Notes

Notes

 

Chapters

Chapters
656 1. his Russian mother Sweetman, p. 140. 2. exhibited at the Salon Mathews, p. 84: Charles Laval (1862-1894; French artist) was either seventeen or eighteen when he exhibited at the Salon of 1880. He also exhibited at the Salon of 1883. 657 3. "free and fertile" Gauguin, quoted in Janzen, p. 1. 4. "the climate is excellent" Gauguin, quoted in Janzen, p. 1. 5. The Marriage of Loti It was the phenomenal success of this book, published in 1880, that led its author, Julien Viaud, to change his name to that of his account's fictional protagonist, Pierre Loti. Even that name was a fiction within a fiction. In the book (which was the basis of the opera Madame Butterfly), the navy officer who marries a native Tahitian girl is named Harry Grant. When Grant marries the fourteen-year-old Polynesian beauty Rarahu, he is re-christened by the natives after a local flower, "Loti." By changing his name, of course, Viaud succeeded in further blurring the distinction between truth and fiction. 6. the Aztec emperor Montezuma Sweetman, p. 11: Paul Gauguin attributes this notion to his mother Aline Marie Chazel and grandmother Flore Célestine Thérèse Henriette Tristan y Moscoso, but continued to trade in it, apparently unaware (as they were) that Montezuma was an Aztec ruler whose empire extended throughout central America, not a ruler of the Inca civilization that flourished in the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries along the western coast of South America, centered in modern Peru. 658 7. proximity to his brother-in-law Mathews, p. 78: Juan Uribe was the husband of Gauguin's sister Marie. According to Gauguin, Marie proposed this distant posting: "Juan needs for a commission and banking agency he is starting," Gauguin wrote to his wife Mette on December 26, 1886, "some one who understands banking, who can be relied on not to rob him, and who can take his place during his trips to Europe ... Marie has me in mind for such a post" (Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, 12/26/1886, in Malingue, ed., p. 73). According to Mathews, "The Uribes had apparently lost badly in the market crash of 1882 and perhaps also in the Peruvian stocks based on guano. But Juan was not a stockbroker like his friends; he was a merchant, and he devised a plan to capitalize on the money flowing into the Panama Canal project that France had launched in 1880." (Mathews, p. 78.) 8. Laval, too, had a relative Mathews, p. 80: Laval had a family connection to Henri Cottu, an official of one of the companies contracted to build the canal, the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interocéanique de Panama. 9. a haut-bourgeois lifestyle of hired carriages Mathews, p. 32: According to an account cited in Mathews, Gauguin once arrived at a session at the Bourse in a hansom cab and paid the driver to wait two hours -- a considerable extravagance -- before taking him home again. Mathews cites another account of Gauguin owning "fourteen pairs of trousers" (ibid.). 10. Spanish was his first language Mathews, pp. 10-12: Gauguin was born in Paris but traveled with his mother to Peru when he was one. He returned to France (Orléans) from Peru in 1854 and only then learned to speak French. 11. uncertain pedigree Gauguin's father, Clovis Gauguin (1814-1849; French journalist), who died on the boat to Peru in 1849 when Paul was one, was a radical newspaper editor who came from a relatively conventional and undistinguished family. Paul's maternal grandmother, Flora Tristan, however, was the illegitimate child of a French mother, Thérèse Laisnay, and a Spanish father, Don Mariano de Tristan y Moscoso, who died when Flora was three (Mathews, p. 5). (Flora sailed to Peru in 1833 in search of her family's supposed fortune. She returned disappointed a year later and published a book about her travels, The Peregrinations of a Pariah (1838). Flora's daughter, Aline, Gauguin's mother, returned from Peru in 1854 landing first in Orléans and then moving to Paris in 1862. There she opened a "dressmaking business," according to the record -- in all likelihood a euphemism for prostitution (ibid., p. 18). Eventually, she entered into a long-term relationship of indeterminate nature with a wealthy businessman named Gustave Arosa, whose Spanish family had built a considerable fortune out of Peruvian guano (ibid., p. 10) -- the exact substance that was used to fertilize the sandy soil of Zundert.

