His Masterpiece by Emile Zola (most inspirational books of all time txt) 📕
- Author: Emile Zola
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After That--Ah! What He Meant To Do--He Beheld It Superb And Heroic,
Above Attack And Indestructible. All This Was The Everlasting Mirage
That Goads On The Condemned Disciples Of Art, A Falsehood That Comes
In A Spirit Of Tenderness And Compassion, And Without Which Production
Would Become Impossible To Those Who Die Of Their Failure To Create
Part 8 Pg 154Life.
In Addition To Those Constantly Renewed Struggles With Himself,
Claude's Material Difficulties Now Increased. Was It Not Enough That
He Could Not Give Birth To What He Felt Existing Within Him? Must He
Also Battle With Every-Day Cares? Though He Refused To Admit It,
Painting From Nature In The Open Air Became Impossible When A Picture
Was Beyond A Certain Size. How Could He Settle Himself In The Streets
Amidst The Crowd?--How Obtain From Each Person The Necessary Number Of
Sittings? That Sort Of Painting Must Evidently Be Confined To Certain
Determined Subjects, Landscapes, Small Corners Of The City, In Which
The Figures Would Be But So Many Silhouettes, Painted In Afterwards.
There Were Also A Thousand And One Difficulties Connected With The
Weather; The Wind Which Threatened To Carry Off The Easel, The Rain
Which Obliged One To Interrupt One's Work. On Such Days Claude Came
Home In A Rage, Shaking His Fist At The Sky And Accusing Nature Of
Resisting Him In Order That He Might Not Take And Vanquish Her. He
Also Complained Bitterly Of Being Poor; For His Dream Was To Have A
Movable Studio, A Vehicle In Paris, A Boat On The Seine, In Both Of
Which He Would Have Lived Like An Artistic Gipsy. But Nothing Came To
His Aid, Everything Conspired Against His Work.
And Christine Suffered With Claude. She Had Shared His Hopes Very
Bravely, Brightening The Studio With Her Housewifely Activity; But Now
She Sat Down, Discouraged, When She Saw Him Powerless. At Each Picture
Which Was Refused She Displayed Still Deeper Grief, Hurt In Her
Womanly Self-Love, Taking That Pride In Success Which All Women Have.
The Painter's Bitterness Soured Her Also; She Entered Into His
Feelings And Passions, Identified Herself With His Tastes, Defended
His Painting, Which Had Become, As It Were, Part Of Herself, The One
Great Concern Of Their Lives--Indeed, The Only Important One
Henceforth, Since It Was The One Whence She Expected All Her
Happiness. She Understood Well Enough That Art Robbed Her More And
More Of Her Lover Each Day, But The Real Struggle Between Herself And
Art Had Not Yet Begun. For The Time She Yielded, And Let Herself Be
Carried Away With Claude, So That They Might Be But One--One Only In
The Self-Same Effort. From That Partial Abdication Of Self There
Sprang, However, A Sadness, A Dread Of What Might Be In Store For Her
Later On. Every Now And Then A Shudder Chilled Her To The Very Heart.
She Felt Herself Growing Old, While Intense Melancholy Upset Her, An
Unreasoning Longing To Weep, Which She Satisfied In The Gloomy Studio
For Hours Together, When She Was Alone There.
At That Period Her Heart Expanded, As It Were, And A Mother Sprang
From The Loving Woman. That Motherly Feeling For Her Big Artist Child
Was Made Up Of All The Vague Infinite Pity Which Filled Her With
Tenderness, Of The Illogical Fits Of Weakness Into Which She Saw Him
Fall Each Hour, Of The Constant Pardons Which She Was Obliged To Grant
Him. He Was Beginning To Make Her Unhappy, His Caresses Were Few And
Far Between, A Look Of Weariness Constantly Overspread His Features.
How Could She Love Him Then If Not With That Other Affection Of Every
Moment, Remaining In Adoration Before Him, And Unceasingly Sacrificing
Herself? In Her Inmost Being Insatiable Passion Still Lingered; She
Was Still The Sensuous Woman With Thick Lips Set In Obstinately
Prominent Jaws. Yet There Was A Gentle Melancholy, In Being Merely A
Mother To Him, In Trying To Make Him Happy Amid That Life Of Theirs
Which Now Was Spoilt.
Part 8 Pg 155
Little Jacques Was The Only One To Suffer From That Transfer Of
Tenderness. She Neglected Him More; The Man, His Father, Became Her
Child, And The Poor Little Fellow Remained As Mere Testimony Of Their
Great Passion Of Yore. As She Saw Him Grow Up, And No Longer Require
So Much Care, She Began To Sacrifice Him, Without Intentional
Harshness, But Merely Because She Felt Like That. At Meal-Times She
Only Gave Him The Inferior Bits; The Cosiest Nook Near The Stove Was
Not For His Little Chair; If Ever The Fear Of An Accident Made Her
Tremble Now And Then, Her First Cry, Her First Protecting Movement Was
Not For Her Helpless Child. She Ever Relegated Him To The Background,
Suppressed Him, As It Were: 'Jacques, Be Quiet; You Tire Your Father.
Jacques, Keep Still; Don't You See That Your Father Is At Work?'
