Soundtrack: [Piano x ASMR] Howl’s Moving Castle | Experience Sophie’s Hat Shop.
The official organ fund has received rather an impetus through the learned but eccentric human phonograph Mrs. Greene, who was at the National convention. After receiving United papers she instantly became an ardent United partisan—began to correspond with Galpin and subscribed fifty dollars to the fund!
H.P. Lovecraft to Winifred Virginia Jackson, August 7, 1921, Letters to Rheinhart Kleiner and Others, p. 331-332.
In 1959, Alfred Galpin’s memoir of H.P. Lovecraft, “Memories of a Friendship”, was published in The Shuttered Room and Other Pieces by Arkham House. The Brown Digital Repository has the original manuscript available with corrections by Galpin and August Derleth. What makes this manuscript unique is for its recollections of Sonia, at least in the original. (I can’t speak for the published text in The Shuttered Room.) In page 11 of the manuscript, Galpin describes Sonia’s visit to Madison, Wisconsin:
When she dropped in on my reserved and bookish student life at Madison, I felt like an English sparrow transfixed by a cobra. Junoesque and commanding, with superb dark eyes and hair, she was too regal to be a Dostoievski [sic] character and seemed rather a heroine from some of the most martial pages of War and Peace. Proclaiming the glory of the free and enlightened human personality, she declared herself a person unique in depth and intensity of passion and urged me to Write, to Do, to Create.
Alfred Galpin, 1916 – 1937: Memories of a Friendship, p. 11, John Hay Library.
What had originally inspired this visit was Galpin’s love for Russian literature. After having read a condensed version of Crime and Punishment, Galpin was preparing to read Dostoyevsky’s novel in all its entirety when Sonia initially wrote to him.
In her incidental correspondance [sic] with me she found that besides by fondness for Nietzsche I was even fonder of Dostoievski, [sic] and it was this discovery (the Russians were not so generally in style in those days) that urged her to meet me in person.
Alfred Galpin, 1916 – 1937: Memories of a Friendship, p. 10, John Hay Library.
It was in this meeting that Sonia described some of her hardships with Samuel Greene:
It seems that her first marriage in Russia had been most unhappy, to a man of brutal character; quarrels became bitter. “Let me tell you, Alfred, things have happened to me that never, NEVER happened before to ANY LIVING CREATURE ON EARTH!” In one of their quarrels—the last?—“I walked to the window,” which looked down x.. stories to the street, “and I said Georgi Fedorovitch, IF YOU TAKE ONE STEP FORWARD, I SHALL HURL MYSELF FROM THIS WINDOW!
Alfred Galpin, 1916 – 1937: Memories of a Friendship, p. 11, John Hay Library.
This anecdote of her threatening to jump out of the window has for many years been misconstrued. Originally when I began studying her life, this manuscript was the first I read surrounding her marriage to Samuel. While I didn’t know it at the time, the proper context behind this anecdote was missing. Without it, she sounds rather unhinged. This quarrel between Samuel and Sonia was certainly not the last, but only the beginning of their relationship. There are two manuscripts in which she elaborated on her courtship with Samuel. In the first, there’s no passage describing this window incident. However, in the second, she left the account in the narrative with a handwritten note relaying her uncertainty about leaving or deleting the scene. According to Sonia, this quarrel occurred on February 11, 1899, going into the morning of Abraham Lincoln’s birthday.
“Mrs. Hathaway” was Christine D. Hathaway, the Special Collections Librarian of Brown University. Given the autobiographical nature of Sonia’s letters to her, it would seem that Mrs. Hathaway had considered writing and/or publishing Sonia’s biography.
When writing to August Derleth, Sonia corrected Galpin’s account in The Shuttered Room:
Thanks a million for Book #2. By the way—in Book #1 Alfred Galpin made quite an error (not that it matters) he said I was married in Russia. I was married in N.Y.C. to a Russian.
Sonia H. Davis to August Derleth, March 29, 1968, Wisconsin Historical Society.
Learning this anecdote from Galpin, Frank Belknap Long apparently found the idea of her threatening to jump out of the window quite amusing.
Sonia could sometimes dramatize some particular event in her life out of all reason, in a wholly melodramatic way. I am indebted to Alfred Galpin for the following amusing story, which she related to him when they met in Madison, Wisconsin the year before.
When she was in her early twenties a young admirer succeeded in convincing himself that her virtue was not unassailable. When she invited him to her home following a theater engagement for a cup of Russian tea, he made a daring proposal, with seduction uppermost in his mind. She had just turned from the window after throwing the casement wide, and the apartment was several stories above the street.
Her immediate response was: “Ivan Ivanowich”—or whatever his name was!—“if you take one step nearer I shall hurl myself from this window!”
I have never doubted that she might well have carried out the threat, and one can readily imagine into what a state of agitation that particular suitor must have been plunged.
Frank Belknap Long, Howard Phillips Lovecraft: Dreamer on the Nightside, pp. 48-49.
Although we don’t have Galpin’s in-depth thoughts or feelings when she described the window incident to him, we can clearly see Long’s ignorance showing through the ordeal. He was downplaying, even if it was unknowingly, the abuse that Sonia endured—perhaps her personality had been a little extreme, but Long’s sympathy on “that particular suitor” just shows how Lovecraft’s friends viewed her through the lens of a man’s world.
Transcription:
536 College Ave.,
Appleton, nWis., [sic]
Monday, August 8.
My dear Mrs. Greene:
I see that my outburst of rhetoric had a better influence than might be feared. You see, I’m subject to such throes of verbology, and in such circumstances I always hasten to remove its achievements before I destroy them. I believe I went down the line of history and compared friend Friedrich to everybody from Christ toSwinburne.***Would [sic] that I could remain mad always, but my ordinary judgments are soaked with mediocrity, level-headedness, and most detestable sanity. As a matter of fact, I regard Nietzsche largely from the utilitarian point of view—he is a wonderful opener of minds and and profound, an eternal voice of antinomianism I like to call him, as you do, the Great Destroyer. He would have worshiped Kubla Khan and that mad son of his who prowled East Europe, glorying in the destruction of allthat [sic] past classic centuries had built.
