February 25 – March 10, 2010
Arts & Culture 9
The Epoch Times
The Antidote—Classic Poetry for Modern Life
Watercolor Pencils
Verse VII From Alfred Tennyson’s ‘In Memoriam’
A cheap, quick, and
fun way to renew
your passion for art
By Christopher Nield
By TIM GEBHART
Epoch Times Staff
Do you sigh at the sight of a
beautiful landscape painting with the rich colors of oil
paints? You only wish you
could create worlds so vibrant
and full of life, but oil paints
are too expensive, watercolors
are too difficult, and time is
too tight to learn how to use
them. How about watercolor
pencils?
Watercolor pencils combine
the intense colors of oil paints
and the fluidity of watercolors,
and they are a fraction of the
cost! Not only that, it doesn’t
take long at all to become proficient with them. There are
plenty of videos online showing advanced techniques, but
watercolor pencils are about as
complicated as crayons with a
versatility that few mediums in
art can match.
Verse VII from ‘In Memoriam’
Dark house, by which once more I stand
Here in the long unlovely street,
Doors, where my heart was used to beat
So quickly, waiting for a hand,
A hand that can be clasped no more—
Behold me, for I cannot sleep,
And like a guilty thing I creep
At earliest morning to the door.
He is not here; but far away
The noise of life begins again,
And ghastly thro’ the drizzling rain
On the bald street breaks the blank day.
The brooding image of the “dark house” dominates
Tennyson’s short, powerful poem—one that teeters
between stark, uncomfortable realism and full-blown
nightmare. Clearly we are seeing the house after midnight, yet we are also viewing it through the darkness
of despair. It is also dark because it is vacant. As if
we had picked up a Sherlock Holmes mystery, we
are forced to ask why Tennyson has come to “stand”
outside of this empty house.
When Tennyson says “behold me” in the second
stanza, he is begging us to make the effort to really
see what he is describing: to begin to make sense of
the surrealistic details of the house, the street and
his telltale heart. It is a cry to be understood. Indeed,
when we are in the grip of profound sadness, we need
to have our vulnerability recognized and accepted.
Unable to “sleep” he has come “once more” to this
house, staring at its “doors,” silent and shut. A story
has come to an end. The image of the “long unlovely
street” evokes his exhaustion—life as a journey unrelieved by grace.
What has happened? He remembers his heart once
beating in anticipation of someone’s presence. (The
use of the past tense chills us with its implication that
Tennyson’s heart is now still. Is he a ghost?) He is
tormented by the absence of an effusive greeting—a
hand “that can be clasped no more”—reminding us
that the firm handshake of good friends goes very
deep, though such feelings are rarely spoken aloud.
We realize he is in mourning. As part of the sequence “In Memoriam,” the poem was in fact pro-
liza voronin/the epoch times
voked by the death of Tennyson’s close friend Arthur
Hallam at the age of 22. His old excitement reminds
us of our own friendships in our early twenties—
full of utopian ideas and the brilliant illusion that
the world is poised to be remade. But his dreams
have come crashing down. The punning phrase
“earliest morning” dissolves hope into its opposite:
The first light of day becomes the first moment of
desolation.
The final stanza begins with the sheer inescapable
agony at the heart of Tennyson’s life: “He is not here.”
Curiously, this line echoes St. Matthew describing the
risen Christ: “He is not here. He has been brought
back to life as he said. Come, see the place where he
is lying.” Does death make a mockery of this, or does
it confirm the Gospel promise of resurrection?
Everything in the final stanza evokes a mind sliding into chaos. The mention of the “drizzling rain”
comes as a surprise—it’s as if, only now, Tennyson
becomes aware of this misty shroud. We see him
hollow-eyed and soaked through to the skin. The
universe mourns with him.
The “noise of life” describes the rebirth of the
surrounding town or city as it springs into motion.
We hear this din in the battering “b” sounds in the
unforgettable concluding line—and we feel Tennyson’s head throbbing from the onslaught. The street
is “bald” because it is shorn of sentiment, fantasy,
whim. Bringing blankness, the dawn robs him of
poetry itself. At this point, the words disappear into
the white page—and the moment we have shared
with him lapses back into the unknown past.
Throughout “In Memoriam,” Tennyson balances
intense feeling, verging on mania, with the delicate
precision of poetic form. Rhythm, rhyme, and meter
subtly affirm order and meaning even while darkness
seems to triumph. Elsewhere, Tennyson speaks of the
“sad mechanic exercise” of writing “In Memoriam,”
yet out of this emerges one of the most moving poems
in the English language.
Alfred Tennyson (1809­– 1892) was Poet Laureate
during much of Queen Victoria’s reign. His most
famous poems include “The Charge of the Light
Brigade,” and “Crossing the Bar.”
Great for Beginners
With all the merits of watercolor paints, the biggest by far
is the simplicity of the pencils.
If you feel inspired to paint,
in a minute you’ll be coloring
away. All you need for watercolor pencils is thick paper or
watercolor paper—so when
water is applied the paper
doesn’t cockle or wrinkle—a
paintbrush, and of course the
pencils. That’s it!
When do-it-yourself artists
out there with little or no training want to paint, oftentimes
they just get intimidated. A
person may think, “I don’t
have time. I’m just not good
enough!”
Watercolor pencils, if applied
without water, are erasable. It
doesn’t take long to fill a paper
with brilliant colors as the colors go on smoothly and evenly.
If you have an idea, you can put
it down on paper and bring it to
life in a matter of minutes.
You hold watercolor pencils
the same as you would a regular pencil. You don’t need to
apply too much water either to
blend colors or get the watercolor effect. Watercolor pencils
as a medium are easy to control, and if you want a desired
look, it’s easy to achieve it.
Watercolor pencils usually
come in boxes of 6, 12, or 24.
For a beginner, the more, the
merrier, as you won’t have to
blend colors very much. For
a box of 24, I paid around
$40. There are many different brands and qualities out
there.
Enjoyable
Watercolor pencils are so easy
to use. I fell in love with them
right away, and hopefully, you
will too. I found that the greatest benefit of watercolor pencils
is that they got me interested in
art again.
Many musicians say finding
the right instrument is one of
the most important elements
in having a long and enjoyable
music career. The same may
also be true with art. As an amateur artist with a low budget
and limited time, I found watercolor pencils to be a perfect
match for me. If you are experiencing a withdrawal from art
and just want to draw and paint
again, maybe watercolor pencils are right for you too.
‘BIRD OF PARADISE’:
Watercolor pencils show, plush,
vivid, and deep colors.
Tim Gebhart/the Epoch Times