Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch (2 page)

To advance, whether on foot or on horseback, was to tangle with spikes, thorns, creepers, with all that pricks, clings, stabs and poisons.

Who lived here first? Troglodytes perhaps. The Indian came late. Very late.

Though young, geologically speaking, the land has a hoary look. From the ocean depths there issued strange formations, contours unique and seductive. As if the Titans of the deep had labored for aeons to shape and mold the earth. Even millennia ago the great land birds were startled by the abrupt aspect of these risen shapes.

There are no ruins or relics to speak of. No history worth recounting. What was not speaks more eloquently than what was.
Here the redwood made its last stand.

At dawn its majesty is almost painful to behold. That same prehistoric look. The look of always. Nature smiling at herself in the mirror of eternity.

Far below, the seals bask on the warm rocks, squirming like fat brown worms. Above the steady roar of the breakers their hoarse bark can be heard for miles.

Were there once two moons? Why not? There are mountains that have lost their scalps, streams that boil under the high snows. Now and then the earth rumbles, to level a city or open a new vein of gold.

At night the boulevard is studded with ruby eyes.

And what is there to match a faun as it leaps the void? Toward eventime, when nothing speaks, when the mysterious hush descends, envelops all, says all.

Hunter, put down your gun! It is not the slain which accuse you, but the silence, the emptiness. You blaspheme.

I see the one who dreamed it all as he rides beneath the stars. Silently he enters the forest. Each twig, each fallen leaf, a world beyond all knowing. Through the ragged foliage the splintered light scatters gems of fancy; huge heads emerge, the remains of stolen giants.

“My
horse!
My
land!
My
kingdom!” The babble of idiots.

Moving with the night, horse and rider inhale deep draughts of pine, of camphor, of eucalyptus. Peace spreads its naked wings.

Was it ever meant to be otherwise?

Kindness, goodness, peace and mercy. Neither beginning nor end. The round. The eternal round.

And ever the sea recedes. Moon drag. To the west, new land, new figures of earth. Dreamers, outlaws, forerunners. Advancing toward the other world of long ago and far away, the world of yesterday and tomorrow. The world within the world.

From what realm of light were we shadows who darken the earth spawned?

PART ONE

THE ORANGES OF

THE MILLENNIUM

The little community of one, begun by the fabulous
“outlander,” Jaime de Angulo, has multipled into a dozen families. The hill (Partington Ridge)
is now nearing the saturation point, as things go in this part of the world. The one big
difference between the Big Sur I encountered eleven years ago and that of today is the advent
of so many new children. The mothers here seem to be as fecund as the soil. The little country
school, situated not far from the State Park, has almost reached its capacity. It is the sort
of school which, most unfortunately for our children, is rapidly disappearing from the
American scene.

In another ten years we know not what may happen. If uranium or some other
metal vital to the warmongers is discovered in these parts, Big Sur will be nothing but a
legend.

Today Big Sur is no longer an outpost. The number of sightseers and visitors
increases yearly. Emil White’s “Big Sur Guide” alone brings swarms of tourists to our front
door. What was inaugurated with virginal modesty threatens to end as a bonanza. The early
settlers are dying off. Should their huge tracts of land be broken up into small holdings, Big
Sur may rapidly develop into a suburb (of Monterey), with bus service, barbecue stands, gas
stations, chain stores and all the odious claptrap that makes Suburbia horrendous.

This is a bleak view. It may be that we will be spared the usual horrors which
accompany the tides of progress. Perhaps the millennium will be ushered in before we are taken
over!

I like to think back to my early days on Partington Ridge, when there was no
electricity, no butane tanks, no refrigeration—and the mail came only three times a week. In
those days, and even later
when I returned to the Ridge, I managed to get
along without a car. To be sure, I did have a little cart (such as children play with), which
Emil White had knocked together for me. Hitching myself to it, like an old billy goat, I would
patiently haul the mail and groceries up the hill, a fairly steep climb of about a mile and a
half. On reaching the turn near the Roosevelts’ driveway, I would divest myself of everything
but a jock-strap. What was to hinder?

