5 20 5655 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/395fe6f2b8804b1b070963ce09d7f3e1.mp4 39e11fea1fcb27c9fbbe9e4f0100a4da Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Description An account of the resource Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>.  <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="https://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5&amp;sort_field=Dublin+Core%2CDate&amp;sort_dir=d">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a> or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Title A name given to the resource St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context formallectureseriesannapolis Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data live YouTube webcast Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 00:52:03 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource <span>Ulysses: Does Your Life Matter? The Conspiracy Against Knowing Who You Are and How to Fight This Conspiracy with Amor-Matris</span> Description An account of the resource Video recording of a lecture delivered by Annapolis tutor David Townsend on March 26, 2021 as part of the Formal Lecture Series. Mr Townsend describes his lecture: "Ulysses names Amor Matris—mother-love—as the passion most strongly opposing the tyrannical conspiracy against knowing who you are. Mothers are certain that their children deserve love and freedom. People infused with Amor Matris cannot be dominated without their consent. Tyrants cannot control people who love this deeply. Via the stories of the three main characters, Ulysses gives you a purpose-driven way to free yourself, your native land, your dearest associations, your working life, your family and friends, and your soul." Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Townsend, David L., 1947- Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-03-26 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource A signed permission form has been received stating: "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audiovisual recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audiovisual recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a typescript of my lecture available online." Type The nature or genre of the resource moving image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource mp4 Subject The topic of the resource Love, maternal Joyce, James, 1882-1941. Ulysses Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Townsend_David_2021-03-26 Friday night lecture Tutors https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/499d77fed3c616f2dab52c7806ee2e61.mp4 add3744da74637264f675b79046187ac Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Description An account of the resource Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>.  <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="https://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5&amp;sort_field=Dublin+Core%2CDate&amp;sort_dir=d">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a> or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Title A name given to the resource St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context formallectureseriesannapolis Moving Image A series of visual representations imparting an impression of motion when shown in succession. Examples include animations, movies, television programs, videos, zoetropes, or visual output from a simulation. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data mp4 Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 01:01:15 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource <span>W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk, and the Democratic Catastrophe of the Color Line</span> Description An account of the resource Video recording of a lecture delivered by Jared Loggins on April 16, 2021 as part of the Formal Lecture Series. Mr. Loggins is an Assistant Professor of Black Studies and Political Science at Amherst University. His research and teaching interests are in black political thought, religious studies, and modern and contemporary democratic theory. He is about to publish his first book, which he co-authored, that “explores a critical theory of racial capitalism in the work of Martin Luther King Jr.” Mr. Loggins describes his lecture: "When W.E.B. Du Bois wrote, at the dawn of the twentieth century, the now famous formulation in The Souls of Black Folk that 'the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line,' he was issuing something of a prophecy. Du Bois foresaw catastrophe in a failure to regard the flourishing of African-Americans in the United States as of central concern in the American polity. Souls imagined racial domination as a shared 'democratic' catastrophe, and one that can be understood as taking on world significance in his later work. In seeing the catastrophe of racial domination as shared, Souls established Du Bois as a towering political theorist on the question of what freedom demands on both sides of the color line." Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Loggins, Jared A., 1992- Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2021-04-16 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource A signed permission form has been received stating: "I hereby grant St. John's College permission to: Make an audiovisual recording of my lecture, and retain copies for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make an audiovisual recording of my lecture available online. Make a typescript copy of my lecture available for circulation and archival preservation in the St. John's College Greenfield Library. Make a typescript of my lecture available online." Type The nature or genre of the resource moving image Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource mp4 Subject The topic of the resource Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt), 1868-1963. Souls of black folk African Americans--Social conditions United States--Race relations Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Macfarland, Joseph C. Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context Loggins_Jared_2021-04-16 Friday night lecture https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/fd3b37ccf37cda39acc2c51d4037265b.mp3 827475f3faf89363e548a9d65516a45c Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Description An account of the resource Items in this collection are part of a series of lectures given every year at St. John's College. During the Fall and Spring semesters, lectures are given on Friday nights. Items include audio and video recordings and typescripts.<br /><br />For more information, and a schedule of upcoming lectures, please visit the <strong><a href="http://www.sjc.edu/programs-and-events/annapolis/formal-lecture-series/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">St. John's College website</a></strong>.  <br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Formal Lecture Series" href="https://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=5&amp;sort_field=Dublin+Core%2CDate&amp;sort_dir=d">Items in the St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection.<br /><br />A growing number of lecture recordings are also available on the St. John's College (Annapolis) Lectures podcast. Visit <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/st-johns-college-annapolis-lectures/id1695157772">Apple Podcasts</a> or <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/6GDsIRqC8SWZ28AY72BsYM?si=f2ecfa9e247a456f" title="Spotify">Spotify</a> to listen and subscribe. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Title A name given to the resource St. John's College Formal Lecture Series—Annapolis Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context formallectureseriesannapolis Sound A resource primarily intended to be heard. Examples include a music playback file format, an audio compact disc, and recorded speech or sounds. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data wav Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 00:55:11 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1001 Nights of Marcel Proust Description An account of the resource Audio recording of a lecture delivered on February 11, 2011, by Patricia Locke as part of the Formal Lecture Series. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Locke, Patricia M. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2011-02-11 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource A signed permission form has been received giving blanket permission to make recordings of lectures and to make them available in the library and online. Type The nature or genre of the resource sound Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource mp3 Subject The topic of the resource Proust, Marcel, 1871-1922. À la recherche du temps perdu Arabian nights. Selections Storytelling Sleep. Stages Sleep. Psychological aspects Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context LEC_Locke_Patricia_2011-02-11_ac Friday night lecture Tutors https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/13a3f6b41c31910812b583216545994a.pdf 669ffc000efd5ac51cbe1d8dcc741d45 PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 13. 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 September 1995 Last Revised January ‘96 �Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 13: 1400 — Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 1) Hubert and Jan van Eyck 1425-9, Adoration of the Lamb, from the Altarpiece of St. Baron, Ghent; first, video detail, center 1a) Same, detail, upper left V1b) Same, detail, upper right 1c) From the same altarpiece, Panels of Just Judges and of Knights of the Cross Music: Dunstable, Ave Regina Coelorum, close, Cape, ARC 3052 Twenty-five years after Chaucer’s death in 1400, and the Van Eyck Adoration of the Lamb heightens the features of his world: the force of robed leaders, commoners, churchmen — I saw his sleves purfled at the hand With fur ...he was a fair prelaat — in a landscape of precise spring — such human filling in of Gothic symbol as Dunstable, also by 1425, achieves in harmony. (end Dunstable) Yet what the proudest, earthiest, lustiest of those Chaucerian characters was headed toward 2) William the Englishman 1180-84, East Chapel (“Becket’s Crown”), Canterbury Cathedral English Norman, c. 1100, Crypt, Canterbury Cathedral William the Englishman, 1179-84, Trinity Chapel Ambulatory, Canterbury Cathedral 2a) 2b) was Canterbury, 12th century shrine of Becket — sacramental blue and gules burning in the vaulted gloom — from that time when even the popular burden was “Worldes blis ne last no throwe.” Music: 9/1995 English 13th cent., “Worldes blis ne last no throwe,” RCA V-LM6015 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 1 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History It is of the essence also of the Waning of the Middle Ages, that the ground of Contemptu Mundi still sounds under Chaucer: This world nys but a thurghfare ful of wo, And we been pilgrymes, passing to and fro. ("Knight’s Tale") (fade Worldes Blis) Meanwhile English architecture, by a kind of skeletal adaptation had reached from Canterbury toward the open clarity of a stately hall. 3 or V3) Early English, 1250-60, Five Sisters Window, York Cathedral (CGB ‘80) First was Early English, 1250, the lancet heightening of the Five Sisters Window in York — just as English thought in Bacon took its own more earthly-immediate way. 4) 4a) Decorated, 1286-1306, Octagonal Chapter House, Wells Cathedral Same, especially the fan vaulting (CGB ‘84) Second the Decorated, as in this 1300 Chapter House of Wells, generates out of Geometric the Curvilinear wreathings which would inspire French Flamboyant — while in thought Duns Scottus led Occam to the empirical outwardness and spiritual intuition aimed at Renaissance and Reformation. It is no clearer, on the surface, how Occam’s study of suppositio (one thing’s standing for another), with its hair-splitting — as of “mobile confused distributive suppositio” from “immobile confused distributive suppositio” — widens creed for a future Cartesian structure reared on causal reason, Va5) Same as 5, video detail of the lierne vaulting (CGB ‘84) 5) Perpendicular, 1337-57, Choir of Gloucester Cathedral with great East Window; Digital adds east window detail than how the marvelous involution of lierne vault, culminating, mid-14th century, in Gloucester Choir, can shape Renaissance out of Gothic; yet the passage from Canterbury apse to the wide-windowed fabric of Perpendicular, must emerge, like the chordhumanizing of music, as a shift from other-worldly severity, through sacramental purity and elaboration, toward earthly vigor in the now Nominal scholastic frame. a6) English Perpendicular, 1337-1412, Cloisters, Gloucester Cathedral June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 2 �C.G. Bell 6) 6a) Symbolic History Late Perpendicular, 1426-80, Divinity School, Oxford (CGB ‘80) Same, 1445-88, Duke Humphrey Library, above the Divinity School, Bodleian, Oxford From which the road is open to the 15th-century perfection of a ceremonial space (as music from its Gothic resources brought the polyphonies of Dunstable), here the Oxford Divinity School, smaller than the great Perpendicular cage carved out of the Romanesque choir of Gloucester. Thus followers polish gems from Chaucer’s great mine — the Scot Henryson that bright windy night after hail, when he made The Testament of Cresseid: I mend the fyre and beikit [baked] me about, Than tuik ane drink my spreitis to comfort, And armit me well fra the cauld thairout; To cut the winter night and mak it short, I tuik ane Quair [Book] and left all uther sport, Writtin be worthie Chaucer glorious, Of fair Creisseid, and worthie Troylus. 7) 7a) Flemish Civic Gothic, 13th cent. (rebuilt after World War I), Cloth Hall and Belfrey, Ypres Again, Hubert and Jan van Eyck 1425-9, Adoration of the Lamb, Patriarchs and Prophets to the left, Ghent From Siena and Florence to London (as here in Flemish Ypres), guild and trading life had reared civic halls, thronged by Chaucer’s time with all his faculties: the Merchant with his forked beard, determined to keep the sea open between Orwell and Middleburg; the Seargeant of the Law, quoting the statutes and cases since King William, and for whom all was fee simple in effect; those guildmen clothed in one livery; and churchmen in so many — bustling the belfried square. Va8) Jean Pucelle, 1343, whole of f. 25, Belleville Breviary, Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; first, video detail, upper left 8) Same, lower left, Cain and Abel, etc. 8a) Luttrell Psalter, 1335-40, Harvest Cart Going Uphill, British Library, London 8b) Misericord Carving, c. 1400, Sow and Piglets, Worcester Cathedral June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 3 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History In poetry too, as in the arts, the mundane style had been ripening over the North since the late 13th century, as in Ruteboef (“Dieus m’a fait compagnon a Job”): God has companioned me with Job When he wiped me at a swab Clean of all I had. This right eye that was my best, Webbed and blind, has left me lost, To grope my road... And now my wife has borne a brat And my horse slipped on a slat And cracked his leg: The nurse is at me like a plague, Grabbing money by the bag, For baby’s pap and souse, Or he’ll be back to yell in the house. (CGB) A sentiment paired, after 1400, in the Second Shepherds Play: I have more cradles to rock than ever I had... A house full of young fat, The devil knock their skulls flat, Woe to him has much brat And little bread... (CGB) The lively details of sacred art. a9) Peter Parler aus Gmund, 1379-93, Self from the triforium, Cathedral, Prague Vb9) English Carving, c. 1380(?), Effigy of St. John the Baptist, detail, from old church of St. Nicholas, now in Hereford Cathedral (CGB ‘84) 9) C. Sluter, c. 1390, Philip the Bold of Burgundy, Chartreuse, Dijon (CGB ‘80) 9a) Same, upper detail; video pans on slide 9, while slide show works from an old photo (formerly V9); digital, like video, pans on 9 In the ground of self- and earth-denial we are watching the rise of a vital antithesis, of self and earth as modes of Western assurance and power. In the age of Chaucer they still claim the sacred embrace. Let us begin at the end with the Retractions the poet appended to the Parson’s Tale: I biseke yow mekely, for the mercy of God, that ye preye for me that Crist have mercy on me and foryeve me my giltes; and namely of my June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 4 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History translacions and enditynges of wordly vanitees, the whiche I revoke in my retracciouns... (a list follows of most of his works) and many a song and many a leccherous lay; that Crist for his grete mercy foryeve me the synne... that I may been oon of hem at the day of doom that shulle be saved... Music: French, early 15th cent, from Tuba Gallicalis, Nonesuch H-1010 In this proudest portrait of Chaucer’s time by the chief sculptor of full-robed human force, Claus Sluter’s 1390 Philip the Bold of Burgundy is on his knees. With Chaucer, what he repents of is not simply what we would call sin, but the earthly fabric to which his commitment is so strong: the art he cultivates, the music of the Tuba Gallicalis. (end Tuba Gallicalis) 10) 10a) E. Anglian (Norwich), c. 1330, Nativity from Life of Virgin, Cluny, Paris Same, detail (can be videoed from 10) Music: English, c. 1310, Agnus Dei, Seraphim, SIC-6052 (2,5) The backward-looking part of every Christian treasured an etherial thinness, where sacred and secular dream timelessly — islanded in contempt of the world, the sensuous poignance of the real (English, 1330): June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 5 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Nou skrinketh rose and lylie flour, That whilen ber that suete savour In somer, that suete tyde; Ne is no quene so stark ne stour, Ne no levedy so bryht in bour, That ded ne shal by glyde. Whoso wol fleyshlust forgon, And hevenè blis abyde, On Jesu be is thoht anon, That therlèd was ys side. 11) (fade Agnus Dei) Simone Martini, 1325-26, St. Clare, S. Francesco, Lower Church, Assisi; + V detail In Simone Martini’s Ars Nova Italy, that distance is refined like an aesthetic perfume, of which Chaucer’s 1370 Book of the Duchess distills a Northern essence, reaching back, past the Romance of the Rose, toward Chrestien’s “land from which no stranger returns.” It is there, deeper than dream psychology, that the Man in Black reveals what we have already learned: 12) 12a) Spanish, 14th cent., Queen Elisenda de Moncada tomb, Pedralbes Monastery, Barcelona S. Martini, 1333, Entombment of Christ, detail, Staatliche Museen, Berlin “I have lost more than thou weanest.” “Allas, sir, how? what may that be?” “She ys ded!” “Nay!” “Yis, be me trouthe!” “Is that youre los? Be God, hit ys routhe!” And with that word ryght anoon They gan to strake forth; al was doon For that tyme, the hert huntyng... We have a sudden insight that the modes of joy and pain, the very modes of feeling, of being, shift like styles of dress. Medieval grief is sharp, fragile, enigmatic. 13) 13a) Sebastiano del Piombo, c. 1517, Pieta, Museo Civico, Viterbo, Italy Same, upper detail Far from the voluminousness of a l6th century sorrow. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 6 �C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Willaert, pub. 1539, O Crux Splendidior, opening, Odyssey 32 16 0202 Its landscape of shadowed space (del Piombo) did not exist in Chaucer’s experience, any more than a solemn music of chordal grief (Willaert, 1539). These realms had no more been explored than Columbus’ America. (fade Willaert) 14) Visigoth to 14th cent. but esp. 13th cent., Porte de l’Aude, Wall of Carcasonne V14a) Same, another view Chaucer’s first period, before the Ars Nova impact of the Florence he visited in 1373, looks to the older Gothic and Chivalric. Let the fortifications of Carcasonne and two scenes of the chase, with “Au tens pascour,” as vigorous a secular motet as the late 13th century offers, revive that Ars Antiqua. Music: French, late 13th cent., Au tens pascour — Lautre jour, AS 71 1st 15) E. Anglian, c. 1300, lower detail of Beatus Page, Peterborough Psalter, Bibliotheque Royale, Brussels 1st 16) Upper-Rhine, c. 1320, Manessa (Minnesinger) MS, Walther von Thüfen, upper detail; University Library, Heidelberg (end Au Tens pascour) 2nd 15) Again, Peterborough Psalter,whole Beatus Page; video: lower half only To shift from the Peterborough Psalter, 2nd 16) Again, Walther von Thüfen, whole page (here video also repeats 14, of Carcasonne) or the Minnesinger delights of Walther von Thüfen — or from the fortifications of Carcasonne — 1st 17) 1st 18) June 1996 Italian Gothic, 1297-1310, Palazzo Publico, Siena (CGB ‘86, from the town heights); while video takes a detail from V1st 17, a wider view over town and countryside (CGB ‘86) Simone Martini, 1328, Guidoriccio da Fogliano, horseman, center of the fresco, Palazzo Publico, Siena (V1st 18: shows more background) 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 7 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History V1st 19) North Italian, 1329, Equestrian monument of Can Grande della Scala, with pedestal, Museo di Castelvecchio, Verona to the city halls of Italy, here Siena, is to feel the sudden stretching of Chaucer’s tetrameter in the House of Fame (c. 1375-80?) when the line straight out of the Divine Comedy breaks in: “O Thought, that wrot al that I mette...” Thus the Eagle lifts the poet to a vastness where he loses the poem. In later works he speaks the fulness of pentameter: To Troie is come this woful Troilus. Just so the Gherardellus Caccia against the older motet, or the new horseman, Guidoriccio (and then Can Grande), against the old: Music: 2nd 17) 2nd 18) 2nd 19) 1st 20) 21) Gherardellus de Florentia, c. 1360, Tosto che l’alba, Decca DL 79428 Closer view of the Palazzo Publico and tower from the square itself; while video takes a closer detail from the lower part of 1st 17 (CGB), adding from the same slide a detail of the upper part of the tower Detail, upper front, of the Guidoriccio, horse and rider, which video and slide show share Upper part of Equestrian Can Grande — of which video takes a closer detail (front) Pisan (Traini) c. 1348, Allegory of Death, detail of Hunt, from old Alinari print, Camp Santo, Pisa; + V closer detail Pisan (Traini), same, whole fresco (1938 Alinari colored photo) (end Gherardellus) 2nd 20) Left side of 21, with Hunt, etc.; with various video details, from 20, 21, and V2nd 20 For 2nd 21) Central part of 21: beggars, Death, corpses, etc., with various video details 1st 22) Lower right of 21: Death advancing toward the Garden of Delight; with video preview of the Alinari print of the Garden 3rd 21) Varied detail of 21: beggars, Death, corpses, and souls; with close video details from Va3rd 21 and V3rd 21a (soul tugged by angel and devil) 3rd 21b) Upper left detail of hermits June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 8 �C.G. Bell a2nd 22) June 1996 Symbolic History Detail of music in the Garden 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 9 �C.G. Bell 2nd 22) Symbolic History Same, whole Garden of Love from the fine old Alinari print (From the 9 slides of the show and 4 video extras, the video shapes 14 views of the fresco.) The mid-century Pisan Allegory of Death (a bad reproduction made before it was ruined in the last war) epitomizes late Gothic — a moral vision, yeasty with new life. Where the rock gulley of the fallen world sprouts ephemeral flowers, a troop of hunters encounter three corpses. They draw back; one holds his nose. Above the coffins, a hermit displays the scroll of our vanity. And the whole scene opens for us: right of center, a bat-winged Death swings her scythe over mounds of bodies. Beggars, the blind and halt, petition her to take them — “cumber-worlds” like forsaken Troilus: “Delyvere now the world.../ Of me, that am the wofulleste wyght...” Capricious as Fortune (“That holds but by a wire”) she advances into the orange grove of delight, where Cupids, already on the wing, lead long-fingered ladies (Langland: “And ye, lovely ladyes, with youre longe fyngres”) in music and courtly love. Death mows. And the moisture-laden souls breathe from the mouths, to be borne up and away by angels, or stuffed by demons in the flaming hill; or as twice in Dante, tugged, above and below. Better in this brunt to join the Dark Age hermits on the hill. So Petrarch brings his spent years to a pious close: Now I go grieving for the days on earth I passed in worship of a mortal thing... But regret cannot quench the flames of a lifetime: vegghio, penso, ardo, piango, e chi mi sface sempre m’è inanzi per mia dolce pena... I wake, I brood, I burn, I weep; she who wounds me Is with me always in my honied grief. (CGB) Chaucer too brings the Troilus to a poetic Retraction: June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 10 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History O yonge, fresshe folkes, he or she, In which that love up groweth with youre age, Repayreth hom fro wordly vanyte, And of youre herte up casteth the visage To thilke God that after his ymage Yow made, and thynketh al nys but a faire, This world, that passeth soone as floures faire. 23) Jan van Eyck, 1427-29, Eve, detail, altarpiece, St. Bavon, Ghent; + V closer detail (video closes with a double of Adam and Eve, from V23a) But that wise counsel melts in the burning touch Chaucer’s art was part of: Hire armes smale, hire streghte bak and softe, Hire sydes longe, flesshly, smothe, and white He gan to stroke, and good thrift bad ful ofte Hire snowisshe throte, hire brestes rounde and lite: Thus in this hevene he gan hym to delite, And therwithal a thousand tyme hire kiste, That what to don, for joie unnethe he wiste. In the deepening incarnation of late Gothic, Chaucer looks back to 1300 psalters and forward to the Van Eyck Eve, painted twenty seven years after his death. 24) Limbourg Brothers, 1413-16, Eden, detail, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly Even the Limbourg Eve follows him by 13 years; yet in sensuous caress Chaucer may surpass the bubble Eden of the Tres Riches Heures: Wher is myn owene lady, lief and deere? Wher is hire white brest? Wher is it, where? The beauty and question of earth cuts the age of faith like a sword. 25) 25a) Lor. Maitani, 1310-30, Creation of Eve, Façade, Duomo, Orvieto (CGB ‘84) Same, detail (also CGB '84); while video uses V25 and V25a The antecedent refinements are in trecento Italy — Maitani, on the façade of Orvieto. In music it is Landini, blind organist of Florence who smoothes Ars Nova progressions almost to the limpid grace with which the 15th century begins. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 11 �C.G. Bell Music: 26) Symbolic History Landini, c. 1370(?), Gram piant’ agli occhi, opening, (Cape) AS 63 Andrea Bonaiuti, 1365, girls dancing, detail from the Spanish Chapel, Florence; + V detail from V26a (cut Landini) A sweetness rivalled in Chaucer’s English: Now welcome, somer, with thy sonne softe, That hast this wintres wedres overshake, And driven away the longe nyghtes blake! 27) 27b) Same, whole fresco, Triumph of the Church, Spanish Chapel, Florence; + V details and a return to the whole (replacing slide 27a: same fresco, detail of dancing girls and adjacent allegory) Most of the same fresco from bottom up through the gate of heaven (CGB '59), from which the video selects the figures by the Church, below In Boccaccio’s Decameron a joy-loving company withdraw from the scythe of the Black Death in Florence; yet even the escape is planned in the church of Santa Maria Novella, to which the ladies return when their ten days of story telling are done. And if we ask the context of these Spanish Chapel dancing girls, we find them to the right, in an allegory of the Triumph of the Church (through the cloister of that same Santa Maria Novella); we see their child gaiety yield, just above, to music and thought, from which a man in green rises (Boccaccio, Chaucer) to kneel, nearer center, and prepare by confession for Christ’s judgment gate, over the Cathedral of Florence — the plan lately agreed on, 1366-8, though the dome would not be built for sixty years. From the triple portal spilled all phases of medieval life. Even Chaucer’s most ribald characters have their sacred tie. Like Troilus, “withinne the temple... pleyinge,” they play on pilgrimage. a28) b28) 28) English (Westminster), c 1265-70, Douce Apocalypse, Lamb opens the first seal, MS page 13, Bodleian, Oxford English Carving, c. 1380(?), St. John the Baptist, now Hereford Cathedral (CGB ‘84; cf. Vb9, above); + V detail Again, Douce Apocalypse, The Temple Opened in Heaven, page 41, Bodleian, Oxford June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 12 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History When the visionary soul of England, revealed in the Douce Apocalypse about 1270, expands to the new century, Judgment finds in Langland a witness solider than this St. John: In a somer seson whan soft was the sonne, I shope me in shroudes as I a shepe were, In habite as an heremite unholy of workes, Went wyde in this world wondres to here. Ac on a May mornynge on Malverne hulles Me byfel a ferly of fairy me thoughte; I was wery forwandred and went me to reste Under a brode banke bi a bornes side, And as I lay and lened and loked in the wateres, I slombred in a slepyng it sweyved so merye. Thanne gan I to meten a merveilouse swevene, That I was in a wildernesse wist I never where, As I bihelde in-to the est an hiegh to the sonne, I seigh a toure on a toft trielich ymaked; Va29) Vb29) 29) Italian MS, later 14th cent., Picture of Dante’s Hell; video: detail only English, c. 1400, MS of Marco Polo, scene of Venice, Bodleian, Oxford Jean de Bandol and Nic. Bataille, 1379-81, Four Horsemen, Apocalypse Tapestries, Angers; + V detail A depe dale binethe a dongeon there-inne, With depe dyches and derke and dredful of sight. A faire felde ful of folke fonde I there bytwene, Of alle maner of men the mene and the riche, Worchyng and wandryng as the worlde asketh. Music: Guillaume de Machault, c. 1370(?), 4v Motet, Christe qui lux es — Veni creator spiritus, close (Munrow) ARCHIV 2723045 (3-b) Like Piers the Plowman, like Guillaume de Machault’s four-voice cry for Christ the Light and Creator Spirit, the Angers tapestries body forth Apocalypse. What bore on Rome and the early Church, Nero and the Legions, seats itself in the corruption and crisis, the expected radical reform of the estates of Europe and France: it is the good — Langland’s Piers, Chaucer’s Farmer and Poor Parson — who face the Horsemen, or the Dragon. (close Machault) June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 13 �C.G. Bell a30) Symbolic History Same, Four Apocalypse scenes, with one of the seven Bishops of Asia, Angers Tapestries Detail of such a group (underexposed; CGB ‘89) from which the video hints dimly at the symbolic borders, above and below; digital omits this Again, from the Angers Tapestries, same Bishop of Asia; video: detail only Vb30) 30) The clustered fours of scenes, with the canopied Bishops of Asia, are framed, like Giotto’s frescoes at Padua, in a symbolic space, a top border of angels, stars, clouds; a base of flowered earth; between, the anagogical Coming is of here and now. The very spirit butterflies of the seven churches display the married wings of Anjou lillies and Bretagne ermine. 1st 31) Chartres Cathedral, c. 1210, Devil and Sinner, from the South Portal Gothic from the first had symbolic immediacy. Take Hell and the Deadly Sins. What happens over four hundred years from Chartres 1st 32) Rubens, c. 1620, Fall of the Damned, Alte Pinakothek, Munich; whereas video draws from the Aachen copy a group of Gluttons (CGB '74) to Rubens is the fleshly engrossment of a spiritual dread, an orgy of amplification, which the time of Chaucer and Langland focuses. 2nd 31) Again, Chartres, another Devil and Sinner The Ancren Riwle, like Chartres, is of about 1210: The sluggard lies asleep in the devil’s lap, his dear drab, his minion. The fiend lays his muzzle close to his ear, and prompts him just as he pleases. 2nd 32) From the Aachen Gallery copy of Rubens' Fall of the Damned, a group of gluttons (CGB '74); here video shows only closer details Spenser’s 1590 procession of the Sins is squeamish of its flesh: ...loathsome Gluttony... on a filthie swyne; His belly was up-blowne with luxury... And all the way, most like a brutish beast, He spued up his gorge, that all did him deteast. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 14 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History (Faerie Queen I, iii, 21) It is Ben Jonson’s pig-woman, fat Ursula (Bartholomew Fair), who plays the Rubens’ role: Is she your quagmire, Daniel Knockem? is this your bog... Twere like falling into a whole shire of butter... Ursula: Hang ‘em, rotten roguy cheaters, I hope to see ‘em plagued one day — poxed they are already, I am sure — with lean playhouse poultry, that has the bony rump sticking out like the ace of spades or the point of a partizan, that every rib of ‘em is like the tooth of a saw; and will so grate ‘em with their hips and shoulders as — take ‘em altogether — they were as good lie with a hurdle... (Ursula falls with the pan) Curse of Hell, that ever I saw these fiends! Oh! I ha’ scalded my leg, my leg, my leg, my leg! I ha’ lost a limb in the service!... Are you under-peering you baboon! Rip off my hose, an you be men, men, men! 33) Freiburg Master, c. 1300, Lust, West Porch, Freiburg Minster; with a video detail If we move in by a century from either side, we come, around 1300, to the Freiburg Lust, her suggestive hand rutted by the hoof of a goat; or in Manning, Handling Sinne, the couple who lived by the church: One night there he knew his wife, In fleshly deed, such was their life; But God was displeased; he willed it nought, So near the church, such deed were wrought: They might no more be pulled asunder Than dog and bitch — at which men wonder... (CGB) 34) Grünewald, 1515, Temptation of St. Anthony, detail, Isenheim Altar, Colmar; video splits to details, below and above On the 1500 side, it is Grünewald, with Dunbar’s Dance of the Sevin Deidly Synnes: Priests came in with bare shaven necks, Then all the fiends laughed and made gecks, Black Belly and Bawsy Brown. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 15 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Lechery, that loathly corse, Came snorting like a big-bagged horse — With him, an ugly crew... They led each other by the terses; If they fouled with their erses, There was nothing you could do. (CGB) 35) Taddeo di Bartolo 1393, Lust, from Sadistic Hell, Collegiata, San Giminiano; + V detail Midway, are the earthy Sins of Langland: Lechery — Each maid I met with, I made her a sign Seeming to sinward; some I would taste About the mouth, grope some beneath, Till our wills were one, and to work we go... I lay by the loveliest and loved them never after... (CGB after Coghill) In Italy the grotesquerie mounts from Dante’s brawls around the boiling pitch and the fart of Malacoda (Bad-tail), “del cul fatto trombetta,” to the 1393 San Giminiano sadistic hell, where the devils handle their bad-tails “in swich manere it may nat been expressed.” 36) Same, detail of the dung-glutton Usurer, San Giminiano Or where the squatting fiend dungs gold into the pursed-out Usurer. As Langland says: For a whore of her arse-winnings may better tythe Than an arrant usurer, so help me God. But it is the drunkenness of Glutton for which Langland is best known. 1st 37) Genoa MS, late 14th cent., Tavern, from De Septem Vitiis, Ad. MS 27695, 14r, British Museum, London Under school-of-Giotto fertilization, as in this manuscript also of the Sins, a surge of late-Gothic realism parallels Chaucer’s third style. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 16 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History 1st 38) Beauvais, late 15th cent., Misericord, Wife wheelbarrows a drunk husband, from Abbey of St. Lucien; now Musée Cluny, Paris (CGB ‘80) Turn up the choir seats in the churches. From about 1380 on, the misericords the priests had carved there were of the foibles of flesh — a drunk husband trundled home in a wheelbarrow. 2nd 37) Same, Tavern scene, detail Here is Langland’s Gluttony: There was laughyng and louring and ‘let go the cuppe,’ And seten so til evensonge and songen umwhile, Tyl Glotoun had y-globbed a galoun an a jille. 2nd 38) Drunk in a Wheelbarrow detail (video draws from 1st 38) His guttis gunne to gothely as two gredy sowes; He pissed a potel in a pater-noster-while, And blew his rounde ruwet at his rigge-bon ende, That alle that herde that horne held her nose after, And wusched it had be wiped with a wispe of firses... 39) V39a) H. Bosch, 1475-80, Gula, from Seven Deadly Sins, Prado, Madrid Same, but a wider view of the table of Sins He stumbled on the thresshewolde and threwe to the erthe. Clement the cobelere caughte hym bi the myddel, For to lifte hym alofte and leyde him on his knowes; Ac Glotoun was a gret cherle and grym in the liftynge, And coughed up a caudel in Clementis lappe; Is non so hungri hounde in Hertford schire Durst lape of the levynges so unlovely thei smaughte. Bosch begins his work, around 1475, with the Seven Deadly Sins, still in the spirit of Langland. In English literature the 15th century is called Chaucerian; and indeed, the crucial turn was taken, in all the arts, by 1400. a40) June 1996 Peter Parler aus Gmund, 1380-85, St. Cyril, St. Vitus’ Cathedral, Prague 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 17 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History 1st 40) Bohemian, Peter Parler and circle, c. 1385, Portrait Bust of Wenzel von Radecz, Triforium carvings, Prague Cathedral The late-century realism of the Parlers in Prague speaks the independence running from Wyclif, translator of the Bible, 1383 — Lord! What cursed spirit of lying stirreth priests to close them in stones or walls for all their life, since Christ commandeth to all his apostles to go into the world and preach the Gospel — to Huss, whom the Council of Constance seeded by fire. Langland of false priests: Thow myghtest better mete the myste on Malverne hulles, Than gete a momme of here mouthe but money were shewed. And “I will become a pilgrim, and wander as wide as the world lasts/ To seek Piers the Plowman, who can put down Pride.” Even courtly Chaucer upholds the Lollard Parson: But riche he was of hooly thoght and werk... …Cristes loore and his apostles twelve He taughte, but first he folwed it hymselve. 1st 41) Parler Circle, 1375-78, Emperor Charles IV, Triforium, Prague Cathedral Though another of the Prague heads, this of the smiling Emperor Charles IV, goes as far toward Renaissance, reminds us how deeply and humanly one are Renaissance and Reformation, a wave with divided crests. 2nd 40) Again Wenzel von Radecz, closer view Thus triadic fauxbourdon Music: 2nd 41) 2nd41a) V2nd 41b) 3rd 41) Apt MS, later 14th cent., Jesu, nostra redemptio, close SAWT 9505 A Ex Again, P. Parler, Charles IV bust, closer view Peter Parler, 1380-85, Prince Wenceslas profile, Prague Cathedral Same, Prince Wenceslas, full face Again, Charles IV, another of the whole bust and filligree Ars Nova: June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 18 �C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History English, late 14th cent., Johannes Alanus, last phrase from “Sub Arcturo,” Phil. SAL 3722 meet in Dunstable; the bluntness of Piers Plowman and early refinement of Chaucer meet in The Canterbury Tales. What had separated out of Occam and Dante would rejoin again and again, as the Medici and Savonarola fuse in Michelangelo. “Here is God’s plenty,” Dryden said of Chaucer. And Kahler: A new alertness of sense — all senses for the first time flung wide — an untramelled life-delight, give him a power to see and record, far in advance of his age. Though to be born in advance means, as with Thoreau, “in the very nick of time.” How else could Prague Cathedral (1375) endow an emperor with so Chaucerian a smile? What is the source of that canny well-being? Bifil that in that seson on a day, In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage To Caunterbury with ful devout corage, At nyght was come into that hostelrye Wel nyne and twenty in a compaignye, Of sondry folk, by aventure yfalle In felaweshipe, and pilgrimes were they alle... 1st 42) Loisel and Privé, 1397, Connetable du Gueslin, St. Denis; + V detail That observed reality hangs in the oblique blessing of faith, permits a transmoral keenness, as with Pandarus, or when Chaucer’s Miller insists on his tale of bawdry: The Millere, that for dronken was al pale, So that unnethe upon his hors he sat, He nolde avalen no man for his curteisie, But in Pilates voys he gan to crie, And swoor, “By armes, and by blood and bones, I kan a noble tale for the nones... Bothe of a carpenter and of his wyf...” 4th 41) Again, Emperor Charles IV in his niche, with coat of arms Music: French, late 14th cent., “Contre le Temps,” Seraphim SIC-6052 (2-9) June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 19 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History In music a like suspension enriches four decades from Machault to Dunstable with dancing harmonies explored in a last loyalty to the bare fifth chord, as in this late 14thcentury “Contre le Temps”. If such vitality wells from the folk, it fills the arts of church and court: here an emperor; 2nd 42) Again, Connetable du Gueslin there the High Constable of France. 43) 43a) 43b) (fade Contre le Temps) Jacquemart de Hesdin, 1406-09, Grandes Heures, f42, det., Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris English late Gothic, late 14th cent., Grotesque: The Blue Man, Roof boss from the Gt. Cloister, Canterbury; here video returns (with the Lochaimer Lied) to a closer detail of 43 Célebre Angevin, 15th cent., Carving on Maison d’Adam, Angers It is in the sacred books of princes, the Duc de Berry’s Great Hours of the Virgin, that fabliaux grotesques swell toward Peter Brueghel, called Peasant. Is this the mock priest of whom the Wife of Bath said “Ther is noon oother incubus but he,” or Nicholas bared at the window? For that Chaucerian element take a German 1450 tupping song: a peasant goes to the woods with his axe; the nasty priest comes to his wife; rhythm tells the rest: Music: Lochaimer Liederbuch, 1452-60, Es fur ein pawr gen holcz, ARCHIV-3222 (fade Lochaimer) Against that cursed up-and-down — “He priketh harde and depe as he were mad” — 44) Franco-English, late 14th cent., Chaucer reads to the court, Troilus MS, Corpus Christi, Cambridge; + V detail June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 20 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Chaucer reads to the modish knights and ladies of Richard II’s court — one of the artcaterpillars of the garden. Why not the gilded dawn from the “Knight’s Tale,” dear to early Shakespeare, who would stage the fall of gracious Richard: The bisy larke, the messager of day, Salueth in hir song the morwe gray, And firy Phebus riseth up so bright That al the orient laugheth of the light, And with his stremes dryeth in the greves The silver dropes hangynge on the leves... 45) Franco-Flemish, c. 1465, Palamon and Arcite, René d’Anjou’s Livre du Cuer, Vienna; first, video detail Or the scene of the friends looking from the tower at Emily gathering flowers, as in this 15th-century illustration of the same Boccaccio story. What joins the Knight and Miller is the closing prayer — “God save al this faire compaigny!” and “The tale is doon, and God save al the rowte!” To balance in faith Romance-of-the-Rose idealism and peasant force. 46) Franco-Flemish 1320-30, Luxuria, Dahlem Museum, Berlin; + V detail What diversity that unreformed church could hold. Here is Absolon, parish clerk, “that jolif was and gay,” twenty years before Chaucer was born. It is a theme treated also in a 1400 poem: Jankin at the Agnus Bereth the pax-brede: He twinkled but said nowt, And on my fot he trede, Kyrieleyson. Benedicamus Domino, Christ from shame me shilde: Deo gracias, therto — Alas! I go with childe, Kyrieleyson. 47) Limbourg Brothers, c. 1413-16, February, detail, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly; + V closer detail June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 21 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Where two peasants warm themselves in the February cottage of the Tres Riches Heures, we pick up the quaint connection — the Wife of Bath’s unflagging interest in “oure bothe thynges smale” — which are not just to tell a female from a male, nor for purging of urine, but to give us as many a merry fit as Solomon was refreshed withal: I will bestow the flower of all my age In the acts and in the fruit of marriage. 48) 48a) Parler Circle, 1375-78, Anne of Swidnica, Triforium, Cathedral, Prague Same, a different view and lighting; + V detail Music: Alanus, late 14th cent., Sub Arcturo (opening), Phil. SAL 3722 This motet by John Alan (Alanus), Chaucer’s English contemporary, the Prague bust of Anne, wife of the smiling emperor (pilgrims all), share the naive joy of Chaucer, a delight aware — in the legacy of faith and resignation — of facts which would darken later joy. The sensuous awakening is nowhere fresher than in mismatched Alisoun: Fair was this yonge wyf, and therwithal, As any wezele hir body gent and smal... Hir filet brood of silk, and set ful hye. And sikerly she hadde a likerous ye. Ful smale ypulled were hire browes two, And tho were bent and blake as any sloo... Hir mouth was sweete as bragot or the meeth, Or hoord of apples leyd in hey or heeth. Wynsynge she was, as is a joly colt, Long as a mast, and upright as a bolt. 49) Lochner, 1447, Lady, detail, Presentation in the Temple, Hessische Landesmuseum, Darmstadt V49a&b) Same, wider details: of the Lady's group, and of the Presentation Whit was hir smok, and bryden al bifore And eek bihynde, on hir coler aboute, Of col-blak silk, withinne and eek withoute. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 22 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The tapes of hir white voluper Were of the same suyte of hir coler... A brooch she baar upon hir lowe coler, As brood as is the boos of a bokeler... (fade Alanus) In Lochner’s 1440 spelling out, that visual delight still grows, innocently resilient, on the church margin of the grave. V & D a50) Tomb: Eleanor of Castile, 1292 bronze, west minster Abbey 50) French, from Amiens, c. 1402, Cadaver tomb, Cardinal Jean de la Grange, Mus. Calvet, Avignon 50a) Beckington cadaver tomb, c. 1450, detail, Wells Cathedral (CGB ‘84) The grave too takes new force. Early Gothic tombs favored earthlessness. As body mounts on Fortune’s wheel, its wrongs and corruptions prepare, by a Dance of Death, for the tragic stage. Here is the memento mori of Cardinal de la Grange, died 1402. There cam a privee theef, men clepeth Deeth, That in this contree al the peple sleeth... The rioters in the Pardoner’s tale encounter him: An oold man and a povre with hem mette... “Why artow al forwrapped save thy face? Why lyvestow so longe in so greet age?”... “Lo how I vanysshe, flessh, and blood, and skyn! Allas! whan shul my bones been at reste? He points them to the wood where they find the treasure for which they stab and poison one another. Even Moral Gower touched on greatness when he told of the “Trump of Death.” 51) Claus Sluter, 1404-05, mourning monk, from the Dijon Monument to Philip the Bold, Cluny, Paris; + V detail June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 23 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The fleshing-out marks every institution. Sluter, Fleming active in Dijon, is the greatest art contemporary. His mourning monk from the Tomb of Philip the Bold has just the cut of Chaucer’s churchmen: This ilke monk leet olde thynges pace And heeld after the newe world the space. A realism which as before finds its Gothic limit in Van Eyck: 52) Jan van Eyck, 1436, Canon van der Peale, from Madonna, Musée Communal, Bruges His heed was balled, that shoon as any glas, And eek his face, as he hadde been enoynt. He was a lord ful fat and in good point; His eyen stepe, and rollyinge in his heed, That stemed as the forneys of a leed... A fat swan loved he best of any roost. 53) English, 1348, Tomb of Hugh, Lord Dispenser, detail, Tewkesbury Abbey With chivalry Chaucer may cling to the idealism of the past. Though a child when this Tewkesbury tomb was carved for Hugh, Lord Dispenser, he presents a Knight of such high calling (though some have scrupled at his battles): he loved chivalrie, Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie... He was a verray, parfit, gentil knyght. a54) b54) 54) Probably Flemish in Paris, 1412-13, Effigy of Pierre d’Evreux-Navarre, detail, Louvre Same, Pierre’s Wife, Catherine d’Alençon, detail, Louvre Same, Pierre d’Evreux-Navarre and his Wife, full figures, Louvre (but half figures videoed from V54) Where this 1412 Pierre d’Evreux-Navarre seems a schemer of the new century — more a Man of Law than a Knight, meek as a maid, who never spoke villany to anyone. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 24 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History His wife, with her ten pounds of coverchiefs on her head — Boold was hir face, and fair, and reed of hewe. She was a worthy womman al hir lyve — might be contending with the Wife of Bath who knows best “the olde daunce.” While the study of the couple as such reminds us how many of the Tales deal not with chivalric romance, but with the chief problem of the middle class, marriage. 55) German, c. 1340, Knight and Bride, carving, Rottweil, Chapel Tower; + V detail German, 1340, love-troth, exchange of rings — Chaucer’s Knight invokes that domestic dream: And thus with alle blisse and melodye Hath Palamon ywedded Emelye. And God, that al this wyde world hath wroght, Sende hym his love that hath it deere aboght… And Emelye hym loveth so tendrely... That nevere was ther no word hem bitwene Of jalousie or any oother teene... 56) 56a) Bohemian, 1363-65, Charles IV and Anne, over the door of the Chapel, Karlstejn Castle, Prague Same: wider view of the Chapel door and decoration More apt, after problem tales of marriage, is the trusting solution of the Franklin’s Tale, which by trial and honour re-cements a union in such “soverereyn blisse” as Charles IV and Anne set Master Theodoric to paint above the chapel door of Karlstejn Castle. 57) 57a) 57b) 57c) 57d) French, c. 1390, Double: [A] Charles V of France; and [B] Jeanne Bourbon; upper details of standing sculptures, Louvre Same, detail of Jeanne Bourbon Same, detail of Charles V Same, full length double; while video returns to 57: busts Another detail of Charles V June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 25 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History From Paris, 1390, comes a sadder couple. We have quoted the Wife of Bath before with this Jeanne Bourbon: Unto this day it dooth myn herte boote That I have had my world as in my tyme... The flour is goon, there is namoore to telle; The bren, as I best kan, now moste I selle... While the confessional smile of her husband, Charles the Wise, explores such psychological depths as Chaucer’s “gentil Pardoner” with his yellow hair and gelding voice: For though myself be a ful vicious man, A moral tale yet I you telle kan, Which I am wont to preche for to wynne... Like the corrupt church which channeled such art, the Pardoner gives his fabulous sermon, concluding — as he brings out variants of Boccaccio’s “feather of Gabriel” (or Heywood’s “buttock bone of the Pentecost”) — lo, sires, thus I preche. And Jhesu Crist, that is oure soules leche, So graunte yow his pardoun to receyve, For that is best; I wol yow nat deceyve. a58) 58) English or French, c. 1395, Wilton Diptych, National Gallery, London; right panel: Virgin and Child, with Angels; while video first shows (from V58) the whole Diptych, then a central spread of a58 (using either slide) Same, the whole Diptych: Richard II introduced to the Heavenly Host; of this, the video narrows to a detail of Richard and Mary, then returns to the whole (frames are too bright in 58; video uses V58) We have still to mention the sacred gem of Chaucer’s time, The Pearl. Both it and the Gawain are by a poet of Western dialect, difficult, but as beautiful as the music the dreamer heard on the flowered grave of his daughter: Yet thoght me never so swete a sange As stylle stounde let to me stele. There his body falls: June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 26 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Fro spot my spyryt ther sprang in space, My body on balke ther bod in sweven; My goste is gon in Godes grace, In aventure ther mervayles meven. Taught by Dante, he sees across the stream, in the jewelled company of the Lamb, His precious perle wythouten spotte. The Wilton Diptych, also of the late century, shows Richard II introduced to such a band on such a shore. 1st 59) Franco-Flemish, c. 1390-1400, St. Christopher, van den Bergh Museum, Antwerp As for the clear stream down crystal cliffs, a late century St. Christopher wades in such bright water. We know, as we cross 1400, the perfection of that nominalist focus on particulars. 1st 60) Dirk Bouts the Younger, c. 1480(?), St. Christopher, Alte Pinakothek, Munich In Dirk Bouts the observation grows precise, without losing preternatural clarity. Style surfaces in art. 2nd 59) Again, Franco-Flemish, c. 1390-1400, St. Christopher, detail Through the abstraction of language, can we assign Chaucer or The Pearl a place in that spectrum? This is their century. 2nd 60) Again, Dirk Bouts, St. Christopher, detail Is this theirs, or Villon’s earth-emergence? 61) French MS, c. 1400(?), Lancelot du Lac, f.7, Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris So with Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight: from the flatness of the Chivalric tradition (this Lancelot of the same time) — June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 27 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History This kyng lay at Camylot upon Krystmasse... With alle the wele of the worlde thay woned ther samen, The most kyd knyghtes under Krystes selven, And the lovelokkest ladies that ever lif haden — 62) Franco-Flemish, c. 1465, Love gives Desire the Heart of the King, Le Livre du Coeur d’Amour, National Library, Vienna; + V detail (V62a) it ripens toward the intimacies of the fifteenth century Book of the Heart of Love — as Love here at night, the lady seducer at dawn comes to Gawayn’s bed: And Gawayn the god mon in gay bed lyges... And as in slomeryng he slode, sleghly he herde A littel dyn at his dor... Hit wats the ladi, loflyest to beholde... And ho stepped stilly and stel to his bedde, Kest up the cortyn and creped withinne, And set hir ful softly on the bed-syde... a63) 63) Simone Martini c. 1340?, Virgin of the Annunciation, whole seated figure, Royal Museum, Antwerp; video: upper half only; digital: double, Angel & Virgin Same, half figure; while video shows a close detail For that filling in of the concordantly human, set one of Simone Martini’s haunting Virgins (her response to the “Ave” equivocal as Lorenzo of Florence’s 14th century “Hosannah") Music: 64) Lorenzo of Florence, c. 1350(?), close of Sanctus, Seraphim SIC6052 Jan van Eyck, 1432, Virgin of the Annunciation, upper half of the figure, Altar, St. Bavon, Ghent; + V detail: head of Virgin (V64a) against Jan van Eyck’s devout Handmaiden of the Lord — while Dufay, in his Alma Redemptoris Mater, gives the scene his tenderest 15th-century chords: Music: Dufay, c. 1433, Alma Redemptoris Mater, close, (Cape group) ARCHIV 3003 That span of eighty years Chaucer divides. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 28 �C.G. Bell a65) 65) 65a) Symbolic History Gaston Phebus, c. 1405-10, Le Livre de la Chasse, Hunting and Killing the Fox, Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris; + V detail Same, Hunting deer Same, Coursing the Stag In music it is Ciconia, born before, died after — Flemish-Italian, like Chaucer a blend of North and South. His madrigal warning foxes against dogs seems early, though such 14th-century sharpness spills over the century in Gaston Phebus’ Book of the Chase. Music: Ciconia, c. 1380-90(?), I cani son fuori, beginning, MHS 899 Chaucer’s visionary hunt in “The Franklin’s Tale” is so stylized: Forestes, parkes ful of wilde deer; Ther saugh he hertes with hir hornes hye, The gretteste that evere were seyn with ye. He saugh of hem an hondred slayn with houndes And somme with arwes blede of bittre woundes... Or the Green Knight’s chase while Gawayn is sleeping: The does dryven with gret dyn to the depe slades... What! thay brayen, and bleden, bi bonkkes thay deyen... Hunteres with hyghe horne hasted hem after... 66) 66a) 66b) V66c) 66d) (fade Ciconia) Boucicault Master, c. 1405-08, Flight to Egypt, whole page with border, MS 2 f90v, Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris Same, upper spread Same, lower spread Same, detail: landscape only, with another video detail Same, the inner picture, without the flowered border That jewelled nature widens in the Canterbury Prologue, to a harmony of the vernal and peopled earth: Whan that Aprille with his shoures soote The droghte of March hath perced to the roote, And bathed every veyne in swich licour Of which vertu engendred is the flour; June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 29 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth Inspired hath in every holt and heeth The tendre croppes, and the younge sonne Hath in the Ram his halve cours yronne, And smale foweles maken melodye, That slepen al the nyght with open ye (So priketh hem nature in hir corages); Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages, And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes, To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes; And specially from every shires ende Of Engelond to Caunterbury they wende, The hooly blisful martir for to seke, That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke. By 1400, the Amen of Ciconia’s Gloria, in sequential phrasing of voiced harmonic space, parallels this Boucicault Master’s 1405 conquest of the dimensional earth. Music: Ciconia, c. 1400(?), from Gloria (Amen), Telefunken SAWT-9544-A Here the essential truth of Renaissance is caught in works almost contemporary with Chaucer. 67) Limbourg Brothers, c. 1413-16, May, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly One speaks of the International Style as preparing for 1425 — for the Van Eycks in Bruges, for Masaccio in Florence. So music moves toward Dunstable and Dufay. In Burgundy the Tres Riches Heures is the masterpiece of that transition. 68) Jacobo della Quercia, 1414-19, Rhea Silvia, from the Fonte Gaia, Palazzo Publico, Siena (CGB '86) In Tuscany the early work of Della Quercia as graciously points the way. With these comes Ciconia’s last and richest piece, the “O Rosa Bella”, which Dunstable also would set. a2nd 67) Again, May of the Tres Riches Heures, center spread 2nd 67) Again, Tres Riches Heures, close detail of the same May June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 30 �C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Ciconia, c. 1405-10, O Rosa Bella, first half, Deller, RCA Victor LM6016 2nd 68) Again, Rhea Silvia, upper half of slide 68 a69) Jacobo della Quercia, 1406, Tomb of Ilaria del Caretto, viewed from her right, detail, Duomo, Lucca (CGB ‘80) 69) Same, whole Tomb, viewed from her left 69a) Same, upper half of the figure, viewed from above (fade O Rosa Bella) Della Quercia’s 1406 tomb of Ilaria del Caretto initiates a type as much of the Renaissance as Shakespeare’s Juliet. Does Chaucer’s Prioress, with her love-brooch (of which no Roman apologist should rob her) live at all in that new world? On which ther was first write a crowned A, And after Amor vincit omnia. Va70) Ghiberti, 1401, Abraham and Issac, model, center spread of whole, Bargello, Florence Same, detail of Abraham and Isaac 70) The tide did not wait for 1425. It was in the first year of the century that the contest for the Baptistery doors brought this winning model from the 20 year old Ghiberti. England was not so far but that Sir John Hawkwood had lately led the forces of the Florentine Republic. Had not the Pardoner come all hot from Rome, the veil of Our Lady and the sail of St. Peter in his wallet? If the Island he came to was backward in antique recovery; 71) 71a) English Misericord, c. 1360(?), Smiling Expulsion, Worcester Cathedral Same, upper detail its humblest arts (from Occam down) could reshape Christianity to affirm the life of the world. In this Worcester Misericord, Adam and Eve and the angel who drives them from the garden smile — Felix Culpa: Adam lay ibounden, Bounden in a bond; Four thousand winter Thought he not too long; And all was for an appil, June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 31 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History An appil that he tok, As clerkès finden Wreten in here book. Ne haddè the appil takè ben, The appil taken ben, Ne haddè never our lady A ben hevenè quene. Blessèd be the time That appil takè was; Therefore we moun singen “Deo gracias!” 72) Limbourg Brothers, c. 1414-16, Eden, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly; + V detail It is not just a modern insight that the bubble-Eden of the Limbourg Brothers is also a womb, from which the expelled are born into the wayfaring Pilgrimage of the world. What Wycliff and Hus had begun would culminate in Milton: “I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised, and unbreathed... where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.” 73) 73a) Massaccio, c. 1426, Expulsion, Brancacci Chapel, Carmine, Florence Same, Expulsion, detail, waist up June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 32 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History By 1426 Masaccio had molded the body and passion of man’s explusion into a tragedy of regenerative nobility. What heightens the sorrow gives the clue. Adam and Eve are coming into light. As is said in Lear: “Out of heaven’s benediction to the warm sun.” In the cloud-cold of England, a symbolic claim. 1st 74) dei Grassi and Belbello, c. 1380-1420, Nativity Page, from Visconti Hours, National Library, Florence; while video takes a detail combining the stable scene with the angels and shepherds on the heath All over Europe now, from 1380 on, as the juggler in the old romance danced for Our Lady, humanized piety plays sacred games. How thin, after Giotto, the miniatures of dei Grassi and Belbello; yet how instinctively earthborn. 1st 75) English, 1410-20, Shepherds from the old Choir Stalls, Exeter (CGB ‘80) 1st 75a) Same, Shepherds, detail, upper right (CGB ‘80); + V closer details In 1400 England, rood-lofts and choir stalls later destroyed (this surviving fragment from Exeter) enact guild drama — The Second Shepherds’ Play: (each enters complaining) We silly shepherds that walk on the moor... No wonder, as it stands, if we be poor... As ye ken We are so lamed Hard taxed and maimed... By these gentry men. (CGB) The second, of marriage: These men that are wed have not all their will... In bedroom or bed they say not their fill... If I read e’er epistle, I have one for my dear As sharp as a thistle, as rough as a briar... (CGB) The third against floods and Fortune: Was never since Noah’s flood such floods seen... (CGB) a2nd 74) 2nd 74) June 1996 Again, Visconti Hours, from Nativity Page, shepherds, below Same, Shepherds and Nativity, center; first, video Nativity detail 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 33 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History So Mak appears, and as they are napping, steals a sheep, which he and his wife wrap in swaddling, as if she had borne a child. Across the guild-stage Christ lies in the manger, while here Gill croons over “a horned lad in cradle.” After a vain search, the shepherds try to kiss Mak’s child, and the cheat is discovered (“He has a long snout”). On the heath once more, they are sent to Bethlehem by the angel. 2nd 75) Same as 1st 75, Exeter Shepherds; + V details of faces Hail, comely and clean! Hail, young child! Hail, Maker, as I mean, of a maiden so mild... Have a bob of cherries! The second: A bird I have brought to my bairn. Hail, little tynemop, Of our creed thou art crop! I would drink on thy cup, Little day starn. And the third: I bring thee but a ball: Have and play withal And go to the tennis. (CGB) 76) English, c. 1400, Flagellation, Retable, Norwich Cathedral; + V detail The acuteness that shapes that delight caricatures Christ’s torturers. It is again Bosch who would culminate what is here begun: lst Torturer: 2nd Torturer: 3rd Torturer: 4th Torturer: Lift up this tree among us all. Yea, and let it into the mortice fall, And it will burst his chest. Yea, and tear him limb from limb! And it will crack each joint in him, Let see now who does best. (CGB) a1st 77) German, c. 1400, Crucifixion with Saints, Pähl Altar, Bavarian National Museum, Munich; + V detail June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 34 �C.G. Bell 1st 77) Symbolic History Master of St. Veronica, c. 1400, Large Crucifixion, detail, WallrafRichartz Museum, Köln (CGB '74); digital uses whole At the core of these 1400 Passions, whether Flemish, English, German, most of all, of the soft-eyed broodings from Cologne, simple pity redeems Gothic pain, as when Mary speaks in the Wakefield (or Townley) play: Such sorrow for to see, My dear child in thee, Is more mourning to me, Than any tongue can tell. The terminal complexities of Ars Nova lose touch with this human breadth developing in the North: Music: Matteo da Perugia, c. 1390(?), “Amen” from the Gloria, O.L. 1 (close) Its voice is the plain fauxbourdon of England: For 2nd 76) German or English, early 15th cent., Crucifixion, Courtauld Inst. of Art Music: England, c. 1400, Old Hall Credo, “Patrem,” Col. DX 582 (78) (fade) Or as polished and disseminated from Avignon: 2nd 77) From 1st 77, Veronica Master, Crucifixion, upper detail; where video then picks up the Saints on Christ's right (John, Mary, Peter), the slide show returns to the Crucifixion panel of a77, Pähl Altar Music: English, late 14th cent., Kyrie de Angelis, opening, SAWT 9505 AEx (fade) It was not only the leaders and the great who turned Europe from earthless devotion; it was the Gothic folk, working in common piety, to ground the Christian legend in the time, space, and cause of mortal possibility. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 35 �C.G. Bell a78) b78) 78) Symbolic History Claus Sluter, 1395-99, Moses and David, from the Moses Fountain, Chartreuse de Champmol, Dijon Same, from Moses Fountain: David, Jeremiah and Zachariah Same, Moses detail If we return, within that ground, to the strongest artist of Chaucer’s time, to Sluter, whose Moses fountain in Dijon mediates whatever is monumental from Donatello to the Baroque, fulfilling the manhood promised from Occam — The pope may not deprive men of liberties conferred on them by God or by nature — to the praying Lollards — When Adam delved and Eve span, Who was then the gentleman? — we may seem to have left Chaucer behind, a jesting courtier. Though in fact the poem it was said he wrote on his deathbed, the “Ballad of Good Counsel,” is the greatest expression of the new self-reliance. He speaks to his pilgrim soul: Forth, pilgrim, forth! Forth, beast, out of thy stall! Know thy country, look up, thank God of all; Hold the high way, and let thy spirit lead; And truth thee shall deliver, it is no dread. a79) 79) Franco-German, c. 1300, Head of a Prophet, Main Portal, Strasbourg Same, another head from a prophet holding a scroll To mark how far we have come from the lean, fierce abasement of a century before, set Strasbourg against Sluter, and with it an English poem, also of 1300, on the vanity of the world: Were beth they biforen us weren, Hundès ladden and hauekès beren And hadden feld and wode? The richè levedies in hoerè bour That wereden gold in hoerè tressour With hoerè brightè rode; Eten and drounken and maden hem glad; June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 36 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Hoerè lif was al with gamen i-lad, Men kneleden hem biforen, They beren hem wel swithè heyè And in a twincling of an eyè Hoerè soulès weren forloren. Va80) 80) Again, Moses Fountain, side view of Zacharias Same, Head of Zacharias from the Moses Fountain, Dijon From that, to the amplitude of Sluter’s Zacharias, or Chaucer’s self-rule — as if Dante had come from mountain hierarchy to this plain of the forthright man: Forth, pilgrim, forth! Forth, beste out of thy stal! Know thy contree, look up, thank God of al; Hold the heye way, and lat thy gost thee lede; And trouthe thee shal delivere, it is no drede. June 1996 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer) 37 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 38 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1400: Pilgrims All (Chaucer), Symbolic History, Part 13 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 13 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_13_1400--Pilgrims_All_Chaucer Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/1dd39c8b9963c09aa94bee47d9d1b58d.pdf 716674ebfeca62f797679c8b521a8c78 PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 15. 1500: Explosive Balance CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 September 1995 Last Revised January ‘96 �Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 15. 1500: Explosive Balance 1) Leonardo da Vinci, 1483 ff., Bombard with shrapnel, Ambrosiana, Milan Music: Isaac, c. 1485(?), Alla Battaglia, Decca DL 79424 1500 goes off like one of Leonardo's shrapnel shells, hurled from the foul bombard, shedding small shot, "causing," he writes, "great terror to the enemy, with great loss and confusion." The martial music of Isaac, 2) Rubens, 1615, copy of Leonardo, 1503, Battle of Anghiari, Louvre, Paris the unfinished frescoes of battle, in which Leonardo and Michelangelo vied on the walls of the Florentine Palazzo Vecchio, set the type of force for centuries — as Rubens made this copy, from a copy of the lost Leonardo. (fade Isaac) Va3) Leonardo, 1503-5, Mona Lisa, whole, Louvre, Paris 3) Same, Mona Lisa, detail Music: Mantuanus, c. 1495, Frottole, Un Sonar, NY Pro Musica, Decca 79435 How does Renaissance, a point of balance between old and new, cultivating in all arts the myth of calm — Leonardo; 4) Giorgione, 1505-10, Sleeping Venus, Gemäldegalerie , Dresden Giorgione; this Mantuan frottole of winds and waters, "Lirum, bililirum"; Sannazaro's Arcadian dream, "Alma beata e bella," "Blest and beautiful soul, who freed from bonds" — how does that promise admit of so fierce a cleavage? (fade Frottole) 9/1995 1500: Explosive Balance 1 �C.G. Bell 5) Symbolic History Pisanello, c. 1415(?), Luxuria, drawing, Albertina, Vienna Was it the turbulence of shooting in a hundred years the narrows of such a transformation as from Pisanello's 1415 Luxuria, lean Gothic lust burning its sinful allure? — Scotch Dunbar of 1500 still working in that vein: Sum kissis me; sum clappis me, sum kyndnes me proferis ... And a stif standand thing staiffis in my neiff... And Marlowe's Lechery flaunting it to the century's end: I am one that loves an inch of raw mutton better than an ell of fride stock-fish... 2nd 4) Giorgione, Sleeping Venus, detail; video, first a closer detail Was Renaissance everywhere islanded in a brimstone which syphilis would fire from the New World; so that Machiavelli's Mandragola-seduction might curl the fingers of Giorgione's acceptance: What your cunning, my husband's folly, a mother's venality and the wickedness of a confessor, has won me to for a night ... I wish to have forever. 2nd 5) Again, Pisanello, Luxuria, detail Not to mention the dialogues of Aretino, where of whores, nuns and wives, only whores ply an honest trade. 6) 6a) 6b) Riemenschneider, 1495, Eve from the Marienskapelle, half-length, Museum, Würzburg French MS, 1450(?), Vapor Bath, MS Franc. 289 Fol 414, Bibl, Nat., Paris Again, Riemenschneider, Eve (head and bust) Music: Glogauer Liederbuch, c. 1477-88, Ich bin erfreut, Archive 3033 On the other side, the purity of flesh lured the North too, as in the famous public baths and love-mystic heresy of Adamites. In the June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 2 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Germany where Luther was growing up, Riemenschneider and the Glogauer Songbook wreathe the voluptuous Garden: "not under the law but under grace" — "nicht unter dem Gesetz, sondern unter der Gnade." 7) 7a) H. Bosch, 1503-4, Garden of Delights, from center, Prado, Madrid Same, a closer detail (1996 video revision) (fade Glogauer) While in the art of Bosch, counterpole to the Italian, equally sought after in Spain, the landscape of venery is composed to such a Garden of Delights, that what stands in the triptych between eating forbidden fruit and choiring in musical hell, has been thought one of those Adamitic celebrations of Eros. As the upstaging of sex implies, the bombard of 1500 a8) 8) Verrocchio, 1479-88, The Colleoni, seen from the south, on its pedestal; Venice (CGB '48) Same, front view, nearer, from below; + V detail, V8a Music: Isaac, Alla Battaglia, as above, conclusion is not merely the intensification of war, of those Italian and European battles from which Machiavelli learned lessons as shrewdly real as the Colleoni by Leonardo's master, Verrocchio: Men must either be caressed or else annihilated ... War is not to be avoided, and can be deferred only to the advantage of the other side ... A prince should therefore have no other aim or thought but war ... the end justifies the means ... 9) 9a) Double: [A] Mantegna, 1449-54, Soldier from Martyrdom of Christopher, Eremitani, Padua; and [B] Leonardo, 1503, Study for the Battle of Anghiari, Budapest (slide show first takes these singly, then the double) Leonardo, C. 1488-90, Study for the Sforza Monument, silverpoint, etc., Royal Library, Windsor Castle (video then repeats the double, 9) It may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain ... June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 3 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History So-called virtues may lead to ruin, so-called vices to security; Caesar Borgia's cruelty united the Romagna. It is not merely that such satanic realism, passed down in the faith-world, as from Mantegna's soldiers to Leonardo's Anghiari sketches, marks the deepening war, until the French sack of Milan destroys Leonardo's Equestrian Sforza, and Boiardo in Florence breaks off the make-believe of his Orlando: Yet even as I sing, O saving God, I see all Italy in flame and fire From these bold Gauls, come down again rough-shod Across our country, wasting everywhere... (CGB) 10) (end Isaac Battle) Double: [A] Honnecourt, 1225-50, Diagrammatic figures, Sketchbook XXXV, Bibl. Nat., Paris; and [B] Leonardo, c. 1492, Vitruvian Man, Accademia, Venice; + singles [slide show takes A before the double, B after; video presents double, detail of A, repeat of double, then B] Less crucial the literal war than the symbolic, that reason, long dutiful to creed, even in Roger Bacon, empiricist: We perceive by the first proposition of Euclid that if the Person of God the Father be granted, a Trinity of equal persons presents itself — as unchecked by brute fact as Honnecourt's 13th-century geometries (left) — reason now seated in the earth-fabric, takes the lead from revealed archetypes: Leonardo, as in the Proportions of Vitruvian man, making that natural bondage the object of our love. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 4 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History So the battle to be joined is not of Florence against Pisa, or of Milan against France; it is the battle of values. 11) Roman (Etruscan), 2nd cent. B.C., Scipio Africanus(?), Louvre, Paris "In ancient times," Machiavelli writes in the Discourses, "men were stronger ... which I believe founded upon the difference of their religion and ours ... The Pagan religion deified only men who had achieved great glory, such as commanders of armies and chiefs of republics ... placing the supreme good in grandeur of soul, strength of body, and all such qualities as render men formidable." (Though this 2nd-century B.C. bust called Scipio Africanus is not as strong as Michelangelo would have made it.) 12) Roman Christian, later 3rd cent., Good Shepherd statue, Cleveland; + V detail (as in slide V12a); digital puts detail first "While our religion glorifies more the humble and contemplative than men of action, placing the supreme happiness in humility, lowliness, and a contempt for worldly objects ... These principles seem to have made men feeble." Yet even Nietzsche, who followed that line, admits a working paradox, by which denial has stretched the bow of spirit. 13) Norman-French, c. 1320, Dragon and Beast cast into Hell, Apocalypse MS, Cloisters, NY Music: G. de Machault, Hocquetus David (from bar 105), OL-3 Like the hocket dissonance of Guillaume de Machault, the dragon and beast of the Cloister Apocalypse inflame their Leviathan depths with a force unparalleled in the ancient world, a vulcanism that flung up towers of church and state. (end Machault) June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 5 �C.G. Bell Va14) Symbolic History Nardo di Cione (with Orcagna?), c. 1355, Hell detail, Lake of Blood; S. Maria Novella, Florence (CGB '59) Orcagna, 1360, The Damned in Hell, fragment; Santa Croce, Florence 14) "Where are all the great Florentines," Dante asks of Ciacco in the mud of the third Circle, and hears: "Deeper, among the darker souls, weighed down by sundry crimes." And we see them, "magnanimous" Farinata, Tegghiaio, Brunetto Latini: "You taught me how man makes himself immortal" — great-souled heroes, in hell. Thus Machiavelli: Doubtless these means are cruel and destructive... neither Christian nor human ... and to be avoided... The life of a private citizen would be preferable to that of such a king... 15) 15a) 15b) 15c) 15d) Florentine, 1492, Death-mask of Lorenzo il Magnifico, Medici Palace, Florence Mantegna, c. 1470(?), Engraving: Bacchanalia, with Silenus; + V detail Michelangelo, 1535-41, Double: details from the Last Judgment, [A] Death Mask, and [B] a Devil's head in Hell; Sistine Chapel, Vatican (digital: only Death's head) Botticelli, c. 1485, Madonna of the Pomegranate, detail, Uffizi, Florence (video: detail of head only from V15c) Verrocchio, c. 1480, Lorenzo dei Medici, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. (while video repeats [A] of 15, the Death Mask ; not digital Nevertheless, if one wishes to maintain power, it is this that is required. As much as any work of art, the death-mask of Lorenzo il Magnifico records that value-cloven pride: mind reaching out to Copernicus in Poland and Columbus in America; the carnival passion of Lorenzo's own songs (CGB): Music: Isaac, c. 1490(?), Donna di dentro, New York Pro Musica, Decca DL-79413 Here we are now, old and young, Glad and lusty, female, male; Hail to Bacchus, Venus, hail; Join in pleasure, dance and song; (music down) the vanity he faces through it all: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 6 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Sola sta ferma e sempre dura Morte — Nothing holds, nothing endures, but Death; the alternate words for tunes of delight: (again up) How great your beauty and your goodness, Virgin, merciful and holy — Lorenzo himself being patron of doom-preaching Savonarolla. 16) A. Pollaiuolo, c. 1470, Hercules and the Hydra; Uffizi, Florence How brief and undercut that keenness Florence and the Medici had fostered: Pollaiuolo's Hercules, like Botticelli's Spring and Leonardo's science — courage, beauty, intelligence — on the whirls of corruption Machiavelli saw and succumbed to, putting Borgia's treacherous henchman, Michelotto, in command of the Florentine militia, for a sellout with hardly a battle. (end Donna di dentro) a17) 17) 17a) Donatello, 1445-48, Entombment of Christ, stone relief, Sant' Antonio, Padova Niccolo dell' Arca, c. 1485(?), Pieta, detail, S. Maria della Vita, Bologna; + V closer detail Prato Master, c. 1430-40, Unbelievers, detail, Cathedral, Prato (video briefly returns to the detail of 17) Music: Compere, pub. 1503, Crucifige, de Van, etc., AS-80 Crucifige! Donatello pierced the Renaissance in Padua. Penitence veers back from the North, as Savonarolla is called to San Marco from Ferrara. But in this dell' Arca Pieta and the Passion motets, reform rides humanist liberation. So the trumpet that roused Savonarolla was Virgil's warning from the severed roots: Heu! Fuge crudelis terras, fuge litus avarum — Fly, fly the ruthless land, the shore of greed. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance (fade Crucifige) 7 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History No medieval voice rages in those sermons against pagan Florence and the Church of Rome: they have not only destroyed the Church of God, but built up another ... of sticks, Christians dry as tinder for the fires of hell ... The only hope that now remains to us, is that the sword of God may soon smite the earth. As the dying Lorenzo turned his back on that holy arrogance, lightning struck the cathedral dome, a comet flared, the Florentine lions fought and the most beautiful was killed. 18) Florentine, early 16th cent., Death of Savonarolla (1498), S. Marco, Florence "Give the people of Florence their freedom," said Savonarolla — already risking mobrule, opening private houses to the search for vanities. Well, he would learn at his own trial how much his populace cared for justice and truth. While Machiavelli, observing the fires from the Palazzo Vecchio, would write: "all unarmed prophets fail." 19) Botticelli, 1500-5, Mystic Crucifixion, Fogg, Cambridge, Massachusetts; + V detail Savonarolla: In my imagination I saw a black cross over the Babylon of Rome, and on it was written Ira Domini, and above it rained every weapon and hailstones and stones, with thunder and lightning ... and dark and abysmal weather. And I saw another cross, a golden one, that came from the sky to earth over Jerusalem, and on it was written Misericordia Dei, and there the weather was serene, clear, and very bright ... And I saw angels arrive with the red cross ... Botticelli's break with the Medici past reflects those doomsday sermons. