human
Well?
gpt
I think, just as I know Madre does, that your things are wonderful. But I don't think they are for everybody.
human
For everybody! How do you mean?
gpt
Oh, I know the bad taste of the crowd. Why, Madre always laughs at me for my horror of the crowd. But there is now a big cosmopolitan public which has taste. Look at the success of Strauss, for instance, of Debussy, and now of Jacques Sennier--our own Elgar, too! What I mean is that perhaps the things you have done hitherto are for the very few. There is something terrible about them, I think. They might almost frighten people. They might almost make people dislike you.
human
I believe it is partly because of the words you set, she added.
gpt
Great words, of course. But where can they be sung? Not everywhere. And people are so strange about the Bible.
human
Strange about the Bible!
gpt
English people, and even Americans, at any rate. There is a sort of queer, absurd tradition. One begins to think of oratorio.
human
I can't help wishing, for your own sake, that you wouldn't always go to the Bible for your inspiration.
gpt
I daresay it is very absurd of me.
human
Claudie, you could never be absurd.
gpt
Anybody can be absurd.
human
I could never think you absurd. But I suppose everyone can make a mistake. It seems to me as if there are a lot of channels, some short, ending abruptly, some long, going almost to the center of things. And genius is like a liquid poured into them. I only want you to pour yours into a long channel. Is it very stupid, or perverse, of me?
gpt
No, Charmian, of course not. So you think I've been pouring into a very short channel?
human
Don't you?
gpt
I'm afraid I've never thought about it.
human
I know. It wants another to do that, I think.
gpt
Very likely.
human
You care for strange things. One can see that by your choice of words. But there are strange and wonderful words not in the Bible. The other day I was looking into Rossetti's poems. I read _Staff and Scrip_ again and _Sister Helen_. There are marvellous passages in both of those. I wish sometimes you'd let me come in here, when you're done working, and make tea for you, and just read aloud to you anything interesting I come across.