PART 3 JANUARY 2 -- FEBRUARY 11, 1919
ROCKWELL KENT WILDERNESS CENTENNIAL JOURNAL
100 YEARS LATER
by Doug Capra © 2018
Part 3 – Jan. 2 – Feb. 11, 1919
ABOVE -- Sunrise on January 31, 2018 at 8:45 a.m. Clouds hover over Fox Island with the moon and morning start above. Capra photo.
BELOW -- The sun at 12:30 p.m. on January 31, 2018. The same clouds hang over the island. Capra photo.
The weather in late January has been quite cold with that
awesome north wind. Kent usually restocks supplies when in Seward. Now with
Olson gone for so long he writes on Jan. 23rd in Wilderness, “It’s a real satisfaction to
find that my calculations in supplies in bedding, in heating equipment were
just right for conditions here. We’re running low now on cereals and milk but
we planned to visit Seward this month to restock. Olson’s absence is quite
outside of all plans.”
The weather and increasing light allow Kent to paint outside
every day. He describes his method of “fixing the forms and above all the color
of the out-of-doors in my mind. Then after dark I go into a trance for a while
with Rockwell subdued into absolute silence. I lie down or sit with closed eyes
until I ‘see’ a composition, -- then I make a quick note of it or maybe give an
hour’s time to perfecting he arrangement on a small scale. Then when that’s
done I’m care free.” After they play cards for a time, Kent sometimes poses
Rockie naked and draws him.
By Jan. 25th the weather is bitter – “as cold
continually as I’ve ever experienced,” Kent writes. The two water barrels in
Olson’s house have frozen – “One bulged and burst the bottom rolling itself off
onto the floor,” Kent observes. By Jan. 26th it becomes milder and
the north wind dies down. There’s always need to keep up with firewood, so Kent
fells a tree and cuts up 15 feet of it.
On Jan. 28th in Wilderness
Kent tells us he’s reading Thus SpokeZarathustra by Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) and quotes him: “Write with blood,
and thou will learn that blood is spirit.” That book, along with William
Blake’s art, influenced him greatly while he was in Alaska. Kent wrote that the
night before he “made a drawing of Zarathustra leading the ugliest man by the
hand out into the night to behold the round moon and the silver waterfall.”
Nietzsche
has been much misunderstood, and I have neither time nor space here to attempt
a detailed analysis of his influence on Kent (although I have previously and
will offer some suggestions later.) Kent’s friend Carl Zigrosser (editor of The Modern School) had read much more of
Nietzsche, and, as Kent scholar Jake Wien suggests, he is probably the one who
gave titles to the Kent drawings that echo the German philosopher. I do
recommend the book American Nietzsche: A
History of an Icon and his Ideas by Jennifer Ratner-Rosenhagen (2011). She
covers well his strong yet diverse influence on American culture up to and
during the time Kent is in Alaska. To Nietzsche, Kent says, and to himself,
Zarathustra is the ideal man. Kent writes: “You are that which in your soul you
choose to be; your most beautiful and cherished vision is yourself. What are
the true, normal conditions of life for any man but just those perfect
conditions with which he would ideally surround himself. A man is not a sum of
discordant tendencies – but rather a being perfect for one special place; and
this is Olson’s creed.” This is Kent’s ideal, but in his letters to Kathleen,
he recognizes that he has not integrated all his “discordant tendencies,” even
on Fox Island, his one special place.
On
Wednesday, Jan. 29th Kent writes in Wilderness: “Alaska can be cold!
Monday broke all records for the winter. Tuesday made that seem balmy. It was
so bitterly cold here last night in our ‘tight little cabin’ that we had to
laugh. Until ten o’clock when I went to bed the large stove was continuously
red hot and running at full blast. And yet by then the water pails were frozen
two inches thick – but ten feet from the stove…my fountain pen was frozen on
the table…the fox food was solid ice, my paste was frozen.”
BELOW -- This is what the weather felt like in Seward during that last week of January 1919, from the Feb. 1st Seward Gateway.
