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The Center of the World
The Center of the World Read online
Copyright © 2013 by Thomas Van Essen
Production Editor: Yvonne E. Cárdenas
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from Other Press LLC, except in the case of brief quotations in reviews for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast. For information write to Other Press LLC, 2 Park Avenue, 24th Floor, New York, NY 10016. Or visit our Web site: www.otherpress.com
The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows:
Essen, Thomas Van, 1952–
The center of the world / by Thomas Van Essen.
pages cm
eISBN: 978-1-59051-550-1
1. Turner, J. M. W. (Joseph Mallord William), 1775–1851—Fiction.
2. Art—Psychological aspects—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3605.S6757C46 2013
813’.6—dc23
2013003848
Publisher’s Note:
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
v3.1
For Bob, WITH LOVE
… no man ever painted or ever will paint well anything but what he has early and long seen, early and long felt, and early and long loved.
JOHN RUSKIN, Modern Painters
. . .
… here his intention seems to have been one of private gratification rather than preparation for a more developed work.
ANN CHUMBLEY AND IAN WARRELL, Turner and the Human
Figure: Studies of Contemporary Life, DISCUSSING TURNER’S
“SHEET OF EROTIC FIGURE SUBJECTS C. 1805”
. . .
It is no discredit for Trojans and well-greaved Achaeans to suffer long anguish for a woman like that.
HOMER, Iliad, TRANSLATED BY ANNE CARSON
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Acknowledgments
. (1856) .
SHE WAS NO DOUBT the most wicked of women. They were the most wicked of pictures. I knew Ruskin was right and that they ought to be consigned to the fire.
“Wornum,” he said, “I have been entrusted with the memory of England’s greatest painter. These images are the products of a diseased mind. We must destroy them. If we do not, the world will not remember Turner as the transcendent genius of his age.”
He instructed the boy to gather some old lumber and kindle a fire in the brickyard behind the gallery. Ruskin said that he himself could not bear to see these sketches burnt, although he knew it was his duty. He was quite distraught and asked me, as a special favor to him, if he could excuse himself and if I would place the offending material in the flames.
Ruskin withdrew and one by one I let the sheets fall into the fire. Most were drawings on paper, some were oil sketches on canvas. A mournful black smoke rose into the sky.
I was not sad to see most of this material go. I had been to Paris when I was young, and, being no better than most young men, I had seen material of this sort for sale on the banks of the Seine. Most of what I burnt was no better than that.
But there was a set of notebooks that gave me pause. They seemed a study for a painting of some evil queen of antiquity. Ruskin said she was Jezebel. I did not say so, but I believe she was Helen. She was more beautiful than I can say. More wicked too, no doubt.
One by one I placed the sheets from the notebook on the fire and watched her disappear in the flames. It was as if I had cast her into hell myself.
After the last piece was burnt and the fire extinguished I went inside. Ruskin offered me a glass of sherry which I gratefully accepted. There was a look of suffering on his face. I had done him, he said, a great service. I said it was nothing, but my looks must have given the lie to my protestation.
I am sure we did what was needful. But I think of her often during the day and by night she haunts my brain.
. 1 .
IN ORDER THAT I should feel the pangs of hell most fiercely, Providence, in its wisdom, has decreed that I should taste heaven before I die. This is, to be sure, a peculiarly English heaven, but it is hard to conceive of a French or Italian one half so comfortable or so pleasing.
The presiding genius of the place is, of course, Lord Egremont, of whom you have heard much. He is a most remarkable personage. I have spent only a few minutes in his company, yet I have felt the nature of the man in my bones. It is difficult to explain or account for. He exudes a sense of mastery so complete that he need not exert it. He is all kindness and welcome, but one knows by a kind of instinct that he is quick to anger and that his wrath, when unleashed, is most terrible. He takes, I think, a silent delight in knowing that all those around him live in fear, although, in spite of that, he appears a delightful old gentleman of the gruff old-fashioned school.
He is almost eighty, yet as active as a healthy man of fifty. Every morning after breakfast he buttons on his leather gaiters and goes out to inspect some part of his vast agricultural enterprise. It is curious to stand in one of the drawing rooms here and look out upon the park and see this English Maecenas making his way across the great lawn, his favorite brown spaniels following close behind. Behind the hounds comes a boy leading his horse, and other functionaries and factotums all waiting on his merest nod or grunt.
