Dear Theo: The Autobiography of Vincent Van Gogh

Front Cover
Doubleday, Incorporated, 1946 - Art - 572 pages
"Written from the heart and without restraint, alive."--The New York Times

Vincent van Gogh, the great but tormented artist, bared his tortured yet ecstatic soul in his letters to his confidant and companion, his beloved brother Theo. These letters reveal the man behind such masterpieces as The Starry Night and The Bedroom--a desperate man whose quest for love became a flight into madness and for whom every day was a "fight for life."

Irving Stone, acclaimed author of Lust for Life and other remarkable biographic novels, has collected Vincent van Gogh's fascinating letters to Theo. Here we see the great artist as a human being as well as a man with an appointment with destiny. Van Gogh is a man struggling with doubts and fears, beset by poverty and mental illness, but also a painter who dares to break all the rules of academic art to create priceless masterpieces never honored during his lifetime. He was part of the coterie of great artists of his day while as the same time an intimate of aging streetwalkers. These letters are outpourings of his soul that paint a vibrant self-portrait in words equal to the intensity and emotion his painting created. This is the personal story of a legend.

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Contents

Section 1
1
Section 2
5
Section 3
7
Copyright

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About the author (1946)

Irving Stone was born Irving Tenenbaum in San Francisco, California on July 14, 1903. He received a bachelor's degree from the University of California, Berkeley in 1923 and a master's degree from the University of Southern California in 1924. He was known for his historically accurate fictionalized biographies. His first book, Lust for Life, was published in 1934. His other works include Clarence Darrow for the Defense, They Also Ran, Immortal Wife, President's Lady, Love Is Eternal, The Agony and the Ecstasy, The Passions of the Mind, and The Origin. He won a Western Spur Award for Men to Match My Mountains. He died on August 26, 1989 at the age of 86.

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