The callers in those days were mostly youngsters just entering or just leaving
the service. (They’re doing the same today, though the war ended in ‘45.) The majority of
these lads were artists or would-be artists. Some stayed on, eking out the weirdest sort of
existence; some came back later to have a serious go at it. They were all filled with a desire
to escape the horrors of the present and willing to live like rats if only they might be left
alone and in peace. What a strange lot they were, when I think on it! Judson Crews of Waco,
Texas, one of the first to muscle in, reminded one—because of his shaggy beard and manner of
speech—of a latter-day prophet. He lived almost exclusively on peanut butter and wild mustard
greens, and neither smoked nor drank. Norman Mini, who had already had an unusual career,
starting as in Poe’s case with his dismissal from West Point, stayed on (with wife and child)
long enough to finish a first novel—the best first novel I have ever read and, as yet,
unpublished. Norman was “different” in that, though poor as a church mouse, he clung to his
cellar, which contained some of the finest wines (native and foreign) anyone could wish for.
And then there was Walker Winslow, who was then writing
If a Man Be Mad
, which turned
out to be a best seller. Walker wrote at top speed, and seemingly without interruption, in a
tiny shack by the roadside which Emil White had built to house the steady stream of stragglers
who were forever busting in on him for a day, a week, a month or a year.

In all, almost a hundred painters, writers, dancers, sculptors and musicians
have come and gone since I first arrived. At least a dozen possessed genuine talent and may
leave their mark on the
world. The one who was an unquestionable genius
and the most spectacular of all, aside from Varda, who belongs to an earlier period, was
Gerhart Muench of Dresden. Gerhart belongs in a category all by himself. As a pianist he is
phenomenal, if not incomparable. He is also a composer. And in addition, a scholar, erudite to
the finger tips. If he had done no more for us than to interpret Scriabin—and he did vastly
more, all without result, alas!—we of Big Sur ought be forever indebted to him.

Speaking of artists, the curious thing is that few of this stripe ever last it
out here. Is something lacking? Or is there too much … too much sunshine, too much fog, too
much peace and contentment?

Almost every art colony owes its inception to the longing of a mature artist
who felt the need to break with the clique surrounding him. The location chosen was usually an
ideal one, particularly to the discoverer who had spent the better years of his life in dingy
holes and garrets. The would-be artists, for whom place and atmosphere are all important,
always contrive to convert these havens of retreat into boisterous, merry-making colonies.
Whether this will happen to Big Sur remains to be seen. Fortunately there are certain
deterrents.

It is my belief that the immature artist seldom thrives in idyllic
surroundings. What he seems to need, though I am the last to advocate it, is more first-hand
experience of life—more bitter experience, in other words. In short, more struggle, more
privation, more anguish, more disillusionment. These goads or stimulants he may not always
hope to find here in Big Sur. Here, unless he is on his guard, unless he is ready to wrestle
with phantoms as well as bitter realities, he is apt to go to sleep mentally and spiritually.
If an art colony is established here it will go the way of all the others. Artists never
thrive in colonies. Ants do. What the budding artist needs is the privilege of wrestling with
his problems in solitude—and now and then a piece of red meat.

The chief problem for the man who endeavors to live apart is
the idle visitor. One can never decide whether he is a curse or a blessing. With all the
experience which these last few years have provided, I still do not know how, or whether, to
protect myself against the unwarranted intrusion, the steady invasion, of that prying,
curious-minded species of “homo fatuoso” endowed with the annoying faculty of dropping in at
the wrong moment. To seek a hide-out more difficult of access is futile. The fan who wants to
meet you, who is
determined
to meet you, if only to shake your hand, will not stop at
climbing the Himalayas.

In America, I have long observed, one lives exposed to all comers. One is
expected to live thus or be regarded as a crank. Only in Europe do writers live behind garden
walls and locked doors.

In addition to all the other problems he has to cope with, the artist has to
wage a perpetual struggle to fight free. I mean, find a way out of the senseless grind which
daily threatens to annihilate all incentive. Even more than other mortals, he has need of
harmonious surroundings. As writer or painter, he can do his work most anywhere. The rub is
that wherever living is cheap, wherever nature is inviting, it is almost impossible to find
the means of acquiring that bare modicum which is needed to keep body and soul together. A man
with talent has to make his living on the side or do his creative work on the side. A
difficult choice!

