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Hughie Erskine
Alan Trevor, Hughie’s friend, is a talented painter. Somewhat odd-looking and crude-mannered, Alan nevertheless earns both respect and substantial fees for his masterful paintings. Despite his own rough looks and thorny personality, Alan believes artists like himself should surround themselves with beautiful and vacuous people—a goal that initially drew him to the handsome Hughie. Eventually, however, he came to admire Hughie’s good-natured generosity in addition to his looks. When Hughie visits Alan’s studio and laments the condition of the old beggar modelling for Alan that day, Alan counters that the man’s sorry condition is the raw material for artistic gold. He doubles down on this position in a further argument with Hughie that night, proclaiming that an artist’s job is merely to depict the world, not to improve it. Yet Alan’s aloofness proves disingenuous once he reveals that the model was no beggar but actually a millionaire, his friend Baron Hausberg. When the Baron gives Hughie the funds to marry Laura, Alan serves as Hughie’s best man. Alan’s bold theoretical declamations—and his mischievous insincerity in delivering them—mark him as a layered, intellectual character who highlights by contrast Hughie’s simple, earnest good-naturedness.
Alan Trevor Quotes in The Model Millionaire
The The Model Millionaire quotes below are all either spoken by Alan Trevor or refer to Alan Trevor. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Model Millionaire
Quotes
Trevor was a painter. Indeed, few people escape that nowadays. But he was also an artist, and artists are rather rare.
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
“Poor old chap!” said Hughie, “how miserable he looks! But I suppose, to you painters, his face is his fortune?”
“Certainly,” replied Trevor, “you don’t want a beggar to look happy, do you?”
“It’s all very well, Hughie, for you to talk, but I assure you that there are moments when Art almost attains to the dignity of manual labour […].”
“An artist’s heart is his head,” replied Trevor; “and besides, our business is to realise the world as we see it, not to reform it as we know it. A chacun son métier”
“The old man you saw to-day in the studio was Baron Hausberg. He is a great friend of mine, buys all my pictures and that sort of thing, and gave me a commission a month ago to paint him as a beggar. Que voulez-vous? La fantaisie d’un millionnaire!”
“Millionaire models,” remarked Alan, “are rare enough; but, by Jove, model millionaires are rarer still!”
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Alan Trevor Quotes in The Model Millionaire
The The Model Millionaire quotes below are all either spoken by Alan Trevor or refer to Alan Trevor. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
The Model Millionaire
Quotes
Trevor was a painter. Indeed, few people escape that nowadays. But he was also an artist, and artists are rather rare.
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
“Poor old chap!” said Hughie, “how miserable he looks! But I suppose, to you painters, his face is his fortune?”
“Certainly,” replied Trevor, “you don’t want a beggar to look happy, do you?”
“It’s all very well, Hughie, for you to talk, but I assure you that there are moments when Art almost attains to the dignity of manual labour […].”
“An artist’s heart is his head,” replied Trevor; “and besides, our business is to realise the world as we see it, not to reform it as we know it. A chacun son métier”
“The old man you saw to-day in the studio was Baron Hausberg. He is a great friend of mine, buys all my pictures and that sort of thing, and gave me a commission a month ago to paint him as a beggar. Que voulez-vous? La fantaisie d’un millionnaire!”
“Millionaire models,” remarked Alan, “are rare enough; but, by Jove, model millionaires are rarer still!”
