Letters 2: Vincent van Gogh

Why geniuses are always some kind of twisted or suffers from depression or abjectedness? Vincent Van Gogh, a renowned Dutch painter produced most of his best work in the two years before his suicide due to his 'mental illness'. Is there some kind of embedded genes that make them more susceptible to depression in their DNA? Or was it their surrounding? Maybe they have to lead a harder path than we the commoners? Maybe some thing that he wrote in his letter that we are going to study in class may answer these questions.

I did some research on this renowned painter. I am most interested in his self-portrait, the one with his ears bandaged. His face was gaunt and brazzen. He must have been a very secretive person. A person who found it hard to warm up to others even after a few meetings. Always putting on indifferent front. But his eyes has something else to say. Something in his eyes telling me that he was suffering, that it was very painful inside. His eyes telling me of his softer sensitive side. Looking into those canvas-frozen eyes I feel melancholy seeping into my heart. If only I can calm those troubled eyes. I feel some kind of attachment to him, he mirrors me. If I can cure his sadness surely I can find a way to cure mine too?

I think Vincent was a lonely man. He depended on his brother to support him financially and emotionally; his only best friends were his brother and sister (and perhaps a few others). ' You are not here- but I need you and sometimes feel that we are not far away from each other.' That clearly shows how he depends on his brother to keep him from falling apart. To forget all that troubling him he started to give full attention to his works. Perhaps at that moment work became a numbing drug that push away all pains to the back of his mind, a moment of solace. He hinted at this saying, 'that is my ambition, based less on resentment than on love, based more on feeling of serenity than on passion...Though I am always in the depth of misery, there is still calmness, pure harmony and music inside me. I see paintings or drawings in the poorest cottages, the dirtiest corners...and my mind is driven towards these things with irresistible momentum'.

The first letter was perhaps written when he was in a better health condition. From the tone of his writing,we could derive that he was lonely, just barely able to keep himself alive due to his financial status ( by that time he was poor), but still he was able to be cheerful, advising his brothers about his books, have more time to dwell in the optimistic view of life. In his second letter we can see a shift in tone, which seems to be more melancholic, and more focused in keeping his sanity, more occupied with his internal conflicts- hence he was more keen on talking about his paintings. His paintings are his self-expressions, his thoughts and feelings. Reading his second letter we could feel that he was withdrawing into himself, disengaging himself from his circle of society (other painters) and prefer to be on his own as he revealed in his preference to listen to the 'language of nature'.

When at first he can still enjoys life apart from painting, in the second letter he seemed withdrawn and enjoyed only painting. This is what I can derive from analysing his letters, but still the questions are not answered.

letters Keat

Letters are the the means of communication which is becoming forgotten these days of instant messaging and emails. However, in this course letters were not to be left behind, we were also assigned letters as text for us to read. However, they were not any letters. They were a prove of correspondence of poets, and the painter Vincent van Gogh with his brother.

These letters differs from any I had read in my lifetime in the language and their word choice. reading Keat's letter to Shelley is like reading one of his poems. He extended metaphor beyond the limits of his poetry scope, using it even in his letters and perhaps freely in his daily interactions. It would be wonderful to have a chance of corresponding to him via letter, or any other means. It would open up my conventionalised world to the potentials of language manipulation, to trim and cut language so that it would be a wonderful arrangement, pleasing to the ears and eyes, amusing to the mind.

Keat in his letters wrote about his last work, relating to his life in his sickness. How he was then only focusing on his works as if sensing that he had only a short while to sacrifice to his works. Keat was then suffering from tuberculosis, and he acknowledged this sickness telling that,' there was no doubt that an English winter would put an end to me, and do so in lingering hateful manner, therefore I must either voyage or journey to Italy as a soldier marches up to a battery.'

The line that I like the most is 'Imagination is a monastery and I am its monk'. It was mildly put than the common one ' (smthg) is a master and I am its slave'.

oral presentation

One of the requirements of this course, Reading and Project work, is to do an oral presentation of our first assignment-position paper. I did my position paper on Boys and Girls and are among the last group presenting.

Looking back at the atmosphere of the presentaion sessions, it was mild to say that it was not an boisterous-inspiring one. My fellow classmates were clearly exhausted on sustaining through the entire process, having to sit still and trying to remain focus while lines of presenter talks about something that may or may not (mostly not) interest you. Even I who always make it a point to stay focus in class found it a Herculean task. So most of the time only a small number of audience is paying attention to the presenter while the others found a better way to cure their bore- disease.

