Home > Authors Index > Upton Sinclair > Journal of Arthur Stirling: "The Valley of the Shadow" > This page
The Journal of Arthur Stirling: "The Valley of the Shadow", a novel by Upton Sinclair |
||
Part 1. Writing A Poem - June 1st. -- June 30th. |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ PART I. WRITING A POEM June 1st. -- June 30th. June 1st. I sat to-night by the river again. It was moonlight, and the water lay shimmering. A little yacht, gleaming with lights, sped by; it was very close, and I saw a group of people on it, I heard them laughing; and one of them--a woman--was singing. O God, what a voice! So rich, so exquisite! It soared upward and died again, quivering like the reflection of the stars on the water. It went in--in to the very depths of my soul; it loosed all the woe of my spirit, it made the tears gush into my eyes. And then it died away, away in the distance; and I sat with my hands clasped. Sail on--sail on--oh heavenly voice! Far-off vision of brightness and beauty! Your lot is not my lot. * * * * * --There is something within me that weeps yet, at the echo of that music. Oh, what would I not give for music! How much of my bitterness, how many of my sorrows have melted into tears at one strain! And I can not have it! Oh, you who do have it, do you know what you have? Oh beautiful voice, do you hear yourself? All things else I can make for myself--friendship and love--nature and books and prayer; all things but music! * * * * * Can you not hear that voice dying--dying--"over the rolling waters"? * * * * * June 2d. I shall come out of this a man--a man! I shall know how to live all my days! I shall have memories that will always haunt me, memories that I can build the years by! * * * * * June 3d. From the time that I began The Captive it has been almost two months; it is just six weeks from the day I wrote that I had ten or twelve weeks in which to finish. I have done well financially--I have twenty-one dollars left, and I have paid for my typewriting. It is not a fortune. But enough is as good as a fortune. And I am coming on! I have been counting the scenes--I am really within sight of the end. --That day when I crouched by the bed I saw all of the end. I have seen the whole thing. It will leave me a wreck, but I can do it. And it will take me about three weeks. Think of my being able to say that!--Five or six hundred lines at least I shall have to do, and still I dare to say that. But I am full of this thing, I mount with it all the time. I am finding my wings. Nothing can stop me now; I feel that I shall hold myself to it. I become more grim every day. * * * * * No one can guess what it means to me to find that I have hold of the whole of this thing! It is like strong wine to me--I scarcely know where I am. * * * * * June 4th. I am sitting down by the window, and first I kick my heels against my old trunk, and then I write this. Hi! Hi! I think of a poem that I used to recite about Santa Claus--"Ho, Castor! ho, Pollux!"--and then ho a lot of other things--a Donner and a Blitzen I remember in particular. I want a reindeer--a Pegasus--a Valkyrie--an anything--to carry me away up into the air where I can exult without impropriety!
* * * * * --The world is divinely arranged, there is no question about it. * * * * * June 5th. Deep in my soul I was convinced that the room would be let to something worse. But now it appears that the landlady's sister is to occupy it. --So now I will get to work! --Moving is noisy; I can't complain. I have been walking about the streets. I am hungry for the work; but still, I had much to think of. It is a wonderful thing--a glorious thing, this story--it will make men's hearts leap. * * * * * June 6th. I have plenty of time to write journals, if I feel like it. There is the sister, and there is the landlady, and there is another woman, and they have been jabbering about dresses all of the morning. I have been like a crazy man--I was all on fire this morning, too! O God, it is too cruel! I could dress those three hags with broomsticks. * * * * * --How long is this to continue, I want to know. Here it is afternoon and they are still chattering. Every time I have tried to compose my thoughts they have come back and begun chattering again. And so I can only pace about, and then rush out into the street--and wear myself sick. I call this simply monstrous. That my soul should be tied down to such vulgarity as this--is it not maddening? Here I am--with all my load of woe--at this fearful crisis! And I am to be shattered and wrecked and ruined by _this_! Just as long as they choose to sit there, just so long I am helpless. Was it for this that I have borne all the pain? * * * * * It seems to me that I hear jeering laughter around me from a swarm of little demons. I hide my face and flee, but they follow me. * * * * * But what can you expect? Have they not a right to talk?--Yes--all the world has a right to be as hideous as it can. And I have no right but to suffer and to choke in my rage. Three vile, ignorant serving-women! Serving-women--ah yes, and if they were _my_ servants! If I could pay them!