Dick French
May/June 2020
It’s interesting to read the letters of John Ruskin alongside those of Vincent van Gogh. Most people are aware that Ruskin became rather unbalanced with age, but from reading his correspondence with Euphemia (Effie) it seems to me he was quite mad from the start. It’s the manic density that impresses as much as the content. Writing from Switzerland … “Coming down from the high snows my face burned literally scarlet, you may well talk of the Kalydor [A kind of early patent sun cream. Ed] but it must be for me there – that it wanted. Then the costume. Fancy – first – me with a huge pair of dark blue double glassed spectacles. Over there – over the whole face, a green gauze veil – doubled and fastened down in the waistcoat ¬ then a broad straw hat on the top of all – tied down tight with its flaps over my ears – by a handkerchief over the crown of it – tied under my chin! Many a hard days walk have I had so accoutred and enough to frighten anything in the world.”
Effie herself was rather odd. She wrote about the eldest son of Earl Somers, who is a beautiful drawer, but also rather fond of queer things, such as he wanted to see a massacre and went some months ago to Algiers where he saw two or three really good ones and has come back quite satisfied.”
Van Gogh’s letters, in contrast, are models of sanity … “One can never study and toil too much from nature. The greatest most powerful imaginations have at the same time made things from nature which strike one dumb.” His descriptive powers are superb: “Flemish sailors eating mussels and drinking beer happens with a lot of noise and movement, while in contrast a tiny figure in black with her little hands against her body comes stealing
Dick French: On The Town – May 2020
Dick French
May/June 2020
It’s interesting to read the letters of John Ruskin alongside those of Vincent van Gogh. Most people are aware that Ruskin became rather unbalanced with age, but from reading his correspondence with Euphemia (Effie) it seems to me he was quite mad from the start. It’s the manic density that impresses as much as the content. Writing from Switzerland … “Coming down from the high snows my face burned literally scarlet, you may well talk of the Kalydor [A kind of early patent sun cream. Ed] but it must be for me there – that it wanted. Then the costume. Fancy – first – me with a huge pair of dark blue double glassed spectacles. Over there – over the whole face, a green gauze veil – doubled and fastened down in the waistcoat ¬ then a broad straw hat on the top of all – tied down tight with its flaps over my ears – by a handkerchief over the crown of it – tied under my chin! Many a hard days walk have I had so accoutred and enough to frighten anything in the world.”
Effie herself was rather odd. She wrote about the eldest son of Earl Somers, who is a beautiful drawer, but also rather fond of queer things, such as he wanted to see a massacre and went some months ago to Algiers where he saw two or three really good ones and has come back quite satisfied.”
Van Gogh’s letters, in contrast, are models of sanity … “One can never study and toil too much from nature. The greatest most powerful imaginations have at the same time made things from nature which strike one dumb.” His descriptive powers are superb: “Flemish sailors eating mussels and drinking beer happens with a lot of noise and movement, while in contrast a tiny figure in black with her little hands against her body comes stealing