Rockie is still deep
into his Sir Lancelot role. “He rarely goes out now without his {stick} horse,
lance, and sword and he addresses me always as ‘My Lord…Surely Lancelot himself
was no gentler knight. {When I met and interviewed Rockie back in the early
1980’s, he spent much time telling me about his fantasy world, especially his
role as Sir Lancelot.} They spend much of the day cutting firewood. “Rockwell
has been a trump,” Kent writes. “The weather can’t be too cold for him. This
morning he pulled his end of the saw without rest.” It’s so cold that
everything in his cabin is freezing and Rockie needs a hot-water bottle for
bedtime. Kent stays up late working and when he goes to bed he hears Rockie
talking in his sleep. “Are you cold?” he asked him. “No, my lord,” Rockie
mumbles. More outdoor woodcutting on Jan. 30th as Kent chops
down a 28-inch tree. Then he and Rockie cut it into sections and split the
drums for firewood. Kent observes a “great, old tramp steamer” enter the bay and
writes “They must carry mail and freight and send Olson back to us.” The wind
dies down and the temperature rises. It looks like a change of weather is
coming. For dinner they have barley soup with two bouillon cubes and onions
browned in bacon.
BELOW -- A page from Kent's illustrated journal.
On Feb. 1st the two adventurers wake up to
spring-like weather with a thawing rain. Kent has averaged one good drawing a
day for January, but today he does two. On Feb. 2nd it’s so warm
that Rockie plays outside barefooted. The weather is mixed: rain, snow, wind,
sun. “Out-of-doors is to us like another room,” Kent writes. “We scour our pots
with snow before washing them, throw the dish water right out of the door, and
generally are in and out all day. Rockie asks Kent how Kings earn their living.
“I said they didn’t earn it – just got the people to give it to them.” Rockie
laughs. “What’s that,” he says, “some sort of joke they play on the people?”
Kent reflects, “So I guess it takes education to appreciate privilege.”
Kent
doesn’t write any letters to Kathleen during the time Olson is away. Why bother? Until he learns how she responds
to his anniversary letters he won’t know his future. Will she accept him as a
changed man? Will she believe he has ended his relationship with Hilda? Will
she trust his new insight as to how cruelly he has treated her, how unkind is
demands and criticisms? He won’t know until Olson returns with the mail. And
what if she doesn’t accept him? Perhaps Hilda will take him back. Or maybe
he’ll just remain in Alaska. Kathleen has told him that Mr. Theodore Wagner in
New York has offered to be a patron with up to $2000 which would allow Kent to
remain in Alaska. That could last him through the summer. He’s been offered
free transportation on the Copper River Railroad and the Alaska Railroad. The Seward
Chamber of Commerce wants him as a guest speaker. Others have offered him
cabins in Seward and along Kenai Lake. He wants to camp out at Bear Glacier
with Rockie and then venture far into the Kenai Fjords to paint the mountains, the
sea and the glaciers. With the light gain accompanied by spring and summer
weather and sea conditions, he won’t be stuck, isolated, exiled on Fox Island. Most
of his paintings are unfinished. Maybe he could complete them, sell some in
Alaska, and send some home. Although Kent isn’t writing letters during this
period Kathleen is writing many that Kent will receive upon Olson’s return.
He
spends these days working, forcing himself not to think of Kathleen. He throws
himself into his drawing and painting. He draws only men, he later tells
Kathleen. Naked, gesturing, striving, suffering, elated men. Only men. He wants
to thrust women out of his mind. He fells trees, breaks them down with the
cross-cut with Rockie’s help, then
splits those sections into firewood. He cooks and cleans and takes care of Olson’s
fox and goats. He enters Rockie’s world to play with him. In the evenings they
sometimes enjoy a game of cards before his son goes to bed. He reads Nietzsche himself and
shares the tales of King Arthur with Rockie.
These
38 days Olson is gone are among the most productive of all his time on Fox Island.
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