I suppose it is necessary to take him with a bit of humor despite his own more than Poe-esque offenses against the spirit of mockery. His ideas were at once sublime and ridiculous. But what a pleasure it is to dig in his priceless store of epigrams and ideas, and gather them together with the hope of hurling them at some pompous old prelate!
Nietzsche probably over-estimated mere manners, the aristocratic substitute for morals. Personally, I have so recently extricated myself from Dial snobbery and Oscar Wilde aestheticism that I am still afraid of my own views, but I shouldn’t like to blame either the masses or nobility, or chance either, for great men. They are the fruit of some process hidden entirely from us, and who knows but that it may be hidden fromthe [sic] gods? They must have their own rights, but whether or not they insist upon them is not necessarily a gauge of their greatness. Greatness of soul, an entirely different thing, is of course the humility of Whitman—Chesterton in “Heretics” deals rather cleverly with types of great men but his view is rather mechanical. Genius can descend to any one, the temperament is merely its trademark. I think the particular reference is to be found in the portion of “The Wit of Whistler,” with collaterial [sic] material in “Mr. Wells and the Giants.”
I finished my “immortal thesis” in the deuce of a hurry and it is rather an amateurish piece of work—ridiculously inadequate as philosophy, and unpolished in what is more important tome, the style. I have sent my only spare copy (at present) to Lovecraft and told him to let you read it. If you want a copy of the thing let me know and I can send you one later. On the other hand, Lovecraft may be able to find some amateur willing to print the thing—as you say, most people are lamentably ignorant of Nietzsche and I’m sure they will overlook the faults of my essay. As a matter of fact, it requires a more than American stage of decency and civilization to understand the simple predication “Nietzsche lived.”
Will you pardon my impertinence if I venture the guess that you are Russian? I derive it merely from your terseness of style, your love of the masses, and the “Sonia?” If you are, do tell me how Dostoyevsky reads in the original. I am reading his “Crime and Punishment” for the second time this summer. And tellme [sic] also what is best to read of Tolstoy, Gorky, and Turgenev—I believe that Andreyev and Tchekov [sic] have sense enough to be less wordy. Judging from appearance, Tolstoy ought to be popular in the land of the free, for I have never seen anything that looked duller or more insistently moralistic.
I am reading right now Stendhal’s “Le Rouge et Le Noir,” which seems to have influence Nietzsche so profoundly. Must read his “Vie de Napoleon” if I find time. Anent Shakespeare, try Frank Harris’ “The Man Shakespeare”—I suppose you see “Pearson’s Magazine.” Farewell Alfred Galpin, Jr.
This response seems to be Galpin’s second letter to Sonia, which to us, feels more like the first. Especially given this is the first letter that gives proof to their correspondence. The majority of the letter focuses on Friedrich Nietzsche, a German philosopher. The topic must’ve naturally arisen in their correspondence because Lovecraft had revealed in the “News Notes” section of The United Amateur 21 that Sonia had originally been a fan of Nietzsche:
Coming at an early age to the United States, [Sonia] acquired a remarkable degree of erudition mainly through her own initiative; being now a master of several languages and deeply read in all the literatures and philosophies of modern Europe. Probably no more thorough student of Continental literature has ever held membership in amateurdom, whilst our many philosophical members will note with interest her position as a former Nietzschean who has at present rejected the theories of the celebrated iconoclast.
H.P. Lovecraft, Collected Essays 1: Amateur Journalism, p. 299.
According to Sonia, she had first learned of Nietzsche through “Kay”, a gentleman she met at a ball.
Kay and [Sonia] had talked about all the Russian writers and poets, then he introduced her to more writers, this time to the mad Friedrich Nietzsche.
Sonia H. Davis, Two Hearts That Beat as One, p. 104.
Who exactly is “Kay”? I don’t have the slightest idea, and Sonia made it a point to leave this man in utter obscurity throughout all her letters and autobiographical writings. He is only mentioned as “Kay”. Regardless of who it may have been, he was very much like Samuel Greene, introducing her to new writers, which would later on give her the confidence to speak knowledgeably on such matters.
Galpin’s disappointment must have been apparent upon receiving her reply, or while conversing in person, that she did not read the Russian classics in their native language. When writing “Russian American’s Views on the Russian Writers” for The Brooklyn Daily Eagle in 1933, this was Sonia had to say:
To split hairs in the controversy whether Willa Cather can prove that the Russians write the truth about themselves is of minor importance, but as a Russo-American who has lived 40 years in America and only 7 in Russia I should be inclined toward Miss Cather’s side. Never having learned to read Russian in Russia, I was obliged to read what I know of them in English. In comparison with the prolific Russians, the American output is indeed meagre.
Sonia H. Greene (Lovecraft), “Russian American’s Views on the Russian Writers”, The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, May 12, 1933, p. 18.
It’s a very neat little editorial, in which she compares influences between Russian, American, and French literature, and how these groups of writers accepted one another’s work regardless of nation. “Russian American’s Views on the Russian Writers” can be found at “Newspaper.com”.
Thus, continuing on this thread, it’s very likely that after Galpin mentioned Tolstoy in his letter, Sonia described the lecture she attended regarding the Russian novelist. In the only surviving letter from Sonia to Lovecraft, she recounted her thoughts and feelings about it:
One evening a few years ago, I went to Carnegie Hall to hear the son of the great Tolstoi. [sic] I was eager to hear ofmhim [sic] from one who was at once his son, friend and exponent. You may imagine my disappointment when I found him to be a mediocre individual with nothing more striking and original to offer than the proper usage of words and phrases, with quotations interspersed; without casting one ray of light upon Tolstoi [sic] other than had already been gleaned from his books and biographies.
Sonia H. Greene to H.P. Lovecraft, August 1, 1921, John Hay Library.