Most of the presenters also did not think gaining attention was on of their chief aims. In fact they were comfortable with the lack of attention situation. Knowing that given that situation they would not have to stand for any questions or critics or comments afterwards. Everybody was doing their own business.

However, when it was my turn, I could feel that they did make some effort to actually listen to me. Why that happenned is beyond my comprehension, but I was and am glad that they did so. What is the point of going through such trouble to prepare visual aids and to arrange your lines when nobody is listening to you. To me it would be a wasted effort. The more attention they gave to me the more anxious and excited I became. But that was good, it made me want to make myself clear and wanting to elaborate more on my points.

All in all in my opinion it was one of my best presentation.

looking from different perspectives

'Satire is a lesson, parody is a game.'
Vladimir Nabokov

What is parody? In literature, it is known as a form of satirical criticism or comic mockery that imitates the style and manner of a particular writer or school of writers so as to emphasize the weakness of the writer or the overused conventions of the school. Wikipedia on the other hand defines parody as a work created to mock, comment on, or poke fun at an original work, its subject, or author, by means of humorous or satiric imitation.

Ambrose Pierce's The Devil's Dictionary was written in literature pursuit to parody the conventions of dictionaries. It tries to redefined the words in the dictionaries, giving it a different perspactives. I found it rather refreshing, entertaining, and amusing. It makes us look and think about the things we often overlooked in our life in other ways. It shows us that we can change the conventions of life if we want to.

Classroom wise, I think this would be an interesting material to work with. Students would gladly approach the light hearted poking fun at conventions. To make it more accessible to them we may choose the parody of definition of things they like the most or hate the most or things familiar to them.

I would like to attach my own version of parody here.

Teacher, n

Is a kind of animal that resembles the cockatoo from the African continent. It has a habit of filling up buckets of minds with water of knowledge for its survival. However, this act proves time consuming as the buckets' fill keeps on receding, and without continual filling of water the bucket would be empty again or filled up with other things instead of the water of knowledge.

Malaysian legends

Legends as defined by Yahoo Education are unverified stories handed down from earlier times, especially ones popularly believed to be historical. Looking at our own local legends, with our colourful cultures and believes it is not really a wonder that each legends differ from others, with different stories to tell.

But, most of these legends are dominated by feminine images of beautiful princesses and maidens- Mahsuri, Mambang Sari and Puteri Gunung Ledang from the Western shores, the seven Bunian princess and Princess Saadong from the east coast, while from the East Malaysia are the infamous Puteri Santubong and Puteri Sejinjang. However, there are also male characters such as Laksamana Bentan, Monsopiad, and Raja Bersiong. These male characters are portrayed as notorious, rough, warrior-like, cruel, and their striving reputation is the result of their wicked deeds. Just like in the classic chinese yin and yang contrast, the female was depicted as pure, loving, kind-hearted and compassionate, even though their jealousy might be a misgiving that brought some of them their downfall. It made me wonder how in those days of patriarchal dominance when women were often second-rated, in this fictional stories women were idolised. It seems like there is a disparity between the value they held in reality and the value the cherish in their pastimes.

Apart from that it is also evident that there is a strong influence of mystical elements in these stories. This is best proven by the way some of the stories evolved around mythical characters as this mythical beings were put into focus as the main character, as evident in the story about the brawl between the giants in Langkawi legendary brawl and the touching love story between two dragons in Naga Tasik Chini. In some other stories these mythical beings were the pivotal element in the plot, given the role as aides to the human main character or the way round. In this legends human beings are endowed with supernatural powers and experienced unique and adventurous or wonderful experiences. This shows how people of ancient times belief in the existence of sacred beings whose mere existence affects their own, and they tend to depend on them believing that they hold some power to change the way things were. This seems to me a desperate measure to keep them intact in enduring their bleak hard life, these fantasies act as the light of hope, a chance for miracle.

These characteristics are not distinctive to Malaysian legends only, they extend to the other legends existing in the other parts of the world also. It seems like despite the geograhical and cultural differences, subconciously the essence of human existence- our thoughts and feelings vibrating with the same frequency.

