Jag fattar pennan

fortsättning på gårdagens inägg.

 Gårdagens samvaro med Gutenberg födde många tankar. I synnerhet när jag botaniserade bland alla brevsamlingar som finns där — såväl de fiktiva, som de skriva av kända och okända personer.

Inte ett inskjutet *fnitter* eller ;), så långt ögat når — ändå råder inte minsta tvivel om när brevskrivare skämtar eller avhandlar allvarliga ämnen. 

Van Gogh använder varken utropstecken, emojisymboler eller yay, när han berättar hur nöjd han är med sin senaste målning. Att han säger sig vara utomordentligt glad, säger ju precis hur han känner sig.

DEAR BROTHER,

You must not take it amiss if I write to you again so soon. I do so only in order to tell you how extraordinarily happy painting makes me feel.

Last Sunday I began something which I had had in mind for many a day:

It is the view of a flat green meadow, dotted with haycocks. A cinder path running alongside of a ditch crosses it diagonally. And on the horizon, in the middle of the picture, there stands the sun. The whole thing is a blend of colour and tone—a vibration of the whole scale of colours in the air. First of all there is a mauve tinted mist through which the sun peers, half concealed by a dark violet bank of clouds with a thin brilliant red lining. The sun contains some vermilion, and above it there is a strip of yellow which shades into green and, higher up, into a bluish tint that becomes the most delicate azure. Here and there I have put in a light purple or gray cloud gilded with the sun’s livery.

The ground is a strong carpet-like texture of green, gray and brown, full of light and shade and life. The water in the ditch sparkles on the clay soil. It is in the style of one of Emile Breton’s paintings.

I have also painted a large stretch of dunes. I put the colour on thick and treated it broadly.

I feel quite certain that, on looking at these two pictures, no one will ever believe that they are the first studies I have ever painted.

Truth to tell, I am surprised myself. I thought my first things would be worthless; but even at the risk of singing my own praises, I must say that they really are not at all bad. And that is what surprises me so much.

Även för  Jane Austen räcker orden till:

We are extremely sorry for poor Eliza's illness. I trust, however, that she has continued to recover since you wrote, and that you will none of you be the worse for your attendance on her. What a good-for-nothing fellow Charles is to bespeak the stockings! I hope he will be too hot all the rest of his life for it!

 

Friday.—At length the day is come on which I am to flirt my last with Tom Lefroy, and when you receive this it will be over. My tears flow as I write at the melancholy idea.

My dear Cassandra,—We have been very gay since I wrote last; dining at Nackington, returning by moonlight, and everything quite in style, not to mention Mr. Claringbould's funeral which we saw go by on Sunday.

Personligen bryr jag mig inte om, ifall någon skulle missa något av  mina eventuella lustigheter — så viktigt är inte det jag skriver. Jag tycker nog att man underskattar sina läsare, om man inte tror att de förstår ett skämt — dessutom är de som skrattar åt sina egna skämt är rätt påfrestande. Vare sig man skriver brev eller blogginlägg, så avhänder man ju sig sitt personliga tonfall om man in inte vågar lita till sin förmåga att uttrycka vad man vill ha sagt, med ord.

 

Kanske är är det bara lättja — vi ids inte längre tänka efter hur vi ska uttrycka det vi vill ha sagt. När Emily Eden berättar vad de har för sig på Newby Hall, erfar jag en mängd känslor, fast jag inte ser henne — och trots att hon är lågmäld, och jag inte ens känner henne. Jag visste inte ens vem hon var, innan jag hittade den här brevsamlingen.

Emily Eden to Lady Buckinghamshire

NEWBY HALL,
November [1818].

MY DEAREST SISTER, We are now quite alone for the first time since I came—that is, the Wynns are here still, but they are part of being alone, and we have never before been so few, and I must say that it is uncommonly pleasant after so much company. The mere comfort of being able to go about the house with rough hair, or a tumbled frill, and in an old black gown, is not to be despised, and there is some pleasure in taking up a book in the evening and yawning over it, and then saying anything that comes uppermost, without thinking. We are very busy, dressing little dolls for Lord Grantham’s Theatre, which is one of the most ingenious pieces of mechanism I ever saw, and one of the prettiest things altogether. There is to be a grand representation to-night, and we have been rehearsing all the last week. It takes nine people to manage the scenery, figures, and music, and we all of us lose our tempers at it regularly every morning. I act the orchestra, and whilst I am playing away to the best of my power the music belonging to any particular scene, Anne and Lady Grantham, who manage the figures, get into some hobble, and the music is finished before the action to which it belongs is begun, so that Harlequin and Columbine have to dance out without any time to assist them. I believe nothing in the world could ruffle Lord Grantham’s temper; but these theatrical difficulties go nearer to it than anything else, and while he is explaining to Lady Grantham that the figures will move if she takes pains, and to me that the music is quite long enough if I will but play slower, it may be rather provoking that Freddy should let down the wrong trap-door, Anne set her sleeves on fire in one of the lamps, Mary turn the cascade the wrong way, so that the water runs up instead of down; Thomas the footman should let down a light blue sky to a dark moonlight scene, and Shaw should forget the back scene altogether, so that his coat and buttons and white waistcoat are figuring away in the distance of the Fire King’s Palace. However, patience and scolding have overcome these little difficulties, and our last rehearsal was perfect.

Några av Gutenbergs intressanta brevsamlingar:

The Life And Letters Of Maria Edgeworth, Vol. 1
Miss Eden's Letters, by Emily Eden
The Writings of Henry David Thoreau, Volume VI, Familiar Letters
Letters of a Woman Homesteader, by Elinore Pruitt Stewart
The Letters Of Mark Twain
The Letters of a Post-Impressionist, by Vincent Van Gogh
The Letters of Jane Austen, by Jane Austen