There is no proof that Aline was Arosa's mistress, but it is difficult to imagine she wasn't, given Arosa's generosity to her and her children. Arosa became Paul's official guardian in 1865, the year Aline died. Sweetman answers the question this way: "Gustave had certainly had a number of liaisons before Aline moved to Paris. He belonged to a milieu which set little store by the usual, albeit hypocritical morality of the middle-classes -- his married sister Irene had left her husband and was openly living with a painter -- all of which must make it likely, though unprovable, that he and Aline were lovers. Why else should he have given such unstinting help to her children? Without Gustave Arosa, Paul Gauguin would have been no more than the poor son of a seamstress, while with him he had an entrée into a world both rich and cultured. As a wealthy Spaniard in the Second Empire, Arosa was not only well off, he was fashionable. A few weeks after Napoleon's accession, the new emperor had married a stunningly beautiful, if politically meddlesome, minor Spanish aristocrat, Eugénie de Montijo, thus starting a vogue for all things Spanish -- Carmen the play, Flamenco dancers, even the once ignored Spanish art in the Louvre. When in 1862, Aline brought the fourteen-year-old Paul from school in Orléans to Paris it was inevitable that he should quickly merge into the world Arosa offered. How much better to be Spanish, the offspring of a colonial aristocracy, than the impoverished grandchild of an Orléanais shopkeeper?" (Sweetman, pp. 39-40.)

12. "like a whore to the market" Gauguin, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 49. 13. a sales job with a tarpaulin maker In December 1884, Gauguin began six months in Copenhagen as a salesman for Dillies et Cie, a French clothmaker. His job was to market canvas tarpaulins in the Danish market. For an account of these "catastrophic months", see Mathews, p. 60. 659 14. fell sick with smallpox Gauguin refused to return the child to his mother in Copenhagen, but did relent and take a menial job with a bill-posting company in Paris. The wage was five francs a day for three weeks -- equivalent to the stipend that Theo gave Vincent (i.e., 150 francs per month). (See Sweetman, p. 127.) 15. He drafted ambitious manifestos "Notes Synthétiques" (1885). 16. a new champion, Cézanne Silverman, p. 18. 17. he laid elaborate plans According to the latest scholarship, Gauguin concocted a fake manuscript, purportedly by an eighteenth-century Turkish (or Persian [Druick and Zegers, p. 202]) scholar which confirmed all of Georges Seurat's new theories. While acknowledging that the manuscript text "is surprisingly similar to Seurat's artistic program," Lövgren suggests, somewhat generously, "that the episode was a result of discussions of La Grande Jatte by the two painters" (Lövgren, p. 117). We think it more likely that the fabricated manuscript represents an effort by Gauguin (by no means his last) to expropriate another artist's work by laying the groundwork for a claim of precedence. 18. "contretemps" Druick and Zegers, p. 61: "Unexplained" because of different versions of the event. In Gauguin's telling, he was given permission by Paul Signac to work in the latter's Paris studio during his summer absence. But Seurat, who lived on the same hallway, claimed ignorance of the agreement, locked Signac's studio, and would not permit Gauguin to enter. An altercation resulted. Gauguin claimed that he only intended to copy one of his own wooden reliefs that was stored in the studio. Seurat claimed that Gauguin -- by now a notorious plagiarist as well as an ungrateful ex-protégé of the beloved Camille Pissarro -- intended to get an unauthorized look at some of Pissarro's recent, innovative Neo-Impressionist canvases that were also stored in the studio. Thanks to his frequent self-exculpating retellings of it, Gauguin's version of the event has survived, whereas Seurat's is largely inferential. Still, Seurat may have been right to be suspicious of Gauguin's motives for coming to Signac's studio. 19. "petit-point tapestries" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 129. 20. "a sailor's art" Camille Pissarro to Lucien Pissarro, 1/23/1887, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 70. 21. "At bottom his character" Camille Pissarro to Lucien Pissarro, 1/23/1887, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 70. 22. "savage from Peru" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 28. 23. he grew his hair long Mathews, p. 292. 24. swaggering capes the next Mathews, p. 292. 25. bedecked in ostentatious jewelry Mathews, p. 292. 