“One evening a few years ago” was in fact January 19, 1917, a Friday evening. The J.B. Pond Lyceum presented Count Ilya Tolstoy, who was lecturing in America at the time. His presentation, “The Life and Ideals of My Father”, was to be a personal discourse on his father’s legacy. The synopsis of the program indeed sounded very promising, especially when considering the information was to be presented by one of Tolstoy’s many sons. However, if one was well read in the writer’s life, perhaps much of what was shared was repetitive, in which case it’s understandable why Sonia was disappointed especially if she was hoping for new biographical views of Tolstoy. The full program (12 pages) may be viewed at: Carnegie Hall.
Transcription:
Fish-trap Lake, Sunday afternoon, Sept. 4.
Dear Mrs. Greene:
My unnatural silence during the past lustrum has been caused by circumstances so sudden as to be almost beyond my volition. Friday night, way back in August, I returned from a motor jauntwith [sic] a car-owning friend and about eleven o’clock was invitedto [sic] go fishing with two younger scions of Appleton’s nobility—the tour to commence the following noon. I had never been up north nor caught any fish except three suckers and a perch in my life—but all the better reason, said I! I have had my important mail forwarded to the nearest post-offices, and got your letter as I passed through Crandon on the way up here. I haven’t caught anything yet but am having a decent enough time, getting well tanned [sic] andcoming [sic] into contactwith [sic] some excellent manifestations of the novelty of the oldest dame of all, Mater Terra.***Mother [sic] wrote me Friday that your book hadcome, [sic] and so I thank you once more. I shall do so at greater length when I get home and readit. [sic]
I believe I got rid of myself pretty well in my last letter—I have found it positively dull to be egotistic ever since, that is in an introspective sense. But since there is little else to discuss I’ll tell you a little about camp—in the first place, I read “The Red Laugh” on the way up and thought it almost perfect as an expression of “Horror and madness….” God putrescent, what a mind that man must have had! He was much like Poe in his fundamental nature, but seems to have suffered all the brooding dread of isolation and the worst sides of reality. He seems to have little idealism left in him, unless|pessimism [sic] be such. But it is interesting and give me one of them for all the Pollyannas ever spewed! I didn’t like the sudden decline in “h.a.m” in the second part, which in other hands would have become an outright oration against war. I think he could have abbreviated it and not left the effect of those utterly inimitable first portions to have been lost. I shall never forget the doctor’s description of “we merry free men” dancing over the red fires of civilization, or of the regiments on the same side fighting each other, or the red laugh. I am now reading the complete version of Dostoyevsky’s masterpiece, and I can’t remember when I have read anything better except Lear and Hamlet. Do you remember Marmeladov in the tavern?
**Besides [sic] that, I have been writing letters to Loveman and the Lomo pair rather constantly, and have read “The Importance of Being Earnest” and Thompson’s essay on Shelley, also from my ten-cent series. Both of them are masterpieces—you must look upthat [sic] Appeal to Reason popular series. I have glimpsed bear and deer, eaten trout, pickerel, and muskellunge, learned how to cast, eaten regularly instead of between meals for once in my life, and spent four hours trying to find my way back from the nearby post-office Friday.
As for the “Brass Chek”—are you sure I didn’t mention that in one of my previous letters? Popular education is rot but I wish every one [sic] in the country could read that. It is greater than anything the abolitionists ever did, and for ten thousand times a better cause—damn niggers anyhow, but damn the press thrice! I know, for I have probably had as much experience in the writing and reporting end of the ordinary-sized town as any one of my age—they are too small to be crooked, but ugh!!!! You mustn’t mind my swearing, I am too expert at it to forswear it. You should have heard me drag Jehovah around by the hair of his beard when I got lost Friday…I wish I could remember some of that line.
Would that I could, with a merry thud, strike your metropolis, and would twice it might be this winter, but nay nay. When I get any extra money it will either go into a.j. or books, until it starts coming by the thousand. Some time, however, I may come East on some magazine and I shall certainly see you if I can, then. I have rather a pull with H.L. Mencken, and was extremely flattered by his criticism of my Modern Mood. Just now I am on my masterpiece, which has rather a—er—pagan plot. An oriental sheik whose race worships the number seven so contrives the management of his harem that he has seven offspring conceived in a single night. They turn out mostly to be sons (maybe all, that depends) and in some way or other to which I have committed myself, they bring to ruination a great kingdom. The style will take weeks to perfect, and the irony shall be more subtle than Anatole France…let us hope, at least. My sheet is now used up. Hope I can get this to the post-office soon. Thank you again for Shaw.
Sincerely,
A.G.Jr.
The Red Laugh was a novella written by Leonid Andreyev and published in 1904. Since Andreyev never experienced real life frontline combat, The Red Laugh is mainly a hallucinatory portrait of warfare and its psychological impacts. The story follows a soldier whose testimony of war are laid out in nineteen fragments, and it is through his crumbling sanity that we perceive the madness and horrors of the battlefield. (Russophile Reads) Another one of Andreyev’s notable stories is “Lazarus” which was translated and reprinted in Famous Modern Ghost Stories (1921) and in Weird Tales (1927). (Deep Cuts in a Lovecraftian Vein)
There are some encounters, even with people who are complete strangers to us, in which we begin to take an interest right from the very first glance, suddenly, before we have uttered a word.
Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, trans. by David McDuff, p. 15.
Marmeladov was a retired civil servant, who was also an alcoholic, in Crime and Punishment. The tavern scene, in which the main character, Raskolnikov (Rodya), crosses paths with Marmeladov occurs in the second chapter. The interaction between the two men feels superficial at first, as though the familial drama described by Marmeladov holds no importance to the overall narrative.