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 8 �C.G. Bell 20) 20b) Symbolic History Italian, 1450-55 and 1492-5, Room of the Liberal Arts, Borgia Apartments, Vatican; + V detail (which the slide show replaces with 20a, Pinturicchio, 1492-1503, fresco from the same apartments — also added to video in '96) Raphael, 1517-18, Portrait of Pope Leo X with Cardinals; Uffizi, Florence; first, video detail Music: Tromboncino, c. 1500, Ostinato vo seguire, Nonesuch 71071 Savonarolla's attack was on the Borgia Pope Alexander VI. It is hard, from the restraint of his Vatican apartments, or of the Tromboncino that might have been played there, to picture the Nero of whom we read: he vying with his bastard Caesar for the favors of daughter-sister Lucrezia; of their famous poisonings; or how that Cesare with the bow of Apollo shot prisoners as they dodged in the courtyard, while the golden-haired Lucrezia and the Pope looked on. Then Pius, and the warring Julius II, Michelangelo's patron, and in 1513 the banqueting Medici, Leo X: "Since we have been given the Papacy by God, for God's sake let us enjoy it." — whom Luther would address in 1520, between rage and naive hope: (end Tromboncino) Leo, most blessed father...I have never thought ill of you personally ... I have called you a Daniel in Babylon ... but I have truly despised your see, which neither you nor anyone else can deny is more corrupt than any Babylon or Sodom ... the most shameless of all brothels, the kingdom of sin, death and hell. a21) 21) Signorelli, 1499-1500, The Damned, Cathedral, Orvieto; plus V lower detail Same, vertical near center (from these and a closer slide, V21a, the video draws two details, one above and one below) Music: June 1996 Josquin des Prez, c. 1500(?) (pub. 1519), from Miserere, AS-107/8 1500: Explosive Balance 9 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History It is not that Gothic energies, from Savonarolla to Counter-Reformation, cease or slack off, but that they clothe themselves in carnal fabrics. Sodomite Signorelli flexes the Medicean arts in a foreshadowing of Michelangelo's darker Judgment. At a time as complex as any in world history, Europe becomes a voltaic pile, stretched over electric fields of north-south, Gothic-classic, Christian-humanist, medieval-modern — blending hues in every heart and work; while power explodes to the New World and implodes in Protestantism — how is such a folded convolution to be exhibited at all? The amplest ingathering is in the music of Josquin des Prez. 22) 22a) Dürer, 1498, Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Woodcut, Berlin Same, detail [video takes its detail from 22] His Miserere-forging of angular rythm and massive chord, impels Dürer's Four Horsemen, that Gothic apocalypse — the Angers tapestries lashed to physical storm — down over the Italy of Signorelli and of Michelangelo, where Dürer made art pilgrimages, and Josquin passed most of his productive life. (end Miserere) a23) 23) Dürer, 1514, Melancholy, Washington, D.C. Same, whole engraving Music: engraving, detail, National Gallery, Josquin des Pres, c. 1498(?), from Dulces exuviae, DL 9410 But there is another Josquin and another Dürer: this laurel-crowned Melancholy heaped round with attributes of thought, idleness, suicide; Josquin's handling of Dido's last love lament, "Dulces exuviae" — as if, in classical renewal, Lucretius' ennui must deepen (under the rays of light over ocean) to the brooding flaw of Hamlet. (fade Dulces Exuviae) June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 10 �C.G. Bell a24) 24) 24a) Symbolic History Bramante, 1502, Tempietto di S. Pietro in Montorio, Rome Bramante, 1480-90, S. Maria presso S. Satiro, interior, Milan Same, another view It is most of all in architecture that 1500 Europe is cloven by the Alps. The classical orders, coffered vault and dome dominate Bramante's Italy. But if we seek in music, where no classical orders survived, a comparable cleavage, what is most Italian — those chordal lauds and frottole that point to operatic song — were written not only by Tromboncino and the rest, but by Flemish Josquin. Music: a25) 25) 25a) Josquin des Prez, c. 1490(?), In Te Domine Speravi, (opening phrase), Angel S-36926 (fade) French Flamboyant, 1500 ff., N Transept of Beauvais, central portion, color French Flamboyant, 1500 ff., N. Transept of Beauvais, night-lighted; + V detail French, 15th cent., Flamboyant Rose Window, Sainte Chapelle, Paris (CGB '59) While in the North, Gothic spills over 1500 in a lacy network of stone, often (as here at Beauvais) completing 13th-century structures. While late Gothic verse ties knots of rhyme: (Henryson) "Superne/ Lucerne,/ Guberne this pestilens;/ Preserve/ and serve/ That we not sterve thairin;" (or Dunbar) "Haile yhyng, benyng, fresche flurising!/ Haile Alphais habitakle!/ Thy dyng ofspring maid us to syng/ Before his tabernakle." For a musical parallel, it is again Josquin who twines the contrapuntal as well as anyone. Thus the six-voice canonic close of the motet Benedicta: Music: a26) 26) Josquin des Prez, c. 1510(?), Benedicta es caelorum regina, close ARC-2533 110 Late Gothic, 1387 ff., Milan Cathedral, section of Façade and South side (CGB '80) Italian Gothic, 1386-1887, Pinnacles over the crossing, Cathedral, Milan June 1996 (end Benedicta) 1500: Explosive Balance 11 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Even in architecture, the geographical divide is deceptive. Through the whole Renaissance and into the centuries after, Milan Cathedral was sprouting minarets over a city given to the smooth accords of Bramante and Leonardo. 27) 27a) Tudor Ceiling, 1478 ff., on Norman 1141-80, Christ Church Choir, Oxford (CGB '86) Same, another view (while video and digital detail slide 27) While the tendrilled fans applied now to churches of the North, build a ceremonious earthly bower within the inherited sternness of the Medieval. So the plainsong floreations of Wolsey's choirmaster, Taverner, enwreathed the Tudor transformation of Christ Church Norman Choir. Music: 28) V28a) 28b) Taverner, c. 1525(?), "Aromata" from Dum transisset sabbatum, Argo RG-316 Jörg Syrlin the Elder, 1469-74, Pythagoras in the Church of Ulm; + V detail (cf. V28) Same, double: [A] Cimmerian Sibyl and [B] slide 28, Syrlin's Pythagoras Same, Cimmerian Sibyl from the Ulm Choir stalls In the stained glass soaring of Ulm, Syrlin's minstrel Pythagoras sings as with personal passion. (So many songs caught up in sacred masses): Western wind, when wilt thou blow, That small rain down can rain? Christ, if my love were in my arms And I in my bed again! Like the German, "Es ist ein Schnee gefallen": A deep snow has fallen Before the snows are due, Boys pelt me with snowballs, My path is lost in snow. My house yawns at the gable, Our years have made it old, The doorbolts are broken, My little room is cold. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 12 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Sweet love, in loving pity, Shield me from my woe; Fold me to your body, And let the winter go. (CGB) Ach Lieb, lass dich's erbarmen, Daß ich so elend bin, Und schliess mich in dein Arme! So fährt der Winter hin. 29) 29a) 29b) 29c) Double: [A] Hugo v. d. Goes, 1476-8, Portinari Altar, detail, Uffizi, Florence; and [B] Ghirlandaio, 1485, Adoration of the Shepherds, detail, Santa Trinita, Florence Detail similar to A of 29, from Hugo v.d. Goes Altar (CGB '59) Again, 29, Double A closer detail from the Ghirlandaio Adoration (cf. B of 29) About 1478, the Portinari Altar by Hugo van der Goes of Bruges was set up in Florence. The realism which delighted the town climaxed in the shepherds (left), pressing in, as from carols and mystery plays: When Wat to Bedlem cum was, He swet, he had gone faster than a pace; He found Jesu in a simpell place, Betwen an ox and an asse. (He was a gud herdès boy) Ut hoy! For in his pipe he made so much joy. Seven years later Ghirlandaio, to whom Michelangelo was apprenticed, painted his harmonious response. These familiar shepherds enter into a stable thatched over a classical ruin, where the feed-trough is an inscribed sarcophagus. No wonder they have the conscious measure of Poliziano's pastoral vignettes: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 13 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History To see the rustic as he tends his sheep Unbar the gate for the passing of his flock. Or delle pecorelle il rozo mastro Si vede alla sua torma aprir la sbarra... 30) 30a) M. Schongauer, c. 1485(?), Adoration of Shepherds, Gallery, Berlin-Dahlem Same, detail (video makes two details from slide 30) In the homespun ripening of this Schongauer, which Dürer would make Lutheran, we have a German version of what Renaissance Christendom, with Erasmus as its ablest spokesman, everywhere hoped for, a kind of Biblical humanization by quiet reform: The sun itself is not as common and accessible to all as is Christ's teaching ... I would that even the lowliest women read the Gospels and the Pauline Epistles. And I would that they were translated into all languages ... that the farmer might sing some portion of them at the plow, the weaver hum them to the movement of his shuttle, the traveller lighten the weariness of his journey with such stories as these. 31) Maitre de Moulins, c. 1498, Madonna in Glory, central panel of triptych, Moulins Cathedral That heritage of faith freed and naturalized is a 1500 starting point. Let the threevoice canon from Josquin's Ave verum corpus, in its first Dijon recording, with the Maitre de Moulins' Virgin in Glory, express what was shared from Memling to Metsys and from Perugino to Raphael: Music: 32) 32a) 33) Josquin des Prez, late 15th cent., (pub. 1503), 2nd phrase of Ave Verum Corpus, old VM-212 (1) Same, detail, top left: angel Same, detail, lower right: angels Same, detail, center: Madonna and Child (here video returns to the whole panel; not so digital) (end Josquin) The formative genius of the 1500 enrichment was Leonardo, June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 14 �C.G. Bell 34) 34a) Symbolic History Leonardo da Vinci, 1483-86, Virgin of the Rocks, Louvre, Paris; + V detail Same, detail, Madonna and angel; + V detail of angel (V34a) and he had entered the promised land (Vasari's "terza maniera") twenty years before. Music: Fr. Bossinensis, c. 1495(?), Lauda, New York Pro Musica, Decca 79437 In music the shift was from the medieval painting: to render "a proportioned and indeed, who came to the service of Sforza lyre, applies (with Aron and Gafori) the adding of parts to what Leonardo stressed in harmonious view of the whole." Leonardo as a musician playing a fantastic skull-shaped same spatial sense to music: "the union of proportional parts sounded simultaneously." In the 1500 Laude, how like the sfumato, which shadows Leonardo's space, is the melting of tonal fullness in complicities of minor. (fade Bossinensis) Can we draw from Leonardo's Notebooks the heart of that mystery? a35) 35) Same, upper section of the whole Same, detail of rocks Shadow partakes of the nature of universal things, which are all more powerful at their beginning and grow weaker toward the end ... And drawn on by my eager desire, having wandered for some distance among the overhanging rocks, I came to the mouth of a huge cavern before which for a time I remained stupefied ... my back bent to an arch, my left hand clutching my knee, while with the right I made a shade for my lowered and contracted eyebrows; and as I leaned one way and then the other to see if I could discern anything ... suddenly I was aware of two contrary states, fear and desire, fear of the threatening dark cavern, desire to see what marvels it might contain ... Longing for the source ... like that of the moth for the light ... a36) 36) 36a) Leonardo 1481-2, Adoration of the Magi, central group, Uffizi, Florence Same, detail of Leonardo self and two heads (cf. also V36a) Same, closer detail of the two heads In the god-like expansion of nature and man, something has replaced the demon adversary of Christian good. What Leonardo saw from his summit of thought was not June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 15 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History only the fury of war ("Della crudelta dell' Omo") but deeper, the smiling enigma of force — as in Carnot's Second Law — that energy quickens by its own decay: Force I define as an incorporeal agency, an invisible power ... It is born in violence and dies in liberty; and the greater it is the more quickly it is consumed ... It desires to conquer and slay the cause of opposition, and in conquering it destroys itself ...Without force nothing moves. (Axiomatic, that in the 1500 dream of calm, where Satan slacks off, entropy appears.) For the strongest contrast of that South and North, against Leonardo, 1452-1519, a37) H. Bosch, c. 1490, Death of a Miser, Nat. Gal., Washington, DC (CGB '60) 37 Same, Central portion (CGB '60) [video takes this first, then a detail from a37] set Bosch, c. 1450-1516, deep in transreal Gothic, what spoke at the same time in Everyman, English morality play from the Dutch: Here shall you se how Felawshyp and Jolyte, Bothe Strengthe, Pleasure, and Beaute, June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 16 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Wyll fade from the as the floure in Maye; For ye shall here how our Heven Kynge Calleth Everyman to a general rekenynge. Give audyence, and here what he doth saye... [God] Where are thou Deth, thou myghty messengere? … Go thou to Everyman, And shewe hym in my name, A pylgrimage ... The structures are medieval. But as in a process of mineralization, every grain has been replaced; in the cast of art and drama Bosch meets with Leonardo. 38) Dutch(?), c. 1440, Mouth of Hell, 99 from Cath. of Cleves Hours, P. Morgan Library, NY; + V detail For centuries his forbears had been filling in and individualizing Gothic (this 1440 Hell-gate as mouth and arse), fitting Christian vision to the feel of man and matter. The moral fact boiling from the church close to the square in all those guild towns may be measured by the stage direction in The Castle of Perseveraunce: "Loke that the Devil have gunne-powder brennynge in pypys in his handis and in his eris and in his erse whan he gothe to battayle." 39) H. Bosch, 1503-4, Triptych of Delights, closed, Creation, Prado, Madrid; + V detail; not digital So the created earth painted on the closed wings of Bosch's Garden of Delights may be medieval in conception — an egg of land and water, cloud and sky, closed in a crystalline shell — but its space reaches into the future, wonderful as the iconography with which Bosch peoples it. Revolution floats in amniotic calm, before the battle of values begins — visionary as Ockeghem's Mass for the Dead. Music: June 1996 Ockeghem, c. 1480(?), from Missa pro defunctis, Ubi est Deus tuus, ff., ARC 2533-145 1500: Explosive Balance 17 �C.G. Bell 40) 40a) Symbolic History Bosch, same, central panel, plus detail: procession around a pool Same, closer detail (revised into video in 1996) (fade Ockeghem) 1500 Dunbar's grosser sins: Then Idleness at the second call Came like a sow from a mud hole; He had a sleepy snout. Many a swag-bellied sluggish glutton, Many a lazy slut and sloven Were servants in his rout... (CGB) 41) 41a) 41b) 41c) Same Bosch, whole triptych open Same, left panel, lower detail Same, central panel, detail Same, right panel, upper half of Hell The spread altar reaches from Adam and Eve through the pursuit of happiness, to a hell landscape of Satanic mills. Obrecht's Marian Mass for 3 to 7 voices, and tied by a cabala of number symbols, has that spectral vastness. Music: 42) 42a) Obrecht, c. 1500(?), Marian Mass, from 2nd Agnus, ARC 198-406 (fade) Same, top of Hell Detail of same, blood-red stream (here video takes two details from 42) But it is the older Ockeghem who rides the hell-energy cresting under halcyon calm: "save the soul from fiends and from the lake of hell" — "de manu inferni et de profundo lacu." Music: Ockeghem, again Requiem Mass, "de manu inferni", etc. (fade) A window into the soul of Europe on the verge of colonial conquest and Protestant war. And with Bosch — as if sprouted from the aspri sterpi of Dante's wood of suicides — compare Gawain Douglas, 1501: My ravished spirit in that desert wasteful Drew to the margin of a river hateful, June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 18 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History That like Cocytus, the ugly stream infernal, With its vile water made a hideous trouble, Spilling overhead, blood red, and impossible It should have been a river natural ... 43) Bosch, 1505-6, St. Anthony Triptych, center detail, Lisbon, Portugal This loathly flood like rumbling thunder routed, Wherein the demon fish so elvish shouted Their wild yelps deafened and benumbed my hearing; At those grim monsters my weak spirit doubted. None through the soil but spunky trees there sprouted, Combust, barren, bloomless, no leaf bearing, Old rotten runts wherein no sap was working, The most part waste, with withered branches moulded; It was a den well fit for murderers' lurking. 44) 44a) Bosch, 1510 ff., detail (lower right), Temptation of Anthony, Prado, Madrid Again, Bosch, Triptych of Delights, from central panel, Lovers in a bubble Wherefore I was myself right sore aghast ... The whistling wind blew many a bitter blast; The bare limbs rattled; I could scarcely stand. Out through the wood I crept on foot and hand. The river stank, the trees they clattered fast. That soil was nought but marsh and slime and sand. (CGB) Small wonder if earthly joy, stemming such a demonism as would haunt succeeding centuries, should be ensphered by Bosch in vegetable bubbles. 45) 45a) Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1506-7, Youth in masquerade dress, Windsor Castle Giorgione, c. 1504, Madonna enthroned, with St. Liberale and St. Francis, Castelfranco, Veneto Was not the humanist hope of Leonardo and his time so islanded? — the 1507 symposium Castiglione celebrates in The Courtier, a discourse opened by della Rovere, who would kill his sister's lover next year, a cardinal then for smiling at him, and connive, it was said, at the sack of Rome; while Bembo, poet-climber and libertine, afterwards Papal secretary and Cardinal, closes it with a paean to Platonic love: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 19 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History let us climbe up the staires, which at the lowermost steppe have the shadow of sensuall beautie, to the high mansion place where the heavenly, amiable and right beautie dwelleth, which lyeth hidden in the innermost secretes of God ... a46) 46) Same, detail of Madonna and landscape Same, detail of landscape only Meanwhile the dawn has come, nature espousing the flight of the soul: When the windowes then were opened on the side of the Pallaice that hath his prospect towarde the high top of Mount Catri, they saw already in the East a faire morning like unto the colour of roses, and all starres voyded, saving only the sweete Governesse of heaven, Venus, which keepeth the boundes of the night and day ... Though the gleaming nature of this Giorgione background was dawning everywhere — even in English poetry: Tyll at the laste I came to a dale Beholdyinge Phebus declynynge lowe and pale, With my greyhoundes in the fayre twy lyght I sate me downe for to rest me all nyght. 47) 47a) Flemish, end 15th cent., Romance of the Rose, Garden entrance, MS Harley 4425 f. 12b, Brit. Mus., London; + V detail (V47), ‘96 revision Giorgione, c. 1504, detail of St. Liberale from Castelfranco Madonna, Veneto That is from Hawes' Pastime of Pleasure, Graunde Amoure's quest for love and virtue — still, like this Flemish miniature (also of 1500), cultivating the Garden of The Romance of the Rose: (Hawes) Amyddes the garden ... there was resplendysshaunt A dulcet sprynge and mervaylous fountayne ... Besyde whiche fountayne the most fayre lady La bell pucell was gayly syttynge... In the interfusion of Gothic and Rebirth, the airy transparency of the miniature ripens, as the myth of chivalry swells toward Ariosto. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 20 �C.G. Bell a48) 48) Symbolic History Dürer, 1489-90, St. John's Cemetery, Nuremberg, stolen from Bremen Kunsthalle Dürer, 1494(?), The Wire-drawing Mill, Berlin-Dahlem From 1490 on Dürer had applied those skills to a landscape liberation of the forest-cleared and fruitful Germany, before the outbreak of religious wars — against Hell Bosch, a faith as natural as Cornish would voice in Tudor English: Pleasure it is To hear, iwis, The birdès sing, The deer in the dale, The sheep in the vale, The corn springing; God's purveyance For sustenance It is for man. Then we always To give him praise, And thank him than, And thank him than. 49) 49a) Leonardo da Vinci, 1494-7, Last Supper, S. Maria d. Grazie, Milan Same, center section (video draws this detail from 49) The easy polarities of century and geography blur; 1495 finds both Bosch and Dürer in the North, in Italy the Piagnoni beside Leonardo. Though what was uppermost was humanist — the Christian myth composed to classical drama. In Josquin's deep Lament for Ockeghem, nymphs of the woods and streams join in the Requiem Aeternam: Music: a50) 50) 50a) 51) 52) 53) Josquin des Prez, 1495, Deploration sur la mort d'Ockeghem, pt. 1, ARC 2533 145 Same, group on Christ's right Same, group on Christ's left Same, the figure of Christ Leonardo, c. 1495, Study for Head of Christ, Brera, Milan French, c. 1500, Entombment, L'Epines, near Rheims (CGB '59) Same, detail (CGB '59) June 1996 (end Part I, Deploration) 1500: Explosive Balance 21 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History a2nd 52) Again, Leonardo, Last Supper, Christ detail (while video holds to 53, Entombment detail) 2nd 52) Again, L'Epines Entombment With Josquin's lament, written in Italy to a French poem, for a Flemish master, we have ranged Leonardo's Last Supper, most famous picture in the world, with this anonymous Entombment carved in a pilgrimage church near Rheims. How Christian Platonism has quieted Gothic pain. Erasmus: He is the true theologian who teaches ... that all good men should be loved and cherished equally as members of the same body, that evil men should be tolerated if they cannot be corrected ... that those who mourn are blessed and should not be deplored, and that death should even be desired by the devout, since it is nothing other than a passage to immortality ... 2nd 51) Leonardo, Study for the Head of Christ From the same essay: What else is the philosophy of Christ, which he himself calls a rebirth, than the restoration of human nature originally well-formed. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 22 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History In the Christ study, as in most of his works, Leonardo proclaims that restoration. V3rd 52) Again, L'Epines Entombment, whole (while slide show goes directly to 3rd 53, below) The new tomb grows shadowed and calm — as in Stephen Hawes: After the day there cometh the derke nyght, For though the day be never so longe At last the belles ryngeth to euensonge ... 3rd 53) Again, L'Epines Entombment, detail (slide show uses 3rd 53 here and for the preceding entry) The transforming death poem had been written in Italy in the 1480's by the imprisoned politician and humanist Collenuccio. Though the close turns to Christ, who in dying made death sweet and beautiful ("Dolce e bella morendo fe' la Morte"), the body of the ode invokes Platonic release 54) Tullio Lombardo, after 1501, head, Guidarello Guidarelli Tomb, Accademia, Ravenna; plus digital detail as "sacra", "splendida", "generosa", "inclita," the comfort of the soul come pure from heaven, weary of a world of tumultuous and elemental war. This hymn to death — for every shipwrecked soul the port of healing: O porto salutar, che sol conforte D'ogni naufragio il mal, splendida Morte swells with the personal pity and anodyne which caused the statue of Guidorello, warrior, who died in 1501, to be kissed and prayed to as to a romantic saint. a55) 55) Raphael, 1509-10, Leonardo as Plato, School of Athens, Vatican, Rome Leonardo da Vinci, c. 1512, Self Portrait (red chalk), Royal Library, Turin In the general amplification, not only Pico della Mirandola acclaimed man as unlimited self-maker: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 23 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Thou, restrained by no narrow bounds, according to thy own free will, in whose power I have placed thee, shalt define thy nature for thyself ... Ficino had extended the Platonic flight to a temporal progress toward Godhead: the soul desires, endeavours and begins to become God, and makes progress every day...Hence our soul will sometime be able to become in a sense all things; and even to become a god. How could Machiavelli, facing the 1512 Leonardo, think Christianity had sapped will and drive; where the inner dynamic, against the Classical, was so recklessly advanced? 56) Peter Vischer, 1509-19, St. Paul from the Sebaldus Tomb, Nürnberg Whatever wrought the change was active also in the northern towns. Peter Vischer cast this St. Paul in Nuremberg about the time Leonardo sketched his own image and Raphael chose it for Plato's in The School of Athens — conscious nobility seeding itself over Europe. Yet in that augmentation a deeper cleavage, as between reason and heart, was to rack the century. It is the separation of enlightened conforming humanism 1st 57) Dürer, c. 1510(?), Self as Christ at the Column, drawing, Schloss, Weimar from militant conscience as categorical guide. "I laid a hen's egg," said Erasmus; "Luther hatched a bird of another kind." Dürer's possession by the nude self as the Man of Sorrows, recalls Luther's insistence as he tore up the Bull: "so hilf' mir Gott, ich kann nicht anders." For 2nd 56) Again, Vischer, from the Sebaldus Tomb, St. James the Younger suppose [Erasmus had answered Luther on Free Will] that in a certain sense it is true ... that God works both good and evil in us, and rewards His own works in us and punishes His evil ones. What a door to impiety this pronouncement would open ... if spread abroad in the world. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 24 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History a2nd 57) Dürer, 1522, Self as the Man of Sorrows, drawing, Kunsthalle, Bremen 2nd 57) Again, Dürer Self as Christ at the Column, detail Against that dialectic prudence, Luther flames in Christ-seizure: God foresees, purposes, and does all things according to his immutable, eternal and infallible will. By this thunderbolt free will is utterly dashed to pieces ... Peace and tranquility of flesh are, with you, of greater consideration than the Word of God ... Let me tell you this ... I am seeking an object so great it ought to be maintained and defended through death itself, even if the whole world should be hurled into chaos and reduced to nothing. And yet Erasmus, in his strangest work, In Praise of Folly, reaches, like Dürer's Christ-man, toward the revelation of comic paradox — Lear's fool, Cervantes' mocked knight as saving clown. 58) Bosch, 1515-16, Christ Bearing the Cross, Beaux Arts, Ghent; + V detail (from b59) Since in praising folly "in a way not wholly foolish," Erasmus juxtaposes three masks: the laughable (as of "old women in heat") which opens to the life-giving illusion of Sisyphus: "all things are presented by shadows, yet this play is put on no other way"; the mask of depravity, which he castigates; and third, in the last reversing chamber of the Silenus, the noble follies of Platonic thought and Christian charity, where a taste of future happiness drowns our knowledge of the world. Bosch's 1515 Bearing of the Cross has no weirder transition. Va59) b59) 59) Same, close detail of Bad Thief and Mockers Same, wider central detail Same, close detail of St. Veronica and a mocker In taking up the weight of the new century and of Leonardo's grotesques, late Bosch prepares for the Protestant agony: earth and soul so fallen that man is mere stercus, a pile of dung, which only the snow of Christ can cover, so that God looking down may see the purity of his own salvation. Luther: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 25 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The human will is a beast between. If God sit thereon, it wills and goes where God will ... If Satan sit thereon, it wills and goes as Satan will. Yet how satanically ambiguous God's Lutheran sitting: "When I fart in Wittenberg, they smell it in Rome." a60) 60) Altdorfer, 1520-25, The Nativity, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; + V detail Altdorfer, 1510, Rest on the Flight, Staatl. Mus., Berlin-Dahlem; + V detail From 1500 to 1520, before the North became a battleground, the life that would polarize and harden, swirls in the temporal wake of art-loving and indulgence-peddling Rome. Is there a richer delight than in the fairy-tale Christianity Altdorfer shares with folk song: Es ist ein' Ros' entsprungen Aus einer Wurzel zart ... Luther too joins that dance in his Gabriel hymn: Vom Himmel hoch da kom ich her, Ich bring euch gute newe mehr ... Not to mention the Rose of Sharon wonder of his Bible: "Ich bin eine Blume zu Saron und eine Rose im Thal." Luther's favorite musician was Senfl, whose most fetching piece is a Christmas Bell Song. This Catholic joy smiles the immediacy of Protestant birth. Music: June 1996 Senfl, c. 1525(?), Bell Song (Das Glaut zu Speyer), AS 51 1500: Explosive Balance 26 �C.G. Bell 61) Symbolic History Altdorfer c. 1525, Madonna in Glory, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59); + V details [V61a, a detail, Madonna and Child (CGB '59) not yet used Same, detail of Angel musicians to the left, revised into video ‘96, (CGB '59) Same, detail of Angel musicians to the right (CGB '59); video: smaller details only, above and below Grünewald, 1511-15, Isenheim Altar, center, detail of Angel Concert, Colmar Same, whole center panel, Angel concert and Madonna and Child Same, another Angel musician Same panel, detail of Madonna under the Baldachin a62) 62) a63) 63) V63a) 63b) (end Senfl) In Grünewald, joy sharpens with the prick of pain. So the great Faust-cry of Hutten: "The spirits awake, there is love and joy in living" — "Die Geister erwachen; es ist eine Lust zu leben" — sounds from the breaking wave. History is powered by tragic excess — Reformation only to be pushed by a temperament capable in its prime of Luther's imperative of Freedom: I declare that neither pope, nor bishop, nor anyone else, has the right to impose so much as a single syllable of obligation upon a Christian man without his own consent ... Why were Christ and all the martyrs put to death? ... because, without consulting the preservers of old knowledge, they brought forth a new thing ... 64) 64a) Grünewald, c. 1506-8(?), Small Crucifixion, Nat. Gal., Washington, D.C. (CGB '60); + V detail Same, right detail (CGB '60) and after, of lashing out at the poor who had taken his freedoms to heart: Against the thieving and murdering Hordes of the Peasants: Who so can, strike, smite, strangle or stab, secretly or publicly ... such wonderful times are these that a prince can better merit Heaven with bloodshed than another with prayer ... (The poor thereafter to call him not Luther but Lügner — Liar.) June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 27 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The Grünewald legend has this core of truth, that Mathis Der Maler did go Lutheran, against his church, his patron and his daring art. Music: Taverner, c. 1525(?), Magnificant (opening), AS 91` And in England, the fiercest genius of music, Taverner, repented, after 1528, of "Popish Ditties," destroyed what he could, and closed his life breaking church windows and despoiling altars. (fade Taverner) a65) b65) 65) Hans Holbein the Younger, 1519, Portrait of B. Amerbach, Kunstmuseum, Basel L. Cranach the Elder, c. 1502, Portrait of Dr. Johannes Cuspinian, detail, Reinhart Collection, Winterthur Same, whole picture What survives that visionary adventure? — the humanist North roused to Erasmus' (1509) "Age of Gold": Reason is as great as a king ... a divine counsellor, presiding in its high citadel, remembering its origin, it thinks of nothing sordid, of nothing base ... Hutten, a precursive Tom Paine, summoning German youth: June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 28 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Come hither all ye who want to be free. Here the tyrants shall be smitten, here the bondage shall be broken. Where are you, freemen? Where are you nobles? Men of great names, where are you? Luther: Every Christian is anointed and sanctified in body and soul with the oil of the Holy Spirit — an early portrait by Cranach, 1502, fresh with that morning — what remains, when genius is consumed in polemic? As Erasmus (1521) would complain: And the more I loved the inborn ability of Hutten, the more I grieve that it was snatched away from us by these disorders ... For what did it avail to have Reuchlin, burdened enough thus far, weighed down with heavier ill will? ... Luther could have taught the evangelical philosophy with great profit to the Christian flock ... if he had refrained from those things which could only end in disturbance ... 66) 66a) L. Cranach the Elder, 1550, Self Portrait, Uffizi, Florence; video: first a close detail Same, detail of head and shoulders The last portrait of Cranach, half a century later, gives a solemn answer: in the deeper hardening of Europe, of which Erasmus grieves in his last letters: The Anabaptists, a race of men frenzied and devoted to death, have inundated lower Germany ... Vives writes that John Vergara, together with Brother Tovar and several other learned men, is in prison. You know, I imagine, that the three most learned men in all England are in jail: the bishop of Rochester, the bishop of London, and Thomas More, a dearer friend than any other I have ever had — man withdraws into a stronghold of consciousness: "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott"; "Aus tiefer Not schrei ich zu Dir" — "From the depths of need I cry to thee". 67) Spanish, B.C. to modern, Barcelona, View of Barrio Gotico; video: first details, below and above Old Barcelona summarizes 2000 years in the history of Spain. What is visible ranges from Roman at the heavy-walled base, through Gothic and Flamboyant, to a June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 29 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History filigree of rococo at the crown; though buried below are cyclopean walls of the preGreek, Greek shards and marble, traces of Carthage; while the city spreads beyond to the Art Nouveau fantasies of Gaudi. The Spain of Colonial conquest rested on that base, with all the levels of period style. 68) 68a) Spanish Romanesque-Gothic, 1188 ff., Portico de la Gloria, Santiago de Campostello; + V detail Same, closer detail Music: Ripoli MS, c. 1200, Credit Frigus, 2-voice Easter Conductus (vocal entrance), MHS-OR-433 At the end of the 12th Century at Compostello, Romanesque is shading into Gothic, as in France, but with an archaic wild excess. And in the contemporary conducti from Ripoli, note-against-note chords dance Isle-de-France rhythms. (fade Credit Frigus) 69) 69a) 69b) Spanish MS, 1415, Rafael Destornes, Judgment page, Barcelona Missal, Cathedral Library, Barcelona (video: upper half only) Same, lower detail, Hell Same, upper detail, Saints (here video shows the whole) Music: Barcelona, end of 14th cent., Agnus Dei, close, Candide CE-31068 By 1400, French, Italian, and Flemish have fused as everywhere into an International Gothic, which in Destornes sets up one of many signs on the way to Bosch. In Catalan music also, the Hocket of Machault and the Italians softens toward familiar style. (close Agnus Dei) 70) Bartolomé Bermejo, 1490, Pietà of Archdeacon Desplà, Cathedral, Barcelona; + V detail During that century the most impassioned realism was absorbed from Avignon, Flanders and the north Italian, to toughen in Bermejo, 1490 — as in the music of de la Torre — to a Cid militance of carnal faith: "Adoramos Te Senor". June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 30 �C.G. Bell Music: 71) 71a) Symbolic History Ferdinand de la Torre, c. 1490, Adoramos, Tinayre (refrain), Lumen 32020 (fade) Alejo Fernandez, c. 1520, Virgin of the Navigators, Alcazar, Seville; first, video detail: ships below Spanish, 15th cent., Castle Valencia de Don Juan, Leon Music: Juan del Encina, c. 1515(?), Una Sañosa Porfia, Cape, EMS-219 At this point the daring of a Genoese navigator opened the New World to a crusading energy which had barely consolidated a sub-continent broken by Dark Age invasions, Moors, and chivalry. All the nations of Europe have been mad, and so variously no one could name the maddest, but the Spanish must rank high. What went over the sea in German imperial dress and with all the financing and skill of Flemish bottoms, under the protection of course of the Papal Virgin, had the outward style and softness of high-renaissance Italian; but it bore from the windy uplands where Gothic Moorish castles were still being built and ballad laments of the fall of Granada sung a chivalric mysticism that would lash Conquistadores from Mexico clear to Panama and Colorado. (fade Encina) 72) Classic Teotihuacan, 1st cent. B.C. to 3rd cent. A.D., view of Teotihuacan For ships from the engineering West to encounter the stone age was not so remarkable. What must have staggered the moral being was to confront a civilization in some way higher than their own, though evolved in isolation from a primitive base and without even the use of the wheel: cities larger and richer than theirs, an astronomical calendar, libraries of religion and law, and an art that left Dürer speechless when he saw its spoils in Antwerp: a civilization with an already mythic past, Teotihuacan, deserted a thousand years before, its Pyramids of the Sun and Moon and Street of the Dead called by the living Aztecs work of the Gods; 73) Classic Maya, c. 800, Temple of the Cross, Palenque (Jean Coureau) a New World of wonders, spread out in time and space — six-hundred miles south and east the Maya ruins, Upland, Lowland, Peninsula, lost in forest — Palenque, sun-lit, under a leafy sea, a life, music, and poetry fabulous then, irrecoverable now. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 31 �C.G. Bell 74) Symbolic History Classic Maya, c. 800, Sacred Cigar Smoking, Temple of the Cross, Palenque (CGB '78); + V detail; not digital Though the carved plinths and stele, as this from the Temple of the Cross at Palenque, some death-god or panther-priest smoking a ritual cigar — cult scenes alive with what Christendom had long since banished into hell — recover one thing for us instantly: the crusading Christian jolt in the presence of a tradition so refined and so idolatrously savage, alien as the Popol-vu sequence this relief suggests, when Hunter and Seven Hunter (and later Hunter and Jaguar Deer), gone to the Underworld House of Darkness where the gods hot-seat them and laugh like a swarm of flies, are given cigars they must smoke all night and return in the morning unconsumed. 75) Aztec, 15th cent., Coatlicue of the Serpent Skirt, Arch. Mus., Mexico; + V detail And as if to raise the strain beyond psychic endurance, the antithesis had grown in the Aztec empire to such sublimity and terror as this colossal Goddess of the serpent skirt, found later under the charred ruins of what had been the greatest city in the world, drives home — a more than Moloch, more than Bhagavad Gita divinity of vulture and snake, a monolyth of rattle, talon and fang, which all the human sacrifices of Montezuma's rule of art, justice, and wisdom could not appease. 76) 76a) French Romanesque, early 12th cent., Knight spears a demon, Tavant, Indreet-Loire Gerona Beatus, 975, f 134 v, Christian warrior spears a snake What could Christian chivalry do, pledged since Roland to archangelic war — this knight spearing a devil in the 12th cent. frescoes of Tavant — Columbus too having told the Cuban chief (where no Caribs would survive) that "the first cause of his coming was to instruct them in godly knowledge and true religion" (though he was then amassing gold) "and especially to punish the cannibals and such mischievous evildoers" — what could that conquering Inquisition do with a mystery as beyond its ken as the plumed serpent, but melt into bullion its ornaments and idols, and gathering from cities and libraries all codices, pictographs and writings, to the priestly censing and sprinkling, eradicate, in one giant auto-da-fe, the entire civilized evidence of a world they would occupy — as a virus takes over the genetic mechanism of the host. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 32 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History While Luther at the same time threw his inkwell at the devil, to exorcise what blasted him within. 77) Post-classic Maya, 15th cent., Tulum, evening, coast of Yucatan (Enrique Franco) By 1518 Juan de Grijalva was exploring westward from the island of Cozumel. His chaplain describes towns on the coast of Yucatan, and to the south a walled city, the ruins now of Tulum: next day a little before sunset, we perceived far in the distance a town or village so big that the city of Seville could not appear larger or better; and a huge tower was seen in it. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 33 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History It was the beginning of the thrust that would take Cortez to the throne of Mexico. 78) 78a) H. Bosch, 1503-4, Delights Triptych, Hell, detail, Prado, Madrid; + V detail Bosch, c. 1504, Last Judgment, Hell detail, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna At the heart of that conquest lies an exploit, weird as the Satanic invention of cannon in Paradise Lost. When the assault hinged on gunpowder, the cavalier Montaño, with four other Spaniards, climbed to the three mile high crater of Popocatépetl, and was lowered in a basket, repeatedly, four hundred feet into a deeper hell-hole of smoke and flame, to scrape off sulphur from the lava walls. That fiery brimstone fed the final massacring charge on Mexico City. Palpable, that the damned eruption Bosch divined in panels fondly acquired by the Spanish crown, powered the reduction of new worlds. In Irving's Columbus, as signs of land multiply and no land appears, the sailors think them signs of the devil, "delusions beguiling them on to destruction"; a79) b79) Leonardo, 1513, Girl pointing in a landscape, Windsor Castle; first, V detail Double: Leonardo [A] 1513-16, John, Louvre; and [B] 1483-86, Angel from Madonna of the Rocks, Louvre [here video repeats a79, Girl pointing] while Columbus praises "the goodness of God in thus conducting them by soft breezes across a tranquil ocean ... with fresh signs guiding them to a promised land." Against jealous temptation, the kindly Rewarder of the temporal quest. And the proof was at hand, the land, though it, too, might seduce with power. But whatever the backward urge or forward danger, the die was cast; Leonardo's angel and John were smiling, his girl pointing across the stream, his bearded face was wise with futurity. 79) 79a) Giorgione, 1504-10, La Tempesta, Accademia, Venice [somewhat cropped in the video] Same, detail, with both figures (while video shows separate details, woman, then man) June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 34 �C.G. Bell 79b) Symbolic History Same, double: closer details of the man and woman (while video returns, through a lower spread with both figures, to the whole) Music: Again, Mantuanus, c. 1495, Lirum bililirum, Decca DL 79435 Giorgione learned it from Leonardo, the accord of nature and man, this Gypsy and Soldier (his own birth illegitimate), like a Rest on the Flight with a nude Mary and profane Joseph. Was that enchantment as merely ideal as the Pastoral Elegy Sannazaro now wreathed in the harmonies Milton would love and pursue? — Thee shepherd, thee the woods and desert caves, With wilde thyme and the gadding vine o'regrown, And all their echoes mourn. — I fiumi il sanno e le spelunch' e i faggi ... And like "Lycidas", Sannazaro's lament leads to an Arcadian paradise ("Where, other groves and other streams along,"): Altri monti, altri piani, Altri boschetti e rivi Vedi nel cielo, e più novelli fiori ... Till all that heaven rejoices To hear their new and unaccustomed voices ... If any spirit of love among you dwell, Oaks of shade and gloom, Cast here a shadow for this quiet tomb. (CGB) Se spirto alcun d'amor vive fra voi, Quercie frondose e folte, Fate ombra alla quiete ossa sepolte. 80) 80a) Giorgione, "La Tempesta", background, with lightning Same, closer detail of lightning What is the gift of art if not to make dream real? But the symbolic dream, of total, ambiguous reality. Giorgione's Gypsy Family, the richest strain of Venetian HighRenaissance, takes its usual title — La Tempesta — from its cloud and lightning sky, a demon flash in the beckoning of calm. June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 35 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Leonardo: Force is of brief duration, because it desires perpetually to subdue its cause, and when this is subdued it kills itself ... One ought not to desire the impossible ... (close Mantuanus) June 1996 1500: Explosive Balance 36 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 37 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1500 : Explosive Balance, Symbolic History, Part 15 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 15 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_15_1500--Explosive_Balance Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/16341f5be9aaa8097211adb056f7ea2f.pdf 3d5ea8c3e090cc00ac8da4d7b1f84d42 PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 14. 15th Century: Early Renaissance CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 July 1994 Last Revised January ‘96 �1 Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 14. 15th Century: Early Renaissance 1) Giovanni dei Grassi, c. 1398, Annunciation, Visconti Hours, National Library, Florence; + V detail Soon after 1400, Ciconia, Flemish-born Italian, closed his career with the ceremony motets, which initiate in music the spatial clarities of Early Renaissance. Music: Ciconia, 1400-10, O Virum — O Lux — O beate Nicholae, SAWT9505 At the same time art formed an horizon of humanizing sacred brightness — the International Style — from this 1398 Dei Grassi, in Italy, 2) Broederlam, 1393-99, Annunciation, from reredos, Museum, Dijon; first, video detail through Burgundy and France (this Dijon Broederlam), 3) English Alabaster relief, c. 1420?, Annunciation, Cathedral, Wells; + V detail across the Channel, to the winsome alabaster reliefs of England; 4) Cologne, c. 1410, Madonna, etc., Johnson Collection, Philadelphia (CGB '74); first, video detail back to Cologne, where the softest jewelling of all runs from this 1410 Madonna, 5) Lochner, c. 1435, Madonna in a Rose Arbor, Walraff-Richartz Museum, Cologne; + V detail to the ultimate child-wonder of Lochner, as late as 1440. So we might return by the Rhine and Danube, 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �2 C.G. Bell 6) Symbolic History Fra Angelico, 1434-35, Coronation of the Virgin, detail, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59); + V closer details to the gold-leaf devotions of Fra Angelico, in Florence — 7) Ghiberti, 1404-09, Annunciation, North Door, Baptistry, Florence; first, video detail city of Classical recovery in Gothic grace. (End Ciconia) Here Ghiberti's early work on the Baptistery doors had opened the century. 8) Michelangelo, 1497-99, Pieta, whole, St. Peter's, Rome; + V detail By its close, art gathers its force in Michelangelo's first Pieta, music in the death-lament which Isaac, Fleming at the court of Florence, wrote for Lorenzo il Magnifico, died 1492: Music: 9) 10) 11) Isaac, 1492, "Quis dabit capiti meo aquam?" last section, Decca DL-79413 Same, detail: Mary's head; + V detail of 11 Same, detail: Christ's hand; + V detail of 8 Same, detail: Christ's body; + V return to 8, first a detail, then the whole (close Isaac) At such advance of consciousness in the science of incarnate sway, we heirs to its later pride feel a shudder of tragic awe. 12) Lascaux Cave 20,000 B.C., wall of main hall, detail, animals; video: close detail only As if the whole rational-realist thrust of civilization were an age-old mistake, some Luciferian fall from mythic immediacy. So it was at the Greeks that Charles Olson, in his Black Mountain lectures on history, pointed the finger of Nietzschean blame: "Man lost something just about 500 B.C., 13) 7/1994 Franz Marc 1913, Deer in the Forest, Phillips Gallery, Washington D.C.; + V details 15th Century: Early Renaissance �3 C.G. Bell Symbolic History and only got it back just about 1905 A.D." Music: Alban Berg 1920-6, from 3rd Mvt, Lyric Suite, V-LM-2531 (As in Marc's magic forest, Berg's Lyric Suite, Rilke's "Exposed on the peaks of the heart"?) Of uncleft consciousness indeed there moves Many about, many a qualmless hill-beast, Moves and delays. And the great inviolable bird Circles the summit's virgin refusal. But here, Unsheltered, here, on the peaks of the heart... (CGB) 14) (fade Berg) Double: {A} Michelangelo 1522, Fury, black chalk, Uffizi, Florence; and {B} Francois Rude 1833, Head of La Guerre, Arc de Triomphe, Paris Surely, if we pursue the revolution by which a Michelangelo hell-fury becomes the summons of a national Arc de Triomphe, arrogating its brazen Book of Law and iron Book of War over space, time and cause — who would not ask where history went wrong? 15) Double: {A} Aegean, c. 2000 BC, Head of Cycladic idol, Louvre, Paris; and {B} Greek (from Delos), c. 100 B.C., Bronze head, National Museum, Athens; and video detail (from V15B) And the modern appeal to the pre-Greek, Cycladic and abstract, is of a piece with Olson's oblique claim, that at the beginning of the Periclean century something happened, by which man was broken from the functionalities of nature and tribe; that it was philosophic scrutiny of self and world which stamped the brow-furrowing of consciousness on centuries to follow. Though if that palpable resolve to compose symbolic reality to the deliberate measure of man, was a mistake, 16) 7/1994 Egypt, Old Kingdom, Dynasty V, c. 2400 BC, Ranofer, Prophet of Ptah (head), Egyptian Museum, Cairo 15th Century: Early Renaissance �4 C.G. Bell Symbolic History it was not made once only, but before and after: 2400 BC, when Egypt became the cradle of civilization by great discoveries that way; 17) Greek (Attic), c. 490 B.C., Korê of Euthydicos, Acropolis Museum, Athens subsequently, by the Greeks, this Saphic Kore of 500 BC; and again (marking another 2000 years) as Christendom emerged from the trance of medieval seizure. And strange — if mistake — that it should produce, in each case, an expression of such vernal delight: the Archaic smile renewed 18) 18a) Baldovinetti, c. 1450(?), Madonna and Child, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80); + V details; with a digital return after 18a Baldovinetti, 1460-62, detail of Arno Valley, Nativity fresco, Vestibule, Santissima Annunziata, Florence [revised into video, ‘95] in this Baldovinetti Virgin, as pure as fetching, seated on some Florentine height over the discovered Val d'Arno. So the beauty of earth, an orphic voice through Dante's dead land — "La dov' esser de' giocondo" — "There, where one ought to be happy" — blooms in 15th-century Poliziano: To behold the valleys and hills and air pure, Grass and flowers, rivers cold and clear; To hear the birds sing and the waters sound And low wind murmuring among the fronds; See apples heap the earth and bend the trees, And the ripe wheat run in billows like the sea. (CGB) (E le biade ondeggiar come fa il mare.) As if a drunk who must end in murderous sick despair (our ravaged civilization of the "Bateau Ivre") could still look back to a morning age, when the first Promethean draughts had awakened to life and love, in what remains perhaps the most loveable of our centuries, the fifteenth. 19) Bernardo Daddi c. 1335?, Madonna etc., detail, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. (CGB '75); + V details Trace the waking from the century before. In a Daddi Madonna, the burning mystery of Dante's praise: 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �5 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Vergine madre, figlia del tuo figlio: Maiden and mother and daughter of your son, Humble and exalted beyond every creature, Determined goal of eternal counsel — (CGB) termine fisso d'etterno consiglio — Music: Landini, c.1360(?), Va pure, amore; organ & harp, Zurich, Odys. 3216017 has lightened (like the music of Landini) through Boccaccio, O regina degli angioli, O Maria: Mary, Queen of the angels of heaven, Adornment of the sky, whose smiling features, Star of the sea, guide into their haven Wanderers from the way, your witless creatures... (CGB) (cut Landini) 20) V20a) Botticelli, c. 1485, Madonna of the Magnificat, detail, Uffizi, Florence; (video closer detail only); then Same, cropped whole from video file toward the 15th century ease of Belcari's sacred plays: Lily of May, flower of blessedness, With chastity and all the virtues else Adorned, of every kind and loveliness — We honor you above all saints and angels. (CGB) What Botticelli would culminate in this Magnificat Madonna — Europe refining from the Gothic past some Beulah wedding of earth and heaven: "You shall no more be called Desolate...for your land shall be married." 21) 22) 7/1994 Jan van Eyck, c. 1425, Madonna in a Church, Dahlem Museum, Berlin; + V detail Same, a closer central detail 15th Century: Early Renaissance �6 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Bruges, 1425: Jan van Eyck's church remains mystical; that sun shines from the north, as on Dante's Paradise; but it irradiates, like daily realities, the Gothic lines, the angels in the choir, the pageant Queen. Such the light in an English Advent poem: I sing of a maiden That is makeles, King of all kinges To her sone she ches. He cam also stille There his moder was, As dew in Aprille That falleth on the grass. He cam also stille To his moderes bour, As dew in Aprille, That falleth on the flour. He cam also stille There his moder lay, As dew in Aprille That falleth on the spray. Moder and maiden Was never non but sche; Well may swich a lady Godes moder be. Music, if nothing else, would make us treat 15th century Europe as a whole. To hear what those angels might be singing in the van Eyck choir, we turn to Dufay, 23) V23a) Hubert and Jan van Eyck 1427-29 (double), {A} Singing angels; and {B} Angels playing instruments, Altarpiece of the Lamb, Ghent Same, detail of A of 23, singing angels Music: Dufay, c.1430(?), Gloria ad modum tubae (Munich) AWT 9439 at the same time bringing the musicians nearer, as in the Ghent Altar of the Lamb. Yet Dufay's Gloria in the manner of trumpets, with canon above and ostinato below, 24) 7/1994 Luca della Robbia, 1431-38 (double), Choirboys from the Cantoria, Duomo Museum, Florence; for the double, video takes details, reversing the order: see A and B of V24 (CGB '86) in video file; digital adds to double one detail 15th Century: Early Renaissance �7 C.G. Bell Symbolic History is from about 1430, when Italianate-Flemish Dufay was with the Papal choir. So Luca della Robbia's Florentine choirboys would serve as well. 25) Benozzo Gozzoli, 1459, Angels and background detail, Medici Chapel, Florence; digital adds one detail (CGB '86) Or Gozzoli's angels, past mid-century, from the Medici Chapel; 26) Piero della Francesca, 1470, Angel musicians from the Nativity, National Gallery, London or Piero della Francesca's, from the London Nativity. 27) Luca della Robbia, Cantoria (double), Dancing, Duomo Museum, Florence; video replaces with details of singles V27 {A} (CGB) and V27 {B} in video file; digital adds to double, one detail (CGB '86) As worship turns to dance, it will be Luca della Robbia again; 28) Donatello, 1433-38, Cantoria of Dancing Genii, Duomo Museum, Florence; with V details or from Donatello's facing Gallery, the more bacchanalian abandon of dancing Genii. (end Dufay Gloria) This is new wine in the old faith bottles — 29) Fra Filippo Lippi, c. 1460(?), Madonna with Angels, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59); + V details, cf. V29a and V29b (CGB '59) Browning's Brother Lippo stealing in from a night frolic to paint On Jerome knocking at his poor old breast With his great round stone to subdue the flesh. It is Vasari who tells how Lippi chose the novitiate Lucrezia as model for a Prato Madonna, finished nun, as it were, with the picture, took her off to be his mistress, 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �8 C.G. Bell Symbolic History thereafter portrayed as Mary, and their lively urchins as Christ and the angels — religion as sprightly as Charles of Orleans' Confession: My gostly fader, I me confesse, First to God and then to you, That at a window — wot ye how? — I stale a cosse of grete sweteness... 30) Fouquet, c. 1450, Agnes Sorel as Mary Enthroned, Louvre, Paris; + V detail But I restore it shall doutless... And that to God I make a vow... While French Fouquet turned Charles VII's Agnes Sorel to a Mary of pneumatic bliss — a levity naive as its embrace in faith: Chiamo il dolce Gesù e canto, canto — But to Mary mild and Jesu child, I sing, I sing... (CGB) 31) Fra Filippo Lippi c. 1441-47, Coronation of the Virgin (video alternates the whole with details from that and from 32) Some years before the meeting with Lucrezia, Lippi had painted the Uffizi Coronation of the Virgin, in which, by the startlingly personal St. Lucy below (with her children), the later affair seems prefigured. For Browning this is "the Prior's niece who comes/ To care about his asthma..." Oh that white smallish female with the breasts, She's just my niece — whom Lippi has chosen for this picture: "I shall paint/ God... Madonna.../ Ringed in a bowery flowery angel-brood / ...i' the front... a saint or two" — 32) Same, Lippi Coronation, detail front, right (old hand-colored Alinari photo) the artist himself then (as Browning thought), in his monk's robe come up, as from a dark stair, mazed, until that "sweet angelic slip of a thing" intercedes: "This man did the work" (as on the scroll) "iste perfecit opus". Such the Ave Regina Dufay troped for himself: "Miserere supplicanti Dufay"; 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �9 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Dufay, 1464, from Antiphon, Ave regina caelorum, Miserere... Dufay (Planchard) MHS 4743A (fade) or the lighter greeting of his Month of May Rondeau, "Karissime Dufay vous en prye..." Music: Dufay, 1423-29, from Ce Moys de May, (Cape) EMS 206 (fade) 33) Double: {A} Lippi(?), c. 1435, Monks from a fresco, Carmine Cloister, Florence; and {B} Lippi, 1460-64, Girls at the Dance of Salome, Duomo, Prato; + V details from V33 {A} and V33 {B}) It is likely that in the fresco fragment in the Carmine Cloister (left) the young Lippi has represented his delight in whatever is perceived (Browning, from Vasari): First every sort of monk, the black and white, I drew them, fat and lean. . . 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �10 C.G. Bell Symbolic History While as late as the Prato frescoes, two girls whispering of Herodias' demand for John the Baptist's head, make such discovery unforgettable. 34) Fra Angelico & school, 1447-50, St. Laurence giving alms, detail, Capella Nicolina, Vatican, Rome (video: lower spread of whole V34, then closer detail) Was not Lippi's art-sire, the saintly Fra Angelico, entering Renaissance by the same observational road? — his mid-century St. Laurence distributing alms dominated by the blind beggar (right), where spirituality springs exactly from heightened sense. So Browning's Lippi, studying the watchmen, calls for "a bit of chalk". 35) French Gothic c. 1230, Faggots for Winter, West Front, Notre Dame, Paris; first, video detail Music: Perrin d'Angecourt, 13th cent., "Quant voi a la fin d'estey," AS-18 We have seen the secular hauntingly suspended in the synthesis of creed, sharp as this winter from Notre Dame. In a Goliard poem: "De ramis cadunt folia," the bleak time burns with love; so too with Perrin d'Angecourt, 13th century Troubador. (close d'Ancecourt) 36) Lorenzetti c. 1340, Winter, fresco border, Palazzo Publico, Siena; + V detail Music: Guillaume de Machault, c.1360(?), Rondeau, Puis qu'en oubli, (Cape) ARC 3032 In Lorenzetti's 14th-century Winter the mystery is distilled through a realism, strange as the "smoky rein" in Chaucer, which keeps Creseyde at Pandarus' house for the consummation required. So Dante in the Vita Nuova speaks with the ladies who pity him: And as sometimes we see water fall mingled with white snow, so it seemed their talk issued forth mingled with sighs. Guillaume de Machault's double-leading-tones, 37) 7/1994 Lorenzetti, c. 1340, detail from Good Government in the Country, Palazzo Publico, Siena; (video: first a closer detail, using Va37) 15th Century: Early Renaissance �11 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Lorenzetti's panorama of a well-governed countryside, have offered such exploratory translations of reality. Each detail of that vast spread — In Augoste in a hygh seysoun, Quen corne is corven wyth crokes kene — holds the dream of spacelessness. 38) (fade Machault) Pol de Limbourg, 1413-16, July, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly (first, V details: reaping, then shearing) Music: Arnold de Lantins, c.1420?, Puis que je voy (Cape), AS-39 With the 1400's estrangement ebbs. The Calendar of the Tres Riches Heures, Burgundian Rondeaux (this Arnold de Lantins), breathe natural air. Even the plays of 1400 Flanders accomplish the human passage: Sandareen tells her new knight of her seduction by the baron who has cast her off; she speaks in the metaphor of a blossoming tree from which a falcon has robbed one flower; and he says one flower is nothing, to speak of it no more, it will not set him against the tree he loves. In English the greatest poetry of the seasons is from Gawayne and the Green Knight. We trim to summer and the coming on of fall: After, the sesoun of somer wyth the soft wyndes, Quen Zeferus syfles hymself on sedes and erbes; Wela wynne is the wort that waxes theroute, When the donkande dewe dropes of the leves, To bide a blysful blush of the bryght sunne. 39) Same, October, Tres Riches Heures; + V detail Bot then hyghes hervest, and hardenes hym sone, Warnes hym for the wynter to wax ful rype; He dryves wyth droght the dust for to ryse, Fro the face of the folde to flyghe ful hyghe; Wrothe wynde of the welkyn wrasteles with the sunne, The leves lancen fro the lynde and lyghten on the grounde, (those alliterations heightening every mood — as in the miniature, the face of the sower of winter wheat) 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �12 C.G. Bell 40) Symbolic History Same, December, Tres Riches Heures; (video has details only, below and above) And al grayes the gres that grene wats ere; Then al rypes and rotes that ros upon fyrst, And thus yirnes the yere in yisterdayes mony, And wynter wyndes again, as the worlde askes, no fage... (The 1400 castle rising behind, like the one Gawayne sees over the December woods: Towers set up between, pinnacled ful thick, Turrets with carved tops and chalkwhite chimneys.) 41) Same, April, Tres Riches Heures; with video details Gawayne must precede the Tres Riches Heures. But Charles d'Orleans, English captive, here writing in French, more than matches its period harmony: Le temps a laisié son manteau De vent, de froidure et de pluye, Et s'est vestu de brouderie, De soleil luyant, cler et beau... Riviere, fontaine et ruisseau Portent, en livrée jolie, Gouttes d'argent et d'orfaverie, Chascun s'abille de nouveau, Le temps a laissié son manteau. 42) (fade de Lantins) Grimani Breviary, c. 1510, April, Biblioteca Marciana, Venice; + V details. Music: Josquin des Pres, c.1500(?), from La Spagna, 5-voice basse danse, Seraphim SIC-6104 (3) With Lang's rendering — The year has changed his mantle cold Of wind, of rain, of bitter air; And he goes clad in cloth of gold, Of laughing suns and seasons fair... All founts, all rivers, seaward rolled, The pleasant summer livery wear, With silver studs on broidered vair; The world puts off its raiment old, 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �13 C.G. Bell Symbolic History The year lays down his mantle cold — we have moved from the Limbourg Calendar to its Grimani translation a century later (time of Josquin), in the robes and haze of bourgeois realism — such a filling-in as that of Arthurian romance over the three-hundred years from Chrestien to Malory. (end La Spagna) 43) Pol de Limbourg, January, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly; + V details and return to the whole. Music: Ciconia, c. 1405-10, from O Rosa Bella, (Deller) RCA VLM-6016 Since the Tres Riches Heures — here January — like Ciconia's 1400 setting of "O Rosa Bella" — has still a trace of the old chivalric suspension of space, time and cause. When Chrestien's Lancelot, seeking Guenevere, has crossed the sword bridge into "the land from which no stranger returns," he is viewed from a tower window by King Bademagu, "very scrupulous and precise about honor and what was right," and by his son and opposite, the Queen's captor, Meleagant, "who never wearied of villainy, treason and felony." (end Ciconia) 44) Grimani Breviary, c. 1510, January, Biblioteca Marciana, Venice; + V details and return to whole; digital first gives a double of 43 and 44 In Malory, 1470, there is no good king Bademagu and no symbolic land. With an armed force Mellyagraunce surprises the Queen at Maying and takes her to his castle seven miles from Westminster. Launcelot gets word. Mellyagraunce's archers shoot his horse. He forces a driver to take him up in what for Chrestien was the mysterious cart. From a bay window, the Queen aspyed by his shelde that he was there hym self sir launcelot du lake; and thenne she was ware where came his hors ever after that charyot, and ever he trade his guttes and his paunche under his feet. Allas sayd the quene now I see well and preve that wel is hym that hath a trusty frend. As in the Grimani densening, the very knights and queens accept the probabilities of the middle class. 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �14 C.G. Bell 45) 45a) Symbolic History Jan (and/or Hubert) van Eyck, 1422-24 (or 1413-17?), Baptism, from the Tres Belles Heures de Notre Dame, Museo Civico, Turin; video has details only (cf. Va45), returning to a cropped whole after 45a (cf. V45b) Same, Voyaqe of St. Julian, from "Turin Hours", section of same MS burned in 1904 Music: Dunstable, c.1420(?), from O Rosa bella, (Cape) ARC-3052 If there are turning points in history, the van Eyck miniatures from the Turin Hours — by one or both brothers and surely from the 1420's or before — are the point of departure for all the realism (trees, water, atmosphere and distance) to follow. They succeed the Limbourg brothers as this Dunstable "O Rosa Bella" does the Ciconia (just heard) — not finer, not better, but polyphonically, sensuously, melodically advanced. As Martin le France wrote, Dufay and Binchois, against the early century of Carmen and Cesaris: Have assumed the English style And followed after Dunstable. (end Dunstable) That mutation of 1425 differentiates the New Europe 46) Rublev, Russian, 1422-27, Trinity, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow from everything that had gone before. The 1400 softening of International Style had cognates as far as the Byzantine — most tellingly in Russia. Though the gentlest art of the West seems physical beside the mystic accord of Rublev's weightless angels, forming (at their Abraham supper) the flower-frail round of a Trinity. 47) Claus Sluter, 1395-99, Head of Christ, Chartreuse de Champmol, Dijon; + V detail In Europe that horizon of grace becomes, as with Sluter, a Renaissance launching ground. Thus the incarnate Christ which crowns his Dijon Fountain. Music: 7/1994 Apt MS., late 14th cent., Jesu nostra redemptio, 1st stanza, SAWT9505 15th Century: Early Renaissance �15 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In the Apt "Redemptio" hymn, the revolution of immediacy takes the same center. The melody has risen from medieval tenor to descant; the bass settles down, seeking faux-bourdon chords; second progressions begin to yield to those of the fourth and fifth; that simple ordering of harmonic space founds the Renaissance Lauda: (cut Apt MS) 48) Belbello da Pavia, c. 1412-30(?), Creation of Eve, Visconti Hours, National Library, Florence (video: details only, cf V48) Music: Joh. Simon de Haspre, c.1400(?), "Ma doulce Amour," Odyssey 32-160178 History moves by the precipitation and inbreeding of opposites: Gothic flamboyance spills into the very years of humanist solemnity. Thus the miniatures of Belbello, completing the Visconti Hours, with the terminal dissonances of Ars Nova: de Haspre. (fade de Haspre) 49) Giovanni di Paolo, c. 1430(?), Entombment, Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore; first, video details Siena is the most startling art-bastion of a Gothic-Byzantine heightened by new experiment. In Giovanni di Paolo's Entombment, Peter does not interrupt, but casts a trans-real shadow on the gold light itself of the grave. Music: Cyprus, c.1420, Amen (close), from the Gloria, A.S. 126, B In music, the French court of Cyprus, until its 1426 sack by the Sultan, tops the isorythmic brilliance of the school of Machault — from the Amen of a Gloria. These pockets of fantastic continuance are not merely backward-looking. Their symbolic agitation, gathering material force, will break into the Renaissance again and again, as Savonarola would stir Medici Florence, or Mannerist distortion climax in El Greco. (end Amen) 50 7/1994 Lorenzo Monaco, 1413, Nativity, Predella of the Coronation, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '48); + V detail 15th Century: Early Renaissance �16 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In Florence the lingering transition works wonders of mystical sweetness, Monaco, Gentile, Fra Angelico. Brolo's hymn to the Virgin, "O Celestial Light", melodizes the starry blend. Music: 51) Va52) 52) Bart. Brolo, c. 1410-20(?), O Celestial Lume (close), AS-l, (#8 in US) Gentile de Fabriano, 1423, Shepherds from the Nativity, detail, Predella of Magi Altarpiece, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '48) Fra Angelico, c. 1425-30, Gate of Light, top left of Paradise Garden, from Last Judgment, San Marco, Florence Same, Paradise Garden, whole; and video details (from 52 or V52) (end Brolo) It is the celestial light of that chant which the saved enter in Fra Angelico's paradise, most childlike of those blessed gardens so much preferred to hell by Villon's mother: "La joye avoir me fay, haulte Deesse." What came from the Song of Songs, through the well-spring of Revelation and the smiling depth of Dante's shores "painted with spring's miraculous colors", has grown as artlessly innocent as the Mary of the Lauds — "Madre e Sposa,/ candida olente rosa" — herself that orchard enclosed, its fragrant herbs, its clear fountain of life: (Belcari) "viva fontana e chiara vena." 53) Claus Sluter 1394-1404, Well of Moses (David, Jeremiah & Zachariah), Champmol, Charterhouse, near Dijon The quantum leaps of history are not entirely localized. We cannot say when the limpid grace was penetrated by the humanist wedge. There had been Claus Sluter in Dijon, precocious as English Chaucer. Va54) Vb54) 54) Brunelleschi, esp. 1420-36, Dome of the Cathedral, Florence, detail Roman, esp. Hadrian, 120 AD, Pantheon (rear), Rome (detail of CGB '86) Again, Brunelleschi, Cathedral with Dome against a cloudy sky While, in Florence, Renaissance center, Brunelleschi's dome has not lost the bareness of the 1368 plan, that stamp of God's Gothic barn, which gives it a strength over all other domes. Vasari stresses Brunelleschi's 1403 sketching from Roman temples and measuring of the Pantheon. But Hadrian's brooding cement mass could hardly have suggested the levitational soar of Santa Maria del Fiore, its curve, as Vasari quotes 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �17 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Brunelleschi, that of a pointed arch. Whatever Rome inspired, the double shell of this ribbed and self-buttressed vault looked for its engineering to the Gothic North. 1st 55) Masaccio 1425-26, + V closer detail Tribute Money, detail, Carmine, Florence; And Masaccio's noble art — by whatever blend of Giotto, nature, the Classic — fulfills Medieval incorporation: to sanctify these sensuous presences. Had not Paul and John promised a glorified body, in which we shall be sons of God and like him? Had not Thomas Aquinas (II of II, 23, 1) made Charity Friendship, under the daring of cohumanity with God — quoting Christ: "No longer will I call you servants, but my friends"? As for music, there was nothing antique to recover. Renaissance had to shape its forms from the polyphony of the Middle Ages. Va2nd 54) Again, Brunelleschi's Dome, nearer view (from 1st 54) For 2nd 54) Same, Cathedral of Florence, interior, nave (CGB '86) It was Dufay who wrote the motets for the 1436 consecration of this cathedral. Their swelling four-voice canons share in its grandeur. Yet a witness to that pomp paraphrases 12th-century Suger on the anagogical gift of the New Light: During these moments I enjoyed so much delight that it partaking on earth of the life of the blessed. Music: seemed to me I was Dufay, 1436, Nuper Rosarum Flores (last 4-voice section) BASF 30249 2nd 55) Again, Tribute Money, detail, head of John 56) Uccello 1436, Equestrian painting of Sir John Hawkwood, Duomo, Florence; first, video detail (with Dufay "Amen" close) Humanist assertion, Roman recovery, civic pride meet in sacred containment. Uccello had just painted the equestrian Hawkwood in the Cathedral where Dufay's music was performed. And in the "Amen" of that praise of Florence, the condottiere vaunt seems made in chords. 57) 7/1994 Donatello, 1443-53, Gattamelata (from below), Piazzetta, Padua 15th Century: Early Renaissance �18 C.G. Bell V57a) V57b) Symbolic History Same, detail: profile from the left (cf. 14th Century 74) Same, another view, upper spread Literature, after the 14th century, ebbs, weighed down by too much Latin revival. Yet Alberti, humanist architect, breaks Gothic continuance with the first sonnet of Renaissance rhetoric and universalizing consciousness. Petrarch's residual bareness: Solo e pensoso i piu deserti campi — Vo misurando a passi tardi e lenti — Alone and sad I measure empty fields — yields to a motion almost that of Shakespeare: "Consum'd with that which it was nourish'd by." (Alberti, with Donatello's Gattamelata): Io vidi gia seder nell'arme irato Uom furioso, e pallido tremare... I saw of late an armed and furious man That for his anger trembled and was pale, Va58) 58) Same, detail, profile, from the right Same, detail of the horseman And eyes I saw whereof tears trenchant ran For too great heat that did the heart assail; And I beheld a lover so long brood That he for sorrow could not weep or wail, Nor rarely saw those that could touch no food Because of hunger that had made them frail; I saw a vessel float and veer with wind Which wind too great did founder in the flood, And watched the greyhound as he coursed the hind For too great swiftness lose her in the wood. Thus I beheld how nature doth dispense To most of wishing, least of consequence. (CGB) 1st 59) Masaccio, 1423-27, The Trinity, Santa Maria Novella, Florence (video: CGB '59 glazed slide, V59) Perspective typefies the new ordering, art-precursor of natural science. Here Masaccio applies Brunelleschi's conception. How the vault looms, viewed, like the great 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �19 C.G. Bell Symbolic History robed figures, from below; while the cross, breaking that system, meets us head on. This theoretic space, this space of mind, will make as clear as possible the divergent modes of Florence 60) Jan van Eyck, 1434, Arnolfini Marriage, National Gallery, London; + V details. and (against it) of Flanders — Jan van Eyck's contemporary space of eye. In this Arnolfini betrothal the capture of reality proceeds by awakened sense and skilled hand — in textures, shadowing and touch, beyond anything Italy would produce for generations. Though if the recessive lines of floor, ceiling, window, bed, are in fact plotted, they form, as in the school of Giotto, separate convergences. Of course, an interior scanned by an actual viewer will have as many meeting points as the fixes of the scanning eye. What is in question is not reality itself, whatever that may mean, 2nd 59) Again, Masaccio Trinity, upper detail (video pans this from 1st 59 or V59) but space heroically formulated by the mathematics of Florentine mind. It is that universal grasp which lifts the Masaccio to the verge of awe. Meanwhile, in both pictures, the new techniques become sacramental; they reconstitute devotion. This frontal Father, the kind of image Cusanus would call "omnivoyant", viewing all viewers, brings the sacred into spatial grandeur. 2nd 60) Again, van Eyck, Marriage (video: details only, from 1st 60 and V2nd 60) Yet even the van Eyck records a sacrament of marriage (Panovsky): the clogs ("put off your shoes, for this is holy ground"); the single candle for the Eye of God; the painter as witness, seen in the mirror ("Jan van Eyck was here"). If what revolutionizes faith in Masaccio is the theoretical and classical, here it is the pietistic pervasion of the Brothers of the Common Life. 61) Double: {A} Venetian, finished 1434, Ca d'Oro, Grand Canal; and {B} Alberti, 1446, Palazzo Rucellai, Florence, + V single of {B} Such counter-thrusts compose the time-wave. Within the bounds of Italy, Venice and Florence present a complementarity. In Venice the Gothic tracery of the Ca d'Oro finished 1434 (left); from Florence twelve years later, the Rucellai Palace by Alberti, with 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �20 C.G. Bell Symbolic History its classical pilasters and rustic masonry — share in the individual and worldly emergence. 62) Flemish Civic Architecture, 1402-54, Hotel de Ville, Brussels From the same years, the town hall of Brussels — extending the European axis from Tuscany to Flanders — speaks the North in no way backward, its Flamboyant stone spired to a search as boldly Faustian. Va63) 63) Fra Angelico, 1430-34, Descent from the Cross, detail of Christ, San Marco Museum, Florence Same, whole; + V central detail (from V63a) Music: Dufay, 1452, Qui tollis, Missa "Se la face ay pale," Seraphim S-60267 (Munrow) Art and music convey the embryonic interworking of that web of commerce and skills, letters and science. Let this Descent from the Cross, begun by Lorenzo Monaco before 1425 and finished by Fra Angelico, be the Florentine harbinger. For music we choose, from Dufay's 1450 return to Italy, the Qui Tollis from his first tenor Mass, "Se la face ay pale" (brilliantly sung by Munrow's Consort). We cannot tell if Angelico's expressive composition, with even the central rise of the foliated frame, (fade "Se la face ay pale" Mass) 64) Roger van der Weyden, 1435-40, Descent from the Cross, Prado, Madrid; with video details (video using V64, of greener coloring) Music: Dufay, 1472, Qui tollis, from Missa "Ave regina caelorum" MHS 4743A suggested (perhaps through a woodcut?) Roger van der Weyden's Prado Descent, with its central rise and framing filigree. Here, although the shallow space and gold ground look backward, the fleshed and robed passion of these sufferers surges ahead. So in Dufay, the fabric of sound deepens over twenty years to the Qui tollis of his last mass, "Ave regina caelorum," sung at the dedication of the Cathedral of Cambrai. (fade "Ave regina caelorum") 65) 7/1994 Ghiberti, 1425-52, East Doors, detail of Eve, Baptistry, Florence 15th Century: Early Renaissance �21 C.G. Bell V65a) V65b) Symbolic History Same, Creation & Expulsion of Adam and Eve Same, Upper four reliefs (with video return to 65, closer detail of Eve) Music: Italian, 15th cent., Perla Mia, Nonesuch 71071 In music, the aesthetic balance of Italy — as influential, as in the other arts — works through the humbler forms of Laude and Frottole. One piece, "Perla mia", may stake out the hidden claim (the words, and perhaps the tune, by Giustiniani from the early century, the setting, it seems, somewhat later) — such smooth harmonies as Ghiberti wrought into the final doors, those Michelangelo thought worthy to be the gates of Paradise. Throughout the century the great Northern composers are in continual touch with this melodious soul of Italy. (fade Perla Mia) Va66) Vb66) 66) Bourges, 1195-1260, Cathedral, from south-east Same, Piers and Vaults (Sam Adams' slide); also digital Same, interior, Nave and Choir (CGB '84) Music: School of Paris, c. 1240, 2-voice Melisma, Ille, last section, (Tinayre) Lumen 32,013 Over 200 years, the Gothic architecture of the North had unfolded from the structural severity and mystical distance of 13th-century Bourges, — this theology of triune lights (with a school of Perotin melisma) — (close Ille) Va67) 67) Norman to Perpendicular, 1094-1500, spire 15th cent., Norwich (CGB '84) Same, interior, 14th cent., apse and windows, 15th cent. vault; + V detail Music: Worcester Harmony, c. 1310, from Puellare Gremium, History of Music in Sound II, RCA-V LM 6015 to foliate, through the next century, the traceried wealth of England — so Norwich choir — music sweetening from the Worcester Fragments, around 1300, (fade Puellare) to Benet, on the eve of Dunstable. Music: 68) 7/1994 John Benet(?), early 15th cent., from Sanctus "Jacet granum" Nonesuch H-71292 (fade) German, esp. 15th cent., Nave and aisle of Ulm (CGB '59) 15th Century: Early Renaissance �22 C.G. Bell V68a) V68b) Symbolic History Jorg Syrlin the Elder, 1469-74, Double: [A] Pythagoras; and [B] the Cimmerian Sibyl, from the stalls of Ulm Cathedral German 15th cent., nave to aisles, St. Georgskirche, Nördlingen, West Germany (CGB '59) Music: Paumann, c. 1450, end of Benedicite, (Tinayre) Lumen 32012 By 1450 those Gothic branchings had ripened, as here at Ulm, a columned and lighted pre-reformation hall. While the blind organist Paumann wreathed the Benedicite in triadic harmonies. (close Paumann) By the paired Rebirth of North and South, this last Gothic shares in the spatial ease of early Renaissance — 69) Apulian, c. 1160, aisle to nave, Bari Cathedral (CGB '84); + V return to Ulm interior (detail of columns and vault from 68) more than all the round-arched precursors of Italian Romanesque, from Lucca and Florence to this 12th century Cathedral of Bari in Apulia. What if they are called Protorenaissance? That proto goes centuries back, as to a solemn crypt — as far from the lightening of Ulm, 70) V70a) Brunelleschi, 1436 ff., aisle and nave of Santa Spirito, Florence (CGB '59); video: upper detail only Same, another view (CGB '84); then video returns to 70, lower detail, Aisle and Nave as from Brunelleschi's lofty liberation of the Roman Basilica from the weight of Rome. In music, Dunstable, who worked on the Continent, influenced from Italy and known there, spearheaded such 1425 changes. His "Veni Sancte Spiritus", "Come Holy Spirit", esteemed and sung through the century, gives mystical love the breath and hypnotic weaving of sensuous sound. Of the sustained Cape recording we hear only the closing section. Music: 7/1994 Dunstable, c. 1425(?), Veni Sancte Spiritus (bar 121 ff.) VLM 6016 (2) 15th Century: Early Renaissance �23 C.G. Bell 71) V71a) Symbolic History Donatello, 1411-13, St. Mark, Or San Michele, Florence Same, detail of head, new angle When Michelangelo praised Donatello's 1412 St. Mark, it was not for Roman face, nor for Gothic robe, but for sacred humanization: "It would have been impossible to have rejected the gospel if preached by such a straightforward man as this." 72) Masaccio, c. 1426, Peter and John heal the sick, Carmine, Florence (video divides to details, above and below) Masaccio's concern with earth, to show common men in the commonest alley of Florence, does not preclude but empowers a deeply religious art. Peter and John walk forward, wrapped in thought; Peter's shadow heals the sick and lame. 73) V73a) Same, detail of Peter and cripples (video works from V73) Same, face of the cripple huddled on the ground One, risen, prays; another rises; a third huddles, the uplifted face lighted around caves of mouth and eye. 74) Hubert and Jan Van Eyck, 1426-27, Mary detail, Altar of the Lamb, Ghent; first, video detail of face (close Dunstable) Over the contrast already made, of medium and style, the brothers van Eyck serve the same transformation. Everything of the world, stuff, jewels, hair, lends light and touch to the heavenly. 75) Same, God, detail, Altar of the Lamb; + V detail Here, also from the Ghent altar, is another of Cusanus' omnivoyants: If I strive in human fashion to transport you to things divine, I have found nothing better than an image which is omnivoyant... such... I call the icon of God. This picture, brethren, ye shall set up in some place... and each of you shall find, from whatsoever quarter observed, that it looks at him as if it looked at no other... 1st 76) Roger Van der Weyden, 1450-60, Deposition, Uffizi, Florence 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �24 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In the Flemish succession of mid-century, and in creative exchange with Italy, the humanization of the gospel proceeds — here Van der Weyden, from during or after his Florentine stay. 1st 77) Fra Angelico, 1439-45, Noli me Tangere, San Marco, Florence V1st 77a) Fra Angelico, c. 1440, Annunciation, San Marco, Florence In Italy too; as the powers of Masaccio fill out the forms of Gothic tenderness, the 'forties and 'fifties fruit in saintly celebration, as present as Angelico's garden where Christ greets the Magdalen. In music Ockeghem, Dufay's successor, holds an all-time summit of heavenly polyphonic weaving, the serene stretching and enhancement of Dunstable's fabric. The works of the Florentine organist Squarcialupi are lost. The Italian pieces that remain, from Romanus of 1416 to Gaffurio toward the end of the century, are not recorded. Va2nd 76) Roger Van der Weyden, c. 1430-35, Annunciation, Left Wing of the Magi Altar, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) 2nd 76) Again, Van der Weyden, Deposition, detail (video works from 1st 76) In any case, the Flemings were dominant; and there is no one, before or after, who could suspend such a web of besouled breathing as Ockeghem. Here the "Qui tollis" from the Mass: "Ecce Ancilla Dei". Music: Ockeghem, c.1470(?), Qui tollis, Mass: Ecce Ancilla Dei, 21512-1 BAS- 2nd 77) Fra Angelico, Noli me Tangere, detail, San Marco, Florence V2nd 77a) Beato Angelico, 1439-45, fresco, Coronation of the Virgin, upper detail, San Marco, Florence 78) Domenico Veneziano, c. 1450, Madonna and Saints, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59) In Veneziano the old triptych turns to a colonnaded space, in which a calm of form and pastel color 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �25 C.G. Bell 79) Symbolic History Piero della Francesca, 1463-65, Resurrection, cropped, Borgo San Sepulcro; + V detail looks to Piero della Francesca: this Resurrection of God in Olympian flesh and Robe. (Music: Quoniam) Here, with as rapt an omnivoyant as art offers, we conclude Cusanus' vision: As in a mirror, an icon, a riddle, 80) Same, Piero, head of Christ I see life eternal, which is nothing else but that blessed regard, that gaze of love which never ceases to behold.me, even the most secret places of my soul. 81) Fouquet, 1453-55, Trinity in Glory, Hours of Etienne Chevalier, Chantilly, + V detail In mid-century France, Fouquet has shown forth the rose-courts of blessing. And Cusanus: For with Thee to behold is to give life, to inflame by love's imparting, and in imparted flame, to let me drink the dew of gladness, drink and be infused with the fountain of life, copartner with Thee and thy Son in immortal bliss, 82) Memling, 1479, Baptism detail, Left Wing, St. Catharine Altar, Bruges the source of all delights, the maximum, undeprived, of every rational desire, than which a greater cannot be conceived. By 1480, in Bruges, Memling clothes the simple Coming in a fruitful ease of earth and waters. 83) V83a) Botticelli, 1481-82, Adoration of the Magi, center detail, National Gallery, Washington D.C. (CGB '60); cf. V83, same, wider view (CGB '60) Same, closer detail of Madonna and landscape (from CGB '75) At the same time in Florence, Botticelli refines the mystical to an aesthetic of starred fabrics and translucent veils. (end Ockeghem) 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �26 C.G. Bell 84) Symbolic History Jacobo della Quercia, 1425-38, "In the Sweat of thy Brow," bronze relief, doors of San Petronio, Bologna But Gothic had been stretched from the start between peace and frenzy, the peace enriching its texture, the frenzy more material in drive. By the 1430's, della Quercia's bronze doors in Bologna have passed the bequest of power to Michelangelo. 85) Double: [A] Masolino and [B] Masaccio, both c. 1425, Temptation and Expulsion, details, Brancacci Chapel, Carmine, Florence In the Brancacci chapel of the Carmine, we feel it like a Gospel command — that passage from the Gothic line and mystery of Masolino's innocent Temptation, to the tragic expulsion of Masaccio. Masolino had chosen this pupil and collaborator; yet how those quiet sinners of his Eden must have gazed across the chapel toward their nobler expulsion — "Paradise well lost!" 86) Pisanello, c. 1435, St. George and the Princess fresco, Sant' Anastasia, Verona; + V closer detail with gibbet So too in Pisanello's 1435 fresco of St. George and the Princess: with the housing of beatitude, force too knits its fabric. The attack is of realism itself, a keenness of seeing and being which arose out of Gothic (that gibbet here against the sky) — until all the Magdalens and beggar rogues of soul-levelling Christendom meet in Villon and Fat Margot: 87) Pisanello, same fresco, detail of gibbet only, two hanged men Come back, whenever you're in rut To this brothel where we hold our state. (CGB) Retournez cy, quant vous serez en ruit, En ce bordeau ou tenons nostre estat! Or, to match Pisanello's detail: I am Francois, I confess, Born in Paris, near Pontoise, 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �27 C.G. Bell Symbolic History And by six feet of hemp-grass, My neck will learn the weight of my ass. (CGB) 88) Andrea del Castagno, 1447, Last Supper, center, Convent Santa Apollonia, Florence (video shows first a closer detail from Va88, then draws a wider center from V88, of the whole) In Florence before mid century, the pastel calm of Veneziano is complemented by Castagno, here from a Last Supper. "Can you minister to a mind diseased?"; Castagno: "I will set its diseases visibly before you." Among the variegated marble panels of this room, that where Judas sits (across from Christ), traces the hell-whorls of his jealous thought. Va89) 89) Francesco Cossa (or del Cossa), c. 1470, Month of March, middle detail, Schifanoia Palace, Ferrara Same, detail of a peasant As the factual comes to parity with its faith containment, an expression is first possible (as in the Ferrara Months, by Cossa, about 1470), lean and hard as Gothic, yet already of Breughel's Renaissance earth. Dante had led the way, as in the metaphor of Inferno 24, where a peasant takes the frost for snow: ...when the hoarfrost on the ground copies the likeness of her white sister… and the peasant who needs fodder rises and looks out and sees the fields all whitened, and turning back to the house, smites his thigh... (CGB) 90) Same, March vineyard; + V detail By the time of these Cossa frescoes, such calendar observation (this March Vineyard) was the life of Mantuan (Turberville's translation, 1567): The man that earst did sowe And tillde his stonie soile, hath let a fielde his plowe And takes his ease: the wearie ground it selfe doth slumber nowe. The Shephierd having shutte his dores, and caught his cloake Keepes house: Neara eke doth sitte 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �28 C.G. Bell Symbolic History at home in smothering smoake At Chimnie nooke, and plies hir pottage Pot apace... 91) Rohan Hours, c. 1425(?), January, detail, National Library, Paris In the Rohan Hours, from about 1425, such realism had incised, within Gothic, the biting winter of Villon's Legacy: Sur le Noel, morte saison: (Kinnell) Near Christmas, the dead time When wolves live on the wind And men stick to their houses Against the frost, close by the blaze... 92) Fouquet, c. 1450, Medallion Self-Portrait, Louvre, Paris; + V detail In Fouquet's Medallion, self assumes that edged precision. No wonder the Testaments so worked on Pound and Eliot — Villon in the first (called Small) penning his bitter bequests until the ink is frozen and the candle blown out; in the second, called Great, Villon himself burnt-out: En 1'an de mon trentiesme aage — In the thirtieth year of my age, Having drunk my fill of shame... Written in the year 'sixty-one When the good king delivered me From the harsh prison of Meung... (CGB) 93) Pollaiuolo, c. 1470, Hercules and Antaeus, Uffizi, Florence I spit phlem as white as cotton, Gobs as big as tennis balls... Thanks to God and Jacques Thibault Who gave me cold water... underground... (CGB) In Florence that carborundum would hone Pollaiuolo's Hercules and Antaeus to a scalpel — 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �29 C.G. Bell 94) 94a) Symbolic History Pollaiuolo, c. 1460(?), Girl's profile, Poldi-Pezzoli, Milan; + V detail Pollaiuolo, c. 1475, Apollo and Daphne, National Gallery, London Music: Dufay, c.1440-50(?), Adieu m'amour, Cape, EMS-206 under which beauty thins to the wistful delight of the Poldi-Pezzoli girl, mostly attributed to that same anatomist Pollaiuolo. As if for all freshness and joy Dufay's "Adieu m'amour" were sounding. So the wailful brightness of Villon's best-known ballade, "des dames du temps jadis": Dictes moy ou, n'en quel pays, Est Flora la belle Rommaine... Mais ou sont les neiges d'antan? Of which Rossetti, for all his "yester-year", caught something; Where is Echo, beheld of no man, Only heard on river and mere — She whose beauty was more than human? But where are the snows of yester-year? 95) English, c. 1460, Sculptured corpse from Beckington Tomb, Cathedral, Wells (CGB '84) (fade Adieu m'amour) Villon's ballade is introduced by a description of death, sharp as those tombs where (sometimes) worms and mice crawl from the sculptured corpse — yet of strange beauty (Symons): No, I am not, as others are, Child of the angels, with a wreath Of planets or of any star. My father's dead, and lies beneath The churchyard stone: God rest his breath! Va96) 96) V96a) 7/1994 Donatello, 1455-58, Mary Magdalen, upper half, Duomo Museum, Florence (CGB '86) Same, head, another view Same, detail of hands 15th Century: Early Renaissance �30 C.G. Bell Symbolic History I know that my poor old mother (And she too knows) must come to death, And that her son must follow her... After comes the old Helmet-maker, with Peaked chin, and cheeks all waste and dead, And lips that are two skinny rags — (Swinburne) elsewhere compared with this Donatello Magdalen. Though the Magdalen might stand as well for Villon's mother in her "Prayer to our Lady": I am a woman, very old and poor; I know nothing; I cannot read at all. a97) 97) V97a) Stef. Lochner, 1440-45, Last Judgment, upper detail of saved, WallrafRichartz Museum, Köln (CGB '74) Same, detail of damned and gorilla-devil (CGB '74); while V97 uses a central detail of saved and damned (panned on the video from 98, the whole) Same, lower detail of saved soul and angel, panned from a97 Music: Dufay, c. 1450, Mass "Se la face ay pale" sancto Spiritu, (Munrow) Seraphim S-60267 from Gloria, "Cum But when I go to church, I see on the wall A painted heaven where harps and lutes are, A hell also, where damned spirits boil. One gives me happiness, the other fear. Give me the happiness, Goddess of the sky, To whom all sinners should render, without guile, Theirs and themselves in love and humble prayer — And in this faith I mean to live and die. (CGB) Va98) Vb98) 98) Same, Lechery detail from Usury and Lechery slide (CGB '74) English perpendicular Gothic 15th c., Doom Painting, c. 1475, St. Thomas Church, Salisbury (CGB '86) Lochner Last Judgment, whole (CGB '74) — Lochner's Judgment reviving for us, with the vigor of a Dufay Gloria, what was painted in all the churches of Christendom, the timeless drop, without which the action of Renaissance loses its stretch and tuning. As the Helmetress says of earth's joy: 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �31 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Que m'en reste il? Honte et pechié. (close Gloria) For 1st 99) Donatello, 1445-48, Pieta, bronze relief, Sant' Antonio, Padua; which video prefaces with 2nd 99, Donatello, Padova Crucifix, upper half In Donatello's Christ, in Villon's Everyman-self, the rising tragic twist is of the enobled, but mortal frame (Symonds): Whoever dies, dies with much pain; For when his wind and breath are sped, His gall breaks on his heart, and then He sweats, God knows that sweat of men! (No need to ask how God knows.) Son fiel se creve sur son cuer, Puis sue, Dieu scet quelle sueur! Significant for the whole Pascalian reversal of Promethean Renaissance, that Donatello, spearhead of pagan recovery and sensuous enfleshment, should also have led in the break to penitential force. From his Padua altar, 1st 100) Mantegna, c. 1490-95, foreshortened Dead Christ, Brera, Milan the Passion whirl spreads and mounts through Mantegna, from the early frescoes to this foreshortened Dead Christ. And in music too the stress of the humanist wedge driven into Gothic swells toward the late century and Reformation. Curious, that where we invoked Ockeghem, supposed canon-tormenter, for floating ease, we call on Obrecht, supposed softener, for the fevered counter-pole. 2nd 99) Music: Donatello, 1444, bronze Crucifix, upper half, Sant'Antonio, Padova; while video takes a closer detail Obrecht, c.1480-90(?), 3rd Kyrie, Missa Fortuna Desperata, Decca DL 79413 2nd 100) Again, Mantegna, Dead Christ, cropped 101) Botticelli, 1495, Deposition, Poldi-Pezzoli Museum, Milan; + V details 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �32 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Such the cry of contrition which shook Botticelli and burned Savonarolla. 102) Cosimo Tura, 1474, Pieta from the Roverella Polyptych, Louvre, Paris; + V detail (close Kyrie) And already by the '70's, in the Ferrara from which Savonarolla would move to Florence, Cosimo Tura had forged, from Gothic and Donatello, an anticipation of Mannerist and Baroque, strange, as in later literature, Gongora and Donne. 103) Antonella da Messina, 1475, Crucifixion, Beaux Arts, Brussels; with video details (cf. V103a) Music: Obrecht, c.1480-90(?), 2nd Agnus, Missa Fortuna Desperata, Decca DL 79413 Yet through the same years, Antonella da Messina, absorbing into Sicilian postGothic the space of Florence, with the nature and oil techniques of Flanders, was preparing (even in this Crucifixion) for the rich calm of Venetian high Renaissance. While Northern composers (here from the Agnus of the same Obrecht Mass) have steeped their counterpoint (fade Obrecht) in the chordal expressiveness of Italy: Music: Italian Frottola, c. 1490(?), from Rusticus, ut asinum..., AS 77 here a peasant's lament for his dead donkey (and had those humanists heard that early Christians vere rumored to have worshipped a crucified ass?) (fade Rusticus) 104) 104A) 104B) Quadruple: used in old 80 slide show, and now in digital; it combines 104A and 104B as listed below. From these, the video opens with singles of the Donatello (Va104), and of the Angelico (from Vc104) Double: {A} Donatello 1415-16, St. George, head, Bargello, Florence; and {B} Michelangelo 1501-04, David, head, Accademia, Florence Double: {A} Fra Angelico 1434?, Angel of Annunciation, Magi Panel, San Marco, Florence; and {B} Botticelli 1501, Mary from Mystical Nativity, National Gallery, London If the style-work of the 15th century is the articulation of humanist islands within the eddying continuance of Medieval faith, it is in Florence that the unconscious change 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �33 C.G. Bell Symbolic History (drop added to drop until crystallization nears) most dramatically presses toward conscious reordering. There the precursive souls, from Donatello (St. George, 1415) to Michelangelo (David, 1501-4), magnify the reasoned assertion of power. While others, from Angelico (1430) to Botticelli (1500) refine the spirit and line of Gothic, but with such ripening of the sensuous and aesthetic, as involves them in the same vortex. 105) Double: [A] Mantegna (above), c. 1468, Triumph of Silenus, British Museum, London (Engraving); and [B] Donatello (below), 1455-57, Bacchic Revel, base of Judith, Piazza della Signoria, Florence; first, video singles Music: Josquin, before 1500(?), from El Grillo, New York Pro Musica, Decca DL 79435 The polarity, working to climax, had shown itself in Donatello. On the pagan side — with Josquin's frottole, "El Grillo" — come Lorenzo de Medici's satyrs and nymphs in Bacchic dance: Or da Bacco riscaldati, Ballon, saltan tuttavia — taking up the levity of Donatello's sportive relief (below) — no doubt seen by Mantegna on his 1466 Florentine visit (compare his Triumph of Silenus, above). (fade El Grillo) 106) Donatello, 1455-57, Judith and Holofernes, bronze, Piazza del Signoria, Florence; with video details (first, below; then of Holofernes) Yet Donatello's carousing amorini Music: Josquin des Pres, close of Mass, Ave Maris Stella, Decca DL 79435 adorn the base of his most puzzling late bronze, Judith hacking off the head of Holofernes. That harrier of Israel dies drunk. The cushions beneath him seem spouting wine skins. So the Bacchantes in Poliziano's pioneer Opera (Isaac's music lost) display the head of deviant Orpheus: "Evoé Bacco, Bacco". Over all sex-death puzzles of this bronze pillar of flesh, one thing is clear, that the tension of the century and of Donatello himself, between pagan delight and penitential seizure, 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �34 C.G. Bell Symbolic History 107) Same, upper detail of Judith; video uses V107 (same, different framing) V107a) Same, another view, upper detail only has been spanned in a prophetic monument. But Josquin too worked over that divide: against the Grillo, and from the same Petrucci record, his Mass, Ave Maris Stella, raises the plea to the Lamb of God to a last strident cry. (close Josquin) Such Savonarolla's "Oimè": All Italy has asked the Judgment of war and plague... Return to Jesus Christ, his Mother and meek Spouse; Quit the inveterate vice of your godless ways. (CGB) 108) Botticelli, 1474, Adoration of the Magi, Uffizi, Florence (cf V108, CGB '59); + four video details (three from V108a and V108b) No one lived both myths, pagan and Christian, more poignantly than Botticelli. His 1475 Medicean Adoration of the Magi assumes the bel viver of his master, Lippi. Old Cosimo kneels to the child; in front, his son Piero (both dead by that time) faces the radiant Giuliano, soon to be murdered in the Pazzi conspiracy. Far right, looking out, we cannot miss the proud painter, Alessandro. Far left, Lorenzo, citizen-ruler holds court. Poliziano, prodigy of Renaissance poetry, fawns on him — a caress even Lorenzo's horse toothfully resents. (Digital adds 108c, Botticelli's Giuliano — see Face and Landscape 34 or 34a; then 108d, central detail of Venus from the Spring) Perhaps a year after this painting, Giuliano's love for Simonetta (Vespucci by marriage) would come to the climax of the January 1476 tournament, over which he, victor, would crown her queen. On April 26th of the same year, Simonetta's death of consumption ranked their love with Petrarch's and Dante's. On the second anniversary of her death, Giuliano's assassination turned it to myth. As Poliziano had written (for Giuliano): She seemed Minerva in act, Venus in face... a109) 7/1994 Botticelli, 1478, Primavera (Spring), whole, Uffizi, Florence; + V detail (using Va109 center) 15th Century: Early Renaissance �35 C.G. Bell 109) Symbolic History Same, Botticelli Primavera, upper left quadrant; + V detail: (to which add close-up of the little cloud, from V109a) or in La Giostra: Candida e ella, e candida la vesta, Ma pur di rose e fior dipinta e d'erba... In Botticelli's Primavera, realm of that Simonetta Venus, Mercury with his wand disperses gathering clouds. How Dante's simultaneous levels of literal, political, moral and anagogical meaning, might reconcile our critics: — If Simonetta comes to this grove through the dispersed cloud of death, it remains Tuscan elysium, from which Good Counsel would banish clouds to ensue. As Striggio would write for Monteverdi's Orfeo more than a century later: "Deh, sommi Dei,/ Non torcete da noi benigno il guardo." 110) Botticelli, c. 1842, Pallas and the Centaur, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59; video shows upper half only So with Botticelli's Pallas and the Centaur: the contention of political or moral ignores the same Dante-to-Can-Grande. No doubt the delivery of Reason from man-beast is guided by Minerva; yet her dress, adorned with the Medici emblem, surely hints at Lorenzo and some feat of diplomatic control. 111) Botticelli, 1483(?), Venus and Mars, National Gallery, London; + V detail Is the control more threatened in this Mars and Venus of perhaps a year later? It is cheerful when Venus as Humanitas prevails over Mars as discord. So at Alexander's marriage (Lucian) cupids played with his armor. But this loved-out Giuliano-Florence is in jeopardy. He sleeps, while those lusty satyrs with the lance stir up a hornet's nest. That the pun on Vespe (wasp) suggests the patronage of Simonetta's Vespucci, can only complement the danger, which, as in Biblical prophecy, is both past and future. 112) 7/1994 Botticelli ,1490, Head of St. John from Madonna of San Barnabas, Uffizi, Florence 15th Century: Early Renaissance �36 C.G. Bell Symbolic History By 1490, in the head of St. John from the Barnabas altar, Botticelli wakes to the fullness-of-time being announced by Savonarolla in his San Marco sermons of that year: The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord." 113) Botticelli, c. 1494-95, Calumny of Apelles, Uffizi, Florence; + V details (using V113, Uffizi slide?) By the old view, Botticelli's reconstitution (c.1495) of Apelles' Calumny, described by Lucian — an innocent man slandered before a Midas-eared king and dragged to judgment, with the blackrobed penitence to follow, and the final pure revelation of naked truth — was aimed, on the political level, at the papal censure of Savonarolla: Botticelli (here his late works confirm Vasari) shaken by those Apocalyptic sermons. A strange caution, to discredit that, while making an issue of this hall, carved with pagan and Christian subjects — as if the painter had not devoted those years to reading and illustrating Dante, whose Purgatory reliefs enforce, by just such polarity, the cleansing of politics and spirit. 114) Double: Botticelli 1492-97, Dante drawings, {A} Inferno 18 and {B} Paradiso 6, E. & W. Berlin (video singles only; see file) Perhaps Botticelli bore his share of Calumny as well: as in Vasari's story: "Without any education, and scarce knowing how to read, he writes a commentary on Dante!" But who else pursued almost to the point of starving, soul's ascent from the rank grovelling of the Bad Ditches, to the flame-geometry of Beatrice's Empyrean? In soul as in paint, where was the link, but in Botticelli, to Leonardo and Michelangelo? 115) Piero della Francesca, c. 1455, Bearing the Sacred Wood, Frescoes of the Legend of the Cross, San Francesco, Arezzo (video: detail only) From mid-century (as under the pastel calm of Piero della Francesca — here one of the Arezzo frescoes, where a laborer carrying the timber destined, centuries after, for the true cross, becomes a mystic prototype of Christ) 116) 7/1994 Piero della Francesco, 1465(?), portraits of Federigo de Montefeltro and Battista Sforza, Duke and Duchess of Urbino, Uffizi, Florence 15th Century: Early Renaissance �37 C.G. Bell Symbolic History what was heightening force and counterforce was the emergence of the new man (new woman) — the harmonious space of Piero's religious art complemented by the transforming boldness of his portrayed patron, Federigo de Montefeltro of Urbino, here with his Sforza wife. 117) Double: {A} Hugo v.d. Goes, c. 1471(?), head from Magi Adoration, BerlinDahlem; and {B} Mantegna, 1480, head of archer from St. Sebastian, Louvre, Paris As the century advances, such assertion swells under the visible interpenetration of Flemish realism and the revived antiquity of Italy — (left) one of the Magi from a Hugo van der Goes altar, about 1470, in the tradition of van Eyck and van der Weyden, though already humanized from the South; and (right) ten years later, absorbing and Romanizing that Flemish skill, this archer from Mantegna's St. Sebastian. 118) Double: {A} Fr. Laurano, c. 1470, Battista Sforza, Bargello, Florence; and {B} Pollaiuolo, c. 1475, Giuliano da Medici, Bargello, Florence (with video singles: B, then A) In Florence, two portraits, from 1470 and '75, by Laurano and Pollaiuolo, of a Sforza daughter and a Medici son, juxtaposed, enact Renaissance drama. But what Machiavelli would concentrate in the 1518 Mandragola, had been voiced before 1500 and in Spain, in the tragi-comedy of the high-born Melibea and her seduction by the somewhat lower Calisto, with the help of the old bawd Celestina. Calisto's passion: If God would give me, for the sight of you, a seat among his saints in heaven, I would not take it; his idolatry when asked "Are you a Christian?" I am a Melibean. I acknowledge no other deity in heaven while she remains on earth; Melibea's proud purity: Vete, vete de ahí, torpe — Go, wretch; I cannot tolerate one who would plant in me the delights of illicit love; her vulnerability to Celestina, that hag "who could move stones to lechery by her art" — shape tragedy: 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �38 C.G. Bell 119) Symbolic History Double: French Renaissance, c. 1455, Figures from the House of Jacques Coeur, Bourges; first, V details of the singles: Va119 and Vb119 (CGB '81) "My daughter, why have you left me to despair, weeping and lonely in this vale of tears?" — "¿Por qué me dejaste triste y solo in hac lachrymarum valle?" In France, with Jacques Coeur, merchant-prince of Bourges — his motto "A vaillans coeurs, riens impossible" — Renaissance assertion, battling Medieval Fortune and the brittle world, had sowed that tragic field. Founder of French trade with the Levant, rescuer of the national currency, who financed Charles VII's wars and fought at his side to oust the English from Normandy, who built chapels and established colleges — Coeur, betrayed by the King and accused without pretext of plotting and poisoning, was tried by his enemies, fined what might now be a hundred million dollars, and thrown into prison, his goods divided among the king's favorites. After five years he escaped, but died of sickness as he led a fleet against the Turk for the relief of Rhodes. At the windows of his Bourges house, these carved servants, man and maid, look out for their master's return. 120) Double: {A} G. da Milano, 1365, Birth of the Virgin, Santa Croce, Florence; and {B} Ghirlandaio, 1486-90, Birth of St. John the Baptist, Santa Maria Novella, Florence; alternating with video singles, or details (V120A and V120B) Music: Osw. v. Wolkenstein, from 14th-cent. Italian, Ave Maria (instr.) ARC-3033 Measure in Florence that advance of earthly assurance — here two sacred births: (below) of the Virgin, by Giovanni da Milano, later 14th century — with von Wolkenstein's transcription of Italian Ars Nova; (fade v. Wolkenstein) Music: 7/1994 H. Isaac, pub. 1506, Missa la Spagna, Agnus Dei, Seraphim SIC 6104 15th Century: Early Renaissance �39 C.G. Bell Symbolic History (above) Ghirlandaio's 149O Birth of St. John the Baptist — with Isaac's Mass formed of Spanish dances — attuned to this coffered room, festive with robed ladies, where a fruitbearing girl billowing in, seems almost to have arrived from Magna Graecia. 121) 121a) Ghirlandaio, 1486-90, Visitation fresco, central section, Santa Maria Novella, Florence Same, upper detail It is what this outdoor scene from Ghirlandaio's same Santa Maria Novella frescoes perfects: this meeting of Elizabeth and Mary by a walled piazzale across the Arno — those heady youths leaning over, where something like the Old Palace towers from below. 122) Memling, 1489, Reliquary of St. Ursula, view of one side, St. John's Hospital, Bruges; + V detail In Bruges that late-century enrichment peaks to the gold-housed and jewel-bright miniatures of Memling's Reliquary of St. Ursula — Christian life and martyrdom (as in Isaac's dancing Agnus Dei) aglow with delight. (end lst Agnus) 123) Memling, 1489, Same, 1st scene, Arrival in Cologne (video: details only, below and above) Music: Isaac, 1484, reset c.1500(?), Isbruck, ich muss dich lassen, Syntagma SIC-6052 Memling's individual scenes, this Arrival in Cologne (with the death-annunciation in the upper chamber) are as feelingly suspended between the poignance of the story and the gladness of earth, as Isaac's homophonic farewell to Innsbruck: "Isbruck, ich muss dich lassen". 124) Pinturicchio, 1503-08, Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini frescoes, East Wall Library, Duomo, Siena (CGB '86) In Italian magnification of Flemish precision, Memling's reliquary sequence expands to the architectural and perspectival vistas with which Pinturicchio, soon after 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �40 C.G. Bell Symbolic History 1500, muralled the Sienese Cathedral library — such tour-de-force panoramas (from the life of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, left, the a125) 125) Same, Aeneas Journey to Basel, fresco; + V detail of travellers (from Va125) Same, Pinturicchio, Journey, upper part, detail of storm Journey to Basel, with its background of harbor and storm) as if the "open road" of Isaac's songs — (fade Isbruck) Music: Isaac, before 1500(?), from Tmeiskin was jonck, I,5,B2b AS (33RPM) "Glück ist in allen Gassen"; with this refrain from his Flemish "Tmeiskin was jonck" — (refrain and fade) were spun quod libet to a glad Missa Carminum. Music: 126) Isaac, c. 1506(?), Missa Carminum, 2nd Hosannah, MHS 1777 (end Hosannah) Luca Signorelli, 1499-1504, Resurrection of the Dead etc., Duomo, Orvieto (CGB '84); + V detail Music: Josquin des Pres, pub.1519, from Miserere, AS 107(A) Yet here as earlier, the claim of earth advances an always more physical doom. So, with Pinturicchio, comes an Umbrian complement, Signorelli — his masterpiece the Apocalypse fresoces at Orvieto — this Resurrection of the Dead. It is a mood to which Josquin continually returns: "Miserere!" (fade Miserere) 127) Gutenburg Bible, c. 1454, Illuminated Page, Proverbs, New York Public Library (video shows first two details, inserting between them: V127a) 19th century color engraving of the 1450 event; so returns to 127, 2nd detail, then whole) Why is this manuscript so mechanical, its illuminations so dull? The question is unfair, since this landmark of progress is the Gutenberg Bible, printed in German Mainz about 1454. It is mechanical because it was set from moveable type and could be reproduced toward a limit which in our time pumps books on and off the cartel shelves 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �41 C.G. Bell Symbolic History like the tasteless apples of a supermarket. Dull in illumination because it no doubt employed what Adam Smith would acclaim as the time-saving principle of division of labor. The multiplied power of Renaissance was to rest on the output of the press; but it will remind us how history dismantles one wall to build another that (as in Greece, bardic memory disappeared with the written word) the sacred and aristocratic glory of the parchment manuscript could only go under in Europe's forward rush. a128) Verrochio and Leonardo, 1472-75, Annunciation, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59); + V detail Vb128) Verrochio and Leonardo, c. 1473, Baptism of Christ, Uffizi, Florence; close detail: head of the Leonardo angel to the left 128) Same: Baptism of Christ, whole, (video shows center spread only) Music: Pierre de la Rue c.1500?, Sanctus from the Missa Ave sanctissima Maria, (Munrow) Seraphim SIC 6104 Meanwhile, a genius was growing up in Medici Florence who would bring Renaissance thought, science and art to such a harmony as in the spacings of de la Rue's six voice Sanctus. The old account of Leonardo as Verrocchio's apprentice painting a beautiful angel (left) in the master's Baptism (c. 1473?) has been confirmed by Bode's study of the oil glazes — 129) Same, Baptism, detail of Angels and Landscape (which video draws from 128) which, with X-ray analysis, has also given the landscape above to Leonardo. In this luminous spread of water under rocks, the boy seems to have envisaged what would become the geology of his notebooks: 130) Same, Landscape detail (or V130) 130a) Leonardo, c. 1505, Mona Lisa, detail, Louvre, Paris V130b) Leonardo, 1508-10, from Virgin and Child with St. Anne, detail with background, Louvre, Paris I perceive that the surface of the earth was from of old entirely filled up and covered over in its level plains by the salt waters, and that the mountains, the bones of the earth, with their wide bases, penetrated and towered up amid the air, covered over with much high-lying soil. Subsequently incessant rains have... stripped bare part of the lofty summits... so that the rock finds itself exposed to the air... And the 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �42 C.G. Bell Symbolic History earth from the slopes and mountains has raised the floors of the seas... and caused the plain to be uncovered... Cusanus "privative infinity" sheds privation, becoming almost the cosmos "Won from the void and formless infinite". (cut de la Rue after "Sabaoth") 131) 131a) Leonardo, 1513-16, John the Baptist as Smiling Precursor, Louvre, Paris; + V detail Leonardo, c. 1514, Self, red chalk, Library, Turin (video, detail only) As the wisdom of age had touched the boy, child-promise smiles on the old Leonardo — this Louvre St. John as Precursor — with Pico della Mirandola: Let a certain holy ambition invade the mind so that we may not be content with mean things but may aspire to the highest things and strive with all our force to attain them: for if we will to, we can...He who is a seraph, that is, a lover, is in God; and more God is in him, and God and he are one. Though the smile is ambiguous in Leonardo's Notebooks: Behold now the hope and desire of going back to one's own country or returning to primal chaos... of the man who looks forward to each new spring... and does not perceive he is longing for his dissolution... as elements... imprisoned...long for the source... What has the Precursor precursed? a132) Leonardo, c. 1483 ff., Great Crossbow on Carriage, Ambrosian Library, Milan 132) Leonardo, 1483 ff., Scythed car and armored tank, British Museum, London V132a) Leonardo, 1483 ff., Bombard with shrapnel, Ambrosian Lihrary, Milan It would be as in Shelley: Although a subtler sphinx renew Riddles of death Thebes never knew. Had not most of the 1482 letter to Sforza promised instruments of war: 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �43 C.G. Bell Symbolic History I have plans for destroying every fortress...not founded upon rock... for making cannon... engines for attack or defence... ships which can resist the fire of cannon... armoured cars... which will enter the serried ranks of the enemy with their artillery... and behind these the infantry will be able to follow without opposition... Talents applied, more than his art, in the service of Il Moro and Cesare Borgia — that Caesar, Machiavelli also would have enabled. In the floating Utopia of High Renaissance, the modern world, with its explosive potentialities, is born. 133) Dürer, "1500," Self as Christ, Alte Pinakothek, Munich; with V details So with person. In this Dürer, inscribed 1500, Cusanus' omnivoyant God-man becomes the deepest reflection of the mirrored self. As Eckhart had said in a passage that would stir Luther: "God has become man in order that I may become God." Was that not the call of the Luther Bible: "zu der herrlichen Freiheit der Kinder Gottes"? The first history of music on records (the Parlophone "2000 Years") paired, with the Dufay Trumpet Gloria already heard, Josquin's Et Incarnatus from the Missa Pange Lingua — "and was made man." Music: Josquin des Pres, c.1500-10(?), Et Incarnatus, close, Parl. R-1019 Thus — Berlin chorus and all — the Western Incarnation takes up the cross of the world. 134) Michelangelo, 1536-41, Last Judgment, detail of Trumpeting Angels, Sistine Chapel, Rome; first, video detail Music: Cabezon, c. 1540-50, opening, Tiento de 4 Tono, Videro, GSC52 A Michelangelo, in the storm to follow ("Tuba mirum spargens sonum"), felt also in the Tientos of Cabezon, must have dreamed sometimes of the Lorenzo de' Medici Florence of his youth. (fade Cabezon) 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �44 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Va135) Botticelli 1482, Birth of Venus, Uffizi, Florence (CGB '59); detail of Venus, upper half from slide 136 135) Same, whole picture (which video crops) Music: Isaac, c. 1485(?), Helas, 3-v, viols (Cape), AS-43 There Botticelli had brought Gothic line to an ultimate clarity of nostalgia in joy — leaves, waves, blown roses, the pure Platonic nude — as Poliziano had described in La Giostra, that unfinished romance which carries in germ the whole future of paganizing poetry and art: A woman born of the waves, lovesome and free In every act, in her face more than human, Wafted by lively zephyrs to the shore Upon a shell, while heaven smiles upon her... (CGB) 136) Same, figure of Venus (CGB '59); here video takes from 135 Venus and the figure to our right) You would have sworn the goddess came from the wave, Gathering with her right hand her golden hair, The other lifted, the sweet fruit to save From greedy spoil; and as she touched the shore With sacred feet, seen herbs and flowers pave The barren strand... (CGB) 137) 138) Same, detail of figure to the right (CGB '59) Same, detail of figures to the left (CGB '59); to which video adds Venus' face (again from 136), with a return to 135, the whole picture ...and marked with what light air Three nymphs accost her and her coming hail And close invest her in a starry veil. (CGB) Michelangelo could have remembered the music too, Isaac — not the brooding Lamentation but ballades sighed by the viols, as wistfully glad as the receding curves of Botticelli's shore. In that backward looking, even Michelangelo, or whoever, after him, has been most partisan in the embattled grandeur of Promethean consciousness, might drop, like 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance �45 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Milton's Adam and Eve, "som natural tears." Isaac Helas) 139) (fade Flemish, c. 1460-70, Virgin and Child with Mary of Burgundy, detail, Hours of Charles the Bold, National Library, Vienna (Landsburg), (video ranges from whole over various details) Since part of every soul must yearn (like the imprisoned elements) for a naive anonymous grace — here from Mary of Burgundy's Book of Hours, the daily reading in that same book become an allegorical window. Such quiet pre-selfhood lightens an English wedding fragment from the time: The maidens came When I was in my mother's bower; I had all that I would. The bailey beareth the bell away; The lily, the rose, the rose I lay. 140) Same, Mary of Burgundy, whole (while video continues with details) The silver is white, red is the gold; The robes they lay in fold. The bailey beareth the bell away; The lily, the rose, the rose I lay. And through the glass window shines the sun. How should I love, and I so young? The bailey beareth the bell away; The lily, the lily, the rose I lay. — As frail, as bright, as the unmatched maiden of the other poem: ...As dew in Aprille That falleth on the spray. Moder and maiden Was never non but sche; Well may swich a lady Godes moder be. 7/1994 15th Century: Early Renaissance � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 46 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 15th Century : Early Renaissance, Symbolic History, Part 14 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 14 of the Symbolic History Series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_14_15th_Century--Early_Renaissance Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/fad610448a734f3bff5cd9a8d9fc85a5.pdf c11856417131273e34feb7d7871d423a PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 19. 1600: The Tragic Divide CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 May 1994 Last Revised June 1996 �Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 19. 1600: The Tragic Divide (Shakespeare) a1) Michelangelo 1536-41, The Last Judgment, detail, Sistine Chapel, Vatican, Rome For 1st 1) Cornelis van Haarlem, by 1588 (copy?), two followers of Cadmus devoured bv a dragon, Ovid Metamorphoses, III 1-151, National Gallery, London It is current to think of history as made by those who enact it; but enacted, it builds a landscape of the causal must-be: "there is special providence in the fall of a sparrow. If it be now, 'tis not to come." In that topology of spirit, there are watersheds and mountain divides — none more charged, "twixt...extremes of passion," than that through which the arts and thought, the very space and humanity of the West, passed around the century mark of 1600. That range, which is the apocalyptic inturning of Renaissance pride and power, For 1st 2) El Greco 1608-14, view and map of Toledo, detail, Museum, Toledo El Greco scaled in painting, Giordano Bruno in flaming act and word: "He who in himself sees all things, is all things." In poetry, the radical violence of Marino, Gongora, de Sponde and Donne finds its height and depth For 1st 3 and 2nd 2) El Greco c. 1610?, view of Toledo, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City (video: detail only) in the storm and madness of Shakespeare's King Lear: 5/1994 1600: The Tragic Divide 1 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Let the great gods That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads Find out their enemies now. Tremble thou wretch, That hast within thee undivulged crimes, Unwhipped of justice. Hide thee, thou bloody hand; Thou perjured, and thou simular of virtue That art incestuous. Caitiff, to pieces shake, That under covert and convenient seeming Has practiced man's life. 2nd 1) 3rd 2) 2nd 3) Music: El Greco 1610-14, St. John's Vision: the Fifth Seal, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City (CGB '74); first, video detail Same, close detail of figures, center (CGB ‘74) Same, of figures to the right (CGB '74) Gesualdo 1611, Aestimatus sum, opening. (Craft) Col. Y 32886 Close pent-up guilts Rive your concealing continents, and cry These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man More sinned against, than sinning... In music. the chromatic venture is at its peak in Gesualdo da Venosa — here from the 1611 Responsories. (on "liber") Va4) Same, Vision (CGB '74; upper spread of 2nd 1) 4) El Greco, 1605, Adoration of the Shepherds, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City 4a) El Greco, 1612-14, Adoration of the Shepherds, Predo, Madrid; copy in Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City (fade Gesualdo) In El Greco after 1600, Apocalypse and Nativity stir the same frenzy. So in Lear the comic and tragic are fused and transcended. With Lear going mad: "Hast thou given all to thy two daughters? and art thou come to this?" Edgar pretending to be mad: "This is the foul fiend Flibertigibbet: he begins at curfew and walks till the first cock"; the Fool clowning like a madman: "Prithee nuncle. be contented; 'tis a naughty night to swim in" — we are caught in the delirium of a chromatic capriccio, where sorrows lighten with electrical play. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 2 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History 5) French, Tapestry, c. 1510, Sight, from The Lady and the Unicorn, Cluny, Paris; + V detail V5a) Same, from Lady and Unicorn Tapestries, Hearing (video: detail only) In that crucible of transformations the dreaming thin idealism of the Gothic past is consumed — the 1500 poignance of The Lady and the Unicorn, with de la Rue's "Incessantly my poor heart laments": Music: a6) 6) Pierre de la Rue, c. 1510(?), Incessament mon povre cueur lamente, (Cape) EMS 213 Poussin, c. 1628, Inspiration of the Poet, right detail, Louvre, Paris Same, whole (video takes these from a lighter slide, V6) and is reborn in the spatial earth and human confidence of the Baroque: Music: Louis Couperin 1650-60(?) from Chaconne, Suite in D, Leonhardt, VICS-1370 Louis Couperin's chordal celebration of our mastery — like Rubens, like this Poussin, pride made art, art ripened into pride. The deities praised in Cymbeline are temporally responsive, temporally benign: Laud we the gods, And let our crooked smokes climb to their nostrils From our blessed altars. Publish we this peace To all our subjects... a7) b7) c7) 7) (fade Couperin) S. Vouet Tapestry, 1627, Finding of Moses, Louvre, Paris; + V detail Arras Tapestry, c. 1430, Offering of the Heart, Cluny, Paris Again a7, Vouet Moses (video: detail only) Double: [A] Arras Heart, b7; and [B] detail of Vouet Moses, a7 Music: Dowland, 1600-04, Lachrimae Antiquae pavan, viols and lute, VICS-1338 It is the contrast I experienced long ago at a tapestry exhibit in the Metropolitan, where, standing at the portal of two rooms — in one the dreaming flatness of late Gothic June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 3 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History (this most refined allegory of The Offering of the Heart), in the other the Cartesian vaunts of Baroque (this 1627 Finding of Moses, designed by Vouet and woven in the preGobelin factories of the Louvre) — I thought of Shakespeare (with the musical glory he invokes, this Dowland) a bridge over that style-gap, as between two separate civilizations, though indeed they were one; the grandchildren of the first manor could actually have been working in the second. (fade Dowland) 8) 8a) 8b) English, c. 1590(?), Elizabeth I, "Ditchley Portrait," National Portrait Gallery, London; + V detail Jacobean, 1607-11 ff., Robert Lyminge (for Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury), The Library, Hatfield House, Hertfordshire Again 8, Elizabeth I (video: detail only, from 8) So Elizabeth stands on her island between the Gothic flatness and the opulence to follow — This... demi-paradise... This precious stone set in the silver sea... Against the envy of less happier lands... The Armada cloud is at her back, before her the sunlit calm of Good Hope, which the late plays wrest from storm and ignorance, "these surges/ Which wash both heaven and hell." Thus Bacon in the New Atlantis: The end of our foundation is the knowledge of causes... and the enlarging of the bounds of human empire, to the effecting of all things possible. Though the pictorial flatness reminds us how far the Medieval stars still ruled over Shakespeare's nativity. 9) Elizabethan, late 16th cent., Sheldon Tapestry, rural pleasures (video: two details only, one from V9a) His early songs, Sheldon tapestries, the plaintive turns of lute and virginals (Farnaby's "Dreame," "His Rest") carry the inconsequent bright awakening through the century: Music: June 1996 Giles Farnaby, c. 1590(?), "His Dreame," (Dolmetsch) Col 5713 1600: The Tragic Divide 4 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History When daisies pied, and violets blue, And lady-smocks all silver-white, And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue, Do paint the meadows with delight, The cuckoo then on every tree Mocks married men, for thus sings he, Cuckoo. Cuckoo, cuckoo. O word of fear, Unpleasing to a married ear. a10) 10) 10a) (cut Farnaby) Rubens, c. 1608(?), Samson and Delilah, National Gallery, London (video: detail only) Rubens, c. 1608, Mulay Ahmad, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; first, V detail Tintoretto, 1579-81, Temptation of Christ, Sala Grande, Scuola di San Rocco, Venice Music: T. Tomkins, published 1622, from "When David Heard," Odyssey 32 16 0171 But Shakespeare died in the volitional grandeur he helped to form — as of Tomkins' Absalom or of this Mulay Ahmad painted by Rubens five years after Othello had dignified his own crime and self-punishment: (fade Tomkins) It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul — Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars — It is the cause... And say besides, that in Aleppo once, Where a malignant and a turbaned Turk Beat a Venetian and traduced the state, I took by th' throat the circumcised dog, And smote him — thus. But such human power still walks the symbolic stage, as in old moralities, between a star-fretted heaven and the cellar traps of hell. The expanded Renaissance earth al1) Giselbertus, 1130-40, detail of Weighing of Souls from the Last Judgment, Cathedral of Autun, Saone-et-Loire June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 5 �C.G. Bell b11) 11) Symbolic History Hans Reichle, 1602-07, Lucifer detail, bronze St. Michaels' Group, façade of Zeughaus, Augsburg French Romanesque, c. 1075, Soul between Devil and Angel, St. Benoit sur Loire reels under the Dark Age battle. It is that demi-devil Iago, the negation of Jahwe's "I am that I am," who has so ensnared Othello, body and soul, that he cries for the lash of fire: Whip me ye devils From the possession of this heavenly sight... On the same "bank and shoal of time" where flights of angels are to sing the sweet Prince, Hamlet, to his rest, Lady Macbeth, summoning spirits to take her milk for gall, goads her tempted thane to "jump the life to come." Banquo: The instruments of darkness tell us truths, Win us with honest trifles, to betray 's In deepest consequence. From the earliest carvings of Romanesque, 12) 12a) Hieronymus Bosch, 1500-02, Good and Evil Angels, detail of the Haywain, Prado, Madrid; + V closer details Same, entire Triptych (video: center panel only, from V12a) to 1500 Bosch and beyond, the reappearing pair of Good Angel and Bad from the scaffold of God and the scaffolds of World, Flesh, and Belial attend Mankind in The Castle of Perseverance. Even Marlowe's Faustus sits in his study between the same prompters: Good: Faustus, repent, yet God wil pitty thee... and the Evill: Ay, but Faustus never shal repent. In Shakespeare the Medieval ground lies most exposed in the early Histories — Hastings: June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 6 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History O momentary grace of mortal men, Which we more hunt for than the grace of God! Who builds his hope in air of your good looks Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast. Ready, with every nod to tumble down Into the fatal bowels of the deep. 13) El Greco, 1578, Adoration of the Holy Name, The Escorial, Spain 13a) Same, detail lower right (while video shows from 13: first, upper half, then two lower details, then the whole); 13a is from El Grecol's Sketch, National Gal.lery, London. Music: Pomponio Nenna, c. 1610(?), Tenebrae, Responsoria, Nonesuch H-71277 In that ghostly forehall to the Day of Wrath (chromatic now with all Pomponio Nenna shared with Gesualdo), El Greco's Philip II (though cushioned) prays to the Holy Name, over the Leviathan mouth of hell. Mad Tom: Nero is an angler in the lake of darkness. Pray, innocent, and beware the foul fiend. For both Lear and Gloucester the turning point is prayer: Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are... ...I have ta'en Too little care of this! and: Heavens, deal so still, Let the superfluous and lust-dieted man ...feel your power quickly. So distribution should undo excess, And each man have enough. Charity itself become Utopian! 14) 14a) El Greco, c. 1610, Laocoön, National Gallery, Washington D.C. (CGB '75); + V upper left detail Same, Laocoön, center detail (CGB '75); video returns first to 14 June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 7 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Under a conscious pagan surface of plural gods and daemonic nature — (skip in Nenna to "Exclamans") As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport — and far transcending the opposite tragic truth, the wheel of retributive justice — The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices Make instruments to plague us — Lear more than any other play builds a Christian mystery of love out of humbled pride: Men must endure Their going hence, even as their coming hither; Ripeness is all. From the same time, El Greco's Laocoön turns the Homeric fable and recovered Hellenistic carving to a sacred involvement of the human family in the toils of the godsnake. 15) Same, closer detail of Laocoön (CGB '75); with video details (also from V15a and 14) Gloucester: Let me kiss that hand — Lear: Let me wipe it first, it smells of mortality. But can El Greco's fevered art rise with Lear through Christ and the woman taken in adultery: Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand; Why dost thou lash that whore? to the old king's waking in Cordelia's care?: (close Nenna) Do not laugh at me, For as I am a man, I think this lady To be my child Cordelia... Pray you now, Forget and forgive; I am old and foolish. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 8 �C.G. Bell 16) 16a) Symbolic History Jacob de Gehyn II, 1603, Devil Sowing Tares, pen and ink, Staatl. Mus., Berlin Bertoia Parmese, 1570-72, Judgment of Paris, detail, National Gallery, Washington D.C. (CGB '75) On Shakespeare's stage, as in any perspective field by his contemporary Jacob de Gheyn, the devil may be sowing symbolic tares. Where is the cave in Macbeth called Acheron? is Hamlet mad or sane? how does the 24 hour action of Othello go with the time implied: "What keep a week away, a month"; "The deed of shame with him a thousand times committed" — in 24 hours? If these flights rest on Medieval earthlessness, they show such mastery of earth's dimensions as the spatial foreshortenings of Tintoretto and the Mannerists. Where the causal mingles with the symbolic, the dramatic why broods "yet hanging in the stars." 17) English late 13th cent., Harlech Castle, Wales; first, V detail Music: 13th cent., In Seculum Artifex, "Jolly Minstrels," VICS-10049 The history Shakespeare chronicles begins with King John, 1200, a time when even the secular held the chivalric distance of sacred surrender. If the crisis of tragedy in Shakespeare is a crisis in Christendom, what it requires (over the Judgment ground) is a world-affirming grandeur as far from Harlech Castle as is 13th-century song from chordal pomp or the mighty line. (fade In Seculum) Va18) Jacobean, 1607-11 (Robert Lyminge), Hatfield House, South Front (detail), near London (slide show substitutes a18, Hardwick Hall, 1590-94, South Front) Same, Hatfield, interior, The Long Gallery Again, a18, Hatfield exterior, wider view Vb18) 18) Music: William Byrd, c. 1600(?), In Nomine à 5, (viols, Jaye) Turnabout, TV 34017 Whereas in the history plays, everything from Constance Plantagenet — Here I and sorrows sit, Here is my throne, bid kings come bow to it — June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 9 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History to the fall of Wolsey — I have ventured, Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders, This many summers in a sea of glory — might be enacted in the Jacobean courtyard of Hatfield House to the swelling harmonies of a Byrd In Nomine. (fade Byrd) 19) Limbourg Brothers, 1413-16, February, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly; + V details Yet for all his vastness, Shakespeare is happy heir to the naive vitalities of Gothic: this Limbourg winter, the birds, the drifted road, the woman blowing her nails: When icicles hang by the wall, And Dick the shepherd blows his nail, And Tom bears logs into the hall, And milk comes frozen home in pail, When blood is nipped and ways be foul, Then nightly sings the staring owl, Tu-whit, tu-who, A merry note. While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. 20) Flemish MS, c. 1510, February, Grimani Breviary, St. Mark's Library, Venice; + V detail The Grimani variation moves a hundred years toward the fulness of Shakespeare's nature and clowns: When all aloud the wind doth blow, And coughing drowns the parson's saw, And birds sit brooding in the snow, And Marian's nose looks red and raw. When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl, Then nightly sings the staring owl, Tu-whit, tu-who, A merry note, While greasy Joan doth keel the pot. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 10 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History By Shakespeare's birth that Gothic observation was opening 21) 21a) 21b) P. Brueghel, 1565, Hunters in the Snow, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna (CGB '59) Same, detail of bird and mountains, upper right Same, detail of hunters, lower left (CGB '59) to the recess of Brueghel, the foreground hill dropping to a valley under snow peaks and the bird's wing, a funnel of force into which we, like the hunters, are drawn. So the winter of Gawain and the Green Knight, 1390 — When clear cold water, shed from the clouds, Froze before it could fall to the fallow earth... And clattering from the crest the running stream Hung over his head in hard icy-ikkles — broadens through Douglas, 1510 (CGB): Over crags and dark brows of the broken rocks Hung long icicles like giant hoary locks... And the wild geese also were clacking and crying, In the dark night above the city flying; through Sackville's 1563 Induction, The naked twigs were shivering all for cold, And Spenser's Winter, Chattering his teeth… Whil'st on his hoary beard his breath did freeze, to Shakespeare's: ...the icy fang And churlish chiding of the winter's wind... 22) P. Brueghel, 1568, Peasant Dance, detail of piper, Kunsthistoriches, Museum, Wien; video: first, central detail from the whole, see Va22 June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 11 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History All over Europe, as the Renaissance deepens, the features of Shakespeare's world take form: folk life in Brueghel gaining in volume, as from mystery plays and farces, through Rabelais, toward Sancho Panza, Bottom, Dogberry: Come hither neighbor Seacoal… You are thought here to be the most senseless and fit man for the constable of the watch. Therefore bear you the lantern. This is your charge. You shall comprehend all vagrom men... 23) 23a) 23b) 23c) Elsheimer, 1609, Night Flight to Egypt, whole, Alte Pinakothek, München Same, Night Flight, detail of sky (cf. Giants 80; while V takes a detail from 23) Rubens, 1637-40, Landscape by Moonlight, Courtauld Institute; + V detail Again 23, Elsheimer, Night Flight, cropped (CGB '59) Music: Dowland 1612. From Silent Night, close, (Deller) SRV-306 SD On the Keplerian divide of 1600, German Elsheimer turns nature to an infinite starry dark, a Sidereal Messenger, as rich and Italianate as the chromatics of Dowland's "From Silent Night". Hard to realize, in the nocturnal glory of the Juliet balcony scene: But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? that the only scene-painting is in Romeo's vow: by yonder blessed moon... That tips with silver all these fruit tree tops. A description slightly extended in The Merchant of Venice: The moon shines bright. In such a night as this, When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees, And they did make no noise... and Look how the floor of heaven Is thick inlaid with patens of bright gold. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide (end Dowland) 12 �C.G. Bell 24) Symbolic History Mantegna, 1474(?), Gonzaga Court, Ducal Palace, Mantua; first, V detail To nature must be added the Renaissance court, jester (here dwarf) and all. It begins, with Mantegna's 1474 fresco of the Gonzagas, to have the right Twelfth-Night look, the combined retinue, if Duke Orsino had married the Countess Olivia. a25) 25) Titian, 1532, Cardinal Ippolito de' Medici, Palazzo Pitti Moretto da Brescia, c. 1525(?), "Alas I desire too much," National Gallery, London V25a) Veronese (1553-4) Juno pours gold on Venice, Doge's Palace, Venice (CGB '59) The individual Claudios and Benedicks first perfect the airs in which even the 19th century conceived them, when the followers of Giorgione — Titian, Lotto, Moretto — painted such portraits as this inscribed: "Alas, I desire too much." Not only The Merchant of Venice, where Portia is the golden fleece and everything hinges on gold, not only Shakespeare, but the whole northern late Renaissance is artfully Venetian. 26) P. Pourbus, c. 1580(?), Court in a Park, Wallace Collection, London; with V details Music: Morley, 1595, Now is the month of Maying, Westminster XWN 18764 Like a Morley "fa-la-la," Pieter Pourbus blends north and south in this mannered banquet in a park, 1581, as if the jester Touchstone had lured all the "country copulatives" to an As You Like It hymen, by Jaques’ "ducdame" burden — an "invocation to call fools into a circle." (cut Morley) a27) 27) 27a) 27b) N. Hilliard, 1572, Man aged 24, Victoria and Albert Museum, London Hilliard, c. 1590(?), George Clifford, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich; + V detail Hilliard, 1588, "Shakespeare as Mercury," Victoria and Albert Museum, London Hilliard, c. 1585, Sir Walter Raleigh, miniature, National Portrait Gallery, London Music: June 1996 William Byrd, c. 1590(?), Wolsey's Wilde. Landowska, G-AD 1014 (78) 1600: The Tragic Divide 13 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History In England the same blend produces the best match for the airier moods of Shakespeare. Hilliard expresses as finely as anyone the high Platonic idealism which lingers somehow from the Lady of the Unicorn and the Offering of the Heart: Romeo: I dreamt my lady came and found me dead — Strange dream that gives a dead man leave to think, And breathed such life with kisses in my lips, That I revived and was an emperor. (Romeo and Juliet, V, i) (fade Wolsey's Wilde) If only we could find (like a chest of old viols) actors so clean ("speak the speech... trippingly... beget a temperance that may give it smoothness"), perhaps even Hamlet could be restored to the veiled nuance of consort-tone, with which the revival of early instruments has blessed the harmonies of Byrd. 28) 28a) 28b) English, c. 1590, Tomb of The Good Earl of Warwick, St. Mary's, Warwick English Tomb Effigies, c. 1576, Monument to Alex Denton, d. 1576, and his first wife Anne, died in childbirth, 1566, Hereford Cathedral, South Transept (CGB '84) Again 28, Earl of Warwick tomb, detail Music: William Byrd, c. 1590(?), Earl of Salisbury Pavan, viols, G-DB 2416 (78) In death as in life a dignity, ultimate containment of the tragic storm: O here Will I set up my everlasting rest; And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars From this world-wearied flesh... The agony of Marlowe's Faustus returns to the choral ground: Cut is the branch that might have growne full straight, And burned is Apollowes Laurel bough... Even in Lear a moral order survives in which the gored state can be maintained. Like this effigy of Warwick, Wolsey carries nobility into the grave. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 14 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History I feel within me A peace above all earthly dignities, A still and quiet conscience... 29) 29a) Hilliard, c. 1590(?), Man leaned against a tree, Victoria and Albert Museum, London; + V detail Spanish, 1486, Tomb of Don Martin Vasquez de Arce "el Doncel," Siguenze Cathedral; + V detail It is surely a gift of Shakespeare's "blessed plot, this realm, this England," that the dainty groupings of Rosalind and Orlando, Viola, Feste, Orsino — If music be the food of love, play on, Give me excess of it... That strain again — it had a dying fall — could revive, after Lear, in the romance deepening of The Winter's Tale and Cymbeline: Fear no more the heat o' th' sun, Nor the furious winter's rages: Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone and ta'en thy wages: Golden lads and girls all must, As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 30) 30a) (close Salisbury Pavan) El Greco, 1594-1604, Female Portrait, Johnson Collection, Museum, Philadelphia Double: [A] Botticelli, 1482, Birth of Venus, detail of head, Uffizi, Florence; and [B] attributed to El Greco, now to Sofanisba Anguissola c. 1585, Woman with Ermine, Stirling, etc., Museum, Glasgow Yet also in that island the wormwood of El Greco's "La Desilusionada" had fallen. The lightly balanced joy of the early comedies slides into a vortex of evil; the clowns thicken to the bawd and pander Pompey Bum: "Does your worship mean to geld and splay all the youth of the city?" Troilus, "The argument of a cuckold and a whore," bequeaths us nothing but Pandarus' diseases. As if Botticelli's Venus had been infected with such a brand as takes off the rose From the fair forehead of an innocent love, June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 15 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History And sets a blister there... a31) Caravaggio, 1607-08, Beheading of St. John the Baptist, Malta (video: left group only) Same, detail, head of old woman Same, closer detail of left group Double: [A] Caravaggio, 1586-98, head of the Medusa, Uffizi, Florence; and [B] El Greco, 1590-1600, Crucifixion, detail, Angel and Magdalen, Prado, Madrid (1996: this has been replaced in the slide show and video by 31a, Double: [A] Caravaggio, 1600, Fleeing youth from Martyrdom of St. Matthew, S. Luigi dei Francese, Rome; and [B] El Greco, 1605-10, Stunned guards from Resurrection, Prado, Madrid) b31) 31) V31a) Yet we search in vain for a specific inception of what has been called the "Baroque disillusionment" — however the more than Othello rhetoric of dark — O heavy hour! Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse Of sun and moon, and that th'afrighted globe Did yawn at alteration — fan out from Caravaggio's 1600 Rome and Naples. Earth's betrayal is ubiquitous: it fell on Abelard, Petrarch, Botticelli, Michelangelo, and Spenser, as on Jonson and Donne: "all in fragments, all coherence gone." The pain of Fulke Greville's If nature did not take delight in blood, She would have found more easy ways to good, appears in Shakespeare's earliest tragedy — and the least resolved — Titus Andronicus: O why should nature build so foul a den, Unless the gods delight in tragedies? What changes, even with pain, is the style — Caravaggio's Tenebrist weight, against the space-dissolving whirls of El Greco. Is Shakespeare affined to both? 32) Michelangelo, 1492, Battle of Centaurs, Casa Buonorotti, Florence; + V detail June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 16 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The Florentine embodiment had set the terms for the crisis of 1600. In Michelangelo's beginnings, 1492, year of Lorenzo il Magnifico's death and Columbus' discovery, power wars on itself. heightened and consumed. The phases of cathartic pain — Hybris, Dikê, Soteria — swell toward an incarnate Trinity: Hegel's Fathering Idea, alienating Passion, synthesis as Comforter; for Blake the Innocence, dire Experience, Renewal of prophetic history. 33) Michelangelo, 1508-12, Adam Created, detail, Sistine ceiling, Vatican The dawn hope Michelangelo drew from that Florence: Pico's human wonder, man lifting himself on the wings of choice beyond the stars. While Shakespeare's early rapture is Platonic love, transplanted from the same humanist ground: Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. 34) Michelangelo, 1530-33(?), "Young Giant" (1st Captive), Accademia, Florence; + V detail But Michelangelo's liberation strikes on a rock of impossibility as hard as any in Shakespeare: Down, down I come, like glistering Phaeton, Wanting the manage of unruly jades... Cover your heads and mock not flesh and blood With solemn reverence... He that hath suffered this disordered spring Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf... a35) 35) Michelangelo, 1542-50, Conversion of Paul, Pauline Chapel, Vatican Same, detail of Paul Pathos and glory fuse: Michelangelo's Paul thrown down and struck blind by the lightning of God. So Gloucester's reversal in Lear: "I stumbled when I saw... our mere defects/ Prove our commodities." His dying reunion with Edgar, "His flawed heart... burst smilingly," is the clue to Lear's immortal insight. as he dies, that Cordelia is coming to life: "Look on her, look, her lips,/ Look there, look there." "Upon such sacrifices... the gods themselves throw incense." June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 17 �C.G. Bell 36) 36a) Symbolic History Michelangelo, 1542-64, Rondanini Pieta, Castello Sforzesco, Milan; first, V detail of Mary's head from 36a Same, upper detail Music: Vicentino, 1567, Heu mihi, opening, Vanguard. HM - 34 SD Though it is in his last broken Pieta, from the time when Vicentino first rounded the chromatic sea, that Michelangelo went beyond what any other artist, in any other image, has ever made of tragedy: No, no, no, no; come let's away to prison: We two alone will sing like birds i' th' cage. When thou dost ask me blessing, I'll kneel down, And ask of thee forgiveness... And we'll wear out In a walled prison, pacts and sects of great ones, That ebb and flow by th' moon... a37) 37) (fade Vicentino) Michelangelo, c. 1539, Brutus, whole bust, National Museum (Bargello), Florence (for this color whole, the video uses Va37, a black-and-white detail of the face) Same, Brutus, a black-and-white view of the shoulder and full face What broke the Rondanini Pieta, applied an infinite torque, even to revived antiquity. Like Michelangelo's Brutus, Shakespeare's Romans have a flawed grandeur unknown to the pagan past. North's Plutarch: Antonius spake... Of all them that had slain Caesar. there was none but Brutus only that was moved to do it, as thinking the act commendable of itself... the other conspirators... for some private... envy... against Shakespeare: This was the noblest Roman of them all. All the conspirators save only he Did that they did, in envy of great Caesar; He only, in a general honest thought, And common good to all, made one of them. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 18 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History His life was gentle, and the elements So mixed in him, 38) Rembrandt, 1661, Conspiracy of Julius Civilis, National Museum, Stockholm; first, a video detail, from Va38 that Nature might stand up And say to all the world, this was a man. Only the great can parallel the great. The next depicted conspiracy of such magnitude comes from as far after Shakespeare as Michelangelo was before him — and in the deepened formal contrasts of Huyghens’ light and shade — it is Rembrandt's mutilated Oath of Julius Civilis (Batavians, in this case, against Rome). 39) Roman late Republican, c. 35 B.C., Bust of Mark Antony, Museum, Narbonne But Antony is the Roman whom Shakespeare most titanically reshapes. Set this Republican bust of him against Cleopatra's praise: His legs bestrid the ocean, his reared arm Crested the world... or Antony's going off: Sometime we see a cloud that's dragonish, A vapour sometime, like a bear or lion... They are black vesper's pageants... thy captain is Even such a body... 40) 40a) Double: [A] Roman c. 20-10 B.C., Livia(?) (or Octavia?), Copenhagen; and [B] Graeco Roman (Africa) c. 40 B.C.(?), head of Cleopatra, Cherchel, Algeria (video also shows 40A singly) Single 40B, again Cleopatra This matron on the left — Octavia, or her sister, Augustus' Livia — fits Enobarbus' description: "Octavia is of a holy, cold, and still conversation." (Menas) "Who would not have his wife so?" (Enobarbus) "Not he that himself is not so; which is Mark Antony... "He will to his Egyptian dish again..." Against the female policy of June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 19 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Rome, this Hellenized Cleopatra (right), as ideal as sensuous, might give a base for Shakespeare's soaring: "Age cannot wither her." But for the fatal extravagance of their love — "The crown o' th' earth doth melt... O withered is the garland of the war" — for images of the sensuous swoon and lethal rapture, "full-drawn, ascendant, like the word expire" a41) b41) 41) Michelangelo, 1520-34, Night, from the Medici Tombs, Florence (detail of face from front and below; while video shows profile detail of Va41) Same, Night, frontal view of head and torso; while video, Vb41, shows the stretched-out body Same, Night, profile, vertical of head, arm, breast; from which video takes a close up, then a frontal head and body from V41a, returning to a profile and breast of 41) (Wilbye's "Draw on Sweet Night") — Music: Wilbye, 1609, "Draw on Sweet Night," (Deller) Quintessence PMC7143 where can we turn but to Michelangelo — the sleeping Night for which he wrote: Caro m’ é ‘l sonno... Sleep is dear to me, and better to be stone... Therefore do not wake me; alas, speak low — (CGB) Pero non mi destar, deh: parla basso! — a carving we can seriously contemplate, even as we read of Cleopatra’s “dateless bargain to engrossing death”: (fade Wilbye) Give me my robe, put on my crown, I have Immortal longings in me. Now no more The juice of Egypt's grape shall moist this lip. Yare, yare, good Iras; quick. Methinks I hear Antony call... I am fire and air; my other elements I give to baser life... — (O eastern star!) June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 20 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Peace, peace. Dost thou not see my baby at my breast, That sucks the nurse asleep? — (O break! O break!) As sweet as balm. as soft as air, as gentle — O Antony! 42) Titian, 1538, Venus of Urbino Uffizi, Florence; + V detail (note alternates: CGB '59 slide, with gold frame, and without, V42) Titian, as different from Michelangelo as Venice from Florence, runs a similar threefold course, however richly its phases overlap. He begins with sensuous delight. Though Juliet, Portia, and the rest do not appear on stage in so frank a pose as this, Shakespeare shows as much in the double-play which constitutes his bawdry: What, with my tongue in your tail? Nay come again Good Kate... We shall ne'er win at that sport, and stake down. O that she were An open et cetera, thou a poperin pear. I would I were thy bird. — Sweet, so would I; Yet I should kill thee with much cherishing. 43) Titian, 1570-76, Tarquin and Lucrece, Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna Titian's later life is a deepening involvement in that tragic century. By 1570 his Tarquin and Lucrezia, in shade and flaming impasto, has more of Othello than of Shakespeare's mannered Rape of Lucrece: Yield to my love; if not, enforced hate, Instead of love's coy touch shall rudely tear thee... 44) Titian, c. 1570 ff., Shepherd and Nymph, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna (CGB '59) June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 21 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But a third phase is implicit in those post-tragic works where primordial and heroic forms loom through a brushwork like incandescent passionate flakes. In one of the last and greatest of his pictures, Titian returns to the Arcadia of his youth, as if to show, with Cervantes in Part II of Don Quixote, the cost of a profound well-being. This pastoral, 2nd 43) Tarquin and Lucrece, detail with the Lucrece of the same time, might form a Winter's-Tale pair: from jealous rigor: if powers divine Behold our human actions, as they do, I doubt not then, but innocence shall make False accusation blush, and tyranny Tremble at patience... Look down, And see what death is doing — 2nd 44) Shepherd and Nymph, detail (CGB '59) to the recreated Enna of a shearing feast: O Proserpina, For the flowers now, that frighted thou let'st fall From Dis's wagon: daffodils, That come before the swallow dares, and take The winds of March with beauty... You gods, look down, And from your sacred vials pour your graces Upon my daughter's head. 45) Pol de Limbourg, 1413-16, August, Tres Riches Heures, Chantilly (video: lower detail only) In the brittle poignance of Gothic there was no room for that shadowed epithalamium of the conscious heart. What Pericles calls "the shores of mortality" had not been widened for its "great sea of joys". Between the "naked villainy" and "holy writ" of Richard III, a thin soil, vernal with flowers, brightens the rock of our wretchedness. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 22 �C.G. Bell a46) 46) Symbolic History Master of the Rohan Hours, c. 1418-20, Death and Judgment, Bibl. Nat., Paris, details of corpse, to which video adds detail of God and whole (Va46) Double: [A] again, a46, Rohan Master's Death and Judgment; and [B] Holbein (Hans the Younger), c. 1525, Dance of Death, woodcuts, The Old Woman #19 (video replaces the double with a detail of B, the Holbein) The happiness, which in early Shakespeare remains inconsequent — "Lord what fools these mortals be" — yields, in 1400 miniatures and poems, at the slightest erosion, to the old bleached skull: The lif of this world Is reuled with wynd, Wepinge, derknesse, And steriinge; With wind we blomen, With wind we lassun; With weopinge we comen, With weopinge we passun. With steriinge we begynnen, With steriinge we enden; With drede we dwellen, With drede we wenden. The whole age of faith had voiced that lean tragic ground, yet could not rise to the proud forms of tragedy. Although from first-Gothic to Chaucer, from this Rohan Hours page to Dürer and Holbein, the quickening life pulse sharpens a cadaver-dance and death's head contemplation — a47) 47) 47a) Durer, 1521, St. Jerome, Museum Nat. de Arte Antiga, Lisbon H. Golzius, 1614, "Quis evadit, nemo", drawing, Pierpont Morgan, New York City; + V details Giorgione, 1505-10, Sleeping Venus, detail, Gallery, Dresden Music: Gibbons, 1618, close "Behold thou hast made..." (Deller) VICS1551 it is only in the time of Shakespeare (of the verse anthems of Byrd or of this Gibbons), when the romance of late-Renaissance has gauded the doublet and plumed the cap, June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 23 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History plumped lip and cheek and brightened the eyes of mortality, that the sun of glory, as in this Golzius, lures the tragic tulip from the skull: Why so large cost, having so short a lease, Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend? Shall worms, inheritors of this excesse, Eat up thy charge? Only then that Hamlet — as the gravedigger singing In youth when I did love, did love, Methought it was very sweet, throws up the skull of Yorick, "a fellow of infinite Jest," at whose lips the child-prince had hung ("Where be your gibes now? Your gambols?") — can weigh loss against an As-You-Like-It dawn, when he had courted the fair Ophelia in ideal love, before the Ghost walked or flesh was so far sullied: But look, the morn in russet mantle clad, Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill. a48) 48) 48a) El Greco, 1584-1610(?), St. Gerome as Cardinal, Museum Bonnat, Bayonne Elizabethan, c. 1570(?), Pleated picture, Mary Stuart and a skull (two views), National Portrait Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh Jacob de Geyn II, c. 1600(?), Seated Gypsy(?), Prof. Altena, Amsterdam Of course tragedy is reared on the old pessimism of earth. But what exploits of power have wrought, from Dark Age Alcuin's "vermibus atque cibus", Hotspur's fall of pride: "For worms, brave Percy. Fare thee well, great heart." So in this pleated picture, its corrugations viewed from left and right: Mary Queen of Scots and a death's head — (Shakespeare) Like perspectives, which rightly gazed upon Show nothing but confusion; eyed awry, Distinguish form... Thus Macbeth meteors to the tragic ground: Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage And then is heard no more: it is a tale June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 24 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing. 49) (end Gibbons) H. Eworth, English 1591 (copying from 1550), Sir John Lutrell, Dunster Castle, Somerset; first, a video detail (cf. V49) If contempt of the world is one pole of the tragic tension, man's belief in its worth is the other. An age of great tragedy takes its tone from that stretch. Sir John Lutrell strides the ocean under the laurel favor of the gods, one of those Elizabethans a contemporary described: "free, stout, haulte, prodigall of life and blood." 50) 50a) Tintoretto, c. 1550(?), Sebastiano Veniero, Prado, Madrid Tintoretto (attr.), c. 1560(?), Portrait of a Sculptor, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) From Italy north runs a wave of self-validating pride: Tintoretto's Venetians; Marlowe's aspirers, robed in the mighty line — Tamburlaine: Nature that fram'd us of foure Elements, Warring within our breasts for regiment, Doth teach us all to have aspyring minds... Still climbing after knowledge infinite... a51) 51) Andrea del Sarto, 1527, St. Michael Weighing Souls, Predella panel, Four Saints' Altar, Uffizi, Florence; + V detail Titian, 1545, Portrait of Pietro Aretino, Pitti Palace, Florence; + V detail But the titan will — "Here, Faustus. try thy braines to gaine a deitie" — strikes on the Satanic compact: Adders and Serpents, let me breathe a while: Ugly hell gape not, come not Lucifer. Ile burne my bookes, ah Mephastophilis. (Exeunt with him.) Titian's Aretino, "poison-flower of the Renaissance," fits Jonson's Volpone, Shakespeare's fallen Angelo: June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 25 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But man, proud man, Dressed in a little brief authority, Most ignorant of what he's most assured, His glassy essence, like an angry ape, Plays such fantastic tricks before High Heaven As make the angels weep. Va52) Hilliard, c. 1600(?), George Clifford, Earl of Cumberland, Nelson Gallery, Atkins Museum, Kansas City Titian, c. 1570, Punishment of Marsyas, Mus. Naz, Kromeriz, Czech. Michelangelo, 1555-64, Rondanini Pieta, Milan (video takes a detail from 36, above) Tintoretto, 1587, Self-Portrait, Louvre, Paris; + V detail b52) c52) 52) There lies the crux of tragedy: man, on the old morality stage, blown to such "fantastical puff-paste": It will come. Humanity must perforce prey on itself, Like monsters of the deep. What such currents have washed over they reduce to scoured rock, bones of the once assertive. But there remains a shattered Pieta, gathering incredible tenderness in its ruin: "No cause, no cause"; or some last death mask, as of Gloucester or Lear, inalienably noble — Tintoretto's final self-portrait, pride divinely broken and affirmed, reaching beyond itself with matchless power: O sun, Burn the great sphere thou mov'st in. Darkling stand The varying shore o' the world... 53) English (Droeshout), pub. 1623, First Folio engraving of Shakespeare; + V detail Laughable, in the flash of Promethean genius and thunder of tragic words, to turn back the pages to the quiet impersonal mask of the folio engraving. Beyond the giants of the Continent forged in the furnace of spiritual war, could the sweet swan of Avon, in the easy success of his investments and art, opening trim lips to the curse and blessing of all that lives — Thou must be patient; we came crying hither. Thou know'st, the first time that we smell the air We wawl and cry... — June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 26 �C.G. Bell 54) 54a) 54b) 54c) Symbolic History Double: [A] Hilliard, c. 1590, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, National Portrait Gallery, London; and [B] Rembrandt, 1629, Self, Dean Cavat Collection, London Again, Hilliard's Dudley, the single A of 54 Again, Hilliard and Rembrandt, the Double 54 Again, Rembrandt, Self, the single B of 54 mediate the deepening of humanity and art, as from Hilliard about 1590 (left), with Morley — Music: Morley, 1600, "It was a lover and his lass, (Cuenod) Westminster WL5085 a realm of Puckish caprice and changing loyalties, And those things do best please me That befall preposterously, where moral questions hardly arise, and happy endings can grace the discomfiture of testy Egeus, Malvolio, even of Shylock's malice (fade Morley) — to Rembrandt, 1628 (right), with Schein — Music: J.H. Schein, 1623, from Die mit Tränen säen, near start, MHS 4288 over the moral divide, so causally aware, that reconciliation is hard to come by, must be paid for at a commensurate, almost at a tragic price: Methought the billows spoke, and told me of it; The winds did sing it to me; and the thunder That deep and dreadful organ-pipe, pronounced The name of Prosper... (fade Schein) Only fifteen years separate that Tempest utterance, which basses the world's trespass, punishes, and rewards, 55) School of Parmagianino, c. 1560(?), Allegorical Landscape, detail, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. (CGB '75); + V detail and return to the whole from the tetrameter yearning of Oberon and Titania: June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 27 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Then my Queen, in silence sad, Trip we after the night's shade. We the globe can compass soon, Swifter than the wandering moon. — Come my lord, and in our flight, Tell me how it came this night, That I sleeping here was found, With these mortals on the ground. As if from Platonic withdrawal, all things earthly "Like far-off mountains turned into clouds" (this 16th-century transreal dance of spirits), weightless as the astronomy of angelically guided spheres, 56) 56a) 56b) Rubens, c. 1630, Feast of Venus, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna (CGB '59); + V detail English Tapestry, 1611, detail from Four Seasons, Hatfield House Again 56, Rubens' Feast of Venus we rode the voluminous and life-affirming masque of Rubens' Feast of Venus toward the astronomy of Newton's gravitating masses. So Shakespeare: You nymphs called Naiads of the windring brooks, With your sedged crowns and ever-harmless looks, Leave your crisp channels... You sunburnt sicklemen of August weary, Come hither from the furrow, and be merry... Though what we need is not simply a dance of nymphs and reapers, but the whole "majestic vision" of The Tempest. 57) Jacob de Gheyn II, c. 1600(?), Witches' Kitchen, Staatliches Museum, Berlin (video: three details only, from left to right) Between the two, lies the nightmare passage of De Gheyn and Macbeth, energized out of Bosch's demonic seizure: Fair is foul, and foul is fair; Hover through the fog and filthy air... Round about the caldron go; In the poisoned entrails throw. Toad, that under cold stone Days and nights has thirty-one Sweltered venom sleeping got, Boil thou first i' th' charmed pot... Finger of birthstrangled babe, Ditch-delivered by a drab... Double, double, toil and trouble; Fire burn and caldron bubble... 58) 58a) Jacob de Gheyn II, c. 1600(?), Sleeping Nude, A. Ulrich Mus., Brunswick Spranger, c. 1600(?), Venus and Adonis, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 28 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History In De Gheyn that souring fell also on flesh, Titian's voluptuous ideal loaded with "the strong'st suggestion our worser Genius can": "It is not words that shakes me thus — pish! — noses, ears and lips." What wrenches love, from Donne ("Spermatique issue of ripe menstruous boils") to Swift ("Oh Celia, Celia, Celia shits!") rages in the tragedies: The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't With a more riotous appetite... 59) Jacob de Gheyn II, c. 1600(?), Witch and Familiar on a Monster, Christ Church, Oxford; + V detail As in de Gheyn's witch visions, the pure offering of the heart, that "silly sooth" of the "old age," becomes the imposthume of Hamlet's fever: Nay, but to live In the rank sweat of an enseamed bed, Stewed in corruption, honeying and making love Over the nasty sty. The new fulness of flesh heightens the task, with the need of vindication. Donne's "dialogue of one" from the "Ecstasy" of his own love and marriage: "To our bodies turn we then," 60) Rembrandt, 1635, Joseph and Potiphar's Wife, etching, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; + V detail and return to the whole "Else a great prince in prison lies," will not answer for Milton's Fall or Rembrandt's wife of Potiphar: (Leontes) No barricado for a belly. Know't; It will let in and out the enemy With bag and baggage. (and Iago) Didst thou not see her paddle with the palm of his hand?... Lechery... 61) Rembrandt, 1668, Jewish Bride, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (CGB '59); + V detail June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 29 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But it was not true of Hermione, nor of Desdemona. The muddy imputation falls off under the death-cadence of an old song: "sing, willow, willow, willow." Rembrandt, too, in one of his last works, as if looking back, "dallying with the innocence of love," reconstitutes, in embodied, earth-shadowed harmonies, that blessedness of the soul: As I hope For quiet days, fair issue, and long life, With such love as 'tis now... 62) Hilliard, 1572, Elizabeth I, National Portrait Gallery, London; + V detail Our pictures have ranged over Europe; yet even in Shakespeare's island, where art after the Reformation lagged, we might trace the threefold transformation. The ideal phase fares best. Hilliard's Elizabeth has the refinement of Spenser's: Tell me. have ye seene her angelick face, Like Phoebe fayre? Her heavenly haveour, her princely grace can you well compare? The Redde rose medled with the White yfere, In either cheeke depeincten lively chere. Her modest eye, Her Maiestie, Where have you seene the like, but there? 63) 63a) Isaac Oliver, c. 1600(?), Nymphs and Satyrs, drawing, Royal Collection, England Same, Nymphs, etc., center detail; while video takes two details from 63 The deepening comic bacchanal that runs from Titian to the compound mass of Rubens pairs English Oliver with a wicked Wylbie madrigal on satyrs: "Fain wouldst thou turn and yield them their delight." Music: 64) Wylbie, 1609, from "Fly not so swift", (Randoloh) Westminster L 5221 (fade) Lagneau, c. 1600-10, Young Man in a Fur Cap, Beaux Arts, Lille; first, video detail While the to-be" "pale cast work is a man... "gloire et rebut," June 1996 introspection which throws over many works of 1600 a "To-be-or-notof thought" (Lagneau's morbid youth) — Hamlet's "What a piece of paragon of animals... quintessence of dust," suggesting Pascal's later "Pride and garbage of the universe" — 1600: The Tragic Divide 30 �C.G. Bell 65) Symbolic History Hilliard, c. 1600(?), Man against Flames, Victoria and Albert Museum, London stretches the lightness of the English miniature in Hilliard's Man holding a Locket against a Background of Flame: The time is out of joint, O cursed spite, That ever I was born to put it right... Look here upon this picture, and on this, The counterfeit presentment of two brothers... 66) Tintoretto, 1591-92, Christ on the Sea of Galilee, National Gallery, Washington D.C. (the video omits this whole, going to 66a, detail) Same, detail: Sea and Ship; + V closer detail Preview close-up of 67, El Greco Landscape; then a video return to 66a 66a) V66b) Music: Giovanni Gabrielli, c. 1610(?), Quem Vidistis (near close), Eng. Decca SDD 363 (cf. London STS-15256) Even the masterly assault on the physical universe, that superscript of light on darkness, which Tintoretto passed (like a harpoon of St. Elmo's fire) to Cretan El Greco, who bore it to Spain — while music built to the vast chromatic chords of Giovanni Gabrielli, on which brasses blazon, voices leap and trill — 67) El Greco, c. 1610, Toledo Landscape, detail, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City El Greco, Laocöon, detail of background (taken from slide 14) V67a) such a storm as Lear was invoking: Blow winds, and crack your cheeks. Rage, blow... ...all germenes spill at once That makes ingrateful man — 68) 68a) 68b) (fade Gabrielli) Sir Nathaniel Bacon, c. 1600, Rocky Landscape, Ashmolean, Oxford Sir Nathaniel Bacon, c. 1620, Self, from Gorhambury Collection, Earl of Verulam Closer view of 68, Bacon Landscape; first, video detail June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 31 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History even that has a humble English cognate in a little landscape by the painter amateur, Nathaniel Bacon. So too the musical daring of Italy spills over the north, mostly in smaller forms — Weelkes, "O care": Music: a69) 69) Weelkes, 1600, "O Care, thou wilt despatch me, opening, Decca STS 15165 (fade) Claude Lorrain, 1630's, Tiber above Rome, detail, British Museum, London Same, Tiber, whole, watercolor Music: William Lawes, c. 1635(?), Sonata #8, opening, Arco ZRG 555 The storm has passed in the music of William Lawes. What went into the 1600 vortex was the thousand year old doom of the world, intensified by the new glory of that world condemned. What comes out is the causal order of human command, the landscape of harmony, most luminous in Claude Lorrain. 70) Inigo Jones, 1638, Scene for Luminalia, Chatsworth Estates And here too, in English art, Inigo Jones' night scene from Luminalia, an ink-wash randomly splashed, holds the chrysolite of the classical dream ("What seas, what shores...") The music of the spheres! List my Marina. 71) Rubens, c. 1615-17, Shepherd with flock in woods, National Gallery, London Such the volitional grandeur of the 17th century, in which Shakespeare died — Rubens' early pictures entering London about the time Prospero took his leave of it: Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves, And ye that on the sands with printless foot Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him When he comes back... by whose aid — Weak masters though ye be — 72) Rubens, c. 1620(?), Philemon and Baucis, storm detail, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Wien (video uses V72, an older detail; replace?) I have bedimmed The noontide sun, called forth the mutinous winds, And 'twixt the green sea and the azured vault June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 32 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Set roaring war. To the dread rattling thunder Have I given fire, and rifted Jove's stout oak With his own bolt... (Rubens in ten years to unleash his own tragic storm) But this rough magic I here abjure. a73) 73) Rubens, 1635-37, Landscape with Rainbow, Alte Pinakothek, Munich Rubens, c. 1638, Landscape with Shepherds and Flock, National Gallery, London; + V detail of sunset Music: William Lawes, Sonato #8, 2nd Movement, Air, Arco ZRG 555 and when I have required Some heavenly music — which even now I do — To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound I'll drown my book... Rubens too issuing, in age, to the light-streaming landscape of recovery and reconciliation. (cut Lawes) In The Winter's Tale the way to that sunlit pastoral is over the flap-dragoning sea: a74) 74) Rubens, c. 1624, The Storm, detail, Franz König Collection, Haarlem Rubens, c. 1624(?), Shipwreck of Aeneas, Berlin-Dahlem Museum; + V details I would you did but see how it chafes, how it rages, how it takes up the shore... And if the chromatic scale, as so many have said, is such a chaos and devouring gulf, it is exactly over that ocean of formlessness that the ordered tonalities of major and minor had to be sought. The defiance and victory of that voyage have ultimate expression in the Chromatic Fantasy by Sweelinck, Dutch organist, who died in 1621. It builds, with Rubens’ night storms, a peak of energy in all art. Music: Sweelinck, c. 1610-20(?), Chromatic Fantasy, opening and close, SVBX-5316 (1) June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 33 �C.G. Bell 75) 76) 76b) Symbolic History Rubens, c. 1620-25(?), Philemon and Baucis Landscape, Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna (CGB '59); with video details (one from 72) Rubens, same, Philemon and Baucis, stream detail (CGB '59); + V details (as V76a) Same, Rubens' Philemon and Baucis, detail of drowned mother and child, lower left (CGB '59) (skip in music) a77) 77) 77a) Rubens, c. 1618, Battle of the Amazons, detail, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (copy of CGB '59, Larger Declaration 35) Rubens, c. 1628(?), Thunderstorm at night, Neuerburg Collection, Hamburg; + V detail Again, Rubens' Storm, whole (cf. a74) (end Sweelinck) The probability matrix we likened at the start to a folded landscape of spirit looms in its bewildering complex of dimensions. The vectors of all phases are at every moment alive and working. Shakespeare, El Greco. Gesualdo, then Sweelinck and Rubens, seem to have scaled the energy peak of the range. a78) b78) 78) 78a) Jos de Momper, 1600, Vista from a Grotto, National Gallery, Washington D.C. (CGB '75) de Momper, c. 1600-1610(?), Mountain Landscape, detail, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) Same, Mountain Landscape, whole (CGB '59) N. Hilliard, c. 1595, an unknown poet, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge Music: Gibbons, c. 1610(?), Fantasia "In nomine" à 5, opening, ARC 3052 But there were easier passes through the same divide, into the silvery landscape Momper had brushed with Prospero's vision; as Gibbons filled the demi-paradise of English houses with strains of proud melting — Baroque substance still lightened by Gothic insubstantiality. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits, and Are melted into air, into thin air! And like the baseless fabric of this vision The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 34 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on; and our little life Is rounded with a sleep... (fade Gibbons) The brave new world is 1st 79) Michelangelo, 1556-64, Rondanini Pieta, Sforzesco, Milan; here video substitutes a detail from 3rd 79b (CGB '80) humanized and sustained only by what it won from tragedy. In that miraculous infolding of heart, by which Lear and Cordelia prepare for a restoration they do not live to enjoy, a beatitude of earth is born of its own denial. a80) Titian, c. 1570, Madonna and Child, National Gallery, London (or Va80, detail) 1st 80) Rembrandt, 1668, Jewish Bride, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam (copy of 61, CGB ‘59); video: detail only So substantial an Innocence, won from the lair of Experience, could not have appeared in the earlier plays; it was an element unknown to the world, then being shaped by the titans of 1600. For the arts are no less exploratory than science, open realms of being, shoulder out time, forge truth. In the sacred tenderness of the old king's waking — Cordelia: O you kind gods, Cure this breach in his abused nature, Th' untuned and jarring senses, O wind up Of this child-changed father — an earthly love (Rembrandt's saving ground) 2nd 79) Again, Rondanini Pieta, detail: the faces, with Mary’s left shoulder; while video shows an upper detail of 2nd 79a 2nd 79a) Same, frontal full-length color (so too the video) is alchemized, as from the last pity of Michelangelo: Thou art a soul in bliss, but I am bound Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like molten lead. June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 35 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Let Monteverdi, at the close of his 5-voice "Zeffiro torna," sound that expansion of possibility. By a storm-crossing of the chromatic sea (Donne's "new Philosophy calls all in doubt"), we reach a harbor 2nd 80) Again, Jewish Bride, figures cropped (CGB ‘59); video: closer detail of the man only of utopian tones. Donne: "No man is an Island, intire of itself; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine." And Campanella: "The sun strives to burn up the earth, not to produce plants and men, but God guides the battle to great ends." Music: Monteverdi, 1614. close of "Zeffiro torna," Cambridge CRS 1708 3rd 79) Again, Rondanini Pieta, view from the right of the whole curving statue 3rd 79a) Same, detail of the two faces; video of Mary’s only 3rd 79b) Same, from right, upper detail (CGB ‘80); since video previewed this slide for its 1st 79, it returns here to a detail of that 1st 79 slide for its V3rd 79b 3rd 80) Again, Jewish Bride, detail of hands (close Monteverdi) As the Shepherd says in The Winter's Tale: Thou mettest with things dying, I with things new born." June 1996 1600: The Tragic Divide 36 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 37 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1600 : The Tragic Divide, Symbolic History, Part 19 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 19 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_19_1600--The_Tragic_Divide Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/53e57a0e0c2494da65a5b13da48b573c.pdf ed909420fee227c91406aacdbfa315a4 PDF Text Text �9661 - 9691 �Dedication From the Editor and Staff This book is dedicated to the Class of 1996, whose graduation coincides with the 300th anniversary of St. John's College. Table of Contents From the Editor. President's Message Dean's Message Around Campus (I) Tutors Reality Sports Around Campus (n) To our 300 years Croquet, Waltz, Lola's Around Campus (HI) Seniors Yearbook Staff. Blank Page 3 4 5 6 12 32 34 42 66 72 78 82 112 113 We wanted this book to be more than a set of your pictures, we tried to make it a beautiful present. Many changes were made to fit the purpose. First, the quality: fifty rolls of film were taken to establish a higher share of quality photos; out of those only the very best shots were selected. Fifteen color pages instead of the usual eight were supplied (and the price of the book is still $35.00!). Pictures of seniors: we really tried to represent the graduating class in color and quality. Every section was thoroughly designed. For the first time both the President and Dean were ask to open the book. Every senior (except those who refused) is represented in the Senior Section. For the very first time every tutor is given space in the book (again, except those who declined our offer). We designed a chapter with professional writing and archive photos to honor our history and tradition. Cover, color and design, font, point size, end pages — all were given thought and attention, and hours of work. We sincerely hope you like it. Note to underclassmen: we apologize for not giving you enough attention. Your time will come very soon. Good luck. Sincerely, Dimitry Fedotov Editor in Chief �Farewell from the Dean March, 1996 On May nineteenth of this year, at twothirty or so in the afternoon, you will suddenly be transformed from enrolled students to graduated alumni. The ceremony that works this magic is called Commencement, a word that hides half the truth, for if something great is in the offing, something wonderful is also at an end: four years in which you belonged more to yourself and more to us than ever you will again. You were here to shape yourself by learning, and you accepted us as the guardians of your studies. From now on your activities will have new aims, and we will no longer be entitled to guide your progress. To the Class of 1996, Greetings and congratulations! It is a semisweet duty I will soon perform, shaking your hands, handing you your diplomas, and wishing you well as you leave this particular "way-station and begin your journey beyond — probably semi-sweet for you too. Your diploma signifies our respect for your capacity to learn and your effort in beginning that challenge so well. That, of course, is the source of our sadness, that you are leaving us in mid-conversation. The remedy to this is the source of the good we will enjoy when we hear from you over the years: What are you doing? What are you thinking? What are you learning? Who are you sharing your lives with? How are you helping others? You can be sure that we will want to hear and to talk and to correspond with you because we have been together for four big years, engaged in one common activity. Our learning together is surely the best foundation for a lifetime of friendship. "Your diploma signifies our respect for your capacity to learn and your effort in beginning that challenge so well." Please keep in touch and farewell Sincerely yours, " We care about how you do in the world both because we have learned to love you, and also because hi your lives, we feel, lies the corroboration of this college." No question, the campus will feel empty that Monday after, empty and ghostly. If some of you happen to have stayed on, you will feel a little like changelings; a day ago you were for us putative grown-ups whom we secretly worried about as children, and now you have suddenly become certified adults who happen also to be quite formally our offspring, our nurslings — for that is what the word alumni means — and whose fortunes we will follow openly and eagerly. We care how you do in the world both because we have learned to love you, and also because in your lives, we feel, lies the corroboration of this college. Believe me, we will miss you, and we hope you will miss us (but not too much). And remember that while your students status was rightly transient, as alumni you are ours forever. So farewell and fare well! Christopher B. Nelson President Fondly, <CJ&^ f- W. KS Eva T. H. Brann Dean �;•• • >-:^ Look,we were studying before YOU barged in with that dumb camera. Let's hear it for the smoking ban! Matt Bralthwaite in his own little world. �Avik tells about his favorite movie "Species No, I don't think roasting [he Navy goat is a good ide �11 �THE FACULTY 12 The faculty watches as the members of the senior class receive their diplomas and hood: What does it mean to be a tutor? To be a professional student: to read the most complicated works of philosophy and question one's opinions every year. To be a leader: to guide class with one's questions towards an elusive truth. To face 18 year old naive, ambitious, idealistic, talented freshmen every year and see them grow and transform. 13 �15 �16 �Nicholas Maistrellis : • • • • • " ; - . . , ; :•:,:;,: larvey Flaumenhaft Kathryn Kinzer I IfflSiHBl£eidbrnian Librarian �David L. Townsend ������REALITY '95 "The maturity of man - that means, to have reacquired the seriousness that one had as a child at play." -- F. Nietzsche Thanks to Dan Speck and Jon Spooner the Grand Old Party was a total success: theme, organization, service, music and games — all deserve an "A+". The weather miraculously complemented their plan: full of sun and madness Friday and Saturday, followed by a quiet and rainy Sunday for sleep and rest. The following pictures are intended for two kinds of people. Those who were physically absent will learn about the school's best party and wish they had been there. Those who were mentally absent will be provided with examples of their glory and magnificence. Fighting goes under water and .. The moment of truth: Ends and Means are ready to fight for the glory after the Dean inspiring speech. ^, __ , ... , oV'rt: :;F ,>""£.• , ;r :-r 1 il :t: ;:. H • W. 32 Flower children: Daniel Insetta and Matt Braithwaite groovin' on a Sunday afternoon �ATHLETICS St. John's Athletics are much like it's Academics - rare, multi-faceted, and intense (and aimed towards the Good, of course). Though St. John's is primarily considered an 'intellectual school', any red-blooded Johnnie knows that time spent in the gym is as much an exercise in philosophy as discussions at the seminar table are. Classes push students to debate and discuss; they struggle •with the ideas of Kant and sack Troy with Homer. The playing fields push students to practice and test ideas and beliefs while offering an outlet from the rigors of academic life. Philosophers develop as contemplation becomes action; the passionate battle cry is heard, "I play therefore I am!" Many Johnnies claim that these athletic rituals are, indeed, necessary for happiness, a balance, and at the very least - sanity. Tutor. Abe Schoener, insists that the successful execution of a left handed lay-up is as good for one's soul as many of the books on the program. Countless members of the community, be they tutor or student,can be found worshipping at Temple Iglehart on any given day, any given season. Basketball is a passionate past-time, and other sports follow close behind. The women's soccer team, known as the Kuvai (or the hell bitches), the crew team and the fencing club participate in matches against other colleges; soccer, basketball, volleyball and handball compete within the college community. Throughout the school year, other special athletic events are held such as bike races, marathons, and ping-pong and basketball tournaments. Most weekends, students and faculty can be found donning their team colors and rushing fearlessly to the field to partake of the joy of battle. At quieter moments, however, when the gym is nearly deserted and the noise has died, you can find a hopeful Johnnie or two casting an eye wistfully backwards as they exit the Temple. Their gaze falls on the shirts that hang so gloriously from the ceiling; these are the trophies of the outstanding athletes that have come before. The mysterious names branded on each shirt have grown in mythic proportion in the minds of the students who frequent the gym. At such moments, desire blazes in the hearts of the hopeful as they dream of their jersey someday hanging, retired, amongst the greats. Tackle Basketball? �STJOHN'S COLLEGE CREW 7e wish we were still asleep! Left to right: Leigh Fitzpatrick, Jehanne Dubrow, Sarah Fremont. Kelly Lyons, Lea Fisch, Anne Dude, Rebekah Jongewaard, Dani Schaffe The few, the strong, the cold - Chris Stevens, Matt Carter, Vince Dude 36 Cl*eW - Back Row: Marcel Potvin, Ian Nyberg, Matt Carter, Todd Pytel. Middle Row: Hai Sun, Christine Coalwell, Karin Ekholm, Aaron Silverman, Chris Stevens, Carter Snead, Leigh Fitzpatrick, Eve Gibson, Kelly Lyons, Joshua Hendrix, Sarah Fremont. Front Row: Aimee Nichols, Dani Schaffel, Pia Thadhani, Erin Bonning, Nelson Hernandez, Anne Dude, Cindy Lutz, Rebekah Jongewaard, Leo Pickens. Crew: They all get along so well! 37 �ATHLETIC TRAINING PROGRAM ick Michelle Smith Greta Pittard, Gjergji Bakallbashi, Haakon Maxwell, Josh Hendrix, Nate Suma, Felix Leslie, Tess Coburn, Alex Kathleen Tinning, Carrie Killoran, Erin Bonning, Kate Wilson, Erin Hearn, B. Good, Justice Schunior, Raphael Jankovic, Adnet While doing push-ups it occurs to Stuart that he might be at college on the wrong side of K George Street, but he soon realizes this is absurd. At the top of the hill, the participants of Homeric Training ask the immortal question: we clone yet?" Drew pumps some iron. 39 �40 Leo Pickens - super rcf. Miilincla Campbell juggles the ball while Sarah Fremont and Pia Thadhani follow in pursuit Fancy foot work by Adrien Gehring. 41 �- • • • "„- "»> •B1 * •• Our friends at Marriott. Standing: Dale Jacobs, Curtis Wilkerson, Damion Day, Alexander Johnson, Craig Pratt. Seated; Cheryl Heseman, Diannese Butler, Nelly Simms, Sylvia "Wilkerson, Pal Wilkerson. •1\2 Keep these doors locked at all times. 43 "Whe �44 Oh that Carl, he's so dreamy Before the ORAL. 45 �I -"#11 46 • • • i ^ • • •^ ™ 47 �48 49 �SEMINAR There are several ways to organize one's learning. Seminar is one of them. St. John's College has chosen it as a major. What if the curriculum were changed and the campus were different? What would be left from the St. John's we know? I would hope that even if all else were lost, seminar would remain. This organization of group learning is based on a premise that none in the classroom knows the right answer, including the tutors. This does not mean that the existence of absolute truth is questioned; but it does mean that if there is truth, then it would be easier to find through group effort. Over four years students develop true respect for different opinions. Misconceptions are more likely to be viewed as abandoned truths rather than personal faults. • •• B • ,, B • B •.'.'B B I • I 11' I•• = i ! - I •'•-. = : - - 1 * »J ° ..''•=• ^ 1 I ' It ,I :••I ": - * I :: • •1 J»' 1 • y:i - \ I |- I BBBHBI ! 1 L b 51 �January Freshman Seminar: Mr. Williamson and Mr. Gu. From Left to Right: Keelin Daly, Amy Humphrey, Krista Taylor, Alexander Berkobein, Elizabeth Bush, Nathan Zweig, Sarah Dawson, Adam Mahler, Daniel Rogers, Prinny Stephens, Samuel Garcia, Karl Boyno, David Bohannon, China Layne, Matthew Coleman, Elena Andriolo, Michael Hraber, Santiago Navarro-Monzo, Gary Temple, Marc Reiner, Mr. Gu. Not Pictured: Mr. Williamson, Freshman Seminar: Mr. Sterling and Mr. Goldberg. Back Row: Ethan Press, Todd Pytel, Matthew Calise, Mr. Sterling, Andrew Merkel, Adrian Bowles. Middle Row: Andre Scalfani, Mr. Goldberg, Nelson Hernandez, Louvenia Magee, Dana Ostrander, Robin Roland, Rebecca Elliott. Seated: Erin Jakowski, Heather Richardson, Daniel Mazal, Elizabeth Sudduth. Not Pictured: Reynaldo Miranda, Kathleen Tinning. Michael Adams. HB^BiHiiHMHM^HiHiMM^^H^^M January Freshman Seminar: Mrs. Berns and Mr. Badger. Standing: Christine Curran, Benjamin Gloss, Leslie Phipps, Ruthanne Rhone, Courtney Klayko, Stephen Cavey, Mr. Badger, Mrs. Berns, Anthony Chiarella, Mark Johnson, Carl Smith, Shelby Blythe, William Hitchner. Seated: Rodino Anderson, Paul Chandler, David Opalinsky, Jonathan Pezold, James Finlayson, Hermes Bojaxhi. Not Pictured: Victoria Hendrickson, Magdalena Kulik, Paul Lochner, Dan Toulson. 52 Freshman Seminar: Ms. Lassowsky and Mr. Tuck. Back Row: Joshua Louis, Cleveland Kersh, Eve Gibson, Mr. Tuck, Elinor Sawyer, Benjamin Thornber. Middle Row: Hayes Moore, Jennifer Connor, Ms. Lassowsky, Genevieve Fewell, Ganesha Vazquez. Front Row: Colby Cowherd, Nicolas Richardson, Carrie Robinson, Heather •McCarthy. Not Pictured: Jenny Peckenpaugh, Adam Smith. 53 �Freshman Seminar: Ms. Heines and Mr. Sachs. Back Row: Christian Moser, Ms. Heines, Robert Mihail, Samuel Davidoff, Tessa Coburn, Johnny Hayes, Mr. Sachs. Middle Row: Jay Henry, Derek Alexander, Kristin Woodfin, Rebecca Schunior, Aimee Nichols. Seated: Maureen Gallagher, Joshua Emmons, Kristin Jacob, Abigail Gibbs, Melissa Coleman. Not Pictured: Nathan Carpenter Freshman Seminar: Ms. Kraus and Mr. Russell. Back Row: Marcel Potvin, Ms. Kraus, Christopher Jordarl Krishna Mehta, Robert Holbrook, Kevin Galvin, Brian Shea, Mr. Russell. Middle Row: Piroska Kopar, Jill Ahern, Karin Ekholm, Catherine Stirling, Michael Soejoto, Corey Sebastian, Kelly O'Malley, Kara Fenske. Seated: Ward Kashiwa, Gjergji Bakallbashi. 54 Freshman Seminar: Mr. Fisher and Mr. Braithwaite. Standing: Nathan Suma, Olivia Morgan, Lauren Bishop, Johan Swindler, Malachi Kenney, Anna Boozer, Sheena Otto, Iddrisu Tia, Corinne Smyth. Seated: Blake Ingram, Joshua Hendrix, Joseph Richardson, Anna-Clare Milazzo,Christina Ruffino. Not Pictured: Mr. Fisher, Mr. Braithwaite. Freshman Seminar: Mr. Salem and Mr. Townsend. Back Row: Kristin Scott, Samuel Hart, Mr. Townsend, George Phelps, Brian Austin, Matthew Kemp, Ryan Simpson. Middle Row: Gabriella D'ltalia, Jessica Morgenstern, Deborah Carlos, Hastings Shannonhouse, Erin Gage, Mr. Salem. Front Row: Michael Busch, Benjamin sPeakmon, Federico Buccellati. Not Pictured: Nan Hobson. 55 �Sophomore Seminar: Ms. Langston and Mr. Zeiderman. Back Row: Danielle Tabela, Heather Miller, Sophomore Seminar: Dr. Capozzoli and Ms. Ruhm von Oppen. standing Melina Hoggard, Leah Mr Zeiderman Jefferson DuBose, Ganwise Fewtrell, Stephen Kagarise, Sara Barker. Middle Row: Julie Stubanus, Leigh Fitzpatrick, Jean Tally, Carrie Killoran, Ian Robertson, Ms. Langston. Seated: Mark Binet, Whitney Peterson, Asta Almenas, Valdimir Mashenko. Not Pictured: Phillip Jumonville, Daniel Lee. Fisch, Amy Robertson, Suzanne Crane, Rodolfo Hernandez, Jeremy Melvin, Dr. Capozzoli, Felix Leslie, Christopher Bush, Andrew Paolone, Darren Gardner, Ms. Ruhm von Oppen, Jihan Shekem. Seated: Heidi Grossenbacher, Pamela Bergson, Dana Schaffel, Heather Deutsch, Jennifer Borell, Crystal Welliver. Not Pictured: Lauren Connolly. Sophomore Seminar: Ms. BlitS and Mr. Page. Back Row: William Sothern, Timothy Pomarole, Jennifer Levy, Clarke Madden, Ryan Emery, Benjamin Rettig, Mr. Page. Middle Row: Ms. Blits, Nadia Qurashi, Sara Tonnessen, Mary Ford, Sarah Knutson, Lea Pitkanen. Seated: Cindy Lutz, Camille Finefrock. Not Pictured: Max Fink, Christopher Jones. 56 Sophomore Seminar: Mr. Edisis and Mr. Umphrey. Back Row: Joshua Burleigh, Joshua Rogers, Mr. raisis, Benjamin Carlson, Mr. Umphrey, Shawn Steward, Robert Young, Luis Salas, Timothy Winslow. Front RowNathan Greenslit, Jessica Covitz, Jill Cantine, Anne Dude, Vira Feliciano, Emily Maglathlin, Beatrice Robbins Not Pictured: Tom Kurland, Kelly Lyons. 57 �Sophomore Seminar: Mr. Cosans and Mrs. Higuera. Back Row: Leon Strand, Alan Pichanick, Josiah Rowe Kevin Davis. Middle Row: Dawn Shuman, Jacqueline Camm, Nicole Standley, Nicole Page, Lucinda Boynton, Greta Vittard. Seated: Nicholas Pignone, Rebekah Jongewaard, Mrs. Higuera, Mr. Cosans. Not Pictured: Lorna Anderson Christian VanSant, Sarah Vinson, Lili Zarghami. •MI^^^^^B^^^^^^^M^^— Sophomore Seminar: Mr. Maistrellis and Mr. Smith. Standing: Mr. Smith, Mr. Maistrellis, Amelia Marcetti, Cristina Gaetano, Keith Bemer, Thaddeus Verhoff, Michael Goree, Joseph Marcucilli, Hai Sun, Marjorie Truman,' Nathan Sherrard, Collomia Charles, Daniel Wood. Seated: Margaret Nicholson, Christine Papavasiliou. Not Pictured: Stuart Davenport, Juliana Martonffy, Erin Rowe. 58 Sophomore Seminar: Mr. Milner and Mr. Sageng. Back Row: Joseph Knight, Patrick Donahue, Mr. Sageng, Mr. Milner, Mitchel Hopper. Middle Row: Benjamin Rickles, Margaret Ross, Matthew Johnston, Laura Spencer, Scott Larson, Sherwin Beck. Front Row: Alexandra Boozer, Lura Groen, Katharine Wilson, Dora Jacobs, Larissa Parson, Alexis Martinez. Not Pictured: Marianne Thompson, Ariel Szabo. Sarah Knutson gets in some last minute studying before class. 59 �Junior Seminar: Mr. Franks and Mr. Wyatt. Standing: Jeremy Schaub, David Veazey, Genevieve Goodrow, Mr. Franks, Mary Lynch, Richard Schmechel, Lee Hoggard, Corey Comstock, Mr. Wyatt. Seated: Laura Collins, Annemarie Catania, Reiko Gregg, Alexander Bilik. Not Pictured: Lydia Aybar, Robin Banks, Mary Duncan, Walter Harris, Becky Lange. Junior Seminar: Mr. Barbera and Mrs. Renaut. Standing: Mrs. Renaut, Maura Tennor, Matthew Braithwaite, Kira Chancy, Zoe Andriolo, Juan Villasenor, Johanna Baumann, Erin Bonning, Remington Korper, Jehannl Dubrow, Jonathan Pomerance, Anthony Cole, Beth Laster, Taylor Hudnall, Mr. Barbera. Seated: Benjamin Bloom, Aidan Kelleher, David Haber. Not Pictured: Patricia Travis. 60 Junior Seminar: Mr. Dink and Ms. Seeger. Back Row: Ms. Seeger, Ian Brennan, Derek Barclay, Samuel Dillehay, Mr. Dink. Front Row: Laura Spess, Lynette Dowty, Forrest Norman, Joseph Manheim, Sarah Fremont, Christopher Stevens, Jong Chung, Kit Linton. Not Pictured: Matthew Buttrill, Rana Choi, Rachel Davis, Kate Classman, Lydia Polgreen. Junior Seminar: Mr. Cohen and Mr. Doskow. Back Row: Matt Freitas, Evan Phillips, Haakon Maxwell, J™- Doskow, Zackary Smoll, Jeffrey Travis, Liam Gracly. Front Row: Jennifer Coonce, Amy Hu, Heicli Jacot, Rebecca Michael, Sarah Bridges, Ian Kelley, Mr. Cohen. Not Pictured: Loraine Freeman, Danielle Insetta Erin Smyth Tulia van Keeven. ' 61 �Junior Seminar: Mrs. Maschler and Mr. Yee. Standing: William Marshall, Judith Neely, Anton Fedyashin, Anne Kniggenclorf, Kevin Gardner, Mr. Yee, Thomas Tandaric, Dana Reynolds, Vincent Dude, David Polgreen, Stephen Urich, Gjergji Bojaxhi. Seated: Geraldine "Griffin" Perkins, Mrs. Maschler, Christopher Simpson, Luke Trares. Not Pictured: Jonathan Andrews,Andrew Keenan. Senior Seminar: Mr. ComenetZ. Standing: Mr. Comenetz, Alexander Pickands, Kendall Golladay, Sophia Fajardo, Carl Grunert, Matthew Carter, Christopher Ranck, John Williams, Sonia Kamal, John Michels. Seated: Colin Thurman, Robin Locke, Felicity Strachan. Not Pictured: Adrienne Jakowski, Paul Krause, Jonathan Spooner. Junior Seminar: Mr. Blaustein and Mr. Datchev. Back Row: Lucinda Montgomery, Joshua Parish, Haye« Adams, Adam Marker, William Erskine, Mr. Datchev, Kamielle Shaffer. Middle Row: Damon Kovelsky, Sarah Morrison, Erin Monberg, Jesse Berney, Seth Milliken, Mr. Blaustein. Seated: Aline Gram, Malinda Campbell, Pia Thadhani. Not Pictured: Benjamin Ilka, Todd Stregiel. Senior Seminar: Mr. Schulman. Standing: Bryce Ferric, Matthew Caswell, Jing Wang, Dara Trought, Daniel Stromberg, James Knerr, Ian Nyberg, Mr. Schulman, Lydia Rolita. Kneeling: Clara Murray, Wesley Beato, Jennifer s, Jennifer Donnelly, Kathryn Thorn, Peter Rubenstein. Not Pictured: Dimitry Fedotov, Carl McLaughlin. 62 63 �Senior Seminar: Mr. Burke. Standing: Allen Ziegenfus, Robert Ottoboni, Jeffrey Palmer, Melissa McKibben, Hannah Gillelan, Melissa Gate, Mr. Burke, Marshall Kass, Christopher Anderson, Sarah Stanley, Thomas Donehower. Seated: Brian McGuire, Keith Forrest, John Sifton. Not Pictured: Heather Calvert, Yu Hang, Elliott Holland. Senior Seminar: Mr. Lenkowski. Standing: Mr. Lenkowski, Marybeth Guerrieri, Christopher Landers, Jeremiah James, Elsa Roth, Mikel-Meredi Weidman, Adam Wing, Aaron Silverman, Susan Rzucidlo, Amanda Norman, Richard Schmidt. Seated: Joella Klinghoffer, Andrew McCarthy, Daniel Speck, Kristin Leake, Franck Roark, Sarah Bittle. Senior Seminar: Mr. Kalkavage. Back Row: Laurin Wollan, Jeffrey Berger, Svetlana Mendyuk, Jeffrey Gara, Ryan Madison, Sharon Soper, Sallie Pullman, Mr. Kalkavage. Middle Row: Carter Snead, Candace Feit, Lenka Rosolova Gabriel Silvers. Front Row: Heather Niemeyer, Jeanne Detch, Erin Hearn. Not Pictured: Kevin Doyle. Senior Seminar: Mr. Verdi. Standing: Erin Wright, Aaron Lewis, Mr. Verdi, Avik Mohan, Peter Rispin, Valerie Garvin, Mark Whipple, Renate Lunn, Sean Leadem, Peter Smith, Adrien Gehring. Seated: Janice Cater, Kirk Duncan, Carla Eehevarria, April Walters. Not Pictured: Hilary Cumberton, Nathan Jongewaarcl. 64 65 �300 Years of Liberal Arts: the St. John's Legacy by Emily A. Murphy, A'95 Assistant Registrar and Curator of Photographs, Maryland State Archives. In 1696, a grammar school was founded in Maryland's new capital of Annapolis "... for the education of the youth of this province in good letters and manners..." as the charter said. The grammar school, named King William's School in honor of the King of England, was intended to be the first step in founding a college in Maryland, since colleges cannot be started until there are students educated to enter them. However, efforts to turn King William's School into a college foundered in the General Assembly of Maryland for almost a hundred years. It was not until 1784 that the Assembly chartered St. John's College, which was to combine King William's School's grammar school with a college - thus, St. John's could educate a man from the cradle to his B.A. St. John's, combined with Washington College on the Eastern Shore, was to be the University of Maryland. Although the university idea quickly fell apart, St. John's survived, and even flourished when the General Assembly appropriations allowed. In its early years, St. John's played host to many eminent people, including General George Washington and the Marquis de Lafayette. As the college established itself, the campus grew. McDowell Hall, the original building, was followed in 1837 by Humphreys Hall, built as a dormitory for the college and preparatory school students, and as a dining hall and library. Paca-Carroll House was built in 1855 for faculty housing; Chase-Stone House in 1857 as the president's and vice-president's house, and Pickney Hall also in 1857 as a dormitory for the college students. During this time, although the books would change, the curriculum basically followed the pattern of most Amercian universities at that time: a fixed curriculum based on the Greek and Latin classics. The students would have to memorize their lessons and recite them for professors. The Civil War disrupted St. John's a great deal: the college students melted away to join both armies, and the U. S. Army took over the campus buildings. However, a single professor kept the college charter in force by teaching a class of the younger students in the Annapolis City Hall. After the war, the students gradually returned to St. John's, finding it a little frayed at the edges due to the army occupation. In 1885, the military program, which had been at St. John's in variorj; forms since 1820, became a compulsory program, and the student, became cadets, drilling and marching in their gray wool uniforms. By thi early 1900's St. John's had placed in the War Department's list Distinguished Military Colleges, and stayed there until the program was disbanded in 1923. The prominence of the military program led to anothi spurt of growth on campus: Woodward Hall, the library, laboratories, am armory, was completed in 1900; Randall Hall, the mess hall and senioi dorm, in 1903; and Iglehart Hall, the gym, in 1909. With the new regime! the curricula had changed to one tending toward free electives, and aftei the military program ended, free electives were established. Howeverj although our sports teams were unbeatable, by 1937 the truth was that thi college was broke and had lost its accreditation. As a result, the bo visitors and governors was willing to let two young men, Stringfellow Bar! and Scott Buchanan, try an educational experiment: The Great Booffl Program. The New Program, as it is also known, is a fixed curriculum, based the Greek and Latin classics - a return to the early years of St. John's. WM is new about the program is the way in which the books are studied! instead of memorized recitations, students are encouraged to think and discuss the books in their seminars and tutorials. Barr and Buchanan's educational experiment has been a success. In the last 58 years, the campus has grown still more, with Campbell Hall built in 1954 as a women's dormitory, a new heating plant in 1951, and Mellon Hall completed in 1958. The New Program has proved that it adapt as times change, and it is certain that the Great Books, and St. John' College will see another century of growth. Early '40's: Thar looks like an even mi �The '5<>'s: U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower stands side by side with St. John's President Richard D. Weigle at the dedication ot Mellon H 68 The'20's: Another [J. S I �70 The 50's: Librarian Charlott 71 �CROQUET The 1995 Croquet Team Craig Sirkin, Imperial Wicket Jon Crimmins, Reuben Marshall, Sean Stickle, Matt Caswell, Jon Spooner, Ned Freeman, James Knerr. John Sifton, Micah Pharris. �MID-WINTER WALTZ PARTY Leah Fisch explains the finer points of waltzing to Marianne Thompson Waltz parties and romance go hand in nan Tockl Pytel and Eve Gibson 74 75 �: S.VTOl �ilffftu 78 �80 �SENIORS 82 83 �; '.; ; V' : - ; ; - , s But those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount UP with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint Isaiah 40:31 Matthew Carter �Hilary Lauren Cumberton 87 �Dimitry L. Fedotov Sophia Rebeca Faiardo fiat shall we say who have Knowledge carried to the heart? -Allen Tate Adrien Portia Gehring �Non in dialectica complacuit Deo salvum facere populum suum -Ambrose (Defide, I, 5, 42) Marybeth Guerrieri It looked good natured, she thought; still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt it ought to be treated with respect. -Lewis Carroll Erin Naomi Hearn First you must gain insight into the natural world. You must Learn to see the depths of its reality. If you glance casually over things of this life, their real significance eludes you... Knowledge surrounds Us in an infinite variety of form. Do not slight any of them or take ttny of them lightly. Morihei Ueshiba O Sensei, Founder ofAikido �August 26, 1992 Bi "(Jlra&ia .Aiams 199B King Pang ieffreg Pela CSara <ttlfristopb,Er JHicljael .Anberaon J*U.c ffllarence pUliam Patt fflaitlin ©'Peefe Aptofatcz : Portia (Searing JUarfc •Jlane ipliaabetb. Panntater ^lamea German ^rin Pizabetlj Jlebefcalj diillelan Ariel ^Robert Penzakein d5. ^Seatl;er Jf temeger ^fefrin |Cawrence Doling Allen JRofaben Ziegenfua feffreg |Iouis Perger Paula Patljerine Hiillta Jkmanba ^lizabetlj Jforman llesBE Jlotlt Perneg Penball flames (Sollabag |0anne (tLlfnetint ©bom t!Io00 A^3" Porin fflarl Phillip Cirunert flljab JR. ©bfaazng ; Petlf (Suerrieri fl^uentin ^xanber Praitlffaaite VjvwitUu ^rtc ^Miclfael Zsebengi ^O (?w/ ^Robert |ob,n ©ttoboni 27, 1993 j Jrff«ff < fflailjerine ^lizabetb, ^Sanber |Sara (ttb,ristine Oloxnrub Aorienne Jafcofoaki tdasfaell ilenntfer (Eareg Patea ^icijarb ^ifrancis Peterson ipCeatljer A^son fflal&ert Ppllip Patricia Purk fonatljan <3lra Pomerance ilantee ^Cgnn (later <_ Bailie Jfairligl|t Pullman ifer JKae iob.naTO atljan Pafriir fottgefaaarb Philip Pass (Eumberlon Anorefa JRicb,arb Peenan Pimberleg ^oel P' Peraroino Parbara Ann fflook ptnba Polk James JRicljarb fflurrin tog Paker JReeb JRacljel Anne Panis feter Jianiii JRiapin (ftanbace 'Sraceg ,3fcit flgrus JRain JRobl (-tj^^ •Iffalerie 3)ane (Siarfrin ^ric plimeck P earner OJb,riatopljer Plancijaro |Eanber8 flsa ^Cgnne i&otlj 3)eanne J- Sean tjgrrell |Ceabem Ikiatljaw Pricfce JRofoan 1 1 Jtang 1 Pristtn Pae ^Ceafce Simotlig Anbrefa ^lofce ^rin ^Beatljer Maf- /Ctw*- Stefaen ' t^?** Samuel 'Plsfoortlj ^i Patrick Pilliam Oioulo y Joella ^Sftelanit pitngljoffer Jlobin f Hzabetli ]Cocke Ptcior-'pung ^clpnilrt Jennifer Anne Ponnellg fflcmstance Attrt Aaron JKattljcfa ^ilfterman Pe&in Hofyn Pogle JRettate iean |IuHn f eter fflijantler ^mitli Danielle Priaten Deride fefferaon Penman POX A«tllong ^pecb Pou3laa Jilabiaon Pirk gditn Puncan ,3lan Priatofor ^gbe ^franctB ^piirle |2gbia Jlopoza JRolita Poril ^icoio& .dEancljefa lean CHarla |icb,enarria fflaroline ^ffiieke 'plliott Pengs ^MarBl|all ^aralj JJulang ^irana Jlenka. JRosolofca Peter JUcfflartlfg Prian Pimitrg ^Ceonaro ^)fe0oto£i Prgce 3ferrie JRattb,efc Jifreitaa ®imo% Itee filler Stromberg loljn @uBta£i2 j^ifton J@a&ib Simpson ffloltn mi|urman Antlrong gianbaric, fr. ,BaniJi Patrick tErefz /f Sfeetiana JHen&gufe 93 �"Laughter I have pronounced holy: you higher men, learn to laugh!" -Friedrich Nietzsche Nathan D. Jongewaard Joella Klinghoffer James Sanville Knerr �"/ belive in and conceive a thousand contrary ways of life..." -Montaigne 'A wolf is fed by its feet. " -Russian Proverb Melissa Lynn McKibben Mark Anthony Whipple / never live alone, I never walk alone my posse's always ready and they're waitin' in my zone. Marshall Phillip Kass I guess by now you can take a hunch, and find that I am the baby of the bunch: But that's okay I still keep in stride all I'm here to do is just wiggle your behind. All my love to the Family and Friends. �Love is a trick played on us by evolution. Pleasure is tbe bait laid down by tbe same. There is only power. Power is of tbe individual mind, but tbe mind's power is not enough. Power of tbe body decides everything in the end, and only Might is Right. -T. H. Whitte It was a mournful conclusion. He locked up the observatory and descended the stairs, hoping that his dreams would contradict bis thoughts. -W. Churchill "Better well hanged than ill wed." -Shakespeare Svetlana Mendyuk 98 99 �Abby Clara Murray "The Lord called me from the womb; From the body of my mother He named me... He said to me, "You are My servant, Israel, In whom I will show My glory." Isaiah 49: 1,3 Sallie Fairlight Pullman 100 Amanda Elizabeth Norman �I» "'""! SENIOR ESSAYS MR. CHRISTOPHER ANDERSON MS. JENNIFER BATES MR. WESLEY BEATO MS. SARAH BITTLE MS. HEATHER CALVERT MR. JEFFREY GAliA MS. RENATE LUNN MS. VALERIE CABVIN The Shapeless Vapoun An Investigation of the Beautiful Soul and Morality in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit Intuition and Arithmetic \Vhy is Socrates a Paradox? Love and Logos hi the Phacdrus MR. RYAN MADISON A Ministry of Faith: The Response to the Revelation of Disciple-ship in Christ MS. ADKJBN GP.HRIMG A Second Look at the Legendary Seducer Don Juan "Ritrovai": A Re-Encountering of the Self in Dante's Inferno MS. HANNAH GILI.KLAN MR. BRIAN McGUIUi; A Subject That Interests Us Above All Others: A Study of the Foundations of Morality MR. KENlMil GOIJ.ADAY a ,yfe The Spiritual and the Perverse: The Agonizing Reality Revealed by an Antithetical Union 4; ; : Rationality, Autonomy and Freedom; An Examination of the Essential Concepts in Kant's MR. MATTHEW CASWELL MS. MELISSA CATE MS. JANICE CATER MS. HILARY CUMBERTON MS. JEANNE DETCH MR. THOMAS DONEHOWER MS. JENNIFER DONNELLY MR. KEVIN DOYLE MR. KIRK DUNCAN An Examination of Motion MS. MAKYBETII Gl'ERKQiKI Theodicy: Guilty Before AH For All: The eternal questions in The Brothers Karama/ov : VIS. YtJ HANG , • ; vi MS. l:i(]N HF.AKN g: MR. ELLIOTT HOLLAND MS. ADRIENNE JAKOWSKI MS. SOPHIA FAJARDO MR. DIMITRY FEDOTOV MS. CANDACE FEIT MR. KEITH FORREST 102 Recollection and Redemption: The presence of Dante's early work La_Vita_Nuova in The Divine Coim-dv ' Higher Medicine: The Transcendent Fxperiences in War and Peace ; ;; \;. , MK. JOHN SIFTON il:^, ^!S; "''& ; ; ,1 ; -::?«1> The Effect of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Concept of Public ReaUty on the Traditional Study of Ethics MR. ;^\RON SILVERMAN " ...» ~-i : : The Role of God in Verdi's Otello MR. GABRIEL SILVERS Love's War and Peace ;1;: MR. PETER SMITH The Identity of Odysseus: Disguise and Recognition in Homer's Odyssey ; >l-^f MR. ORLANDO SNEADg !;:•" \s Retreat from Humanity Itl^lBift's Gulliver's Travels Tableaux Russe MR. JOHN MICHELS Relations Between Men ia Melville's Benito Cereno Co^ afc MR. AVIK MOHAN The First Principles of Morality: M* A Look into Aristotle's NJcomachean Ethics and Kant's Groundwork of the Me tap The Enchiridion of Well-Being: Melville's Instruction in • • ^ • ; ; '"-• MS. CLARA MURRAY MS. HEATHER NIEMEYEK 0 Capitalism: The First Perpetual Motion Machine | What is Proof?: An Examination of the Different Forms of Persuasion, Both Logical and Rhetorical. The Horror and Beauty of Gray in MelVille's B_ejiito_Cereno | | | MR. NATHAN JONGEWAAED Monolith MS. SO.NIA KAMAL On Prince Channings. Frogs, Love Marriages and Arranged Ones, :: Morality and Mystery: Marlow's Transformation in Conrad's Heart ql' Darkness MS. JOEM.A KIJNGHOEFER "England hath been Mad7': A Look at a Corrupt Kingdom in Richard HI 'But I Digress...': An Examination of Digression and Textual Authority hi Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy The Gambit of Master Babo THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN RECOLLECTION, LANGUAGE, AND THOUGHT or If Uons could talk, why we would not be able to understand them. Rule and Compliance: The Master/Slave Relationship in Xenophon's Oeconomicus MS. SARAH STANLEY Holding It All Gently: Galway Kinnell's The Book of Nightmares Akhilleus, First in Beauty, First in Might. Honesty and Idiocy in Pride and Prejudice God and Man in Dostoevsky's Demons MR. WIUJAM TIIUKMAN Religious Picture-Thought and its Movement into Absolute Knowing Newton and Leibniz on Matter and Soul Knowledge of a Sage, Wisdom of a Child: An exploration of Puck MS.JING WAN(i Analysis of Aristotle's Ethical Virtue and Practical Wisdom MS. MIKFIrMIiKEDITH WEIDMAN "Tis a Gift to be Simple:" Tolstoy's Blessing of Simplicity in War and Peace Pascal and the Imagination W. PETER RISPIN Certainty and Validity for Geometry and Kant's Critiqijg ^ •':;. "' The Validity of ;=V Mathematical Propositions MB. CHRISTOPHER I ANDERS MK. SEAN I.EAHEM On Time in Augustine's HR. FRANCK ROARK' Gulliver's Philosophical Voyage: Pride and Virtue in /•,., IS. LYDIA ROIJTA The Liberation of the Will Through Kaniian Morality A Look into the Eye of the Voyeur: The Role of the Observer in Baudelaire's "Les Petites Vieilles" A Light In The Underground The Reign of the Sage: Cosmology and Politics in the Tao TejChing The Angelic Butterfly: The Story of Purgation in Dante's Divine Coim-dy VIS, CHRISTOPHER RANCK MK. PAUL KKAUSF. MR. JONTHAM SPOONER MS. APRIL WALTERS The Divine Sword: The Road To Inner Peace Through The Military Arts: : = ;; ; A Study of Zen hi the fi<>. Em_No Sho add Ikilio Ivaden Sho >1S. SALUF. PULLMAN ^ Equality at the Cost of Freedom: Why is Rousseau an Enemy of Factionalism? MS. DARA TROUGH! The Highest of Arts: An Exploration of Thoreau's Views of Man in Walden ''•',•_ MR. ALEXANDER PICKANDS IS. 1EIVKA ROSOLOVA Proper Statecraft for Proper People: An Examination ol Political Necessity in Edmund Rurke's Reflect ions on the Revolution in France The Fight for Independence: An Exposlulalory Understanding of HegcFs "Independence and Dependence of Self-Consciousness lordship and Bondage" The Theater of Katerina Ivanovna In The Brothers Kanmiazoy Through The Tempest Prospero Sees: Pleasure In Natural Order MS. KATHRYN THORN The Search for Truthe The Pilgrimage of the Will in of Piers Plowman :=S MR. MAKSHAI.I. K.VSS The Birth of Absolute S On Consciousness' s Progreli&n through the Hegelian Dialectic of Morality '^ | | Ife 'IP; MR. DANIEL SIROMBFRG The Change in the Conception of Nature from Aristotle to Kant 1H. .JEFFREY PALMER :;! MS. SHARON SOI'ER : =;:V:': v"Fn: MS. FELICITY STRACHAN "Le Cirneticre marine'' The Pendulum of Sense and Intellect tlR. ROI5ERT OTTOBONI The Exegesis of anlfpbhorism5: Ascetic Ideals in the Third Essay of On the Geneology of Morals :: MK. DANIEL SPECK MR. IAN NYBERG The Place of God: Origins of Newton and Leibtii/'s Absolute Time and Space Debate "Stronger, more ,l ; vil, and more Profound; ;fi»o more Beautiful": The Future of Philosophy in Nietzsche's Beyond Good andjj^Jl -'fi/l j ; r ' lljl ''•:::•::'•" The Genesis of Morality in Rousseau's Emile MS. AMANDA NORMAN A Harmony Of Natures: The Necessity of Human Experience In Unifying The Conflicting Natures of Plalo'S Guardians £:W: • \^K • 1~ Plato s View On Education: What Would Confucius Say? MR. JEREMIAH JAMES MR. AARON LEWIS MR. BRYCE FERRIE RICHARD SCHMIDT !; ; = ; "1:'l -:k MS. SVETLANA MENDYUK SOCRATES AND THE CITY; An Examination, of Socrates' Defense of Philosophy in Plato's Apology MR. JAMES KNERR MS. JEAN ECHEVARRIA MS. MELISSA MeKIBBEN ;|| ;; Should We Feel Sorry for Melos? ;!; || Myself Creating What I Saw Reality, Imagination, and SelfExamination in Jane Austen's Hamlet ]f MR. CARL MCLAUGHLIN The Artificial Mail vs. the Ultimate Design of the Universe: Hobbes and Hegel on Freedom and Man's Nature The Beautiful Balance: A Study of Schiller's I.etiers on the Acsiheiic Education of MgHl MR- '^|%. Emma The Memento of Class In the Symbolic logic of Rertrand Russell •: '•. : : Natural Knowledge and Morality Rosemary, Fennel, Columbine and Rue, But No Violets: An ol Morals "Lift up your eyes on high|ppd see...": An examination o|lpfe birth of irrational numhis^ Kant's Theory of the Moral Self: Unity as the Condition for Completeness MS. SUSAN RZUCIDLO \t En Se MiiHiplianl A Reading of Baudelaire's "Utie Charogne" •*M*?> MK. CARL GRUNRRT MR. MATTHEW CARTER K MR. ANDREW MCCARTHY The Dangers of True Happiness in a Legitimate State Metaphysical Consequences of a Mathematical System = " From the River to the Ocean: Society vs. Nature in !he Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and "Benito Cereno" r :-:™ vIS. ELSA ROTH Marriage and Happiness Jn War and Peace The "Mechanism" of Freedom: An Exploration of Concepts in the Metaphysics of G. W. Leibni/ MR. JOHN WILLIAMS Faith, Despair, and the Practice of Religion MR. ADAM WING A Fear of Hegel MR. LAURIN WOLLAN IR. PETER KUBENSTFJISf The Failure of a Good Man's Ideals in Ihe Practical World, as shown in Dostoevski's Idiot Is Pure Knowledge Dependant Upon Comprehended History? MS. ERIN WRIGHT In Defense of Rousseau's Natural Man: !he Growth of the Beautiful Child MR. ALLEN ZIEGENFUS !he Relation of Suffering and Beauty in Princess Marta 103 �Chris Ranck "What do you want to do tonight?" 'Same thing we do every night Try to take over the world!" Peter Rispin �Erin Elizabeth Wright Would you like to knou It's that I've put I've put onfyjny talent ini^i La, tout n 'est qu 'ordre et beaute, Luxe, calme, et volupte. - Baudelaire Richard V. L. Smith Susan Irene Rzucidlo Franck Roark �108 �1 I Colin Thurman Allen Ziegenfus When she reached this passage, Princess Maiya sighed and looked round into the pier glass that stood on her right. The glass reflected a feeble, ungraceful figure and a thin face. The eyes, always melancholy, were looking just now with a particularly hopeless expression at herself in the looking glass. She flatters me. thought the princess, and she turned away and went on reading. But Julie did not flatter her friend: the princess's eyes - - large, deep, and luminous (rays of warm light seemed at times to radiate in streams from them), were really so fine, that very often in spite of the plainness of the whole face her eyes were more attractive than beauty. But the princess had never seen the beautiful expression of her eyes; the expression that came into them when she was not thinking of herself. As is the case with every one, her face assumed an affected, unnatural, ugly expression as soon as she looked in the looking glass. Tolstoy, War Cr Peace 110 Congratulations an Best Wishes lass in �Yearbook Staff Editor-in-Chief Contributing Editors Principle Photographers Production Production Assistant Contributing Photographers Writers Contributing Staff Special Consultant Special Thanks Dimitry Feclotov '96 Betsy Blume 75 Emily Murphy '95 Heather Niemeycr '96 Juan Villasenor '97 Keith Harvey Kim Kern '89 Reynaldo Miranda '99 Aaron Silverman '96 John Michels '96 Christine Coalwell AGI'96 Amy Marcetti Lauren Connolly '98 Vivian Ronay '65 John Bidahl Dimitry Feclotov '96 Chris Ranck '96 Jackie Camm '98 Camille Finefrock '98 Michael Goree '98 Chris Denny '93 Terence Whiteside Acknowledgments I would like to thank the St. John's College Alumni Association for funding the Tutor Photo Project, Barbara Goyette, 73, who supplied photos from the files of the "Reporter"; Leo Pickens, "78 and Brian Good, '89, for their assistance with the Sports section, and Jeff Bishop, '96, for his patience and support as the yearbook project became more unwieldy and threatened to engulf the entire second floor of Carroll Barrister. Many thanks to the 1996 Yearbook Staff for producing the book. A book that, at times seemed to hang by a thread has turned out to be the best produced since I revived the yearbook over a decade ago. Those who came through for us as we pushed for completion, in a kind of frenzy of creative exertion, deserve thanks. Our long weekends were well spent. This page is blank for two reasons. First, one might like to get one's friends' addresses and signatures before leaving Annapolis (why not put them in the Yearbook). Second, the page symbolizes our future: it is untouched, undetermined. It is completely up to us to choose it: its shapes, images, colors. There are no limits. Good luck, Class of 1996! Betsy'Blume 75 Adivisor 113 �• i Eim • (410) 261-0799 1900 FAIRFAX ROAD ANNAPOLIS, MD 21401 College right around the corner? So are we. If you want your children to go places, why not start with a college loan from a bank right in your hometown. First National has three flexible education loans to choose from; a Guaranteed Student Loan (GSL), a First Tuition Loan or a FirstLine Revolving Credit Account. After all, college is closer than you think. And fortunately, so is your local neighborhood First National branch. Stop by or call 1-800-842-BANK Member FDIC/Federal Reserve System/ Equal Opportunity Lender iThe IPalate ^Pleasers Fine Catering Wedding Cakes Gourmet-To-Go Special Orders Amy Daniels (410) 263-6941 1023 Bay Ridge Avenue Annapolis, MD 21403 really Managed. Nationally Recognized. We Bring You the Best in Banking and Hometown Service. 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CONTE -Built and Managed by J&A Builders116 DC (301) 970-2524 BALTIMORE (410) 841-2440 MULLEN, nSONDBERG WIMBISHCfcSTONE, PA. CERTIFIED PUBLIC ACCOUNTANTS AND BUSINESS CONSULTANTS FAX (410) 224-4927 The Boathouse • 410 Severn Avenue Annapolis, Maryland 21403 (410)269-0784 1-800-342-9295 117 �STUDIO NAILS (410)266-7970 410-266-6920 798-0185 2005 West Street • Suite 1 • Annapolis, MD 21401 Hours: Mon. - Fri. 9-8 Sat. 9-5 "SAY YOU SAW IT IN THE YEARBOOK AND GET $5 OFF NEW SET!" FULL SET TIP FILLS SILKWRAP FULL SET SLKWRAP FILLS MANICURE WHIRLPOOL MANICURE COMBO. MA./PED. SALE 40.00 20.00 50.00 25.00 REG, 50.00 30.00 60.00 30,00 11.00 15.00 35.00 45.00 25.00 35.00 RV REPAIRS • PffOPA/VE • HITCHES THOMAS P. GILMAN Route 50 Ridgley Avenue, Annapolis, MD 21401 Graduation & Wedding Invitations & Accessories Advertising Specialties-Business Printing-Rubber Stamps Personalized Holiday, Get Well, Sympathy & Birthday Cards Excellent Service since 1967 THE MULBERRY MART 2208 Mulberry Hill Road, Annapolis, MD 21401 "Call, I WILL COME TO YOU" 410-757-2751 -1-800-560-0062 ISAAC E. JOHNSON, Sr. Prop Three Centuries Tours of Annapolis 8 Fleet Sfreef 2nd Floor Annapolis, Maryland 21401 f41OJ 2634628 Specializing In Driveways & Parking Lots CHARLES N. CROMWELL ASPHALT PAVINGS INC. BONDED-M.H.I.C. 17120 48 Maryland Avenue A Special Thank You goes out to these Sponsors whose contributions made the yearbook possible! Annapolis Memorial Park Law Office of Joanne Tetlow Francis J. Elward Attorney Accent Graphics Inc. Drumcliff John J. Swartz, Architect Sigmund A. Amitin, PA The Manor House Heidler Inc. Mediation Services of Annapolis Flag House Inn Bed & Breakfast Liberty Truck Parts Inc. P.O. Box 29 Annapolis, MD 21404 Tel: (410) 263-5401 Fax: (410) 263-1901 1442 Log Inn Rd. Annapolis, MD 21401 Telephone (410)757-2414 ADAMS MEDICAL MICHAEL SCHWARZ 410-268-1550 ANNAPOLIS 410-269-1212 BALTIMORE 301 -261 -1599 WASHINGTON 410-263-2295 FAX (410) 1 1 7 GlBRALTER ST. ANNAPOLIS, MD 21401 The business printers 263-3218 4 ANNAPOLIS STREET ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND 21401 THE ANNAPOLIS BANKING AND TRUST COMPANY GRRPHIC DCSIGN • TVPCSCTTING PRINTING • COPYING • BINDCRV 75 Forest Plaza • flnnapolis, Maryland 21401 (410)224-6534 118 P.O. Box 311 Annapolis, Maryland 21404-0311 (210)268-4285 Thanks to the following companies and individuals who support our yearbook! Annapolis Formal • Riggs Marine Appraisals, Ltd. Camelion Designs • Michele's Little Shop of Flowers Martin & Bond Photo, Inc. • Annapolis Word Works Liberty Truck Parts, Inc. • Strothman Company, Inc. Peppercorn Gourmet • Whitehall Group, Inc. The Calico Mouse Ed Brown & Assoc. Inc. 1993 Moreland Parkway, Suite 103 Annapolis, Maryland 21401 (410) 268-8013 The Dog Salon 112 Hillsmere Drive • Annapolis, Maryland 21403 (410) 267-0451 119 �1 iHfU3*<=!•..»! ,««" ;: \ • i � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 119 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1696-1996 [Yearbook] Description An account of the resource St. John's College Yearbook for the year 1996. Dedicated to the Class of 1996, whose graduation coincides with the 300th anniversary of St. John's College. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Fedotov, Dimitry (Editor in Chief) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1996 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1996 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/df853bd1a45fba3632c1e6bafcbd87b1.pdf 95efce658052f2d88d8e3126a73bf996 PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 23. 1700: The Comic Divide CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 April 1994 Last Revised January ‘96 �1 Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 23. 1700: The Comic Divide 1) Double: [A] Rigaud, 1701, Louis XIV and [B] Watteau, 1717, L'Indifferent; both Louvre, Paris Double: details of 1, [A] and [B] 1a) The Divide of 1710, from the heroic and rational Baroque to the mock-heroic and wistful Rococo, is peculiarly the comic divide; since those opposites — assertive fulness and ironic play — suggest the blending poles of comedy itself: exuberance and mockery. Typical that grandeur and ridicule so meet in both styles that the change from Louis XIV to Regency (as from Cartesian command to Berkeleian subjectivity) seems merely a change of emphasis. What else informs historical contrasts but subtle shifts of stress between wedded contraries? 2) 2a) H. Rigaud, 1701, Louis XIV, Louvre, Paris; first, a video detail (Va2) Testelin, 1648, Portrait of Louis XIV as a Boy, Versailles (video returns to 2, upper body detail Same, detail of legs; + V return to the whole (see V2) 2b) Music: M.-R. Delalande, c. 1695, From lst Suite, Musiques Royales, Turnabout TV 34232 When Riguad's 1701 Sun King steps from his throne, as to the supper music of Delalande, the trailing vast fleur-de-lys robe raised on aging cork-heeled legs (already his vanity in Testalin's portrait fifty-three years before), that heroic proclamation — not throne, not crown, but self: "L'etat c'est moi" — bears the burlesque of Vanbruch's 1696 Lord Foppington: Mr Mend Legs, a word with you; the calves of my stockings are thicken'd a little too much. They make my legs look like a chairman's... let the next be the 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �2 C.G. Bell Symbolic History thickness of a crawnpiece less — (Aside) If the town takes notice my legs are fallen away, 'twill be attributed to the violence of some new intrigue. (fade Delalande) Yet the break at Louis XIV's death in 1715 — from pomp's overreach 3) 3a) 3b) Watteau, 1717, L'Indifferent, Louvre, Paris; + V detail Watteau, 1712, detail of Jupiter and Antiope, Louvre, Paris Return to 3, L'Indifferent, upper detail to the precise wit of Watteau — is one of the sharpest in history: in drama, the softening from Molière to the delicious sentiments of Marivaux, "A Game of Love and Chance"; in music from Lully and Delalande to Couperin's plaintive Concerts, the first in fact written to soothe the ailing king's last years. Music: Fr. Couperin le Grand, c. 1710(?), Echos, 2nd of Concerts Royaux, Vanguard Cardinal S-10029 Thus in England the fragile ironies of Pope's 1714 "Rape of the Lock": Belinda still her downy pillow press'd, Her guardian sylph prolong'd the balmy rest: 'Twas he had summon'd to her silent bed The morning-dream that hover'd o'er her head? A youth more glittering than a birth-night beau, (That ev'n in slumber caused her cheek to glow) Seem'd to her ear his winning lips to lay, And thus in whispers said, or seem'd to say: "Fairest of mortals, thou distinguish'd care Of thousand bright inhabitants of air! … For 2nd 2) V2nd 2a) Music: French Baroque, c. 1680, Louis XIV as Roman Emperor, MS Fr. 7892, Biblioteque Nationale, Paris Le Brun, 1663-75, Tapestry, Louis XIV at Dunkerque, detail, Versailles (CGB '59; cf slide 57) Again, Delalande, from lst Suite, close — that Pope succeeds Dryden's 1685 "Threnodia Augustalis": 4/1994 (fade Couperin) 1700: The Comic Divide �3 C.G. Bell Symbolic History A Warlike Prince ascends the Regal State, A Prince, long exercis'd by Fate… False Heroes made by Flattery so, Heav'n can strike out, like Sparkles, at a blow; But e're a Prince is to Perfection brought, He costs Omnipotence a second thought. (end Delalande) What can so swell the heroic tympanum For 2nd 3) Watteau, c. 1717(?), The Gamut of Love, National Gallery, London but the birth of precious ridicule — mutation of bouyancy and disenchantment? 4) N. de Largilliere, 1696, Ex Voto to St. Genevieve, with the Magistrates of Paris, Church of St. Etienne du Mont, Paris; first, video details (see V4 and cf. 24) By the end of Louis' reign, a France ruined by extravagance and war was in the hands of such tax-farmers as the forthright Lesage shows us in Turcaret: I marvel at the course of human life! We pluck a coquette; the coquette devours a man of affairs; the man of affairs pillages others: and all this makes the most diverting chain of knaveries imaginable — un ricochet de bourberies le plus plaisant du monde. Largilliere's 1696 devout magistrates of Paris cloak the travesty of that ricochet. a5) Vb5) 5) V5a) Watteau, 1720, Shop of Gersaint, whole; Charlottenburg, Berlin Same, detail: portrait being packed away Same, detail, left side Same, detail, right side (to which video adds closer details of 5 and V5a) No wonder, twenty-four years later, in Watteau's Shop of Gersaint, the wigged Virtu of the old Louis, painted by Lebrun and acclaimed by Molière at the close of Tartuffe: We live under a prince wise in the ways of the world, Whose great soul sees the truth through every mask, Whose steadfast reason admits of no excess — 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �4 C.G. Bell Symbolic History that pomp is stowed in straw in a packing case, from which the painter himself beckons a nostalgic beauty. Thus at the close of the school of manners Molière's France began, Sheridan's improvident auctions the stern portraits of his family past. As in Johnson's "Vanity of Human Wishes": From ev'ry room descends the painted face, That hung the bright palladium of the place... For now no more we trace in ev'ry line Heroic worth, benevolence divine; The form distorted, justifies the fall, And detestation rids th'indignant wall. But what if, with the picture, normative reason should be deposed, ushering in the passionate successor? Va6) Hans von Aachen, c. 1596(?), Joking Couple, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna b6) B. Strozzi, c. 1625(?), Vanity (old woman making up), Private Collection, Bologna Vc6) Velasquez, c. 1628(?), Los Borrachos (The Topers), or Triumph of Bacchus, detail, a peasant, Prado, Madrid 6) Same, whole High comedy is a type and mirror of purposive aim. In every act of purpose — as when we reach for something — the central thrust is trained on its goal by a feedback correction of misses. So in the comic antinomy, Dionysian release, breaking tame symmetry in a dance of the grotesque, takes the blaze of corrective mockery, by which its overflow is guided home — from Aristophanes to Twain and Chaplin, ironic mantle of generative force. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �5 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In the Gargantuan Renaissance, the poles seem to fuse in Windmill assault or Falstaffian celebration; in the social comedy of Method, from Molière to Austen, reason separates a truth-core, etched round with the acid of vanity and hypocrisy scorned. Velasquez' 1628 praise of Bacchus and castigation of drunk peasants straddles the line, at once Quixotic and normative. a7) Van Dyck, 1622-27, Marchesa Balbi, National Gallery, Washington Vb7) Velasquez, 1635, Filippo IV of Spain on horseback (variant of the Prado painting), Pitti, Firenze 7) Bernini, 1650-1, Bust of Duke Francis I d'Este, Mus. Estense, Modena V7a) Jean-Louis Lemoyne, 1703-04, Bust of Jules H. Mansart, Louvre, Paris 7b) John Nost, c. 1698, Digby Memorial, S. Transept, Sherborne Abbey, Dorset (CGB '84) 7c) Again Bernini, Bust of Duke Francis I d'Este, closer view Music: Fr. Turini, 1624, Sonata in A, 2 vls & continuo, Telef. AWT 9461-C But when Bernini's 1650 Duke of Este had proclaimed over Europe the code and canon of reasoned grandeur, what were all those courtly aspirants with their art- and stage-reflections to do but assume the stance of that saltimbanque nobility (Dryden's Alexander: "None but the Brave deserves the Fair"): in France the Bourgeois Gentilhomme M. Jourdain preposterously apes; in England, the Dorimants and Bellairs, Harcourts, Mellefonts, Mirabells, who pace the Restoratian stage? Though of course the manly center will be rimmed (Grave to allegro) 8) Bernini, 1665, Caricature of a French Cavalier, Gab. Naz. Stampe, Rome; first, video detail with the misses and exaggerations of Sir Fopling Flutter, Sir Novelty Fashion, Sparkish, Lord Froth, Tattle, Witwoud, Petulant. Is it not thematic that the man who schemed the ultimate inflation, Bernini, also, and at the same time, invented its caricature — the very idol, in this French Cavalier, pricked and deflated by comic scorn? (fade Turini) 9) 4/1994 Egyptian, Dyn XIX, c. 1250 B.C., One of four colossal statues of Ramses II, on the Great Temple, Abu Simbel 1700: The Comic Divide �6 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Perhaps the heroic has always occasioned playful divisions on its ground. From Soser and Khafre to Tut and this Ramses II, the enthroned Pharoah was the image of power, as epic for Egypt as Homer's warriors for the Greeks. But when in tomb-paintings of the same XIXth Dynasty, the same judgment seat 10) Egyptian, Dyn. XIX, c. 1300 BC, Cat serves a throned mouse, Brooklyn Museum secures for a royal mouse the service of a cat, we recall those Iliad parodies once ascribed to Homer — the Battle of Frogs and Mice, in which Aristotle found the comic source, how mice, armed with beanpod greaves and peanut helmets, attack the frogs armed with rushes and snail-shells, until the Myrmidon crabs intervene. Va11) b11) 11) Breughel, c. 1557, St. Anthony Landscape, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. (CGB '60) Vincenzo de' Rossi, c. 1560(?), Hercules and Antæus, Palazzo Vecchio, Firenze Domenichino, c. 1620(?), Apollo and Cyclops, with the Aldobrandini dwarf, National Gallery, London Now, as the epic mode revives, the take-offs also stake a claim: Cervantes — Scarce had..Aurora... display'd her rosy graces to mortal eyes from the gates and balconies of the Manchegan Horizon, when the renowned Knight Don Quixote... forsook the voluptuous down; or under baroque hardening, Tassoni's 1622 Rape of a Bucket: a Bolognese assault on Modena, In which they make horrible war for a bucket And go back home in triumph and racket — (CGB) Fanno per una Secchia orribil guerra, E Tornan trionfanti a lor terra — model in Dryden's England for Hudibras, and then, as the title reveals, for Pope's "Rape of the Lock." Compare Pope's mock-heroics with this fresco Domenichino painted for the Aldobrandini: the negligence and punishment of their dwarf against a simulated tapestry of Apollo and the Cyclops: 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �7 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Not louder shrieks to pitying Heaven are cast, When husbands or when lap-dogs breathe their last; Or when rich China vessels, fall'n from high, In glitt'ring dust and painted fragments lie! 12) Longhena, 1631-56, Santa Maria della Salute, Venice (CGB '59); first, video details Music: Benevoli, 1628, 53-v. Festival Mass, Et Resurrexit, Epic LC 3035, near opening If earthly exultance is a ground of laughter, even the religious Baroque must surge that way, as in the formal leaps of Benevoli's Et Resurrexit, or the dome and volutes of La Salute, everywhere on the point of overplaying such magnificent powers — pious exhuberance denying mockery. (fade Benevoli) 13) V13a) 13b) Bernini, 1657-66, St. Athanasius, head, High Altar, St. Peter's, Rome Guarini, 1667, 36-arch Dome, East end, Duomo, Turin (CGB '84) Same, more central detail (CGB '84) Carissimi's "Deum de Deo" from the Mass for Five and Nine takes up the dance of Bernini's High Altar or Guarini's Turin Domes — Music: 14) Carissimi, c. 1660(?), Deum de Deo, Missa a quinque et a novem, MHS-lllO (fade) Pozzo, 1688-94, side of nave ceiling, St. Ignazio, Rome (CGB '48) which carries to the end of the century in Pozzo's Ignazio ceiling, or in the Christmas Concerto of Corelli: Music: Corelli, by 1699, lst Allegro close, Christmas Concerto, ARC-3147 15) V15a) Pozzo, 1688-94, Center, nave ceiling, St. Ignazio, Rome (CGB '48) Pozzo, 1685, left transept, Nave ceiling, St. Ignazio, Rome (CGB '48) 16) Churriguerra, 1693-96, High Altar, Esteban Church, Salamanca, Spain (video divides to below and above) 4/1994 (end Corelli) 1700: The Comic Divide �8 C.G. Bell Symbolic History It fills the Spain of the organist Cabanilles with Churriguera's altars; Music: Va17) 17) Cabanilles, c. 1700, from Tiento XVII, de Pangue Lingua, MHS 3069 (B,1) Mexican, 16th-17th cent., Dome at sunset, Santo Domingo, San Cristobal, Chiapas (CGB '78) Mexican, 1659-90, Ceiling, Rosary Chapel, Santo Domingo. Pueblo (CGB '74) (end Cabanilles) and crowns Indian Mexico with the gold of earth-conquest. Va18) 18) Prandtauer, 1702 ff, Monastery of Melk, Danube near Vienna (CGB '59; video takes a detail here from Bach 74, over the town) Same, West front from below (CGB '59); + V detail From Rome and Venice the power of High Baroque strikes north over the Danube, rearing, as to the festal pomp of Biber's St. Polycarp Sonata, the imperial monastery of Melk. Music: Va19) b19) Vc19) 19) H.I.F. Biber, c. 1690(?), St. Polycarp Sonata, near close, SAWT 9537-A Ex Same, 1702-26, interior of Melk, detail of Cloister Library (CGB '59) Same, a corner of the Library (CGB '59) Same, Cloister Hall, detail (CGB '59) Same, Chapel, Choir & High Altar, detail (CGB '59) (end Biber) Though German music, at this Melk turn of the century, peaks 400 miles to the north, in the fugal toccatas of Buxtehude. Music: Va20) 20) 4/1994 Buxtehude, c. 1690(?), Toccata in F Major, close, (Hansen) Nonesuch H 71188 E.Q. Asam, 1717-25(?), Assumption of Mary, Choir and Altar (from the Nave), Rohr, Bavaria (CGB '59; video first shows a detail of Mary and the Angels from Bach 49); digital varies this order Same, Assumption of Mary, Altar from side (video: detail only) 1700: The Comic Divide �9 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History J.S. Bach, 1723, Magnificat, Instrumental opening, Bach Guild 555 — A sacred exuberance flooding over the century, through the lifetime of Bach: here Asam's boisterous ascent of Mary from tomb to angel-light: Magnificat. (fade Bach) What should the courts be where religion has become the bouyant opera of material praise? VA of 21) Sir Peter Lely, c. 1660(?), Self-Portrait, Collection of Mrs. H.N. Lely 21) Sir Peter Lely, Double: [A] c. 1660(?), Self-Portrait, Collection of Mrs. H.N. Lely; and [B] c. 1650(?), Portrait of a Woman, British Museum, London; + video detail of [B], from VB of 21 21a) S. Cooper, 1643, Viscountess Fauconberg (Cromwell's Daughter), Collection of E.M. Hodgkins 21b) W. Dobson, c. 1645, The Artist with Sir Charles Cotterell and Sir Balthazar Gerbler, Albury Park, Guilford 21c) Cooper, c. 1650(?), William Lenthall, National Portrait Gallery, London 21d) Le Brun, c. 1665(?) Portrait of Henri de la Tour d'Auvergne, Viscomte de Turenne, sketch for a tapestry, Versailles; where video has used: Sir Charles Lely, c. 1658, Robert, 2nd Earl of Sunderland, Knole, near London (see V21d) In Dutch Lely, fad of the English court after Van Dyck, Bernini's Duke of Este sires manly virtue thinning into mannered dress. Etheridge (1676): next to the coming to a good understanding with a new Mistress, I love a quarrel with an old one. Wycherley's Horner (1671) who has himself declared impotent (as from something caught in France) that his cuckolds may not suspect him. Lady Fidget: ...could you be so generous, so truly a man of honour, as for the sakes of us women of honour, to cause yourself to be reported no man? No man! and to suffer yourself the greatest shame that could fall upon a man, that none might fall upon us women by your conversation? but, indeed, sir, as perfectly, perfectly the same man as before your going into France, sir? as perfectly, perfectly, sir? 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �10 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Though the loving Country Wife almost explodes everything. Her jealous husband is being assured of Horner's impotence: Why, thou jealous fool, dost thou doubt it? he's an arrant French capon. Country Wife: Tis false, sir, you shall not disparage poor Mr. Horner, for to my certain knowledge… Others: — O, hold! — Stop her mouth! — Upon my honor, sir... The lie prevails: Cuckolds, like lovers, should themselves deceive. In that field, Molière's good is moderation: The rigid virtue of the ancient sages Is out of key with present usages… (Bishop) Like the "nature" Boileau says art should follow, it is style, groomed by wit. 22) 22a) N. de Largilliere, 1703, The Artist with his Wife and Daughter, Louvre (CGB '80); + V details Strozzi, c. 1625, Vanity, Private Collection, Bologna (detail of b6) And yet it overweens. Molière (with Largilliere): Men never will keep to the golden mean; They will spoil and pervert a noble aim, By exaggeration, carrying things too far. (CGB, after Bishop) The cosmetic arts of Pope's beautiful Belinda are those Congreve marvelously misapplies to the earthquaked old face of Lady Wishfort, that "antidote to desire," so "prone to the iteration of nuptials" — as Erasmus' Folly had said: "they pluck out hairs from the strangest places; they display their withered and foul breasts": Lady Wishfort: 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �11 C.G. Bell Symbolic History He has put me out of all patience. I shall never recompose my features to receive Sir Rowland with any economy of face. This wretch has fretted me that I am absolutely decayed. Look, Foible. Foible: Your ladyship has frowned a little too rashly indeed, madam. There are some cracks discernible in the white varnish. Lady Wishfort: Let me see the glass. — Cracks, sayest thou? — why, I am errantly flayed — I look like an old peeled wall. Thou must repair me, Foible, before Sir Rowland comes, or I shall never keep up to my picture. What Lady Wishfort is to the Belle, 23) V23a) 23b) V23c) 23d) Claudio Coello, c. 1690(?), Portrait of Charles II of Spain, Prado, Madrid Daniel Mytens, 1629, 1st Duke of Hamilton, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh Cooper, 1665, Portrait of Anthony Ashley, 2nd Earl of Shaftesbury, Victoria and Albert Museum, London Ghislandi, c. 1700(?), Portrait of a Gentleman in a Tri-Cornered Hat, Poldi Pezzoli Mus., Milan Coello, c. 1690(?), Charles II of Spain (detail of 23) the fop is to the Beau. We approach the type wherever Baroque might decks a puny center — as with poor sickly Charles II of Spain. On the English stage, it is as if Shakespeare's "waterfly" Osric (" 'A did comply with his dug before 'a sucked it") had absorbed, with the exiled Court of St. James, the preciosities of Molière's France, to become Etheridge's Sir Fopling Flutter — "He went to Paris a plain bashful English Blockhead, and is return'd a fine undertaking French Fopp." — He thinks himself the Pattern of modern Gallantry. — He is indeed the pattern of modern Foppery. He was Yesterday at the Play, with a pair of Gloves up to his Elbows, and a Periwig more exactly Curl'd than a Ladies head newly dress'd for a Ball. — What a pretty lisp he has! — Ho, that he affects in imitation of the people of Quality of France. — ...his looks are more languishing than a Ladys when she... leans her head carelessly against the side of a Box i'the Playhouse. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �12 C.G. Bell a24) 24) V24a) Symbolic History N. de Largilliere, 1696, lower detail of Magistrates, St. Genevieve Ex-voto, St. Etienne-du-Mont, Paris (video: right half only) Same, right detail (video: closer details only) H. Rigaud, 1728, Count Phil. L.W. Sinzendorf, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna By the end of the century, Largilliere's Magistrates vie with Vanbrugh's Lord Foppington: Gad's curse! Mr. Foretop, you don't intend to put this upon me for a full perriwig? Foretop: ...Why, as God shall judge me, your Honor's side-face is reduc'd to the tip of your nose. Lord Foppington: My side-face may be in eclipse for aught I know; but I'm sure my fullface is like the full-moon. Foretop: Heaven bless my eye-sight... an't please your honor... the broadest place I see in your face does not seem to me to be two inches diameter. Lord Foppington: If it did, it would just be two inches too broad; for a perriwig to a man should be like a mask to a woman, nothing should be seen but his eyes — Foretop: My Lord, I have done; if you please to have more hair in your wig, I'll put it in. Lord Foppington: Passitively, yes. Foretop: Shall I take it back now, my lord? Lord Foppington: No; I'll wear it today, tho it shew such a manstrous pair of cheeks, stap my vitals, I shall be taken for a trumpeter. In Molière, vigor is less lost under the mannered wig. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �13 C.G. Bell a25) 25) 25a) 25b) 25c) Symbolic History Jan Steen, c. 1650(?), The Village School, National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin Jan Steen, c. 1660, "No medicine for love", Alte Pinak., Munich Le Nain Brothers, c. 1645(?), from Peasant Family, peasant, Louvre, Paris Again, Steen, "No Medicine for Love," detail (video takes other details from 25, the whole) J. Steen, 1660s(?). Sick Lady, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam He is closer to the mid-century realism of the North, the clean fugues of Pezel. Music: 4/1994 Pezel, pub. 1685, Intrade for Brasses, Anthologie Sonore 2 1700: The Comic Divide �14 C.G. Bell Symbolic History That comic play, as in Jan Steen's "No medicine for love," rides a grandeur of ordered space. Such Molière's absolute clarity of character and action, against which Restoration drama blurs its complexities of plot and person. Yet Molière transcends the realism of the Small Masters. As La Fontaine wrote: "Under this stone, where Molière lies alone, Plautus and Terence lie, three dead in one." So in Le Medecin Malgré Lui, Sganarelle, woodcutter, taken for a physician by the trickery of his wife, fumbles a girl who plays dumb for love: "Here is a pulse which denotes that your daughter is dumb"; and when father, lover, and all pay him, he finds doctoring a good trade: Maybe I'll stick to medicine the rest of my life... For whatever you do, good or bad, you get paid the same... If a cobbler spoils leather, he has to pay; but here you can spoil a man and it costs you nothing... It's always the fault of the one who dies. You don't hear the dead man complain of the doctor who killed him. In The Hypochondriac there is Purgon's curse at the refusal of his clyster: — That in four days' time you enter on an incurable state… that you fall into a dyspepsia. — Ah, M. Purgon! — From a dyspesia into a dissentery; from a dissentery into a dropsy. — Mercy, M. Purgon! — From a dropsy into the privation of life, where your folly will bring you... Or the closing chorus of mock-doctors in Pidgin Latin: Vivat, vivat, forever vivat, Novus doctor… et manget et bibat, Et bleedet et killat. (1739 translation) a26) b26) 26) 4/1994 (end Pezel) Cornelis Troost, c. 1737-41, Cuckold Scene, detail, Print Collection, BerlinDahlem Museum, Berlin J. Steen, c. 1665, Girl Eating Oysters, Mauritshuis, The Hague Again, Troost, Cuckold Scene, whole; first, video close detail 1700: The Comic Divide �15 C.G. Bell Symbolic History By the 18th century, French Classical has permeated Dutch realism with its comic themes. The mocking maid through the half-door, her fingers raised to her forehead like horns, tells after what discovery the magisterial husband hides his face, leaving his wife in tears. It is cuckoldry, on which Molière, with a girl-actress for sportive bride, tellingly dwells — Arnolphe in The School for Wives: I know all the tricks, all the devices That ladies use to victimize their husbands... And so I've taken adequate precautions. The girl I'll marry is an innocent, And her simplicity is my protection. . . (Bishop) While Chrysalde counsels proportion: Why should the actions of a wife determine whether a man is worthy, or not, of honor? … Does breach of trust make her, make him, a monster? A gentleman treats cuckoldry with reason. Though Troost's print is as mild as 18th-century Addison; 27) 27a) Charles LeBrun, 1661, Chancellor Sequier, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80) Same, upper center detail (while video takes five details from 27, whole) whereas Molière's blend of classical balance and rolicking farce is of the high baroque, never rococo, never Watteau-light. LeBrun's equestrian Chancellor hints at such a comic seriousness, where the formal is real, poetry has wit, state and grandeur wear a mocking, urbane smile. Such aims attend the heroic normalization of verse which advances in France from Malherbe (English Waller's model) to the swelling periods of Boileau, where "a just cadence has reduced the muse to obligatory rules" — "Une juste cadence" "réduisit la muse aux règles du dèvoir." The proof of the achievement is that it could contain Molière's verse plays, Racine's tragedies, and even in Boileau, not simply the reason of his Art poetique, but the Pascalian shadow of Les Folies Humaines: Often of all our evils reason is the worst — Souvent de tous nos maux la raison est le pire. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �16 C.G. Bell Symbolic History And where was reason going in the guise of this chancellor with his mocking smile? The year of the picture is 1661. Va28) Le Vau, Le Brun, Le Notre, 1656-60, Chateau Vaux le Vicomte, side view, SE of Paris (CGB '80) Same, interior, Round Hall under Dome (CGB '80) Same, exterior, front view from distance (CGB '80); + V detail Vb28) 28) That August, Nicolas Fouquet, libertine Superintendent of Finance, invited Louis XIV and the court to a fête at his Chateau Vaux le Vicomte, just completed by the team of Le Vau, LeBrun, and Le Notre, later to create Versailles. Lully's violins played; there was a farce by Molière, followed by a tremendous firework (Artefice de Feu). La Fontaine wrote: Tout combattit a Vaux pour le plaisir du Roi, La musique, les eaux, les lustres, les étoiles — All contended at Vaux for the king's applause: The music, the waters, the lights, the stars. (CGB) But "heaven was jealous of it" — "Le ciel en fut jaloux." Nineteen days later the subject who had out-pomped a king was imprisoned — as it turned out, for life. For 2nd 27) Again, Chateau Vaux le Vicomte, interior, corner of Mirror Room (CGB '80) Chancellor Sequier could have agreed with Molière's Philinte: Perfect reason flees every extremity; Warns wisdom itself: be wise with sobriety. (CGB) The convergence of mannered Séquier, baroque Lully, cork-heeled Louis, La Fontaine of sage Fables and Molière of truth-telling farce, 2nd 28) Again, Vaux le Vicomte Chateau, nearer front view (CGB '80) in the showiest palace of pre-Versailles France, has import. Ages of formal pomp incline to the comedy of manners. 29) 4/1994 Indian (Islam), 1632-52, Taj Mahal, Agra, India; + V detail 1700: The Comic Divide �17 C.G. Bell Symbolic History And in one of those resonances the world gives hints of, our Renaissance and Baroque coincide, over Asia, with a noble opulence (soon to be imitated in the rococo), a Taj-Mahal grandeur, 30) Indian (Nepalese), 16th cent., Dancing divinities, Private Collection, Rome charged, in illumination and sculpture, with meticulous abandonment, refined out of the sacred energies of centuries before. It is the more and more courtly dance of divinity. 31) Japanese, 16th cent., mask of the "Ugly Woman" ("Oto"), Nat. Mus., Tokyo; + V detail Nowhere has civilization achieved higher life-style than in late Muromachi Japan. A mask designed for "Ugly Woman" roles seems to reach across land and ocean to the praised improvisations of the Commedia del Arte. But what speaks in it like a comic oracle is the blend of the vital and grotesque, the corrective energy of the art-laugh. 32) Upper Paleolithic, c. 23,000 B.C., Venus of Willendorf, Natural History, Madrid; + V detail We know nothing of the use or intent of Cro-Magnon fertility fetishes; yet here, in the earliest carvings we possess, generation revels in an all-time archetype. In burlesque New Orleans, it is "the biggest baby-doll of them all" who keeps her dancing mass continually in the air, a captive balloon in defiance of gravity. In Molière, it is the Mock Doctor's enthusiasm for the ample wet nurse: "Ah nurse of my heart... there is one, not far from here, who would be happy just to kiss" (as Bishop will translate "les petits bouts de vos petons") "to kiss the sweet utensils of your trade." Va33) 33) V33a) 33b) 4/1994 Hellenistic, 3rd-1st cent. B.C., Double Comic Mask, Mus. Barracco, Rome Hellenistic, 3rd-lst cent. B.C., terra cotta of comic actors in masks (Life, Feb. 8, 1963) Classical Greek, Peloponnesian from Palestrina, 2nd half of 4th cent. B.C., Aphrodite on a Goat (cover of a box mirror, detail), Louvre, Paris Greek (Macedon, tomb at Derveni), c. 330 B.C., Krater, Dionysus, etc., Mus., Thessalonikê 1700: The Comic Divide �18 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Like any polarity, the vital-and-ugly admits of infinite field solutions: How keen the satyr discovery of the Greeks — Aristotle's Ridiculous: "a mistake or deformity not productive of pain... the mask, for instance, that excites laughter." Though the rapturecloses of Aristophanes should have brought even the Stagirite nearer to mockery's ecstatic core. The Birds: …to the nuptial couch!… Take hold of me by my wings and let us dance... Oh joy! Io paean! Tralala! victory is thine, oh thou greatest of gods! Lysistrata: Appear dancers, and the Graces with you... Apollo... Dionysus... Aphrodite. Io Paean! dance, leap, as in honor of a victory won... and Artemis… a fillet binding thy tresses... strike thy divine hands to animate the dance; aid us to praise the valiant goddess of battles, Athene of the Brazen House! Va34) b34) 34) Attic cup by Makron, c. 470(?) B.C., Satyr and Maenad, Mus., Munich Greek, 6th cent. B.C., Phallic Monument, Sacred precinct, Delos Græco-Roman, 1st cent. A.D., Phallic Fountain, House of Vetii, Pompeii — The Lysistrata standing as near as any play to comic center: the deed of kind, with its life-giving clown. When the oath of the Athenian and Spartan women, "to refrain from the male part altogether," has brought their warring men, like stalking herms, to treat for peace and coition: Could any man's back and loins stand such a strain? — Ye gods in heaven, the pangs I suffer! — it is the phallus that leads to god-celebration. Even in the Neronian lust of the Satyricon, the Priapus of this Pompeian fountain holds some sacred claim: a land so infested with divinity, one might meet with a god more easily than with a man. 35) 4/1994 French Romesque-Gothic, 1145-50, Shepherds, right of West Portal, Chartres; + V detail 1700: The Comic Divide �19 C.G. Bell 35a) Symbolic History Rohan Hours, 1425(?), Shepherds’ Dance, f85 v, Bibl. Nat., Paris Like everything of the pagan earth, comedy went down in Christian faith. When it revives in the church close it is under the transformation of innocence — these sely shepherds of Chartres, naive as Chrestien's description of a bridge, which is the sharp blade of a sword: There was never such a bad bridge, nor one whose flooring was so bad… It is badly made and badly built, and the construction of it is bad. From this 1140 carving to the mystery plays of the 15th century (the shepherd to the Christ child: "Have here a ball/ And go to the tennis"), we sense how the Germanic word "selig," blessed, innocent, would change to the English "silly," stretching the salvation comedy of innocence, Music: Lochaimer Liederbuch, 1452-60, "Es fur ein pawr gen holcz," opening, Arc-3222 Va36) German late Gothic, 1352-61 (attributed to Heinrich Parler), Portal of Frauenkirche, Nuremberg, Bavaria Vb36) English (E. Anglian), early 14th cent., Psalter of the St. Omer family, detail of Beatus page, Add. MSS 39810, British Museum, London; + V detail Vc36) Grandes Heures of the Duc de Berry, 1406-09, pl. 64, detail, "Mock Priest"; Biblioteque Nationale, Paris d36) German, 1480 (Erasmus Grasser), A Moorish Dancer (standing), City Hist. Mus., Munich e36) Bellini, 1515, Lady at her Toilet, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (CGB '59) 1st 36) E. Grasser, c. 1480, Another Morisco Dancer (crouching), Stadtmuseum, Munich with the profane juggling and farce that boil up from folk Gothic, Corpus Christi interludes, between-sports, Grasser's 15th-century Morisco Dancers, this Lochaimer germ of Don Giovanni's demonic patter-song; (fade music) or the English ballad of the proud lady and the juggler: Here beside dwelleth A riche barons doughter; 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �20 C.G. Bell Symbolic History She wold have no man That for love had sought her, So nise she was. She wold have no man That was made of molde, But if he had a mouth of gold To kisse her whan she wold. So dangerus she was. There of hard a joly juggeler That laid was on the grene, And at this ladys wordès Iwis he had gret tene, An angred he was. He juggeled to him a well good stede Of an old horse bone, A sadill and a bridill both, And set himself thereon. A juggeler he was. 1st 37) V2nd d36) V2nd e36) 2nd 36) For 2nd 37) French Gothic, 1260-70, Smiling Angel, head, Rheims Detail of d36, above: Standing Moorish Dancer Detail of e36, above: Bellini, Lady at Her Toilet Detail of 36, above: Crouching Moorish Dancer [B] of double 38, below: Franco-German, c. 1280, Prince of this World, head, Cathedral Museum, Strassburg He priked and praunsed both Beffore that lady's gate; She wend he had ben an angell Was come for her sake. A prikker he was. He priked and praunsed Beffore that lady's bowr; She wend he had ben an angel Come from heven towre. A praunser he was… The day began to passe, The night began to come, To bed was brought 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �21 C.G. Bell Symbolic History The fair jentell woman, And the juggeler also. The night began to passe, The day began to springe, All the birdès of her bowr They began to singe, And the cokoo also. 'Where be ye, my mery maidens, That ye come not me to? The joly windows of my bowr Look that you undo, That I may see! For I have in mine armès A duke or elles an erle.' But whan she lookèd him upon, He was a blere-eyed chorle. 'Alas!' she said. She lade him to an hill, and hangèd shuld he be. He juggeled himself to a mele pok; The dust fell in her eye; Begilèd she was. God and our Lady And swetè Seint Johan Send every giglot of this town Such another leman Even as he was. 38) V38a) 38b) 39) 40) 4/1994 Double of 1st and 2nd 37, above: [A] French-Gothic, 1260-70, Smiling Angel, Rheims; and [B] Franco-German, c. 1280, Prince of this World, Strassburg; + V detail of each Basler Münster, c. 1290, The Deceiver and a Foolish Virgin, from a cast, Basel Museum Mantegna, c. 1468, Triumph of Silenus, detail, British Museum, London Salvator Rosa, c. 1650, Head of a Faun, Albertina, Vienna; + V detail Goya(?), c. 1824, Self in a Tall Hat, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna; first, a video detail 1700: The Comic Divide �22 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History French, c. 1250-60, Alle Psallite cum Luya, vocal, Seraphim SIC6052 In two smiles we read the radical Christian heightening of the poles of comic possibility (wide as from Shakespeare's Tempest to Jonson's Volpone; yet fused in one troped Alleluya) — the Rheims angel smile of Grace; and the Strassburg smile of the Tempter, the Prince of this World. (end Alle) That equivocal vitality reaches forward from the Gothic root; through Renaissance, 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �23 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Music: Mozart, 1787, Finch' han del vino, Don Giovanni, Angel 3605 D/L through the satyr espousal of Rosa's baroque, toward Storm and Stress, the rape aria of Don Giovanni, as revolutionary a seizure on the comedy of manners as Goethe's Faust; as this smile the old Goya painted or inspired, resurrected from the beast-base of the snarl. Such the humor of Kant's Critiques, where reason sharpens its weapons to depose itself and crown the intuitive successor. (end Mozart) a41) 41) V41a) 41b) J. Fouquet, 1453-55, Job on his Dung Heap, Hours of Etienne Chevalier, Musée Condé, Chantilly Florentine, c. 1525(?), Bust of Machiavelli, Palazzo Vecchio, Florence Giulio Romano, 1540(?), The Lovers, Hermitage, Leningrad Valerio Cioli, 1558-70(?), Morgante, Duke Cosimo's Dwarf, astride a turtle, Giardino di Boboli (video then returns to 41, Bust of Machiavelli) By the 15th century, medieval farce had begun the amplification which would lead to Molière: — Pathelin, shyster, out-cheated by the baaing shepherd with his "bump of villainy". But it is first with Machiavelli, who even in his bust smiles like a roguish Leonardo, that fabliaux realism is invested in the spatial harmonies of Renaissance, without loss of natural immediacy. In the Mandragola, the beautiful Lucrezia is to be seduced. Parasite Ligurio suggests a spa to the learned dolt her husband: — — — — Did you see the sea at Leghorn? What do you think? Of course I saw it. How much bigger is it than Arno? Than Arno? Why it's four times — no, more — six bigger — seven bigger — I tell you, you don't see anything but water, water, water. (CGB) — …e non si vede se non acqua, acqua, acqua. 42) 42a) After Q. Massys, 1510-20, Ugly Queen of Tunis, National Gallery, London School of G. Romano, 1530-32, Jove and Olympia, Palazzo Te, Sala di Psiche, Mantua (video returns to a detail of 42, the Ugly Queen of Tunis) We have seen that surge engender on gargoyle farce a progeny of giants strange as Massys' Queen of Tunis — Rabelais, with codpiece distending the monk's habit — as when Panurge, rejected by a lady, sprinkled her clothes, in church, with an extract made from a hot and salt bitch: 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �24 C.G. Bell Symbolic History All the dogs in church came running, big and little, laying out their yards and pissing all over her… A tall greyhound bepissed her head; some her sleeves and others her crupper; the little ones pissed on her pattens. Panurge laughed and said to a lord of the city: "I think that lady is in heat, or has been covered lately by a greyhound." Then he left... and wherever he saw dogs in the street, he would give them a kick and say: "Get along! Join your fellows, in the devil's name." 43) Bronzino, c. 1546, Exposure of Luxury, National Gallery, London; + V details The comic-tragic cleavage has mostly ruled the stage. Yet Bronzino's Allegory of Cupid, Venus, and Time, sometimes called the "Exposure of Luxury," is a comic picture, applying the heroic mythology of Raphael and Michelangelo in a Mannerism of fancy play — as in the court comedy of Lyly: Cupid and my Campaspe played At cards for kisses; Cupid paid. Though there was no such brilliance of Cupid-lust in English until heroic Dryden toyed with it: He showed her his arrow, and bid her not fear, For the pain was no more than a maiden may bear; When the balm was infused, she was not at a loss What they meant by their sighing and kissing so close; By their praying and whining, And clasping and twining, And panting and wishing And sighing and kissing, And sighing and kissing so close. a44) b44) 44) School of Leonardo, c. 1505, Leda and the Swan, Borghese Gal., Rome Titian, 1559, Rape of Europa, Isabella S. Gardner Museum, Boston Tintoretto, 1550, Vulcan, Venus, Mars, Alte Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59); + V details, then again the whole The revived mythologies of Poliziano, Ariosto, and the rest prompt the visual. Marlowe, of Venus' temple in Sestos: 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �25 C.G. Bell Symbolic History There might you see the gods in sundrie shapes, Committing headdie ryots, incest, rapes; For know, that underneath this radiant floure Was Danaes statue in a brazen tower, Jove slylie stealing from his sisters bed, To dallie with Idalian Ganimed, And for his love Europa bellowing loud, And tumbling with the rainbow in a cloud: Blood-quaffing Mars heaving the yron net, Which limping Vulcan and his Cyclops set… In the Venetians such scenes range from the tragic, through high romance, to this comic Tintoretto: Vulcan reflected in the mirror like an old woman, inspects the Venereal premises, while Cupid feigns sleep, and the phallic helmet of Mars pokes from under the bed. Music: a45) 45) V45a) Vicentino, c. 1571, close of Petrarch "Passa la nave," Bach, Guild HM 34 SD G. Arcimboldo, 1570(?), The Summer, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien Arcimboldo, 1560-70, Water (fishy-face), Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien; + V detail Arcimboldo, 1563, Winter, (head of a gnarled tree), same museum In the deepening value crisis of the late century, even comedy and pastoral darken; while mocking experiments — Arcimboldo's heads formed of vegetables or of fish — accompany the chromatic upheaval of music: Vicentino. (end Vicentino) In Bruno, the hermetic fury of magic swells with modern science, a cauldron of the tragic and grotesque. Of all Renaissance plays, his Candellaio is the weirdest, fuzing the visionary 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �26 C.G. Bell 46) 46a) 46b) Symbolic History An. Carracci, c. 1585, The Bean Eater, Colonna Gal., Rome Rubens, 1612-15, Toilet of Venus, Vaduz-Lichtenstein Collection; + V detail Rubens, 1608(?), detail of Sampson and Dalilah, National Gallery, London (video repeats 46, The Bean Eater) with the brute physicality which in this early Carracci looks to the Baroque. Carubina is to meet with her old candlemaker, he taking her in the dark for the mistress he thinks he has charmed; she plots it all: I'll come on hot with kisses like a bear. When I gnaw his cheeks, you'll hear him yell in the next room. "My heart, my life," I'll say; "soft, or we'll be overheard..." I'll get his tongue between my teeth and bite until he screams some more. "O love, O sweetheart," I'll whisper, "passion drives me wild." I'll pretend to want him before we go to bed, get him ready, egg him on; but before the King of Glory can come in, 1'11 squeeze his root and cullions like wringing out a wash, and pant: "My own, to have you in my hands." When you hear him howl the third time — and I'll twist until he howls — then come into the room, all of you, with lights; and we'll see. (CGB) Against the diabolic grossening which would lead to Ben Jonson: Sirrah, I'll strip you — What to do? Lick figs out at my — 47) V47a) V47b) 47c) 47d) G. Lytens, c. 1617, Winter Scene, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien (CGB '59); + V details Same, Another winter scene, Aachen Gallery (CGB '74) Roeland Savery, 1610, Mountain Landscape with Woodcutters, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien (CGB '59); + V detail Jan Brueghel, 1599, Little Bouquet in a Clay Jar, close detail, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien Brueghel, 1609, Harbor City, Alte Pinak., Munich (CGB '59); + V detail angel make-believe enwreathes The Tempest and The Winter's Tale, fills art with naturelove (Lyten's Gypsy snow-pleasures, romantic as Huck Finn), spins the lute arabesques of Dowland's incomparable fantasies. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �27 C.G. Bell Music: a48) b48) 48) V48a) V48b) Symbolic History Dowland, c. 1610(?), Fantasy, (Bream) beginning and end, RCA V LDS 2656 H. Goltzius, 1604, Venus, Bacchus, Ceres, etc., Hermitage, Leningrad J. de Gheyn, c. 1590(?), Mother and Child studying drawing book, Print Room, Staatliche Museen, Berlin H. Avercamp, c. 1615(?), Storm on the Coast, Berlin-Dahlem Mus., Berlin; first, a video detail Rubens, c. 1632(?), Homecoming from the Fields, Pitti, Firenze Frans Hals, c. 1622, A Couple in a Garden, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam In Bacon, Gilbert, Harvey, reasoned exuberance proliferates observational science. The later novel, Dickens and all, lurks in the melodrama of humors. In the neglected sketches of 1600, Golzius, de Gheyn, Velvet Brueghel, this Avercamp, man walks the animate stage of earth, winds, and waters. (end Dowland) 49) 49a) J. Jordeans, 1638, The King Drinks, Royal Museum, Brussels; first, a video detail J. Jordeans, c. 1640, The Feast of the Bean King, close detail, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien In Rubens and his school (this Jordeans' "The King Drinks") myth riots in the physical. So drunkenness on the English stage thickens from Iago's "Potations pottle deep" and Anthony's "Cup us till the world go round," to that Heywood carouse where revellers take the house for a ship tossed by storm: To cast their lading overboard... All fall to work, and hoist into the street... Stools, tables, trestles, trenchers, bedsteads, cups, Pots, plate and glasses; here a fellow whistles, They take him for the boatswain; one lies struggling Upon the floor, as if he swum for life; 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �28 C.G. Bell Symbolic History A third takes the bass-viol for the cockboat, Sits in the belly on't, labours and rows, His oar the stick with which the fiddler played... 50) 50a) V50b) 50c) G. Honthorst, c. 1625-30, Merry Flea-Hunt, Öffentliche Sammlung, Basel G. Honthorst, 1625, The Procuress, detail, Central Mus., Utrecht; + closer V detail Rembrandt, 1646, French Bed, Amsterdam Again 50, Merry Flea-Hunt, detail Jonsonian comedy points again and again to the northern Caravaggiesque. Honthorst's Merry Flea-Hunt reaches from the joking lust of Falstaff: "She's neither fish nor flesh, a man knows not where to have her," to Otway's Sir Jolly Jumble, old pimpvoyeur: My Ganymede!... She's thine, boy... plump, soft, smooth, wanton! Ah rogue!.. here's shoulders... here's a leg... I will kiss thee ; ha, ha, he, he... a toad... Odd, I love... to see a pretty wench and a young fellow touze and rouze and frouze and mouze... faith dearly!... I'll pimp for thee, dear heart; and shan't I hold the door? shan't 1 peep, ha?... if thou hadst her in thy arms now between a pair of sheets, and I under the bed to see fair play, boy... gemini!... there would be doings! O lawd, 1 under the bed! (Enter whores) .... Bubbies! Oh, law, there's bubbies — odd, I'll bite 'em... Tickle me a little Jenny — do! he he, he he! 51) Poussin, c. 1629-30, Nymph carried by satyr, Gallery, Cassel; + V details Even moral Spenser had played the wag with satyrs — when old Malbecco finds his wife among them: Nine times he heard him come aloft ere day, That all his hart with gealosie did swell. Even elegiac Poussin shows such a nymph as Beaumont sends into the woods in his play otherwise called The Faithful Shepherdess: From one danger I am free; No man on earth can ravish me — I am so willing. . . 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �29 C.G. Bell Symbolic History The haste of the fruit-bearer, the white flesh on brown, the turnabout play on riding, the drape between the satyr's legs, like a Shakespearean pun, the cupids, voyeurs surely, like Sir Jolly — yet beside the later erotica of Boucher or Fragonard, this holds the heroic vein. a52) b52) J. Steen, 1650-60(?), The Poultry Yard, detail, Mauritshuis, The Hague Le Nain Brothers, 1645(?), Peasant Family, whole, Louvre, Paris (this video whole yields in the slide show to peasant and wife; plus video: woman to the left, from Vb52; woman, far left, from V52a; and man, right of center, from V52b) In England realistic comedy is cut off by the Puritan closure of the stage; though the genre equivalent in painting flourished in Calvinist Holland through much of the century. In France the peasant realism of the Le Nain brothers parallels that liveliest ingredient of Molière — thus at the opening of The Mock Doctor, Sganarel's fight with his wife, and the backfiring intervention of a neighbor — she: "Why do you stick your nose in? Suppose I want to be beaten?" But to approximate the style condition of Molière, that wonderfully articulated folk stem must be engrafted with a noble scion — Va53) 53) French Renaissance, 1518-27, Chateau d'Azay-Le-Rideau, Indre et Loire French Renaissance, 1519 ff., Chateau de Chambord; first, video detail Music: Attaignant, 1529, Tant que vivray, lute, Turnabout TV- 34137S the courtly splendor growing in Royalist France since the Renaissance Chateau de Chambord, or the lute songs and dances of Attaignant. But the 150 years from this Francis' hunting lodge on the Loire, (fade Attaignant) 54) 54a) 4/1994 Le Vau and others, 1669-85, Garden Façade, Palace of Versailles Same, corner view; with video return to a detail of 54 1700: The Comic Divide �30 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Le Sage de Richée, pub. 1695, Lute Ouverture, Turnabout TV34137S to Louis XIV's Versailles, swells airy Renaissance to the heroic assertions of Baroque. And even within the limits of the musing lute, as played by the same performer, the passage from 1529, to Le Sage de Richée, 1695, loads the chords with grandeur. (fade Le Sage de Richée) How much more when the orchestra of Lully took up the orgulous overture — Music: a55) 55) V55a) Lully, 1675, from Thesée Overture, (slow, fast) from Col. M-376 Same, interior, Ambassadors' Staircase, Versailles Le Vau, Mansart, Le Brun, 1668-79, ceiling of Salon de Venus, Versailles (CGB '59); + V detail Le Brun, c. 1650-61, detail of ceiling fresco, Galerie d'Hercule, Hotel Lambert, Paris as in those royal apartments by Le Vau, Mansart and LeBrun, where the whole life of the King, among heaped geometries, wreathed and stuffed with precedents of power, became a state display. But the very structure of the French Overture opposes to the majesty of the opening grave 56) Le Brun, 1663-75, Tapestry, Louis XIV visits the Gobelin factory, Versailles (CGB '59); + V details, return to whole, and a closer left detail a faster moving section of fugal play, as if we had gone from the embattled virtu of Corneille to Molière's ingenious toyings in the high costumed mode: THE STAGE OF THE ROYAL THEATRE AT VERSAILLES Molière (alone): Come along, ladies and gentlemen. Why don't you come out? The devil take your delay… You'll drive me mad. Actor: It's you who'll drive us mad. We don't know our parts, so what are we to do? Molière (Towards Louis XIV): 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �31 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Well, the king won't be here for two hours, let's rehearse and see if we can hit on something. (end Lully) Or among the tapestries glorifying the reign, turned to this one where Le Brun leads the Grand Monarch to see the Gobelin works. So Dryden passes from The Conquest of Granada to Marriage à la Mode — Why should a foolish marriage vow, Which long ago was made, Oblige us to each other now, When passion is decayed? — without abandoning the stance of the beau monde. 57) 57a) Le Brun, 1663-75, Tapestry, Louis XIV at Dunkerque, Versailles (CGB '59) Same, detail, left (from CGB ‘59 Larger Declaration 39) Music: Lully, 1675, Thesée, Marche des Sacrificateurs, Col. M. 376 And even when the king, mounted on Bernini's horse of Constantine, appears at the siege of Dunkerque — as in that Dryden heroic Conquest: Heaven has not destined you so soon to rest: Heroes must live to succour the distrest... Into the press of clashing swords we'll go, And, where the darts fly thickest, seek the foe — the royal claim so curls with irony, we might wonder if the last courtier to the left were not the admired original of Lord Foppington. 58) Le Brun, 1665-80, Tapestry, detail, Crowning of Louis XIV, Les Gobelins, Paris (here video adds a closer detail of 57a, above) How can the honnête homme in all his formal nobility, but walk the tight-rope of Molière's Misanthrope between unmannered bluntness and sauve hypocrisy? — an argument Wycherley would stuff with English life and color: Lord Plausible: If I did say or do an ill thing to anybody, it should be sure to be behind their backs, out of pure good manners... 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �32 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Manly: And if I would say or do ill to any, it should be to their faces... Why should a man be troubled with the flattery of knaves if he be not a fool or cully; or with the fondness of fools, if he be not a knave or cheat? Va59) 59) F.L. Juvarra, 1729-33, Stupinigi, through the gate, Palace near Turin French, c. 1690, Painted Fan, The Ball (Le Loir, Histoire du Costume) We are particularizing an axiom of historical change, that the polarity which sets Baroque grandeur against Rococo play must be structurally bedded in both styles; as this 1690 ball in the baroque salon thins toward the Mozartean ironies which would bring down the curtain on the Ancien Régime. In music the rift is bridged by the foremost composer, François, the great Couperin, whose Third Lesson of Tenebrae, amplified in its first festal recording, For Va60) Mansart, 1699-1710, Royal Chapel, Apse, from courtyard, Versailles (a detail previewed from 2nd a60, below) 60) Mansart, Coypel, etc., 1699-1710, interior of Chapel at Versailles culminates the French Baroque — such a "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, convertere ad Dominum Deum Tuum," as Bossuet preached in this Versailles Chapel, to the admiration of the court he served next to God: Behold! Columns that lift to the sky the boast of our nothingness… Voila... des colonnes qui semblent vouloir porter jusqu'au ciel le magnifique témoignage de nôtre néant... 2nd 59) Again, Painted Fan; + V detail Yet Couperin launches the closing great Jerusalem fugue from a skipping confession of weakness, as if some salon lady, waving such a fan as this, had fluttered "the liquefaction of her clothes". Music: Couperin le Grand. 1714, Third Tenebrae Service, V-1235-6, from "de qua non poter surgere" to close 2nd a60) Again, Royal Chapel, exterior, Apse (video: closer detail only) V2nd 60) Again, Interior of Chapel at Versailles (detail of 60, above) 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �33 C.G. Bell 61) 62) 63) Symbolic History Versailles Chapel, lower nave and choir (CGB '59); with V details Same, upper row of columns and apse (CGB '59); first V detail Same, vault, with Coypel painting (CGB '59); video: details only, below and above, then a return to the apse painting, detail of 62, above (end Tenebrae) From Coypel's heroic religiosity, 64) Watteau, 1716, Les Deux Cousines, Marquis de Ganay, Paris; + V detail to the frail dream of Watteau, seems to crowd into the fewest years a centennial demarcation. Music: Couperin le Grand, c.1715-20, from Les Folies Françaises, 2nd through 5th (Landowska), Couperin Society But Couperin found no difficulty in going from the Lamentations of Jeremiah to the most precious miniatures on the Follies of France — like Watteau's little canvases, plaintive diversions of the Regency. 65) Watteau, 1720-21, Judgment of Paris, Louvre, Paris; + V detail (Folies 3) In Watteau a Rubens Judgment of Paris turns to a parody in the vein of Pope: "To arms, to arms!" the fierce virago cries, And swift as lightning to the combat flies... (So when bold Homer sets the gods in arms, Towered Olympus rings with loud alarms). 66) Watteau, 1718(?), The Music Party, Wallace Collection, London (Folies 4) V66a) Same, detail of musician Yet whatever the loss and longing of these deft ironies, in space and person they cling to the noble norm; instruct us that the death of the Grand Monarch and waste of heroic war ("It was a famous victory") drove the thinnest wedge into the confidence of the West. For 1st 67) Watteau, 1717, Gathering under an Arcade, right section, Dulwich College, London, which video replaces with three details (Folies 5) 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �34 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In The Rape of the Lock — Hither the heroes and the nymphs resort, To taste a while the pleasures of a court; In various talk th' instructive hours they pass'd, Who gave the ball, or paid the visit last; One speaks the glory of the British Queen, And one describes a charming Indian screen; A third interprets motions, looks and eyes; At every word a reputation dies — that derision celebrates Augustan values. (Cut Folies) 1st 68) Watteau, c. 1718(?), Gilles, Louvre, Paris In the "Essay on Man", our Pascalian paradox — The glory, jest, and riddle of the world — meets Leibnitzian surety: And spite of pride, in erring reason's spite, One truth is clear, whatever is, is right. 2nd 67) Again, Gathering under an Arcade, whole; + V details 2nd 67a) Same, detail of dancing to the left Watteau's wigs, robes, poses, this Baroque arch and piers, still voice what we would hear if we could freeze the full chords of Couperin's music — as indeed we almost do in his Passacaille "Vanity of Human Wishes". Music: Couperin, c. 1717, Passacaille (from 1st into 3rd Refrain), (Landowska) Couperin Society Album It is hard to decide whether Congreve's last refinement of manners in his 1700 Way of the World, has crossed the Watteau divide: (1st Couplet) Mrs. Millamant: I won't be called names after I'm married; positively I won't be called names. 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �35 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Mirabell: Names! Ay, as wife, spouse, my dear, joy, jewel, love, sweetheart, and the rest of that nauseous cant, in which men and their wives are so fulsomely familiar... let us be very strange and well-bred; let us be as strange as if we had been married a great while; and as well bred as if we were not married at all... Va2nd 68) Watteau, Gilles, with frame (CGB '80); + V detail 2nd 68a) Same, closer detail (2nd Couplet) But when the dowager Duchess of Marlborough, after Congreve's death in 1728, had a wax effigy of him made to sit by her at table, and the better to suggest the gouty genius, let the feet be regularly blistered and annointed by his doctor, that was comedy in the new mode of Watteau's Gilles, of Marivaux and Sterne, an overplaying of le sentiment du coeur. (fade Passacaille) a69) 69) 69a) Wrenn, 1664-69, Sheldonian, detail, Oxford (CGB '59) Sir Peter Lely, c. 1650-55, Henry Sydney, Penshurst, England Giacomo del Po, c. 1690, Expulsion, detail of The Fall, Metropolitan Museum, NYC (CGB '74) Music: Henry Purcell, c. 1685, Canzona, Golden Sonata, Purcell Society Album In England as in France, the 17th-century Baroque, by its brisk facility of command, enacts the soul of comedy. Thus Lely's Henry Sidney, or the Canzona of Purcell's Golden Sonata. Is the delight of precise imitation a comic delight? (fade Purcell) The canon, anyway, was the form taken by Purcell and the Restoration for the lusty catch: "Adam caught Eve by the furbelow/ And that's the oldest catch we know." a70) b70) 70) 70a) V70b) English late Baroque (Sir John Vanbrugh) 1705-22, Blenheim Palace, SW view, Oxfordshire; + V detail Same, detail of North Court (CGB '84) Same, North Court through iron gate (CGB '84) Same, a darker detail (CGB '84) Same, a variant detail (CGB '84) Music: 4/1994 Lully, 1668, Overture to George Dandin (Le Grand Divertissement Royal de Versailles); Musical Heritage Society 704 1700: The Comic Divide �36 C.G. Bell Symbolic History From Versailles, the Lully Overture — Grave and Allegro — spread over Europe, like all the Sun-King assertions of architecture, dress, reason, statecraft, war. So when Vanbrugh, playwright and architect, came to design for the Duke of Marlborough the most heroic mansion in England, how could his genius not yoke those perennial steeds of comedy, fat and lean — ostentation and ironic wit? (allegro) With what repartee the north gate, with its iron curls and gilded sharp flower-flames, pricks the swelling vaunts of the wide-winged court. Was not Vanbrugh, maker of Lord Foppington and Tunbelly Clumsy, to break off his unfinished Journey to London (and his life) with the lurid awakening of Sir Francis Headpeice: — ...And why will you be in a passion, Sir Francis? — Because I came here to breakfast with my Lady (Arabella)... expecting to find my family set round a civil table with her, upon some plumb-cake, hot rolls, and a cup of strong beer; instead of which, I find these good women staying their stomachs with a box and dice, and that man there, with the strange periwig, making a hearty meal upon my wife and daughter. Va71) 71) 71a) V71b) 71c) V71d) 71e) J. Thornhill, c. 1710, etc., upper section of 71, used here for two close video details J. Thornhill, c. 1710, Painted Hall Ceiling, Former Naval Hospital, Greenwich (slide show: whole; video: upper half only) I. Jones, (Wrenn and others), 1616 ff. and 1694 ff., The Queen's House, Naval Hospital, etc., from the Thames, Greenwich, London (CGB from Milton Vb42) Ch. Le Brun 2nd half of the 17th cent., Gobelins Tapestry, The Elements: Water, as restored by Colbert, Gobelins Mus., Paris (here video first shows the whole of Thornhill's Painted Ceiling Hawker, c. 1680-85, Charles II, National Portrait Gallery, London (video: upper half only) Kneller, c. 1706, John Churchill, lst Duke of Marlborough, Nat. Port. Gal., London Again, Thornhill's Ceiling, lower detail Music: Purcell, 1689, Overture, Dido and Aeneas, l'Oiseau-Lyre, 50216 When Thornhill in the Great Hall ceiling at Blenheim, or in this of the Greenwich Naval Hospital, exalts the conquering England of William and Mary, who can 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �37 C.G. Bell Symbolic History unscramble Homeric epic from Battle of the Frogs? Does it match the Grave of Purcell's Dido Overture, with the Dryden "Year of Wonders" where Pope began? The time shall come, when free as seas or wind Unbounded Thames shall flow for all mankind, Whole nations enter with each swelling tide, And seas but join the regions they divide. (Music: Allegro) Or is it the rush and edged wit of the succeeding allegro — the Dryden Swift belittles in the "Battle of the Books"? the helmet nine times too large for the head, which appeared situate far in the hinder parts... like a shrivelled beau, from within the penthouse of a modern periwig. With the takeoff on War, in A Tale of a Tub? the true foundation of grandeur and heroism... necessary to establish subordination... as also to purge bodies politic of gross humours... 72) W. Hogarth, 1743, Marriage a la Mode II, Breakfast, National Gallery, London; + V details In England as in France the fugue fiercens as peanut virtue rattles in the great shell: — Hogarth's "Morning After the Party" in the spendthrift mansion of Marriage a la Mode, Swift's Modest Proposal for maintaining the destitute of Ireland: (fade Dido) I have been assured by a very knowing American... that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked or boiled... I grant this food will be somewhat dear, and therefore very proper for landlords, who, as they have already devoured most of the parents, seem to have the best title to the children... This would... increase the care and tenderness of mothers toward their children... Men would become as fond of their wives during the time of their pregnancy as they now are of their mares in foal... nor offer to beat or kick them (as is too frequent a practice) for fear of a miscarriage... 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �38 C.G. Bell 73) V73a) V73b) V73c) 73d) V73e) Symbolic History French Engraving, 17th cent., "Monkey-Shines," Abbé de Marolles Collection Huet, 1760(?), Mural from Salon des Singes, detail, Chantilly, France (here video returns to a detail of 73, "Monkey-Shines") Callot, 1631, Siege of La Rochelle, detail, British Museum, London Callot 1631, Siege of the Isle of Ré, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien Callot, c. 1633, from the Miseries of War: Plundering a Large Farmhouse, left detail Same, right detail (here video returns to another detail of 73, "MonkeyShines") The ironic masque of manners had inevitably hit on the court-mockery of monkey-shines, as in this French engraving, good-humored as Molière. There is a card game of Monkey belles at Chantilly, and Chardin did several versions of the Apeantiquary. But as the rift widened between the façade of divine right and the stink of world wrong, Swift, in "hatred, disgust and contempt," turned the whole "execrable crew" into dung-flinging Yahoos: I gave [my Houyhnhnm master] a description of cannons, culverins, muskets... pistols... battles, sieges... plundering, stripping, ravishing, burning and destroying... He said whoever understood the nature of the Yahoos might easily believe it possible for so vile an animal to be capable of every action I had named, if their strength and cunning equaled their malice. But... it gave him a disturbance in his mind, to which he was wholly a stranger before. It is this disturbance which tells us that corrective comedy has swung to something lacerative, an abhorrence destructive of the good it reached for. Va74) Vb74) c74) Vd74) 74) 4/1994 Magnasco, c. 1720-30, Storm Scene with Fleeing Monks, lower detail, Brera, Milan (note: videos before ‘94/5, use for Vb74 &c74 a CGB foreground of Vd74) Magnasco, c. 1730(?), Monks' Library, J. Brass Collection, Venice Same, 1730-40, Interrogation, Kunstinstitut, Frankfort am Main Magnasco, c. 1735(?), Landscape with Figures, upper detail, National Gallery, Dublin (CGB '74) Magnasco, 1712(?), Punchinello Playing the Guitar, Gatti-Casazza Collection, Venice; + V detail (cf. V74a) 1700: The Comic Divide �39 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Domenico Scarlatti, c. 1730(?), Sonata in F Minor, (Landowska) Society Album We minimized the rift opened in France by the Baroque debacle. In Swift it strikes deeper, undermining the exuberance which still exalts the style. And in the weirdly lighted satires of Magnasco, (North Italian, early 18th century) forms are wrenched in a violence as darkly radical as the savage indignation of Swift. We have related it before to the chromatic fury of Domenico Scarlatti. No doubt these are comic arts (with the possible exception of Bach's Passions, tragedy was the lack and failure of the age), but it is a comedy of Storm and Stress, seeded with the bitterness of what would later be called "La Comedie humaine". (end Scarlatti) Va75) Vb75) 75) V75a) 75b) 75c) Piranesi, 1743-45, Le Carceri X, 1st State, Nat. Gal., Washington, D.C. Same, XI, 2nd State (pub. 1761) Same, XIV, 2nd State, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. Same, detail Piranesi, 1743-61, Carceri X, 2nd State, detail of Chained Captives, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. (cf. Va75) Blake, c. 1795, Visions of the Daughters of Albion, Frontispiece Tate Gallery, London; + V detail Music: Alessandro Scarlatti, c. 1710(?), lst movement, close, Concerto Grosso in F Minor, Telefunken 89-80059 And what Pascalian vertigo of the young Piranesi would seize exactly on the vaultings of spatial command to exhibit, in his mid-century Prisons, the rational order of the phenomenal gone from Cartesian glory to nightmare bondage? — a doom here sprung upon us by a contradiction: that the two great piers to the left are joined by an arch which must hold the plane of the picture, though we see it reaching back in space. And already in Alessandro Scarlatti (Domenico's father), the fugue, Baroque structure of reason affirmed, flexes with menace, (fade Alessandro Scarlatti) Music: 4/1994 William Friedemann Bach, c. 1750(?), from Sinfonia for 2 Flutes and Strings, Fugue, MHS 3474 1700: The Comic Divide �40 C.G. Bell Symbolic History to become, in the moodiest of Bach's sons, Wilhelm Friedemann, almost the battleground late Mozart and Beethoven would make of it. Between the first state of this engraving and the second, Blake was born, to cry the skull caves of space and time — Blake, too, trained on satire — 1784: Ha ha ha said Inflammable Gass, [Voltaire] was the glory of France — I have got a bottle of air that would spread a plague... 76) V76a) Fr. Boucher, 1752, Reclining Girl, Alte Pinakothek, München; + V detail Rubens, 1636-40, Diana and Nymphs Surprised by Satyrs, Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin; + V detail In that ferment, for salon France to go on refining more sensuous provacations in the courtly mode, comedy sliding over into Casanovan Memoirs — this Luise Murphy on her belly, so disposed as to suggest the addition of a succubent king, a picture in which Boucher pimped for Louis XV, who took the bait, and the mistress — how that confrontation delayed fosters the explosion of '89, the terror of '93. (fade W.F. Bach) Sex has always seemed our funniest attribute. The Fontaine-Congreve fable of an impossible task for the devil, to straighten a ringlet curl, could not be so diverting if the hair in question were not "A tendril of the Ciprian vine/ Shade of the labyrinth of love." But sexuality itself does not make high comedy; it must be caught up in a godhead mocked and believed. 77) V77a) Double: [A] Gainsborough, c. 1760(?), Lady Innes, Frick Collection, NYC; and [B] Greuze, 1760(?), Broken Pitcher, Louvre, Paris (video uses only singles and details: see video file, A and B of V77) Blake, 1794 (copy of 1826), Songs of Experience, 39, “The Sick Rose,” Library of Congress In Gainsborough's England middle-class humanity assumes the formal robes. From Addison's Sir Roger to Fielding's loveable Fanny and Joseph, Sophie and Tom Jones, with Parson Adams and the rest (on the angel side of the Christian smile), a new nature softens toward the geniality of Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer. But in such complicity with the mocked Lady Boobies, Tow-wowses, cheats and hypocrits (heirs to 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �41 C.G. Bell Symbolic History the devil-strain of grinning possibility) that the Enlightened rose-garden knocks under, as in the Greuze Broken Pitcher, to the spouting Faustian lion. (Blake) O Rose thou art sick. The invisible worm That flies in the night In the howling storm: Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy… 78) Pietro Longhi, 1751, The Rhinoceros, Ca' Rezzonico, Venice; first, three video details In Venice from mid-century, the thinning masquerade of high style barely hints at the volcanic buildup of what Blake would have called "the Antediluvians who are our Energies." Though surely that master of symbol would have recognized Longhi's Rhinoceros, under the dividing barrier of consciousness, as the great suppressed Behemoth of Job, gawked at by the puppets of empty dress, while the managing barker brandishes the cut-off phallic horn, long famous as a drug of aphrodisiac power. Thus, over a Europe as international as ever before or after, the comedy of manners — Goldoni in this Venice, Beaumarchais in France, Lessing's Minna in Germany, in England Sheridan's brittle take-offs on the genteel — 79) 79a) 79b) Goya, 1791-92, La Boda, detail, Prado, Madrid (for which video substitutes Va79, La Boda, whole) Goya, c. 1798-1805, The Naked Maja and The Clothed Maja, Prado, Madrid (by video numbering b, c, and d79: first single details, then double. Here video inserts 79, Goya, La Boda, detail, as V79) Goya, 1777, Dance on the Banks of the River Manzanares, Prado, Madrid (by video numbering 79a) or in the art of Spain this Goya cartoon of mismarriage — everywhere that comedy yields, like the Bastile, to the revolution of nature and heart. In Blake's reversal of Heaven and Hell, it is from the burning infinite of creative desire that Reason's establishment has distrained its goods. Its "Messiah fell & formed a heaven of what he stole from the Abyss." A rape the original sadist, Marquis de Sade, deviantly applied in his erotica, 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide �42 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Justine 1791, Julliette 1792 — de Sade, called ''the freest spirit...in the most imprisoned body." While Mozart closes Don Giovanni, after the hero's demise, with a chorus of the "good little people" singing the customary sweet song. Music: Mozart, 1787, Don Giovanni, from the closing chorus, Angel 3605 (or London A4406) But how thin and posed the morality of reason has become. (fade Mozart) If, in this comedy of outbreak, exuberance and mockery have fused as in the Renaissance, it is under a reversal of sign. Molière's corrected good has dwindled to the trivial mask; Va80) b80) 80) 80a) Goya, 1788, St Francis of Borgia at the Deathbed of an Impenitent, version in the Cathedral of Valencia, whole Goya, 1788, same subject, in the fiercer oil sketch, Marquesa de Santa Cruz (slide show: whole; video: detail only) Goya, 1815-24, Disparate Desenfrenado, engraving (Proverbs 10), Prado, Madrid; + V details Picasso, 1934, The Minotaur, drawing, S.W. Labrot, Jr., Hobe Sound, Florida Music: Mozart, 1787, Don Giovanni, Close of the Hell-descent, Angel 3605 (or London A4406) while the excess once castigated, now in flaming reach and fall, flaunts a passionate banner. Even in Goya's Proverb of "Unbridled Folly," where lust reverts to the oldest centaur radical of the horse — as Lear said: "The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to it with a more riotous appetite" — the old irony swirls in the modern ambivalence. Thus in Don Giovanni, before the manikins usurp the stage, Dionysian eruption in the formal house of cards has affirmed the cry of Blake: Energy is the only life and is from the Body, and Reason is the bound or outward circumference of energy... What the outcome is to be, Faust and Nietzsche have left our time to discover. (end of Damnation) 4/1994 1700: The Comic Divide � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 43 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1700 : The Comic Divide, Symbolic History, Part 23 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 23 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_23_1700--The_Comic_Divide Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/e48a607917b6a927ba03d295125fb92f.pdf e911cc9801961398698e6091ce44307b PDF Text Text sc/m-bolic Througfi Sigfit and Sound 33. 1890: fluant-Garde Break CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 January 1994 Last Revised June 1996 La>*^ �Caiarles Greenteaf Ben, 1260 Canyon Boad, Sanfa Fe,J«vi87501 synfiOLxc KisTOJxy Through Sight and Sound 33. Med 189B - fluant-Garde Break '■='^'9®"“'’. Prelude (from Moser, CGB Greg. vnlo-f*"” “ >>efore the "mad flight" (Dante's "(olle with a P TT "Fonr q“":“ ® *^“'®kura Japan. Eliot's lines from the Only by the form, the pattern, Can words or music reach The stillness, as a Chinese jar still Moves, perpetually in its stillness. bevnnJ** Romantic, incarnate stretch beyond possibiltty had flawed the West with Symbolist rupture that sky-leap and crazing of the temporal fabric. V2a) ------------\ (Arrau) Against that ancient East, Delacroix's mid-19th century Jacob wresting with the angel, like stormy Liszt, fables the Faust champion, out of Judgment Hebrew by Promethean Greece. Yeats, in A Vision: June 1996 1890 Avant-Garde Break 1 �SSymboIic Histoiy C.G. BeU A civilization is a struggle to keep self-control, and in this it is like some great tragic person... (fade Liszt) The loss of control over thought comes towards the end: first a sinking in upon the moral being, a3) Qauguin, 1888, ^iHsion after tfie Sermon, (ktaiC, Scot. !J^t. QaC., T,dhifur0fi 3 ) Same, wfioCe then the last surrender, the irrational cry, revelation — the scream of Juno's peacock... Music: Satie 1890, First Gnossienne, close, Philips PHS 900-179 In Gauguin's 1888 Jacob and the Angel, Symbolist vision breaks so far with nature ("Art is an abstraction," Gauguin wrote) that the padre and his witnessing congregation could only laugh at the artist's wish to hang that picture in the church. And who took Satie's piano pieces of the strange names, the 1890 Gnossiennes, as musical compositions at all? (fade Satie) SFor Znd 2) (DeCacrovo 1852, OKe 5ea at (Dieppe, from CoUection ^eurdeCey, (Baris It is the abandon of Rimbaud's "Bateau Ivre," "Drunken Boat" of 1871,* once guided (like this Delacroix) by the ropes of its haulers, traficking in Flemish wheat or English cottons, under the stupid eye of lighthouses, "I'oeil niais des falots". for 2nd 3) Qaupuin, 1889, SeCf-Portrait, (J^tionaC QatUry, ^asfiwyton, (D.C. 2nd 3a) gtmyuin, 1892, fatata U (MiU, (HationaC galCery, Wasfiinyton (D.C. Gauguin has cut loose from that life-class, job and family, celebrates Rimbaud's take-over: (Wallace Fowlie) Comme je descendais des Fleuves impassibles... As I was going down impassive Rivers, I felt no longer guided by the haulers; Yelping redskins had taken them for targets. Having nailed them naked to colored stakes June1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 2 �C.G. BeU Sjymbc^ EBstoiy aux poteaux de couleurs. What if the "waves... eternal rollers of victims," which have washed him clean of wine stains and vomit, have also "scattered rudder and grappling hook"? — he is bathed "dans la Poeme/ De la Mer." 4) Ignaz ^untfier(F), c. 176S(?), fKeratd Singdj entrance, (Diessen am Simmersee (CQ‘B ’59); first, "U detaU Music: J.S. Bach(?), c. 1730, from Cantata No.53, "Schlage Doch," Westminster SL 5197 If the angels of "the Babylonian starlight" brought in on the Classical world "a fabulous formless darkness," their Western suc­ cessors of Rococo ceremony, here Bach and Gunther, have filled even the last call with sensuous promise: "Schlage doch Gewiinschte Stunde." Where is Yeats’ fierce incursion of the absolute, a glittering sword out of the East"; (fade "Schlage doch") aS) !l(pman 'Byzantine, 9tfi cent., SbigeCmosaic, S. ^assede, 9(pme 6S) 9doreau, 1897, 'Dead Lyres, iJdoreau Mus., Taris 5) DouBCe: [J4.J 9tfi cent., S^ngeC mosaic (aS); and [‘B] Dead Lyres (65) where Rilke’s "Every angel is terrible" — "Ein jeder Engel ist schrecklich"? The 9th-century mosaic vault of Sf:~Praxecrs“in Rome'is'wfdeeyed with the Dark-Age revelation which dissolved earth’s assur­ ance. But that messenger was contained in creed. How frenzied now the Zarathustra cry to the rending infinite — Moreau’s last sketches (1897) for the unpainted "Dead Lyres": the great lyre of the soul... has just silenced... all... those voices that glorified nature; this superb lyre is raised, held by a dark, terrible angel armed with the cross of blood... So Rilke, 1912, as TEufope armed for war, would pace the bastions of Duino over a storm sea, and catcli, as if roared by wind: Juztel996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 3 �C.G.BeU ^ymboluc BSstofy Wer, wenn ich schriee, horte mich denn aus der Engel Ordnungen? Who, if I cried, would hear me then among the angel orders? 6) 6 a) MuruA, 1893, iJie Cry, 9^twnaC QaUery, OsCo; + ^ cCose detaiC Vduncii, 1899-1900, dlanu ofLife, OdgHomU QaUery, OsCo *1^66) Same, Cry, intermediate detaiC Music: Mahler, 1909, 9th Symphony, 1st movement, dissonant passage, (Horenstein) Vox Box 116 Was Munch's 1893 "Cry" (after Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Romantic) a yet wilder charging of the personal and temporal, or its dissolving return to the transpersonal abstract? The poles define the art. Since the insufferable loading of romantic realism, as in earlier Munch, climaxes here in a stylization which becomes its mask. So Strindberg abstracted his ghastly marriages into more and more symbolic dramas. And does not the suspension of tonality in dis­ sonance — what Mahler (1860-1911) advanced in his symphonies like a throttle, to the culmination of this, the Ninth — deflect Liszt's blatant major to an estrangement of the cry it heightens? (fade Mahler on drum-roll) S^or 2nd S) 9doreau, 1876, SaCome (Dancing Before (Herod, (Sdoreau 9dus., (Paris Naturalist Manet deplored the influence of Symbolist Moreau: Moreau has chosen the wrong path... He leads us to the incomprehensible. While we want everything to be understandable. That realist-romantic rift had stamped the century. But the poles were always inbreeding: Rouault and Matisse would study with Moreau. 9^or 2nd 6) 9dundi, 1893, (PuBerty, (MuncB 9dus., OsCo (video uses MuncB, 1894, J4ju>(Uty, Munch Mus., OsCo, V2nd 6) June1996 1890 — Avant-Grarde Break 4 �C.G.BeU Symbolic History By report Expressionist Munch visited there. "The camera," he said, "cannot compete with painting so long as it is impossible to use it in heaven and hell." 1st 7) Cezanne, 1860, Louis-^uguste Cezanne (tfie painter's fatfier), ih(p.tionaC Qa(£ery, London Cezanne, whose revolution peaked as Munch's began, must have thought himself on the other side — from the violent Daumier realism of his youth (boyhood friend of Naturalist Zola); 1st 8) Cezanne, 1873-7S, Tanorama of lAitvers, Inst., Cfiicago (C^CB '74)) through his Pissarro awakening to landscape apprehended in light and air (this 1873 Panorama of Auvers): 9) Cezanne, 1890-92, Lhe Card iPCayers, CourtauCd gallery, London to the objective formalization of the actual, as in these Card Players of 1890 to '92 — he practiced Manet's science of the physical. 2nd 8) Cezanne, ^Panorama cfJ4upers, detail (CQ^ '74) Yet Cezanne throughout was overriding the real: sionism is already an abstract of brush work planes; his Impres­ 2nd 7) Cezanne, LLe (Painter's Ifatfier, detail-foideo-f^0tn4st-7)-------------------------his radical first caricatures leap from the prose journalism of Zola toward the visionary Baudelaire he memorized: "The Voyage", 0 Mort, vieux capitaine, il est temps!, levons I'ancre! the worm-kissed transcendence of "A Carrion"; the repeated specter of "The Seven Old Men" in their "ant-swarming city." IFor 3rd 8) Cezanne, 1894-98, IForest of Ifontau^Ceau, (Rpcds, 9det., (N)yc 3rd 8a) Cezanne, 1883-87, VdteSte. Victoire, (Pfiidips CoCCection, Wasft., (D.C. June 1996 1890 Avant-Garde Break 5 �C.G. BeU j^ymboHcHistQE^ From Baudelaire's "Correspondences" — (CGB) Nature is a temple where from living pillars Will come from time to time a confused phrase; One passes there through a forest of symbols, As under the scrutiny of familiar eyes... Vast as the night, or as the light of day, ' Perfumes, sounds and colors correspond... Vaste comme la nuit et comme la clart6, Les parfums, les couleurs et les sons se repondent. __ Cezanne’s analysis points to Rimbaud: A, black, E, white, I, red, U, green, 0, blue: vowels, I will tell one day the latence of your birth. (CGB) 2n(£ 9) Cezanne, OTte Car(C TCayers, Stephen Claris O^C; + VcCetaiCs 2nd: 9a) Cezanne, 1900, La n/kiOe au ChapeCet, QaC., ^ndon; + ^detaiC These Card Players, Munch’s Cry — from the same years — grip though differently, Rimbaud’s Season in HpIII made every hope vanish from my mind. With the lunge of the beast I leaped on every joy to strangle it... Misfortune was my god... Spring brought me the idiot’s terrifying laughter... (CGB) Music: Bruckner, 1891^, 9th Symphony (original.version), forte before close (timpani), Deutsche Gram. Gesellschaft 29333 And in the 9th (unfinished) symphony by Mahler’s first master Bruckner, also from 1891 to ’94, the rip-saw of dissonance cleaves a Choral and fugal buildup of studied polyphonic form. (music pause) 10) Cezanne, 1896, The Lahe of Plnnecy, Summer, CourtauCd Inst., London: -first video detail ■' 10 a) Same, a central detail (from which video tahfs only two closer details) Music: June 1996 Same Bruckner, close cont., tranquil 1890 — Avant^arde Break 6 �^yxnbolic Ifistory C.G.BeU But the dissonance yields to a close as calm, as classically harmonious, as Cezanne's 1896 Lake of Annecy. ("I will arise and go now, and go to Annecy"...) Yet there is a puzzle in Cezanne's classicism, his admiration for Poussin and belief that he himself was reconstituting that noble order of planes. Since the cubist colors here emerging from tree and mountain, water and sky, effect a prismatic diffraction of Poussin’s Cartesian space, as new to the world as the wave equations of Max­ well. Did Bruckner so reconstitute the polyphony of Renaissance and Baroque — Wagnerian chromatics exploding Gabrielli? (fade Bruckner) 11) (BuzHs (U Chavanms, 1889-93, tti (study), 9dus., CUvedand; ivith-video detaiCs Music: Franck,1884, Fugue from Prelude, Chorale, etc, opening V-LM 1822 The 19th-century cult of Bach, as in Franck's Prelude, Chorale and (here) Fugue, is cognate with Cezanne's espousal of Poussin, as with Puvis de Chavannes, who in this sketch for a fresco of Summer also revived the dream of classical order — like the Parnassians in poetry, Heredias: Maternal earth, who to the gods would seem Yet gracious, with each spring, as for a tomb. Brings to the broken urn acanthus bloom... (CGB) Fait... Au chapiteau brise verdir une autre acanthe... But all that is somehow backward looking, aU) Cezanne, c. 1890-94, (Batfiers, Louvre, (Baris; + ^ detaiC 12) Same, 1900-0S, CZHe (Bathers, S4rt Institute, Chicago; + ^detail against Cezanne's always vibrant Bathers, or the pointillism of Seurat __ both esteemers of Puvis — however mired (with Franck s chromatics) in the. reeds of the 'SO's. Cade Franck) June 1906 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 7 �C.G. BeU Symbolic Histbay "Take eloquence, said Verlaine, "and wring its neck." Perhaps only Reger, especially in the Bach-based cello suites, projects formal Baroque beyond Wagner, toward the modern stripping — Music: Reger, c. 1910(?), from Fugue of Cello Suite 1 (Feuermann) Col. ML 4678 a leap as far as Mallarme made from the Parnassians: The Will The The (CGB) virginal, vigorous and beautiful today. it tear for us with a blow of its drunken wing hard, forgotten lake which haunts under frost transparent glacier of flights that have not flown! Le transparent glacier des vols qui n'ont pas fui! (fade Reger) Only by vivifying abstraction could the arts of that late century repossess 13) C.(D. ^riedTicIt, 1821, Mi(C(Cay, O^dersac/isiscfies Landestmiseum, iHunover; + (CetaiC the natural health of Goethe a hundred years before, which Friedrich and Beethoven would carry over into the Transcendental yearning of 1820. Music: Beethoven, 1825-7, A Minor Quartet, from Trio of 2nd Movement, Col. M5S 677 ____________. Goethe: "Happy only is the soul that loves" — "Gliicklich allein/ ist die Seele, die liebt." All those now used up "Laughing suns and pastures bright,/ And Maytime harvests of delight" — Mailied; Wie Mir Wie Wie herrlich leuchtet die Natur! gl^zt die Sonne! lacht die Flur! 14) HAiTtwr, c. 1826, iJ\{ortCal^ ^Terrace, 9^t. QaC., Wasfi., CD.C (CQCB '60) 14 a) Same, detaiC (C(j‘B '60), wfUch video may tal^from 14 (fade Beethoven Trio) June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 8 �C.G. BeU Symbolic IBstoiy In 1820-England that first immediacy ("0 blithe New-comer") yields to a moodier colouring, as of autumnal Keats: Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness... Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft; And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.’ While in Turner’s Mortlake Terrace, where the sun spills over, dis­ solving the wall, earth's diffraction into light and air has begun. ’ Van go£fi, 1887, WfUaifieU witd !jrCyin£ Lark, Van GoaH Museum, JimstercCam ISa) Same, detail (video tfien returns to the rvhoCe) 15; By the Avant-garde break, what vertigo of electric technique lifts Expressionist joy from its Gates of Hell base — the flight of Van Gogh's lark hair-triggered to an anguished opposite. So Rimbaud: I know skies split with lightning, waterspouts. The surf and currents; I have known the night. And dawn exalted like a flock of doves... I would have shown children those sunfish Of blue waves, the fish of gold, the singing fish. (CGB) ...ces dorades Du flot bleu, ces poissons d'or, ces poissons chantants. Music: Bartok, 1934, close of the 5th Quartet, Concert-Disc CS-501 t Bartok, fifty years later, closes his Fifth Quartet with such a "Drunken Boat" injection of the Beethoven trio. 16) Van Qosh, 1890, Crows over a ComfieCd, Van Qogh Mus., Slmstadam 16 a) Same, Crows, detail (to which video adds another, from 16) Rimbaud through the 70s, Van Gogh through the ’SOs. most in­ tense spirits of the time, both cracked up. Van Gogh’s rapture of wings over wheat closed in by 1890 to the last road, disappearing June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 9 �C.G.Ben l^ymbolic BSstory under a fatal flight of crows. Rimbaud's sabotage was of his poetry — by that tropical buming-out he had predicted in A Season in HellMy day is done. I am leaving Europe. Sea air will burn my lungs. Lost climates will tan me... I will have gold. I will be lazy and brutal... But now I am accursed... (cf. Delmore Schwartz and Wallace Fowlie) The poet-angel, the Gdnie, "0 fertility of the mind and vastness of the universe" (Illuminations^ goes under: "Je voudrais me taire." 17) ^riedricd, c. 1820, ^Evening, iSQedersacfisiscties Landesmuseum, ^Hanover; first, video detaU Music: Beethoven, 1825-7, A-Minor Quartet, Heilige Dankgesang, opening. Col. MSS 677 Or there is night, the quiet Friedrich and Beethoven distilled again from Goethe: Over all hills Is peace Through all trees You can trace Hardly a breath; The birds are asleep in the wood; Wait; soon, like these. You too will rest. (CGB) 18) y^riedricd, 1835, ^RiesengeSirge, l^landerer at Evening, 5dg.tional QaCCery, West EerCin; first, video detail liber alien Gipfeln 1st Ruh, In alien Wipfeln Spurest du Kaum einen Hauch; Die Vogelein schweigen im Walde. Warte nur, balde Ruhest du auch. (fade Beethoven) June1996 1890 — AvanM^arde Break 10 �Symbolic History C.G.BeU 19) ^an Qo^fi, 1890, witfi Cypresses, a Sit cropped., 9Qrd(hr-9du^ Museum, OUerCo 19 a) Same, an upper detaiC 19 S) Van QoyS, 1889, Starry 9^St, detaiC, Museum of Modem Pirt, O^C (ivSUe video ta(^ wSoCe and two details from VlSS) By 1890 even in England the "Winter Heavens" of Meredith hint at the form-twisting of Van Gogh: Lengths down our road each fir-tree seems a hive. In swarms outrushing from the golden comb... While Hopkin's evening — ...frightful a nightfall folded rueful a day... The times are nightfall and the light grows less; The times are winter and a world undone — that "Evening strains to be time's vast womb-of-all, home-of-all, hearse-of-all night." Though the Victorian island had hardly passed, with the Symbolist Continent, through the collapsing antinomies, the yea-and-nay fusion of Eternal recurrence: (Nietzsche) This world: a monster of energy, without beginning, without end... a becoming that knows no satiety, no disgust, no weariness... this Dionysian world of the eternally self-creating, the eternally—self-xiestroying7.T — my "beyond good and evil"... This world is the will to power — and nothing besides! And you yourselves are also this will to power — and nothing besides! Yet Hopkins could almost have spoken for Van Gogh: ...This to hoard unheard. Heard unheeded, leaves me a lonely began. 1st 20) ConstaSCe, c. 1823(.F), Hsee Tsunf^s, 9{amstead ydeatfi, Victoria and MSert Museum, London (sCide show: wfioCe picture; video: cropped) June 1996 1890 — AvantGardeBreak 11 �Symbolic His&ny C.G. BeU Of course the break had shown at the peak of Transcendental and Romantic inebriation, most strikingly at the art surface with Turner, or this Constable; 21) J^riedricd, 1830~3S, ^ad to tfie Cemetery, ^Easter, (Baron *Tfiyssen (Bomemysza, London at the brooding core with Friedrich (this last Easter Road to the Cemetery). In poetry it was Holderlin above all, in whom nostalgia for the infinite began to crack the canons of utterance, compressing the two-fold time-symbol of the God's indwelling and soul's deserted winter into that almost fragment 2nd 20) ^ain, ConstaSCe, Tree 'Trun^ (sCide sfiow: detaiC; video: first, cCoser detaiC) called "The Half of Life" — "Halfte des Lebens": Wreathed with yellow pears And with wild roses, hangs The land in the lake, 0 blessed swans. And drunk with kisses You dip your heads In the holy sobering water. (CGB) Mit gelben Birnen hanget Und voll mit wilden Rosen Das Land in den See, Ihr holden Schwane, Und trunken von Kussen Tunkt ihr das Haupt Ins heilignuchterne Wasser. 2nd 21) l^ain, y^rUdricd, (I(pad to the Cemetery, detail 2nd 21a) y^riedrkh, 183S, Wood and Stvamp at Sunrise, Qoethe Vdus., S^ranhfurt Where alas shall I catch At blooms in winter, where At the light of sun And earthy shadows? June 1906 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 12 �C.G.BeU Symbolic History Speechless and cold Stand the walls; in wind The vanes clatter. (CGB) Weh mir, wo nehm' ich, wenn Es Winter ist, die Blumen, und wo Den Sonnenschein Und Schatten der Erde? Die Mauern stehn Sprachlos und kalt, im Winde Klirren die Fahnen. 22) V22a) 226) V22c) lumer, 1832, CfiUde 9{aroC(Cs Ti^rimage: Italy, ^aUery, London burner, 1823, “Bay ofBaiae, ^ate Qtdiery, London HAimer, 1833, QrandCanal, Venice, Ulyde.Codection, Qlen J^cdls, burner, c. 1829, J^lorence, British 9duseum, London Music: Mendelssohn, 1833, Italian Symphony, 2nd mvt, opening, RCA-VLSC-2221 A testimony to the rifted love of Romantic, that rapt Holderlin's god-claim abuts on the desired Italy of Childe Harold and Turner, of Mendelssohn's Symphony, or Shelley's "wild West Wind" — And saw in sleep old palaces and towers Quivering within the wave’s intenser day. All overgrown with azure moss and flowers So sweet the sense faints picturing them — the whole post-card dream on which generations were reared. (fade Mendelssohn) 23) burner, 1835-40, WatercoCoT, Boats at Sea, British Museum, London Yet in some watercolor sketches, unlike the canvases he dressed for show. Turner could cleave through all that, as in the performing art of music no composer perhaps did or could; so these boats at sea anticipate the negative capability of the minimal — Rimbaud: June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 13 �C.G.BeU Symbolic Histcny I wrote silences; I wrote nights. pressible, fixed vertigoes... I recorded the inex­ Elle est retrouvee! Quoi? I'etemite. C'est la mer melee Au soleil. iMxmetj 1872, Sunrise, 94ms. 94armottan, iParis (since stoCen) 24 a) Same, (ktaiC (video uses *1)24 and returns to tde zufioCe) 246) Monet, 1875, *Woman witd a ^ParasoC, Sdrtist's Wife and Son, 9(fltionaC gaPCery, Wasfiington, *D.C. (video: detail only) 24) It is found again! What? Eternity. It is the sea Mixed with the sun. (cf. Fowlie) Was Monet's Sunrise, from the same year as that Rimbaud, on the same track? Impressionist eternity pursued through a shimmer of light and air? — Emily Dickinson's I'll tell you how the sun rose, — A ribbon at a time... Or later, Wallace Stevens: The body dies; the body's beauty lives. So evenings die, in their green going, A wave, interminably flowing... V. No objects, but modes; relations, but of no substance; the wave motion of light, and no ether to be waved. Music; Saint-Saens, 1873, Cello Concerto, 2nd movement, cadenza, etc. Col. M 30113 In that France of the '70's, after the Franco-Prussian War, where first-impressionist lightening joined Symbolist estrangement, and Saint-Saens and his pupil Faure (played by Leonard Rose on one record) formed the Society for French Music, June 1996 1890.-—. Avant-GardeSreak 14 �C.G.BeU ^ymbofic History aZS) WfiistCer/c. 1867-68, ^ J^rtist in 6is Studio, SUrt Inst., CRicago; + Vdetail) 25) H/RistCer, 1875, O^ctume in ‘BCacR^and QoCd: ^ ^alCing 5(pcR^t, Institute of SLrts, (Detroit 25a) Same, (h^ctume, detail and began the etherialization of Wagnerian chromatics, distilling out its heavy Germanic tug toward resolution (fade Salnt-Saens) (as if the modal and Eastern already beckoned beyond tonality: Faur6) __ Music: Faure, 1883, Elegie, cello and orchestra, Op.24, close (from flute) Col. M 30113 in that Paris, an American, Whistler, as much as any, leavened Western realism with the Japanese print — this "Nocturne in Black and Gold: The Falling Rocket" — to provoke in England Ruskin's slander, with the Pyrrhic victory of Whistler’s suit: "Can you explain to the jury, Mr. Whistler, what constitutes a work of art?" The monocle scans them. "That is manifestly impossible." Was the root shift of the modern away from the spatiality of cause from Spinoza’s "God as an extended thing"? (close Faur6) 26) goCden (PsaCter (MS, c. 880, David xvitfi (Musicians and Dancers, St Gad+ *1^ detail ‘ ^ " In the representation of motion, this 9th-century David with Musicians and Dancers claims as bodiless a symbol-world as Carolingian astronomy, where Alcuin, to clear up for Charlemagne an assumed disappearance of Mars (they had lost sight of it for several years), contrived a muddle of solar glow, latitude and longitude, all aimed at the caprice and irregularity of the merely physical. 2 7) DoCCavuoUo, 1470, (Battle of (My.de Warriors, (Petit (PaCais, (Paris 2 7a) Same, detail; + two closer video details and a return to the xvfioCe Music: June 1996 M. Pesenti, c. 1480(?), Dal letto me levava (de Van) AS-77 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 15 �C.6. BeU Slymbolic H]st(»y With Pollaiuolo, 1470, motion and force take up the physical, as in the chordal Frottole, or the pulleys and levers by which Leonardo embodies the animate: Force with material movement and weight with per­ cussion are the four accidental powers in which all the works of mortals have their being and their end... where there are neither sinews nor bones there cannot be any force exerted in any movement made by imag­ inary spirits. (end PesentI) Yet that lean anatomy 28) HiiiBens and Studio, c. 1620, (Drun^n SiCenus and Crexv, 9dg-tionaC QaCCery, London; + VdttaiC Music: Scheldt, 1621, Canzone Gallicam, brass, opening, Candide 31004 was a century and a half from the billowing flesh and voluminous riot of the circle of Rubens, the ground-bass order of baroque (Scheldt), Galileo's demonstrations of the mechanics of mass: Since I assume matter to be unchangeable and always the same, we are no less able to treat it rigorously than if it belonged to mathematics. (fade Scheldt) 29) (BCaf^, 1804-18, SlCBion turns from fiis daugflters, ^Binder Jerusalem, p. 47 Blake assaults that formulation no less in thought than'* in the representation of body and motion. The Atoms of Democritus And Newton's Particles of Light Are sands upon the Red sea shore Where Israel's tents do shine so bright. 30) ^Bicasso, 1908, Dryad, Jlermitaye, Leningrad; xoitfi video details June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 16 �C.G. BeU History 30a) OCripCe: details from [Ji] Spanis/i 9dSj Cate lOtd cent., TscoriaC (Beatus, f18, T,ve; [(BJ fBjiBens, 1622, {Marie de {Medici at {MarseiCCes, douvre; [C] {Picasso, 1907, {DemoiseCCes dSlvi£non, {Museum of {Modem Art, {J^C If Cubism reverts to a dynamic of the abstract, it is not by Blake’s vision, but by a method like that of the sciences through the Cubist early century: Planck, 1900; Einstein’s 1905 paper merging the discrete physics of atoms and the continuous physics of waves, leading through the quantum ambivalence and indeterminacy of Bohr and Heisenberg, to Schrodinger's wave mechanics, its mathe­ matics a crushing, by reciprocal fiat, of the "least-action" velocities of mass-point and propagated wave. No one doubts in physics that something was revealed. And if not in the art, why should it have multiplied its value a thousand fold? That sequence, from abstraction, to mass in motion, and back to the formal and abstract, 31) graeco-iKpman ({Pompeii), 1st cent. A.'D., fresco, (fmit and game, {Mus. 3^., {^CfipCes reappears in the still life; though this Pompeian richness of fruit and game foreruns the phenomenal certainty of the West — heir to what Heidegger would call the Greek "tuning of wonder," its instinctive space to go down in the spiritual undertow of the Dark Ages. 32) ZurBaran, 1633, App[es(?) on a {Pewter {PCate, {Mus. Cat., (BarceCona; + detaiC (where sCide show has a32: ZurBaran, 1633, tripCe stUCUfe, Simon {J^rton, Los PlttgeCes, foCCowed By 32) Music: German, c. 1670, Viola d'Amore Sonata, from 2nd Grave AS 19-B When the still life resurfaces, through the vibrance of Renais­ sance to the weight of Baroque (this Zurbaran, with a tensile ground bass sonata), one feels the conscious science, not only of those fruits, but of the projective space in which they hold substantial being — summit for all time of that Galilean matter: "unchangeable and always the same." June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 17 �C.G.^U (Symbolic Bistory 3*3) Cfiardin, 1764-65, TCums, (Private CoCCection, (Baris; first, xndeo detaU 33 a) Same, detail (wfiUe video dratvs a closer detailfrom 33) Music: J.S. Bach, Chromatic Fantasy, opening, Edwin Fischer, Piano, V8680/1 One sentation Zurburan's surface of might say Chardin holds to the grandeur of the old repre­ as much as anyone after the Baroque debacle; but geometry of lighted recess wavers toward a brushwork color play. So in Bach's Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue, tonal heroics is suspended in, accidental transtonality. (fade Fantasy, begin Fugue) 34) Liotard, 1782, (Pears, figs, pCums, Mus. dS4.rt et ddlistoire, Qeneva 34 a) Same, detail Liotard's last still life, 1782, in its spatial detachment, might almost be taken for a century later. While Bach’s Chromatic Fugue, even more than the Prelude, has that clean hypostasis of formal relations, which has launched it again and again into modernity (fade from Fugue beginning to close) 35) Cezanne, c. 1900(7), Still Life witfi Melon, watercoCor, (Private Collection; first, a vuko detail 35a) Cezanne, 1882-85, La Mer a L'^Estague, CoC. Pederin, Paris as when Fischer, thirty years into the century which this Cezanne began, reshaped it on the piano, for our between-war world. (close Bach) But to see Western history as a dimensional conquest returning to the abstract is to obscure what dimensionality contained — 36) Ingres, c. 1810, Portrait of tfU Sculptor Paul Lemoyne, (S(g,Cson QaCCery, d^nsas City, Missouri 36a) Ingres, 1810, OUe SLrcHitect Jean-Paptiste (DesdeBan, detail, Mus. of Dec. SLrts, Pesan^n 36B) J^ain, 36, Portrait ofLemoyne, detail June 1906 1890'— Avant-Garde Break 18 �C.G. BeU l^ymboKc IBstory the maturation, outbreak and crisis of conscious person: stamped on the classic form, of this portrait. Herder: what Ingres All beings have their centre In themselves, and each stands in proportioned relation to the rest; all depend on the equilibrium of opposed forces, held together by organizing power... i Novalis: "Nature is visible spirit; spirit invisible nature." feel yourself sprung from the highest God!" Robespierre: Goethe: "0 Kings, aristocrats, tyrants of every description, are slaves in revolt* against the sovereign of the earth, ■ which is the human race, and against the legislator of the universe, which is Nature. V * Yet the wine of the god-self was always changing to the other draught, Hdlderlin, Pindaric rhapsodist, at length desired: But let one reach me Brimmed with dark light The foaming beaker full. That I may rest; Since sweet Under shades would fall that sleep. (CGB) Es reiche aber, Des dunkeln Lichtes voll, Mir einer den duftenden Becher, Damit ich ruhen moge; denn siiss War unter Schatten der Schlummer. 3 7) ^ouBCe: [A] T^ypt CDynasty c. 2600 (B.C, (Bust ofTnnce S^l^-3{af, J^ine Arts, (Boston; ancC [(BJ (Dynasty X^III, *TeC Antama, xvoocCcn fieacC from a harp, Louvre (first, vuCeo (ktaiCs of A and ‘B) If a culture matures by individuation from mythic cult, and if individuation is always fraught with danger — a Pandora box of consciousness -—• we should find from culture to culture a recurrent ripening, as here in Egypt, from Fourth Dynasty prince to time-ofIkhnaton carving from a harp — a paradigm of early against late. June 1998 1890 — AvantTGarde Break 19 �C.G. BeU Symbolic IBstoxy 38) (DouBCc: [SI] Jitticj c. 550 iHfiittpin 5{e(id, Liouvre.) dtuC [*B]~^£eXpndH(tti(?) 2nd ctnt. (B.C, CaGmacfias (once ccdhdSeneca), Mus. V^pCes In, the Classical theater, such a leap takes us from the keen Archaic smile of the 6th-century B.C. Rampin rider, to the burdened Alexandrian bust, probably of the librarian Calimachus, though once called Seneca — baffled in either case. 39) (DouBCet [^] OCtnec, 800’400 ‘B.C; Qiant 5kadfront £ja ‘l^enta, (Mus., JaCapaj and [B] CCassicaC Maya, c. 700 ‘^.(D.l?), Stucco Bead from BaCenyue, Mus. SlntBropoCoyy, Mctqco City Even in Mexico and Central America, the oldest monuments, the giant Jaguar-man heads of the Olmec, simplify to a primitive force of monumental stone; while the refined Maya stuccoes, as this from Palenque 1500 years later, suggest the romantic brooding and sensuous complexity of a life-mask (though the nose-bridge pre­ cludes that). 40) (DouBCe: [Si] (Dirl^ Bouts, 1464-67, SeCf from Last Supper, St. Beter's, Louvain; and [B] Corot, c. 1835, SeCf zvitB BaCette, Uffizi, BCorence (video adds details from'sinyCes *l7405L and ‘1/40B) In the West, the realistic self-portrait arises out of the Medieval. Less than four hundred years separate this Dirk Bouts detail, from Corot’s The Artist with a Palette. That Corot, in simple modesty, has also taken the stance of a craftsman, heightens the build-up — from Dirk Bouts' assumed appearance in the creed-room of a Last Supper, to the 19th-century unfettered looming, as if seen from below — a measure, over that span, of the amplification of the earth-claim. a41) Laf^ Constance Master, c. 1480, CoupCe from Megory, detail of Covers, Qerman Mas., MuremBery B41) Same, detail of the lady (to wBicB video adds detail of tBe man) 41) Same, the ivBoCe scene of tBe Covers Music: Junel^e H.Fink, c. 1490(?), Ach Herzig Hertz, A.S. 51 1890 Avant-Garde Break 20 �C.6. BeU l^ymboEc Histoiy Consider Eros. In the Middle Ages it had kindled a Chivalric flame, but earthless, mystical. As the thickening plot of space, time, and cause foreclosed on chivalry, married love advanced its bour­ geois hopes — curiously enough, first in the book of a King, James of Scotland, whom Venus — "Worship my law... And I your confort here sail multiplye" — and Minerva — "Desire," quod sche, "I nyl it noght deny. So thou it ground and set in Cristin wise" bring to the guerdon of his "blisfull aventure": In youth, of lufe,- that now from day to day Flourith ay newe, and yit forthir, I say. So in Finck's love songs, or in this Lake Constance detail, we feel that validation, but modestly — these lovers form one scene in an Allegory on Life and Death. (cut Fink) 42) yosepd-Marie 1773, l^mpCe of tHyimn, ^^ecture. de CdamBiry, Savois; witfi video details Music: Mozart, 1791, The Maaic Fluto. "Tamino mein," Deutsche Gram 2709 017 Under what panoply of bliss marriage parades in this French Temple of Hymen, 1773, cognate (if only the artist had some of Mozart’s genius) with the trial and union of The Magic Flut^P^,tTiino... Tamino... mine... what happiness." Our grandmothers featured such engravings on their walls. (fade Maaic Fluted a43) ‘Bocffin, 1878, Weddiny Journey, upper section, 0dp.t. gaC., (BerCin; + V cCoser detail 643) Same, Wedding Journey, Cower section; + ^ detail of a43) 43) JLgain, Wedding Journey, wdoCe picture Music: June 1996 Brahms, 1878, vioiin Concerto in D major, slow movement RCAVICS 1028 1890 — Avant-GardeJBreak 21 �Symbolic Histoay C.G. l^U Though by that time what the world dreamed toward was no allegory of the old regime, but the Freudian enfleshment of Bocklin's "Wedding Journey," love's garlanded, flute-blowing descent down the shaded cleft into the honeymoon valleys of the South. It is the over­ loading of desire, which the concert repertory pushes like a drug; Brahms’ Violin Concerto; in poetry the addiction of romantic penta­ meter: "Far folded mists and gleaming halls of morn" — that Ten­ nyson vibrato fulness of loss and wish: The woods decay, the woods decay and fall... And after many a summer dies the swan. 44) iMonet, 1873, ^iJie ^Poppies, Louvre (Jeu cCe (Paume), (Paris 44 a) Same, dCetaiC (tufiUe video puts the zufioCe Between details) Such paradisical longing stretches the realistic hovel. It fills the Poppy Fields of Monet's light and air as with flesh memories of Meredith's "Modern Love": We saw the swallows gathering in the sky... Love that had robbed us of immortal things. This little moment mercifully gave. Where I have seen across the twilight wave The swan sail with her young beneath her wings. What Wallace Stevens so breathed At evening, casual flocks of pigeons make Ambiguous undulations as they sink. Downward to darkness on extended wings — that he fought it the rest of his life. 45) (Rffdin, 1889, the LtemaC IdoC, (Ppdin Museum, (Paris; + 9/ detail The notion of Brahms as a reserved master of design, obscures the soar and sob. Through the Impressionist veils of that Paris, Ro­ din's "Eternal Idol" bends ideality to the flesh-loading of Baudelaire: jTxnel996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 22 �C.G. BeU ^ymbofic History Evenings illyminated by the charcoal glow __ Les soirs illumines par I’ardeur du charbon. when: I thought I breathed the perfume of your blood __ Je croyais respirer le parfum de ton sang... And it is just that Eden bubble of promissory touch, (fade 2nd movement) 46) c. 1882, rEhe gates of 9{eCC, Hipdin 9vCus., {Paris (wfiicfi tHe video divides into detaiCs, aBove and BeCow) Music: Brahms Violin Concerto, continued, begin 3rd movment which involves Rodin, and the whole Romantic world, inner and outer, in the turbulent enormities of The Gates of Hell — as the slow movement of the Violin Concerto requires the finale's inflated battle to affirm. 3rd movement) 47) SamueC {PaCtner, c. 18S0(F), Slmos Simon CottCe, {\(fitionaC {Portrait GaCCeru, London; + 'l^detaiC 4 7a) J7E. {MiCCais, 1852, OpBeCia, {Cate QatCery, London How does estrangement enter that Faust-night of Care? Even in England and by 1850, the beauty of the ideal (Palmer's portrait of Cottle) seems withdrawn from the actual. Yet that refined estrangement keeps the old techniques of. ordered command __ Arnold's "Dover Beach", Tennyson's "idle tears": Break, break, break. On thy cold gray stones, 0 sea! the resolve of "In Memoriam": June1996 1890 — Avant-GaMe Break 23 �C.G.BeU BSstoiy I hold it true whate'er befall; I feel it, when I sorrow most; Tis better to have loved and lost Than never to have loved at all.. a48) 48) Cezanne, 1869, Tfie Temptatim ofSt. Slntfiony, ‘BuftrCe y^oundation, Zuricfi Cezanne, 1870-71, '9vCan in a Strata 9{at ('Boyer), Odet. 9/tus., 9>0yC; first, video detail 'U48a) Cezanne 1880, SeCf-Tortrait, detail, Louvre, Taris Music: Mussorgsky, 1874, Pictures at an Exhibition, opening. Turnabout TV 34258 As Yeats would write after the first World War: We had fed the heart on fantasies. The heart's grown brutal from the fare... And planned to bring the world under a rule. Who are but weasels fighting in a hole. When Mussorgsky and Cezanne charged the rtiusical hnd art salons with something of the same bull-violence (Man in a Straw Hat, 1871; Pictures at an Exhibition, 1874), a break was made with the romantic ideal and its vulnerability. How much nearer to Camus' Stranger than to those lost dreams of Palmer, Tennyson, Brahms. (fade Mussorgsky) 49) iBarmagianino, c. 1523, Self in a conveTcmirror, HQinstfiist. 9dus., Vienna V49a) iMaster of S4u7(erre, 1537, (Descent into the CeCCar, Stadtische (Kynstinstitut, y^raiihfurt 496) deCC SlBSate, 1555-60, Landscape zvith 9den Tlireshiny 'Wheat, 9dus., (fontaineSCeau Parmagianino's youthful self-portrait in a convex mirror is one of the wildest pictures of the 16th century. Yet its experiment is rationally grounded in the optics of the mirror. The stormiest adventures of Renaissance are landward; those voyagers do not, as Baudelaire's, "partent/ Pour partir". Thus with Du Bellay's Odyssean sonnet: (CGB) Jux»1996 1890 ^ Avant-Garde Break 2A �C.G. BeU Symbolic History Heureux qui, comme Ulysse, a fait un beau voyage... Happy who like Ulysses after a fair voyage... Comes home to employ the experience of his age... Better my fathers' house than Roman palaces, Loire than Tiber, my hill than the Palatine; Better than ocean air, the sweetness of the Angevine. Et plus que I'air marin la douceur Angevine. SO) V\{anet, 1879, (Portrait cf^eor^e Moore, detaiC, Met. Mas., O^C ^SOa) Manet, 1876, (Before the Mirror, §uggenheim Museum, 9^C SOB) Manet, 1873, Sur Ca (Plage, Musie du Jeu de (Paume, (Paris Where the iiew art, even in observational quiet (this detail of Manet's George Moore), is suggestively adrift. Against Du Bellay's sonnet, take Mallarme's on the Sea Breeze, "Brise Marine". He sits at home, in Paris, with his wife and child, before him the unwritten blank of the page. He drowns in ennui: "The flesh is sad, alas! and I have read all the books" — "La chair est triste, h61as! et j'ai lu tons les livres"; he thinks to sail, inviting storms, towards "shipwrecks lost without masts, without masts or fertile islands... But O my heart, listen to the sailors' song!": ...les naufrages Perdus, sans mats, sans mSts, ni fertiles ilots... Mais, 6 mon coeur, entends le chant des matelots! SI) ^an Qogh, 1887, SeCf-(Portrait, V. Qogh Mas., Sbnsterdam *l7Sla) ^an Qogh, 1890, Self-(Portrait (Qreen), detail, Louvre, (Paris (video then returns to a close detaid of SI) Mallarme dreamed and wrote in the wifely embrace of that room. But Van Gogh (Self Portrait, 1887), embarked with Rimbaud in the Bateau Ivre, took the shoreless voyage all the way: (CGB after Fowlie) I sailed until across my fragile cords Drowned men spinning backward sank to sleep. June1996 1890 — Avant-^arde Break 25 �C.G. BeU ^ymbotic mstary Now I, a lost boat in the hair of caves. Hurled by tempests into the birdless air. Whose water-drunk carcass would not be fished up By Hansa sailing ships or armored Monitors... Who ran, spotted with electric crescent moons — Qui courais, tache de lunules 61ectriques... Lucifer-Ahab broken to what climax of pity? 52) *l^an Qogfij 1888, (Portrait of an Victor, 5(fdCCer-fM^uCCer (\{us., OtterCo; + (UtaiC 52 a) Cezanne, 1890-95, ^oy in a (Rg^cC Waistcoat, (BiirfiCe CoCCection, Zurich (video: detail only) I, who trembled, hearing at fifty leagues. The rut of Behemoths and heayy Maelstroms, Eternal spinner of blue immobilities, I regret Europe with its ancient parapets! But in truth, I have wept too much! Dawns are rending. Every moon is atrocious and every sun bitter. Acrid love has swollen me with intoxicating torpor^ 0 let my keel burst! Let me go down into the sea! Through that split century of revolt — self-pity, tender memories, backward longings arise: Impressionist domesticities, Renoir's girls, Degas' Dancers, the sigh under Seurat's pointillism, even Cezanne's Boy in a Red Waistcoat, resonate toward Yeats' Prayer for his Daughter: 53) (Picasso, 1906, (Portrait of Leo Stein, drarviny, (Museum of ^rt, (Baltimore: + detail (here video adds a detail of sCide 806, from the close of the shozv: (Picasso, 1924, (Paul in a Clozun Suit, .Artist's Collection) And may her bridegroom bring her to a house Where all's .accustomed, ceremonious... Though he himself, has paced storm-battlements June 1996 1890 — Avant-Grarde Break 26 �C.G. BeU SymboBn HiigtoTy Imagining... the future years... Dancing to a frenzied drum... So Picasso, at the onset of abstract rupture (1906) calls back photo­ realism for the romantic representation of Gertrude Stein’s brother Mais, vrai, j'ai trop pleure! and: Fileur eternel des immobilites bleues, Je regrette 1 Europe aux anciens parapets! I long for that Europe of the ancient parapets! 54) >2aire, ^rt^o bronze 94:ask, 5(pcl^fdCCer CoCCectum, MetropoCitan Museum cf m, 9^0 first, video detaiC But Picasso had already fixed his sights on an impersonal primi ive containment for all demonic possessions, the African mask, in which the terminal and personal shame of Rimbaud's "Drunken Boat might pronounce beyond personality, clean: Je ne puis plus, baigne de vos langueurs, 6 lames __ I can no longer, bathed in your languors, 0 waves. Follow in the long wake of cotton boats Nor traverse the fanfare of their flags and flames Nor swim under the horrible eyes of prison ships.’ — As m all satyr wisdom from Homer down, death-acceptance turned to life-force. first, vuCec dose S5a) mcasso, 1308, ‘Woman witfi a fan, hermitage, Uningrad V55c) (Picasso, 1908, ifriendsfivp (L'Sdmitie), (Hermitage, Leningrad June 1998 1890 Avant-Garde B^ak 27 �^ymbolieHistoiy C.G.BeU How would it operate in the post-individual and luxuriant West? An art fad? A Dionysian birth? Where Rilke, the same years as this 1908 Picasso, in the Malte Brigge "Other Self," saw the facds of Paris wear out... split and fold... be changed in succession... The last is worn through in a week, has holes in it... gradually the lining — the no face — comes through, and they go about with that... Or he sees the woman, sunk inward, her head in her hands: At his step... the emptiness clattered... she took fright, was torn too quickly out of herself... the face remained in the hands... to see a face from the inside... the flayed head without a face. The excitement of Cubist art is as clear as the record every­ where of broken content, what moved toward the World War and totalitarian seizure — Yeats (that "last romantic"): We, who seven years ago Talked of honour and of truth. Shriek with pleasure if we show The weasel's twist, the weasel's tooth. The marvel of the Negroid and Cubist is its changing devaluation, outrage and despair to abstract strength — the dance of Zarathustra: "zur Umwertung aller Werte." 1 56) y^ragonard, 1780, ^ete at !^m6ouU£et, QulBenJoan CpCCection, LisBon 56a) Same, detaiC of stream (into zofiidi video inserts a detail cf the sBip, from V56B) The first turning of royal France from court ease to the risk of wild nature is deliciously toyed with by Fragonard in his painting of a Fete at Rambouillet. So Johnson's Rasselas — "he whose real wants are supplied, must admit those of fancy" — searches the woods and June 1996 1890 — Avant-Grarde Break 28 �Symbolic Histoty C.G. Bell cliffs of the Happy Valley for an escape from those "soft vicissitudes of pleasure and repose": He examined the cavern through which the waters of the lake were discharged; and... discovered it to be full of broken rocks, which... would stop any body of solid bulk... 57) C.T>. g^Twiricfi, 1818, CftaOiCGffs of ‘KS£en, fKginfiart, Wintertfiur 57a) Same, CfiaCliCCiffs, centraC detail, from 'wfiicfi video draws two closer details (cf. V57al and a2) In Friedrich's "Chalk Cliffs of Riigen" that mannered grotto-play advances to the awed contemplation of cliffs and mountain torrents, which, from romantic poetry and the tales of Hoffmann, would seize on Poe ("A Descent into the Maelstrom", 1841): The "little cliff" upon whose edge he had so carelessly thrown himself... arose, a sheer unobstructed precipice of... rock, some fifteen or sixteen hundred feet from the world of crags beneath us... In truth, so deeply was I excited by the perilous position of my companion, that I fell at full length upon the ground, clung to the shrubs around me, and dared not even glance upward at the sky... "You must get over these fancies," said the guide. 58) (Bavarian (Romantic, 1869-86, (hlg.uscfiwannstein, S'H^ of (Municft (video uses ^58) But what Symbolist enactment of the European Weird, could lead from Friedrich's nature mystery to the actual Wagnerian extra­ vagance the mad king of Bavaria, Ludwig II, reared at Neuschwanstein in the chain of Valhalla-imaginings which let to his suicide? As if the whole Alpine landscape were haunted 59) giorgio de Cftirko, 1908, (Jlpsta^ia of the Infinite, (Museum of (Modem Strt, (Nirc ^59 a) g. de Chirico, 1913-14, Singuish cf (Departure, 5llBrigh.t gallery, Buffalo, (N!/ June1996 1890 — Avant-(5arde Break 29 �C.G. BeU Sjymbolic Histoxy by a ghost of the surreal, future, to be painted in 1908 by Giorgio de Chirico, in this "Nostalgia of the Infinite" — Neuschwanstein of the now consciously alienated mind, as immediate, and remote, as the Castle Kafka's Land Surveyor sees but never reaches, phones and is bureaucratically shunted from, evasive ultimate of religion turned on itself. Even when Kafka's surrealism had been confirmed by the Great War, the many had no notion how his Castle and Trial, his Meta­ morphosis into cockroach and the like, applied to their daily lives. Va60) n^ozuer detaiCfrom sCide 58, Odg'Usdvwannstein, 60) 5Lnierican QingerBreacC, 1886, LumBertnan's Bouse, ‘Eureka, CaCifomia; first, xHxCeo detaiCs How could Ludwig n have known what Masque of the Red Death his fairy castle was to accommodate? How much more purblind the new rich of Gilded America must have been to the ghostly estrangements which nightmared their gingerbread — as in the meeting on the stair of James' Turn of the Scre.w The apparition had reached the landing half way up... in the cold faint twilight, with a glimmer in the high glass and another on the polish of the ,oak stair below, we faced each other in our common intensity... Like that candy-manufacturing malaise and soul-closure from which at the turn of the century. Hart Crane would be born to the exile of the poetry nonsense that strained his nerves (Dante's prurient "mal protesi nervi"). 61) fFJC. (hCesserscBmidt, c. 1770, Carved SeCf, 9duseuin, TressBur£, Qermany; + V detaiC Music: Shostakovich, 1945, close of 9th Symphony, Col. M 31307 In the energized West, enlightened well-being has long over­ played its cheer. Extrapolate, from Messerschmidt's 1770 grinning self, to Shostakovich's 1945 "merry little piece" (the 9th Symphony), June 1996 1890 *— Avant-Garde Break 30 �C.G. BeU ^J^mbolic History its close carrying the comfort of Papa Haydn to an assertion the more urged for 200 years of irreversible trouble — an always toothier lie even to its jolliest participants. Shostakovich) ‘i'aezj Semini, c. 1619, (a. of imUc sOde 62) fbtma Dannata, ‘SaC. di Sp(ma, 62) (Bernini, c. 1619, (DouBCe: [H] (DatnnecC ancC f(B] BCessecC SouCs, (PaC. cCi Spagna, 9(pme V62a) Bemint, c. 1619, (B (rf 62) S^ima Beata, TcU. diSpagna, Bsmie Since already the twenty-year-old Bernini had stumbled on the disturbing truth, whether universal, or a curse of Faustian civiliza­ tion, that in the pairing of saved and damned, the creative energy of his own face had to operate ^ on the satanic ,side; while peace and blefssing would furnish a female of such wall-eyed mawkishness as must enforce angel-limitation from Blake's Milton to Nietzsche's creeping Christian, 63) Basttmn Joflnson, 1869,,for 1869 painting of tfie Boy LincoCn (I(^ing, So how would Eastman Johnson’s charcoal of the imagined boy Lincoln reading (sketched after the Civil War though still in the hope of pioneer humanity) _ how would it hold out against Baudelaire’s Au Lecteur, To the Reader," published twelve years before: "and we feed our pleasant remorse as beggars nourish their vermin"? 64) (Daumier, 1863, ^TBe !l(gader, Center, (Des Moines, Iowa; + V detail Daumiers Reader of 1863 more sustains that dedication to Satanic loves: "It is the Devil who holds the strings which move us " Johnson’s glowing Lincoln would know nothing of that worst vice of all, 1 Ennui, hookah-smoking boredom of Romantic decadence: Tu le connais, lecteur, ce monstre delicat. Hypocrite lecteur, mon semblable, mon frere! June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 31 �C.G.BeU ^ymlx^ic H]stda:jr A close Eliot would take up in The Waste I.and. without even troubling to' translate. 65) Victorian, 1897, T>mtnon([ JuSiCu, (Progress since 1837, iCCustrated: London Odg.'WS', + V details 65a) Van Qo^fi, 1885, Lhe (Potato Xaters, (Rij^mus., ^Lmsterdam (video: detaiC only) 656) 9dundi, 1891, (Rite Lafayette, (NfitionaC QaCCery, Oslo No one can doubt progress. From Roger Bacon, to Francis Bacon, to Priestley, to this celebration of Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, 1897, with its sixty years of sail to steam, coach to train, lamp to electricity — the vision of technocracy builds a spread in time, from burning apex to the diffusion of common acceptance; while the counter-spark condenses in the mass — Hopkins: "And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil." The question is not of Progress, but of its Satanic bent — as simple as whether the Devil is real. The same split has attended the view of the city. though a journalist, framed the poles:* O’Henry, Far below and around lay the city like a ragged purple dream, the wonderful, cruel, enchanting, bewildering, fatal, great city. 6 6) 5ldCeT and SuCCivan, 1890-91, WainrvriyRt ‘Budding, St. Louis, (Missouri 66 a) Currier and Ives, 1862, Central (ParR, ‘Mater, Skating, detaiC, (Rpy. (Rj-ng CoL, (^ 666) SuCCivan, 1907, CkandeCier detaiC, farmers' and (Merchants' ‘BanCu Ckvatonna, (Minnesota 66c) (M. (Prendergast, 1901, Centred ParR^ ‘Mutney (Museum, (Mlf Whitman’s first focus in Democratic Vistas is on the surge of material possibility which, thrusting up the 1890 Wainwright Build­ ing in St. Louis (Adler's steel skeleton hung with Sullivan’s patterned brick), would put architecture at the vanguard of the modem: June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 32 �C.G. BeU Symbolic History Whitman After an absence, I am now again (September 1870) in New York City and Brooklyn... The splendor, pic­ turesqueness and oceanic amplitude and rush of these great cities, the unsurpassed situation, rivers and bay, sparkling sea-tides, costly and lofty new buildings, facades of marble and iron, of original grandeur and elegance of design... the flags flying, the endless ships, the tumultuous streets, Broadway, the heavy, low, musical roar, hardly ever intermitted, even at night... these I say... give me... a continuted exaltation and absolute fulfilment... A67) g. ‘BdCoivs, J9p9, 9Cfie Lone 'Tenement, 9^tionaC gallery, 'Washington, 'D.C.; + 'U (CetaiC 67) 9{. (Daumier, 1863, 'Washerwoman, (MetropoCitan 'Museum of Art, (S^C (video: detail onCy) t But we have already mentioned Baudelaire's antithesis; Fourmillante cite, cite pleine de reves. Ant-hill city, city full of dreams. Where the specter in plain day grips the passer-by. It is the "unreal city" Eliot, like that specter, seizes on in The Waste — where Baudelaire had encountered in self-multiplying repli­ cation his seven old men, bent and eternal as this Daumier Washer Woman (shoulders hunched again in the child) — at which his soul __ old dismasted hulk, danced, and danced/ Across a monstrous sea without a- shore." (CGB) Et mon ame dansait, dansait, vieille gabarre Son mats, sur une mer monstreuse et sans bords! IfreiKh (g. 'Eiffel), 1887-89, 'Ihe Eiffel 'Tozuer, night storm, (Paris (video: detail only) '17068) ']7an gogh, 1889, 'Uan gogh's 'Bedroom at Arles, 'l7incent van gogh (Mus., Amsterdam c68) 'l/an gogh, 1889) On the 'Threshold of Eternity, Hg-oller-lMuller Museum,. Otterlo, UTolland a68) June 1996 1^0 — Avaii1>€rarde Break 33 �C.G. BeU 68) ^ymboHd Histoxjr *Uan Q 1886, (Boots witfi Laces, f^ij^museum, l^bnsterdam In the modern break, what so drives us without bourne, is art’s tragic enactment of cloven value: the Eiffel-towered city, its victories of steel and dynamo, our cage and defeat; while the dejecta of that aim. Van Gogh's Room or Chairs, his face-clutching man "On the Edge of Eternity," become the crushed-out oil of Heidegger’s essential truth: a well-known painting by Van Gogh... a pair of peasant shoes and nothing more. And yet from the dark open­ ing of the worn insides of the shoes the toilsome tread of the worker stares forth... Under the shoes slides the loneliness of the field-path as evening falls... The art work lets us know... what the equipment, the pair of peasant shoes, is in truth. This entity emerges into the unconcealedness (Greek: aXiiGeia) of its being. a69) Manet, 1863, Le ^Dejeuner sur CfierBe, oiC s^tcfi, CourtauQC Inst., London; + tcpo V details 69) Same, Le (Dejeuner sur CdeTSe, Louvre (jeu de (Paume), (Paris (first, a video detail) Music: Mussorgsky, 1866, "Why should Your eyes" Artia ALP 704 (3rd sect.) No wonder, whereas Renaissance art-advances were a civic delight, each phase of this avant-garde unveiling occasioned hue and cry. Whatever deft liberation of the urbane tickles our left-bank senses in Manet’s 1863 Luncheon on the Grass, the old moral and spatial connections are falling away. As in Mussorgsky’s 1866 "Why should your eyes," so rich in the bass of Kim Borg, those transmodulatiofts and short-cuts were creeping in which would leave the composer unplayed until Rimsky-Korsakoff had revised out the idiosyncracies. In Paris, at the Salon des Refuses, connoisseurs could always titter: "Where is the background?" "Why make a farce of Giorgione?" and "What are those girls up to?" (end Mussorgsky) Juik1996 1890 — Avant-Grarde Break 31 �Symbolic EBstoacy C.G.BeU 70) Japan, Cate 18tfi unt., Tea Ceremony; tobocCBCoc^ print; + V (CetaiC 70a) J{dl^ai 1827-30, Ono Waterfall, lUoodBCoc^prmt (video: detaiConly) 706) 9donet, 1872, IRdjatta d. Jlr^enteuil, Louvre (Jeu de iPaume), Paris Music: Gamelan Orchestra of Bali, Sekdar Gadung, close, BAM LD 096 M When the great causal rhetoric which Renaissance, Baroque, and Enlightenment had bequeathed as their noblest heritage, was to be thinned toward Verlaine's "rien que nuance" — the non-Western everywhere pointed the way. What the patterned flatness of the Japanese print, its casual composition and haunting remove, sug­ gested for the circle of Manet, the Gamelan music of Bali would effect for Debussy when he heard it at the Paris Exposition of 1889. How elegantly the shadows of tensile harmony might be withdrawn. (close Gamelan) Music: Debussy, 1910, Voiles (close). Preludes, Bk. I, (Gieseking) Col. Odyssey 3236- 0021 Frail as Debussy's own Prelude depiction of Sails. (end Voiles) 71) Monet, 1866-67, Women in idie Qarden, Louvre, Paris; + V details 71a) Monet, 1880, Woman Seated Under Widows, 9^tionaC QaUery, Was6., P>.Cs + V detaiC Under the sway of the Japanese, of Manet's figures and Boudin's color-lightening, Monet caught the ephemeral play of a garden. . Music: Faure, 1879, Trio, 2nd mvt. of 1st Piano Qrt, RCA ARL 1 -0761 But that was in 1866, when Debussy was a child, and thirteen years before Faure matured to the airy delight of this First Piano Quartet. Though Verlaine (at 22) had just published a book with such garden moments: We were alone and walking in a dream (Nous etions seul a seule et marchions en revant)... June1996 1890'^' Avant-Garde Break 85 �C.G. BeU Symbolic History How the first flowers have the sweetest scent (Ah! les premieres Hears qu'elles sent parfum&s!) Or the Autumn Song of violins sobbing in the heart, which, as much as any poem, refines pure sound: Les sanglots longs Des violons De I'automne Blessent mon coeur D'une langeur Monotone. So the chromatics of Faure moves toward an abstract repose. (fade Faur4) 72) (DauBigny, 18$8, Mominy, fortnerCy ^ermitaye, now Moscow; first, V detaUs Music: Liszt, 1863, Etude, Waldesrauschen, opening, Philips 6500 043 The musical antecendents are as complex as the Beethoven to Wagner scene. But a piano sequence might reach from the Nocturnes of Field, through those bolder .ones of Chopin (the D-Flat Major close) to Liszt, who in such studies as this Waldesrauschen went as far toward nuance as anyone around mid-century. In art, the freshening of landscape flowed from the Romantic English through Barbizon France, where Daubigny evoked light and air over earth and water. But to see how sharp a break was still to be made, set this oil-sketch of Morning (fade Liszt) 73) Monet, 1869, La grenouiCCere (froygery), MetropoCitan Museum of llrt, ■9frC; + ‘UdetaiC ^ 73 a) Monet, after 1920, Les (DeuT^ LtoiCes, Oranyerie, (Paris 'U73B) Monet, c. 1920(F), Water-CiGes, 9fationaC gatCery, London Music: June 1996 Debussy, 1888, En Bateau, opening. Petite Suite, 2 pianos. Turnabout TV 34234 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 96 �C.G. BeU ^mbcdic History against Monet's wave reflections not twelve years later (1869), where space and motion atomize into abstract impressions. Though the musical contrast leads us to 1888, Debussy's "En Bateau," from the Little Suite for two Pianos. (fade En Batteau) Music: Debussy, 1905, from Reflets dans I'eau Images. Bk.I, (Gieseking) Angel 35065 (arpeggios). Since that post-impressionist phenomenon called musical Impres­ sionism does not climax its suspension of tonal rhetoric in wave-play ("Reflets dans I'eau") until Debussy's Images of 1905, contemporary not with Monet’s rippling Froggery, but with the advancing abstrac­ tion of his Lily Ponds. (fade Images) a74) Van Qo^fi, 1888, Cafe atO^fit, !lQ;d(leT-Mu(hrMus., OtterCo 6 74) ‘Domenico Veneziano, c. 1480, St. Jofin in tfie Desert, 9\(fitionaC QaCCery, ‘Wasfiit^ton, D.C. (C^(B '60) c74) Van Qo^d, 1886-87,14tfi cfJuly, Jaggd-JdifvnCoseTCodection, iVintertfiuT 74) fRsnoir, 1879, Oarsmen at Cdatou, O^ational gcdlery, ‘Wasd., D.C. 74 a) iRgnoir, c. 1869, Luncdeon (ftde ‘Boatvny Tarty, Jlrt Inst., Cdicago Avant Garde having set the conditions for always more radical revolt against establishment, even, by their acceptance, the estab­ lishment of its own styles. Renaissance, in this sense, had not been avant garde. Its explorers could move with society toward the shared ordering of space, time, and cause. This new elite forms a cadre recruited within that now entrenched civilization, and, as the military term implies, at war with its traditional values. But the current can always eddy, Music: Faure, 1886, 2nd Piano Qrt, 1st mvt, 2nd theme, RCA V LSC 2735 Renoir harnessing to the art customs of the past (Titian, Rubens, Watteau) the^ revolt of free composition and broken color, for the more cheerful accommodation of elegant status quo. So in the musical salon, Faure and the rest tamed Wagner. No doubt art is June 1906 1890 — AvanlrGsorde Break 37 �Symbolic Histpiy C.G.B^U celebration; but what is to be celebrated? of bourgeois delight? 75) The fragile Gallic shimmer (fade Faur6) Moreau, c. 1880(?), Jlt^eCs of Sodom, Moreau Mus., (Paris; first, video detaiCs Or, through a surface of romantic dark, Moreau's assault of Symbolist angels, the holocaust overthrow of the physical by spirit? Music: C. Franck, 1883, Le Chasseur Maudit, close, Westminster WL 5311 As with Franck’s symphonic mysteries against the charm of Faur6, (end Franck) who can say which is more Avant Garde? a76) TautQau£uin, 1898, Hdie ^fiite (Horse, (Paris, Louvre 76) gau£um, 1897, ‘ZTte (Batfiers, Mg-tionaC QaiCery, Wasfiin£ton, (D.C.; + ^ detail Music: Debussy, 1893-4, Prelude a I'Apres midi d'un Faune (opening). Col. MS 6077 So it was attuned to that older Symbolist pain and Faustian attack that a post-impressionist corps, withdrawing from the already prosperous circle of Manet, turned Impressionist weapons against the ephemeral ease of Impressionist savoir-faire: — Gauguin, seeking realms as visionary as of Mallarme's Faun: Nymphs, I shall see the shadow you became. « Couple, adieu; je vais voir I'ombre que tu devins. — though salon-eased perhaps in the music Debussy wrote for the poem. (fade I'Apr^s midi d’un faune) 77) Van Qoyfi, 1888, LLe (SQgfit Cafe, Slit gadery, O^aCe University; + V detail Van Gogh, radical as Rimbaud: "I accustomed myself to plain hallu­ cination"; "At last I held sacred the disorder of my spirit" — "Je finis par trouver sacr6 le d6sordre de mon esprit." Consumptive Laforgue, praying that "whirlwinds and floods... sweep the leprosy of cities... June 1^6 1880 — Avant-Garde Break 38 �C.G. BeU l^ymbofic EBstoxy that nothing be known of this rotted, brain which was the earth, one day" — "De ce Cerveau pourri qui fut la Terre, un jour!" — Laforgue, for whom on all the peopled stars "a fraternal outcry will be raised against God" — "Ce sera centre Dieu la clameur fraternelle!" C^zditnC/ 1900/ ‘BeruC in tfic (^cu£/ T'l^dCtcv CBcirciss CoCCcction/ ycUc ^ftwini Sfiow (video cropped BeCow) 678). Cezanne, 1900-04, *Tfie (BCue Landscape, ^Hermitage, Leningrad; + ^17 details 78) Cezanne, 1898-1900, !I(pc^ at 'BiBemus, ^oCfcjvang Mus., Tssen ® Cezanne, most rooted in the past, most looming over the future, shaping from personal neurosis and ennui an art as Olympian in well-being as Whitman’s, yet as radically compulsive as Rimbaud's __ Cezanne, great beyond parallel, though with cognates everywhere; from Verlaine, "The sky above the roof/ Si bleu, si calme!/ A tree above the roof/ Sways its fronds./ The bell in the sky you see/ Softly sounds..."; through Mallarme, obsessed with "The Azure": "Je suis hante. LAzur! lAzur! I'Azur! rAzur!"; Rimbaud (closing the vowel poem we earlier began — Fowlie): O, supreme Clarion full of strange stridor. Silences crossed by worlds and angels: — O, the Omega, violet beam from His Eyes. — O rOmega, rayon violet de Ses Yeux! to Valery (1920): When, on the abyss, a sun takes repose, iPure works of an eternal cause. Dream is knowledge in a time that shines. Le Temps scintille et le Songe est savoir. *]/a79) Seurat, 1884-86, La Qrande Jatte, detaiC, J4rt Inst., CBicago B79) Odauriude VCamincki 1906, Landscape xvitB 9(^d OIrees, .d^tionaC Museum of Modem. Slrt, Baris Vc79} Bicasso, 1911-12, Clarinet Blayer, detail, B>. Cooper CoCCecthn, London June 1996 1890 — Avant-€rarde Break �Symbolic ffistory T9) T9 a) (Bo(xioni, 1911, forces of tfie Street, iBrivate Cofection, (BaseC, SwitzerCaiuC; + video detail f upper section Same, detail of Cower section When those post-impressionist assaults have been absorbed — with the others, Seurat, Ensor, Munch — in the chain-reacting iconoclasm of Avant-Garde, to kindle by 1905 the Fauves, "Wildmen," more fiercely improvising with color and form; and when that salvo has yielded in Paris to Analytical Cubism, and over Europe touched off Blaue Reiter, Suprematist, Futurist darers of the pure abstract, this 1911 Boccioni, "Forces of a Street" — as in the 1910 Manifesto, no less the forces of the coming World War: Music: Schdnberg, 1912, Pierrot Lunaire #13, Col. M2S 679 A roaring motor car that looks as though running on shrapnel, is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace... We wish to glorify war, the only health giver of the world, militarism, patriotism, the destroying arm of the Anarchist, and the beautiful ideas that kill... — in the desperate ecstasy of that increasingly global enactment of The Drunken Boat (music too, in Schonberg, pursuing the Wehrmacht attach on tonality) (close Pierrot #13) 80) iK^noir, 18T6, QirCwitfi Watering Can, CMpdoncd gallery, ‘Washington, 2).C 80a) Bonnard, 1929-32, Little girl xuith Dog, (Private Collection, fontaineSleau, france 806) (Picasso, 1924, (Paul, the Slrtist's Son, Artist's Collection (video: detail only) 80 c) (Pissarro, 1881, (Peasant girl with a Stichi Louvre, (Paris (video: detail only) 80d) Again, from 80, (Renoir's girl, detail; + V closer detail efface Music: Chausson, 1880, "Les Papillons," RCA V LM-6153 — under successive revolts, how could there not be successive pinings back, as to Renoir's Girl in a Garden (with Chausson's Butterflies, "Les Papillons"), a tenderness already of the past, though Bonnard would enchant it forward — such a prayer as Yeats' for his Daughter, such a wish as Picasso's in his children. Had not the most infernal rebel of June 1996 1890 — Avant-Garde Break 40 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 41 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1890 : Avant-Garde Break, Symbolic History, Part 33 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 33 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_33_1890--Avant-Garde_Break https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/571180ebea2898d069bcd3cd94670c75.pdf 6337edba87fc9949c25c51958f39b6f7 PDF Text Text SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 25. 18th Century: Voltaire's Smile CHARLES G. BELL ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO or 1260 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 May 1994 Last Revised January ‘96 �2 Charles Greenleaf Bell, 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 25. 18th Century: Voltaire's Smile 1) Pierre F. Lejeune, c. 1760, Bust of Voltaire (profile), detail, Landesmuseum, Stuttgart; + V, whole bust (from 2nd 1) 1a) Houdon, c. 1770(?), Voltaire (full face), National Gallery, Washington, D.C. V1b) Houdon, c. 1777(?), Voltaire in age, detail, Louvre, Paris 1c) Double: [A] whole Lejeune Bust of slide 1, and [B] Houdon, c. 1778, terra cotta Bust of Rousseau, Mus., Orleans; while video shows a detail only of B Music: Rameau, published 1741, 5th Piece de Clavecin en Concert, lst movement, A.S. 30 At the French heart of the 18th century lies Voltaire's smile, witty as the octave leap in Rameau's 5th Concert de Clavecin. Martin concluded on the whole that man was born to live in the convulsions of inquietude or the lethargy of boredom... "Let us work," he said, "for it is the only way to make life tolerable."...Their little land produced abundantly. Cunegonde was ugly indeed, but she became a fine pastry cook... Not one of their company was idle... As for Pangloss, he would say to Candide: "All events are linked in this best of all possible worlds: If you had not been kicked on the breach out of that beautiful castle because of your love for Lady Cunegonde; if you hadn't been seized by the Inquisition, traversed much of America on foot, run your sword through the baron, and lost those sheep you brought from Eldorado — you wouldn't be here eating citron comfits and pistachio nuts." "You have spoken well," said Candide; "but we ought to cultivate our garden." (fade Rameau) Is this the smile of scoffing or the smile of reason? (Locke): 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �3 C.G. Bell Symbolic History The candle that is set up in us shines bright enough for all our purposes — And yet the Enlightened smile, in the confidence game of 18th century, was somehow modulating from Locke's reason toward Rousseau's heart. 2) French Gothic, c. 1260, Smiling Angel, Portal, Rheims Cathedral; + V detail Music: French, c. 1280(?), Secular Motet: En mai, quant rosier sont flouri (with Robin and Marion duplum and tenor) Munrow, ARC 2723045 (#12) Contrast the smile of grace — a Rheims angel from another century of formal synthesis, the 13th — its art, its music a sprightly overflow of heaven onto earth — the motet, still vowed to the Church modes and bare-fifth chords, yet flowering in the melody, rhythm, words of the May morning, the loves of Robin and Marion — (fade En mai) Would the two smiles have told us 2nd 1) Again, Lejeune's bust of Voltaire (profile), whole that where the century of Voltaire was working toward the least action calculus of a mechanical universe of conserved energy (Maupertius, the Bernouillis, Euler, D'Alembert, Lagrange, La Place), 2nd 2) Again, Smiling Angel, detail of same or another Rheims Angel the chief scientist of the Thomistic century, Roger Bacon, even as he writes in his Opus Maius On Experimental Science — I now wish to unfold the principles of experimental science, since without experience nothing can be sufficiently known — seeks higher truth: a3) French Gothic, c. 1250-60, Dragons and Foliage, Rheims Cathedral Vb3) French Gothic, c. 1240(?), Capital of Choir, Joshua and Caleb fight over grapes, Rheims Cathedral 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �4 C.G. Bell 3) Symbolic History English Decorated Gothic, 1280-1300, Leaves (vine) on Capital in Chapter House of Minster, Southwell; + V detail But experience is of two kinds; one is gained through our external senses... This experience is both human and philosophical... but this does not suffice, because it does not give full attestation in regard to things corporeal owing to its difficulty, and does not touch at all on things spiritual... For the grace of faith illuminates greatly, as also do divine inspirations, not only in things spiritual, but in things corporeal and in the sciences of philosophy. So the realism of leaves which adorns the capitals of Gothic cathedrals (here of the vine at English Southwell) sprouts as ravishingly in the sacred, as Bacon's prophecy of lenses: from an incredible distance we might read the smallest letters... an army might appear close at hand... we might cause the sun, moon and stars in appearance to descend here below. 4) 4a) V4b) 4c) G. dei Grassi, c. 1380-90, antlered deer, sketch, Accad. Carrara, Bergamo A. Pisanello, c. 1440, The Vision of St. Eustace, National Gallery, London Same, The Vision of St. Eustace, right detail, National Gallery, London Again, G. dei Grassi's sketch of an antlered deer; first, video detail In this Giovanni dei Grassi, late 14th century, the art of nature comes from the sacred (here the Vision of Saint Eustacius) into the perfection of its own powers. Such Buridan's formulation (against Aristotle, and by appeal to experience) of the "impetus" by which mass retains an impressed motion. So 250 years before Descartes and Galileo, Nicholas of Oresme (French Bishop) graphs such intensities as velocity and acceleration, along such an extension as time: sometimes it happens that velocity is increasing while acceleration is decreasing... accelerations can take place uniformly or difformly in various ways... (What was he observing but pendulums, harmonic functions, falling bodies?) 5) Il Rosso, c. 1523, Moses and the Daughters of Jethro, Uffizi, Florence; + V detail V5a) Same, c. 1527, Dead Christ with Angels, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �5 C.G. Bell Symbolic History V5b) Dürer, 1511, Adoration of the Trinity, foreground detail, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien (CGB '60) 5c) Elsheimer, 1609, Night Flight to Egypt, right detail, Alte Pinakothek, München V5d) Rubens, c. 1624, Het Onwaer, The Storm, detail, Konig Collection, Haarlem That insular rebirth swells to the 16th century, this Il Rosso, where the physical and dynamic struggle within Biblical legend (Moses and the Daughters of Jethro). So, within the frame of the past — of Aristotelian motion, Ptolemaic geocentricity and Church dogma (no vast empty spaces in God's universe; no spots on the ethereal sun; no change in the sphere of stars; and "as Holy Writ declares, it was not the earth but the sun Joshua commanded to stand still") — the new astronomy of worlds in space struggles through Copernicus: ("Nothing stands in the way of the movability of the earth"), Tycho Brahe ("this new star is not some kind of comet or fiery meteor... it is a star shining in the firmament itself — one that has never previously been seen before our time, ...since the beginning of the world."), Gilbert's globes of earth, moon, sun, planets as gravitating loadstones: "the agent force abides in bodies themselves... not in the interspaces." 6) 6a) 6b) 6c) 6d) Rembrandt, 1632, Anatomy Lesson, Mauritshuis, The Hague C. Huygens, 1703, from De Motu Corporum, Picture of boat, etc.; + V detail Leibniz, c. 1700, Impact equations with Cartesian graph, drawn by CGB (video: details only, above, then below) Again Rembrandt, 1632, Anatomy Lesson, detail; first, video closer detail Rembrandt, 1656, another Anatomy Lesson (of Dr. J. Deyman), Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam In Rembrandt's Anatomy Lessons (this of 1632, or the fragment from 24 years later), the drama of mind invests a space-world of lighted mass, causal force — what Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Leibniz, would formulate through the century: Huyghens, in Rembrandt's Amsterdam, solving the impact of two elastic spheres, viewed by his wonderful postulate, as on a moving frame of reference — a boat, seen from the shore; so that each case can be adjusted to one of symmetry, where, the center of gravity stilled, equal momenta are exchanged. But that visualization was not required. We had only to mathematize the common first principle that the motion of body is conserved, admitting the division by which any 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �6 C.G. Bell Symbolic History body can be both one and many, in this case the summed whole and a rebounding two. If in elastic impact, the momentum of the total mass and the relative velocities of its colliding parts must both be preserved, Leibniz' three equations automatically arise, for the conservation of inner velocity, for the momentum of the whole, and (the two compounded) for the energy of the masses times their velocities squared. But if all matter must follow these laws, every motion in the universe becomes a clockwork determined from beginning to end. The snare Leonardo, talking of the wonder of force, had implied, but failed to see ("Without force nothing moves" and "there cannot be any force exerted in any movement made by imaginary spirits"), that noose is being sprung upon us. Is not the lighted drama of either Anatomy Lesson the temporal appearance, in such a clockwork mill as this cadaver, of the paradox springs of life and motion? But had Rembrandt, or anyone else of that century (except perhaps Pascal) felt the foreclosure of Cartesian mechanization? 7) 7a) Rubens, 1618, Landscape with a Wagon, Hermitage, Leningrad; + V details Rubens, c. 1635(?), Evening Woods, Neuerburg Sammlung, Hamburg This 1618 Rubens Landscape is still mysteriously organized, as in exploratory polyphony, all over the canvas. To the left, is an Elsheimer memory of the reflected moon; on the right, day expatiates over open fields; center, above the wagon, which seems to be stuck, though lurching down hill, an incredible rock pocket glows like a Resurrection cave. In science we recall the speculative daring which leaps (before the formulation of method) from Gilbert: As for us, we deem the whole world animate, and all globes, all stars, and this glorious earth, too, we hold to be from the beginning by their own destinate souls governed and from them also to have the impulse of self-preservation — to Kepler: The celestial movements are the work... of soul acting in accordance with bodily powers... the ellipse bears witness to the natural bodily power and to the emanation and magnitude of its form. 8) 5/1994 Jacob v. Ruisdael, 1665, A Forest Marsh, Hermitage, Leningrad 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �7 C.G. Bell Symbolic History V8a) Same, Ruisdael's Forest Marsh, center detail V8b) Ruisdael, c. 1665-69 Landscape with Waterfall and Castle, National Gallery, London (video: upper detail only) 8c) Ruisdael, 1660-65(?), A Waterfall in a Rocky Landscape, National Gallery, London 8d) Salomon van Ruisdael, c. 1660, Estuary with Sailboats, Staatl. Kunstsammlungen, Kassel; + V detail V8e) J. v. Ruisdael, c. 1660(?), Sunlight through Clouds, Louvre, Paris On the other side (of Cartesian formulation). Ruisdael's Forest Marsh of 1665, has no such independent vitalities of scene. Meaningful details can be made only by closing in, as under increasing magnification, on the focal center of the reflecting pool and waterfowl. It is what was unfolding, through that mid-century, in Spinoza's philosophy and in propositional physics, from the logic and mathematics of axiomatic deduction. Descartes, 1644: That God is the first cause of motion, and that He always conserves an equal quantity of it in the universe. Newton, about 1690: Law I: Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by force impressed upon it. Law II: The change of motion is proportional to the motive force impressed; and is made in the direction of the right line in which that force is impressed. Law III: To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction: or, the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts. The mystery of action withdraws to the unstated dilemma: that impressed force can only live (and die) one with the change it is supposed to cause. 9) French late Gothic, 1517 Choir with late Renaissance (1600-05) Jubé or roodloft, detail to the right, St. Etienne du Mont, Paris (CGB '59) V9a) Same, detail to the left (CGB '59) 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �8 C.G. Bell 10) Symbolic History Same, 1517 Choir with the rood-loft and spiral stairs (CGB '59); from these the video shows four details and then the whole Music: Sweelinck, c. 1600(?), Echo fantasie (Videro), G-DB 5214 (78) Let architecture and music repeat the focal formulation from Mannerist (or late Renaissance). to Baroque: — here an Echo Fantasie by 1600 Sweelinck, with the fanciful rood-loft of the same date, in the Flamboyant choir of St. Etienne du Mont, Paris. (fade Sweelinck) Va11) Vb11) 11) Va12) 12) Roman Baroque, S. Maria in Vallicella, frescoed and decorated, 1647-56, Cortona and others, Rome Lanfranco, 1621 ff., ceiling detail, S. Andrea delle Valle, Rome Rainaldi, 1663-67, S. Maria in Campitelli, interior, Rome (CGB '86); + V detail Bernini, 1658-70, Main elliptical vaulting, S. Andrea Quirinale, Rome (CGB '86) Bernini, 1663-66, Scala Regia, Vatican Palace (to St. Peter's), Rome Music: Frescobaldi, 1635, Toccata per l'Elevatione, AS 4 Whereas in the 1660 church structures of Rainaldi and Bernini, as in the toccatas and canzone of Frescobaldi, methodic consciousness centralizes the weighty masses of the Roman Baroque. (fade Frescobaldi) Va13) 13) V13a) J. Prandtauer, begun 1702, Melk, Danube, Austria Same, Melk, part of Church and S. Tower (CGB '59) Same, Melk, interior, Library (CGB '59) With that heritage the German 18th century began: Melk on the Danube, 170226, and far to the north, the old Buxtehude, whose organ-playing Bach would walk 200 miles to attend. Music: Buxtehude, c. 1700(?), close, Toccata in D minor (Kraft) VBX-29 (end) Meanwhile, the Great-Chain-of-Being philosophy and science was carried across 1700 by Leibniz, born in Leipzig and variously active from Berlin and Hanover to Mainz, 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �9 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Holland, Paris, London. In that Europe it must have seemed that the stair of progress could mount without limit, each worker, by the method of experimental reason, adding, through publication in the academies of learning, verifiable truths to the achievement of the past, the promise of the future. a14) b14) 14) Same, Melk courtyard with S. Nepomuk (CGB '59): + V detail Same, Melk, interior, Church (CGB '59) Same, Melk, interior of the Dome (CGB '59) Music: Again, same Buxtehude, close, but starting earlier In regard to the question already raised: How is motion conserved through physical exchanges? — nothing could reach further than Leibniz' three equations, of which the last — for live-force, where velocity squared matches the height through which a weight falls (the work to lift it there) — led to a cosmic insight: that such absolute force (to be called energy) is the eternal ground of the world; that even when friction damps the momentum of a body, there is no loss, but a complex exchange between the motion of the whole and of its molecular parts. Leibniz: But this loss of total force, this failure of the third equation, does not detract from the inviolable truth of the law of the conservation of the same force in the world. For that which is absorbed by the minute parts (as heat) is not absolutely lost to the universe, though lost for...the concurrent bodies. (close Buxtehude) Va15) b15) Vc15) d15) Ve15) 15) 5/1994 Schlüter, 1698-1700, Chained Captive, from the Great Electors' Monument, Berlin; first, video detail Schlüter, 1698, One of 21 Masks of Dying Warriors, Zeughaus, Berlin (video, detail only) Again Schlüter, another Chained Captive, from Electors' Monument, Berlin Schlüter, 1705, Death, from the Sarcophagus of Queen Sophia Charlotte, Dom, Berlin Schlüter, 1700, Tomb: Death and Child, detail, Nikolaikirche, Berlin A. Schlüter, c. 1698, another one of 21 Masks of Dying Warriors, Zeughaus, Berlin 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �10 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Yet in Andreas Schlüter, chief architect and sculptor of that northern Germany, what Wagnerian premonition disposed his carving to chained captives, hooded figures of death, dying Warriors from Germanic myth? Music: Buxtehude, c. 1700(?), Passacaglia in D minor (close), Nonesuch H-71188 So in Buxtehude's B-Minor Passacaglia, the ground-bass celebration of order rounds on itself in a chromatic brooding, to evoke Bach's Passacaglia in C Minor. And even in a science throned over Baroque debacle and vagrant moods — in Leibniz' proclamation of active force as the substance of change, there lurks the Eleatic axiom of changelessness, Aristotle's: "surely the substratum cannot cause itself to move." The vital mystery once invoked to stir inert matter, becomes a reservoir, powerless to stir itself. The Deist clockwork yawns over an entropic void which the Romantic century would unveil — the contradiction that energy, though eternal, can only run down hill, to a stagnation in which it denies its name. a16) 16) 16a) Rigaud, 1701, Louis XIV, Louvre, Paris; + V details Double: [A] Again, a16, Rigaud, Louis XIV; and [B] David, 1810-12, Napoleon in his Study, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. Right side of Double, David's Napoleon; here, video shows six details only, then returns to 16, the double In France the century of Voltaire (the rational utopia of Eldorado at its core — though Candide had fretted there) begins with the formal assertion of this Louis XIV, 1701, who sustains the robe of Divine Right not by the old Judgment Throne, from which he has risen, but on his own high-heeled legs, pillars of the rational pomp that was pouring, in all the arts, from Versailles over Europe — "the agent force... in bodies themselves..." That century breaks into the 19th with the more pragmatic boast of Napoleon, Faustian self-maker — the painter David well aware of ringing the changes on Rigaud's Louis. This emperor also rises, his sheathed sword on the heraldic honey-bee chair, working throne of Rousseau's Lawgiver. Had not Rousseau's 1762 Social Contract voiced the world's most ironic prophecy? — 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �11 C.G. Bell Symbolic History There is still one country in Europe capable of receiving laws: it is Corsica… I have a presentiment this little island will some day astonish Europe. The candle has burnt to a nub; the clock stands at 4:13; under the Egyptian lion desk lies Plutarch's tome of the past, of the great Greeks and Romans; above, just signed, and the goose quill pen laid down, is the scroll of the Napoleonic Code. Between those great thrusts of Baroque and Revolution, the 18th century enacts its civilized play. 17) Wm. Hogarth, 1743-4, Marriage à la Mode #4, The Countess' Levée, National Gallery, London; + V details and a return to the whole (where slide show has only one detail, a17, left of center, and then the whole) Music: Boyce, pub. 1760, Symphony #1 in B flat, from closing Allegro, BG S-70668 — Thus in the England of Boyce and Hogarth: this fourth scene from Marriage à la Mode, the Levée of the Countess (that woman in the yellow dress having her hair curled), a rich alderman's daughter married to a sickly Earl (the fop who sips chocolate, his hair also in curlers, though the music, with the other lady's raptures, would seem enough to curl it) — the Countess's lover, a lawyer who will kill the Earl in a duel, lounges on a sofa; a black boy in front points to a statue of horns; on the wall Correggio's Io, cloudembraced, instructs the clandestine in their play. (end Boyce) Va18) 18) 18a) Fragonard, c. 1770(?), The Two Lovers, Leopold Rey Collection, Sion Fragonard, c. 1776, La Chemise enlevée, Louvre, Paris; first, video detail Fragonard, c. 1770(?) The Peeping Children, Louvre, Paris Music: Rameau, Impatience, Cantata, 2nd recitative, "Les Oiseaux," (78 Album) Technichord 2 In Fragonard's Paris, as to the sensuous seduction of Rameau, Cupid pulls off madam's nightgown — a curious art-focus in 1767, France already on the whirls sloping toward Revolution. (close Recitative) 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �12 C.G. Bell 19) V19a) 19b) V19c) Symbolic History Luis Paret, c. 1770(?), Charles III dining before his court, Prado, Madrid; first, video detail Tiepolo, 1764-66, "Apotheosis... Spanish Monarchy," detail, Royal Palace, Madrid Again, Paret, Charles III dining, detail, Prado, Madrid Watteau, 1717, Embarkation for Cythera, detail of a couple, Paris, Louvre Music: Soler, c. 1770(?), from Concerto No. 1 for two organs, opening, Col. MS 7174 In the Spain of Scarlatti's devotee Soler, and about the time of the American Revolt, Paret shows an Enlightened Charles III dining before his court. Above, Tiepolo's frescoes carry the glorification of the Spanish line from Baroque Italy into the apprenticeship of Goya. To the cost, the irreality, of keeping up the old-regime façade around the would-be royal liberals of the Age of Reason, summon Lord Chesterfield: It is an active, cheerful, officious, seducing good-breeding that must gain you the good will and first sentiments of the men and the affections of the women. You must carefully watch and attend to their passions, their tastes, their little humours and weaknesses, and aller... au devant. (fade Soler) Va20) b20) 20) Sir Joshua Reynolds, 1748, Self-Portrait, National Portrait Gallery, London (video: detail only) Ant. Ralph Mengs, c. 1775, Self-Portrait, Hermitage, Leningrad Pieter von Verschaffelt, c. 1760(?), Bust of Himself, Historisches Museum, Speyer; + V detail Music: Haydn, 1764, Symphony No.22 in E flat ("Der Philosoph"), HSLP 1009 But something else was coming to birth: an immediate declaration of human value, Burns: "A man's a man for a' that"; and "That man to man the world o'er/ Shall brithers be for a'that." We read it in this self-portrait by the sculptor Verschaffelt, active in Mannheim while the symphony was developing there, when Haydn, following the Mannheim lead, wrote his 22nd, called "The Philosopher". 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �13 C.G. Bell 21) V21a) V21b) V21c) 21d) Symbolic History Alan Ramsay, 1766, Portrait of J.J. Rousseau, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh Gainsborough, 1754, Self-Portrait, Marchioness of Cholmondeley's Collection, Norfolk Fragonard, 1773-76, The Donkey's Stable, Veil-Picard Collection, Paris Ramsay, 1754-55, The Painter's Wife, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh Liotard, c. 1765(?), Portrait of the Artist, Museum of Art and History, Geneva The man who gave his name to all that was Jean Jacques Rousseau. Does the portrait by the Scot, Ramsay, hint at the complexities under Rousseau's appeal to Nature? (On the Origin of Inequality) That men are bad; my sad experience proves. But man is naturally good, as I have shown... It is the spirit and inequality of society, that perverts our natural inclinations. (Emile) Respect childhood... Allow nature to act in her way... Is it nothing to be happy? To jump, play and run?… What would you think of a man who, in order to turn his whole life to profitable account, would never take time to sleep?... Reflect that childhood is the sleep of reason. (Confessions) How came it to pass that I, a man of naturally expansive soul, ...consumed by the desire of loving, without ever having been able to satisfy it completely, saw myself approaching the portals of old age, and dying without having lived. (fade "The Philosopher") 22) V22a) V22b) 22c) 5/1994 Fuseli 1799-1801, Silence, from the destroyed Melancholy, Kunsthaus, Zurich Anne Girodet, 1808, The Funeral of Atala, Louvre, Paris J. Vernet, 1777, The Storm, Calvert Mus., Avignon John Flaxman, c. 1780(?), Chatterton takes Poison from the Spirit of Despair, Private Collection, England 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �14 C.G. Bell 22d) 22e) Symbolic History Carstens, 1795, Night with her Children, Sleep and Death, Schlossmuseum, Weimar Canova, c. 1818-22, Lament for Abel, Gipsoteca, Possagno Impulse so trusted opens through Revolution to Romantic: to Fuseli's turn of the century Silence from his destroyed Melancholy. It leads in France to Chenier: Pleurez, doux alcyons!... la jeune Tarentine! Son beau corps a roulé sous la vague marine... In England Cowper compares his life of insanity and despair with that of another castaway: No voice divine the storm allay'd No light propitious shone; When, snatch'd from all effectual aid, We perish'd, each alone: But I beneath a rougher sea, And whelm'd in deeper gulphs than he. In Germany the brooding of Klopstock passes from Hölty Und die einsame Träne Bebt mir heisser die Wang' herab! — to Goethe: Wer nie sein Brot mit Tränen asz... Der kennt euch nicht, ihr himmlischen Mächte. In Italy, Alfieri's tragic preoccupation vaults over 1800 to Leopardi: Amaro e noia La vita, altro mai nulla; e fango è il mondo. 23) V23a) 23b) 5/1994 Telescopes, 1609 and 1897, Galileo's and Yerkes 40"x64', Splendour of the Heavens, p. 41 Harvey, 1619(?), Experiments on a bandaged arm, from Circulation of the Blood Air Pressure, 1654 (pub. 1672): Demonstration of Guericke's air pump against the pull of horses, detail of engraved plate 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �15 C.G. Bell V23c) 23d) V23e) V23f) 23g) Symbolic History Astronomy and Physics 1676 (pub. 1730): Roemer, Design for "The Finite Velocity of Light", from the moons of Jupiter as timed across Earth's orbit Newcomen, c. 1726(?), Early Pumping Steam Engine Galvani, 1792, Experiments with Animal Electricity Lavoisier, late 18th cent., Reconstruction of his Lab, Conservatoire Mus., Paris Herschel, 1789, 40-foot Telescope, Slough, England But science (from Galileo's telescopes to the Yerkes refractor, 40 inches by 64 feet) held to the course Pascal had long discounted: we burn... to find solid ground and an ultimate sure foundation whereon to build a tower reaching to the Infinite. 1609 and '18: Kepler's Laws; 1619: Harvey proves the Circulation of the Blood; 1637: Descartes' Analytical Geometry; 1654: Guericke's air pump against the pull of horses; thereafter, his electric machine; 1660: Boyle's Gas Laws; 1676: Roemer clocks light from the moons of Jupiter; 1678: Huyghens, the theory of light as waves; 1687: Newton's Principia; 1675-1717, his corpuscular optics; 18th century: Newcomen's steam engines with Watt's improvements; 1735 and after: Linneus, Systema Naturae; 1745 and after: Electricity pursued by Franklin, Galvani, Volta; 1749: Buffon, Newtonian synthesis of cosmic evolution; 1774: Priestley; 1777: Lavoisier — an oxygen-based chemistry of combustion; 1789: Herschel's great reflector; 1798: Cavendish measures the gravitational constant to weight the universe; end of the 18th century: La Place, probability, Celestial Mechanics: God? "No need for that hypothesis". 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �16 C.G. Bell 24) V24a) 24b) V24c) V24d) V24e) Symbolic History Starlight, prism and spectrum, from Book of Knowledge, Vol. 9 Astronomy: Full Moon as Photographed by Apollo VIII Rainbow, 1981, East, from 1260 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe (CGB '81) Aurora Borealis, photo by Tarnjörn Lörgren Goya, 1788-89, Blind Man's Bluff, Prado, Madrid Photograph of Lightning bolt (cf. Nature, slide 59) A tower to the Infinite. (This imagined spectrum from the light of a star.) Yet the romantic close of the century was also to trigger in the science of thermodynamics which the older Carnot, strategist of the Revolution, would leave to his son, the dilemma foreseen in Leibniz, that indestructible energy may go slack. So for the theology of rational science, Pascal had the last word: "But our whole groundwork cracks and the earth opens to abysses." — the particle-wave ambivalence of light deeply bedded in 18th century (in England from Newton to Young); the ambivalence of matter as atom and field, working from Galvani toward the assumed stretched bands of Faraday's electric force, in void. The two stories we seem to be telling of 18th century — one an art vagary of reason's mockery and heart's search, the other a scientific dream of unlimited progress — begin to converge. Va25) 25) F.E. Juvarra, 1717-31, detail of Basilica di Superga, on a mountain near Turin Guatemalan Baroque, 1638, 1668, and 1728, Señora del Carmen, Antigua (CGB '74) Through the first quarter of the century, while Melk was raising High Baroque over the Danube, and the great vaunt was flowing out everywhere, from Bernini and Borromini of Rome, through Juvarra in Turin and the Churrigueresque in Spain, all the way to this earthquake-destroyed, 1728-rebuilt, and again destroyed Señora del Carmen in Guatemalan Antigua — through those same years, Va26) Vb26) Vc26) 5/1994 J.B. Pater, c. 1725, Fête Champêtre, Dublin (CGB '74) Lancret, 1720, Dance in Pavilion, Schloß Charlottenburg, Berlin Watteau, 1720, L'Enseigne de Gersaint, detail, from the left side, Louvre, Paris (all the above are replaced in the slide show by d26) 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �17 C.G. Bell d26) 26) V26a) Symbolic History Lancret c. 1720(?), Le Moulinet, detail of the lower half, Staatliche Gal., Berlin; from this, video shows a couple only, bottom right Same, the whole; here video shows only the lower half Rigaud, 1735, Pres. Gaspard de Gueidan playing bagpipe, Mus., Aix-enProvençe; digital variies this sequence, dropping some V slides Music: Fr. Couperin, 1722, 4th Concert Royal, beginning of last movement, Nonesuch 73014 ("Courts") Couperin in Paris, with Watteau and his followers, here Lancret, were refining the sentiment and fragile wit of Rocooco. In England Congreve marks the transition (Millamant's contemplation of marriage in The Way of the World, 1700): My dear liberty, shall I leave thee?...'tis more than impossible — positively, Mirabell, I'll lie abed in a morning as long as I please. Mirabell: Then I'll get up in a morning as early as I please. Millament: Ah! idle creature, get up when you will... Pope polished the verse — Snuff, or the fan, supply each pause of chat, With singing, laughing, ogling, and all that — which Gay would apply in "Trivia": The ladies gayly dres'd, the Mall adorn With various dyes, and paint the sunny morn... You'll sometimes meet a fop, of nicest tread, Whose mantling peruke veils his empty head... Him, like the miller, pass with caution by, Lest from his shoulder clouds of powder fly... a27) 27) 5/1994 (fade Couperin) Magnasco, 1731, Church Thieves attacked by skeletons, Chiesa di S. Maria Assunta, Campomorto (Pavia); + V detail Magnasco, 1720-30, Monks in a Landscape, Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; video: upper detail only 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �18 C.G. Bell 27a) V27b) Symbolic History Magnasco, c. 1720-30, Storm scene with fleeing Monks, detail, Brera, Milan; video: closer detail (then video returns to a lower detail of 27) Hogarth, 1733-35, Debtors' Prison, Soane Museum, London Music: Tartini, c. 1745, from Siciliana, Sonata #2 for Violin and Cello SAWT-9592-B But the 18th-century break sharpened also within Rococo a fierce counterpole to the courtly; Magnasco's irony of monks in the old skull-caves of earth, the dissonances, here of Devil's-trill Tartini, speak what from darker Baroque (Dryden) — When I consider life, 'tis all a cheat... I'm tired of waiting for this chemic gold, Which fools us young, and beggars us when old — through Swift (as of religious sects, worshippers of wind, inspired — literally, blown into) — with every man a pair of bellows applied to his neighbors breech... after certain gripings, the wind and vapours issuing forth, having first, by their turbulence and convulsions within, caused an earthquake in man's little world, distorted the mouth, bloated the cheeks, and given the eyes a terrible kind of relievo. At which junctures all their belches were received for sacred, the sourer the better, and swallowed with infinite consolation by their meager devotees — clouds to Johnson's "Vanity of Human Wishes": That life protracted is protracted woe… 28) (fade Tartini) Diezenhofer, Hildebrandt, etc., 1711 ff., Pommersfelden, Stables (CGB '52); + V detail Music: Bach, 1721, 3rd Brandenburg Concerto, from close of lst movement, London LPS 226 In Bach's Germany, Rococo innovation, courtly or splenetic, is carried, like the Brandenburg Concerti, on the great surge of residual Baroque. Conceive the Palace of Pommersfelden from the pomp of these stables! 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �19 C.G. Bell Symbolic History 29) Same, Pommersfelden, main house across the grounds (CGB '52); + V detail of reflection (the two adagio chords) 30) Same, Pommersfelden, inner detail of the Banqueting Hall (CGB '52); + V closer detail of the ceiling (closing allegro) Though even in Bach, or in the decoration of Pommersfelden — within the might of Baroque — the style-lightening of Rococo is brilliantly advanced. (fade 3rd Brandenburg) a31) 31) Same, Pommersfelden, Stairhall (CGB '52); + V details G.R. Donner 1735, St. Martin and the Beggar, from High Altar, Dom, Pressburg; + V details Music: Bach, c. 1720(?), from 2nd movement, Concerto in D for 2 Violins and Orchestra, SAWT 9508-A Ex Yet through that extravagance and preciosity, the classical and pre-romantic was being explored — a melodious interfolding in which Bach's Largo of the Concerto for two violins seems to outdistance the works of his sons. In Viennese sculpture, Donner's St. Martin and the Beggar, cast in lead, so rounds its conscious contours. In poetry Klopstock's Messias (in classical hexameters, the first three cantos, published in 1748, the others thereafter) evokes out of Milton such neo-Attic Baroque: "Seraph, I will descend... Follow me, my chosen, in your beauty from afar." — (CGB) "Seraph, ich steig' hinunter... Folge mir, mein Erwählte, in deiner Schöne von fern nach." (Canto 5) 32) V32a) V32b&c) Donner, 1739, detail from Andromeda Fountain, Altes Rathaus, Vienna Donner, 1737-39, River Goddess, from Neuer Markt Fountain, Vienna (CGB '77) Same, a River God, Variant views (CGB '77) Donner's Andromeda is a fountainhead of that swelling idealism. "These the seraph freed, and robed their new aspiring forms in deathless radiance" — "Diese verklärte der Seraph und goß unsterbliche Strahlen/ Um den neuen, schwebenden Leib." 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �20 C.G. Bell 33) Symbolic History Zimmermann, 1755-57, Ceiling, Gods of Olympus, Great Hall, Nymphenburg, Munich; + V detail (CGB ‘59) Zimmermann's last ceilings melt Baroque and Rococo, Renaissance and Classical into a rainbow of academic romance. (Klopstock): On the other verge of the road of suns raised himself Upon his gleaming chariot, Eloa, against whose coming Through all heaven beat a thousand-voiced acclaim That rang about the golden axles. Behind him like clouds Billowed his robes and streaming hair... (CGB) 34) V34a) V34b) (fade Bach) French, 1762, Frontispiece of de Fontenelle's Sur la Pluralité des Mondes (video: center detail only) Composite photo of Milky Way Galaxy (cf. Now III, C of slide 154a) M83: Spiral Nebula in Centaurus (Malin photo); then video returns to the whole of 34, + another detail Even the new astronomy is whipped into Klopstock's God and Seraph journey from heaven to earth: The Almighty passed the star-field named the Milky Way, (A thousand stellar miles, the space from sun to sun His measure) as he neared a world where men also Were found, like us, but innocent, immortal forms... (CGB) Kant's 1755 Island Universes are nebular systems of suns, like our Milky Way; so this 1762 edition of de Fontenelle's Sur la Pluralité des Mondes floats the solar system in a cloud of angel-faced stars, each circled by planetary worlds. a35) 35) F.X. Schmaedl, c. 1760(?), Bavarian Baroque, Rottenbuch, Bavaria (CGB '59); video: horizontal detail only Same, Pulpit, Rottenbuch, Bavaria (CGB '59); while video shows three details: above, below, and below but closer Music: 5/1994 K.P.E. Bach, 1749, from Magnificat, "Fecit potentiam," Bach Guild552 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �21 C.G. Bell Symbolic History It was within Bach's lifetime that his own sons took up the gallant style of Italy, France, and Mannheim, parallelling (against the weight of the old Baroque) the passionate levity of Rottenbuch Pulpit. Let K.P.E. Bach's Magnificat, composed a year before Johann Sebastian's death, rear the expressive arch to Haydn and Mozart. (fade "Fecit Potentiam") For Va36) Schmaedl, Rottenbuch; video returns to a closer detail of a35 36) Same, Pulpit, detail of Luke (CGB '59); + V detail Music: K.P.E. Bach, Magnificat, continued, from "Deposuit", Bach Guild552 In the St. Luke of that pulpit, Baroque force, by the always more personal involvement of the advancing century, anticipates Storm and Stress. (fade "Deposuit") 37) 37a) Maulbertsch, c. 1755, Holy Family with Saints, Österreichische Galerie, Wien Same, horizontal detail (which video replaces with three details) Music: K.P.E. Bach, Magnificat, continued, Esurientes (2nd repeat, vocal) BG-552 In painting Maulbertsch is the master of that search, where the base of Italian chiaroscuro is stretched and whirled on the agitations of person. (close "Esurientes" vocal) 38) Joh. Mich. Fischer, 1732-39, Façade of Diessen, Bavaria (CGB '59); + V details Music: K.P.E. Bach, Magnificat, "Esurientes", BG-552 continued, Instrumental close of As emotion ebbs, Philip Emanuel's instrumental texture is as suave as Johann Michael Fischer's caressing of Diessen façade. (close "Esurientes" section) a39) Vb39) 5/1994 D. and J.B. Zimmermann, 1746-54, Die Wieskirche (among fields and snowy mountains; CGB '86) Same, Die Wieskirche, from the south-west (CGB '86) 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �22 C.G. Bell 39) Symbolic History Same, detail of West front, sun and shadows (CGB '86) Music: Haydn, 1766, "Great" Organ Mass No. 2 (E flat), opening, Deutsche Gram. LPM 18 756 The Meadow Church (Die Wieskirche, finished 1754), is Zimmermann's final gem of openness and delight. Haydn had written his first mass while it was building; the second, the "Great" Organ Mass (whence this Kyrie) followed the church by 12 years. Amazing, in a cult and tradition so ornately sectarian, heart's appeal to nature. (fade Haydn) Va40) Vb40) 40) Same, interior, detail: windows, columns, and fanciful arches Same, interior, stucco and fresco (CGB '59) Same, wide angle view upward toward choir (CGB '86) Music: Mozart, 1779, "Coronation" Mass (C Major), Benedictus to Hosanna, Nonesuch H-1041 To enter the Wieskirche, is to pursue Rococo almost to the Coronation extravagance and joyful immediacy of Mozart. (end Hosannah) Va41) 41) V41a) Cuvillies, 1734-39, Hall of Mirrors, Allegory of Water and Fishing, stucco detail, Amalienburg, Nymphenburg, München Same, wider view, mirrors and ornament, (CGB '59; cf. Bach a65) Same, through a door (CGB '59); to which video adds another detail of slide 41 Music: J.S. Bach, from Prelude, Fugue, and Allegro in E-flat (interlude in fugue), (Landowska) RCA-V-LM 1217 (1) (or VIC 1594) In the hunting lodge of the Nymphenburg, Cuvillies had brought Rococo lightening to its secular triumph — the silver frosting of a mirrored filigree. But did not the old Bach himself tend that way whenever he touched the harpsichord in the manner of Couperin? (fade Landowska) For the fused polarity of Baroque against Rococo, we go from this hall of the Amalienburg a few miles north, 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �23 C.G. Bell 42) V42a) V42b) Symbolic History Asam Brothers, 1717-35, detail of carved vault, Weltenburg Cloister, Bavaria (CGB '59); first, video closer details Same, whole ceiling, carved border and fresco (video cuts to half) Same, half of the ceiling fresco (CGB '59) Music: Bach, 1709(?), Toccata and Fugue in D minor, close, (Kraft) Vox PL 11-440 to a vault the Asam Brothers were constructing about the same time (1735) at Weltenburg on the Danube. Yet the same Bach whose harpsichord interlude matched the one, in his organ toccatas and fugues, gives the other its strongest cognate. But the stretch from this mighty Baroque (end Toccata and Fugue in D minor) 2nd 41) Again, 41, Amalienburg, wider view; while video shows a lower section of 41 to the weightlessness of Cuvillies, exhibits the 18th century already in Berkeleian flight 2nd 42) Detail of 42; while video pans to a closer detail from the solidarities of Leibniz, of assertive cadence, muscled gesture, intestinal clouds — the whole conscious rhetoric of the formulated earth. 43) French Flamboyant, c. 1510 (on 13th cent.), Frieze of the Sanctuary, St. Pierre, Caen (CGB '74) V43a) Same, Sanctuary, c. 1520 ff., St. Augustine, with a Flamboyant vault (CGB '74) Music: Paumann, c. 1455, "Des klaffers neyden" (Tablature), pos. organ, ARC 3222 It is a winging which might take us back, at least 200 years, to a prior vaulted filigree — the last defiance of space and mass in the lacework of Flamboyant stone (St. Pierre in Caen), with a setting by the 15th-century blind organist, Conrad Paumann, of Nuremberg. (fade Paumann) 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �24 C.G. Bell 44) Symbolic History English, 13th century, 1540, and 1753, Neo-Gothic, Lacock Abbey, Wiltshire (CGB '67); with video details Small wonder the wished revival of the style Congreve had called "rude as Gothic" was already under way. Music: Thomas Arne, 1738, from Comus, Dance of the Naiads, Largo, L'Oiseau-Lyre OLS 141 (side 3) It is always a happy surprise, traveling abroad, to move from the ostentations of the courtly Continent, to the special green of rural England. Is the charm of Lacock Abbey backward or forward looking? A 13th-century monastery was here, which became a Tudor House at the Reformation, yet it was tenderly Gothicized after 1750, and what estate near Bath would so perfectly fit the romance of Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey? 45) English revived Gothic, 1740 (from 15th cent.), Blue Drawing Room, St. Michael's Mount, Cornwall; + V detail So Thomas Arne, enamoured of Elizabethan music, Shakespeare and Milton, was reviving and exploring, as in his 1738 Comus, a style of pre-romantic and ballad simplicity. About the same time, at St. Michael's Mount in Cornwall, the 15th-century Lady Chapel of another ancient priory became such a neo-Gothic parlor as any of Austen's heroines 60 years later might have visited in demure pursuit of eligible Knightleys, Bingleys, Brandons, Bartrams, Wentworths. (close Arne Dance) 46) French Romanesque Castle, 11th cent., Loches, Keep, Indre-et-Loire V46a, ‘95 Edit) R. Haldingham, c. 1290, Mappa Mundi, Hereford Cathedral V46b) English, 1066 ff., Scolland's Hall, Richmond, England To have come, from the 11th-century castle, to that house, is as clear a progress as in experimental science — however we reserve the right to prefer the castle (provided we are not required to live there); indeed, some have similarly chosen the God-synthesis of medieval thought (though Pound said "Aquinas map not valid now") over a technology which cannot deal with its atomic and industrial wastes. Maybe, with wall-hangings and the fire-logs of a forested land, they kept cheerful enough in those halls and towers (though we can hardly conceive it); 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �25 C.G. Bell 47) Symbolic History English Paladian (C. Campbell), 1722, Stourhead House, Wiltshire (CGB '59); + V detail but the Palladian delight of Stourhead, which Fielding would turn to Tudor brick, preserves from 1722 what our millionaires might still aspire to live in. (Though heating and plumbing, even since the Jamesian era, have advanced, again, at some cost to the globe — the question of science and progress being always the hidden cost.) Va48) 48) 48a) 48b) English Paladian (Roger Morris), 1736-37, Bridge, Wilton House, Wiltshire Thomas Gainsborough, c. 1751-2, The Painter, his Wife and Daughter, Marchioness of Cholmondeley, Houghton Same, detail Gainsborough, c. 1780(?), Margaret Gainsborough, National Gallery, London Music: Thomas Arne, Comus (continued), Ballad: "On every hill in ev'ry grove" Anyway, as the Palladian and Gothicizing scene of musical Arne and Fielding would remind us, the familiar mode of freehold humanity had been made lovable, from early in the century, by Addison's Sir Roger de Coverley — a country right-mindedness which reaches through novels and essays, the early paintings of Gainsborough (this about 1751, the artist with his young wife and daughter), to Goldsmith, who spreads it over Europe, and to Fanny Burney, whose Evelina prepares for the balanced good of Austen: (fade Arne) Persuasion: There they returned again into the past, more exquisitely happy, perhaps in their re-union, than when it had been first projected; more tender, more tried, more fixed in a knowledge of each other's character, truth, and attachment; more equal to act, more justified in acting. a49) 49) P. Longhi, 1740-45, Artist Painting a Lady's Portrait, whole, National Gallery, Dublin (CGB '74); first, video detail Same, Lady's Portrait, detail (CGB '74); video: closer detail only Music: 5/1994 Haydn, 1755, Trio of Quartet Op. 1, #6, Haydn Quartet Society 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �26 C.G. Bell Symbolic History It is a study in the dialectic of one-many, to compare Pietro Longhi's Venetian mid-century family scene (a lady escorted by her husband for her portrait). How little it shares in the English openness of manner, yet how unmistakably is embraced in a single horizon of enlightened emergence from the artifice of court. And could not Haydn's plucked-string trio from an Opus 1 Quartet have moved either way — to the Italy from which it was inspired, or to the England which would make Haydn's music a household entertainment? (fade Haydn trio) a50) 50) Fr. Boucher, 1759, Pan and Syrinx, National Gallery, London Boucher, 1748, The Triumph of Venus, National Museum, Stockholm; first, video detail Music: Rameau, c. 1740(?), from L'Impatience, Air gai, Technichord T-2 (78) Meanwhile, even in Paris, bastion of absentee noble play, of which Lord Chesterfield: I should have thought that Lord , at his age, with his parts and address, need not have been reduced to keep an opera whore in such a place as Paris, where so many women of fashion generously serve as volunteers — Boucher sweetening the opulence of Baroque for the Venus Triumph of all those highborn volunteers; Rameau seductively reclaiming the heroic cantata; 51) J. H. Fragonard, c. 1765, The Bathers, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80); first, video detail (fade Rameau) Fragonard (past Boucher) subliming into pure fluff the copulative drive of flesh, as if revolution and all could be staved off by nymphic sprees — 52) 52a) Boucher, 1750, Landscape with a Mill, Musée, Orleans; first, video detail Mill House by Mique and H. Robert 1783, Marie Antoinette's Hamlet, Park of the Petit Trianon, Versailles, France even in that Paris, must not romantic wish have been as deeply seated as Rousseau was read, repudiated, and admired? Boucher himself, between sports of sea-girls, brushes his 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �27 C.G. Bell Symbolic History 1750 Mill with the sighs that would lead Marie Antoinette to her cottage retreat in Versailles park. Let it box the compass that Rousseau in his operas (for he also wrote music) seems to outdo Fragonard; Va2nd 51) Vb2nd 51) Fragonard, 1780's, The Stolen Kiss, Hermitage, Leningrad Fragonard, c. 1770(?), The Two Lovers, close detail, Leopold Rey Collection, Sion (cf. Va18) For 2nd 51) Fragonard, c. 1785, The Fountain of Love, The Wallace Collection, London Music: J.J. Rousseau, 1752, Le Devin du Village, "Avec l'objet de mes Amours," AS 54 (fade) For 2nd 52) Boucher, 1755, Landscape with a Water Mill, National Gallery, London; first, video detail Music: Rameau, 1737, Minuet from Castor and Pollux, Decca CA 8153 (78) while witty Rameau, as in this minuet from Castor and Pollux, wakes the strain that would flow through Glück and Mozart into a century of longing. 