26. he had slipped into megalomania Mathews, p. 292. Gauguin's wife Mette later called him "criminally egoistic" (Mette Gauguin-Gad to Émile Schuffenecker, 5/6/1891, in Malingue, ed., p. 246): "He never thinks of anything but himself and his welfare; he prostrates himself in complete admiration before his own magnificence." (Mette Gauguin-Gad to Émile Schuffenecker, 9/15/1893, in Malingue, ed., p. 246.) 27. he continued to woo and charm Mathews, p. 63: In Mathews telling, "When Paul Gauguin returned to France [in 1885] without his family, old friends noticed that his behavior had become flamboyant and unpredictable. Outbursts alternated with spells of self-justification and a honeyed, calculating charm." 28. "You must remember" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, February 1888, in Malingue, ed., p. 94. 29. "outside the limits that society" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 127: We have changed the translation slightly. 30. He could be affable and gregarious Mathews, p. 63: Mathews refers to Gauguin's alternating spells of "self-justification and a honeyed, calculating charm." 660 31. bullying and bellicose Mathews, p. 222. 32. "gentleness and warmth" Huret, n.p. 33. "scoffing" Gauguin, in Guérin, ed., p. 108. 34. self-pity Gauguin, in Guérin, ed., p. 108. 35. "heavy-lidded sensuality" Mathews, p. 1. 36. Gauguin boxed and fenced Mathews, p. 72. 37. five feet four "Gauguin Uncovered." 38. he was strong and solidly built Mathews, p. 150. 39. "menacing power that seemed" Mathews, p. 1. 40. " malin" Hartrick, p. 31: The expression Hartrick uses is "C'est un malin," an idiom that suggests caginess but with a mischievous, even sinister overtone. Le Malin means The Evil One. Another painter in Pont-Aven, Henri Delavallée, later described Gauguin as "proud, a little naïve, a great trickster, and incredibly sly. You often had to ask whether or not he was kidding." (Delavallée, quoted in Mathews, p. 72.) 41. "Most people were rather afraid" Hartrick, p. 31. 42. men as well as women could taste Mathews, p. 74: Mathews notes that Gauguin "preferred the company of young men" and refers to the "almost erotic intimacy that Gauguin engendered" with friends like Émile Schuffenecker. "Whether Gauguin's homoeroticism in relationships like this was accompanied by actual sexual intimacy is unknown but Gauguin's liaisons with men were far tenderer than those he had with women" (ibid.). 43. Laval was by no means See Ch. 34, n. 42. 44. " pas de femmes" Gauguin, quoted in Hartrick, p. 30. 45. exalted androgyny above all other Mathews, p. 113: During his stay in Pont-Aven in 1888, Gauguin wooed Émile Bernard's seventeen-year-old sister, Madeleine. In a letter written soon after they parted (just before Gauguin left for Arles), he addressed her as "Dear Sister" and advised her to strive to be "an androgyne, without sex." His obsession with androgyny played out disturbingly in his relations with his own children, especially his daughter Aline. The family had a history of incest (his grandmother had accused his grandfather of molesting Gauguin's mother) and in 1881 Gauguin painted his four-year old daughter asleep in a leeringly half-naked position, with her hair so closely cropped that for years the image was thought to be of his first-born son, Émile. (See Sweetman, p. 10.) Seven years later, he made a portrait vase depicting the myth of Leda and the Swan in which the young girl threatened with ravishment by the disguised Zeus bears an unsettling resemblance to his twelve-year-old daughter. According to Druick and Zegers, "This image of dawning sexuality is complicated by the figure's likeness to Gauguin's young daughter, Aline. Various taboos are unleashed: the specters of rape, bestiality, and incest." (Druick and Zegers, p. 89.) 46. "All the artists fear me" Gauguin, quoted in Mathews, p. 73: We have taken Gauguin's word-order as significant, presenting intimidation as his first strategy of domination (and line of defense), seduction as his second. In this, we differ from the literature. Mathews, his perceptive biographer, writes, "Alternately seductive and bullying in his manner, [Gauguin] capitalized on the powers of his body not simply to reap physical pleasure (sexually and athletically) but also to carry out his wishes in the larger professional arenas of his life. His method of dealing with most people and situations was first to cajole and persuade, then, if not successful, to threaten and menace." (Mathews, p. 1.) 47. a chasm of mistrust and recrimination Mathews, p. 52: According to Mathews, "None of the dealers he knew from the old days -- [Paul] Durand-Ruel, [Alphonse] Portier, Legrand -- would take on his work. Nor could the old Impressionist exhibitions be revived. ... The more salable Impressionists were invited to exhibit, like Monet and Pissarro and the second tier, Seurat, but not Gauguin. Although he again frequented the café Nouvelle Athènes, his anger at the Neos grew so uncontrollable that he finally refused to speak to any of them."