If he has the luck to find an ideal spot, or an ideal community, it does not
follow that his work will there receive the encouragement he so desperately needs. On the
contrary, he will probably find that no one is interested in what he is doing. He will
generally be looked upon as strange or different. And he
will
be, of course, since
what makes him tick is that mysterious element “X” which his fellow-man seems so well able to
do without. He is almost certain to eat, talk, dress in a fashion eccentric to his neighbors.
Which is quite enough to mark him out for ridicule, contempt and isolation. If, by taking a
humble job, he demonstrates that he is as good as the next man, the situation may be somewhat
ameliorated. But not for long. To prove that he is “as good as the
next
man” means little or nothing to one who is an artist. It was his “otherness” which made him an
artist and, given the chance, he will make his fellow-man other too. Sooner or later, in one
way or another, he is bound to rub his neighbors the wrong way. Unlike the ordinary fellow, he
will throw everything to the winds when the urge seizes him. Moreover, if he
is
an
artist, he will be compelled to make sacrifices which worldly people find absurd and
unnecessary. In following the inner light he will inevitably choose for his boon companion
poverty. And, if he has in him the makings of a great artist, he may renounce everything, even
his art. This, to the average citizen, particularly the good citizen, is preposterous and
unthinkable. Thus it happens now and then that, failing to recognize the genius in a man, a
most worthy, a most respected, member of society may be heard to say: “Beware of that chap,
he’s up to no good!”

The world being what it is, I give it as my candid opinion that anyone who
knows how to work with his two hands, anyone who is willing to give a fair day’s work for a
fair day’s pay, would be better off to abandon his art and settle down to a humdrum life in an
out of the way place like this. It may indeed be the highest wisdom to elect to be a nobody in
a relative paradise such as this rather than a celebrity in a world which has lost all sense
of values. But this is a problem which is rarely settled in advance.

There is one young man in this community who seems to have espoused the kind
of wisdom I refer to. He is a man with an independent income, a man of keen intelligence, well
educated, sensitive, of excellent character, and capable not only with his hands but with
brain and heart. In making a life for himself he has apparently chosen to do nothing more than
raise a family, provide its members with what he can, and enjoy the life of day to day. He
does everything single-handed, from erecting buildings to raising crops, making wines, and so
on. At intervals he hunts or fishes, or just takes off into the wilderness to commune with
nature. To the average man he would appear to be just another
good
citizen, except that he is of better physique than most, enjoys better health, has no vices
and no trace of the usual neuroses. His library is an excellent one, and he is at home in it;
he enjoys good music and listens to it frequently. He can hold his own at any sport or game,
can vie with the toughest when it comes to hard work, and in general is what might be called
“a good fellow,” that is, a man who knows how to mix with others, how to get along with the
world. But what he also knows and does, and what the average citizen can not or will not do,
is to enjoy solitude, to live simply, to crave nothing, and to share what he has when called
upon. I refrain from mentioning his name for fear of doing him a disservice. Let us leave him
where he is, Mr. X, a master of the anonymous life and a wonderful example to his
fellow-man.

While in Vienne (France) two years ago I had the privilege of making the
acquaintance of Fernand Rude, the
sous-préfet
of Vienne, who possesses a remarkable
collection of Utopian literature. On leaving, he presented me with a copy of his book,
Voyage en Icarie,
*
which is the account of two workers from
Vienne who came to America just a hundred years ago to join Étienne Cabet’s experimental
colony at Nauvoo, Illinois. The description given of American life, not only at Nauvoo but in
the cities they passed through—they arrived at New Orleans and left by way of New York—is
worth reading today, if only to observe how essentially unchanged is our American way of life.
To be sure, Whitman was giving us about this same time (in his prose works) a similar picture
of vulgarity, violence and corruption, in high and low places. One fact stands out, however,
and that is the inborn urge of the American to experiment, to try out the most crack-brained
schemes having to do with social, economic, religious and even sex relations. Where sex and
religion were dominant, the most amazing
results were achieved. The Oneida
Community (New York), for example, is destined to remain as memorable an experiment as Robert
Owen’s in New Harmony (Indiana). As for the Mormons, nothing comparable to their efforts has
ever been undertaken on this continent, and probably never will again.