The Andy Warhol Diaries

'Death means a lot of money, honey. Death can really make you look like a star.'

Andy Warhol

To certain extent I do agree with him. The closest example is Andy Warhol himself who after his death even his diaries are sold to others to read; while most people treasure their diaries as their secret best friend. However, diaries are one of the most trusted source to get to know a person better, especially a social figure like Andy Warhol who set a shift in the art culture.

Reading his diaries I realise that Andy Warhol led a very sociable life. He was a member of the elite circles- the politicians and also the Hollywood celebrities. But, with this grand image it is hard to believe that he was only human. He also gossipped and said bad things about other people even though it was meant to criticize and not based on ill-intention. He was a simple man with little worries, who talked about how he hated the Awards, about the recent movie screening, about the new Tarzan series, and other common place things. It is difficult to accept the fact that a genius also led a normal life.

Andy Warhol was a religious christian, but in the same time he was against the tide by being a gay. He was open about his sexuality. He even produced some paintings with the subjects that portrays his sexuality. In his diary he did mention about some orgy his friends joined during which they used their 'bigtoes to fuck' since there were rumours about gay cancer. He even joked about it saying 'now it's whoever has the biggest toe'. He even (few times in his diaries) showed his preference to John Travolta, ' but nobody good like John Travolta won. I mean, Richard Dreyfuss? I mean, if he's a sexsymbol...'

Throughout the diaries entry, I got the impression that Andy Warhol was an observant jolly person who seldom dealt with his internal conflicts. He often talked about other people around him and little was said about himself. The closest he went in expressing his deepest thoughts and feelings is when he told about his opinion on commercial movies and later relate to his preference towards the things that other people don't understand, claiming that such works are artful and more creative than the commercially produced works.

In school, I think diaries entries would be useful in exposing students to the characters- their thoughts and feelings. It is also effective to teach them how to express themselves. Besides, it is fun to get to know how public figures days are. It is like peeking into some forbidden chamber...

Andy Warhol- self portrait with camouflage

'I suppose I have a really loose interpretation of 'work', because I think that just being alive is so much work at something you don't always want to do.'


Andy Warhol





We watched a quite long video clip featuring Andy Warhol last week. You may ask who Andy Warhol is, so let me tell you a little bit about this talented man. Born as Andrew Warhola, he was an American artist who involved with many arts fields including painting, writing, movie directing, and others. He was known in diverse social circles that included bohemian street people, distinguished intellectuals, Hollywood celebrities and wealthy aristocrats. It was him who coined the phrase ‘15 minutes fame’ which refers to the quickly exhausted limelight that celebrity are subjected to. Upon my research my conclusion of this man with Social Disease is an eccentric, a genius with a twisted mind.





The video clip is about his paintings. His work are mostly influenced by pop culture. His specialty is screen prints, by which technique he produced his series of Campbell soup cans, Coke bottles, and pop icon portraits such as Madonna. For most of my classmates they just could not understand one bit why are they watching the video clip, yawning with bored indifference at the screen. Some of them are restless, doing something else. In contrast I was enthralled by Andy Warhol works. the subject or the different colours they were done with did not interest me. All the while I was thinking what was going on in that man's mind all the while he do his paintings. His subjects are all common everyday items, but somehow he saw something different in these things, making them larger than their existence itself, putting them in focus.

I think he see himself in these commonplace items. Even though others think of him as a celebrity, he always think of himself as an ordinary man. As he was quoted to say,'Why do people think artists are special? It's just another job.' Perhaps he got bored with the attention people always give to grand things, longings for luxurious items, and therefore try to shift their attention to things people often overlooked in their haste, forgot to appreciate and be thankful on their existence. Somehow this intention mirrors his self. He was himself like an abandoned child seeking for attention.

His painting that I like the most is the painting of a mother and child. The mother embracing the child protectively blanketing the child with sheer love while child hung onto her and stare out to the audience. I could picture the child in Andy Warhol, showing his affection towards his beloved mother, his love ablaze through the canvas, giving the feeling the immortality.

Much like eyes are the window to a person's heart, I believe paintings are the window to a person's soul. Intentional or not we leave a part of ourselves in our work of art, our self-expression. Therefore, I think by looking at his paintings we may have a glimpse at who Andy Warhol truly was.