In a letter that Pissarro wrote to his son Lucien in November 1886, there is a suggestion that Gauguin initially tried to reclaim his place in the Paris art world by allying himself with Degas -- an artist whom he had earlier admired and imitated and who had supported his inclusion in the Impressionist exhibitions (Degas had bought a Gauguin painting in 1880 or early 1881). But Degas had soured on Gauguin as early as 1882, and by 1885 Gauguin had returned the favor, accusing Degas of having "greatly harmed our movement" (quoted in Roskill, p. 264). According to Roskill, "[Gauguin] appears to have deliberately made himself unpleasant to the older artist when the two of them met at Dieppe in September of that year [1885]" (ibid.). There is some evidence that Gauguin made efforts starting in the winter of 1886 to mend this deep rift. By 1888, Theo could report to Gauguin in Arles that "Degas is so enthusiastic about your works that he is speaking about them to a lot of people, and he is going to buy the canvas representing a spring landscape" (BVG T3a, 11/13/1888). However, the sale to Degas apparently never happened, which may suggest that Theo's report of a rapprochement between Degas and Gauguin was, in some part, salesman's hype (Rewald, p. 36, n. 76).

48. a long hospitalization Welsh-Ovcharov, p. 24: Welsh-Ovcharov reads Gauguin's letters to indicate he spent twenty-seven days in the hospital between mid-November and December 26, 1886. 49. a full turn from painting to pottery Mathews, p. 77: According to Mathews, from the beginning of 1887, "Gauguin was spending all his time with Laval and [Ferdinand Loyen] du Puigaudeau and seemed to be working exclusively on his pottery, for no paintings survive from the first three months of 1887." 50. "Gauguin is gone" Pissarro, quoted in Mathews, p. 77. 51. warmed only by his kiln Gauguin did not fire his ceramics in his apartment at 257, rue Lecourbe (in Montparnasse). He used the kiln in the studio of Ernest Chaplet [1835-1909; French artist] at 153, rue Blomet. The older Chaplet was a master ceramicist formerly associated with Félix Bracquemond. Since Gauguin's apartment was only a block or so from Chaplet's studio, the fierce heat of the kiln could be seen in his reddened face, and its heat felt, long after he returned home. 52. a few Pont-Aven acolytes Mathews, p. 77: In addition to Laval, another young Pont-Aven admirer, Ferdinand du Puigaudeau, remained steadfast in his adulation after Gauguin returned to Paris from Brittany in November 1886. 53. "rebaptize" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 153: "I will take my colors and my brushes and I will rebaptize myself far from humankind." 54. "I am going to Panama" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 153. 55. "packed like sheep" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, late April 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 78. 56. the shipboard ritual of storytelling Mathews, p. 16: Mathews writes, "Aboard ship Paul quickly learned how to be a favorite among the men. He honed his storytelling skills, he learned to play the popular musical instruments, including the concertina, and he was an avid participant in the physically competitive games on deck. He had learned fencing and wrestling in school, and as his body developed a sailor's strength, he became a formidable opponent, especially if he felt slighted in any way. He was thin-skinned and not by nature a jovial man, but the social skills he learned in the all-male environment of a ship served him well in years to come." 57. "an astonishing liar" Gauguin, quoted in Mathews, p. 15. 58. of earthquakes and shipwrecks Gauguin, in Guérin, p. 234. 59. madmen chained to the roof Gauguin,quoted in Mathews, p. 15. 661 60. of sexual awakening Gauguin, quoted in Mathews, p. 15. 61. whores in every port Mathews, p. 16. 62. of cloak-and-dagger doings Sweetman, p. 163: Gauguin claimed to have had a central, spy-like role in the events leading up to the attempted overthrow of the Spanish king Alfonso XII in an 1883 coup led by an expatriate military officer named Manuel Ruiz Zorrilla (1833-1895). For a discussion of the conspiracy and an argument for Gauguin's actual participation in its farcical unfolding, see Sweetman (pp. 103-106). Ruiz Zorilla headed to the Spanish border in the first half of August 1883 in order to be available if an uprising at the military base in Barcelona succeeded. (Due to failed communications, the uprising, which had been scheduled for the same date at bases throughout the country, misfired, giving authorities ample time to stamp it out.) Sweetman writes, "What we know is that Gauguin also left Paris and headed south for there is a surviving landscape dated 18 August 1883 of a view near Cerbère close to Sète [a town on the France-Spain border]. A mere coincidence seems very unlikely, though whether this was anything more than just a rallying round of interested supporters, gathering to give encouragement to Ruiz Zorilla, is hard to tell. Years later Schuffenecker revealed how Gauguin had told him that he had been paid to smuggle Ruiz Zorilla across the frontier into Spain under the nose of the border guard and that when the uprising collapsed he had managed to get him out again hidden under a cart-load of hay." (Sweetman, p. 105.) Unfortunately, both the dating of the landscape (and its subject), and Schuffenecker's colorful account, lead back to the same unreliable and unconfirmable source: Gauguin. 