Chapter VI
And instinctively, once alone, I made for the places where she had
painted her extraordinary pictures; I tried to see what she had seen.
Perhaps, now that she had opened my mind to another view, I should be
sensitive to some similar interpretation--and possibly by way of
literary expression. If I were to write about the place, I asked myself,
how should I treat it? I deliberately invited an interpretation in the
way that came easiest to me--writing.
But in this case there came no such revelation. Looking closely at the
trees and flowers, the bits of lawn and terrace, the rose-garden and
corner of the house where the flaming creeper hung so thickly, I
discovered nothing of the odious, unpure thing her color and grouping
had unconsciously revealed. At first, that is, I discovered nothing. The
reality stood there, commonplace and ugly, side by side with her
distorted version of it that lay in my mind. It seemed incredible. I
tried to force it, but in vain. My imagination, ploughed less deeply
than hers, or to another pattern, grew different seed. Where I saw the
gross soul of an overgrown suburban garden, inspired by the spirit of a
vulgar, rich revivalist who loved to preach damnation, she saw this rush
of pagan liberty and joy, this strange license of primitive flesh which,
tainted by the other, produced the adulterated, vile result.
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