Vincent Van Gogh | In the springtime a bird in a cage, 1880

Vincent van Gogh letter to Theo van Gogh, Cuesmes, 24 June 1880:

In the springtime a bird in a cage knows very well that there’s something he’d be good for; he feels very clearly that there’s something to be done but he can’t do it; what it is he can’t clearly remember, and he has vague ideas and says to himself, "the others are building their nests and making their little ones and raising the brood", and he bangs his head against the bars of his cage.

And then the cage stays there and the bird is mad with suffering. "Look, there’s an idler", says another passing bird - "that fellow’s a sort of man of leisure".

And yet the prisoner lives and doesn’t die; nothing of what’s going on within shows outside, he’s in good health, he’s rather cheerful in the sunshine.

But then comes the season of migration.

A bout of melancholy - but, say the children who look after him, he’s got everything that he needs in his cage, after all - but he looks at the sky outside, heavy with storm clouds, and within himself feels a rebellion against fate. "I’m in a cage, I’m in a cage, and so I lack for nothing, you fools! Me, I have everything I need! Ah, for pity’s sake, freedom, to be a bird like other birds!"

An idle man like that resembles an idle bird like that. And it’s often impossible for men to do anything, prisoners in I don’t know what kind of horrible, horrible, very horrible cage.

There is also, I know, release, belated release.

A reputation ruined rightly or wrongly, poverty, inevitability of circumstances, misfortune; that creates prisoners.

You may not always be able to say what it is that confines, that immures, that seems to bury, and yet you feel I know not what bars, I know not what gates - walls.

Is all that imaginary, a fantasy? I don’t think so; and then you ask yourself, Dear God, is this for long, is this forever, is this for eternity?

You know, what makes the prison disappear is every deep, serious attachment.

To be friends, to be brothers, to love; that opens the prison through sovereign power, through a most powerful spell.

But he who doesn’t have that remains in death. But, where sympathy springs up again, life springs up again.

And the prison is sometimes called prejudice, misunderstanding, fatal ignorance of this or that, mistrust, false shame.

A primavera un uccello in gabbia sa bene che c'è qualcosa a cui potrebbe servire, sente benissimo che ci sarebbe qualcosa da fare, ma non ci può far nulla, e cos'è questo?

Non si ricorda bene, ha idee vaghe e dice: "Gli altri fanno i loro nidi e portano fuori i loro piccoli e li cibano" e poi sbatte il suo capino contro le grate della gabbia.

Ma la gabbia resiste e l'uccello impazzisce dal dolore. "Guarda che fannullone", dice un altro uccello che passa lì davanti, "quello è un tipo che vive di rendita".

Eppure il prigioniero continua a campare, non muore, fuori non appare nulla di quel che ha dentro, è in buona salute, e di tanto in tanto è allegro sotto i raggi del sole. Ma poi viene il tempo degli amori. Ondate di depressione.

"Ma ha poi proprio tutto quel di cui ha bisogno?" dicono i bambini che si prendono cura di lui e della sua gabbietta. E lui sta appollaiato con lo sguardo proteso verso il cielo, dove sta minacciando un temporale, e dentro di sé sente ribellione per la sua sorte.

"Me ne sto in gabbia, me ne sto in gabbia, e non mi manca niente, imbecilli! Ho tutto ciò di cui ho bisogno! Ma per piacere, libertà, lasciatemi essere un uccello come gli altri!".