63. Gauguin crossed paths Sweetman, p. 55. 64. artistic soul of ambiguous sexuality Sweetman, p. 151. 65. "malarious swamp" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, August 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 84. 66. "a sort of filthy, putrescent" Sweetman, pp. 115-156. 67. infecting half the population Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 81: These are Gauguin's estimates, delivered with the self-conscious sang-froid of a soldier entering battle. More than the actual statistics (which were not quite so dire), they give an index of the danger that he and Laval thought they faced: "As to the mortality, it is not so terrible as it is said to be in Europe; among the negroes who do the worst jobs the mortality is 9 in 12, the others only about half." 68. just a general store Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., pp. 80-81. 69. Gauguin found neither work nor money Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., pp. 80-81: Gauguin reported furiously to Mette: "My fool of a brother-in-law is there with a shop that looks anything but prosperous; he hardly spent five shillings on our reception, in short, he was as stingy as could be. ... the cheapest hotel is 15 francs a day, that is 30 francs for the two of us, so we have spent 400 francs without having been able to do anything." 70. "the sad spectacle" Mathews, pp. 81-82, quotes a journalist for the Tribune: "It is no unusual matter, this sad spectacle of educated men starving in the streets of Panama. Nowhere else does there seem to be less of the milk of human kindness than on the isthmus." 71. they found jobs as clerks Sweetman, p. 158. 72. but only for two weeks Sweetman, p. 159. Gauguin wrote Mette on June 20, "I worked 15 days for the Company when order came from Paris to suspend much of the work and that same day 90 employees were dismissed, including me, of course, as a newcomer" (Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, 6/20/1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 81). 73. When that failed Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 80: There is evidence that Gauguin, in his lordly colonialism, tried simply to squat on unsettled land: "These idiots of Colombians, since the cutting of the canal, will not let you have a yard of land at less than 6 francs a yard. It is totally uncultivated and weeds grow everywhere, yet it is impossible to build a hut and live on fruits without people mobbing you as a thief." 74. "genial and gay" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 81. 75. "We ought to have gone" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 80. 662 76. "enchanting life" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 80. 77. struck down by yellow fever Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 81. 78. "all's well that ends well" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, 6/20/1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 53. 79. "some good pictures" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, September 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 57. 80. Gauguin, too, fell sick Mathews, p. 85: We know this, despite Gauguin's failure to report it, because Laval mentioned it in a letter to Du Puigaudeau in July 1887. 81. when word arrived Mathews, pp. 85-86. Laval's brother, Nino, wrote Laval that the collector was not only interested in buying Gauguin's pottery, but also in setting up a business with Gauguin. According to Mathews, "Gauguin lunged at the opportunity -- as he did at any business proposition, no matter how slight. Once again he saw his future grow rosy: this time the long-awaited triumph would be over old enemies in Paris." Not surprisingly, the plan for the business eventually fell through (Mathews, p. 91). 82. "I must get out of here" Paul Gauguin to Émile Schuffenecker, 8/25/1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 86. 83. "break[ing] the earth" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early May 1887, in Malingue, ed., pp. 80-81: He wrote this in a letter to his wife Mette in May 1887. His subsequent fabrication of illness in August followed on this bold lie: "During my stay at Colon, I was poisoned by the malarious swamps of the canal and I had just enough strength to hold out on the journey, but as soon as I reached Martinique I collapsed" (ibid., p. 84). 84. "agonies in the stomach" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, August 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 84. 85. "atrocious pains" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, August 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 84. 86. "My head is swimming" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, August 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 84. 87. "expected to die" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, August 1887, in Malingue, ed., p. 84. 