--But who serves me! Of what consequence am I! * * * * * These things goad me, they are like poisoned thorns in my flesh. The infinite degradation of it all, the shame, the outrage! It has burned a brand deep into my flesh, and never while I live will it come out. Ah, you rich men! You who rule us, who own the treasures, the opportunities, the joys! You who trample the fair gardens of life like great blind beasts! Do you think it is nothing to me that the inspiration and the glory of my whole lifetime is to be trampled into nothingness for lack of what others spend upon one dress? Yes, of my whole lifetime! My whole lifetime! Give me but what another will spend upon one foolish gimcrack that he never looks at again, and I will live for a whole lifetime! And I will write such music--Bah! What am I doing? * * * * * --Sometimes when I think of these things a black shadow stalks over my heart. I hear a voice, "Fool, and do you still think that you are ever to escape from this? Do you not perceive that this sordid shame is your _lot_? Do you not perceive that you may writhe and twist, struggle and pant, toil and serve, till you foam at the lips? Who will heed you! Who will hear you! Who cares anything about you!--Who wants your Art! Who wants your work! Who wants your _life_!--Fool!" * * * * * --Of course this thing could not go on. And so of course,--stammering and writhing, as I always do when I have my nose pushed into this kind of filth--I had to speak to the landlady about it to-night.-- And of course the landlady was astonished. "Why, Mr. Stirling, can't a body talk in a body's own room?" Yes, a body can talk, but then other bodies have to move away. Now she's going to speak to her sister about it. And here I sit, writhing and trembling. Oh my God, suppose I have to move! Oh merciful Father, have pity on me--I can't bear much of this! To go tramping around this hot and horrible city, to go into some new and perhaps yet more dirty place! And oh, the agony, the shame--suppose _that_ will not do, and I have to keep on searching! Dragging this fearful burden with me! And I have only eighteen dollars left! * * * * * If I think of it any longer I shall scream with nervousness. * * * * * June 7th. And now it is all settled. A body has to talk in a body's own room, and a body's nose has to turn up with indignation as a body announces the fact. And so here I sit, waiting for the expressman to come for my trunk. Now that it is over it does not seem so bad. I am like a snail--once back in my shell, I do not care what happens. I have given up trying to write The Captive, and so nothing bothers me any more.--I have forgotten all about it now, it is years behind me. But I have seen it all; I can get it back in good time. I do not fear. I have rolled up a little bundle, a tooth-brush and some manuscripts principally; and I send the rest to a friend's house. I have had an inspiration. Why should I stay in this hot and steaming place?--Why should I be "barricaded evermore within the walls of cities?" _Ich will ins Land!_ Why did I not think of this in the beginning? I am going now to see the springtime!--"the only pretty ring time, when birds do sing--hey ding-a-ding!" That was a real idea. I do not know where I am going; but I will walk and get somewhere--there will be woods. I'll sleep in hay-ricks if it can't be managed any other way.
* * * * * June 8th. Howdy-do, Brother Bobolink! How in the world did you guess I was coming this way?
I turned my steps Jerseyward. * * * * * --I have been walking all day. I must find some place to stop very soon. I can not think of the country with this burden on me. I am like a sick animal--I seek a hiding-place. I fancied I might think of my work on the way, but I can not. The world is happy; my work is not happy. My hope is all in the end of the journey, and the walking is drudgery. And then, my money is going! I must find some sort of a hut--a tumble-down house, an old barn--anything. I shall trudge one more day's journey. Then I think I shall be far enough from New York. * * * * * --I passed a tramp to-day; and while we walked together I composed an address: "My brother--for are we not brothers, thou and I? "Have we not fled from the sleek man, thou and I? And is it not we alone that know Truth? "Thy clothing is ragged, and there is hunger in thine eyes; it is so also with me. "It is thy fate to wander; it is my fate to wander too. And with restless eyes to look out upon the world, to meet with distrust from men. "Yet not for that am I sad, nay, not for that, but for a deeper sorrow; because I was sent out into the world with a curse upon me, because I was sent out into the world a Drunkard. "Yea, so it is, my brother. "And that for which I thirst is not easy to find; and when I have found it I am not content, but must seek more; and so I have only desolation. "Who laid this curse upon us, my brother? "That we should dwell in sorrow and unrest? "That no man should heed our voice, and that we should grow weak and faint? "That we should die, and be forgotten--thou and I? "Oh, tell us wherefore--ye wise men." * * * * * June 9th. I have walked another day. I am beginning to get away from the suburban towns, and into the real country. I knew that it would cost me a good deal to go to a hotel last night, and it was warm, so I slept in a hay-stack! It was quite an adventure. Now I've got my pockets stuffed full of rolls, Benjamin Franklin style. --My mind is like the ocean after a storm. The great waves come rolling over it still; it is all restless, tossing. But it is sinking, sinking to rest!--Heaven grant that I may find my place of refuge before it is quite calm. It is everything or nothing with me; I am made that way. Either I give every instant of my time, every thought, every effort to my work, or else I close up like a flower and wait. I can not write poetry and hunt a lodging too. So I am waiting--waiting.