Vincent Van Gogh history
There
is a cataclysm in your head. You question everything. You sink into a deep
depression...Your parents are sorry to see you in this state. Your first big
crisis. How could you be helped? You reread Renan:
“Man didn’t come on earth to act suitably in this world. He is here
to achieve gret things for humankind, to achieve nobility, and overwhelm
the ordinariness most human beings languish in”.
After the holiday in Helvoirt, your sister returns to London with you. She
is looking for a position. You live together. You try to devote yourself to
your work. But you are hurt. You are quick-tempered, irascible, unpleasant
with the customers.You are fed up with the trade of works of art. Uncle Cent
suggests you should work in the Paris branch. You settle in Paris in October.
But you are miserable. You want “to die to yourself”. You read the
Bible. Your first big mystic crisis. Somehow, you needed something to cling
to... You go back home at Christmas, whereas the gallery needs you. But you
don’t care. You don’t enjoy your work anymore. You are no longer
appreciated. You are unhappy in Paris. In January, you are told you have three
months to leave. Eugénie still tortures your soul. You want to see
her again. You decide to return to London. You look for a job. Any... You
read job ads in the English papers. At last, you find a job as a coach
in Ramsgate, four hours away from London by train. You wouldn’t even
be paid. Fed and accommodated, that’s it.
You arrive in Ramsgate in M. Stockes’s school, in April. The boarding
school is as dreary as you.
You have to teach French, German and Dutch, and look after children. Without
any salary which could have allowed you to go to London, or buy anything,
whatever it was. You tried to see Eugénie, walking for hours in the
cold. You come back exhausted and sick. You needed to talk. To relieve your
misery. You wished to be a clergyman. Your job as a coach didn’t really
match your desire to serve God. You are looking for another situation...