However, this scene sets up the whole book and the characters that the reader will encounter. It is through this chance meeting that reveals the web of entwined lives, and ultimately speaks of Sonya, the daughter of Marmeladov, who will guide Rodya into his path of redemption. Without this vital scene, we don’t have the full depth of Crime and Punishment. From her autobiography and The Brooklyn Daily Eagle article, we know Sonia read Dostoyevsky, but not the specifics of which publications she read. If Galpin had asked her if she remembered “Marmeladov in the tavern”, it leads one to believe she had indeed read Crime and Punishment. What her thoughts were on the massive book, I wish I knew!
The book that Sonia sent to Galpin was Back to Methuselah by George Bernard Shaw. It was this very book that Sonia had also sent to Lovecraft, which he then relayed in a letter to Rheinhart Kleiner:
Bless her heart, if she hasn’t just sent Grandpa a beauteous gift, in the form of a copy of Shaw’s new play, Back to Methuselah!
H.P. Lovecraft to Rheinhart Kleiner, August 30, 1921, Selected Letters 1.149.
In the very same letter, Lovecraft sheds some light on what Sonia may have been writing about to Galpin, which also correlates with their topic of discussion:
He has told her the sad, sad story of his whole life, and his mother will be lucky if she does not kidnap him some day. Also, she hath told him that I am egotistical from reading Nietzsche—which disturbeth me not in the least.
H.P. Lovecraft to Rheinhart Kleiner, August 30, 1921, Selected Letters 1.149.
While Galpin didn’t react to her saying this about Lovecraft, it’s still a neat anecdote of what she must’ve written to Galpin that perhaps went unanswered in his letters to Sonia. In another letter, Lovecraft shares a hint of how long her letters were:
Galba, yuh’d orta hear what she says about you in her latest 12-pager! If you ma don’t watch out, she’ll kidnap yuh!
H.P. Lovecraft to the Gallomo, August 31, 1921, Miscellaneous Letters, p. 117.
Additionally, what is interesting about Galpin’s second letter is his rejection of her offer in coming to New York. Since the letter is dated September 4, which is the day that Sonia arrived in Providence, it proves that Sonia had this vision of a gathering well before she visited Lovecraft.
Transcription:
Home, James, Sunday, September 11, 1921.
My dear Mrs. Greene:
H.P.L tells me that you have had the super-modesty to believe that my assumption of the pseudonym under the Nietzsche article is due to shame at the quality of the magazine and not of the article. I am sure you were kidding Lovecraft for your Rainbow ought to be of exceptional merit. I should persist in my former decision, except that I have other plans for Consul now. So you may, if you wish, put my proper signature under the article. In any case, I thank you very much for the privilege you give me of seeing it in print, and still more in theRainbow. [sic]
I am writing this in a deuce of a hurry. Returning last evening from Squaw Lake I found oodles of mail to answer, papers and books to get in order, several things I must read at once, two or three important things to write—and to write my best on—, duties as rusher for my Lawrence fraternity, and in my spare time the ineluctable necessity of getting ready for my first year at the University within a week! So I haven’t read your lecture yet but intend to read Methuselah tonight, as far as I can get, that is. Meanwhile, more thanks and profound ones for the book—that makes my third of Shaw’s, and I am sure it is the best of the lot. I can’t understand my boundless enthusiasm for theman. [sic] It must be his entire Shavian quality—neither art, nor argument, but Shaw. And he makes his borrowed stuff so delightful! I believe you sent Lovecraft one too—it ought to give him equal delight, for he is an enthusiast on evolution yet is almost unacquainted with G.B.S. Do you remember his “Caesar and Cleopatra?” Or “Pygmalion?” They are my favorites of the two volumes I own.
Read “Crime and Punishment” through with care while I was at camp. It is as great a novel as I ever read, despite faults which would ruin any other: It doesn’t get anywhere, the conclusion fizzles terribly, the epilogue ought to be an artistic mistake, we lose sight of the main thread of the story and its principle character toward the conclusion—but I still love it and must read all of Feodor I can hold. I love it for its inconceivable detachment, its lack of the expected morbidity, its marvelously high plane of intelligence in every character and situation, and finally for a creationof [sic] character by means of dialogue which I will flatly say is the greatest in all the literature of the world. I shall read the book a dozen times yet, if gracious Yawveh [sic] permits me, also “The Brothers Karamazov” and the rest of his works. He is superb.
I also read “Othello” for the first time, “As You Like It” for about the fourth, and “Lear”for [sic] the tenth. Have you read “The Man Shakespeare” yet? It will mean a new era in your life if you like great poetry. P.S.: If you think my enthusiasm for F.D. is too great, let me explain that I am unacquainted with Thackeray, Turgenev, Hardy, and any of the Frenchmen except Stendhal and Anatole France. P.S. again: Look up all the back files of Pearson’s if you like Harris, he has been editor for about four years now and to my mind is the greatest living American. He is also a very queer duck.
I am glad to hear you like the United so well. It is hauling in some of the best recruits a.j. ever landed –Spoerri, Long, McMullen, Greene, and other more recent ones I haven’t met yet. Evidently she is going to erupt into activity again—I shall do my part this year. If you feel like broadening your acquaintance here you might try Campbell, or Cook, or young Margaret Abraham, a townswoman of Appleton who goes to Chicago U. She is very intelligent, though mediocre in her inspiration; well-bred, and rather likeable. I think you would enjoy writing her—tel [sic] her I recommended her to you. I don’t know her address but you will find it in the official organ.
Be sure and write me as usual—though I leave for Madison in a week I intend to keep up all my amateur connections, especially my correspondence with you, Loveman, and Lovecraft. How did you like your visit with H.P.L.? He will undoubtedly tell me about it at very great length—suppose you let me have both sides of the case? Thanks for this, for the Rainbow, and for Shaw—and many of them.
Sincerely,
A.G.Jr
P.S. Please don’t tell anyone a thing about Consul—
You (illegible sentence)
“Consul Hastings” was Galpin’s pseudonym. He originally wrote the Nietzsche article under this penname, and the “immortal thesis” mentioned in the first letter is very likely the same article. Sonia must’ve read the article when she visited Lovecraft in September, liking enough to accept the piece for the first volume of The Rainbow. This would explain why he corrected himself in saying his preference for the pseudonym was based solely on the merit of the article rather than shame of the journal it was set to appear. It is wonderful to follow the progression of this article through these letters, from not having a place in print and concealed behind a pseudonym, to landing in a beautiful journal and revealing its author. What’s most interesting is that at the end of this letter, Galpin asked Sonia not to give away the identity of Consul. Especially when Lovecraft was quite open about it in June 1921:
The Critic”, written by Galpin under his now familiar nom de plume of “Consul Hasting”, is a veritable gem of vers de société.
H.P. Lovecraft, Collected Essays 1: Amateur Journalism, p. 289.
Transcription:
Nietzsche as a Practical Prophet
By Alfred Galpin, Jr.
The problem that Friedrich Nietzsche set himself was a double one. First, he intended to confound and overwhelm the forces of contemporary Christian morality; and then to propose a radical scheme of social organization and of individual aspiration which had as its supreme aim the creation of the superman.
To this problem he brought the genius of his own personality and its hitherto intensely conflicting elements. That is to say, he brought the hard sincerity which was derived from his personal struggle against centuries of tradition crystallized into the modern church. He had himself been a Christian, and a pious one, until his manhood; and yet there was in him that high seriousness of effort, that conscientious endeavor to solve in his own brain the problem of human ends, which refined itself gradually into a religion based on his own worldly and sensitive aristocracy.
Of the many influences which entered into his philosophy either as elements to be combated, or as elements to be absorbed, there were four which might loosely be chosen as the principle ones. H.L. Mencken* (* “The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche,” by H.L. Mencken.) points out the two most obvious: Greek classicism and the new biology heralded by Darwin. I should choose two others, also, which were nearer to his home, if not to his heart: The scholasticism and ponderous romanticism of his German confreres, and the rather opposite influence of his master, Schopenhauer. The first involved him as a scholar and philologist, but the second opened up the vista of his thought and made possible Nietzsche’s defiant emancipation from all the traditions about him.
His philosophy, then, was a revolt against all modern German traditions; it was a purely Nietzschean sublimation of the Schopenhauerian doctrine, a rather confused acceptance of Darwinism, and a straightforward defense of the classical spirit* (*Many of my facts are derived from the standard biography by Frederic Halevy.)
To the solution of his problem Nietzsche directed his entire mental energy during the last fifteen years of his sanity. Reasonably enough, he started out with an attack on Christianity, the first bold step without which the remainder would be impossible. He showed that Christianity was a slave religion, perpetuating the sick and botched while dragging down the strong, the healthy, and the courageous. He traced the origin of its morality and painted it, not as a divine and unquestioned edict, but as a mere perpetuation of customs, stupid customs and decadent at that: He mercilessly attacked the Oriental conception of a supernatural god, and proclaimed “on all walls—I have letters that even the blind shall see”—that since it asserts the supremacy of another world, the whole fabric of Christianity was a contradiction to life, a blasphemy to the soul of man, a stench in the nostrils of the seeing ones, a triumph of unreality, nihilistic pity, and a sickly and putrefied democracy. In the aphoristic books this was carried off with aplomb and a rather ironic analysis; by the time of “The Antichrist” this Oriental faith of Jesus and Paul became to Nietzsche the “one immortal blemish of mankind.”
From this new point of view, which was much more penetrating and effective than the old rationalism of Voltaire and his school, Nietzsche practically rewrote the history of man. It seems to me that his most valuable contributions to modern thought are to be found in his piercing analyses of moral and historical problems of the past. Socrates and Christ as the great decadents, Luther and the Reformation as the worst catastrophe of modern time—men, philosophers and states were picked to scraps by his iconoclasm.
This was the achievement of his early aphoristic writings. Before this task should monopolize him or find complete expression, Nietzsche gave the world his constructive doctrines in the poetic testament “Thus Spake Zoroaster.” The entire book is infused with the exalted spirit of a new aristocracy—an aristocracy of confident, honorable, ecstatic egoism. “This new table of values, O my brethren, I set over your heads: Become hard. **** Man is something that is to be surpassed.” With these famous lines Zoroaster seeks disciples who will labor with him for the ultimate end and flowering of mankind in the superman. Zoroaster is very careful to warn off those who have not the inborn sense of honor necessary for this discipline. He is specific in preserving slave-morality for the slaves—that is, in preserving old moral values as the best protection for, and from, those who are incapable of welcoming his innovations. His is the most limited of aristocracies.
His ethical teachings may thus be summarized. His philosophy, therefore, can be arbitrarily divided into three essentials: (1) The will to power—his debt to Schopenhauer, whose will to live he turned from an abstract motive force of life to a conflict of individual wills, and made it not resigned, but vaunting and glorified. It is probably his most emphasized nonethical idea. (2) The double morality—herren-moral and sclaven-moral. [sic] This presupposed a dual conception of society and was Nietzsche’s most terrible weapon against modern democracy. (3) The superman, the quintessence of his prophecy, his most original and daring conception. Of his other novelties, only the eternal return is important, and that chiefly as an evidence of the uncontrolled passion which some call madness.
This, in brief, is the philosophy which, commencing about 1885 and gradually enlarging its scope, has been the horror of the conservative, the Bible of the revolte, [sic] the delight of the prose artist and poet. Perhaps no man has ever been more misinterpreted. He has been blamed, more or less justly, for German militarism, the sensual licenses of “modern moral degeneration,” modern atheism, and, in general, for the failings of those cheaper souls whom he so well foresaw, playing the part of his disciple, proud of this high sanction for their sins.
But his influence was a greater and more positive thing than misconception and misrepresentation. He is one of the great prophets of this liberal age, and acquaintance with his writings has touched profoundly the lives of nearly all those leaders of men who have followed him. Today he is beginning to be understood.
In relation to his time, Nietzsche was obviously the enemy of everything most truly contemporaneous. He opposed democracy, scholasticism, romanticism, Christianity, and Christian ethics of all types. He attacked nearly every man who approached his eminence or who came into direct contact with his philosophy. He invented modern German prose and defied every rule of literary tact and coherence. From his mountainous isolation of thought he viewed the entire path of human history in a light that contradicted every current attitude. He arraigned every past philosopher, and when he borrowed an idea he infused into it the vigor and elevation of his own personality.
Back of this anachronism there is no mere perversity, still less reaction. There is rather the spirit of power, dynamic energy, of the glory in life and the striving for individual and social betterment. His time was “out of joint;” it worshipped abstractions, and Nietzsche held up vital energy as the a priori fact and the highest value. In this trait he was a true prophet and he anticipated with his quick and lively intuition much that is salt to modern minds. He saw directly into the workings of the human spirit, and made psychological advances informally which the technical and objective psychological schools were slower in reaching. For instance, in “Prejudices of Philosophers” he briefly analyzes the psychology of the philosopher, and then proposes that only psychological facts, not Greek abstractions, should be the basis of philosophy. Here and elsewhere he spoke vaguely of the “new psychology” as he did of “philosophers of the future.” And he was partly justified in the appearance of Bergson and James, both of whom embody a great deal of the Nietzschean love of life. For example, Nietzsche anticipated James’ pragmatism, his voluntarism in psychology and his temperamentalism in philosophy. Bergson’s catchword “Creative Evolution” might be the very method for the superman, and Bergson also bowed to creative, vital energy. It is therefore quite likely that when Victorianism and its contemporaneous German culture have been forgotten, Nietzsche instead will be remembered as the very incarnate spirit of his time—not of the time in which he lived, but of the time with which he was pregnant. In the accidental timbre, the spectroscope test of his genius, he was in every sense a true prophet. So much for his greatness of soul: what of the logical fabric he created?
The most apparent thing about it is that Nietzsche had no metaphysical insight or logical subtlety — he could not leave the realm of life. I had been able nowhere in his works to find any clear statement of his metaphysics. He evidently accepted the biological data of Darwin, yet he attacked Darwin personally and tried to overthrow his theories. He did the same with Schopenhauer’s will to live — altered it arbitrarily to fit into the pattern of his temperament. He spoke of will to power as a profound philosophical doctrine when it was merely the psychological fact of personal assertion, and when his own application of it rendered it futile as an explanation of the universe. Nothing is more evident that that he accepted evolution because it suited his love of the world, and the will to live because it suited his love of both will-power and life.
Even his ethical edifice will not stand the test of logic. The superman starts out by overlooking the conclusions of modern anthropo-biology, that man is incapable of development beyond his present biologic power* (* “The Direction of Human Evolution,” by Conklin, is a rather dull treatment of this point.) and that his future evolution must be selective and, more especially, social. One indication of this which everyone will recognize is illustrated by the fact of insanity, which is, in many cases, the result of mutations in the evolutionary scale. The “sport” is abnormal, and is combated by the fundamental instincts of the race. More technically the conclusion is upheld by the fact of man’s high degree of specialization, which brings about a decrease of adaptability. But even granting the possibility of a noble and select aristocracy, immune from the ordinary weaknesses of man, glowing with strength a race of creators of rulers — even this race is obviously not a surpassing of mankind, but an artificial culture separated from mankind in the mass by a long and arduous chain of sacrifice and peril, the product of which is its own negation. Nietzsche himself was the first to admit the immense labor necessary for the superman, but he had a passion for aristocratic perfection which overleapt all humanity. Going farther, Nietzsche knew too that the modern democratic freedman hated the aristocrat and would never sacrifice his own material interests for the fostering of genius. He would view the superman as a mere rhetorical tour de force, which in actual life could mean one of two things: Nobility, which he hates, and genius, which he leaves to chance.
I need go no farther on this via dolorosa to show what was already clear; yet I must admit the fascination of the idea, and the apparently powerful influence it is having on modern philosophies of evolution. The fault lay in the radical temper of its creator, not in the conception itself. This same radicality of thought makes impossible a literal application of his dual morality, yet this also is valuable in theoretical ethics and may be applied, following Nietzsche’s own example, to every factor of human progress.
Nietzsche was ,therefore, [sic] as a thinker, a great prophet of revolt, a great iconoclast, a great innovator. If I may broaden the use of the ambiguous term “practical prophet” to include his influence in general on modern time, there remains a consideration of his personality, his artistic genius — its influence on his philosophy and on present-day thinkers and artists.
Probably the most emphasized trait of his personality was that unfortunate neuroticism which later led to his total insanity. I say unfortunate when I do not really mean it, because it is better to undergo savage derogation than to have written nothing worthy of such notice. And it is certainly obvious that we owe the superb literary finish, the whole bravura and fire of his philosophy, to that internal and agonizing emotional stimulus. He was like the nightingale and the thorn, like Shakespeare and his tragic passion for Mary Fitton.* (*I have this on the word of Mr. Frank Harris in his great book, “The Man Shakespeare.”) He was in torture, but in exquisite torture. And it is a final and subtle shibboleth of one’s taste, whether or not one is repelled by that beautiful instability which would wreck the efforts of the mediocre but which intensifies the purely instinctive thinking-in-words of genius.
It is to this insanity, such as it is, that we, therefore, owe his genius; but it will prevent his literal acceptance and make him rather a source than an authority. For him to win any significant literal disciples in practical affairs would mean that he must create aristocrats; and an aristocrat needs no Nietzsche. He was a philosopher, not a sociologist, and held always to the necessity of radicalism in thought.
And the final touch to his temperament was that hardness of soul, that revulsion which Chesterton calls a philosophy of “weak nerves.” To me this shutting off of all but the emotions of personal glorification is the most vulnerable point in Nietzsche. I think Chesterton is almost justified when he says that truly great men are ordinary men. At least the really great man in my estimation is the man who accepts his own greatness without social prejudice, who has that overflowing soul which has no time for egoistic ecstasy, and who if he loves himself has love and pity to spare for those less fortunate beings whom he can by no honest interpretation avoid recognizing as his fellow men.
But this also is a fault in Nietzsche, and not in his glorious prophecy. No one with the artist soul to which he makes his strongest appeal can overlook the terrible soddenness, the weakness of will, the intrusive stupidity and filth of the modern mob autonomy. We must love mankind, but there must be discrimination. It is easier to love men from the cave of a hermit than from the window of a city apartment where the odor of democracy and the contemptible viciousness of the newspaper crying its wares offend the senses. Nietzsche teaches men the message that the soul of a strong man is precious and many not be poisoned with the conglomerate Freudian complexes of a herd. He was a poet, and will never lack hearers; his life was a tragedy, he will never lack sympathy. He possessed the essence of that noblest of all souls, the artist who can bear the brunt of truth and its pity; but he sacrificed everything in him that he thought was “soft” for the one purpose of perfecting his philosophy.
He pointed out the errors of our present democracy and opposed thereto an opposite equally fallacious. But life moves forward by opposites, and if he can gain hearers the future ought to tell how much of his proud and brave insight humanity can bear.
Viola tout.
I must admit that I haven’t read any of Nietzsche’s works to properly dissect Galpin’s paper. However, there was a passage that brings a sense of understanding in the misinterpretation of Nietzsche:
Perhaps no man has ever been more misinterpreted. He has been blamed, more or less justly, for German militarism, the sensual licenses of “modern moral degeneration,” modern atheism, and, in general, for the failings of those cheaper souls whom he so well foresaw, playing the part of his disciple, proud of this high sanction for their sins.
Alfred Galpin, “Nietzsche as a Practical Prophet”, The Rainbow, Vol. 1, No. 1, 1921, p. 5.
It’s nothing new when certain individuals, who wish to justify bad behavior, seek to find an ideology that fits their intentions. Just as those sought “sanctions for their sins” in Nietzsche, so do others seek that same sanction in Christianity, hiding behind one truth for a means of remaining immoral. An ideology should never give justification for continual wrongdoing. If it does not change our character, then what is the point in following Nietzsche’s decrees or choosing to baptize into Christianity.
This misinterpretation of Nietzsche was even apparent to Sonia. She wrote “Taking Nietzsche Literally” to The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, which has some shades of Galpin’s article:
Transcription:
Taking Nietzsche Literally
Editor Brooklyn Daily Eagle:
In last evening’s Eagle I was amazed to find that Dr. M. F. McDonald has so far misinterpreted Nietzsche’s philosophy as to state that one “should trample his neighbor down,” and that this is so typically exemplified in the subway, where we find even the most modest girls flailing their arms to get into a much crowded car. I fear Dr. McDonald is interpreting the German professor literally.
The proper interpretation to put upon his philosophy is that if Nietzsche had his way, there would never be such crowded subways and there would be no need for trampling of any kind.
It is appalling how many people read Nietzsche and how few know how to interpret him. Any one [sic] who really wishes to understand him should read H.L. Menken’s “The Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche.” I would advise the biography by Frederic Halevy; after reading which, the reader will find Nietzsche as a practical prophet rather than a destructive one.
The average American girl or boy will answer, when asked about Nietzsche: “Oh, that’s the guy who is to blame for the war.”
Upon further inquiry, “Have you read anything by Nietzsche?” you will hear: “Aw, no, I haven’t and I don’t want to! He’s no good to read about anyway!”
As with Caesar, the good is interred with Nietzsche’s bones, and all that appears evil in the eyes of the nonunderstanding majority is flagrantly and maliciously flaunted into the universe.
Sonia H. Greene.
Brooklyn, Feb. 10.
One minor thing worth noting, however, is that in 1921 Sonia had cared very little of Nietzsche but appeared to feel the need to defend his philosophy in this 1933 editorial.
In this third letter, Galpin mentioned that “I haven’t read your lecture yet”. Without any real and concrete details about the title of this “lecture” or what it was about, it’s rather discouraging not being able to turn a mystery into fact. However, up until this point in their correspondence, Sonia had only submitted her “credential” to be accepted into the National Amateur Press Association, and there wasn’t a single poem or story in her name in the pages of the Blue Pencil Club’s journal, The Brooklynite, which she had joined in January/February 1921.
This only leaves The Rainbow to narrow down the leads. In the first volume of The Rainbow, Sonia had three written pieces that are of medium length: Amateurdom and the Editor, “Philosophia”, Idle Idylls. Of the three, “Philosophia” reads more like a rough draft of an essay. In The Rainbow Vol. 1, No. 1 & Vol. II, No.2, Bobby Derie had suspected ‘that “Philosophia” is borrowed from one of her letters to Galpin or Lovecraft, addressing a similar subject but in a very informal way’. We know she had done this with Lovecraft’s letters in “Nietscheism [sic] and Realism”, and if she would do that with his words, she could certainly do so with her own. Especially if she was in a hurry to print the first volume. Then could “Philosophia”, a work likely drafted out of letter passages, be the very “lecture” that Galpin never read, the lecture that never received the criticism it needed to make it better? The truth is, this is merely speculation, and we’ll never truly know unless new materials emerge to prove the necessary facts.
As with Nietzsche, Crime and Punishment was a reoccurring theme in the Galpin and Sonia letters. I challenged myself to read Crime and Punishment this year well before I decided to write this post. I’ve had the book in my bookshelf for months, (maybe even years!), that I thought it was time to finally face it. Having loved The Brothers Karamazov, I wasn’t quite prepared for the darker themes of Crime and Punishment. I don’t know what I was originally expecting, (the name says it all!), but yes, there’s violence and much of it is graphic. Even so, the narrative has more depth than just murder, and themes of nihilism and the concept of the “superman” are woven in. Is it a crime if you murder someone who is repulsive in societal terms? Does eradicating this person make society better? Do we, as humans, have the right to make that choice? That’s what Crime and Punishment wants the reader to answer for themselves.
