"on the side of the angels" casts somewhat of a shadow over the
sentiment; yet I feel constrained to quote it, as representing my own
feelings in regard to the question whether the artistic temperament is a
curse or a blessing. Shakespeare had it; Dickens had it; and Thackeray
confessed that he would have been glad to black Shakespeare's boots. One
may well be convinced that it is a blessing by the penalties which
Heaven exacts from its possessors. It means the capacity to enjoy and
appreciate the beautiful; with the great poets and novelists it means
the power to express the beautiful and describe it "in thoughts that
breathe and words that burn." On the other hand, it means experiencing a
keener sense of pain than those are capable of who do not possess tender
susceptibilities. But in the spirit of "better fifty years of Europe
than a cycle of Cathy" the miseries that belong to the poetic
temperament are better than the pleasures that go with its opposite. To
feel the full glory of the sun, the joy of the Western wind, to hear the
aphonous whisperings of the flowers, to be fancifully cognisant of "the
music of the spheres"; better this with only a garret for your
environment, than to be a wealthy Peter Bell in a palace, or a lord of
many acres who sees nothing beyond its intrinsic value in a Turner, and
finds Shelley poor stuff and Tennyson only a rhymster. It is the
artistic temperament that lives up to the glories of Nature, and
understands the parables; and you need not be a writing poet to have it.
There is many a poet who never wrote a line, many a romancist who never
contributed to a magazine. The ploughboy whistling behind his team, the
gardener lovingly pruning his vines, the angler sitting in the shade of
summer trees, even the playgoer craning his neck over the gallery and
failing to catch the last words of Hamlet on the stage, may be blessed
with something of "the divine afflatus," to be born utterly without
which is to require at the Maker's hands a compensation. Thus He gives
in a lower form the trick of money-making, the rank of birthright, the
cheap distinction of a high place in society; with poverty He joins the
peace of humble content, a solid faith in the bliss of a future state,
and the rough enjoyment of perfect health. But the poetic temperament is
the choicest gift of all; it may have occasional glimpses of the
bottomless pit, but it can make its own heaven, and paint its own
rainbow upon "the storms of life."
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Angelina wants to concentrate genius.]
The artistic temperament implies genius--and "there's the rub," for we
others don't understand genius. The Almighty bestowed the blessing; we
have superadded the curse of an ignorant reception. The Genius is the
child of his century. _We_ persist in relegating him to his family. He
asks for materials and room to create. We answer him, "Go to--thou art
idle. Put money in thy purse." We bind him with cords of
conventionality, and deliver him into the hands of the Philistines. We
declare him to be a rational animal who could pay his bills if he
chose--and we County Court him if he does not. We build and maintain
stately edifices for the accommodation of paupers, criminals, and
idiots; but for the Genius there is not even the smallest parish
allowance made to his relatives to pay for a keeper. How _can_ he expand
under present conditions? "_Es bildet ein Talent sich in der stille_,"
says Goethe, and I think you will admit that there is precious little of
"_der stille_" to be found either in ordinary domestic life, or that
refuge of the desperate, a garret in Bloomsbury. Picture to yourself
Orpheus executing frenzied violin _obbligati_ to the family baby
(teething)--or Apollo hastily descending the slopes of Olympus to argue
with a tax collector, or irate landlady! Alas! few survive this sort of
thing. What I would propose is a Grand National Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Genius--including a National Asylum for its
reception and maintenance. Geniuses would be fed and clothed, and have
their hair cut by the State, who would adopt and cherish them during
life, and bequeath them to posterity at death. In this blissful retreat
they would be preserved from the chilling influences of the outer world,
liberally supplied with foolscap, musical instruments, and padded cells,
and protected from all that had hitherto oppressed them--including cats,
organ-grinders, creditors, and matrimony. Worshippers of the opposite
sex would be allowed to express their appreciation sensibly, by
contributions to the box at the door. Just think of the enormous
advantage which would be gained by thus concentrating our Genius as we
do our other illuminating forces; the saving of brain power by avoiding
outside friction. Why there need be absolutely _no_ waste! Genius could
be "laid on," at a fixed rate, and "lions" supplied by annual
subscription.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Florence Marryat believes it to be a blessing.]
Surely--without a manner of doubt--a Blessing--the greatest blessing
ever bestowed by Heaven on Man--the best panacea for the troubles of
this life--the magic wand that, for the time being, opens the door of a
Paradise of our own creation. And in order to procure this enjoyment, it
is not necessary that the artist should be successful. Disappointment
may be the issue of his attempt, but the attempt itself--the knowledge
that he _can_ attempt--is so delightful. The work may never reach the
artistic ideal--it seldom does--but no artist believes in failure,
whilst the child of his brain is germinating. It looks so promising--it
grows so fast--the ideas which are to render it immortal press so
quickly one upon the other, that he has hardly time to grasp
them--whilst his breast heaves and his eye sparkles, and his whole frame
quivers with the sense of power to conceive and to bring to the birth.
