective. Yet if Van Gogh’s literary achievement is to be adequately assessed, his correspondence needs to be read from both practical-critical and literary-theoretical points of view. Consequently, the present book approaches the letters by way of a set of ideas about dialogue and self-fashioning derived especially from Mikhail Bakhtin, and, in each chapter, I bring these ideas to bear while also engaging the reader in some hitherto undiscussed aspect of Van Gogh’s writing. Throughout, I deal only with the letters, together with their attend- ant sketches, and the tacit assumption (well, now not so tacit) is that Van Gogh’s writing would be highly regarded even if the paintings and drawings had not survived. Yet, to date, commentary on the correspond- ence has reflected mainly the interests of art historians and biographers, whose principal focus is on Van Gogh the painter. But if the letters are to come into their own as literature, some separation of the domains of scholarly discourse is in order, if only to enable the foregrounding of both critical and theoretical modes of enquiry and analysis. Xiii doi:10.15215/aupress/9781771990455.01 All quotations from the correspondence are from Vincent Van Gogh: The Letters (2009). As the editors, Leo Jansen and Hans Luijten, say, this English translation is “the first truly integral and updated compilation of Van Gogh’s correspondence available to an international reader- ship” (Editio: Internationales Jahrbuch für Editionswissenschaft 15 [2001]: 53). Consequently, it makes good sense to work from the English version, and in the preface to my earlier book, I weighed some pros and cons of doing so. But then, as now, the central point is that I am writing mainly for English-speaking readers who will be reading the letters in English. Still, it is important not to let critical interpretation override what the original languages say, and I have checked the Dutch and French, as appropriate, to defend against interpretive transgressions. I gratefully acknowledge help received from the Van Gogh Museum and from the staff of the Museum Library. Many thanks to Hans Luijten for expert help, advice, and encouragement all the way, and also to Teio Meedendorp, Sue Mitchell, Peter Stoepker, and Henry Summerfield. Permission to print excerpts and sketches from the letters has been gratefully received from the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam.