Nothing moves me less than Rubens when it comes to the expression of human sorrow. Let me start by saying, to make it clearer what I mean — that even his most beautiful heads of a weeping Magdalen or Mater Dolorosas always just remind me of the tears of a pretty tart who’s caught the clap, say, or some such petty vexation of human life3 — as such they’re masterly, but one needn’t look for anything more in them. Rubens excels in the painting of ordinary beautiful women. But he is not dramatic in the expression. Compare him with, say, the head by Rembrandt in the La Caze Collection4 — with the male figure in the Jewish bride5 — you’ll understand what I mean — that, for instance, his 8 or so bombastic fellows performing a feat of strength with a heavy wooden cross in The elevation of the Cross seem absurd to me as soon as I look at them from the standpoint of modern analysis of human passions and emotions. That in his expressions, particularly in the men (always excepting actual portraits) Rubens is superficial, hollow, bombastic, yes, altogether conventional and nothing, like — Giulio Romano and even worse fellows of the decadence.6

But all the same, I adore it because it is precisely he, Rubens, who seeks to express a mood of gaiety, of serenity, of sorrow, and actually achieves it, through the combination of colours — even if his figures are sometimes hollow etc.

Thus in The elevation of the Cross, even — the pale spot — the body a high, light accent — is dramatic in the context of its contrast with the rest, which has been pitched so low.

The same thing, but to my mind far more beautiful, is the charm of The descent from the Cross, where the pale spot is repeated by the blonde hair, pale faces and necks of the female figures, while the sombre setting is immensely rich because of those various low masses, brought together by the tone, of red, dark green, black, grey, violet.

And Delacroix tried again to get people to believe in the symphonies of the colours.7 And in vain, one would say, judging by how much almost everyone understands good colour to mean the correctness of local colour, the small-minded preciseness — that neither Rembrandt, nor Millet, nor Delacroix, nor whomever you like, not even Manet or Courbet, set as their aim, any more than Rubens or Veronese did.  1v:2

I’ve also seen various other Rubens paintings &c. in several churches.8 And it’s very interesting to study Rubens, precisely because he is, or rather seems, so supremely simple in his technique. Does it with so little, and paints — and above all draws, too — with such a swift hand and without any hesitation. But portraits and — heads or figures of women, that’s his forte. There he’s deep and intimate, too. And how fresh his paintings have remained precisely because of the simplicity of the technique.

Now what else shall I tell you? That I feel increasingly inclined, without rushing, that’s to say without rushing nervously — to do all my figure studies over again from the beginning very calmly and coolly. I’d like to get to the point in knowledge of the nude and the structure of the figure where I can work from memory. I’d like to work either with Verlat or at another studio for a while, and for the rest also paint from models for myself as much as possible. At the moment I’ve left 5 paintings — 2 portraits, 2 landscapes, 1 still life — with Verlat’s painting class at the academy.9 I’ve just been there again, but each time I haven’t found him there. But I’ll soon be able to let you know how that turns out. And I hope to arrange it so that I can paint from the model at the academy all day, which would make it easier for me, since the models are so awfully expensive that I can’t keep it up.

And I must find some way of getting help in that regard.

In any event, I think that I’ll stay in Antwerp itself for a while, instead of going back to the country. It would be so much better than postponing it, and there’s so much more opportunity here of finding people who might take an interest in it. I feel that I dare do something and can do something, and things have already been dragging on for far too long.

You get cross if I make a comment, or rather you take no notice of it, and all the rest that we know, and yet I believe that there will come a time when you yourself will have to acknowledge that you’ve been too weak in seeing to it that I get back some of my credit with people. But anyway, we’re facing the future, not the past. And again — I believe that time will bring you to the realization that, if there had been more cordiality and warmth between us, we could have set up our own business together.10  1v:3

Even if you’d stayed with G&C. You said to me, indeed, that you know very well that you’ll get no thanks for your pains — but are you so very sure that this isn’t a misunderstanding like the one Pa himself laboured under? At any rate I won’t put up with it, you can be sure of that. For there’s still too much to do, even nowadays.