88. Laval was still too weak There is uncertainty in the literature about when Laval finally left Martinique. According to Sweetman, "Laval was still too ill to travel and would have to convalesce for several months before being repatriated" (Sweetman, p. 170). According to Mathews, Gauguin departed, "leaving Charles Laval behind to paint and nurse his frail health for another year" (Mathews, p. 86). 663 89. "I have just enough" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, early April 1887, in Malingue, ed., pp. 74, 76. 90. "a man of the tropics" Mathews, p. 91: Mathews concludes that it is "doubtful that Gauguin's construction of his new identity as a man of the tropics occurred to him before he returned to Paris." 91. "the center for the Impressionists" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, 12/6/1887, quoted in Lövgren, p. 120. 92. "hit everybody in the eye" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, July 1886, in Malingue, ed., p. 70. 93. Theo's cautious optimism Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, 12/6/1887, quoted in Lövgren, p. 120: This is the way Gauguin characterized Theo's guarded, "have-a-little-patience" reassurances to him in late 1887: "Little by little he is going to make his clientele swallow us; here is yet another hope and I am sure that in a short time I will be launched." 94. "All I have brought back" Paul Gauguin to Mette Gauguin-Gad, July 1886, in Malingue, ed., p. 88. 95. "decisive" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, pp. 170-171. 96. "If one wants to know" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, pp. 170-171. 97. "dark and primitive" Loti, Mon frère Yves, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 96. 98. "primitive times" Loti, Mon frère Yves, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 96. 99. "the hidden savage" Loti, Mon frère Yves, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 96. 100. "inhabited the primitive world" Druick and Zegers, p. 96. 101. a charade of imminent departure According to Sweetman, although Vincent first invited Gauguin in March 1888, once the good weather arrived in Brittany, "Gauguin began to prevaricate, hinting that he might go [to Arles] but that he was prevented from leaving Pont-Aven because of all the debts he had run up, especially at the Gloanec. By June, Theo offered Gauguin a monthly allowance of 150 francs in exchange for a single painting, on the clear understanding that he would join Vincent as soon as possible. Gauguin accepted, though he no longer had any intention of leaving." (Sweetman, p. 192.) Mathews is slightly more circumspect, but equally suspicious: "Much to the surprise of Vincent and Theo, Gauguin put them off. On the one hand, he wrote pathetic letters about illness and debts, yet, on the other, he always seemed to have the wherewithal to turn down offers of money that didn't suit him. Whether he had a source of income that he did not reveal or whether he thought he could force a higher offer, his reluctance to take either Schuffenecker's offer to buy the Cézanne or the Van Gogh's offer of support makes one question his candidness in financial matters." (Mathews, p. 101.) 102. finally limped home from Martinique Mathews, p. 106: Laval joined his brother Nino, who was already in Pont-Aven. While Laval seems to have forgiven Gauguin, there is an indication that the embrace was not entirely reciprocated. A few months later, from Arles, Gauguin sent greetings to Laval through Bernard with this ominous caveat: "Handshakes to you both and be friends with Laval who has a fine and noble character in spite of his transcendent faults" (Paul Gauguin to Émile Bernard, letter 176, c. 11/4/1888, quoted in Merlhès, pp. 269-270). It would have been consistent with Gauguin's character to resent the insights that Laval had glimpsed into his mentor's less attractive side during their time in the Caribbean and thus for Gauguin to have undermined Laval's credibility with their mutual acquaintances, like Bernard, with dark insinuations like this. 103. "crudity" Sweetman, p. 192: Gauguin described his painting of two boys wrestling, Jeunes lutteurs -- Brittany (July 1888) this way: "I have just done some nudes which you will be happy with; no Degas about them whatsoever. The latest is of two boys wrestling by the river, thoroughly Japanese, but seen through the eyes of a Peruvian savage. Upper area white, greensward, very crude." 104. Gauguin's self-portrait as savage See Ch. 34, n. 103. 664 105. "fierce, blood-glutted face" Gauguin, quoted in Silverman, p. 109. 106. "eyes like lava fires" Gauguin, quoted in Silverman, p. 109. 107. some of his ceramics Jirat-Wasiutynski, p. 240: "Gauguin left for Arles on the 22nd of October, liberated by a sale of ceramics to Theo." 108. a final fifty-franc inducement Paul Gauguin to Émile Schuffenecker, 10/16/1888, in Malingue, ed., pp. 109-110: On October 16, 1888, less than a week before his departure from Brittany, Gauguin wrote his friend Schuffenecker with this request: "Be good enough to go and see Van Gogh at once, and arrange for him to send me 50 francs. Telegraph me at once." 109. the long journey to Arles The trip from Pont-Aven to Arles covered 685 miles (1,100 kilometers) and required six changes of trains. 110. alerted by a trunk BVG 555, 10/17/1888.

