Henri Gaudier to Sophie Brzeska
    Early in 1910 Sophie Brzeska, a highly strung and eccentric 38 year old Polish woman, was sitting in the St. Geneviè Library in Paris, inventing imaginary lives for the people around her. By chance, a young aspiring artist, Henri Gaudier--only 18 years old--sat opposite her. Like Sophie, he had been in Paris just a few months and we lonely. But the unlikely couple were destined to share more, as the letter extracted her--written two years later in London--reveals. The curious relationship that developed was fueled by deep passion.
    From childhood to the moment Henri met her, Sophie was a victim. To her weary mother, her womanizing father, and her eight brothers, she was a burden needing to be married off. She resisted, trying to stay focused on her own dream of writing. She fled Poland for Paris, where she accepted a succession of jobs as governess, one of which involved her living in the United States for several years. These ventures with other people's families left her contemplating suicide. Yet in June 1910 Henri saw her in a fresh light, describing her in a letter to a friend as,

"...lithe and simple with a feline carriage and enigmatic face."
    Henri saw Sophie through an artist's eyes. He delighted in her tempestuous voice, changing moods, and flashing eyes, at one moment tragic, the next lit with joy. From the age of six Henri had been interested in drawing, and encouraged by his carpenter father, had left his village to study art. In Paris he worked in a bookshop during the day and spent long evenings studying in the city's many libraries and museums. Sophie, acutely aware of his close proximity and famished for love, felt confused maternal longings for someone she could protect.
    One night, as Henri walked Sophie home, he told her how he longed for someone who would understand him and encourage his ambitions. Sophie spontaneously replied,

"I am too old for you really, but I will be a mother to you, if you agree."
Henri was charmed by the idea. They resolved to go together the next day to visit the Louvre. Nobody had ever listened to Henri as Sophie did in the galleries. They were extravagantly happy.
    Sever poverty, however, made life in Paris difficult, and at the end of 1910--with Henri wanting to avoid military service--they moved to London. They decided to pass as brother and sister, changing their surnames to Gaudier-Brzeska. Still desperately poor, Sophie went so far as to beg for food in the street, cradling a doll wrapped up to look like a baby. Henri was outraged. When her meager savings ran out, Sophie took work as a governess in Felixstowe, about 80 miles away on the east coast. Letters flowed between them, full of sun and an almost pagan love. They exchanged ideas about life and art, and consoled each other.
    During this period of correspondence they adopted pet names for one another. Henri was Pik, Pikus, or Pipik; and Sophie was "beloved little Mamus," "adored Mamuska," Zosik, or Sisik. Largely at Henri's insistence, Sophie gave up her work as a governess and came back to London, where they lived in a series of damp, dilapidated houses. They were always hungry. Sophie bought and cooked the whole week's food on Monday--meat, potatoes, and herrings--and they ate the same fare cold, stretched with a little bread and milk, until the following Monday. Underfed, gaunt, and subject to powerful fits of emotion, Henri was described by a fellow artist who knew him during this period as,

"probably the dirtiest human being ever known."
Sophie was becoming increasingly tense and neurotic as well. She upset many of the people whom Henri hoped would buy his drawings and sculptures. Both were proud, never admitting to others that they needed money--Henri would give away work rather than sell it--and they both had such volatile tempers that the strain was often impossible to bear.
Both Henri and Sophie suffered from recurring guilt, terrifying moods, and sudden bursts of joy, as evidenced by many of the anecdotes recorded in Sophie's diary. On one occasion, determined to be happy, Henri devoted many hours one night to modeling a bust of Sophie as she sang folk songs from her childhood. But the next day they quarreled over money, and in anger, Henri damaged the statue while Sophie was out. The next morning, but furious, they destroyed it together. Yet they remained devoted to one another. Driven by raw energy and boundless enthusiasm, Henri would make a hundred rapid drawings during his London life classes, while other finished one. He would capture in a quick sketch a panther's grace or the alertness of deer. His energy brought clarity to his statues.
    There is no evidence that Sophie's own work--her attempts at writing--were ever published. Unlike Henri, she was forever refining the same piece,

"her work always in a state of preparation,"
as Henri said. Where he was direct, she was hesitant. Their love, intense but often confused, mirrored this pattern: they were neither brother and sister, nor mother and son, not lovers in the full sense. During a separation of several months in 1912, when Sophie was living in the country for the sake of her health, they exchanged many intense letters--including the one extracted here--Henri writing almost every other day. Various passages from this correspondence suggest Henri desired a more physical relationship.

"I kiss my dear Zosik, all over her dear body, and recommend her to the care of the beneficent sun,"
he wrote in one particularly tender passage.
    When was broke out in 1914, Henri went to fight for France. He wrote to Sophie, saying they should marry when he came home. It crossed with her letter blaming him for the state of her life in England. She did not reply at once to his proposal, and when she did finally compose a letter, she waited to send it, adding afterthoughts. Before it was mailed, she heard that Henri had died during the attack on Neuville St. Vaast on June 5. Theirs was the love of two unconventional and tempestuous spirits, passionate and intense while still remaining chaste. Sophie kept her diary for the next seven years, and died an obscure death in a mental hospital some years later.





Text from
Famous Love Letters
Messages of Intimacy and Passion
Edited by Ronald Tamplin