53) Chardin, c. 1745 (or 1733?), Soap Bubbles, National Gallery, Washington D.C.; first, video detail Chardin, indeed, through two generations of court frolic, had quietly pursued the plastic composition of fables of the heart. (fade Rameau) 1st 54) Joseph Vernet, c. 1745, The Ponte Rotto (Rome), Louvre, Paris; first, video detail Before mid-century, the cult of the antique, of which Winkelmann would become spokesman, was drawing pre-romantics to Rome. Vernet sketched the Ponte Rotto in 1745. And it was he who, at the same time, 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �28 C.G. Bell Symbolic History For 1st 55) Richard Wilson, 1755(?), View of Rome from Villa Medici, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (cf. V1st 55) guided the deeper genius of Richard Wilson into landscape. The radiance of Cuyp is recovered, in inwardness — as in Kant, will secures what pure reason had forfeited. In music, the first fruit of that revival is Gluck's Orpheus, with the wistful dance of Elysian spirits. V2nd 54) Again, Vernet, Ponte Rotto, closer detail (while slide show goes at once to 2nd 55) Music: Gluck, 1762, Orfeo ed Euridice, Act II, Che puro ciel, London LL 924 (B) In English poetry, Gray's "Elegy" still breathes that solemn hush: (1750) 2nd 55) Richard Wilson, 1760(?), Oil sketch: River with Ruins, National Museum, Wales 2nd 55a) Same, central detail 2nd 55b) Christian G. Schütz, c. 1770, Valley of the Main with Thunderstorm, Neue Pinakothek, München (CGB '59); + V detail, from V2nd 55c (to which video adds from 2nd 55, R. Wilson, a detail, far left) The Curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea, The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me. Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight And all the air a solemn stillness holds, Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight, And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds; Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such as wand'ring near her secret bow'r Molest her ancient solitary reign... Collins had caught it in the "Ode to Evening" (1746): Then lead, calm vot'ress, where some sheety lake 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �29 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Cheers the lone heath, or some time-hallow'd pile Or upland fallows grey Reflect its last cool gleam. (fade Orfeo and skip to chorus) a56) 56) Gainsborough, c. 1785, Landscape with a Bridge, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.; + V detail Gainsborough, c. 1785, Landscape, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City (CGB '74); + V detail (One of Gainsborough's misty late landscapes here enacting the Ode): But when chill blust'ring winds, or driving rain, Forbid my willing feet, be mine the hut That from the mountain's side, Views wilds, and swelling floods, And hamlets brown, and dim-discover'd spires, And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er all Thy dewy fingers draw The gradual dusky veil. Winckelmann's Greek mode become the mode of nature, the people's mode of feeling and earth, the romantic classicism of Goethe's Herrmann und Dorothea, or of Wordsworth's appeal to rustic life and the language of men. (fade Gluck's Orfeo) Va57) b57) 57) George Stubbs, 1770, White Horse Frightened by a Lion, Walker Gallery, Liverpool; + V detail Stubbs, 1765, Lion Attacking a Horse, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven Stubbs, 1769, A Lion Devouring a Horse, Tate Gallery, London; + V detail Music: Haydn, 1772, from Fugue for 4 subjects, 4th movement of C Major Quartet, 0p. 20 #2, (Tartrai) Qualiton SL PX 11-332a (last twofifths) In the polar reversal by which Cartesian reason, turned to Deistic clockwork and courtly pose, unseats itself and points to the intuitive successor (an action opened by Berkeley and climaxed by Kant — Swift near the beginning, where reason drives the man mad; Paine toward the end, mad for an Age of Reason), in that scrimmage under the 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �30 C.G. Bell Symbolic History polite surface of the world, the roofed unconscious of Blake's creative Hell, where Haydn was revitalizing the fugue as a ground of struggle, and George Stubbs (1769 Lion Devouring a Horse) turned animal realism to savage symbol — there everything splits from itself and fights on both sides. (close Haydn Fugue) 58) 58a) Sir Joshua Reynolds, c. 1765(?), Portrait of Dr. Johnson, Tate Gallery, London; + V detail Reynolds, c. 1776, Dr. Samuel Johnson, Knole, Kent; + V detail Sam Johnson in mid-stream holds the fort of mind, in the knowledge of its own and the world's vanity, sustained by a promise which faith could only credit, reason not confirm. Of course he condemns all romantic and Rousseaunian innovators: "Truth sir, is a cow which will give such fellows no more milk; sir, they are gone to milk the bull." Yet his immortal letter to Chesterfield is, under its formal robes, the most independent outbreak in the language: Seven years, my Lord, have now passed, since I waited in your outward rooms, or was repulsed from your door; during which time I have been pushing on my work through difficulties of which it is useless to complain, and have brought it, at last, to the verge of publication, without one act of assistance, one word of encouragement, or one smile of favour... The notice which you have been pleased to take of my labours, had it been early, had been kind; but it has been delayed till I am indifferent, and cannot enjoy it; till I am solitary, and cannot impart it; till I am known, and do not want it... Having carried on my work thus far with so little obligation to any favourer of learning, I shall not be disappointed though I should conclude it, if less be possible. with less; for I have been long wakened from that dream of hope, in which I once boasted myself with so much exultation, MY LORD, Your lordship's most humble, most obedient servant, SAM. JOHNSON Va59) Vb59) 5/1994 Daniel Chodowiecki, 1771, engraving, the Artist's Family, National Print Gallery, Berlin Double: [A] Frans Hals, c. 1625, La Bohemienne, Louvre, Paris and [B] Hogarth, 1740(?), Shrimp Girl, National Gallery, London 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �31 C.G. Bell c59) 59) 59a) Symbolic History Jean-Baptiste Greuze, 1774, The Twelfth-Cake (detail), Musée Fabre, Montpelier (video takes detail from 59, whole) Same, Twelfth-Cake, whole Double: [A] Greuze, c. 1765, The Morning Prayer, Musée Fabre, Montpelier, and [B] Greuze, c. 1768, The Broken Pitcher, detail, Louvre, Paris (video takes these singly from V59a A and B) In Johnson's circle, Goldsmith published The Vicar of Wakefield in 1766, a novel which took Europe, most of all Goethe's Germany, by storm. Here the plot in the grand manner, where good, ensnared by hypocrisy and evil until the world seems such a vale of dark that only the old appeal beyond time will serve, is suddenly delivered to the vindication of this best of all possible worlds — that Baroque cadence is here stretched to the limit. Within its Leibnizian action, the Vicar and all his family (delivered from prison and oppression) become homespun models of truth and sensibility, calling mannered Europe to such values as Greuze, taking the pulse of his aristocratic clientelle, would enshrine, eight years later, in his picture of "The Twelfth Cake" — almost a pastiche of Goldsmith. In the attempt to recover simplicity in an age of social artifice and irony, only fierce genius can avoid the mawkishness of Greuze (those crouching babes at Morning Prayers, that Pitcher Broken on the spouting phallic lion). 60) V60a) 60b) Double: [A] George Morland c. 1790(?), Soldier's Return, Lady Lever Art Gallery, and [B] A. Brouwer, 1635-8(?), Interior with peasants, Alte Pinakothek, München (video takes these singly, substituting for the Brouwer his Card Players, from the same gallery, see VA and B of 60) Double: A of 60, Soldier's Return, with 60b, Guinea Pigs, both Morland Morland (same date and gallery?) Guinea Pigs (here video shows details only, below and above) So what could we expect of poor George Morland, who wrote his own epitaph "Here lies a drunken dog"? He was sold too short to give even his boozing scenes the Brouwer force of Burns: a merry core O' randie, gangrel bodies In Poosie-Nansie's held the splore To drink their orra duddies... 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �32 C.G. Bell Symbolic History What then when even Burns, in "The Cotter's Saturday Night," slips to the tearful verge: At length his lonely cot appears in view, Beneath the shelter of an aged tree; Th' expectant wee-things, toddlin, stacher through To meet their dad, wi' flichterin' noise and glee. His wee bit ingle, blinkin bonilie, His clean hearth-stane, his thrifty wifie's smile, The lisping infant prattling on his knee, Does a' his weary kiaugh and care beguile, And makes him quite forget his labor and his toil. 61) V61a) V61b) V61c) 61d) Gainsborough, 1777-78, The Honourable Frances Dunscombe, full-length, The Frick Collection, New York City Thomas Rowlandson, 1802, Blood Royal, detail, British Museum, London William Blake, 1794 (copy of 1818), Urizen plate 20, Burning Babe, Rosenwald Collection, Library of Congress, Washington D.C. (here video adds a half-length detail of 61, Lady Dunscombe) Gainsborough, 1785-86, Lady Sophia Charlotte Sheffield, National Trust, Waddeson Manor, Bucks (standing figure, from which video draws a halflength detail) Same, Lady Sheffield, detail, head and shoulders, from which video takes a close-up of the face, then returns to a half-length of 61, Lady Dunscombe No social painter of England rose as Goya did, from courtly praise (this Gainsborough Lady Dunscombe), through such irony as Rowlandson's, to Revolutionary vision (as in Blake). If mockery lurks under these robes and studio props, it is not overt; nor would the sitter have claimed the resemblance to Lady Teasle in Sheridan's School for Scandal of the same year: The hypocrite Joseph Surface, seducing her: Ah, my dear madam... 'tis this very conscious innocence that is of the greatest prejudice to you... What makes you run into a thousand little imprudences? — Why, the consciousness of your own innocence... Lady Teasle: So... then I must sin in my own defence, and part with my virtue to secure my reputation? 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �33 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Though even in Sheridan, mockery yields to the Handel cadence of vice discomfited and virtue wed. 62) Thomas Lawrence, c.1810(?), Julia, Lady Peel, Frick Collection, New York City; + V details (cf. Panavue, V62) It would cost the next century a groaning to cast that heroic baggage. Yet in the Frick Gallery there is a room where one may take in, at a glance, Gainsborough's optimism of limitation, and on the other wall, the sensuous vulnerability of Lawrence's Julia, Lady Peel — ripe for Scott's Bride of Lammermoor, for the Brontes' Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights, Hardy's Tess, or, in The Return of the Native, Eustacia Vye. The 18th century, by the lure of Voltaire's smile, prone to an infection of heart. 63) Guardi, 1784, Balloon Ascent over the Giudecca Canal, Staatliche Museen, Berlin-Dahlem (video: details only) In Venice the seventy-year-old Guardi shows us a gas balloon rising over the Giudecca Canal, while the beau-monde of what was already Revolutionary Europe, look on, though dressed still in the manner of court — like Goethe and Beethoven when they met the noble party and Goethe bowed and stepped down. Through the play of fashion some defiant giant release is stirring, as from deep in the mineral veins of earth. Proud Beethoven walked on; but it was Goethe's Mephisto who had said: "This puff of hydrogen will do it" — and they were lifted into the air. 64) V64a) 64b) Venetian Gothic, 1424 ff., Doge's Palace, West Façade, Venice (CGB '59) (video: detail only) Same, Doge's Palace, wider view Italian late Gothic, c. 1380-1452 ff., Apse of Milan Cathedral Music: Matteo da Perugia, c. 1400(?), Gloria in Excelsis, OL 1 (78) For the taste of progress go back 400 years, the Doge's Palace, trecento in style, though 1424 and after, with the Ars Nova Gloria of Matteo da Perugia — Italian lateGothic, a style like the Rococo, of cunning complexity — yet how stripped to line and structure, 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �34 C.G. Bell 65) V65a) Symbolic History Andrea (Bonaiuti) da Firenze, acc. 1343-77, Church Militant and Triumphant, detail, Spanish Chapel, Florence (CGB '59) Same, Spanish Chapel, closer detail (CGB '59) how clean of wishful personality; in the symbolic Florence of this Spanish Chapel Allegory of the Church, humanity, as in Chaucer, is keenly emergent: no pompous "all is best," no sentimental longing. 66) Florentine MS Illumination, late 14th cent., Annunciation (Initial R) Add. MS 35254C, British Museum, London; + V details The Annunciation, in this initial from a choirbook, is as reconciled (in all the flare of its decoration) to its creed-given spacelessness, as the faces to their vacancy, or music to its bare fifth intervals. (fade Gloria) 67) V67a) French Rococo, 18th century, Salon of the Chateau de Champs German Rococo, 1745-47, for Frederick the Great, Music Room, Sans-Souci, Potsdam Music: Philibert de Lavigne, c. 1740(?), from Sonata in C for Recorder and Continuo, "La Barssan," start of Rondeau, SAWT-9570-B In the French Rococo salon, the civilized recess is as ornately, as formulably filled as the time-space fabric of material causality, or (under the inventive floreation of recorder delight) the harmonic assertions of the enlightened ground. (fade Rondeau) 68) 68a) François Casanova, 1772, Beauvais Tapestry, Country Pastimes, detail, Mobilier National, Paris (video: closer details only, above and below) English Classical Baroque (James Gibbs), 1737-48, Radcliffe Camera, Oxford (CGB '84); first, for digital, V68a, wider view (Adams) Music: Same as above , but close of Tambourin, SAWT-9570-B In tapestries of "Country Pastimes," our very picnic clownings, our ironies of wit, affirm the plenum of the ordered universe: "All is best, best, best." (end Sonata) 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �35 C.G. Bell Symbolic History But that completion and closure of the phenomenal, that rounding of the wheel, summons the old antagonist. Against the dream of methodic science: that though men (even scientists) may fall in love, despair, kill themselves, or (like Pascal) get religion, still the great tree of knowledge grows — 69) 69a) V69b) 69c) Joseph Wright of Derby, c. 1774, The Old Man and Death, detail, Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut; first, video closer detail Istrian late Gothic (Vincent of Kostav), 1474, Dance of Death fresco, Guild Church, Beram, Yugoslavia Zurbaran, 1639, Fra Gonzalo de Illescas, detail, skull, etc., on table, Geronimite Monastery, Guadalupe, Spain Piranesi 1743-61, Carceri XIII, engraving, 2nd state Music: Again, Tartini, Siciliana, SAWT - 9592 B (as with slide 27 above) comes a hiss from that very tree: "The fruit of science is death." What is the Age of Reason giving birth to but its own antithesis? But when, with Wright of Derby, 1774, the skeleton appears in the crumbling garden, it is no backward motion. The old Dance of Death was painted on church walls: "Rest of their bones and soul's delivery." It is upon energy now, where all action has reared its eternal claim, that the withering of entropy will fall. Carnot's irreversibility of the physical. Blake: The same dull round, even of a universe, would soon become a mill with complicated wheels. (close Tartini, 2nd phrase) 70) Viennese, c. 1800-10, Astronomical clock, Uhrenmuseum der Stadt Wien; + V details; digital, central detail 1800: a final overflow of the post-Newtonian century — the famous passage from Laplace, with a Viennese Astronomical clock: If an intelligence, for one given instant, recognizes all the forces which animate Nature, and the respective positions of the things which compose it, and if that intelligence is also sufficiently vast to subject these data to analysis, it will comprehend in one formula the movements of the largest bodies of the universe as well as those of the 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �36 C.G. Bell Symbolic History minutest atom: nothing will be incertain to it, and the future as well as the past will be present to its vision. The human mind offers in the perfection which it has been able to give to astronomy, a modest example of such an intelligence. 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �37 C.G. Bell Symbolic History It is what Whitehead (after Faraday's fields had finally led to Indeterminacy) would call "misplaced concreteness." Against the tick of that astronomical clock, against motion's subsiding pool — a71) V71) 71a) V71b) 71c) 71d) 71e) Blake, 1795, color print from design of 1780 or earlier: Glad Day, British Museum, London (slide show, whole; video, detail) Double: [A] Blake, Glad Day (cf. a71); and [B] Blake 1794 (1818 copy), Urizen pl. 18, Los in Flames, Library of Congress, Washington D.C., cf. 71a) B of the double V71: Los in Flames (slide show, whole; video, detail) Blake, c. 1803-05, Ezekiel's Wheels, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Antonio Canova, 1795-1815, Hercules and Lichas, National Gallery of Modern Art, Rome Canova, 1787-93, Cupid and Psyche, Louvre, Paris Blake, 1825-27, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Pl. 1, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge (video: two details only, above and below) Blake from the 1790's had raised the Son of Morning — from the only axiomatic source of life as unpredictable, creative paradox: Without contraries there is no progression. What the religious call... Evil... is the active springing from Energy... Energy is Eternal Delight. And when his arm-spread Day turns to Los at the forge of Imagination, sheathed in the battle-fires of energy's operation in the inertial world — however many thereafter might espouse (with conservative Burke) the propriety and balance of an old regime, Blake through Reign of Terror and the dragon-scaling of the Orc Cycle, would still affirm: Bring me my bow of burning gold! Bring me my arrows of desire! For Glück (as for Blake's repudiated Swedenborg), Hell's dissonant outbreak Music: 5/1994 Glück, 1762, Orfeo ed Euridice, from the Taming of the Spirits, Act II, Col-LL 924 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �38 C.G. Bell Symbolic History is to be calmed by successive applications of Orphic harmony. (fade Gluck) How radically Blake's Marriage of Heaven and Hell has broken with that mid-century. Is it in Mozart, or first with Beethoven that music espouses the Faust compact, Hegel's Passion, the Dionysiac cry of Hölderlin: The rescuer I hear then in the night, hear Him kill as he frees, and beneath, full Of fetid weeds, I see the earth, As by second sight, an enormous fire. (CGB) (Shau ich die Erd', ein gewaltig Feuer.) 72) 72a) J. L. David, 1787, Death of Socrates, cropped, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City (CGB '74); video uses V72, uncropped whole, + V detail David, 1784, The Oath of the Horatii, Louvre, Paris; + V detail In France the ferment had been rising since the 1762 publication of Rousseau's Social Contract: When each citizen is nothing and can do nothing without the rest… it may be said that legislation is at the highest possible point of perfection. An absolute moral law of the cloud-wrapped General Will. In the representations which from about 1783 David gave to Classical scenes of heroism or revolt (tight as if Cartesian formulation could be reèndowed by fiat), we feel the closing in of that "Republic of Virtue": Robespierre: If virtue be the spring of a popular government in times of peace, the spring of that government during a revolution is virtue combined with terror...without which virtue is impotent. Babeuf: a single man on the earth more rich, more powerful than his fellow men... destroys the equilibrium... Perish, if needs be, all the arts, provided real equality abides with us! 73) 5/1994 David, 1794, Self-Portrait in Prison, Louvre, Paris; with video details 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �39 C.G. Bell Symbolic History In 1794 David, briefly imprisoned, painted this baffled self-portrait. Perhaps he felt, with Chenier, in "La Jeune Captive": And even as she, those with her in that place Feared the closing of their earthly course. Though Chenier's death testament would not apply: A certain Andre Chenier was among those five or six whom neither the general frenzy, nor avidity, nor fear, could induce to bend the knee before crowned assassins, to touch hands stained by murders, and to sit down to a table where they drink human blood. ("s'asseoir a la table ou l'on boit le sang des hommes.") Since David came quickly to terms, and would again as Napoleon's court painter. 74) Goya, 1777, The Parasol, Prado, Madrid; + V detail Music: Mozart, 1787, Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Romanza, Angel 35098 Only the genius of Goya could wear the richest robes of the artifice it was to revolutionize, making this parasol play of the '70's as poignant as the lighter Mozart: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. (fade) 75) V75a) 75b) V75c) Goya, 1795-97, Self-portrait, drawing, Metropolitan Museum, New York City; + V detail H. Fuseli, c. 1780, Self-portrait with Chalk, detail, Victoria and Albert Museum, London Fuseli, c. 1785(?), Prometheus, drawing, Kunstmuseum, Basle Fuseli, c. 1800(?), Satan Fleeing from Athuriel's Spear, Cleveland Gallery (CGB '81) Music: Mozart, 1788, Symphony No. 40, from last movement, C-D3S691 By the mid-nineties Goya had loosed the furies we tie in music to Beethoven. Though Mozart, too, in some late works, this G Minor Symphony of 1788, rode the rising storm. 5/1994 (fade Symphony #40) 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �40 C.G. Bell Music: Symbolic History Beethoven, 1798, Sonata #8, Op. 13, Pathetique in C Minor, (Schnabel) 1st movement, Seraphim ID-6063 While Gauss, discovering Euclid's space of the parallel postulate no more demonstrable than a curved space of hyperbolic asymptotes, wrote the elder Bolyai: If it could be proved that there can be a rectilineal triangle greater than any area, I could demonstrate the whole of Euclid... But however far apart the vertices, the area might fall below a given bound... a76) 76) V76a) David, c. 1794, Death of Bara, detail, Musée Calvet, Avignon Canova, c. 1787, Death of Adonis, second terra cotta model, Gipsoteca Canoviana, Possagno near Treviso Same, first terra cotta model, Gipsoteca, Possagno — a Lobachevskian gulf from which that Bolyai would vainly warn his son: (Pathetique continued) I have traversed this bottomless night, which extinguished all light and joy of my life. I pray you, leave the science of parallels alone. By 1800 Beethoven had not only written the First Symphony, the First Concerto, the first string quartets and the Prometheus Overture, but the Grande Sonata Pathetique, which so overwhelmed his contemporaries. Canova, 1797, answering from Italy the muster of a revolutionary art in almost every country of Europe. (Pathetique continued) 77) 77a) 77b) J. A. Koch, 1796, Waterfall, whole, Kunsthalle, Hamburg; + V 77, Double: details, above and below Same, Waterfall, upper detail (CGB '86) Same, Waterfall, lower detail (CGB '86) 1796: the German Romantic landscape begins with this Koch: the human figure (right) reduced from the shepherd below to an insect-sized being above. (fade Pathetique) 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �41 C.G. Bell Symbolic History The Sublime had appeared in Edmund Burke as a transrational element, born in pain of the Great, Dark and Terrible, yet somehow stronger than its smooth contrary, the Beautiful, founded on pleasure, engendering "in the soul that feeling which is called love". It is the germ of Blake's Angelic and Satanic, of Nietzsche's Apollonian and Dionysian. And what the transition of 1800 would require is the leap from calm balance to the cascade of energy. In Kant, the Sublime almost, but never quite, becomes the pedalpoint of such a modulation: The mind feels itself set in motion in the representation of the sublime in nature; whereas in the aesthetic judgement upon what is beautiful therein it is in restful contemplation. This movement... may be compared... with a rapidly alternating repulsion and attraction produced by one and the same object. (Critique of Aesthetic Judgement, ch. 27) 78) 78a) Turner, 1797, Moonlight — A Study, Tate Gallery, London Same, a central detail; + V closer detail Music: Beethoven, 1798, Pathetique, Op.13, continued, Adagio, (Brendel) Murray Hill S 34564 With Beethoven's Pathetique Adagio and Turner's Moonlight — A Study (1797) — however few were aware, matter in motion was giving ground. What was emergent, from Galvani's electricity and muscle response, Goethe's Metamorphosis of Plants, or Evolution (from the older Darwin to volitional Lamarck) — requires what Whitehead would call "entwined... modal presences". Faraday (1854) My physico-hypothetical notion... accepting the magnet as a centre of power surrounded by lines of force... views these lines as physical lines of power... or as a state of tension... — Things dissolving to force-fields, as under Turner's moon. 1st 79) 79a) Runge, 1799, Self-Portrait (Crayon), Kunsthalle, Hamburg; V, detail only Triple: Portraits: [A] Hegel, c. 1820 [B] Hölderlin, 1792 and [C] Schelling, c. 1810; here V returns to 79, Runge, Self In 1799, the German painter Runge made this glowing crayon of himself. It is not that Baroque confidence has gone under. Wordsworth is at least as certain as Dryden; 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �42 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Beethoven as rapt as Buxtehude. The constructions of space and cause, art, harmony, plot, are retained. That trio of schoolmates, Hegel, Hölderlin, Schelling are no less fired with God in the world than Leibniz was. But there has been a shift of ground. (fade Beethoven Adagio) Hegel might frown if we said: "Voltaire and Rousseau have led you through the scoff of Reason to the trust of Heart. Since Hegel calls his history Reason's actualization in the world. If we protest: "But your reason makes war on itself, works by passion; you forge a dialectic of contradiction" 80) V80a) 80b) Double: [A] portrait of Leibniz, c. 1700, steel engraving; and [B] Solimena, c. 1710, Self Portrait, detail, Uffizi, Florence Detail of the same engraving of Leibniz Again, Solimena, whole self-portrait — how easy for him to remind us that Leibniz (complex as the Solimena of this 1710 self-portrait) had planted contradiction in the very Monad, making a multiplicity of change in that changeless One the primary fact of perception: The passing condition which involves and represents a multiplicity in the unity, or in the simple substance, is nothing else than what is called Perception. Both Liebniz and Hegel soar to giant syntheses. How could they, as men, but use what men have: reason, passion, intuition? Yet those seemingly constant words, man, reason, and the rest, also undergo style-changes. Solimena's formulated claim (undercut by protective irony) 2nd 79 and for 2nd 80) Runge, Self yields in Runge to the risk of romantic dream. Though even the dream takes up the program of the past. 80+1) 80+1a) V80+1b) 80+1c) 80+1d) 5/1994 Lejeune's Voltaire, again 1 Houdon's Rousseau, again B of 1c (cf. V1c) Canaletto, 1754, Rotunda at Ravelagh, National Gallery, London Brunel, 1836-64, Clifton Suspension Bridge, Avon Gorge, Bristol David, 1797-98, General Bonaparte, Louvre, Paris 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile �43 C.G. Bell Symbolic History Was Voltaire's smile of mockery, progress, or revolution? At the center of The Wealth of Nations, published 1776, in which Adam Smith launched the science of economics — a book crammed with the ironies of exploitation and capitalist self-seeking, there lurks the "invisible hand," sure pilot of the murderous barque of history (the "agent force" gone beyond bodies themselves): As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce may be of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it...he intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention. — As if Pangloss's providence had heaved up into Hegel's cunning war of Reason. "Let us cultivate" — but which garden? 5/1994 18th Century: Voltaire’s Smile � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 43 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 18th Century : Voltaire's Smile, Symbolic History, Part 25 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 25 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_25_18th_Century--Voltaire's_Smile Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/97f8e30053aa4a46990f5c41c5e10065.pdf e1d27cb823ae359e83c996891b828197 PDF Text Text Chairl^s G. Bell, 1260 Canyon Road, or St. John's College Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501 SYMBOLIC HISTORY: THE HUMAN ARTS - THROUGH SIGHT AND SOUND XXXIV: 1) 1900 Bi Crisis of the Abstract Claude Monet 1882, The Cliff Walk, Art Institute, Chicago MUSIC: Faure 1879, Piano Quartet, 1st mvt close, RCA-ARI 1-0761 If desire is a lack, romantic desire (footnote: cf. the Meno paradox of learning) is loaded... In Monet, in Faur^, in Verlaine, wish is the sensuous inverse of fulfillment: "How blue the sky was, and how great our hope" — "Qui'l etait bleu, le ciel, et grand, I'espoir." This flowered headland cries to the wind the wistful beatitudes of light and air. (fade Faure) ✓ Such poignance Chausson would learn from Faure, though swayed already by the younger Debussy: MUSIC: Chausson 1891-2, soft passage half through 1st mvt. Concerto OP« 21 for Vn, Piano & Str.Qr; Orion 73134 (Mace MC S 9074) (fade) 2) Gustave Moreau 1896-, Jupiter and Semele, Moreau Museum, Paris MUSIC: same Chausson, 1st mvt, near the beginning, forte * Yet the Chausson concerto just paired with Monet, equally swells toward" the. Wagnerian counterpole of Symbolist Moreau — this 1896 Jupiter and Semele, of which the artist wrote: Semele, penetrated by the divine effluence...dies struck by lightning, and with her dies the genius of terrestrial love, the genius with the goat hooves... It is an ascension toward th,e upper spheres... Death on earth and apotheosis in immortality... How far from Renaissance this late revival of its tragic themes. 3) B. Cellini 1553, Perseus -with the Head of Medusa, Loggia della Sig­ nor la, Florence MUSIC: Mhdarra c. 15507, Fantasia (rtaniera de Ludovico, con falsas — ARC 2533-183 (B-5) ' Benvenuto Cellini, by his own account as overcharged a �1900 B - 2 C.G. Bell n revolutionary as any of the Avant Garde, poured the bronze Perseus in 1553, under trials set forth in the Autobiography. After a quarrel with the Duke of Florence ("My lord, you do not understand my art"), he fires the furnaces.' The house roof takes the blaze; a sudden fever drives him to his bed. When rain and _ wind have caked the bronze, a slacker twisted in the shape of an S appears: "You are attempting an enterprise which the laws of art do not sanction, and which cannot succeed." Cellini resurrects, piles on oak, hurls all his pewter in the melt, opens the sluices to an explosion and flash of flame. No man, they say, could have brought it off, only some powerful devil. 'Vulnerable, as Faust. Yet the achieved Perseus is a victory of light, for which Cellini's elation was prayer: "I fell on my knees: '0 God...who didst rise from the dead and ascend to heaven...'" Even the dissonant works of Renaissance, Mudarra's "falsas" . .. ,^ El Greco's Laocoon, have a containment like Lear: "The wheel has «• 4) come full circle, I am here." (end Mudarra) Paul Klee 1916, Stars above Evil Houses, Gustav Zumsteg col'n, Zurich MUSIC: Alban Berg 1926, Presto Delirando f-rom Lyric Suite, (begin --------- then skip) Deutsche Gram., from LPSt 2713066,- Rec.5-a But the new art tears containment in a life-and-death ecstasy, a rite of'passage, where the very record of loss, incapacity, negation, turns by paradox to a yea-frenzy of the absolute. From Rimbaud's "Bateau Ivre" to the first World War, that transformation prevails. And even when trench stalemate had betrayed its dominant Yes to the great recessive and the backlash of Dada was cracking the whip of the absurd — even then, how soon, in Klee's 1916 "Stars over Evil Houses", or the programatic despairs of Schonberg or Berg (this tenebrous Presto Delirando from the Lyric �1900 B 'Bell 3 Suite), how soon Spenglerian fall — "the dance of the dream-led % masses down the dark mountain" — phosphoresces, a self-affirming energy. 5) (fade Berg) Wm. Blake 1799-1800, Bathsheba at the Bath, Tate Gallery, London That going under of the physical and spatial, Blake's art had prophecied: "the world will be consumed in fire...displaying the infinite which was hid." In this 1800 Bathsheba seen by David, the Beulah garden is at once of the Fall ("Cruel sacri­ fices had brought Humanity into a Feminine Tabernacle in the loins of Abraham and David" J 27) and of love's redemption (Bathsheba, Hittite adulteress, on the line to Mary); "O Divine Humanity!__ If I were Pure I should never Have known Thee..." In his solitary precursing of Avant Garde, Blake made Christianity his point of' departure. 6) M.v.Marees 1885, Hesperi^es Triptych, Neue Pinakothek, Munich—(CGB 59) MUSIC: Wagner 1870, Siegfried Idyll (orig.) near close, London LL 525 By 1885, under the sway of Wagner (this Siegfried Idyll) and of Nietzsche — When the Dionysian powers rise with such strength as we are experiencing at present, there can be no doubt that, wrapped in a cloud, Apollo has already descended to us; whose fullest and most beautiful effects coming generation may perhaps behold , Hans von Marees, in this pagan triptych (unconsciously tied to Blake's abstraction), sets the serpent-guarded Eden of renewal in the Hesperides. Nietzsche: "Blessed race of Hellenes What must this people have suffered, that they might become thus beaiitiful! (fade Wagner) How was that stable of Faustian yearnings to be cleansed? 7) P.Cezanne 1900-05, Bathing Women, Mus. of Art, Philadelphia �C.G. Bell With Cezanne the disruption of the personal and formulable crystallizes past loss the dynastasis of that overthrow. perhaps Ives, in New England, of all places, pursued a like purging - as in the First Symphony, written while he was still a student at Yale. At the same time Mallarml's aesthetic of ..pure poetry" broke off (1898) with the picture pages of A Throw of Dice, the poem constellated by the annihilation, LE HAZARD, of its objects^ "collapsed/ by the indifferent neutrality of the - "neutrality identique du gouffre". (gnd I^) Manet 1869- olvmpia, Jen de Paume (LouvrenParis in the abstract stripping of romantic flesh, Manet s 1863 Olympia focussed the art breakthroagh and social outrage. This take-off on Titian.s Venus of Urbino (itself an adulteration of Giorgione.s idea - like Shakespeare's "If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head") short-circuited normal responses, amorous, moral, even practical. As Courbet complained: "flat... like the Queen of Spades coming out of a bath." If Baudelaire played such a role, his lushness of Spleen and Ideal is 'far from the Queen of Spades. 9) j.-A. Ingres 1814. Odalisque. Louvre> Paris (CGB-- 8^ T +- Tnrrnfao 1814» Where the tradition of the 19th In the coolest Ingres, lox'i, century harem Odalisque begins, the style of Fountaineble already swells with seductive touch. Prom Baudelaire the climactrc poem would be "The Jewels", "Les Bijoux" La tres chere etait nue . .. ses bijoux sonores �Bell 1900 B - 5 ...Passion's child, born where the sun Showers triple light, and scorches even the kiss Of his gazelle-eyed daughters. Though this voluptuous dream has hardly entered the bordel of erotic ennui and decadence, which made "The Jewels" be censored from the 1861 Fleurs du Mai: She was recumbent, and let herself be loved... File etait done couchee, et se laissait aimer... -- gP^^bet 1856, Girls by the Seine, Petit Palais, Paris Courbet's 1856 "Girls by the Seine", even more than his nudes, advances the passion-throttle commensurately with Baudelaire: A certain candour coupled with lasciviousness Gave a new charm to her metamorphoses... gysic: 12) Saint-Saens 1875, Samson et Dalila, oboe cadenza to Bacchanal —------- --- RCA Viet LM-184 8 Renoir 1870, Odalisque, Nat. Gal., Washington DC It is the risky coloration which runs in music from Berlioz through Bizet, this Saint-Saens Dalilah, to a whole Scheherazade horizon. (fade Bacchanal) And in this Renoir 1870 Odalisque, the langorous flesh of Courbet’, more exotically clothed, has — at the risk of calm — almost been wallowed in. Whereas Baudelaire even as ravished by Joanne Duval's flashing world of metal and stone...where sound is mingled with light" — ou le son se -mele a la lumiere — il)-- Cezanne 1873, A Modern Olympiar, Louvre. Paris �1900 B C.G. Bell 6 even as he lifts to the adored, couched at the height of the divan, a passion "deep and gentle as the sea, which mounts toward her as toward its cliff" must draw release from that poison. Cezanne would take up the scene in his extraordinary mockery of Manet's Olympia — as if the grotesque were one rescue from the Scylla vortex. BACK; again 12, Renoir 1870, Odalisque, Nat. Gal., Wash. DC. Since rescue was required. The new worship must rear on lubricity itself a paradox of equilibrium — what would drive Renoir from this lush indulgence toward nudes like Maillol's later bronzes, of statuesque repose. Again 13) Cezanne 1873, A Modern Olympia, Louvre, Paris But how — at the condemned erotic bound of "Les Bijoux": Her eyes fixed on me, like a tame tiger. With a vague air of trance she varied her poses -how is Baudelaire to refine the postures of a West Indian mulatto to a contemplative counterpart of the mystical? 14) Van Gogh 1887, Oval Nude, Barnes, Merion; or From Rear, Priv., Paris No artist pl\ambed that Flower of Evil maelstrom more reck­ lessly than Van Gogh after his 1886 arrival in Impressionist Paris. And her arms, her legs, her hips and her loins. Polished, smooth as oil, undulent as a swan. Passed before my eyes, clairvoyant and serene. And her belly and her breasts, clusters of my vine. Et son ventre et ses seins, Oes grappes de ma vigne. In that tactile seizure where, as with Dante's damned, "fear turns into desire", it is no longer the woman flesh-throned on the divan who looks down, but the poet "from crystal rock", at the "hips of antiope", "the torso of a boy" — those posture, which �-r Bell 1900 B 7 advance, as to dislodge his spirit from the.height. Ou calme et solitaire elle s'etait assise. 15) Gauguin 1897, "Nevermore", Courtauld Institute, London If Van Gogh's calm was in question, Gauguin variously assumed the Baudelaire mystique of contemplative Eros, as in this Tahitian "Nevermore" (another variation on Manet's Olympia), "to suggest", he said, "by means of a simple nude, a certain longlost barbarian luxury." But for Baudelaire, a romantic half-century before, the selftransendence of spleen asked a more excruciating stretch. As ' he wrote: into this atrocious book I put all my heart, all my tenderness, all my religion (travestied), all my hatred. On her savage brown complexion the rouge was superb — Sur ce teint fauve et brun le fard etait superbel By a sensuous art of sex, to bewitch pure flame from the devouring cleft itself — 16) H.Matisse 1905, The Gypsy, Mus.de 1'Annonciade, Saint Tropez MUSIC: Stravinsky 1909-10, Firebird, harp etc. 1/3 way. Col.MG 31202 (but orig. version better) what Joyce would do with Molly Bloom's "I will", what Agee with « the girl sleeping on the floor: "as if flame were breathed forth from it" — though these, like Matisse's 1905 Gypsy (or Stravinsky' Firebird), lend the attack of another century to the arcane glow of Baudelaire's last stanza: And the lamp at last being resigned to die. It was the fire alone which lighted the room; Which, every time it uttered a sigh of flame. Flooded with blood that amber-colored skin. Et la lampe s'eta'nt resignee a mourir, Comme le foyer seul illuminait la chambre. �1900 B C.G. Bell Cheque fois qu'il poussait un flamboyant soupir/II inondait de sang cette peau couleur d'ambre (fade Firebird) 17) Matisse 1906, Luxe Calme et Volupte, Col'n H. Matisse (Skira) —A Tantrie prolongatio of fire and blood. In the oil of verbal texture, Baudelaire might seem a romantic decadent; but in the ambiguity of crushed opposites — Spleen become Ideal: the "Harmonie du Soir" that so moved Joyce, where through an evening drowned in curdled blood, memory shines like a monstrance; or in the untranslatable refrain of that other poem Matisse mythologized in 1906, the "Luxury, calm and pleasure , "Luxe, calme et volupte" — in Baudelaire's unmediated elation by negation, we have crashed the gates of the Modern: (Yeats) I must lie down where all the ladders start. In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart. 18) I.K.Brunei 1857, Steamship Great Eastern under construction, photo: Institution of Mechanical Engineers^ London Even the Faust of mechanical power was cloven -- Priestley's technocratic hope already undercut in Franklin's 1780 letter: ' It is impossible to imagine the height to which may be carried, in a thousand years, the power of man over matter...O that moral science were in as fair a way of improvement... Whatever euphoria drove Brunei to engineering marvels: j^ailroads, bridges, this 1857 iron ship, the Great Eastern, a wonder city to cut the night ocean in lighted luxury, broke in morbidity and suicide — the industrial call clotting round the soul like Baudelaire's evening, "le neant vaste et noir", where the "tender heart" enshrines its luminous past. In the Crystal Palace of Exposition Europe, ambivalent progress 19) Edw. Burne-Jones 1880, The Golden Stair, Tate Gallery, London brewed ambivalent dream: "the great four-leafed clover of modern �^Bell ^ 1900 B 9 idealism" (as they were praised): Bocklin, Moreau, Puvis de Chavannes, Pre-Raphaelite Burne-Jones of this "Golden Stair". 'And 'might not the Great Eastern, or any of her more practical successors of the Jamesian era, have adorned their steel salons with Botticelli-inspired visions of such secretly erotic beatitude — Rossetti'e "Blessed Damozel" who leaned "From the gold bar of Heaven", "And laid her face between her hands,/ And wept. (I heard her tears.)"? 20) Monet 1877, Gare Saint-Lazare, Art Inst., Chicago (or Louvre, or double) When Monet in 1877, frequenting the Gare Saint-Lazare in Paris, painted the same scene through variations of cloud and hour — the steam blue against background sunlight, or white against an overcast gray he cut through those argiiments of nostalgic heaven and industrial hell. irradiation of the actual: But what is signified? Hardly Vermeer' (Traherne) Your enjoyment of the world is never right, till every morning you awake in Heaven__ look upon the skies, the earth and the air as Celestial Joys. Monet s naturalist delight is in the art changes of abstract percep­ tion — a "Sea Surface Full of Clouds". In the art detachment of any such station, Tolstoi's Anna KareAina (the novel finished that same year) might have gone under the wheels: A luggage train was coming in. The platform began to sway...she knew what she had to do...A feeling such as she had known when about to take the first plunge in bathing came upon her..."What am I doing? What for?"... 21) G.Eiffel 1887-9, The Eiffel Tower, Paris (CGB '80, or other, night?) Since the Paris Exposition of 1889, the Eiffel Tower has expressed for tourists everywhere the joy of the Impressionist with the excitement and utility of the sky-race of skeletal �1900 B C.G. Bell steel. Though not even the designer claimed a utility beyond the view -- that abstraction concretized (so Hugo's Hunchback or Michelet's Tableau. Barthes) out of But the great precursors are the tempted Christ, and in Goethe's Faust, Lynceus on the tower: Born for seeing. At watching skilled. Pledged to the tower, I delight in the world Zum Sehen geboren, Zum Shauen bestellt, Dem Turme geschworen, Gefallt mir die Welt. Thus he sees the ship at sunset enter the harbor, and that night thd burning of the house of the pious old couple. ’ When.scientific vision had girdered the 984 foot tower over the Seine, aviation was anticipated, and the vibrant geometry of Cezanne strangely parallelled. The delight, however, is of Rimbaud's "Drunken Boat", of Mallarme's "Sail past fertile islands": "But 0, my heart, hear the sailors' song entends le chant des matelots!" 22) Renoir 1881, Boating Party, Phillips Gallery, Washington, _DC MUSIC: Faure 1879, Piano Qrt Op-15, 2nd Mvt, No doubt (as in Faure) Avant Garde was always tempted to a compromise of genial cultivation. No doubt Renoir was as gifted as any foi; the color-glad depiction of life as pleasantly lived, perhaps that ease left him vulnerable to the form-crisis and sterility of 1883 — on the way to which even the lustiest group scenes, this Boating Party of mashers, top hats, flirts, puppy kissing girls, entrain surface realism in a sort of Joycean search for radical value. So the plucked-string Scherzo of early Faure (fade) reaches toward the remoter harmonies it drew from Debussy. �1900 B - 11 / Bell 23) Manet 1882, Bar at^the Folies-Bergere, Courtauld Inst./ London Nor was it merely a dictate of Puritan morality, that James, from The American (1877) to The Ambassadors (1903) should alienate the Impressionism he handled so well. As in late Monet, Cezanne, Seurat, there was an abstract imperative. Even Manet, oldest of them all, who had begun the revolution by a detached flattening of dark Spanish realism, who in the success of his forties had joined Monet in pure color and open air, arrived by 1882 (a year before his death) at the mysterious and formal illusions of A Bar at the Folies-Bergere, (end Debussy) where everything beyond the foreground bottles and the musing girl is reflected in a mirror: her back, the looming customer, theater and lights — Platonic images. 24) Pissarro 1877, The Red Roofs, Louvre, Paris Pissarro was at the center of the Impressionism, originator with Monet of its theory and practice. But he is also the radiant for Post-Impressionism to follow. From 1871 to '77 his teaching brought Cezanne to a threshold of light. One might think to ^see in this Pissarro landscape of Red Rooves how much Cezanne could have learned from him. But the painting, from the last year of the Cezanne association, dramatizes the teacher as learner. 25) Cezanne 1873, House of Pere Lacroix at Auvers, Nat. Gal., Wash., DC Without what Pissarro taught, Cezanne's early violence would hardly have lightened to this "House of Pere Lacroix". Yet Cezanne painted the picture in 1873, four years before Pissarro's "Red Rooves". In the interplay of that Avant Garde, effect con­ tinually circles and acts as cause. MUSIC: Satie 1888, Gymnopedie 1, Philips PHS-900-179 �1900 B C.G. Bell 26) Pissarro 1887, Woman in an Orchard, Louvre, Paris (Jeu de Paume) ^ Again Pissarro, from 1887, time of Satie's first radically neglected piano compositions (.this from the Gymnopedies, to be orchestrated by Debussy) — Pissarro, teacher of everyone, might seerii in this orchard to have gone as far as Impressionism could in preparing for Neo-Impressionist Seurat, with his consuming science of minute color spots. But here too the influence goes the other way -- the master swayed by a pupil's genius. 27) Seurat 1884-5?, .Morning Walk, study for The Seine at Courbevoie, Ittleson Col'n, N.Y. Since more than five years earlier, Seurat, studying with Pissarro, had begun those ravishing sketches in which color division works from observed nature toward a final harmony of abstract "color-luminist" control — scores of studies, in charcoal and oil, exploring and fixing the intellectual geometry of the great pointillist monuments, where Impressionism becomes its own antithesis — Baudelaire's passion- throned on cyrstal rock: — Valery: This tranquil roof where pigeons promonade Trembles between the pines, among the tombs; Noon, the just, composes there with fire The sea, the sea, forever rebegun 1 28) .t. Seurat 18B4-5, Afternoon on.the Grande Jatte, Art Institute, Chicago The Grande Jatte is as total a fulfillment of Seurat's method as any. What mappings of the scene, open-air studies and stage- set division of the players, remote from each other as the charac­ ters of a Chekov play, produced this life-size frieze, where all motion, all life is stilled — not merely as every carved .or painted object must be, but in doctrinal soul, proclaiming a metaphysics of changeless remove — as Valery would invoke the sun at the zenith ("midi le juste"), a Zeno paradox to immobilize �ell 1900 B - 13 that "Cemetery by the Sea": Zenon! Cruel Z^on! Z^on d'Elee! _Zeno! Cruel Zeno! Zeno of. Elea! Have you fixed me with that arrow winged That whirs and flies and cannot fly the place?... X) sun...What tortoise shadow for the soul, Achilles, with his great stride, motionless. 29) - (close Satie) Double: Van Gogh 1888; Van Gogh's Yellow Chair with Pipe, Tate, London; and Gauguin's Arm Chair with Candle, V.Gogh Mus., Amsterdam In a direction opposite to Seurat's, Van Gogh too ricochets from Pissarro, his Parisian catalyst of 1886-8. The concert- dependence of music must have stacked the odds against a Van Gogh as composer. But in poetry Rimbaud comes near enough — his Season in Hell, like Van Gogh's Chairs, record of a destruc­ tive friendship: letters of 1873, to Verlaine: Come back...everything will be forgotten...Yes, I was in the wrong...Be brave. Answer me quickly. I cannot stay here much longer...Yours, all my life. Rimbaud. So while waiting for your wife and your death, you are .going to struggle, wander about and bore people. . .But it is you who will be wrong in the end, because, even after I called you back, you persisted in your false sentiments... Think of what you were before knowing me... These Chairs, Van Gogh's with the pipe, Gauguin's with the candle, testify to that other love-hate, when an imagined accord broke under the nerve-frayed fact, and Van Gogh sliced his ear, sent a piece of it to, a prostitute, beginning the reductive con­ finements which would grind to his suicide — as if life had to hold to norms of outmoded pretence, or tear itself to pieces — the vulnerability of avant-garde. 30) A. Bocklin c. 1880?, Faun and Throstle, Neue Pinakothek, Munich MUSIC: Debussy 1892-4, Prelude a I'Apres-midi d'.un faune, .Col.f'iL 6077 • (last thirdT From the Bohemian modernity of Paris, it is strange to turn �1900 B C.G. Bell (0Y6n es we sound Debussy's Feune) to the jromantic lingeiring of Germany, Bocklin's pagan make-believe — to sense the Dionysiac affinity with Mallarme's Eclogue or this Prelude, and at the same time to note the demarcation; that in Bocklin (as in Brahms, say) romantic longing still accepts the old forms; its Symbolist quarrel with the space-time fabric of will and cause has not yet disabled the harmonic and representational modes — the reason and morality of bourgeois assurance. 31) That break drives us forward from Bocklin. Gauguin c. 1893, Indian Queen, Mme Desjardins, Paris to Debussy's Post-Impressionist contemporary (who also began with Pissarro), Gauguin, 1893, where space itself, like chordal harmony, invokes a dissolving magic. So Maetetlink, the same year, in Pelleas and Melisande (for which Faure, Debussy, Sch5nberg and others would compose music), suspends a mystery, beyond fathomable ground, vague as the forest pool where Melissande loses her wedding ring: — Golaud to Melisande in the wood: Come with me. The night will be very dark and cold... (She) Where are you going? (He) I do not know. I am lost also. % (The Avant-garde paradox of the lost guide): Venez avec moi. La nuit sera tres noire et tres froide... Ou allez-vous?...Je ne sais pas. Je suis perdu aussi... 32) H. Rousseau 1897, Sleeping Gypsy, Mus. of Modern Art, N.Y._C_^ Henri Rousseau, le Douanier, customs man, found his way, by a self-taught primitivism of naive vision and dream color, through the same barrier of *the objective and outward into a mystery more immedia-te than Gauguin's, 'some haunted realm of the Faun, where the Symbolist flows over into the Surreal this Sleeping Gypsy of 1897, gone, unanswerably, beyond the phenomenal veil. �< Bell 33) 1900 B 15 Odilon Redon c. 1905?, Le Cyclope, Kroller-Mviller Mas., Otterlo At the same time Redon completes the circle to a more abstract handling of Moreau — this one-eyed Cyclops rising like a phallus over the earth vaginal fold of the sleeping' Galatea — dream changes rung on Mallarme: 34) ripe pomegranates, purple, burst and murmur with bees, and our blood aflame for her who will possess it flows for the timeless swarm of all desire. At the hour when this wood is tinged with ash and gold A feast flares up amid the extinguished leaves, AEtna, on your slopes, by Venus visited... (end Debussy) Degas 1876, L'Absinthe, Jeu de Paume (Louvre), Paris In Degas, Impressionist realism broke through a first devotion to Ingres and an interest in Moreau. As with the naturalism of Zola or DeMaupassant, Hardy's Satires of Circumstance \ or Chekov's heartbreak comedy, the content of civilized despair is carried over into an objective lightening of technique. In this study called Absinthe, a laceration as in Dostoievsky or in Gorki's Lowest Depths, seems less the work of philosophic pessimism than of accident, as in the snapping of a camera. MUSICj Mussorgsky 1874, Pictures at an Exhibition (piano). Ballet of “ Chicks in their Shells, Turnabout TV, 34258 Where the world falls in on itself, with hardly a whimper, I the challenge of Mussorgsky's eerie Pictures (this "Ballet of Chicks in their Shells"), 35) (fade Mussorgsky) Degas 1890-95, Dancers in Blue, Jeu de Paume, Paris will bleed through the lightest 1880 Scherzo-Valse by Chabrier. MUSIC; Chabrier 1880, Scherzo Valse, Rubinstein, RCA LSC 2751 In that Absinthe context the radiant delights of theatre and ballet, which Degas painted from the early '70's until increasing blindness drove him in the 'nineties to cloud-rich pastelles �1900 B - r C.G. Bell .and finally to modelling ("Death", he would say, "is all I think of"), form a contrast so polar, one has to ask: Is this realism, or an escape into artful dream; or is realism itself the escape, the earth-claim luring as the Sleepsong in Faust. (fade Chabrier) 36) Toulouse-Lautrec 1896, Maxime DeThomas, (Dale) Nat. Gal., Wash.,DC Some nostalgia of the infinite was driving through Degas' Absinthe and beyond, seizing on maladies of body or soul (Avantgarde strategy of creative negation), turning vulnerabilities into powers: — so, with the high-born dwarf, Toulouse-Lautrec, in this portrait of Maxime DeThomas, Bohemian connoisseur, lifedeformity speaks oracular depression, biding the next thrust of the style-apocalypse. While Henry George, American economist, who died in 1897, wrote of other things, than art: As public spirit is lost...as reforms become hopeless, then in the festering masses will be generated volcanic forces... Strong unscrupulous men...will become the ex­ ponents of blind popular...passions, and dash aside forms that have lost their validity. 37) Toulouse-Lautrec 1894, The Bed, Louvre (Jeu de Paume), Paris If Toulouse-Lautrec ever inclined to genial affirmation — obverse of the DeThomas pathology — it is in this 1894 evoca­ tion called "The Bed"; though like any obverse it affords another view of the same coin. So Joyce's brothel of Circe would yield in Ulysses to the bed of Molly Bloom, she reclined semilaterally...left hand under head, right leg extended in a straight line and resting on left leg, flexed, in the attitude of Gea-Tellus, fulfilled, recumbent, big with seed... (thinking joyful adultery): he does it and doesnt talk I gave my eyes that look �Bell 1900 B - 17 with my hair a bit loose from the tumbling and my tongue between my lips up to him the savage brute Thursday Friday one Saturday two Sunday three O Lord I cant wait till Monday. The sword will again be mightier than the pen, and in carnivals of destruction brute forge and wild frenzy will alternate with the lethargy of a declining civilization. Ensor, Flemish contemporary of Dutch-French Van Gogh (though Ensor lived on and on), was possessed by symbols of destructive carnival, as in this detail from his huge 1888 Entry of Christ into Brussels. How the demons of Bosch and Breughel, in Ensor’s Ostend isolation, bear down, angels with the vials of wrath. They had staged a Romantic comeback in Hugo and windy Wieftz; now the Expressionist fin-de-siecle opens to them. 39) Cezanne 1888, Mardi Gras, Pushkin Museum, Moscow Yet the same year, 1888, Cezanne distilled Carnival into something quite different. Mere estrangement and transvaluation (since no one can explain what is humanly intended) have been lifted to a well-being as enigmatic as any in Don Quixote — though of the order, as we implied with Seurat, of Chekov's 1903 Cherry Orchard, that sublimation of pain into incongruous laughter. It seems the right genius could ride those a[lternate "carnivals of destruction" and "lethargy of a declining civilization", winning its art—image (cleansed in the abstract) 40) ^o-Americhn, Maya 7th-10th c.AD, Terra cotta Aristocr;,^. mus. ~^throp. , Mexico City back to the unfathomable vitalities of ages to which understanding and causal entry no longer apply — this Maya terracotta of about �1900 B C.G. Bell the 9th century, where representational refinement almost makes us one with its aristocratic herald: "0 Kin," - and we cannot go on, because time and the Spanish auto-da-fes have left us ignorant of whom he would address or what he might say; so we can only repeat, as with Cezanne’s wilful suspension, "Magrcair' ca.anne 186S. Sorrow (Mary Ma2dalen)x^g!Z£^r,^a£j:S But with Cezanne we have a context, life, a history in which .we share - the rebellion that spanned Europe from this 1866 tear-drop Magdalen called Sorrow (with Mussorgsky's "Catacombs" from the 1874 Pictures at an Exhibition) ii; Cezanne 1900. Old Woman in a Cape, Mat. Gal., London to this Cezanne Old Woman with a Eosary of 1900, rim of no man s land. Here the abstraction of Landscape, Bathers, of the mysteri­ ous Mardi Gras, assume a function the Pre-Columbian has lost: to shape, of romantic Angst, an Aquarian containment. over forty years Cezanne was forging that He^ of Darkness, 411 Cezanne 1866, Sorro«^.I£u:^ from some Tess of the d'Urbervilles pain. As if, m the poetizing of cyclidal fall, we had gone from Arnold's disenchantment: Years hence, perhaps, may dawn an age. More fortunate, alas 1 than we... .for the world which seems TO lie befor^’ufe like a land of dreams... Hath really neither joy, nor love, no g Cezanne 1900, 01dJjoman^n_A,CaESxJgl!l^^gS^ to what Yeats distilled from Nietzsche and his own crazy Jane. aTf tfLoSf if thiroSe'^SoJd 'Pejoice! ' �1900 B - 19 Bell 43) Picasso 1901, The Poet Savartez, Mus. Modern Western Art, Moscow MUSIC: Stravinsky 1909-10, The Firebird, Lullaby close. Col MG 31202 . I I I.. .1. . . . . . . . . . . .. . l.l It was easier to inherit Cezanne's abstraction than his OlymEjian maturity. illusion. Picasso had to begin, 1901, again with dis­ So later with Joyce and Eliot; even Yeats had opened his 'poetry with "The woods of Arcady are dead", his plays with "the world's more full of weeping than you can understand." It was a blue mood the young Stravinsky (so time-tied to Picasso) would exploit in the Lullaby of The Firebird. (Lullaby into Victory finale) 44) Double: Cezanne 1887-9, large Bather, Mus. Mod. Art, NYC; S Picasso 1905-6, Nude Boy with Horse, Paley Coll'n, NY But as Stravinsky, out of nostalgic sleep, could always stage a Firebird victory, Picasso's Virile force had begun by 1906 to break the Blue spell. And what could better precipitate an energized opposite than the absolute magnitude (left) of Cezanne's Bathers, this standing youth — to receive a softer poignance in Picasso's Boy and Horse (led without rope, a manbrute meld). It was Rilke who would write in 1907 of "that development... in me which corresponds to the immense forward stride in the Cezanne paintings"; while his sonnet on an "Archaic Torso of Apollo" (how it "breaks out of all its contours/ like a star: no place/ that does not see you. for there is You must change your life") points as much to Cezanne and Picasso as to the early Greek. 45) Matisse 1905, Pastoral, Priv. Coll'n, Paris (fade Firebird) While Picasso was moving through Blue and Rose toward Negroid and Cubistic, an ecstatic complement appeared in pure color, those Dionysiac Fauves, led by Matisse, most versatile �1900 B C.G. Bell and life-loving of them. Though darker Mann (1911) would turn this pastoral dream, with Death in Venice Aschenbach (Brook-ofashes) to "the promiscuous orgy (grenzenlose Vermischung) of his own fall". narain 1906. L'Estaque, Three Trees, Ayala & Sam Zacks, Toronto AS for Derain — this 1906 L'Estaque — with Dufy, Vlaminck, Braque and the rest - who would have believed that such heirs of individual outbreak, joined in a group fervor, could become almost indistinguishablY charged? Yet how many composers of the time (from the older- Debussy -to the rising generation) might share in the designation "Fauves"? By 1907 the last movement of Schonberg's Second String Quartet advances from chromatic tonality to the atonal setting of George "Transport" - "Entruckung": "I breathe an air from another planet" _ "Ich fuhle luft von anderem planeten." I have seen sidereal archipelagoes! and islands Whose delirious skies open to the voyager: in these unfathomed nights do you sleep your exile. Millions of golden birds, 0 future Vigor. i �1900 B - 21 /Bell -*• Rilke of that .future, 1912, First Duino Elegyc ...Wirf aus den Armen die Leere... ...Fling the emptiness from your arms into the spaces we breathe — maybe that the birds should feel the expanded air in more intimate flight. (close Bartok) 48) Picasso 1908, Friendship (L'Amitie)-, Hermitage, Leningrad The crested wave still breaking. MUSIC: Stravinsky 1912-13, from Le Sacre du Printemps, Col. MG 3 1202 Thirty-seven years after Rimbaud's South Sea frenzy — I have watched the fermentation of enormous swamps Where giant serpents devoured by bedbugs Fall down from gnarled trees with black scent — Picasso (1908), as by a voodoo of jungle and Negroid, hammers Blue-period loss ("Hurl the emptiness from your arms!") into primitive and cubistic gain. Four years later Stravinsky would break into the fertility climax of the Rite of Spring. (fade Stravinsky) 49) Polynesian Easter Islands c. 1400?, Colossal monolithic heads What was in fact longing over into the new century — some dinosaur upheaval through the crust of civilized restraint, romantic idealism and ennui — was deeper than sense, beyond conscious control; as if suppressed demons and gods, these Easter Island huge volcanic monoliths, with prehistoric and African, all primitive rebelling loci in the Freudian and group unconscious (Rilke's "buried guilty river-god of the blood" — "verborgenen | schuldigen Fluss-Gott des Bluts") had heaved up to seize their [ day: Yeats to Florence- Farr, 1890: Has the magical armagedd'on begun at last? S^'O) Picasso 1910, Girl with a Mandolin, Penrose Collection, London �1900 B C.G. Bell MUSIC; Debussy 1910, Preludes Bk I, from ”Les Sons et les parfums ■---------------— tournent dans 1'air du soir", Philips PHC 5-012 ^ Though in the ambivalence of Picasso, what had begun as rape could always be methodized and refined to seduction. This 1910 "Girl with a Mandolin" suspends the langour and elegance of Blue and Rose in formal analysis. While Debussy, in the Preludes of the same year, has begun a systematization of the semitone mode of chords in fourths. 51) (fade Debussy) G.Braque 1910-11, Composition with Violin (Behind Appearance, p. 12) Which Schonberg, Berg and Webern continually advanced toward the technique of the twelve-tone row. Here Schonberg, of 1911: MUSIC: Schonberg 1911, Six Little Pieces for Piano (#5), Dover HCR 5285 Also by 1911 Braque, working as one with Picasso, had brought the abstraction of things to a threshold of corrugated space, a tensile geometry, beyond which in one sense art could not go. Yet to ring the changes on that non-objective claim would take half a century. 52')' (end Schonberg) Theophanes the Greek 1378, St. Macrobius, det. , Cath. of Transfig­ uration, Novgorod, Russia In 1378 Theophanes the Greek had fresqoed the Cathedral of the Transfiguration in Novgorod, Russia. MUSIC: Russian 10th-16th c.. Entombment chant (near close) Anth. —------------------ —------------- Sonore LP AS 10 (A-5) That the Eastern Slavs, in the time of Chaucer's humanity and lusty realism, 'should have held to the crypts of world-dissolving and "otherworldly power with which Dostoievsky's mystics still contend, dramatises, in the leap to the modern, what Trotsky calls "the messianism of backwardness." 53) (fade Troparion) V.Tropinin c. 1818, Portrait of Artist's Son, Tretyakov Gal., Moscow �'Bell 1900 B - 23 MUSIC: Glinka 1845, Symphony on Two Russian Themes (near opening) VJestminster XWN 184 57 In Tropinin's ideal portrait of his son about 1818, the old theophany yields (as with this Glinka, or the untranslatable Pushkin) to a radiant opposite, fruit of liberal England, Revo­ lutionary France and Romantic Germany — trust in the worth of man and world (though Pushkin complements that glow with Byronic irony). In Tropinin's picture, the give-away flush of sentiment takes us back to Rousseau: The Russians 'will never be perfectly civilized because their civilisation was attempted too hastily... takes us forward to Dostoevsky's depiction of The Possessed heirs of such enlightened dream. 54) (Glinka: forte and fade) Kandinsky 1909, Murnau with Rainbow, Stadtische Galerie, Munich MUSIC: Scriabin 1909-10, Prometheus: Poem of Fire (near close), London ------------------------------------------------------------- OES 6915 In the early century quickening toward war and revolution, Russia's avant-garde 'leap was extraordinary it would turn out, -mostly in exile-. though made, At the time of this 1909 Village Scene, Kandinsky was 43, had absorbecj Impressionism '‘twenty-five years before, was living near Munich at Murnau,. and was just entering the crucial phase of his art, when he would found (with Franz Marc) the Blaue Reiter — in touch with the musical iconoclasm of Stravinsky,. Schonberg, the Scriabin of this 1910 "Prometheus: Poem of Fire". Through Fauve mastery, Kandinsky was advancing 55) Kandinsky 1911, All Saints Day II, StSdtische Gal., Munich toward a mystical color music in which objects would disappear, this 1911 "All Saints Picture" (trumpeting angel above), of which �C.G. Bell 1900 B the artist wrote: ^ In many ways art is similar to religion...was the New Testament possible without the Old? Could our ..."third" revelation be thinkable without the second? That Superman Judgment clue, with subsequent abstractions — flood and cannon turned to vital ecstasy — lift us on the tide of New Apocalypse which also inspired 'Scriabin's Poem of Fire. (close of Scriabin) He wrote: I am desire, I am light...I am the boundary, i am the summit. I am nothing. I am God... I shall not die, I shall suffocate in ecstasy. Though he died not long after of blood poisoning, from a boil on the neck. 56) M.Chagall- 1911, I and the Village, Mus. of Modern Art, NYC From Jewish family life in a suburb of Vitebsk, Marc Chagall shaped such fantasies as "I and the Village", 1911; although he had lived in Paris for a year, absorbing Fauve color and the non-perspectival rythms of Cubist space. But what he poured into that crystal architecture was a new imagery of memory and symbolic ’>• dream. As Andr^ Breton, later spokesman of Surrealism, would write: I V^ in 1911, and through Chagall alone, metaphor ■made its triiimphal entry into modern painting. Yet those metaphors — "the cow who used .to talk to us", the magic spray of flowers, trance-green face of the artist inspired, are not, as with Dante,, or even Blake, systematic, but subliminal, associative mystery for its own sake. 57) G.Balia 1913, Velocita d'automobile + luci, M.G. Neumann Coll'n, Chicago Now various Italians, also in touch with Paris, spurred �ell 1900 B - 25 Cubism (with or without Fauve color) to the cinematic transcript of motion (this Ballo "Velocity of Automobile + Lights"), actualizing the dynamic of the 1910 Futurist Manifesto; We exto11 the love of danger... rebellion...the double quick step...the box on the ear, fisticuffs ^otor-car, its frame adorned ^ith greafpi;;s, libraries, shjant the canal^?; flood the museums; demolish, demolish the venerated ••• That utopian unrest would read itself through socialism, war. Fascism, industrialization, to a belated echo in Spender's "Express" (Internationale); Steaming through metal landscape on her lines She plunges new eras of wild happiness up strange shapes, broad curves And parallels clean like the steel of guns. AJelaunay 1912, Windows on the City (Ist Part. 2nd Replica), Kunsthalle, Hamburg By 1912 Parisian Delaunay opened, for Blaue Reiter contempo­ raries, the Orphism of his "Windows", described in passages of inspired delirium; Impressionism is the birth of Light in painting, Lignt in nature creates movement of colors Art in nature is rythmic__ to reach the limits of sublimity, it must approach our harmonic Vision; clarity. Clarity will be color, proportions; these proportions are composed of various simul­ taneous measures within an action. This .action must be representative harmony, the synchromatic movement (simultaneity) of light, which 'is the only reality... As Apollinaire would close his Delaunay poem; The window opens like an orange The beautiful fruit of light — Le beau fruit de la limi^re. Yet It is curious that in Mallarme's earlier "Les Fenetres", such openings of abstract radiance were an escape, as from the �1900 B C.G. Bell sad hospital of soul's confinement; ^ I flee and lean at all the casements... Blessed in the eternal dews of that glass Which the chaste morning of the infinite gilds. That escape become Delaunay's "only reality". 59) Franz Marc 1913, Tierschicksale, Kustmuseum, Basel MUSIC; Schonberg 1910-13, Die Gluckliche Hand (climax) Col.M2S 679 In Franz Marc, as in Schonberg's "Die Gluckliche Hand" (while the Great War neared), the tumult of elation crests in terror — as if the metaphorical vase of culture,- violin-bowed up the scale of natural and unnatural resonances towards a euphoria of self­ transcendence, should be stretched ahd shattered before our eyes. Mark's "Animal Fate" projects Leonardo's prophecy of a ravaged nature — Nothing on earth or under the earth or in the waters but shall be pursued, molested and destroyed — into the Symbolist subconscious Rilke also shared; ...throttling growths and bestial preying forms!...How he loved that interior world... ...seines Inneren Wildnis,/ diesen Urwald in ihm. When Mark, most searching German artist on the scene, fell % in 1914, who could follow the burning call of George?; "You who have, circled the flame, hold to the faith of the flame!" "Bleibe der flamme trabant!" 60) (fade Schonberg) Q.&O. Wright 1903, Flyer (with Langley's 1896 steam model), Smith-sonian. Wash., DC In 1896, year of Moreau's "Jupiter and Semele", with pictures we have seen by Gauguin and Toulouse-Lautrec, this Langley steampowered plane (above and small) brought the dream of flight almost home — though his model could not lift a man. In 1903, when �/ Bell 1900 B - 27 the old Cezanne was touching off the excitement of the Fauves, this larger Wright brothers biplane accomplished the first heavier-than-air powered and piloted flight. Like all adventures of Avant-garde, it would prove ambivalent. 61) R.de la Fresnaye 1913, Conquest of the Air, Mus. Modern Art, NYC Ten years later, when Fresnaye painted his Cubistic and Delaunay-inspired "Conquest of the Air", who could have told how far these cloud-hung airmen at the drafting table were plotting the sky-strategy of the war so soon to be loosed over Europe — theirs the only war-vision which would not appallingly bog down in trench mud-holes, where Nietzsche's expected trans­ valuation would concrete toward a mustached phoney of frenzied outwardness. 62) European Armour c. 1535, to Francis 1st from Ferd. of Tyrol?, Mus. de L'Armee, Paris If the paired offence and defence of -toothed Tyranosaurus and horned Triceratops ±ook them both under, it was with Duckbill and all the rest. So the" warning against armament, like all the lessons of history, remained equivocal. In the West (where evolution has not completed its proof) the mechanized type of force was conceived from the start — armored knight on aritfored horse charging peasant field or village like the precursive ultima-te of ironclad war. Although the horse-name of chivalry embraced a damsel-succoring code. 63) Photo World War I c. 1917, stalled Tank, U.S. Official Pictures After 1916 the true tanks caterpillared in, and some, like tar-poOl Dinosaurs*, were -stranded, swivel of what Nietzsche had hailed: I am delighted at the military development of Europe... the period of quietude and Chinese apathy is over... �1900 B - C * G • HgH Rilke's first war elation, George's account in his long poem Per Krieg of the first Demian hope for spirit out of material destruc' tion, Kastorp's leap from the Magic Mountain into sacrifice — such soul-surmises cloud to Owen's "Anthem": What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? Only the monstrous anger of the guns... The shrill demented choirs of wailing shells And bugles calling for them from sad shires... 64) George Grosz 1918-22, from Ecce Homo: Twilight, watercolor, pub. 1923, repr. 1965 So to the embittered post-war of George Grosz's book of cartoon derelictions, Ecce Homo, Behold Man. Plunged into that "hell where youth and laughter go" (Sassoon), would not the crazed vessel at last be shivered in the Untergang Spengler imperatived: "Bare your necks to the blade 1" And what of America, whose vital delivery had s'prung the trench stalemate — America, barely emerged from pioneer assurance, how would she take to what war had hardened 65) Toulouse-Lautrec 1899, Private Room at Le Rat Mort, Courtauld, London from fin-de-siecle Toulouse-Lautrec, this "Private Room at Le Rat Mort"? Could the Jamesian traveler have missed, under Impressionist verve, the Vampire metamorphosis of Baudelaire? — The woman meanwhile from her strawberry mouth. Twisting her body like a snake... Let fall these words, charged with the odor of musk; Zola's 1880 Nana, dead of smallpox in a Paris seething with Franco-Prussian war? — The' pustules had invaded the whole of her face... The left eye had foundered among bubbling purulence; the other, half open, was a ruinous black hole...a reddish crust was peeling from one of the cheeks and invading the mouth, which it distorted into a horrible grin...And over this mask of death, the beautiful hair still flowed like sunlight downward in rippling gold. �Bell 1900 B - 29 Acade.., MUSIC: Scott Joplin c IRQ? r>v. • ■ ========g^^g=^i=^i^l^=gg^g4gal,^^ tape I. ^ George -Luks, through the Naturalist . . arisian tra-ining, saw in pre-war 1905 , . ^ his boisterous New York claim: glass of surh p> gj-ass Of such European and a -roai •-i^ reality proportioned to Who taught Shakespeare ter^hn-i rT,.^o ^ Or George Luks? Guts> f Rembrandt? ^—.That s my technique! Ana Drelsser, in studied pursuit of Deter^inist Zola, had Closed his first novel (1900, with sister Carrie rooming alone ,ret those who would answer Spengler with the plea of a New world culturally new, were Ignoring the continuity of culture Ashcan affirmation was a Whitmanesgue phase of an Avant-garde everywhere transvaluing the negative, hnd. what, in civilised content, comprised more negatibn than the worksongs, blues and lazz which, gathering head in the unlettered proletariat of Black America (New Orlpanc; °* "his joplln 1897 ragtime). The Circus. T.onvrs Kould.irresistably conquer the worlds ■ v.,.-- , (fade Joplin) Monde, Nonesi^^TTT^ And Within the sophistication and science of Pointillism, what stripping to Circus, music-hall f music hall and ^ive, occurs in the last patterned reductions of gfan-m-i. Seurat - an affinity that would open post-war orchestration ation to to thr^ the ki blue notes and rythmic firewater of Harlem's elemental "Yeah'" ^ean. du Monde". mhnc -fv-n Thus from Milhaud's "La Creation (fade Milhaud) 3rd whistle) C01.D3S 783 ! �C.G. B^eTT Ives was the composer who from his earliest works gave the disruptive triumph of modernism an American stomach for every­ thing from the great tradition, to hymns and pop tunes. . 68) Prenderqast 1901, Central Park, Whitney Museum, NYC_ After Homer, Eakins and Ryder, no American artist had such force; though various painters between realism and the all-out abstrac­ tions of the 1913 Armory Show, share a natural vigor with Ives. Here is Prendergast's patchwork "Central Park" of 1901. (fade Ives) with the slow movement from the Second Symphony: MUSIC: Ives 1897-1902, 2nd Symph., 3rd mvt, near close. Col. D3S She dreams a little, and she feels the dark Encroachment of that old catastrophe. As a calm darkens among water-lights... The day is like wide water, without sound. Stilled for the passing of her dreaming feet Ove'r the seas, to silent Palestine... Why should she give her bounty to the dead... Divinity must live within herself: Passions of rain, or moods in falling snow... These are the measures destined for her soul... 70) Eilshemius 1909?, Contentment, Kleemann Gallery, NY Like Stevens' lady, Eilshemius quickens the Bacchic myth: Supple and turbulent, a ring of men Shall chant in orgy on a summer morn Their boisterous devotion to_the sun. Not as a god, but as a god might be. �. Bell 1900 B 31 Naked among them, like a savage source. Their chant shall be a chant of paradise-•. Out of their blood, returning to the sky; And in their chant shall enter, voice by voice. The windy lake wherein their lord delights. The trees, like serafim, and echoing hills... And whence they came and whither they shall go The dew upon their feet shall manifest. (end Ives Adagio) 71) Arthur Dove 1910, .Abstraction No. 2, Downtown Gallery, NYC As early as any of the Europeans, Dove, from upstate New York, who had known the Fauves in Paris, moyed to the delight of pure color forms (1910). Though if the scanning eye could have taken in thdse numbered abstractions as dwellingly as tjie time-art of tones forces upon, the ear MUSIC; Ives 1897-1902, 2nd Symph., close, last Mvt. Col. D3S 783 it would surely have experienced ^ shock, as from the fanfares and unresolved dissonance with which Ives concluded that Second Symphony*. 72) Macdonald-Wright c. 1915, Abstraction on Spectrum (Organization 5) Art Center, Des Moines, lA After the 1913 Armory show’, when European Modernism first struck America in force, the country was divided between mass realist reaction (last bars of_ Ives) Avant-garde handful of artists "(and even buyers) caught up in the European Fauve and abstract. Ma’cdonald-Wright, in this 1915 Abstraction on the Spectrum, rapturously pursued the color-circle Synchronism of Delaunay. 73) Double:/ Cezanne 1900-06, Bend in the Road, Walter Bareiss (cf. Munich) & Delaunay c. 1912-13, Window, Museum, DiSsseldorf, Germany In the juxtaposition of a Cezanne (left) from about 1900, and a Delaunay Window of 1912 to '13, we ride — ecstatic as Holderlin and Nietzsche, for the coming of the gods — the comber of an abstract surge peaking up the shoal as far back as the 1870's in Cezanne �1900 B - C.G.> Bell or in the "Drunken Boat" precosity of Rimbaud. Morton Schamberg c 74) 1917, Miter box and plumbing trap entitled God, Mus., Philadelphia What a break, when Dada, beginning in World War Zurich of 1916, had espoused the ridicule of a civilization gone wrong, and Morton Schamberg — 1917, Philadelphian, in the New York Circle of Duchamps, could give the title "God" to this found sculpture of a miter box and a cast iron plumbing trap — not a mockery alone, but like William Carlos Williams on the pretence of a hearse: 75) "Knock the glass out!/ My God — glass, my townspeople!"; Joseph Stella 1913, Battle of Light, Coney Island, Yale Univ. Gal. MUSIC: Ives 1910-16, 4th Symph., 2nd MVt, 4th of July close, Col.D3S 783 The Italian Futurist Stella, who would also settle in America, had brought the Armory show to its color-action peak with the glad riot of his Coney Island — as Ives, the same years, unleashed the Fourth of July scherzo of his Fourth Symphony. easier the art we can gawk at. How much No one would hear the Ives for fifty years; but Century Magazine gave Stella's "Battle for Light" a color reproduction: a daring interpretation...of the dazzling light, the noise and ceaseless motion...so evident in America... Had he merely represented the physicai...