-- * * * * * June 10th. I began inquiring to-day--a shanty, a barn--anything. Every one thinks it necessary to be very much puzzled about what I want it for. My clothes are still fairly respectable, and so they tell me about pretty summer cottages--only so much per month! * * * * * June 12th. I have been tramping on and on for two more days. I do not believe I shall ever find what I want. Nothing but one old musty place in ruins, so far! And my money is going, and I am wild with anxiety! I am almost tempted to turn back to the ruin. * * * * * June 13th. I am sitting in a room in a dirty hotel. It was raining to-day and I had to come here. I shall probably have to pay fifty cents too. I won't stay to breakfast. Oh what will I do if my money gives out? I saw a cottage to-day, that a man said I could have for ten dollars a month. I was tempted to spend nearly all I had and take it, and live on bread and water. I am desperate. * * * * * June 14th. "Perhaps maybe you'd like 'Oaklands,'" said the farmer, laughing. "Oaklands" turned out to be the home of a millionaire "dry-goods man" who was in Europe. I did not want "Oaklands." "I don't know of anything else," said the farmer, scratching his head. Then he added with a grin, "unless it be the cook-house." "What's the cook-house?" I asked, suspiciously. "Oh, it's a kind of a little place they've got 'way out in the woods," said the farmer. "It's where they goes when they goes picnicking." My heart gave a jump. "What sort of a place?" I asked. "They've got a big platform chiefly, where they put up a. tent. The cook-house ain't nothin' but a little two by four shanty, with a big stove in it." "How big is it?" I cried. "It's about half o' this here room, I reckon." ("This here room" was about six of my rooms in New York!) "And where is it?" I cried. "How can I get there?" "Oh, you don't want to go to no sech place ez that!" said the farmer. "There ain't no bed nor nothin' in it! An' it's two mile out there in the woods!" Let anybody imagine how my heart was going! "Who can show it to me?" I panted. "Why," said he, "I'm the man that's in charge of it; but I--" "And can you rent it to me for a month?" "Why, I don't know any reason why I can't rent it to you for a year--only it ain't worth nothin', an'--" "Then rent it to me! The less it is worth the better it will suit me. But come, show me where it is!" "I reckon I can show you," said the man, looking perplexed. "But what in the world do you want to go into that lonesome place for? Why, boy, nobody goes there in a month! An' what you goin' to do for somethin' to eat, an' some place to sleep, an'--" * * * * * I managed to get him started at last. And now, oh just look at me! I've been roaming around staring at it--inside and outside. The gods love me after all. The infinite relief that it is! The infinite exultation that it is! And all to myself--not a soul near me! And out in the woods! _And mine for a month!_ Oh blessed 'cello player that moved away; blessed landlady's sister that talked--! And oh blessed cook-house! We will make thee a consecrated cook-house before we get through--we will! We will cook a dish in thee that will warm the hearts of a goodly company--oh blessed cook-house! --And outside a great white moon streaming through the forest trees! * * * * * The "cook-house" is about ten feet square. It is about one-third stove, now covered with a newspaper and serving as a table. Besides that there is one chair, for which I have just improvised a leg, with the help of my knife. Besides the knife I have a fork, a plate, a cup, and a spoon--borrowed from the farmer. I have a blanket and a bed consisting of an old carriage robe, rented from the farmer. I have a lamp and a kerosene-can--ditto. I have a frying-pan--ditto. But I haven't my little oil-stove, so I fear I shall eat mostly cold things. I have a pail of milk, a loaf of bread, a ginger-cake, some butter, some eggs, some bacon, some apples and some radishes; also a tooth-brush, a comb, a change of clothing, two handkerchiefs, some pencils and paper, Prometheus Bound, Prometheus Unbound, Samson Agonistes, faith, hope, and charity! --I believe I have named all the necessaries of life. * * * * * June 15th. I have scooped myself out a bathtub below the spring. I forgot towels in my list of necessaries! I fear it will be inconvenient on rainy days. I am like a child with a new toy, in my wonderful home. I was too excited to think of working. I fried an egg over a little fire, and then I roamed all about the woods. I don't remember ever having been so happy before. I had forgotten there was anything beautiful in the world.-- * * * * * --I spent the whole of the afternoon dreaming a dream. When I have finished The Captive and gotten some money, I am going to have a little house in the woods! I have just had it before my eyes--and I laughed with delight like a boy. It will be a fine big house--it will cost about fifty dollars; and there will be a table and a chair, and a cot, and such things. It will stand by a lake, a wild lake far out in the mountains! I have vowed to find a lake at least five miles from anything; and once a week I will have somebody bring me provisions. * * * * * --That is the way I shall spend next summer!--Up, up! Get to work!-- * * * * * June 17th. I have done nothing for two days but wander around and stare at things. It is all gone, every gleam of it! And I can not bring it back--I know not what to do, where to turn. I stopped in one of the hardest parts of the whole thing--in the very midst of it; and how in the world am I to begin? I walk around, I sit down, I get up again; I try to put my thoughts upon it, I bring them back again and again. But I can not do it--I have let every thread of it go. What has tramping over the country and delight in houses got to do with my work? I have nothing to write--the whole thing is a blank to me. And here I am, eating up my provisions!