Part 26

“But there is one essential difference between the genius of the looker-on and the genius of the artist; it is that the artist creates, that he must have talent. No matter how much genius a man may have, if he does not or cannot express his genius, he is not an artist.”

“Do you think,” asked Marian, “that an artist knows himself to be a great genius?”

“I think,” I answered her, “that no man ever does a great thing unless he first believes he can do it.

“You remember, I once said that to understand life well one must be creative, one must do things, because life is forever creating. And so the genius who is an artist, who has talent, who creates, by that very creation understands better than other men. He who can draw a thing sees it better than he who cannot.”

“Yes,” said Virginia, “the fact that he can draw it proves that he sees it better.”

“And in learning to draw it,” I went on, “he came to see it better.”

“The great artist,” said Henry, “is one who expresses his idea perfectly.”

“Then,” Virginia said, “I wonder if I will ever get to be a great artist. For the thing I draw is never the thing that was in my mind.”

“Now,” said I, “you see the distinction between genius and talent. Genius is the power of understanding. Talent is the power of expression. A man may have very little to say, and yet say it wonderfully well. And another man may have much to say, and marvellous understanding of life, but not nearly so great power of expression. That is what Florence meant the other day, when she spoke of ‘Jenny Kissed Me,’ and of ‘Faust.’ But the man who expresses even the smallest thing well understands, at least, that thing. The power of expression itself implies understanding and a sense of unity and harmony. For no matter how well a man may be able to draw lines and objects, unless he understands composition—which is the knowledge of harmony and completeness—he cannot paint a good picture. And no matter how well a man may write English, however perfect his style may be, unless he understands something of life, of symmetry and structure, he cannot write a good book.”

Henry said: “Poe expressed himself very well. Was he a genius?”

“Now, stop,” I answered. “Don’t ask, ‘Was he a genius?’ Of course, he was that. We all have genius. The question is, how much?”

“It seems to me,” said Henry, “that in some way Poe was as great as Shakespeare.”

“Yes,” I said, “in some ways; and that is a very good example. Poe’s power of expression may have been as great in some ways as Shakespeare’s. But just think how immeasurably greater was Shakespeare’s genius, his understanding, and grasp of life!”

“Poe, for instance,” said Henry, “was a great mathematician, and used his deductions in his stories.”

The others told Henry this had nothing to do with his genius. They had a long talk on the relative genius—that is, understanding of life—of Poe and Hawthorne, and brought up many instances.

Marian said: “Was Milton a great genius?”

“What do you think?” I asked.

“I suppose he was,” she said, “but I don’t think he had a great understanding of human life.”

“Have you read ‘Paradise Lost’?” I asked her.

“Yes,” she answered.

“Then you must have noticed his wonderful sympathy with, and understanding of, the devil himself. He saw the tremendous contrasts of life, and understood them.”

“I must read that,” said Virginia, “if he wrote with understanding sympathy of the devil. Don’t you think,” she asked, “that those who write books for children generally understand life very well, and have true genius?”

“Perhaps,” I said. “What do you think? How about those artists who write for children in the Sunday comic papers?”

Now I spoke of the artist in us all, who sees things ever as distinct wholes, who picks out, as he goes through life, complete visions of beauty to reproduce in his mind. These visions have to be distant, separate from himself. For life is so distracting and full of contradictory passions, so vast, and, as we know it in our limited lives, so incomplete, that we must get rid of it, we must separate ourselves, with our universal and unfinished relations, from the perfect and whole beauty which we wish to see in the artistic vision.

“You must have noticed,” I said, “and you have often heard, that far-off things are most beautiful. It is because our life, interwoven with endless distracting circumstances, does not seem to touch those far-off things.”

“Autumn leaves,” said Marian, “far off look so beautiful, and near by are full of imperfections.”

Virginia said: “And perfection of detail in a picture, as if the things were very near and real, does not make it better. It does not seem good. You know Millet’s ‘Sower,’ at the Metropolitan Museum: when you go close, it is all streaks.”

“This dimness of detail is for two reasons, in most great pictures,” I said. “First, the artist often paints a picture with the intention of having it looked upon from a distance. Second, in the perfect whole, detail is merged. All must blend and harmonize.”