Chapter I


I confess that when first I made acquaintance with Charles
Strickland I never for a moment discerned that there was in
him anything out of the ordinary. Yet now few will be found
to deny his greatness. I do not speak of that greatness which
is achieved by the fortunate politician or the successful
soldier; that is a quality which belongs to the place he
occupies rather than to the man; and a change of circumstances
reduces it to very discreet proportions. The Prime Minister
out of office is seen, too often, to have been but a pompous
rhetorician, and the General without an army is but the tame
hero of a market town. The greatness of Charles Strickland
was authentic. It may be that you do not like his art, but at
all events you can hardly refuse it the tribute of your
interest. He disturbs and arrests. The time has passed when
he was an object of ridicule, and it is no longer a mark of
eccentricity to defend or of perversity to extol him.
His faults are accepted as the necessary complement to his merits.
It is still possible to discuss his place in art, and the
adulation of his admirers is perhaps no less capricious than
the disparagement of his detractors; but one thing can never
be doubtful, and that is that he had genius. To my mind the
most interesting thing in art is the personality of the
artist; and if that is singular, I am willing to excuse a
thousand faults. I suppose Velasquez was a better painter
than El Greco, but custom stales one's admiration for him:
the Cretan, sensual and tragic, proffers the mystery of his
soul like a standing sacrifice. The artist, painter, poet, or
musician, by his decoration, sublime or beautiful, satisfies
the aesthetic sense; but that is akin to the sexual instinct,
and shares its barbarity: he lays before you also the greater
gift of himself. To pursue his secret has something of the
fascination of a detective story. It is a riddle which shares
with the universe the merit of having no answer. The most
insignificant of Strickland's works suggests a personality
which is strange, tormented, and complex; and it is this
surely which prevents even those who do not like his pictures
from being indifferent to them; it is this which has excited
so curious an interest in his life and character.