Reading Other People’s Mail

        You wouldn’t do that, would you? I wouldn’t, and yet I’ve been doing quite a bit of it lately. The letters are those written by famous authors. If it’s in book form it’s no longer private and is fair game for the inquisitive. 

When explaining how a collection was assembled, the compilers usually state that they canvass people the author corresponded with, and these folks offer up letters that they kept. Or the compiler finds copies of letters that the author sent and that remain part of his or her estate (almost all collections are published posthumously). Unless it involves business matters, most of us don’t keep copies of what we write; I suppose, when you’re famous (or think you may become famous), you consider even casual correspondence as having value. After all, the letters of Kafka and Flaubert have been published — why not yours? In some cases, authors who are esteemed enough during their lifetime donate letters to a university or some such institution.

Chance plays a role in what appears in these collections. A bevy of possible responses from the receivers: Sorry, I don’t keep letters. Sorry, I can’t find them. Sorry, I just have these two. Or they may not want to share some letters they do have. This decision to withhold also applies to authors; they might decide that a letter is not for public consumption. Hemingway stipulated that “none of the letters written by me in my lifetime shall be published.” He knew that a lot of what he wrote was indiscreet and even libelous. Eighteen years after his death his wife, the executrix of his estate, handed over the letters to Charles Scribner’s Sons. By that time I don’t think she cared enough to do any withholding, but with wives that’s often not the case. Beware of collections assembled by spouses or children; when it comes to personal matters they tend to doctor the truth. Reading the letters that William Styron’s wife allowed to be published show us a husband and father far from the person depicted in the tell-all memoir by his daughter. Someone not emotionally involved with the author, such as a biographer, has the best chance to be an unintrusive compiler (though they’re still subject to the limits of what’s made available to them). They have to do some editing, mainly to avoid repetition, but this is a matter of necessity. Also necessary is a degree of selectivity (often the words “Selected Letters” appear in the book title). Who, besides scholars, would be interested in a three volume collection? I find some one volume affairs (such as Evelyn Waugh’s letters) too dense to tackle.

There are collections in which we get the correspondence of two authors. I’ve read letters that Walker Percy and Shelby Foote exchanged, and those of Ross MacDonald and Eudora Welty. But most collections are one-way affairs. Though I was initially put off by the fact that we don’t get letters that the person received, this turned out not to be a problem. The compiler usually gives annotations that, when necessary, explain the context or supply a fact. And that’s enough. The purpose of a collection is to give insight into the writer of the letters. A back-and-forth correspondence actually works against that. When writing to one person we often take one approach; with X we may be introspective, with Y light and humorous. In the case of letters sent to various people the various aspects of a personality have a better chance of being revealed.  

Even with the possibility of withholding and censoring, letters are revealing. That said, the range of revealing is enormous. Some authors by nature don’t hold back emotionally — Hemingway and Jean Rhys are two. Others, like George Orwell and Percy, are reserved. Most fall somewhere in between. There was a side to Hemingway — his loneliness, his need for company — that surprised me. Rhys was congenitally depressed, and her constant laments over her situation tend to diminish their force. Orwell was a stoic, so when he sometimes lifts the reserve to show his innermost feelings (as in a marriage proposal letter), it has impact. He and Flannery O’Connor, the two who had the most to complain about as regards physical disability and pain (both died young, he of TB, she of lupus), never complained about their illnesses; they may mention that a procedure was done, but they don’t dwell over it.

A person’s preoccupations get a lot of space. Since I choose to read the letters written by authors, I want the writing life to be the primary topic. But John O’Hara’s concerns about book contracts and sales and promotions held zero interest for me. Orwell was too involved with politics for my taste, so I skipped those parts. With Hemingway I also did a lot of skipping — his hunting and fishing exploits, for example. And when O’Connor got into discussions of religion I bailed out. I’ve never read any collection of letters from beginning to end. I pick and choose, and what I choose is that which reveals thoughts, opinions and feelings. One feeling that these authors commonly express about their writing is the difficulty they have in doing it well; it’s a long, hard grind that both fulfils and burdens them.