One’s only obligation while a guest here, as near as I can make out, is to be agreeable and not to get in Lord Egremont’s way. Those guests who delight in the hunt join His Lordship when he rides; those more peaceably inclined are given the freedom of the house and the grounds. There is much to do. One can play billiards in the Marble Room, find a comfortable chair in the library, or go to the North Gallery, which contains what many say is the finest collection of pictures in all England. One can also retire, as I have done, to one’s own room. I have ne
ver before spent the night in a room so grand. There are high ceilings with curious carvings, crimson walls hung with paintings that would find pride of place in the drawing rooms of most noble houses, and various pieces of antique furniture. My bed, for example, could comfortably sleep six (although you know, dear David, that only a certain one, in addition to myself, would make my Paradise complete!). I almost fear that I am in danger of smothering when I lie down, such is the profusion of soft blankets and feather beds. There is a remarkable portrait of Lady Mary Villiers—by Van Dyck, no less—glowering over me, and despite her fierce expression I have taken it into my head that she will keep me safe from all harm.
Some time toward the late afternoon His Lordship returns, wet through and through and either cursing like a fishmonger or dispensing smiles all round, depending on what he has learned. He then disappears into his chambers and, as a general rule, is not seen again until about seven, when we all dine.
Dinner is the only time that all the guests and hangers-on are gathered together. His Lordship and Mrs. Spencer (more of her shortly) preside over an agreeable motley of about twenty people. The only sour notes in the composition are Mr. Wyndham, Egremont’s heir and bastard, and his wife. He is fat and bilious; she is thin and shrill. Both are much given to disapproving expressions of piety and contempt. Wyndham seems to resent every forkful that his father’s guests consume as some diminishment of his patrimony. One half suspects that he eats as much as he does because he knows that every morsel he devours will not be given to another.
But those two aside, it is a splendid company. There is Mr. Romney and his beautiful lady; Mr. Sockett, an agreeable divine; and Mr. Gedding, the member for Pulborough. Gedding and His Lordship have different views on certain agricultural matters which I do not profess to understand and get quite heated about them. Then there are the artists: Jones (whose sea scene you much admired when we saw it in London), Simmons, and the great Turner. Turner is an unprepossessing figure. Much below the average height (which seems somehow queer when you consider how grand and mighty his paintings are), he is a barrel-chested man with a large hooked nose, which is often red. He wears a suit of shabby and much mended black, and were it not for his dirty hands and the paint under his fingernails one would take him for a clergyman in reduced circumstances. His eyes, however, are wonderfully acute and he seems to see into the very heart of things. He says little and has a queer gruff way of speaking into his soup, but what he does say is worth attending to.
So now let me come to Mrs. Spencer. She sits by His Lordship’s side and presides over the table. When conversation flags, she revives it; when it strays into unprofitable areas, she redirects it. She is His Lordship’s mistress.
Egremont has always set conventional pieties at defiance. For many years Wyndham’s mother lived at Petworth and bore His Lordship’s children without benefit of marriage. He married her eventually, but when she died, his grief was so extreme that he went up to London to recover and returned with Mrs. Spencer. She is a great and ageless beauty. I would guess that she is forty years younger than her lord and master, but she looks and may be as young as thirty, younger than his son and heir. She has good teeth, fair hair, and wonderful skin. Her smile would bring cheer to a dead man, and even Wyndham is sometimes unable to resist her charms, although he makes no secret of the fact that he hates her with all the strength a small soul is capable of.
The food is good solid English fare, served out with a liberal hand. Fresh game and fish from Petworth’s forests and streams and ponds; vegetables from the model kitchen gardens. There is good wine, but not extravagant, poured liberally, but not to excess. Between the wine and Mrs. Spencer the conversation is most delightful. She makes a point of drawing everyone out and manages to make the dullest person at table seem interesting. The only blemish on my happiness is the fear that I will be found wanting and cast out of this Paradise prematurely. Do not take that to mean that I do not miss you; far from it. Nothing could increase my joy more than to have you by my side to share it.
Last night after we dined I joined a small group gathered in the library. The conversation was of the usual sort to be heard in country houses: talk of land reform, of the state of the deer herd at Petworth and other agricultural topics, of the latest news from France—but it was all carried on in the most agreeable way.
At length everyone tendered their good nights, but I knew I should be unable to sleep for the sheer delight of my situation. I had found a beautiful edition of Pope’s translation of Homer and settled down before the fire with the volume on my lap; it seemed the right thing to be reading in a room which also contained a bust of Aphrodite said to be by Praxiteles.