Context:
JLB 707, 10/17/1888: "Gauguin writes that he's already sent his trunk and promises to come around the 20th of this month, in a few days, therefore. Which I'll be very pleased about, because I dare believe that it will do us both good."

111. "However much Van Gogh" Paul Gauguin to Émile Schuffenecker, 10/16/1888, in Malingue, ed., pp. 109-110. 112. Gauguin failed to inform Vincent BVG 551, 10/22/1888. On October 17, Vincent wrote that Gauguin had sent his trunk and "promises to come around the 20th of this month" (JLB 707, 10/17/1888). But five days later, Vincent was still waiting for more definite information. On October 22 (the day before Gauguin's early-morning arrival, perhaps only hours before), Vincent wrote his brother: "we'd have to have deliberations as soon as Gauguin arrived, which I hope will be any day now" (JLB 710, 10/22/1888). The next day (the day Gauguin arrived), Theo wrote Vincent, unaware that Gauguin had left Pont-Aven and still uncertain as to the Frenchman's intentions regarding Arles: "I'm sending [Gauguin] 500 francs for it and so he'll be solvent for the moment, but will he come to join you?" (JLB 711, 10/23/1888). Gauguin could have telegraphed his arrival information to Vincent in advance, just as Vincent immediately telegraphed Theo to notify him when Gauguin finally arrived (JLB 712, 10/25/1888). Given the efficiency of the French post and the length of the trip from Brittany to Provence (two days and two nights, according to Sweetman, p. 205), there was almost enough time for a letter to reach Vincent with the arrival information.

Context:
JLB 710, 10/22/1888: If it went wrong we'd have to have deliberations as soon as Gauguin arrived, which I hope will be any day now.

113. "It's you" Gauguin, "Avant et après," pp. 123-124. 114. Vincent had shown Gauguin's self-portrait Gauguin, "Avant et après," pp. 123-124: This is Gauguin's story and explanation: "I arrived at Arles toward the end of night and awaited daybreak in an all-night cafe. The owner looked at me and cried out: 'It's you, his pal, I recognize you.' A self-portrait that I had sent to Vincent suffices to explain this proprietor's exclamation. While showing him my portrait, Vincent had explained that it was of a pal who was to arrive soon." While generally skeptical of Gauguin's accounts -- especially crafted, retrospective ones like this -- we agree with Hulsker that this one seems credible since there is no evidence that the story "attempts to represent himself as better or more important than he was, or to clear himself of real or imaginary accusations" (Hulsker, p. 310). 115. "I have a need for struggle" Gauguin, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 120. 116. a French term, la lutte Druick and Zegers, p. 120: Druick and Zegers explore the special meaning of lutte in the vocabulary of the artistic avant-garde: "It had gained particular currency among the Neo-Impressionist vanguard; Seurat designated his major paintings as 'toiles de lutte' (canvases of combat) and as 'research canvases, conquests if possible'; Pissarro frequently referred to the group effort in terms of 'notre lutte' (our combat) against dissenters like Gauguin." 117. whether with swords Mathews, p. 72. 118. "I slash away blow by blow" Gauguin, quoted in Druick and Zegers, p. 120. 119. It showed two Breton youths Sweetman, p. 192. 120. a tense, wrestlers' embrace Mathews points out the "ambivalent, tender eroticism" of the wrestling young boys (Mathews, p. 104). Druick and Zegers suggest that the image is an illustration of the concept of "wrijving" -- creative friction. Vincent used the term in describing his experience at the academy in Antwerp ("I find the friction [wrijving] of ideas that I'm looking for here -- I'm getting a fresh eye for my own work, can judge better where the weak points are and thus make progress in order to correct them" [JLB 555, 1/28/1886].) But Vincent was engaging in a self-deluding fiction. In fact, he could never tolerate disagreement, let alone true competition -- with his brother, with Van Rappard, or with his fellow students. His insecurities ran too deep and his enthusiasms demanded too much for any kind of genuine give-and-take, creative or emotional. 121. "as seen through the eyes" Gauguin, quoted in Sweetman, p. 192.