As with people you know, some are more interesting than others. Of the ten authors I’ve cited I found O’Connor’s letters  to be the most entertaining. She has a fresh and unique outlook, is truly funny, and her prose has a smooth flow. But it’s not prose that’s been worked over; I believe it was written in one draft and sent. A letter should not be literature; it should be more like conversation — happy, angry, sad, contemplative, whatever emotion the writer is feeling should be there on the page. A carefully wrought letter lacks spontaneity, and the personality of the writer is thus obscured. Also — for a personality to fully emerge — it’s important that a collection spans a lifetime, for in that way we can see the change from youth to old age, often right to the brink of death. Along the way character flaws are exposed — often hiding between the lines, either on a grand or petty scale. But who is free of flaws? I liked, felt closer, to some people more than to others, but even in the case of those I initially didn’t like, reading through their letters a sense of sympathy gradually took over.

Those who fail to get recognition in their creative endeavors may believe that success would bring them happiness. But reading the letters of these successful authors makes it clear that this is not necessarily so. Success won’t bring happiness to those who weren’t made for it. This statement is reinforced by my knowledge of the lives of other major writers and famous figures in various creative fields. It’s been said that the artistic temperament contains an element of instability. And, indeed, one finds many instances of dysfunctional relationships, alcoholism, depression and sundry discontents among these successes. Not all are unhappy; those who have another outlet, be it politics or religion or a peaceful family — or whatever — have the best chances. But artists tend to have one consuming passion.

Life can be a sad affair for successes and failures alike.

Afterthoughts:

These thoughts, which concern what a compiler of letters can and cannot do, arose from my reading of the letters that Vincent Van Gogh wrote to his brother and that were published in 1937 under the title Dear Theo. The editor of that book was Irving Stone. Three years earlier Stone’s fictionalized life story of Van Gogh, Lust for Life, had been a best-seller.

In 1927 many of Van Gogh’s letters had come out in a three volume set of 1670 pages. In his Forward Stone states that he and his wife worked for seven years honing that collection to one volume (the copy that I have, published by Grove Press in 1960, is 570 pages). Of course, a good bit of honing was necessary. But it’s Stone’s selectivity that is questionable.

I’ve been living with a conception of the relationship of the Van Gogh brothers to be one of deep love. As I read through the letters in Dear Theo that love is a predominant feature. But also playing a major role is the money issue. Vincent, most of his adult life, was financially dependent on his younger brother. In the letters that Stone includes Vincent frequently makes gentle requests for money and expresses much gratitude. No discord is evident. But that financial arrangement struck me as odd, and led me to engage in a bit of investigation.

On my bookshelves I have (unread) an 868 page biography entitled Van Gogh. It was written by Steven Naifeh and Gregory White Smith and was published in 2011. I went to the index and under the heading of “Theodore Van Gogh” I read all the many pages devoted to his “financial support of” his brother. From these passages emerged a portrayal of Vincent — and of his relationship with Theo — that stands in stark contrast with the one that’s presented in the pages of Dear Theo.

Of course, Naifeh and Smith (N&S) had access to Van Gogh’s letters to (and from) Theo. They weren’t looking at the version that Stone had at his disposal, but the contents must have been basically the same. The N&S excerpts present a selfish and manipulative Vincent. He wielded psychological blackmail against his brother like a cudgel. His most frequent tactic was to claim that if money wasn’t forthcoming he would break down — not receiving his monthly stipend “would be something like choking or drowning me.” He told Theo that his fraternal duty was to comfort his brother, not to “distress or dishearten him.” Another ploy was to threaten some reckless course of action if he did not receive funds. When he didn’t get compliance Vincent would vacillate from a cajoling tone to one that was abusive (such as calling Theo “an impotent dullard and blockhead.”)