I was thus engaged for about half an hour when I heard voices approaching. It was His Lordship, Turner, and Mr. Jones. As I rose to greet them, Egremont waved me back into my seat.
“Well, Grant, what are you doing here?”
I said something to the effect that I was not yet tired and wanted to read. I offered to retire if he and his companions wished to continue their conversation in private.
“Nonsense,” he said in his gruff manner. “I don’t plan to say anything to these fellows that I would not say in front of any other gentleman.” He settled himself into an armchair, as did Turner and Mr. Jones. His Lordship called for a bottle of brandy and a plate of biscuits. The three of them smelled like paint and mineral spirits. There is a room above the chapel to which Turner has been given a key and where he has set up his studio. No one is allowed in without his permission except, of course, Lord Egremont. I surmised that they had just been there looking at Turner’s latest painting.
“I hope,” His Lordship said, addressing me, “that you have found everything to your liking so far. I look forward to seeing what you will make of the collection here. That was a very pretty essay you wrote in the Westminster. Have you had much chance to look about yet?”
I said that I had seen very little, but already much to admire.
“Well, you must take your time and get to know the place. Turner here has studied our collection as well as anyone. You must have him show you round. But I look forward to your article. It will be a pleasure to see a good essay on the collection. Get it known more in the world, you know. No point hiding one’s light under a bushel. But not too long, mind you.”
I said that I would do my best to provide satisfaction, but it would be difficult to decide which pieces to single out for praise.
“That,” he said, “is your job, not mine. So what are you reading that keeps you up after dark?”
“Pope’s Iliad, my lord,” I replied. “This is a remarkably fine edition. A pleasure to hold in one’s hand, and the poetry, sir, is always nourishing.”
“Well said, young man, well said.”
Turner meanwhile had taken his first (and not particularly modest) swallow of brandy. I began to understand why his nose was so often red. His Lordship turned to the painter.
“Ah, Turner,” he said. “You daubers and paint-smearers can never approach Homer and Virgil. The authors of antiquity show us all we need to know of men and morals. You poor present-day fellows can do nothing but embellish and illustrate what their genius proved.”
Turner seemed at first somewhat taken aback by Egremont’s sally, although I suspected that this was not a new topic between them. He looked at his patron sideways for a moment and then took another swallow of brandy.
“My compliments,” he said. “This is most excellent brandy.” He resumed his study of the fire. “But words,” he said, “and images. Altogether different. Not even images. Light. Color. Paint. Shadow. A different order of things, sir.”
Mr. Jones now spoke. He is a bluff and commonsensical sort of man. “But you have to admit, Turner, that the ancients knew more of the truth of things than most men of our time will ever imagine.”
Turner fairly snorted. “Truth, sir? What is it? There is more truth between a woman’s legs than there ever was between Homer’s ears.”
“But a woman’s legs,” said Jones. “What does that have to do with it?”
Turner looked at Jones with something like anger. He pointed one of his short stubby fingers and shook it at his friend as he spoke.
“The truth, sir, is what matters. My lord, you understand. Good night, gentlemen, good night!” And with that Turner, the man they call the greatest painter of the age, rose abruptly from his chair and left the room.
. 2 .
I AM NOT a remarkable person, but I have had a glimpse into the heart of things.
I was born in the same year as the hydrogen bomb; I grew up in the New York suburbs; I have lived an ordinary life. My parents got divorced in 1967, when I was in high school. It was a messy business: alcohol, unexplained charges on the company card, calls to the police. I was sent away to a third-tier prep school to join the other lost boys who were there for similar reasons. When I returned, my mother was living on a golf course in Boca Raton with most of my father’s money and one of his partners. My father got me and the summer house on Saranac Lake in the Adirondacks.
I was an unhappy kid, my childhood wrapped up in my parents’ miserable marriage, but the summers I spent at the lake were cool drinks in the desert. It was only when we were up there that they stopped fighting. They would play golf in the morning; my father would take me sailing in the afternoon. We would sit on the dock in the evening as they had their cocktails, chatting amiably until my mother was too drunk to stand. My father would laugh, offer her his arm, and drag her up to the house.
Except for the lake frontage, the house is a modest place. Upstairs are three small bedrooms and an old-fashioned bathroom; downstairs, a fifties-style kitchen and a living room with a view of the lake and a moose head on the wall. I spent hours when I was little staring at this sad and giant creature. It seemed, like me, to be trapped on the wrong side of my parents’ picture window.
The Center of the World