--This shows me what I am--what a child. --But how am I to get up on those fearful heights again? How am I to take the first step toward those fearful heights again? I cry that all day! * * * * * June 20th. Oh, the joy of being out in the woods! I never knew of it before--I never dreamed it! It is better than an orchestra. To be able to stretch your arms! To have a place to walk! To be able to talk aloud!--to laugh--to shout--to do what you please!--to be free from all men, and the thought of all men! And to hear your own poetry aloud!--I cried out to-day that I would go back and do the whole of The Captive over again, so that I could hear it out loud. It made me quite wild yesterday when I first realized that I was _alone_! --Last night there was a gale, and the clouds sped over the moon, and the wind roared in the trees--and I roared too! --"For I see the crescent promise of my spirit hath not set!" * * * * * June 21st. I did just as I have always done before. I got desperate enough, and then I went to work. I said "I will! and I will! and I will!" I think I said nothing else for twenty-four hours. And so the storm again, and the great waves speeding! * * * * * Is there any one who has ever watched the great waves?--How they go! They take you right with them. My verses shall be waves. I am tired out again; but oh, I am filled with my music! There was never any poetry like it in the world! * * * * * And at the height of it I cry out: "I am free! I am free! "I won't have to stop again! "I can go to the very end of it! "And I don't care who hears me! "I am free!" * * * * * June 23d. I ate a raw egg this morning. For yesterday I let the fire go out five times, and gave up my breakfast rather than start a sixth. I wanted to save time--I thought it would be egg just the same; but I record it for future generations of poets, that the experiment is not a success. You taste raw egg all day. I shall have them all hard-boiled in the farmhouse after this. --Twenty-eight lines to-day! I had more, but I lost them, and then I fell down. --There is always a new height, but there are not always new words. My verse grows more and more incoherent, and more and more daring. I can feel the difference of a whole lifetime between it now, and what I wrote ten weeks ago. * * * * * --That is as it should be, of course. One does not reckon by days in a dungeon. I notice also that the periods get longer; it has more sweep--it leaps wider spaces--it is less easy to follow. * * * * * --Oh, let not any man read what I wrote this morning, except he stand upon the heights! * * * * * I have worn a path in the woods, deep and wide, pacing back and forth, back and forth, all day. Any one who saw me would think that I was mad. Fighting--fighting--all the time fighting! Sometimes I run--sometimes I don't know what I do. Last night I know that it grew dark, and that I was still lying flat on the dead leaves, striking my hands, that were numb with excitement. I was too weak to move--but I remember panting out, "There is nothing like that in _King Lear_!" * * * * * I brought about twenty phrases out of that, and one or two sentences. They will fall into the verse the next time it comes. * * * * * June 24th. --Listen to me, oh thou world--I will tell you something! You may take a century to understand those phrases--to stop laughing at them, perhaps--who knows? But those sentences are _real_; and they will last as long as there is a man alive to read them! When I let anything make me cease to believe in that scene, may I die! --I will shout it aloud on the streets; they are _real_! * * * * * And there has been nothing like them done for some years, either. * * * * * June 25th. To-day you may imagine me frantically throwing stones at a squirrel. I said: "If I get him I won't have to go to the farmhouse to-morrow." I had had nothing to eat but bread and apples for two meals, and I couldn't stand that again. I had fried squirrel and fried apples for supper. It was a very curious repast. And I was hungry, and I ate too much! That made me wild, of course, and I flung all my apples away into the woods. May they feed new squirrels! * * * * * June 26th. I get up every morning like--like the sun! I overflow with laughter--nothing frightens me now. I never knew what was the matter with me before--it was simply that I could not fight as I chose. If ever I go back again to have my soul pent up in the cities of men! I am full of it--full of it! I grapple with it all the day, I can not get enough of it. I do crazy things. And the harder it is the faster I go! This thing has been my torturing--it has made me fight and live. That is really the truth. * * * * * And I am coming to the end--really to the end! * * * * * June 27th. A rainy day! And no glass in my house--only a board cover to the window. I made myself a nest on the sheltered side. Nearer! Nearer! * * * * * June 29th. Wandering through the woods dreaming of a banquet-hall.--The guests are witty. * * * * * I have put into the mouths of the guests all that the world has said to me, since first I went poetical. * * * * * June 30th. To-day I got a big stock of things to eat. I count my time not by days, but by loaves of bread and dozens of hard-boiled eggs. * * * * * --This book goes out into the world, not to be judged, but to judge! _ |
||