Theo often asked Vincent to make an effort to become self-sufficient. Just to dress better in order to make himself presentable to art dealers. Or to produce work that was more saleable. Vincent refused to change one jot. He believed that he was entitled to the money — as an artist, he deserved it. And, as an artist, he should be free to pursue his vision, however unsalable it might be. What he wore should not be a factor in judging his work. When asked to economize, this too he rejected: he needed models, he needed high quality paints and canvases, he needed a studio. He pointed out that in his personal expenses he lived like a peasant. When Theo suggested that Vincent get a job, he dismissed this idea as a “nightmare.” He was working sixteen hours a day at his painting; how could he hold down a job? Vincent sent Theo a constant flow of his canvases; his argument was that he would reimburse his brother through their sale, and he often chastised Theo for not working hard enough to promote them to potential buyers. 

This back and forth went on for ten years, over which time Theo gave Vincent tens of thousands of francs (which was often a strain on him). Theo sometimes rebelled, tried to break free of his brother. At one point he lashed out: he wrote to Vincent telling him that he was his enemy, not his friend. No matter how much money he sent, no matter how hard he tried to sell Vincent’s paintings, he would only be rewarded by “stinking ingratitude.” 

In the end, it was Vincent and his demands that prevailed. The older brother’s will — or his psychological hold on Theo — seemed to be too strong for Theo to resist. Perhaps Theo was moved by Vincent’s pitifulness. Here was a man who was rejected by everyone, even his mother and father. Theo was the valued one, and that privileged role might have made him susceptible to guilt. This guilt could partially explain Theo’s irrational behavior when Vincent died.

Why continue with this sad story? The point — which has to do with the role of a compiler of letters — has been made. Stone didn’t alter the words Vincent wrote; that would violate ethics. But neither did N&S do any altering. Stone engaged in tactical picking and choosing as to what to include and what to omit. In doing so he might have been motivated by the belief that the world didn’t need to know the truth; a purified version is more sustaining. He wouldn’t be the first person to engage in myth-making of a famous person. But Stone subtitled Dear Theo with the words “The Autobiography of Vincent Van Gogh.” It was therefore incumbent on him to present the whole man, including the ugly flaws.  

After going through N&S’s excerpts, I stopped reading Dear Theo (I was about a hundred pages from the end). Why continue, if I was being presented with a false portrayal? But after a while I mellowed. The fact is, I did feel sustained by the Vincent that Stone chose to present to the world. And his presenting this version could be based on human — or humane — reasons. I find it excusable (or at least understandable) for the writer of letters or a surviving relative to censor, to withhold. Possibly, over the many years of  research, Irving Stone developed feelings of protective sympathy for the man: Vincent Van Gogh had suffered enough in his lifetime.

It was indeed a deeply troubled life. Van Gogh’s only happiness came in his appreciation of the beauty of nature and in his art. But near the end he more and more expressed doubts as to whether his art compensated for the absences in his life: no wife, no children, no community of friends. 

As a painter Vincent was a failure in his lifetime. Would things have been different for him — would he have been happy — if he had sold his paintings? It would have relieved him of certain problems, but I believe it would have created new ones. A man who had such difficulties in personal relationships would not find that problem solved; rather, with more people he needed to relate to, it would have been exacerbated. I even think it possible that the discord with his brother would have increased.

Vincent had two sides to his personality: the loving, thoughtful, gentle side did exist. When Theo’s wife gave birth to a son, Vincent wrote a letter suggesting that Theo name the boy after their father (but, instead, Theo would name him Vincent). And in that letter of congratulations — “. . . this has given me more pleasure than I can put into words” — Vincent writes, “I started right away to make a picture for you to hang in your bedroom — big branches of white almond-blossom against a blue sky.”

                                                                                     *

On my “How Jack London Changed My Life” blog I’ve reviewed the books written by the authors mentioned in this essay (not just the letters, but other works by them). If you click on a name from the list below, those reviews will appear. The one discussing O’Connor’s Everything That Rises Must Converge may be of interest; in it I propose that the stories reveal a side to her that is absent from her letters. Also included is the memoir written by William Styron’s daughter.

Flannery O’Connor

Ernest Hemingway

Walker Percy/Shelby Foote

George Orwell

Jean Rhys

William Styron

Eudora Welty

Ross Macdonald

John O'Hara

I read the letters of the following authors after writing this essay:

John Steinbeck

Vladimir Nabokov

Paul Bowles

Martha Gellhorn

F. Scott Fitzgerald

William Faulkner