No fear enters his mind then that his offspring will prove to be
stunted, deformed, or weakly. It is his own--no man has begot it before
him--and he can take no interest in anything else, until it is
completed. Is this not true of the Painter, as he stands with his
charcoal in hand thinking out his picture for next year's Academy?--of
the Composer, seated before his piano and running his fingers with
apparent want of design over the keys?--of the Author, as he walks to
and fro and plans the details of his new plot?--of the Poet, as he gazes
up into the skies and hears the rhythm of his lines in the "music of the
stars?" True, that the finely-organised and sensitive temperament of the
Artist suffers keenly when jarred by the discord of the world--that it
amounts almost to a curse to be interrupted when in the throes of a new
conception (just thought of and hardly grasped) by someone who has no
more notion of what he is undergoing than a deal table would have, and
pulls him back roughly from his Paradise to the sordid details of Life,
putting all his airy fancies to flight, perhaps, by the process. But
neither this materialistic world, nor all the fools that inhabit it, can
ever really rob the Artist of the joy--in which "no stranger
intermeddleth"--of the Realm of fancy which is his own domain, inherited
by right of his genius. Though he may pass through Life unappreciated
and unsuccessful, let him still thank God for the Divine power which has
been given him--the power to create! It will tide him over the loss of
things, which other men cut their throats for--it will stand him in
stead of wife and child--in stead of friends and companionship.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: And that the true artist is never alone.]
Is the true Artist ever alone? Do not the creatures of his brain walk
beside him wherever he may go? Do they not lie down with him and rise up
with him, and even when he is old and grey, his heart still keeps fresh,
from association with the Young and Beautiful, with the blossoms of
Womanhood and of Spring, that have bloomed upon his canvas--with the
notes of the birds and the sounds of falling water that his fingers have
conjured to life upon his instrument--with the fair maidens and noble
youths that he has accompanied through so many trials and conducted to
such a blissful termination in his pages. And beyond all this--beyond
the joy of conception and the pride of fruition--there is an added
blessing on the artistic temperament. Surely the minds which are always
striving after the ideally Perfect must be, in a measure, refined and
purified by the height of the summit they try to reach. "We needs must
love the highest, when we see it." It is a Blessing to have the desire
to reach the highest, even though we fail, and our natures are raised by
the mere contemplation of it. So that the Artist may well forget the
rebuffs and cold douches which he receives from those who cannot
sympathise with him, and thank Heaven that he can walk out of their
world into his own.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Zangwill draweth a distinction.]
There are two aspects of the artistic temperament--the active or
creative side, and the passive or receptive side. It is impossible to
possess the power of creation without possessing also the power of
appreciation; but it is quite possible to be very susceptible to
artistic influences while dowered with little or no faculty of
origination. On the one hand is the artist--poet, musician, or
painter--on the other, the artistic person to whom the artist appeals.
Between the two, in some arts, stands the artistic interpreter--the
actor who embodies the aery conceptions of the poet, the violinist or
pianist who makes audible the inspirations of the musician. But in so
far as this artistic interpreter rises to greatness in his field, in so
far he will be found soaring above the middle ground, away from the
artistic person, and into the realm of the artist or creator. Joachim
and De Reszke, Paderewski and Irving, put something of themselves into
their work; apart from the fact that they could all do (in some cases
have done) creative work on their own account. So that when the
interpreter is worth considering at all, he may be considered in the
creative category. Limiting ourselves then to these two main varieties
of the artistic temperament, the active and the passive, I should say
that the latter is an unmixed blessing, and the former a mixed curse.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: He speaketh of ye curse.]
What, indeed, can be more delightful than to possess good aesthetic
faculties--to be able to enjoy books, music, pictures, plays! This
artistic sensibility is the one undoubted advantage of man over other
animals, the extra octave in the gamut of life. Most enviable of mankind
is the appreciative person, without a scrap of originality, who has
every temptation to enjoy, and none to create. He is the idle heir to
treasures greater than India's mines can yield; the bee who sucks at
every flower, and is not even asked to make honey. For him poets sing,
and painters paint, and composers write. "_O fortunatos nimium_," who
not seldom yearn for the fatal gift of genius! For _this_ artistic
temperament is a curse--a curse that lights on the noblest and best of
mankind! From the day of Prometheus to the days of his English laureate
it has been a curse
"To vary from the kindly race of men,"
and the eagles have not ceased to peck at the liver of men's
benefactors. All great and high art is purchased by suffering--it is not
the mechanical product of dexterous craftsmanship. This is one part of
the meaning of that mysterious _Master Builder_ of Ibsen's. "Then I saw
plainly why God had taken my little children from me. It was that I
should have nothing else to attach myself to. No such thing as love and
happiness, you understand. I was to be only a master builder--nothing
else." And the tense strings that give the highest and sweetest notes
are most in danger of being overstrung.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: And its compensations.]
But there are compensations. The creative artist is higher in the scale
of existence than the man, as the man is higher than the beatified
oyster for whose condition, as Aristotle pointed out, few would be
tempted to barter the misery of human existence. The animal
has consciousness, man self-consciousness, and the artist
over-consciousness. Over-consciousness may be a curse, but, like the
primitive curse--labour--there are many who would welcome it!
* * * * *
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _i.e._, Gambled at Faro.
[2] See the writer's _Life of David Gray_.
[3] I have given a detailed account of Peacock in my "Look Round
Literature."
[4] O those "Tendencies of one's Time"! O those dismal Phantoms,
conjured up by the blatant Book-taster and the Indolent Reviewer! How
many a poor Soul, that would fain have been honest, have they bewildered
into the Slough of Despond and the Bog of Beautiful Ideas!--R.B.
* * * * *
End of Project Gutenberg's The Idler Magazine, Vol III. May 1893, by Various