Starry, starry night. Paint your palette blue and grey, Look out on a summer's day, With eyes that know the darkness in my soul. Shadows on the hills, Sketch the trees and the daffodils, Catch the breeze and the winter chills, In colors on the snowy linen land. Now I understand What you tried to say to me How you suffered for your sanity How you tried to set them free. They would not listen They did not know how Perhaps they'll listen now. Starry, starry night. Flaming flowers that brightly blaze, Swirling clouds in violet haze, Reflect in Vincent's eyes of china blue. Colors changing hue, Morning field of amber grain, Weathered faces lined in pain, Are soothed beneath the artist's loving hand. Now I understand What you tried to say to me How you suffered for your sanity How you tried to set them free. They would not listen They did not know how Perhaps they'll listen now. For they could not love you, But still your love was true. And when no hope was left in sight On that starry, starry night, You took your life, as lovers often do. But I could have told you, Vincent, This world was never meant for one As beautiful as you. Starry, starry night. Portraits hung in empty halls, Frameless head on nameless walls, With eyes that watch the world and can't forget. Like the strangers that you've met, The ragged men in the ragged clothes, The silver thorn of bloody rose, Lie crushed and broken on the virgin snow. Now I think I know What you tried to say to me, How you suffered for your sanity, How you tried to set them free. They would not listen, They're not listening still. Perhaps they never will ...
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In the autumn of 1970 I had a job singing in the school system, playing my guitar in classrooms. I was sitting on the veranda one morning, reading a biography of Van Gogh, and suddenly I knew I had to write a song arguing that he wasn't crazy. He had an illness and so did his brother Theo. This makes it different, in my mind, to the garden variety of 'crazy' – because he was rejected by a woman [as was commonly thought]. So I sat down with a print of Starry Night and wrote the lyrics out on a paper bag.The Telegraph wrote, "With its bittersweet palette of major and minor chords, Vincent's soothing melody is one of high emotion recollected in tranquillity".
Record World called the song "artful", saying that "the Vincent Van Gogh story is told with melody and poetry."
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Van Gogh was born into an upper-middle-class family. As a child he was quiet and thoughtful, serious about drawing, but showed signs of mental instability. His early works were mostly still lifes and depictions of peasant labourers.
In 1886, he moved to Paris, where he met members of the artistic avant-garde, including Émile Bernard and Paul Gauguin. They were seeking new paths beyond impressionism. Van Gogh moved to southern France in 1888 to establish an artistic retreat and commune. Once there, his paintings grew brighter and he turned his attention to the natural world, depicting local olive groves, wheat fields and sunflowers. He invited Gauguin to join him to explore painting styles.
Van Gogh suffered from psychotic episodes and delusions. He worried about his mental stability, and often neglected his physical health. He did not eat properly and drank heavily. His friendship with Gauguin ended after a confrontation with a razor when, in a rage, he mutilated his left ear. He spent time in psychiatric hospitals, including a period at Saint-Rémy. After he discharged himself his depression persisted. On 29 July 1890 Van Gogh shot himself in the chest with a revolver.
His work gained widespread critical and commercial success in the decades after his death. He has become a lasting icon of the romantic ideal of the tortured artist. Today, Van Gogh's works are among the world's most expensive paintings ever sold. His legacy is celebrated by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, which holds the world's largest collection of his paintings and drawings.
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Van Gogh viewed the night sky primarily in aesthetic terms, so the painting included Venus, which was visible in the sky at the time, though the moon’s depiction is not astronomically accurate. The village is an imaginary addition, based on sketches rather than the actual landscape seen from the asylum.
The Starry Night has been subject to various interpretations, but it seems to represent Van Gogh’s emotional turmoil, an expression of his personal struggles. Van Gogh himself considered the painting a "failure" in letters to his brother, Theo.
The artwork was inherited by Theo upon Vincent's death. Following Theo's death six months after Vincent's, the work was owned by Theo's widow. She sold it to Émile Schuffenecker in 1901, who sold it back to her in 1905.