The other day I saw an excerpt from Zola’s new book for the first time, ‘L’oeuvre’, which as you know is appearing as a serial in Gil Blas.11 I think that this novel will do some good if it sinks in a little in the art world. I thought the excerpt that I read was very realistic.

For my part I’ll admit that something else is needed when working absolutely from nature — facility of composition — knowledge of the figure — but after all — I don’t think I’ve been putting myself to all this trouble for years for absolutely nothing. I feel a certain power in me because, wherever I may go, I’ll always have a goal — painting people as I see and know them.

As to whether we’ve already heard the last of Impressionism — to stick to the term Impressionism — I always imagine that many newcomers may still emerge in figure painting, in particular, and I’m beginning to think it increasingly desirable in a difficult time like the present that one should seek one’s salvation precisely by going deeper into high art. For there is relatively higher and lower — people are more than the rest, and for that matter a whole lot harder to paint, too.

I’ll do my best to make acquaintances here, and I thought that if I worked for a while with Verlat, say, I’d be in a better position to know what’s going on here, and what there is to do, and how one can get into it.

So just let me scratch around, and for heaven’s sake don’t lose heart or weaken. I don’t think that you can reasonably ask me to go back to the country for the sake of perhaps 50 francs a month less, when the whole stretch of years ahead is so closely related to the associations I have to establish in town, either here in Antwerp or later in Paris.

And I wish I could make you understand how easy it is to foresee that a great deal will change in the trade. And consequently there are many new opportunities too, if one could come up with something original.12 But that that is therefore necessary, if one wants to do something useful. It’s no fault of mine and no crime when I tell you we must put more force into this or that, and if we don’t have it ourselves we’ll have to find friends and new contacts. I have to earn a bit more or have a few more friends — preferably both. That’s the way to get there, but it’s been too tough for me recently.  1r:4

As regards this month, I really do definitely have to insist that you manage to send me at least another 50 francs.

At the moment I’m losing weight, and moreover my clothes are getting too bad &c. You know very well yourself that this won’t do. All the same, I have a degree of confidence that we can pull through.

But you said that if I became ill we’d be in even more of a state — I hope it won’t come to that, but I would like to be a little bit more comfortable, precisely so as to prevent that.

Anyway — when one thinks how many people just go on living without ever in their lives having even a notion of care — and who always just think that everything will turn out for the best. As if people didn’t starve — and no one ever perished.

I’m beginning to object more and more to your imagining yourself to be a financier and, for instance, thinking the exact opposite of me.

People aren’t all alike, and if one isn’t able to see that in calculating, above all, time must have passed over the calculation before one can consider for certain that one has calculated correctly; if one can’t see this, one is no calculator. And a broader view of finance is precisely what characterizes many modern financiers. That’s to say not exploiting, but allowing freedom of action. I know, Theo, how you yourself could perhaps be rather hard pressed. But you’ve never in your life had it as hard as I have for the last 10 or 12 years in a row. Can’t you understand that I’m right when I say that now, perhaps, it’s been long enough; in that time I’ve learned something I couldn’t do before, so all the opportunities have been renewed and I come up against it, against always being neglected? And if it were now to be my wish to stay here again in city life for a while, then perhaps also go to a studio in Paris, will you try to prevent it?13 Be fair enough to let me go on, because I tell you, I’m not looking for a row and I don’t want a row, but I won’t allow my career to be blocked. And what can I do in the country, unless I go there with money for models and paint? There’s no opportunity in the country, absolutely none, to make money from my work, and that opportunity does exist in town. So I won’t be secure until I’ve made friends in the city, and that’s the order of the day. Now for the moment it might make things a bit more difficult but it’s the way, all the same, and going back to the country now would end in stagnation.

Anyway — regards — De Goncourt’s book is good.