Crime and Punishment follows Raskolnikov (Rodya), a student, who dropped out of university due to financial difficulties. In order to stay afloat, he pawns his father’s valuables to the local pawnbroker. This elderly woman is vexing, giving off every reason why this person should not be alive. Due to his perception of her and his belief of being above moral law, he thinks killing her is not a crime due to her low status in society. The whole book follows this thread, using literary doubles to present the complexity of this thought.
When Galpin said, “It doesn’t get anywhere, the conclusion fizzles terribly, the epilogue ought to be an artistic mistake, we lose sight of the main thread of the story and its principle character toward the conclusion”, that’s not entirely true. Crime and Punishment is a character driven story. Occasionally certain passages would follow other characters, but it never strayed from the main plot and its themes. As for the epilogue, I will say that it did feel as though Dostoyevsky included it as an afterthought, as if to please readers who were dissatisfied with the ending and needed to know what happened next for Rodya and his family and friends. Crime and Punishment is a long, cat-and-mouse novel but one I certainly recommend.
It was both kind and understandable why Galpin had suggested another person for Sonia to correspond. With him preparing to leave for college, and even if he kept a reasonable correspondence with Sonia, it would help broaden her list of acquaintances in amateurdom. Margaret Abraham had attended Appleton High School, alongside Galpin. Also, it was very likely that she was involved in the Appleton amateur club, whose paper was The Pippin.
Miss Margaret Abraham, our new Treasurer, was valedictorian last June at Appleton High School, and has now entered the University of Chicago, where she has every reason to expect a brilliant and successful career. Her present address is 49 Kelly Hall, U. of C., Chicago Ill.
H.P. Lovecraft, Collected Essays 1: Amateur Journalism, p. 258.
It is unknown if Sonia ever reached out to Margaret Abraham. If she did, those letters did not survive, or they are locked away unknowingly in someone’s basement or attic. If they corresponded, these two women would’ve had much to say to one another with both being part of amateur journalism and knowing Galpin, and even Lovecraft.
After her marriage to Lovecraft, like Samuel Loveman, Sonia’s correspondence with Galpin began to dwindle. In one unique case, Galpin brought her up in one of his letters to Lovecraft:
No—you hadn’t previously mentioned the relay’d greetings from the quondam Mme. Theobald; an incident which prompts the usual platitude concerning the microscopic dimensions of this planetary spheroid. My messages from that direction during the past two years have been confin’d to Christmas & birthday cards, but if occasion arises to exchange more verbose greetings, I shall assuredly add your respects & compliments to my own.
H.P. Lovecraft to Alfred Galpin, c. Sep 1930, Letters to Alfred Galpin and Others, p. 264.
After leaving New York and settling in Los Angeles, it’s not surprising that she would lose touch with those she left behind. As mentioned before, Sonia would not pick up the pieces of her former life as Mrs. Lovecraft until the death of Nathaniel Davis. Even so, it seems that her correspondence with Galpin took even longer to resume, especially given that Galpin was by that time living in Italy.
And another surprise by a letter from Alfred Galpin. He must have obtained my address from you or perhaps from Eddie Daas [?]. In my replay I did not ask him, after forty (40) years what made him write, and to what purpose. This was more than a month ago, but I have not yet heard from him again.
Sonia H. Davis to August Derleth, November 16, 1961, Wisconsin Historical Society.
I received a long list of the names of former presidents from Wilfred Meyers. Among them is listed that of Alfred Galpin Jr. as “dead.” If so, I am very sorry to hear this, because at one time we were very good friends. In my early travelling days, I visited him one afternoon in Madison, and spent a few hours with him. Also, I heard from him in 1962. I was surprized [sic] to have received his letter. Do you happen to know whether he passed away? He sent me a snapshot of himself and his present wife who, I thought was his first, whom I met at H.P.L.’s quarters in Brooklyn, in Clinton St. If he is still alive, he ought to be about 57 years of age.
Sonia H. Davis to August Derleth, January 15, 1967, Wisconsin Historical Society.
He must’ve responded back at some point because Sonia invited him to her 85th birthday concert held at the Diana Lynn Lodge:
I knew that you & Alfred Galpin could hardly be present at one of the most beautiful concerts that were ever given for me by my friend of-15-yrs standing, Dr. Lucia Liverette and her clerge-man husband the Reverend Jack Liveret: (this is how they each spell their name.)
Sonia H. Davis to August Derleth, March 27, 1968, Wisconsin Historical Society.
Is there more that could be said about the correspondence of Sonia and Alfred Galpin? Perhaps. Yet, since little of their correspondence has survive, this is as detailed of an account that one can get regarding the two. It is safe to say that Samuel Loveman and Alfred Galpin genuinely admired Sonia. Even when her image was torn or wrongly portrayed by the many admirers and friends of Lovecraft, these men stood by to protect her character. If she was extreme in personality and emotion, these men overlooked it and believed her worthy of their friendship. Although time separated much of their correspondences, especially after her leaving Lovecraft, it speaks volumes of the type of friendship that can resume as though it had stopped only the day before.
I have read everything that she—in her admirably dignified statement in Something about Cats—or any one else has put into print on her marriage with Howard, not to mention having been constantly in touch with Howard himself during that time; and I never had any reason to feel anything but approval mingled with admiration for her role in his life.
Alfred Galpin, 1916 – 1937: Memories of a Friendship, p. 10, John Hay Library.She may have tried the impossible, but thank God that some one occasionally has the courage to try it.Howard had no need to exaggerate his peculiarities to remain a genuinely man, and he needed to mitigate them to become a genuine—hence, an original-writer; and bad health, physical or mental, is simply bad. In doing what was humanly possible to bring him health and happiness she may have tried the impossible, but she deserves the warmest praise for her courage in undertaking such a task and persisting in it until the most courageous course was to acknowledge defeat.
I’d like to thank Dave Goudsward for helping me clarify some of the quotes in this post. It’s greatly appreciated!
The Papers of Sonia H. Davis 