The Urchin Suffered From Being Cooped Up In Paris. He, Who Had Had The
Whole Country-Side To Roll About In, Felt Stifled In The Narrow Space
Where He Now Had To Keep Quiet. His Rosy Cheeks Became Pale, He Grew
Up Puny, Serious, Like A Little Man, With Eyes Which Stared At Things
In Wonder. He Was Five By Now, And His Head By A Singular Phenomenon
Had Become Disproportionately Large, In Such Wise As To Make His
Father Say, 'He Has A Great Man's Nut!' But The Child's Intelligence
Seemed, On The Contrary, To Decrease In Proportion As His Skull Became
Larger. Very Gentle And Timid, He Became Absorbed In Thought For
Hours, Incapable Of Answering A Question. And When He Emerged From
That State Of Immobility He Had Mad Fits Of Shouting And Jumping, Like
A Young Animal Giving Rein To Instinct. At Such Times Warnings 'To
Keep Quiet' Rained Upon Him, For His Mother Failed To Understand His
Sudden Outbursts, And Became Uneasy At Seeing The Father Grow
Irritated As He Sat Before His Easel. Getting Cross Herself, She Would
Then Hastily Seat The Little Fellow In His Corner Again. Quieted All
At Once, Giving The Startled Shudder Of One Who Has Been Too Abruptly
Awakened, The Child Would After A Time Doze Off With His Eyes Wide
Open, So Careless Of Enjoying Life That His Toys, Corks, Pictures, And
Empty Colour-Tubes Dropped Listlessly From His Hands. Christine Had
Already Tried To Teach Him His Alphabet, But He Had Cried And
Struggled, So They Had Decided To Wait Another Year Or Two Before
Sending Him To School, Where His Masters Would Know How To Make Him
Learn.
Christine At Last Began To Grow Frightened At The Prospect Of
Impending Misery. In Paris, With That Growing Child Beside Them,
Living Proved Expensive, And The End Of Each Month Became Terrible,
Despite Her Efforts To Save In Every Direction. They Had Nothing
Certain But Claude's Thousand Francs A Year; And How Could They Live
On Fifty Francs A Month, Which Was All That Was Left To Them After
Deducting Four Hundred Francs For The Rent? At First They Had Got Out
Of Embarrassment, Thanks To The Sale Of A Few Pictures, Claude Having
Found Gagniere's Old Amateur, One Of Those Detested Bourgeois Who
Possess The Ardent Souls Of Artists, Despite The Monomaniacal Habits
In Which They Are Confined. This One, M. Hue, A Retired Chief Clerk In
A Public Department, Was Unfortunately Not Rich Enough To Be Always
Buying, And He Could Only Bewail The Purblindness Of The Public, Which
Once More Allowed A Genius To Die Of Starvation; For He Himself,
Convinced, Struck By Grace At The First Glance, Had Selected Claude's
Crudest Works, Which He Hung By The Side Of His Delacroix, Predicting
Equal Fortune For Them. The Worst Was That Papa Malgras Had Just
Retired After Making His Fortune. It Was But A Modest Competence After
All, An Income Of About Ten Thousand Francs, Upon Which He Had Decided
Part 8 Pg 156To Live In A Little House At Bois Colombes, Like The Careful Man He
Was.
It Was Highly Amusing To Hear Him Speak Of The Famous Naudet, Full Of
Disdain For The Millions Turned Over By That Speculator, 'Millions
That Would Some Day Fall Upon His Nose,' Said Malgras. Claude, Having
Casually Met Him, Only Succeeded In Selling Him A Last Picture, One Of
His Sketches From The Nude Made At The Boutin Studio, That Superb
Study Of A Woman's Trunk Which The Erstwhile Dealer Had Not Been Able
To See Afresh Without Feeling A Revival Of His Old Passion For It. So
Misery Was Imminent; Outlets Were Closing Instead Of New Ones Opening;
Disquieting Rumours Were Beginning To Circulate Concerning The Young
Painter's Works, So Constantly Rejected At The Salon; And Besides,
Claude's Style Of Art, So Revolutionary And Imperfect, In Which The
Startled Eye Found Nought Of Admitted Conventionality, Would Of Itself
Have Sufficed To Drive Away Wealthy Buyers. One Evening, Being Unable
To Settle His Bill At His Colour Shop, The Painter Had Exclaimed That
He Would Live Upon The Capital Of His Income Rather Than Lower Himself
To The Degrading Production Of Trade Pictures. But Christine Had
Violently Opposed Such An Extreme Measure; She Would Retrench Still
Further; In Short, She Preferred Anything To Such Madness, Which Would
End By Throwing Them Into The Streets Without Even Bread To Eat.
After The Rejection Of Claude's Third Picture, The Summer Proved So
Wonderfully Fine That The Painter Seemed To Derive New Strength From
It. There Was Not A Cloud; Limpid Light Streamed Day After Day Upon
The Giant Activity Of Paris. Claude Had Resumed His Peregrinations
Through The City, Determined To Find A Masterstroke, As He Expressed
It, Something Huge, Something Decisive, He Did Not Exactly Know What.
September Came, And Still He Had Found Nothing That Satisfied Him; He
Simply Went Mad For A Week About One Or Another Subject, And Then
Declared That It Was Not The Thing After All. His Life Was Spent In
Constant Excitement; He Was Ever On The Watch, On The Point Of Setting
His Hand On The Realisation Of His Dream, Which Always Flew Away. In
Reality, Beneath His Intractable Realism Lay The Superstition Of A
Nervous Woman; He Believed In Occult And Complex Influences;
Everything, Luck Or Ill-Luck, Must Depend Upon The View Selected.
One Afternoon--It Was One Of The Last Fine Days Of The Season--Claude
Took Christine Out With Him, Leaving Little Jacques In The Charge Of
The Doorkeeper, A Kind Old Woman, As Was Their Wont When They Wanted
To Go Out Together. That Day The Young Painter Was Possessed By A
Sudden Whim To Ramble About And Revisit In
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