APPROACHING NEW YEAR'S EVE 1918

ROCKWELL KENT WILDERNESS CENTENNIAL JOURNAL

100 YEARS LATER

by Doug Capra © 2018

Approaching New Year’s Eve 1918

The sun over Fox Island a little after noon on Dec. 31, 2018. Capra photo

Christmas has passed. It was a wonderful, magical day on Fox Island – at least as described in Wilderness, and later in the 1940 little book, Northern Christmas. But the letters tell a different story. Kent has been ill through the holiday. “It’s sad being sick away from you,” he writes on Dec. 29th. “I think it’s nothing but a nervous breakdown of my whole digestive system after these three months of worry and unhappiness. It’s much like the trouble I had in Newfoundland. I’ve tried every remedy I have – or will have tonight when I take castor oil. Fortunately, I have capsules of it to take, thanks to Mother’s kind thoughtfulness in sending them.”

Between the illness and planning a special Fox Island Christmas, he hasn’t spent any time with his art. “I feel so tired, tired, tired. As if I’d lived many lifetimes and was worn out,” he writes. He’s not unhappy with Kathleen he says, adding that this week is too holy for that. He reaffirms his deep love for her and hope for their marriage. “Some day, if we ever really are together again, we’ll nurse for each other our worn tattered souls back to their true strength and glory. Sweet Kathleen of mine!” But his insecurities and doubts run deep and his moods change rapidly. “Last night I wrote a letter to George. It’s not what it should be. If you want us to be friends you must take much blame upon yourself. I wrote to him bitterly of you – when I did mention you. I couldn’t help it.” He refers to his close friend George Chappell, partner in the architectural firm Ewing and Chappell” From what correspondence I’ve located, this is what I surmise: He wants George to set Kathleen straight about what he wants from his wife – but he suspects Kathleen is not cooperating and George is siding with her. As Kent states above, he blames Kathleen for this rift in the friendship and is also angry with George.

Back in New York on the same day Kent’s writing his letter -- Dec. 29th -- Kathleen writes to him about how she and the children spent their Christmas. She describes all the presents, the food, and all the fun activities. She wanted to write only a happy letter, she says, but she’s learned something distressing. Kathleen has her informants. Hildegarde received a Christmas present from Kent in the mail – and the package was addressed to Mrs. Hildegarde Kent. Kathleen has also heard that her husband agreed to continue writing to Hilda once a day, phone her once a week, and visit her once a month. Kent had written to Kathleen that the affair was over and that he had informed Hildegard of that in a letter to her. “Dear, it’s a blow to me and it must be a blow to you that I can’t simply take your word for this; but having seen the gift arrived addressed to her in that manner; what you tell me and what has happened don’t quite hang together.” Kathleen demands to see the letter Kent wrote to Hildegarde ending the affair.

Kent has also been writing to Carl Zigrosser. He and Chappell sometimes visited and dined with Kathleen during this time. Zigrosser has made multiple copies of Kent’s Chart of Resurrection Bay and brought some to Kathleen to distribute to friends. Kent wants Zigrosser to look out for her, but Kent’s letters to him are mostly about art and his wonder and awe of Alaska. We have some of those letters and Kent’s in return. I haven’t located any of Kent’s letters to Chappell from Fox Island but they are more personal. Some of Kent’s letters to Kathleen support this and the few of Chappell’s letters to Kent make this clear. Kent is apparently informing Chappell about Kathleen’s unfaithfulness and neglect toward him and asking his friend to intervene. He wants George to make sure Kathleen understands what he wants from her – dedication faithfulness as well as longer and more loving letters

In a Jan. 29, 1919 Chappell letter to Kent we get a real insight into what’s going on. He quotes and summarizes some of what Kent is writing to him. It begins: “Your last letter of Dec. 28^th quite disturbed me, to put it mildly. I know that my ‘happy-careless way’ has perhaps made me negligent in the proper acknowledgment of letter received for – and delivered to Kathleen, but that any sort of ‘black interpretation’ could be put upon my shortcomings quite struck me dumb.”

Chappell goes on to discuss how sacred their friendship is and how much he cherishes it. This reminded me of a comment Zigrosser makes about Kent in his autobiography, A World of Art and Museums (1975). These two men – Chappell and Zigrosser – knew Kent intimately during this time of his life. Zigrosser wrote: “The roster of Rockwell’s friends and acquaintances varied from time to time according to whether they were in or out of favor. Either they did not live up to his impulsively generous estimate – presuming too much on a friendly relation they didn’t not understand – or else his interest changed and the ties between them no longer endured. I remained his friend, and became, by virtue of duration the friend of the family as well.”

Carl Zigrosser about 1920

Kent’s idealism extended toward his expectations of friendship, at times over-idealizing the relationships lofty heights that some friends could neither understand nor achieve. That’s why Chappell in the above letter spends a whole page assuring Kent of their sacred friendship – because what he will say next might be something Kent doesn’t want to here. Cautiously, he begins with praise; “I hope the painting is going better. I look to that to trail clouds of glory into New York, in which even I shall shine with reflected light!” That’s what Kent needed, praise and assurance of his success. Then Chappell teeters on the edge of criticism: “And please do try not to worry too much about home affairs. It hurts me terribly to have you speak of Kathleen’s ‘faithlessness’; of how she has ‘shown herself up’ – It seems to me harsh and unfair, when I see her at home giving unremitting care to the children, tied hand and foot with daily drudgery that would make a man into a maniac in a week, -- and always sweet and patient, always trying in her dumb, inarticulate way to do what she thinks is her Duty. O, Rocky! Perfection is always the peak beyond and the way to it is full of bruises, but we can attain a kind of perfection by idealizing what we have and still not lose sight of the great unattainable. You have much to think of with most precious comfort, much to work for with great patience, much to come back to with supreme joy – if you will only surround them with greatness of heart, with forgiveness for short-comings, with tenderness and with -- unfailing love.”

Even after a full page of praise in that letter, Chappell has to be tactful as he tries to give his friend Kathleen’s perspective. If one wanted to maintain a friendship with Kent, one had to learn how to approach him.

In his own memoir quoted above, Zigrosser gives us reliable insight into Kent’s character. “I found it expedient…to avoid, as far as possible, arguments on certain issues, debates in which neither could convince the other, and which could lead only to the aggravation of tempers for no good purpose.” Eight years younger than Kent, Zigrosser admits that during these years he was “a youthful and uncritical admirer. As the years passed – although he still admired and respected his friend -- Zigrosser developed a more balanced view. “I came to know and affectionately admire his three wives, Kathleen, Frances, and Sally,” he wrote. “It is a commonplace observation that the wives of great men generally are unheralded and uncelebrated heroines. It is true of Rockwell’s wives, even though he did voice his appreciation of them at times – not, however, at all times, not with full understanding. He made great demands upon them: they must be wife, companion, household manager, hostess, amanuensis, and secretary for voluminous correspondence. Brimming over with energy, he could and did wear out two wives. I salute all for their loyal and unselfish devotion.”

As we can see, Kent didn’t take criticism well, even from those close to him. Four years after Kent’s death, Zigrosser is able to write in his memoir that Kent’s 1955 autobiography contains “the usual amount of inaccuracies, half-truths, and evasions.” He doesn’t minimize the books merit, but he “cannot accept his legend entirely at its face value, nor refrain from expressing…sympathy for some of those who have experienced his disfavor.” Shorlty before he died, Zigrosser met with Kent and his lawyer, Leonard Boudin. When Zigrosser told Kent he planned to include a chapter about him in his memoir, Boudin jokingly urged Zigrosser to be merciless. Zigrosser had published a portrait of Kent in 1942 that was not entirely uncritical but mostly positive. Kent enjoyed it. In 1967, when he read Kent the draft of an addition to that piece, Kent begged him not to publish it. Zigrosser did not promise, however, to never publish it. Kent had to have faith in his ability to overcome all obstacles in life, Zigrosser suggests: “Whatever he could not meet and overcome – he was very competitive – he would obliterate and act as if it had never existed. Had he lost his faith, the whole structure of his life would have crumbled. Hence the urgency of his desire to prevent a few negative assessments in my pen portrait from impinging and challenging his assumptions.” Zigrosser says he wasn’t being malicious but only trying to provide a more balanced portrait – but perhaps, he suggests, as Kent got older “he felt less secure and needed more and more reassurance.”

The Kent that Zigrosser describes is the one we often see in his letters to Kathleen. He must have assurance of his genius and his greatness. Hildegarde most likely gives him this in her letters. His wife – pushed to her limits with Kent’s affairs, criticisms and unkindness – will no longer tolerate his behavior and holds back these affirmations.  Because of this – as Zigrosser suggests – combined with his isolation, the darkness and the weather, Kent’s life begins to crumble all around him. He goes through what the spiritual mystics have called the “Dark Night of the Soul.” As Zigrosser suggests, Kent was able to obliterate this part of the Fox Island experience from Wilderness and from his autobiography – but not from the letters. As we’ll see, the New Year’s letters he writes to Kathleen – on the eve of the tenth anniversary of their marriage – are some of the most honest and revealing he has ever written. As Zigrosser suggests, even in his praise for his wives, Kent never had full understanding of their loyalty, devotion and the sacrifices they made for him. On Fox Island as he approaches the abyss during that long, dark winter, he finally begins to see how deeply his behavior has hurt Kathleen.

Sunrise on Resurrection Bay -- December 31, 2018. Capra photo