(the artist) believes that he could not have given the rythm of the scene, which transforms the chaos of the night, the lights, the strange buildings and the surging crowd into the order, the design and the color of art. (end Ives) 76) Stella 1922, The Bridge, 5th panel, Newark Museum The disillusion of the war did not undercut Stella's celebra­ tion of America as Futurist land. Though the early century ardor tightened, like Twelve-tone harmony, here to the bound geometries of the Bridge Panels. �. -Bell 1900 B 33 It was the theme under which Hart Crane, from 1924 to '30, hoped to affirm America: f How many dawns chill from his rippling rest The seagull's wings shall dip and pivot him. Shedding white rings of tumult, building high Over the chained bay waters Liberty... —' Till elevators drop us from our day. Always Crane's vision lets him drop: A bedlamite speeds to thy parapets. Tilting there momently, shrill shirt balooning, A jest falls, from the speechless caravan. In the gulf of Munch's Cry, how could the "curveship" of the Bridge "lend a myth to God"? 77) Francisco Goya 1812-19, Bullfight in a Village, Royal Academy of San Fernando, Madrid In the old revolutionary world of Blake, Goethe, this Goya, there was a separation of light and dark; the brute seizure spoke its ritualistic containment — what in music gripped the magnification of dissonance from Mozart: MUSIC: Mozart 1788, near close of 1st Mvt, Jupiter Symph., Col. B3S 891 through Beethoven. MUSIC: Beethoven 1804, 3rd Symph, 1st Mvt before recapit., Deutsche ■“ ---------------- Gram. LPM 18 802 78) Pablo Picasso 1935, Minotauromachia, det. of Beast, etching Since Zarathustfa, we are one with the world beast. Picasso: If all the ways I have been along were worked on a map and joined up with a line, it might represent a Minotaur. BACK: again 77) Goya, Bullfight in a Village In the uncontained emancipation of dissonance as such — BACK: again 76) Stella 1922, The Bridge what Schonberg would take for his battle cry — BACK: again 75) Stella 1913, Battle of Light',.'Coney, island �1900 B C.G. Bell soul flames the antinomy of the unresolved, consuming in revelational delight the crucible of its tensile ground. 'After Rimbaud's "Drunken Boat" ("0 let my keel burst; 0 let me go down into the sea") .cain 74) Schamberg 1917, God_^Miter.A^lHBbiS^^£g£n-^jii^^^ Hart crane despaired of a reconciling Bridge (Letters of 1926): At times it seems demonstrable that Spengler is . ■ T-+frVici mone and more licks his r^;o“if!;inT^f£without^Sidge;'in?Sl2ctually judged the whole theme and project seems more and more absurd... ' ,ca)n-73) Double, ^^esaHia^fter,190^H)l^glaunay^^ ?iofw?irsefi^hfi?rSf/airti:fgreJt“iiiircrackers in Valhalla's parapets; Again 74) Schamberg 1917, God the sun has set theatrically while Lafdrge, Eliot and others of that kidn y have whimpered fastidiously... ..Mn 75) Stella 1913, Battle of Light, Coney Islajjd But Picasso could have said the same about working in the " wake of that disruptive fervor (from Cezanne down) which he himself, with Fauves, Cubists, Blaue Reiter, had inflamed, ;'cain 76) Stella 1922, The Bridge up to the break and restrictive deliberations of post-war. again 77) Gova 1812-19, Bullfight in a Village, Since all arts after that crisis had to grope gackward and for­ ward for a "Tower Beyond Tragedy". But where Hart Crane slipped from the stern of the Orizaba, Again 78) Picasso 1935, Minotauremachia det-. of Beast Bartok had mounted (1928) the fierce lunge of the Fourth Quartet. Bartok 1928, Fourth Quartet,_J,as^ivt^_g^gs^^^ �Bell 1900 B - 35 Picasso turned the beast outbreak (Yeats' "Violence upon the road; violence of horses") to the 1935 Minotauromachia, Hi-- Picasso 1935, Mintauromachia, det. of child, L, etching where a child poignant as the one who in Rimbaud ".launches a boat frail as a butterfly of May" — confronts with candle -and flowers (Yeats' "0 may she live like some green laurel") -- again 78) Picasso^ Minotauromachia, detail of Beast the shared dread of Crete (Yeats too "Imagining in excited reverie/ That the future years had come,/ Dancing to a frenzied drum__ "). Again 79) Picasso, Minotauromachi, detail of Child, L. Crane would ignore Yeats in that prophecy of no gr^at poet after adolescent Rimbaud; but it was just Crane's despair which Yeats had hammered into "The Second Coming" of 1920: the gyre of negation pierced by the Thirteenth Cone, God-sphere of tragic miracle. 80) Picasso, Minotauromachia, whole •V Turning and turning in the widening gyre ^ The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood—dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand.The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight; somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun. Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle. And what rough beast, its hour come round at last. Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? (end Bartok) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data pdf Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 35 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1900 B : Crisis of the Abstract, Symbolic History, Part 34 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 34 of the symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_34_1900_B--Crisis_of_the_Abstract https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/939c1d2cface0795abba1788d3212413.pdf 123449ba08923c625409f106623ecca3 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 240 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1915 Rat-Tat Description An account of the resource Rat-Tat 1915 Key Edition, Volume XVIII. Published annually by the Junior Class - St. John's College. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Moon, Orville M. (Editor-in-Chief) Bielaski, Fred L. (Assistant Editor-in-Chief) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available The Horn-Shafer Co. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Baltimore, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1915 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1915 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/324b3eaf165ae795700b34dfcb1da586.pdf 3f9363579a8a443e89ad3c5debd41de5 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 234, 24 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1921 Rat-Tat Description An account of the resource 1921 Rat Tat, Vol. XXIII, Published by the Junior Class of St. John's College. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Heil, F. M. (Editor) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available The Read-Taylor Company Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Baltimore, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1921 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1921 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/ebe170053447c1903c3c196454b206f8.pdf b6392a618de0bd157a2398f2f6f98669 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 253 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1922 Rat_Tat Description An account of the resource Rat Tat 1922, Vol. XXIV. Published Annually by the Junior Class of St. John's College. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Baxter, W. C. (Editor-in-Chief) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available The Read-Taylor Company Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Baltimore, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1922 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1922 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/90d97ac726d753a91d19a92154c8de98.pdf 31e4a4ba2439609963a60b6e5090fdfc Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 247, xvii pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1923 Rat-Tat Description An account of the resource 1923 Rat Tat. Published annually by the Junior Class of St. John's College. Vol XXV Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource McCauley, David R. (Editor-in-Chief) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Capital-Gazette Press Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1923 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1923 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/8e594e9c443e6516b5598d7965b9d8ec.pdf 7fbb6b1c30dde432379c36abd74aaf0a PDF Text Text XxX/XxxxxV ��RICHARD DANIEL WEIGLE President Many people have expressed the wish that this yearbook include the years between the last yearbook and the present bne . The reply has always been the same: "Sorry, but it's out of the question." The reasons for this remark are numerous. The two main ones, perhaps, are (1) not enough money, and (2) not enough time . Because of the budget alloted this publication, it must be limited to a certain amount of pages. Because of the limited amount of pages, it would be impossible to do even a mediocre job of including the four years between the last yearbook and this one . JACOB KLEIN Dean The yearbook , as it now appears, is a product of many months of hard work by one or two individuals . There is much room for improvement-this is clear. Some of the articles that appear throughout the book are bad, while others are excellent. I can only express the hope that those of you who recognize the weak points of this yearbook w ill be willing to help produce better yearbooks in the future. HuGH CuRTLER, JR. YEARBOOK STAFF WILLIAM KYLE SMITH Assistant D ean HuGH CuRTLER, JR . Editor JoHN MALONEY Business Manager MARSHALL LASKY' ALAN MARSHALL Photographers NANCY EAGLE Typist CLARENCE KRAMER Faculty Advisor BARBARA HoPKINs L E ON ARD A ssistant D ean �FoRD KEELER BRowN Tutor HuGH P. McGRATH Tutor SIMON KAPLAN Tutor WILEY CRAWFORD Tutor JoHN SPANGLER KIEFFER Tutor CuRTis A. WILSON Tutor LuKE HARVEY PoE, JR . Tutor DouGLASS ALLENBROOK Tutor JOSEPH WINFREE SMITH VICTOR ZucKERKANDL Tutor Tutor CHARLES G . BELL Tutor JoHN ALoYsms BREMER Tutor �HENRY VINCENT GRATTAN RICHARD ScoFIELD Tutor Tutor WILLIAM FRANCIS GLEASON ARLAND F . CHRIST-] ANER Intern Treasurer MICHAEL OssoRGIN loLA R. ScoFIELD Tutor Tutor WILLIAM F . WYNN Intern jAMES M. ToLBERT Director of Admissions SETH G . BEN ARDETE CLARENCE J. KRAMER Intern Tutor ALAN MARSHALL THOMAS KING SIMPSON Tutor Assistant to the President �DALE BROOKS CuMMINGs WILLIAM MoNEY AsTON Director of Athletics Laboratory Advisor ~18AtJwn .... RoBERT S . BART Tutor A. LEONARD Tutor SLAFKOSKY WILLIAM A . DARKEY, JR . RAYMOND NEIKIRK wILBURN Tutor (Sabbatical leave 1956-57) Tutor ( On L eave) \ Time brings not death, it brings but changes. DouGLAS MALLOCH �Next it was necessary to devise teaching formalities. The chronological order of reading recommended itself for the reason that human thought, in its history, grappled first with fundamental and elementary questions , and then worked out the consequences of the various answers proposed. The rna j or turning points in thought occurred when one set of consequences or another sent men back to reconsider the fundamental questions. Toynbee's requirement of an "intelligible field " for a study of history holds even for a brief essay on the last twenty years of the two-hundred-sixty-year history ~f King William's School- St. John's College . Dogmatically asserted, our intelligible field must be " educated man . '. By 1937 the conviction was shared by many people that there were no educated men any more and that furthermore the institutions of society for developing the breed had become so corrupt that they were producing the very opposite of what they intended to produce, that a race of barbarians with college degrees sat in the seats vacated by the wise men of old . In 1937 two men with this conviction, Stringfellow Barr and Scott Buchanan, felt themselv~s ready to act in the crisis so as to lead the exiled men _ wisdom in an attempt to ~ecapture thetr of thrones from the barbarians. In 1937 one throne, whtch had never completely capttulat_d to t_ e he barbarians, St. John's College, extended a call for help to. t~~se z:nen and became a rallywg powt for all friends of liberty of the arts·. The march back to Civihzatwn began . A revolution is something other than a war. B~rr and Bucha~an led St . John's against no single, well disciplined enemy, but rather into ~h~ ffii~st of a bab~hng ra~ble. Am~ng the confused shouts and outcries of the melee could be distwgutshed from time to w~e t~e v:o1ces of th?se calling futilely for the preservation of this or that piece of wreckag_e _ f past wstitutwns; clashwg o with them were the cries of the utopians who were bent on_reahzwg a new heaven and _ ?ew a earth . Underlying all the uproar was the seismic rumble ofsctenceand technology , th~preClpttat­ ing cause of the crisis . The world was i? revolution; _w-hether St. John's was a revolu~wnary force or counter revolutionary could not easlly be determi_ned. That ~e were called fascists by som_ e and communists by others, atheists by some and medieval Cathohcs by others, was perhaps testimony to the soundness of our stand . There were three planks in our pro gram: the recovery of the Liberal Arts; t~e disc? very of the meaning of science; the Socratic method. The first of these followed f:o.m a diagnosis of our ills as a breakdown of communication; the second ensued from a recogmtion th_at the modern world was in upheaval because technology, whic~ from _immemorial time had gUlded the ~ands of the artisan, at last had pushed its way to the braw and infiltrated the reason, to becom_ science. e Thirdly, the Socratic method furnished a flexible way to teach rea~on ~o take.stoc~ of itself, un-. hampered by stereotyped beliefs, but guided by a fundamental fauh 1n man s :ational po_ ers. w Another way of putting it is to say that St. John's planned to restore th~ do~aw _ f the Ltberal o Arts over all manifestations of the human spirit through the use of Socratic dialectic. The first practical step was to found a curriculum on the record o~ the human spirit's _struggle for consciousness of its powers and its limits. Everyone knew that this recor~ was f?und 1ll books that have become classic. So the first task was to select the books that contawed thts record most fully and intensively . Then, making these books the tea~hers, to fort? the habit amon_ the g faculty of making a continuing critical review of the selectwns for the hst. It was an ace1dent, happily seized on by the publicity-minded that the books nuz:nbe~~d close to one hundred . s.~ this part of the program was reduced to a slogan, for good or 111: The Hundred Great Books. ., , Reading and discussion presupposed the arts of language and so the language and mathematical tutorials were set up to inculcate thes'e arts . The four years of laboratory followed from the special problem of science: It was in one aspect a tutorial in the language of science, that is dbservation and measurement; in another sense, a seminar in the classic record of science, a record which must be assimilated by experiment , an analogue to Socratic dialectic. Mathematics forms a link between the laboratory as a tutorial and the seminar in so far as it furnishes an ideal language in which the book of nature may be read by the reason . Finally the originators of the program took seriously the title, ·'Queen of the Sciences,'' given of old to Theology, and sought to provide through theological readings a focus in which to explore the grounds of unity within the sciences and between science and the other manifestations of the human spirit . The history of the last twenty years of St . John's is the story of the faculty's attempt to follow this program and the students' attempts to get an education from it . The greatest problem and the greatest challenge has been the fact that education requires both freedom and discipline . Learning takes place .spontaneously and unpredictably and yet not without order. How to provide an order for classes without constructing a deadening routine has been continually before us . Complicating the problem is the necessity of certifying to the outside world what has been learned and how it is relevant to the demands society makes upon us. (Don rags, enabling examinations, theses and senior orals become the institutional forms which mirror the goal, ·'the educated man" .) . The history of the program shows remarkable adherence both to the original goal and the original plan . The administrative changes of these years are too intimately a concern of the writer to be touched on, and in the long view are unimportant . Changes within the curriculum have been in the nature of the relaxing procedures that turned out to be too ambitious, such as reducing the number of books to be read; or they have consisted in tightening up where too much was taken for granted in the students, for example, the constant revision of the language tutorial in the direction of closer study and more writing; the introduction of algebra and analytic geometry into the mathematics tutorial, or the rearrangement of the laboratory to conform more to the traditional division of physics, chemistry, and biology, or lastly, the attempt to specify the nature of music in its ordinary understanding . St . John's approaches the canonical maturity of twenty-one years with unchanging purpose, but in a society that has changed beyond recognition from the world of 1937 . If in 1937 we could recall men from despair by proclaiming that the truths of the human spirit stood firm amidst the decay of the old order, in 1957 we offer a reminder that these same truths rebuke easy hopes springing from Fortune's quick reversal to prosperity. JOHN S. KIEFFER �Motion is inevitable. No matter how comfortable traditions may be, there is always change. Yet, call it what you will, there is always some point in terms of which this motion is meaningful. Without such a reference point there is chaos . At St. John's, that point is the Program; this is the unity which imparts the motion. Throughout the College there have been many changes during the last four years. The surface of the Program, itself, has changed. The seminar list has been revised and re-arranged. The sophomore language tutorial now attempts a more direct approach to the Trivium-an approach which is, perhaps, not altogether a happy one. Laboratory, which has never rested comfortably within the sphere of the Program, has been revised and amplified more than once. And, happiest of all, the fine arts are slowly coming to rest within the curricu~~m through music. It is hoped, or rather it is felt, that all these changes have been made in one sp1nt, the spirit or experimentation. No one can be sure how the liberal arts are best applied to the problems confronted in the world of ideas. Perhaps this kind of certainty can never be attained . T~e Program, therefore, can not remain static. There is need for motion, so long as the mouon 1s limited by the principles which define the ?rogram. Physically the College has changed a great deal through the past four years. The construction of a woman's dormitory constitutes the major change, although there has been extensive redec~ra­ tion in almost every building on campus . This, of course, is not to mention the transformatwn which has been effected through the artistry of landscaping . It is with no little fondness that some of us remember Koogle Hall, and the door in the basement of Campbell which now bears that name is cold comfort to our memories . Likewise, the nursery which now covers the land once occupied by the famous Paca-Carroll Wings can do nothing to assuage our sorrow if we recall the bohemian comfort of those cells . Even now the College is in the process of building . And altholl:gh the immediacy of the prospect of a new laboratory is somewhat frightening, there can be nothmg but universal agreement that some improvement was needed. Saddest of all is the realization that when it is finished, the new building will take the College out of the Great Hall on Friday evenings . But, as Messers. Chase and Philli'ps admonish us, "Time is the physician ." Some of these changes are disquieting, and student opinion has varied in every case . More often than not, when changes have been made with respect to the Program, there has been at least a serious attempt to give thought to their meaning. The worst that can be said of judgments made with regard to other changes is that they have, perhaps, been founded more in fear and trembling, than in serious consideration . Everything at St . John's must, like lines drawn from all points on a circle to its cente~, ~ave but one point of convergence-the Program. If there is any reason for being at St . John's, lt 1s .to be under the discipline of the Program. Ideally, then, our course of action should always be .dlctated by the answer to this question: What effect will this have to the Program? As we conunll:e to seek fresh answers to this question, we would all do well to judge their adequacy by th1s maxim: At St . John 's it is the liberal arts which lend meaning to the activities of life, not the activities of life which lend meaning to the liberal arts. WALTER D. WEIR The love of learning, the sequestered nooks, and all the sweet serenity of books. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW �"So here I am, zn the middle way, having had twenty yearsTwenty years largely wasted, the years of l'entre deux guerresTrying to learn to use words, and every attempt Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of .l .. f azure . ... ELIOT: East Coker What is being discussed in this quotation? Communication and the difficulties of communication. Why is communication considered difficult? Because we can not communicate on the conceptual level, but must use words or symbols. Thus our matter of co.mmu~ica~ion is once removed from what we might .hke 1t to be: this results in the twice-removedness of the idea which the person to whom we are communicating ends up with. Communication is difficult- witness the preceding sentet:J.ce. Learning to communicate clearly a~d lucidly; to ·get across' an intended meamng to the person to whom we are conversing-this is what takes place in the Tutorials he~e ~t St. John's. We study language because with It we communicate. It is not a very good means for communication, due to ambiguities, doubleentendres, and human ignorance; but we try to make the best we can of it. Mathematics is a language which involves no ambiguities, so we study it to apply to language whatever we might learn from it. One evidence of the meeting of these two is in symbolic logic. ~hat t~e symbolic logician attempts to do Is to nd language of its vagueness and unclearness. He sees that language by itself, and the rules governing it (trivial arts) are not enough to make language a good vehicle; so h~ informs language with the form of mathemaucal order and hopes to have a good vehicle. ~owev~r, if the order of the informed order Is not Invulnerable-if it has a leak-where are we? Mr. Curtis Wilson's lecture on symbolic logic showed that there is a leak in the order. As a result all we can do is work with what we have,' · · .. '. shabby equipment, always deteriorating. In a general mess of impre.cision of feeling .... " This is what we do m the language and mathematics tutorials. By reading the books and analyzing them as best we can, we get closer and closer to the order that we must think is there. Does this group of words communicate anything to you? Maybe so, and maybe not. "I gotta use words when I talk to you, .but if r:ou don't understand, or if you do, that s nothmg to me and nothing to you.·· ELIOT: Fragment of an Agon Article written by: John Maloney 8emina/Js The seminar is the focal point of the studies at St . John's. The group of approximat~ly nineteen to twenty-five students together wlt? two or more tutors which makes up the seminar meets twice a week for two hours or longer. It is a study group which discusses. an assigned reading, bringin.g out and ~evelopmg the problems treated of m the readmg . Concerning the subject at hand, a student may p~t forth a theory which may be and usually IS challenged by the other students. Each stude~t must be ready to defend his statements . In this way fallaciou~ reasoning .can be brought to t~e surface idenufied and discarded. Then vahd reasoni~g can take place and enrich the thought of the students. I said that the seminar is the focal point of study, because it is in the setninar tha~ all problems can be discu~sed. The~e are readmgs which bring out certam theoreucal as ~ell as practical difficulties which co~e up I~ the mathematics and language tutonals and IJ?- the laboratory practice and discussi~n penod.s . The laws which influence and gmde men In society are discussed; that is , all of the laws which influence life- laws of nature, laws of physics, laws of men or government,. divi~e law and moral law. These are seen In their separate peculiarities and in relation to one another. Man is studied in all his a~pects through history, politics, psychology, science,. poetry, and philosophy. The probl~ms which continue to pursue man as he hves through all ages become clear and therefore become capable of solution. The seminar coheres by virtue o~ a c~:mtinu­ ous examination of the puzzle which 1s rna~ . The puzzle, so diffic':llt becaus.e of the very diversities of man, Is a proJeCt . 'Yorked on through four years by students stn:vmg to help themselves and one another to gam an understanding. But the end of the four ;:-ears does not end the project. The students wlll alw~ys have the ability to tackle an~ to ~e~l with problems that arise whether .I~ pohucs, the study of law, ~inistrf, medicme, et~. The habit of thinking thmgs through IS . wellestablished by the seminar and stays with us after graduation from St. John's. CoRNELIA HoFFMAN KLINE �Sometimes the lecture and the question period are the most exciting parts of the week . The study of a year or more becomes a living tool, parts of it emerging and being regrouped to appraise an entirely new idea and probe to the far reaches of its consequences. While the lecturer is presenting his thesis , the audience is muted-hushed. We are already seeking the answers to the questions and objections which will present themselves fully formed in the discussion later. Then the lecturer has gone, too soon, and with the dialectic of the question period comes new insights and new questions in their turn. These remain to be answered . But of course, there are the other times, and too many of them, when the only excitement is caused by the beat of the leoturer's deter·mined course between the water pitcher and the lectern with a murmur of bored comments . Why a man who has nothing to say should be invited here to drone away an evening is a mystery . More amazing is the ingenuous attitude that a famous name on the weekly calendar means that a man capable of delivering a lecture will appear on Friday . The illustrious incompetents still come. An audience of students and faculty at St . 'John's wi.ll sit far beyond the time when the speaker begins to eye his watch in order to hear a stimulating lecture . They will talk until early morning to understand it . They should not be subjected to the intellectual meanderings of the semiserious and the insensitive, no matter what the higher reasons for their being here . The formal lecture was instituted and is still represented as the culmination, the natural climax, of the week . It is a time of testing, both understanding and dialectical skills . When there is nothing to be understood the skill is wasted. Chess, anyone? MARY GALLAGHER 1 ,· For better or for worse the Student Polity has undergone a fundamental change in its nature, and hence in its manner of functioning . The present Constitution calls for a democratic form of government, that is, one in which decisions are made directly by the student body . In actual practice the Polity is republican, not democratic . The decisions of the Polity are made by the Executive Committee, the representatives of the students . The executive Committee has come to take all the action it can within the limits of the Constitution because of a general lack of concern on the part of the student body. A case in point was the unsuccessful attempt on two occasions to convene the Polity in order to decide who should be held responsible for damage in commonrooms during vacations. The lack of cohcern on the part of many students iq the activities of the Polity raises the question of the value of the Polity in any form. The end of the college community is learning. It is the job of the administration to provide the conditions that will make the actualization of this end possible. The administration by necessity makes many decisions which affect the every day life of the students: there must be rules of residence, screens on windows, satisfactory food in the dining hall, money appropriated for extra-curricular activities, rodent control, discipline of socially hazardous persons. The opinion of the student body on these matters greatly facilitates the operation of the administration. Although it is assumed that the student is not yet capable of deciding how his intellectual powers shall be developed, he is able to tell when the food in the dining hall is bad. In order to provide better conditions for learning, the administration has in fact delegated some of its power to the students. Ideally all the students should be aware of the responsibility they have to the college community; in practice this is not the case. The Polity, then, is faced with two sensible alternatives : either it must instill a greater sense of responsibility in many students, which seems unlikely; or it must change the Constitution so that the republican form of government can work more effectively. HARVEY WYNN ��tion decid~d th.at th~y had been a party, in a sense, to vwlaung dnnking-age statutes in the past, when the Cotillion Board held "beer busts" on its budget funds provided by the College . It was decided that no Coliege funds cou~d be used in the future to purchase alcohohc beverages. So, "beer-busts" were replaced by Boat House "B .Y .O ." parties . ~nly si.xty per cent of last year 's membership surv1ved the St . John's fatality rate- so we scouted the Freshman Class , and recruited several at gun point. On the twe~tieth of October, we presented the Homecommg Dance . The decor featured a spotlight revolving overhead flashing on four huge leaves hung around it ; and a bandstand b~ckdrop of crepe in fall colors, lit from be~md so a~ to silhouette the band . The revolvmg spotlight picked up speed as the evening passed and had to be turned off when several people complained that it was producing unpleasant gastric complications. On the twelfth of January, we presented the Student-Faculty Party in the Great Hall . Beer was served. It turned out to be the first and last, "beer bust" of the year . The Administra- The " Balpere avant Noel " was presented on December fifteenth in Iglehart Hall. It featured all white decorations, a large silver star behind the. band, which was flanked by a pair of Chnstmas Trees . The band was a jazz combo gathered by Jim Chrestenson for the occasion . As a final touch, we splurged $25 .00 on hors d 'oeurves . The " Cafe sans Jean" was held in the Boat House on March 16th. To make it more than m er~l y a Boat House " set-up" party, we orgamzed a '·gala floor show ' ' consisting of a d~m rag lampo~n , Chris Griffin playing Adeste F1deles (a la Ktrkpatric), and dance music by Messers Wray, Adler, and Tilles . The costume party was presented in the Boat Ho~se on the eighteenth of May. A pair of free uckets to the June Ball was the prize for the most original costume. The activities during June Week, i .e. The June Ball , and a party after the Variety Show, are a finale to the Cotillion Board's enterprises of the year . jiM DEYOUNG I / �The St. John's College Boat Club was founded in 1931. There is no record of the early activities of the club, but in 1938 some Dyer Dinghys were pqrchased, and racing was conducted on an intra-mural basis, and informally with the United States Naval Academy. This continued until 1942, when the dinghys were sold and five sixteen foot sailboats were built. These turned out to be unsuitable for racing, and in 1948 it was decided by the Club Members to build a fleet of sailing dinghys, and to restore racing as a sport . At present we have five tempest dinghys, and an assortment of other craft which all total a fleet of ten able vessels. The club is now thinking about obtaining a larger boat, as well as one that could be used for extended cruises. The purchase of such a boat would complete the facilities of the Boat Club., for we could have both racing and cruising facilities. STEVE LERNER There is perceptible activity in the field of the fine arts at St. John's. Several persons are known to use the art studio on occasions, and in the past we have seen student artists of considerable talents . Even this year, there has been a successful exhibition of student oils, watercolors, and drawings; and another (complete with price tags) is being planned at this writing for the Playhouse Theater. Models have been supplied twice a week, and numerous ill-attended but heated discussions have grown up a.round Saturday morning drawing classes. A Baltimore artist and art instructor spoke on dynamics in art and nature and was sharply cross-examined at one of these sessions, and general criticism of everyone else's work identifies most of us as artists in spirit if not in technique. But the group is not representative of the student body. The unhappy fact is, the fine arts are currently not modish here in the college. Many students, on examination, will admit complete disinterest in painting, sculpture, ar~hi­ tecture, and all the other fine arts; excepung, of course, music, which is claimed by some members of the liberal arts camp, and is at least an authorized object of contemplation. Its implications are philosophical, it is rumored, and so it becomes significant to us philosophizers . The other arts are, it would seem, small and unmeaningful as seen from our disturbing vantage point on the philosophic height . Perhaps the fine arts have been swamped in the backwash of the educational trauma of our first reading in Plato, the Ion,· the St. John's mind is surely capable of overcoming any blinding attachment to its first dialogue, however, and so we present the idea as no more than a curiosity . Rather our suggestion is that since the already telescoped Program admittedly offers no niche for any artistic artifacts, except a rare hour or two on Friday evenings, St. Johnny's exhibit the indifference of ignorance, not genuine insensibility. Poetry, indeed, is a frequent topic of discussion, both formally and informally; and through this chink in the liberal armor, perhaps there filters an occasional glimmer of the fine arts. This might certainly be expected, since poetry and the fine arts treat the same subject matter, whatever that may be, in the same way, whatever that may be? It is precisely this identification of poetry and the fine arts that we believe to be the strayed connection between those arts and the local liberal imaginations . If it can be retrieved and restored, student interest might justify a few more fine arts lectures, or even promote a small discussion group. One of our tutors has recently said that poetry is the characteristic of the Great Books that will mark them as Great when their fortunes are otherwise at lowest tide in departments of philosophy and history and sociology. If this same element is to be found in painting and sculpture and architecture, then they are not to be tossed aside as fodder for ruminating dilettantes. Their poetry is as significant as the poetry of the books . If you find in poetry insights essentially inexpressible in prosa-ic terms, you will find the same in art; if you find poetry appealing to the intellect, you will find art the same. DAviD JoNES �Iglehart Hall, the den of diversion, again provided during the year 1956-57, the plan for good health and friendly excitement . Under the direction of Dale Cummings, the intra-mural athletic program, as well as the tourneys and individual sports, offered the refreshment and relaxation necessary during a St. John's work-week filled with arduous and diligent application . The season began with intra-mural contests in football. This rough and tumble sport for brisk weather lasted until late January, when basketball became the athletic intra-mural challenge. The remainder of the winter and the early spring found the basketball champions tenacious and consistent in their team-work and application to the skills of this most difficult and demanding sport-and the finals really found champion against champion. There is no joy in beautiful wisdom, unless one have holy health. SEXTUS EMPIRICUS Along with the growth in enrollment this year has been a decided rise in participation in athletics. A basketball team was formed that chalJenged local teams quite successfully. The fenc11:~g t~am took a number of first places in the d1stnct meets and sent representatives to the North Atlantic Sectional Championships. Students competed on a seminar team or individual basis for awards in badminton tennis fencing, basketball, football, softball, 'squash: and field and track. Activities offered not on an aw~rd basis were weight lifting, ping pong, wrest!lng, and ?and~al~ , with weight lifting showmg a definite ga1n 1n popularity . JoHN McDEviTT The spring term, and a new diamond on back campus, brought intra-mural excitement out into the sunshine with the softball tourney. The freshmen's proficient fielding, and the sophomores' determination made the competition keen between the two lower class teams, and the tension mixed with the fresh air offered afternoons of fun for the participants and the on-lookers. The track and field meet was the final inter-class competition, and that Saturday morning by the creek found the entrants in peak condition for the trials . The community gathering at the horseshoe cheered and encouraged the athletes throughout that grand entertainment, for the balance of the day. The games-between-the-classes proved again this year to be a favorite diversion for the St. Johnnys. The athletic program met part of the social needs of the community, and, at the same time, helped to instill in the participants the virtues of sportsmanship and teamwork. The class of 1957 looks ahead to future years to bring more successful programs of good health and good spirit. WILLIAM TILLES �Lyric Suite A LBAN B ERG Allegretto Giovaile : Seven College Students participated in the Annapolis YMCA Basketball League. Beginning without high aspirations, the first few games were played in the mood of the first movement. Andante A moroso: After several games, the players became a team. Although they lost the first few, they were improving. It was at this point that their interest shifted to the theme of the second movement. Allegro Misterioso-Trio Estatico : How could Don Cummings continue to average 25-30 points a game? Almy's energy ? Curtler's "special" shot-with his eyes closed? Trownsell's dribbling through his own team, as well as the opponent's? "Old Man" Dale Cummings running . .. and running? W ynn's free throws? The tempo of the third movement was established by such questions. Adagio Appassionato: The team began to move from the bottom of the league upward by upset victories. The new theme was evidenced by the fact that the players stopped smoking during the games. Once or twice there were even six players available for the games. Presto Delirando : St. John's qualified for the play-off games for the league championships. Losing team members to Spring Vacation, the players nevertheless w0n the semi-final game by 2 points. • • 1957 Largo Desolato: The final game, and championship, was lost by 3 points. T h is game being played by five players, one of which had only played with the team once before. In spite of this loss, the team was awarded a "run ner-up" plaque, which will be kept in the gymnasium. A. F. CHRIS T-JANER The rung of a ladder was never meant to rest upon, but only to hold a man's foot long enough to enable him to put the other somewhat higher. THOMAS MEMBERS OF THE TEAM Captain: HuGH CuRTLER Players DoN CuMMINGS DALE CuMMINGS HARVEY WYNN STEVE ALMY CHucK WoLBURG MIKE T ROWNSELL HuxLEY �STEVEN ARNOLD LERNER JoAN ELIZABETH CoLE RosABELLE GouLD HARRIS GERALD GEDIMAN jAMES wALTER LINSNER FAYE CouNCELL PoLILLO �JoHN jAMES RonowsKY jOSEPHINE jAQUELINE jASTER jAMES BuRT SIEMENS CHARLES AuGUSTINE NoRRIS HARVEY WILLIAM WYNN CoRNELIA HoFFMAN KLINE �Education is the instruction of the intellect in the laws of nature, under which name I include not merely things and their forces, but men and their ways; and the fashioning of the affections and of the will into an earnest desire to move in harmony with these laws. THOMAS HuxLEY .- �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 32 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1957 yearbook, St .John's College Description An account of the resource St. John's College Yearbook for the year 1957. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Curtler, Jr., Hugh (Editor) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1957 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1957 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/8d987d01aa7f8bd1713b1a5870b3cb00.pdf 7037f6824880ec91f85b45e7bac5bfaa PDF Text Text �CLA SS OF 1986 ANNAPOLIS CANPUS fl./;"'~-, 11(1Nvt.Lu.!u:,.L/L.- Ju li a nne Hambur g er September 9, 1982 ~d~-~ Linda Lorraine Hamm Samantha Alderson c-~-·~·~ Jh ~, ~ - --~/Lh. -.· Ch ristopher Temple Harris J..-J Dav id Prashakaran Amirthanayagam ~~ Jeannin e Nar i e Amont '"''"' "''"' '"'""' · '"· ~ }{a:....;_e. Ck~ ~~ ~ . . Renee Louise Berglund .. ~ ~· 'k ~~J~ Char l e s Foster Beckman A nne Elizabeth Boy le S ~..:san / ~ Ellen Hines Richard StepheniHvuelrbsuonrt I~ II ~~~~ ~ ~ lku,J~~ J;:,an Elizabeth f/a?lei ~_,f!?~r rf!jdrve/(; If_ . Ceelen! J o L (}~, 1,;.,~~ Daniel Stamper caldwell John Phillip- Richard Kathl een Susan Kelley ~- ~~ Ke nneth Gera ld Jacobs ~:ancy Martha Judith Cinader_ Did not register ~ ~ Narion Cannon Colli e r , :::::: ::::"::::::~~~~ ~ ~ Dv-y Daniel Paul Ellio tt ~ --~ O.....VV,... Anastacia Maria Kuvshinoff \ Arne Marie Litwiller ~T7. Yl~ _ ~~ ~ I ::::~::'.:::::: '""~~ b-~ ~ ~~~~~ ~ ~ Alejand ra Gomez Farias J{~ ~~/UAJ.({/ ~ Gabrielle Josephine Fink Andrew James F reda _ ~~- ~as>~ - -~ ./ · <? ....~ ~~ Teresa Jeanne Fullinwider S: ephen Ge of fre y Garner Scan Heath Genovese · • ~ ,· · -' ::1!/,e#::J._ x,o/~ ~~~_::;:_ llJ~~ Q)~Lh~ Elis~beth ,I ~~J.~~Jl' ~~d AJJ1$vn ~ ~ ~ LJwJf.ti. Jeremy Addison Lauer ~ - .. .• -- \1::?:>- I, ~- v~ -;1/'a~?~ ~~ Krlvak~ ~- -~ Andrew Joseph Frank Herman Durgin III Rebecca Ann Ei nsig Ellen Kesler ~~ ~ -~ :::::,:::'::,::::·:.:::~~,,~ ~ ~- Clayton Richard DeKorne c,;/ . ) ~ J/ v - ~ II' ~~ ~#~JL Tn omas Beverley Howard :::::·:":·:::.'""~~ ~- ~ Merchant Longi(Z1a,,k{A Thomas Merrill Lotina-Wyman Roger Winston Lowe Jfucj,~ (~ , - ·r..ct'YI--""? ~~ ~ ~ ~ /i,..._~ Lowthe~ D~ ~ .C.,-~ T:odd William Masilon :f¢J iJv' A~ )1 ~ .. George Patrick HcDo nald V:J /)~{~ David Crit t endon Deirdre Mary Elisabeth McGlynn Amy Nargaret j)~ -1/1~ ~ 'J11C£jr McManus~ -711~ 7fh m~- M ary Ondine McRoberts ~ t!J.~ ~6-~ Melissa Sharon Mead ~ )~ ~ Bc.rbara Maureen Gesiakowski Joel Benson Monaghan -6~ M ~ . Dc.v id Russ ell Rebecca Morgan Dc ~glas Alan Gentlle ~ -M_~ _p{:j~~ Gi v ens 'I)~ - 1\>~ 0~ . '· J c.mes Golder Goddard ,( ) ~ C" nstina Harie Greenhal g h e~'l. G~ a.A/ ":p . ~1:.v'n..a- mQ/u..L .;t; ~ .(;. Cl Suzanne ~- /')it!~ .. Emilienne Huise ~ ~ -~ Christopher John Nagel ~~~ ~ ~ - John Fran cis Newe ll A~an James Haffa ~ Derek Johnson 11 -~-- ~~ AJ~ -- 7'- ~~ r~ ~ O'Brien ~ ~ ~~ Debra Jean Grind l ey ~ -- ~~~ Kev in Michael Hey burn ~ .Jos,~\1'\t. \j,D.fA~ Cln.n:£ .eL_~e:flt_ &F Amy Josephi ne Bianco • ~~~~'---(1 ::::·,:::·::::::· ,.,,.. ~ M -fb;;__ ~~ �The 1986 Yearbook Staff would like to dedicate this book to Voltaire IL faut cultiver notre jardin- -Candide 2 �Annapolis, Maryland 3 ���" l'p , , t I , Pp 6 �- " WHAT DID YOU DO ON YOUR SUMMER VACATION ? I molested children. I did genetic experiments on sea monkeys. I sat in Central Park and threw pi$,!eons at passersbv. I worked toward World Peace and international harmony. I slung food in a greasy diner and became a member of Hell's Angels. I didn 't eat at SAGA I ate real food. I lived off my parents' wealth. I lived in Wyoming. I caused the sphere of the fixed starts to collapse on Blinky, the dog. I watched reruns of Miami Vice. I took classes, hung around, hit my little sister, and watched MTV I turned to jello I lived in the north with fish . I worked for SAGA I watched the universe end. I went to Mars I took up taxidermy. I worked for a rich man, I developed my laziness, I didn't read Don Q/ I took over a hundred million dollar company I protected the yuppie generation by picketing volvo dealerships I built a house, rebuilt a car I read a lot of trashy literature I sold plastic jewelry display cards I watched Star Trek episodes to help prepare for 7 seminar. �WHAT DO YOU LIKE TO DO AFTER SEMINAR? Read what the seniors read Read the next seminar reading Read the last seminar reading Study greek get trashed and do it fast · Think about how much its costing me and then contemplate beatitudes of hatred concerning my fellow interl~ cutors. The pills I used to take don't work anymore so now I lay in a gutter and get stoned on tap water While everybody is doing the above I study to get ahead, so that later in life I will be financially well off. I get lots of silly putty and take a bath Generally, I am hyper for a few hours until I am tired enough to fall asleep I play Trek Trivia or Scrabble Hang upside down from the rafters and sing ''Beautiful Dreamer'' Drink Pan Galatin Garge Blasters and contemplate the infinity of space Do homework Get put in a trash can Drink vodka and imitate Tiberius Attempt to sleep Watch all the weird things that go on in Campbell Hall at night Hang out in the coffee shop and eat a lot of food Take off my tie 8 �- WHAT'S THE FUNNIEST THING YOU'VE EVER HEARD SOMEONE SAY IN SEMINAR I have an inquiring mind weel, c'mon, I mean, you know a burp I read in the translator's preface that ... well, what if I perceived this table as reptilian If we hung this table on the wall, would it still participate in tableness I am the generator of Reality I may be dead wrong ... but well, my translation says God is sort of like a picnic basket Well, what you say makes sense, except the next sentence ... You don't have to be black to talk about soul Just because there is a mouse in the cookie jar doesn't mean he is a cookie jar Don't you understand, heaven is an eternal paradise that's really profound you know, the Odyssey can really be related to birth, kind of an analogy The relationship of Achilles to Priam is like that of Superman to Lex L. Well, if I were God Could you unpack that metephor goats don't make atoms what color are these well, it is, but it isn't 9 --·~-- -~~=--'-- - -'---"---------- �.i. ~ * Q) ,, ., k ~ "' ~ A dream, too, is from Zeus. HOMER Don't gain the world and lose your soul. ROBERT NESTA MARLEY �c .... ti'Y-NiW /Ion__£ 'no)t 3 ;1 o1 - 11 --;,- �MARL\S t:>EC.~ER . ~·' --- Peter Dwyer MILLIPORE 11ta.4"'H ;, t1u. "'Jr~N\k. lt s~ · Fovr yeo.rs) a.nd then ... . ~ruff l'"''h -:sa: 12 �Be nobody's darling Be an outcast. Take the contradictions Of your life And wrap them around you Like a shawl, To parry stones ' To keep you warm. Watch the people succumb To madness With ample cheer; Let them look askance you And you askance reply. Be an outcast Be pleased to walk alone (Uncool) Or line the crowded Riverbeds With other impetuous Fools. Make a merry gathering On the bank Where thousands For brave hurt words They said. ~ ..., Be nobody 's darling Be an ·outcast. Qualified to live A!nonq your dead. cys ~~ ~ -Alice Walker ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ \~(p ~<> 0 < l ,,_ ,} 1 g ~~ ,_. w \\ ---- ~~-z~~CP ___.. so~~ .. > r ~ ~ tn < (J) rrl z I ��WHAT'S YOUR OPINION OF THE NAVAL ACADEMY? They don 't read it in a book, they live it Fascists They are better than the Army They are almost as much fun as slugs Some of my best friends are mids The uniforms are cute I love a woman with a torpedo Its a glory symbol of the oppressive imperialist power hungry military state in which we live They're learning I like the long black coats They are nice people Does any one care? The entire operation would run much better if it were turned over to a private enterprise There is a lot of them They all look the same They have a nice library I don't know. I never met a mid ��- �so~ S e--;....;..._e_. fo·Ur'~:n·;./i..(. C.<:;r..-;.·+ ·(. £•OYH·Y¥;...-e . ·Yt·l!..-i-f. f.·-i-o-·;--+ <.l ~/1>€ h·nri.·;-·t, tll>e.B. . -;-·+u8 £•£~·;-...o£,<.t,·H..:l."' -·;....i-5 ut£' -·H·Yt- p-t::~u.p i£' <.l£' .Di~-;.~·-,..-cr-r+8_• .Et_. q ·H.a,·;.·+<.l ·'r +o·H·B ..,...£,8-fri·'~..a -;.·t.B_ . C.<.t. ..?Ju-·;."! <.l<.t.-'~·t-8 ·;.·t.<r'L(·8 pu-u.--...-;,.~t-<r'~·t-8 'H •Yot- .lJ{:t.··;-·+B .lJ £ ' 8 <:·-t::~·;.·+i.l_. .rr..-t::~·u.-'o £ ' -·i·;.~·t..:o-·i-8-'i- 5 r. e _ . H•V£'o -tf.£, 8<ru.--...--<f.£,8 pf.-tt.-'~·Yt-t£, 8. B <t•t.(. -tl £' r. <t.-i•?-..e II0 H ..1 ...1 w GAt\ 'f ( e ·v \. \) A ~ ~ " lL A cf 1 ELLIOtT �Asleep again? Caroline Oh yes - as often as possible. Fabhrney rnenn die einen gfnd im 1J>unkefn Und <Ht' ~ndern sind im Liclht. Und man-svehet di«:' hn 'L.~chte 5()) ie im dunke~n sieht mau 'Nicht rr~ i . McL\NDA FISHER .--"Bertolt ~rec.ht �fL6e rf A. r" ,)" 1\ ~ j' () OJ f\ t.K<>{;- tk)).. o<.. Cut Moj: LoJ''!> m :(. i""' k.s r . & uJJ ...,,.,o-~lt ~ / {Yl. ( .,/.,., ;<. J C!c1J_·/ lc:rcc.v 'E. 11 6Ko)..orf_ l; (- L" rlec)'Je. ) ~ 6( f/, (in t.. lvJi Y ''J ' II p. .-.s.J . r k O(. ' -r, ' j""o ~:JL-r ./... \/l oL5 JTJ.. vToL-- H.c rc.c....//f._·s vJor J-fl"y 1 TLI •?K) .) pr,n(e <> ( tv i /1 (~). oy o.s); pl,i)~ ht.·/.J yoJ ·.j.J, \{_ ( r'' (c. j t-f'/ _ .T )) .J, -. '"' ~"'9" fvre I 11 a•• nfh ........ Ou jd 11 if (;. .,..J f-<> ~~ ,..fL.,. r' <I J W s. $; wly ();J-,.. nJ4t tic fu-f if J · ltJo.Jjv 5-f 'f fu·s+ fi'dle); c~,( .J-o'l fl• l ("Jt"fs) j 1/.r, (71.,._,.., J<.J; ''tJv t~ ~iII tiv_ 6,.s-f r· ; tv+ 'fot.J L,., If n , J -1-o ft II fuv ~"~ i f yov dd ...,.,i 'fn~'<~YJi...;r Y'., 1 J'-- x;)I~:;; L+ wt"~ p.?} 1 ANDR.fW )>?e N. /YI_ {_Knf h;.., oJ-f o..:f -fh,,,6/f) k,, f a II ~-;:;a~ -h J r!L~r), Hr t wL. s-lot~ ,.5fec..s .J .) Rob~rt ,<:;.., 11.- on? tJ~~ he, )'YJ '( PHINEAS 20 _1_· - .J.. T'< <'HI n -'1 "«, v.., j ..vL, .L . f i ..;~ f· ,..,,. WorJ lkr-.. c.hf~ '""'"""f,.r,J i4/l'c-f). 5flr,..ll (1i,."ff ks) fi"J<I ~ 4/1 f u·' }'lof 1) • wrrc: I yoJ hr .. r but... k L ue -iv vt-J' r - ~+.. ,_,J ~f.> no . r.~·.J id•4 /.,. .... r {)('sf\ rj t' · J · ~.._.. j t.., t "'"L,f .§. .ftJ-eD.; Ev'"''' .,, ;Jrs cJ w ~tf( Ls t i {tv.· }){ clos''f /,._,,_,,.,.,... {I ft-H.,rY}d ) v"' Ue - ,>?f,: ,)r~ GOSSELINK 1 1 ���DO YOU LIKE THE SPORTS PROGRAM AT ST. JOHN 'S, WHY OR WHY NOT? Yes I like what it should be , I hate what it is I'll tell you if I ever start playing Neat-o o.k. I guess, it could be better I would give my left kneecap for it More soccer More yelling and team spirit ��l �Junior Seminar Mrs. Flaumenhaft; Mr. Williamson; Abrams, Jerry; Bailey, Christopher; Beckman, Charles; Bogucki, Joan; Figueroa, David; Haffa, Alan; Hodges, Robin; Irvine, Catherine; Jackson, Stephen; Johns, Karin; Kambouris, Alexandra; Kornbluh, Rebecca; Powers, Jay; Sinis, Katia-Elena; Sulat, Sabina-Anne; Thomas, Julia Mr. Dink; Mr. Zuckerman; Allen, James; Burke, Justin; Fullinwider, Teresa; Gerstmann, Michael; Kovar, Elizabeth; Krupa, Christine; Langan, Bernard; Lavery, John; Lowry, Thomas; Masilon, Todd; Morgenstern, Raymond; Rettenberg, Frank; Roscoe, Johanna; Solin, James; Tappan, David; Watson, Christopher; White, Lisa 26 �·Junior Seminar Mrs. Kronsberg; Mr. White, Anderson, Paul; Apirion, Jonathon; Ben-Yosef, Zohar; Bernstein, Daniel; Breuer, Talke; Cohen, David; DiNucci, Celeste; Emmart, Paul; Gesiakowski, Barbara; Harrison, Chase; Hart, John; Howell, Christopher; King, Susan; Ladd, Felicity; Macfarland, Joseph; Morse, Matthew; Scarfe, Susan; Schug, Rebecca; Wolska, Alexsandra Mr. Milner; Mr. Sterling; Beckman, Andrew; Bond, Katharine; Caldwell, Daniel; Dallett, Christian; Davis, Denton; Fabi, Andrea; Fine, Sallie; Heimann, David; Hum, Barbara; Manry, Mark; Mobayed, Julia; Morris, Michael; O'Brien, Derek; Owen, Charles; Peterson, Todd; Shaughnessy, John; Smith, Michael; Valle, Milagros 27 �Junior Seminar Mr. O'Grady; Mr. Raditsa; Anderson, Mary; Anderson, Paul; Bailey, Christopher; Bockman, Jason; Chang, Hak-Man; Clement, Kateri; Harrison, Chase; Hum, Barbara; Kambouris, Alexandra; Klebe, Skott; Lynch, Christopher; McShane, Michael; Mobayed, Julia; Morris, Elizabeth; Morse, Matthew; O'Brien, Derek; Schug, Rebecca; Shaughnessy, John 28 �Sophomore Seminar Ms. Locke; Mr. Zeiderman; Argodale, Paul; Campbell, Jean; Demajistre, Robert; Eubanks, Marc; Fettner, Peter; Hamm, Joel; Harper, Burch; Kester, Preston; Lapham, Jennifer; Lewis, Kirsi; Newton, Sidney; Phillips, Dale; Ritsinias, Spyros; Sisko, John; Wilson, Erika Br. Robert; Mr. Townsend; Anderson, Larra; Cunningham, Carole; Gillett, David; Hawkins, Matthew; Hoh, Daniel; Holmes, Catherine; Komara, Edward; Lavoie, Eric; Madhu, Rama; Magocsi, Alexander; Masters, Bernard; Mitchell, Katharine; Mock, Tracey; Paffenroth, Kim; Trigg, Fawn 29 �Sophomore Seminar , ~, , l Mr. Tuck; Mr. Verdi; Bertram, John; Comeaux, Robert; Craig, Caron; Culver, Leslie; Daton, Gidon; Ferguson, Gregory; Hahn, Barbara; Hayes, Janet; Laporte, Irene; McGowan, Timothy; May, Shannon; McNabb, Gerald; Randles, Charles; Schaller, David; Schwindt, Ellen; Suh, Thomas; Szweda, Matthew; Waters, Sarah • l \' ' .,. t~ I ! , Miss Blettner; Mr. Lenkowski; Bauer, Karel; Branter, Hugh; Brown, James; Clement, Linda; Derocher, Christopher; Doorandish, Meetra; Freeman, Christine; Jacobs, Gretchen; Kuntavanish, Rena; McDeavitt, Jason; Ostdiek, Julie; Parfitt, Jeremy; Pendergrass, Andrew; Schwenk, Lisa; Slakey, William; Strache, Vivian; T ouey, Daniel 30 �Sophomore Seminar Mr. Blaustein; Mr. Kalkavage; Back, Eun; Carter, Samuel; Cooper, Laurie; Dean, Steven; Doorandish, Dariush; Dupuis, Pamela; Friedenberg, Christopher; Garelick, Matthew; Guyot, Khin Khin; Karins, Arturs; Kastel, A. Kurt; Periwal, Sukumar; Probst, Claudia; Rosen, Beth Mr. Kuder; Mr. Umphrey; Butters, Paul; Caiola, Sara; Craven, Rick; Deddens, Theodore; de Mare, Elizabeth; Dooling, Sarah; Fischer, William; Floyd, Picot; Halkett, Pamela; Hynes, Brian; LaGuardia, Juliet; Maxwell, Tobias; May, Shannon; Nordin, Craig; Patterson, Angeline; Shaw, Diana; Smith, Jeffrey; Virgil, Stephen; Wald, Sabrina 31 �DESCRIBE THE MOST MEMORABLE SAGA MEAL YOU'VE EATEN? Meal? you mean SAGA makes food? Steak and lobster Rover was a fine pet, but a lousy meal The ice cream is always good The escargot was undercooked I don't know what it was, but it was good Felafel with Tahini Reality food Leftovers Breakfast Fruit Loops It was green The cauliflower was excellent Potatoes Lots of chocolate cake Meals in the private dining room Free meals for off-campus students 32 ��34 �35 �' I '' I: I, THE GAME OF GETTING THROUGH ST. JOHN'S COLLEGE ' r !' I. I -for up to six players- On these two pages you will find your instructions and game pieces. Turn the page to find the Board Object: To be the first to reach the Liberty Tree and graduate. • I' ,I Instructions: Xerox the game pieces, cut them out and fold in half to make them stand upright. Start at the Carroll.-Barrister Admissions office End at the Liberty Tree Use one die to roll and move along the path of the program. Follow all instructions on each square 36 �FOLD HERE .i I.,II FOLD HERE 'I FOLD HERE FOLD HERE Ii )' I• 1. '( 37 �You learned how to waltz and even enjoy it, dance ahead 2 spaces You're a febbie, go back 7 spaces to learn the Greek alphabet You couldn't find the heart of the dissected frog in lab, move back l square You actually attended 3 freshman chorus meetings in a row You're a soph. transfer from Santa Fe , go to the Pres . house for a picnic President's house Roll a 4 to get out and go to Soph . Math The Helical Anomaly has you running in eccentric circle Campbell You are taking an Aristotle & Aquinas preceptorial You read the wrong Kant reading for the seminar, lose a turn You got disenabled! Start again at the beginning You learned the conjugation of etre and avoir You composed your own tune in music class, skip ahead 2 spaces You turned 21, go to the Little Campus to celebrate Little Campus Roll a 5 to get out and go to Junior Language You have to translate 30 lines of Euripedes by tomorrow, lose a turn You were drafted by the team of your choice 38 Humphreys The saga meal you ate last night is still with you , go back l space Job reading tonight, wear a tie to seminar Its Reality Weekend! The enabling committed decided to offer you a job as a tutor-skip to the Liberty Tree and win! You returned all your library books on time You don 't know what you will be doing after graduation-go to Santa Fe �-------=========~ --=-== - ---==-=-=-~~=-=- =========-------~--~~~==~~~=~ - -~ -~ -- --- Meno makes no sense , lose a turn You did your first Euclid proof at the board You know all the names of the sports teams Take your first trip to Chic & Ruth 's Deily for a bagel You can say the whole Greek alphabet! Roll a 3 to get out and start again at Carroll-Barrister House ~----------~~--------~ Welcome to St. John 's, skip ahead 2 spaces (tarn.dl- Baar isftr1Umse O FF ICES ADM ISSIONS ALUMNI DEVELOPMENT PUBLIC RELATIONS Randall START You handed a paper in on time , skip ahead 2 spaces You proved Prop. 70 in Newton A pendulum fell on your toe, go back 5 spaces Its senior prank! Carroll- Barrister You're a DJ at a coffee shop party, but you must be trained to use the stereo, lose a turn You called people by their first names in class-go to Santa Fe McDowell You can draw a model of the atom East-West Pinkney SANTA FE You won the mud-wrestling event during Reality -take a shower You actually read the Heart of Darkness before seminar Your senior essay was accepted, go to the liberty tree to receive your diploma It's Spring Break, you 've gone to Miami, move ahead 2 spaces Finish Liberty Tree Your room looks like a Hjelmslev Transformation Roll a 2 to get out and begin in Senior Lab You've been reading too much Fleurs de Mal , lose a turn and dream about it You've won a blazer 39 �WHAT'S YOUR IMPRESSION OF SANTA FE? The experience in Santa Fe does not leave one with impressions, only with a few lasting realities, that never forget the feel of mountain air, or the sight of aspens changing in the lofty distance. Everyone has long hair 50% eccentric, tal~nted and transient people, 49% people who don't have what it takes to be in Annapolis and 1% normal people Lots of people tripping on tofu Its great, I love it Annapolis refugees Mountain wave gliding on to the desert, a weight of the spirit the canyon behind you Cacti, cacti tumble weeds and lizards basking in the sun adobe I don't know, never been there a restful place 40 I like the skiing ��defies rules ... 0 42 //ike a lot of New Wave." �- TED He went back to the house, and in the living room stretched out on the couch. Pulling the folded quilt to his chest, he held it there like a pillow against himself. He heard the cattle lowing to be fed, heard the softrasp of his father's crying breath, heard his mother's broken humming of a hymn. He lay that way in the graying light and slept. The sun was blackened with snow, and the valley closed in quietly with humming, quietly as an hour of prayer. Breece D'J Pancake "First Day of Winter" I NC7HAM �ANNE" - MARIE LITWILLER !?~~(!flU) ~4-1~ 1 ~,~.). /~t: ~~ ~~5 ~J, ,,;71~?~1/ ~ ~~~~7~~ur r~ .Lu/-1~ 17d- ~? ,~~ ~"k ~~'/~t/ ~ ?; ~ ~~7~~· ~w/, Or~y~,;_~ ~~ ld4~? /Jurlre ~~ /z:> ~~~~a' /~~/~~ //1~ rnvers /fb /<.dtl '!Ju.r~e.C-/~ ~ ~~r~m. We~ ,r:-t:->/4~ J ~ ~7'~' t �T\M LOTINA -WYMAN M 0 R G A N MEL\SSA M£AD 45 �46 �------ - -- ------ -- - - - -- WHAT DO YOU PLAN TO DO AFTER YOU LEAVE ST. JOHNS? become a hunger artist plant beans come back work for saga be a yuppie apply for unemployment I'm joining the gun lobby read comic books and be happy try to go to grad school maybe drink some wine and eat some cheese and redefine late twentieth century consciousness reapply to santa fe under an assumed name move to wyoming become an expert climber, hunt, ski, ride horses have kids live in the mountains and eat wild strawberries and bake bread move to gaithersburg maryland and be religious learn something useful move, live in Santa Fe adobe solar houses rot in an alley die of high blood pressure from eating saltine crackers �48 �. I - .. / ;!._/ . ' t ~/ 49 �A ?HI/b~-, c.a...--;~~J/ey- h4--,1~ --Durn~t( r.l,e.?N.se-/.Yq- ~J .. S~;u I -re4.d a7( • ......,. 7/tt~?dr~.$~7 �- L ' I. Nothlnt: exists. If 11nything exists, it must be either Being or Not-Beinf:, or both Being and Not-Being. (a) It cannot be Not-Being, for Not-Being docs not exist; if it did, it would be at the same time Being and Not-Being, which is impossible. (6) It cannot be Being, for Being docs not exist. If Being exists, it must be either everlasting, or created, or both. i. It cannot be everlasting; if it were, it would have no beginning, and therefore would be boundless; if it is boundless, then it has no position, for if it had position it would be contained in something, and so it would no longer be boundless; for that which cont.'lins is greater than that which is contained, and nothing is greater than the boundless. It cannot be contained by itself, for then the thing containing and the thing contained would be the same, and Being would become two things- both position and body- which is absurd. Hence if Being is everlasting, it is boundless; if boundless, it has no position ('is nowhere'); if without position, it does not exist. ii . Similarly, Being cannot be created; if it were, it must come from something, either Being or Not-Being, both of which are impossible. iii. Simil<~rly, Being cannot be both everlasting and created, since thq are opposite.· Therefore Being docs not exist. iv. Being cannot be One, because if it exists it has size, and is therefore infinitely divisible; at least it is threefold, having length, breadth and depth. v. It cannot be Many, because the Many is made up of an addition of Ones, so that since the One docs not exist, the Many do not exist either. (c) A mixture of Being and Not-Being is impossible. Therefore since Bein& does not exiet, nothln& exieu. L7o r~ ,a_s of ) b' OU K "'"- £. 1T / !:-"'1/ et('A Ev D ~> . _ <AIIv L /; .. , ./'11'. vCJ./ - "'v Oc' 'f v ;~,., ,;ov 01. )/ • £.)C.:>V(;;DS X') ) ~ / ) ?o..'-'<'f''nTO tl 8 £ fr>. TT z: lll.LI/1 / /..,. . __J, "(Lc;r"x,vf~?t.ta>"' v ws (:-, l~orrt (f\ I', / 'Ei7(tf"'t'f"'"C"- IT£ TT ur / t c v i<o"too.. , .· E£$;ct<>~. :see yo oJ C.\.. 'jet t(\ C? ) Johl\ Ne_wel/ ~ - 0 p H A A ) / ' 'c. ' ~IJ~OV ' )<.. ':_ 1.:: o"7:'5-. CV='/-'"'-O"'LV ) £)<; t:Cv· c: ,,S P1-1t'TO .. N u L ... Cr-•+ylvs 'f'tOC..'- _ - (over) L 0 untitled --Peter Christopher Reichert-Facilides 1986 1 this is a poem to my son Peter whom I have hurt a thousand times whose large and vulnerable eyes have glazed in pain at my ragings thin wrists and fingers hung boneless in despair, pale freckled bent in defeat, pillow soaked by my failure to understand. I have scarred, through weakness and impatience your frail confidence forever because when I needed to strike you were there to be hurt and because I thought you knew you were beautiful and fair your bright eyes and hair but now I know that no one knows that about himself, but must be told and retold until it takes hold because I think that anything can be killed after a while, especially beauty so I write this for life, for love, for you, my oldest son Peter, age 10, 51 going on -~1. ~ ._ _ , __g__ .ff. _.., ~ N �YOLANDA RIVERA CoT!£ (!jus s. .f' ,To !J._ ,-s -11, c!o . .So u .. les .:SO...f.l : To clo , ·~ fD !J e . .:S,·YJa...fr,.._ MAR\ -C.LAIRE Ruc.ELL S..p. : ho he J., b e. do �tpHlLN390~ A thought that sometimes makes me hazyam I, or are the others crazy! Albert Einstein 0 0 'J: u V) > ... - 2 :: v 2 c( f\ ...... '2 \u <t G JOHN RYAN 53 �54 �WHAT'S YOUR FAVORITE READING ON THE PROGRAM? The shortest one Scooby-Doo where are you Nothing, so far, but I still have six months and a lot of hope Everything except Epictetus The Good Book Aristotle's De Anima Plato does Dallas Hegel's Phenomenology of Okra The Dead DonG Winnie the Pooh All of them 55 ��• .f ' Patrick Bergin Roger Burton John Chua Charles Crutchfield Mar 1 is Decker Peter Dwyer Paul Emmart Steven Gere Harry Hami 1 ton Erik Harder Paul Kelley _ Carrie Kropeck Andrew League Matthew Morse Kell i Ostrom Charles Owen t4argaret Parish Jennifer Parker Yolanda Rivera Lisa Rose Robert Rybarceyk Norman Santiago Lisa Schne 11 Michael Shec.k Laura Shedd Christopher Stevenson Christopher Stokes Michael Wright �,, ~e lllarvefous, " 1'1 11~/ fl $Y '·"' . < . Courtesy OE M:;sr. l.ardy erg Targ NANCY 1'0W~SEN1> �• EDITH lJ ?-Dl K E' 59 �~~ it~/ tl ... $Y '\ ' .r . Courtesy OE M>sr. la.rdy erg Targ NANCY 1'0\>.lt-ISENt> �I r~~t"~co ..,.rr. p,~t-2. o)::i-.., ct1li1 ~ cr, v. "' ~A~:>"'Itll/ t1 G\ ~ • ~ ~~~~~~:\~g ~ot.-1;\~i,"~"" a_ !1\~ (.4 J: r :J> ~ ,... r ::;.. ~ "' z. ~ ~ t, . t "ig ~k~o .,. ~ . l:. g ~ E, ~ r~ ~ ~""~c.Ct 0 (il ~ ., ~ .t!l\~ ct\ il It G ~ t J i ~ " 0 ~ v "' -< 0 >t ~ ~ ~ 'lj ~ ~~ "· ~ ~;; Wi~ ~"\ ~~ i~ ~~ .... >. . '!'"; ,.!;tl Be always drunken. Nothing else matters& that is ..r • the only question. If you would not feel the horrible burden of Time weighing on your shoulders and crushing you to the earth, be drunken continually. Drunken with what? With wine, with poetry, or with virtue, as you will. ·But be drunken. And if sometimes, on the stairs of a palace, or on the green side of a ditch, or in the dreary solitude of your own room, you should awaken and the drunkenness be half or wholly slipped away from you, ask of the wind, or of the wave, or of the star, or of the bird, or of the clock, of whatever flies, or sighs, or rocks, or sings, or speaks, ask what hour it is; and the wind, wave, star, bird, clock, will answer you: "It is the hour to be drunken~ Be drunken, if you would not be martyred slaves of Time: be drunken continually~ With wine, with poetry, or with virtue, as you will." (from Symons' translation of Baudelaire's prose poem) Lyndsey Pilar Wyman~ ~. ('tiPQ f :I. ::t. l 5'· l , ~· ez . ~ ~ 0 ; a l'l> . a· . ~ ., ·~~·.-.·~\."' 1,. .···· ~ : l:·.:.•. '~. , r "" ·~ . ., c ~ "'('} r {{'k W~ ~:P""ll('l;p-9 2 ~ f1)2: 70 ~orn ~ ~ 3;pc~-< ~ cr,:r ,_~ ~ ~ ~ 0 mo- ~~~~()~ rn ' ~;p~;._,.,..co ~ -<~ O s " D C -r--t ;JI> ;o ." c .ZVIO-ii~;p -1 ~· r-~:rv :J :z mmrtotc ~ O.:a(J)r-0 .z . ""0 __, c .... . 3~ · �• ED WEISS THE POP£ AND HIS PARTY p\c~red ~ Co~ BvvkleY j tvn t3v~ s. JbM C~f~ Bvaot Coo,k ~M~ Pl~hY) t-f Owo-t cJ S~ \S¥aeJ \OM ~o \-le. ILer ~ ~ \ 1"Z-'o ~ 1- Ortj (Zo~ l-ovv<- 0 r l3rteh ~ l<;~ LdYrJ O',_.(~h~V?h k- -tU r f'v{tvhw l~olk ' fl1t u.. Pot+e¥ Sh'aAG?'h. Potfn ot P Ue~ Scof-f ~~~ S!--veh t>ev~ S~_s G'tt1 v tS tz, ICL s s DMre jD 61 0 sfvo n, V~r-ue#-e_ ~§~ �Freshman Seminar Mr. Druecker; Mr. Dublin; Benjamin, Timothy; Clurman, Will; Gilden, Violet; Hackett, Andrew; Heinberg, Nancy; Lucas, David; Manning, Maura; Miles, John; Miller, Joseph; Morton, Emma; Orlin, Janet; Pittman, James; Roustan, Estela; Tegeler, Christopher; Waters, Alexei; Wetherson, Sarah; Walberg, Robert; Yancey, T y Mr. Berns; Mr. Burke; Ahonen, Miriam; Aukerman, Daniel; Craig, Cherie; Datcher, Rhonda; Earnest, David; Gaffney, Erika; Girod, Jennifer; Good, Brian; Goodrum, Garfield; Herz, Nathaniel; Hogan, Mary; Letaw, Ninda; Liddel, Alan; Lieberman, Joel; Morrell, Richard; Packard, Jenni; Quigley, Thomas; Stuart, Brad; Takacs, Stephanie 62 �.... Freshman Seminar Miss Colmant; Mr. Kurs; Catania, Sara; Dill ard, D avid; Empie, Douglas; Fallon, James; Guszcza, James; Heitmann, T imothy; H olmberg, T eodor; Jeffers, Jason; Kalinauskas, Alfonso; Kojac, Jeffrey; Lee, Jennifer; Mauldin, Bronwyn; Nickson, Nanette; Pawlewicz, Valerie; Pisarra, David; Sturr, C hristopher; Williamson, Steven Mr. Antal; Mr. Sachs; Attar, Susie; Beers, Lee; Bieneman, Charles; Cargas , Sarita; C arpenter, Lee; Duvoisin, Jeanne; Gold, Lael; Klatte, Diana; Martin, Jonathan; Pantalone, Anne ; Pope, Denise; Porter, Molly; Rushlau, Ian; Ruzsits-Redfield, Kurt; Schmidt, Eric; Tosti, Nina; Young, Malcolm �Freshman Seminar Ms. Kraus; Mr. Maistrellis; Cullen, Daedre; Dalton, Amanda; Forgus, Tristan; Harmon, Ian; Heavner, Bruce; Kirschner, Andrew; Maganias, Margo; Mattingly, James; McClain, Christopher; Mitten, Eleanor; Ripp , Renee; Rosenthal, Caren; Schneier, Jeffrey; Skinner, Jonathan; Stenger, Scott; Sullivan, Brian; Sullivan, Christopher; Webb, Anna Miss Giovannelli; Mr. Comber; Abramson, Maia; Brennan, James; Chatfield, Benjamin; Davis, Dixie; Dobbs, April; Duel, Rachel; Eggleston, John; Heffernan, Brendan; Isham, John; Kloss, Judith; Mecinski, Barbara; Mendelson, Lee ; Mooney, Monique; Nyberg, Anthony; Sawicki, Melissa; Shiffman, M ark; Speck, Paul; Sullivan, Courtney; Woidyla, Heather 64 �-- - - -- -- - - - - -- January Freshman Seminar Miss Fain; Mr. McDonald; Antoniou, Anna; Bechtel, Brigham; Boucher, Joseph; Duhan, Eliot; Faris, Sabrina; Gelfand, Martin; Graham, Michael; Hall, Michael; Leonard, Elisabeth; Maillett, Peter; Petrone, Susan; Ressler, Mark; Rosenbaum, Aaron; Williamson, Amy; Wolbarsht, Selah Mr. Capozzoli; Mr. Fisher; Baugh, Conrad; Baxter, Scott; Bowen, Michael; Davison, William; Freeman, John; Grablewski, Andrew; Hanson, Diane; Johnston, Jennifer; Lord, Richard; Marks, Christopher; Moulton, George; Silver, John; Stephens, Stephanie; Sweeney, Nell 65 - -- - - �..L - ..~- ./ i ., I . \ I I . ;\ \·, ll 1 .' ��Jlr! ' • ... ~· , 68 .· •. ., .... .. ·.. . �/ / 69 �Senior Essays 1986 Alderson, Samantha Amirthanayagam, David Fink, Gabrielle Friend Phaedrus A Senior Draft The Recognition of Penelope and Odysseus Stories about Equality Fisher, Melinda The Poetic Art Critism of Les Phares Beauty for the Moral Man Amont, Jeannine Death-Marked Lovers: Romeo and Juliet and Antony and Cleopatra. Fitzmaurice, John A Comparison of the Cosmologies of Alexander Pope and Isaac Newton Aron, Carl What is This Stuff?!? A Study of the Concepts of Body, Matter, and Substance Flynn, Jennifer God and the Good: A Comparison of Likely Stories Freda, Andrew On Courage Bergland, Renee Ripeness Is All George, Robert Besher, Arseny Chuk Tolstoy and His Icons of Greatness Boyle, Anne Notes on Aristotle's Ethics Logos The Universe and Everything Man's Changing Relationship with the Divine Buckler, Mary Catherine "Which Will You Choose?" A Look at Descartes' Sin of Error and The Two Creation Myths of Genesis Gere, Steven A Post Non-Euclidean Look at Kant, Space, and Geometry Givens, David Marx Historical Materialism and Critical Theory Kernel Kurtz: A Clew on How to Hear Marlow's Story in Heart of Darkness Goddard, James The Logical Foundations of Arithmetic A Critique of One Christian's Thought by Johannes Climacus Gosselink, James Intelligence, Sympathy, and Suffering in Prometheus Bound Knowing as a Journey, Not a Destination Hamburger, Julianne Laws and Labyrinths: The Heroic in Phedre and Nadia The Establishing of Mastery in Marriage Hamilton, Harry The Failure of Gabriel DeKorne, Clayton A Vision of the Hagia Sophia Harriss, Nancy "0, The Green Wothe Botheth" DiGiovanni, Portia Neils Bohr: On the Spectrum of Hydrogen A Revolution in Scientific Method Hawkins, Helmut Rain Falling From a Clear Sky: Paradox and Structural Continuity in joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness Downey, Jerome Fuzzy Tigers and Billiard Balls Herner, Mary Beth Wisdom Through Violence in War And Peace Durgin, Frank A Commentary on Baudelaire's ''Correspondances" Howard, Thomas Free Will in War And Peace Ingham, R. Edward A Reading of the Melian Dialogue Israel, Sanford The Shape of Things johnson, Ward Mathematical Intuition Kelley, Kathleen The Movement of Life into Death Knight, Eugene Fools and Madmen, Bedlam Beggars and Kings : Where Comedy and Tragedy Meet in King Lear The Uses of Nothing: A Study of the Fool in King Lear Krivak, Andrew A Tragedy and a View of Life: The Mayor of Casterbridge Evans, Seth Gentle Irony: the Transformations of Pierre in War and Peace Kropeck, Carrie An Essence, and It Is Love Lauer, Jeremy The Iliad: not Will, but Wonder Fahrney, Caroline Plato, Gorgias Litwiller, Anne Marie Farias, Alejandra When can the Distressed Spirit Rest? The Struggle of an Exile: Camus' "The Adulterous Woman" and "The Growing Stone" Burton, Roger Buss, James Cook, Bradford Decker, Marlis Dwyer, Peter The Union of Freedom and Necessity in the Development of History Einsig, Rebecca Courage in Speech and Deed: An Exploration of Plato's Laches Elliott, Daniel Paul Mechanics of Mankind's Rescue Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound Elliott, J. Gary . 70 �Long, Elizabeth The Fluid World of the Bacchae Rosen, Philip Interpreting Quantum Theory: A Linguistic Consideration Latina-Wyman, Thomas The Influence of Descartes' Need for Certainty on the Development of His Physics Rucell, Mari-Claire Can We T alk? Rudolph, Bernadette What Gulliver Does Not Learn From His Travels Ryan, John Love and Freedom in War And Peace Schoos, Daniel The Dead and the Naked, or You Always Hurt the One You Love: Socrates and the Art of Statesmanship in Plato's Gorgias Scott, George Metaphor and Symbolism in Kafka's The Metamorphosis Lowther, David McDonald, George A Discussion of the Foundations of Geometry The Problem of the Prince: Motivation, Hesitation, and Resolution in Shakespeare's Hamlet McRoberts, Ondine A C ircumspect Welcome; Book XXIII of Homer's Odyssey Mead, Melissa "Why Could not They go on as They Had Done?" A Study of Change in Emma Seidl, Lawrence Origins of Cohesive Thought Morgan, Rebecca I Don't Know About Art, But I Know What I Like Sery, Douglas Kierkegaard's "Either/ Or" An Examination of Thought and Spirit Muir, Melissa Chivalry is not Dead: The Role of the Reader in Don Quixote Shen, Keh-Wah Kenneth The Three Predictions of Virgil Nagel, Christopher The Latent Image in Donne's Good friday Sobczysnki, Stuart Rimbaud, Kandinsky, Bacon Stengren, Ralph Opstigen: The Ascent to Faith Newell, John Passive Genesis: A Search for the Origin of the Sense Th at the World is Intersubjective Steven s, Paul An Analysis of Johann Sebastian Bach's Figure No . 6, Vol. 2, of The Well Tempered C lavier O'Brien, Lisa An Oar for Elpinor Stokes, Richard O'Flahavan, Lawrence The Mole Theory Descartes' Imagination and Analysis O'Hanlon, Paul Pascal's Geometry of Looking T ang, Landy The Love Song ofT. S. Eliot Ostrom, Kelli An Awakening in The Dead Townson, Nancy Politic Imagination in Shakespeare's The T empest Parish, Margaret An Essay on J ung's T ypology Updike, Edith Pausic, Teresa T o Begin in Wonder Painting wit h Words: Baudelaire's "Paysage" Polk, Michael How Self-Interest Serves Public Welfare: The Economics and Moral Philosophy of Adam Smith Vermette, David A Commentary o n "The Four Great Errors" Walker, Nathan Porter, Alice Coming Back From Beyond An Essay on Conversation and Responsibility in Montaigne's Essays External Government and the Natural Man Walker, Reid Human Potential and Human Folly in The Divine Comedy Warner, Paul Questioning Action at a Distance: An Analysis of Faraday and Maxwell Weiss, A. Edward A Critique of Kantian Aesthetics Whedon, Matthew Divinity & Identity in King L ear Whitestone, John The Legend of a Faun, a Titanesse, and the Universe, by Edmund Spenser. (Cosmology in a Story? You've got to be Kidding?) Wi ll iamson, H enry The Troubled Warrior : Inner Conflict in Hektor and Archilleus Wyman, Lyndsey Clear to the Infinite: Pascal's Conic Generation Young, Mark Human Wisdom and Statesmanship in the Gorgias Portnoff, S h aron "When We Two Parted .... " Reichert, Christopher The Federalists Vs . the Anti-Federalists Rico, Stephanie Objectivity: Nietzsche and Quantum Physics Rivera, Yolanda "You H ave Seen Sunshine Rain at Once ... ": Natural Justice in King L ear Robnolt, Jacquelaine "From Heaven Through the World to Hell" The Unfolding Spirit in Goethe's Fau st (Part I; Part II, Acts Four and Five) Rose, Lisa An Appeal on Behalf of Poetry 71 �Index - - - -- - - - - Page 6 - - -- - - - -Katie Kelley, Sally DeKorne, Lyndsey Wyman, Samantha Alderson, George Scott, Nathan Walker, Tom Howard, Joe Miller, Brad Stuart, Doug Rushlowe, Lisa Rose - - - - - - -- - Page 40 - - - - -- - - Deirdre Cullen, Denise Pope, Roger Burton, Steve Dean, Joe Miller, Jon Martin, Marc Eubanks, Todd Masilon, Anne Boyle, Dave Amirthanayagam - - - - - - - - - Page 7 - - - - - - - - Jeanne Duvoisin, Anna Webb, Harry Hamilton, Alexandra Kambouris, Jeanne Duvoisin, T y Yancey, John Shaunessey, Chris Marks, Ann Leonard - -- - - -- -Page 41 - - - -- -- Kate O'Malley, Chris Stokes, Melissa Sawicki, Lisa Rose, Gail Watkins, Ondine McRoberts, Renne Bergland, MariClaire Rucell, Portia DiGiovanni, Brad Cook, T y Yancey - - - - -- - - - Page 8 - -- -- - - - John Skinner, T odd Masilon, Steve Dean - - - - - - -- - Page 46 - - - - -- - -Larry Seidl, Helmut Hawkins, Chris Nagel, Ondine McRoberts, Renee Bergland, Bernie Rudolph, Alejandra Farias, Becky Einsig, Mr. Beall, Tom Howard, Robert George, Chris Reichert, Alice Porter, Julie H amburger - - -- -- - - - Page 14 - -- - - -- - George McGovern, Mari-Claire Rucell, Rhonda Datcher, Susan Scarfe, Bruce Heaverman, Mark Schiffman, Michael Gerstmann, Dan Bernstein, Molly Porter, Robert Walberg - -- - - - -- Page 47 - - - -- -- Marlis D ecker, Nathan Walker, Lyndsey Wyman, Ralph Stengren, Kate Kelley, Edith Updike, Eugene Knight, Steph Rico, Carrie Kropeck, Mr. and Mrs. Berns - -- -- - - -- Page 15 - -- - - - - - Mr. Kuder, Mr. Milner, Todd Peterson, Eleanor Mitten, Lael Gold, Jeff Kojak, Brian Good - - - - -- -- - Page 16 - -- -- - - - Edith Updike, Chris Reichert, D ancers, Stephanie T akcas, Brad Stuart, Elliot Zuckerman, Rhonda Datcher and friend, T om Burke, Janet H ayes - - -- -- - - - Page 17 - - - - - - -- Sara Catania, Tim H eitman, Dave Tappen, Susan Scarfe , Ray Morganstern, Dan H oh, Alejandra Farias, Steve Dean, Bronwyn Mauldin, Jeanne Duvoisin, Ed "the Pope" Weiss - - - - - - --Page 48-- - - - - - Ms. Giovanelli, Jeff Kojak, Edith Updike, Stuart Sobczynski, Doug Sery, Robert Comeaux, Paul Speck, Simon McNabb, Susan Scarfe, Bruce H eavner, Mark Shiffman - -- - -- --Page 49-- - - - - - Todd Peterson, Charles Randles, Diana Shaw, Paul Argodale, Jean Campbell , Jason Jeffries, Brian Good, John Shaunessey, Chris Marks, Anne Leonard, Anna An inion - -- - - - - - Page 22 - -- - - -- Edith Updike, Alexei Waters, Bernard Masters, Devlin Back, Aris Somis, T ed Ingh am, Chuk Besher, Michael Morris, Jason Bockman, D an Auckerman, Jack Eggleston - - -- - - - - - Page 54-- -- -- - - Mark Shiffman, Anthony Nyberg, Mr. Berns, Rachel Duel, Garfield Goodrum, Mr. Kurs, Juli a Thomas, Fawn Trigg, Ms . Kraus, Rhonda Datcher, Gabrielle Fink - - - - -- - - - Page 23 - -- - - - -- D ave Lowther, Mr. J, Chris Stokes, Mr. Wilson, Alejandra Farias, D an Schoos, Mr. Dink, Justin Burke, Bill Slakey, Pete Fettner, Alexei Waters, Ell iot Duhan - - - - -- -- - Page 24 - - - -- -- - Paul Speck, Jonathan Martin, Rhonda Datcher, Nathaniel H erz, Fawn Trigg, Margo Magarias, Ms. Kraus, Dave Dillard, Jonathan Skinner - -- -- - - -- Page 25 - -- - - - -- Fawn Trigg - - - - -- - - - Page 32 - -- - - - -- Doug Sery , Paul O'Hanlon, Anne Boyle, D ave Amirthanayagam, Pat Wilkinson, Judy Bessinger, Brenda Wilkinson, Kurt Ruzsits-Redfield, Chuck Bieneman, Becky Morgan, Seth Evans - -- -- - -- -Page 55 - - - - - - - - Scott Young, Mr. J, Tim Benjamin, Dave Lucas, Chris Sturr, Violet Gilden, Stela Rustan, Simon McNabb, Elizabeth Long, Miss Leonard - -- -- - --Page 56-- - -- - - Nell Sweeney, Jennifer Johnson, Ann Leonard, Peter Maillet, Michael Bowen, Susan Petrone, Blaise Bechtel, Selah Wolbercht, Conrad Baugh, Michael H all, Amy Williamson, Chris Marks, Joe Boucher, Elliot Duhan - - - - - - - --Page 66 - - - - -- - - Miss Leonard, Larry Adams, Stephanie Rico, Julie Ham- burger, Dave Lowther, Dave Dillard, Carrie Kropeck, Larra Anderson, Lyndsey Wyman, Chuk Besher, Renee Bergland, Chris Nagel, Campbell residents, Simon McNabb - - - - -- - - - Page 33 - -- - - - - - Jeanne Duvoisin, John Sh aunessey, Lisa Rose, Mari-Claire Rucell, Eleanor Mitten, Heather Wold, Sallie Fine, Steve Dean, Check Bieneman, Margaret Parish - - - - -- - - - Page 34 - - - - - - -- Mr. Beall, T om H oward, Mr. Verdi, Ms . Calmant, Miss Leonard, Mr. Berns, Mr. Oink, Mr. Kutler, Mr. Milner, Todd Peterson, Mrs. Berns, Christopher Watson - - - - - - - -- Page 67 - - - - - - - - Janet Orlin, Ellen Schwindt, Mr. Williamson, Garbrielle Fink, Becky Morgan, Jenn ifer White, Mortimer Adler and friends, Brad Cook, George Scott, C layton DeKorne, Ted Ingham, Julie Hamburger, Celeste OiNucci - -- - - - - -- Page 68 - - - - - - - - Dave Lowther, Miss Leonard, Kate Kelley, Mr. J, The teams - - -- - - - -- Page 69 - - - - - - - - Steve Virgil, Anthony Nyberg, Mr. Antal - - - - -- - - - Page 35 - -- - - - - - Mr. Zuckerman, Mr. Sterling, Mrs. Kronsberg, Mr. Comenetz, Mr. and Mrs. Sparrow, Mr. Tuck, Zoh ar Ben-Yosef, Mr. Umphrey, Mr. Lenkowski, Mr. Druecker, T alke Breuer 72 �Yearbook Staff Michael Gerstmann Conrad Baugh Sarita Cargas Jonathan Martin Julie Ham burger-Editor Betsy BlumeYearbook Advisor Stephanie Rico Michael Morris Dixie Davis Ondine McRoberts Jenny White 73 �74 �In Memoriam William W. O'Grady, Jr. 1945-1986 The following remarks were delivered by Joe Sachs, fellow tutor and close friend of William W. O'Grady, Jr., at a memorial service for Mr. O'Grady. He knew, first of all, that the proper work of the human intellect is to affirm, and that of its other work of criticising, questioning, and negating is not in the service of affirmation, it is a waste of time . He knew, too, that everything worth studying is bigger than we are, so that the life of every good student is an almost daily battle with discouragement. That was why he never made demands on students, or on anyone but himself. All he did was offer each of us all he had to give, all the time. He knew everything there was to know about giving. No man ever accumulated fewer possessions in forty years . He just couldn't see the point in having anything, except to give it away. He had a car for a little while when I first knew him, until he thought of someone he could give it to . And his was a marriage of true minds . Almost the first thing Joey did after they were married was give away her car. She has a wisdom we older friends of Bill didn't have. She didn't try to change him by one iota. But he changed us . To name some obvious ways; when Bill came to the college we did not read the Brothers Karamazov or the Philoctetes . We read The Divine Comedy in three seminars, and the sophomores had five classes to try, or pretend, to prepare. The program is incomparably better because he was here and was such a fighter . I can tell you that he didn't like to fight. It cost him more misery to win a fight than to avoid it, but he couldn't help fighting when someone else had no other champion. He never compromised because he was never fighting for principles, just for people. Bill's first year in the college, the dean had the good sense to tell him that St. John's wanted him to stay for the rest of his life, if he could find some livable way of being here . I think we all know he never did. There was not a day for him when St. John's was not an agony of too many needs to answer. But his eyes were open, and this agony was an inseparable part of his happiness. He was here a long time before he decided finally to commit his life to St. John's. He saw that choice with complete clarity the day Mr. Klein was buried, in the spot where he too now lies. What was worthy of that good life was worthy also of Bill's. Bill loved Mr. Klein's insistence that Socrates meant just what he said in the Republic, that the love of wisdom and the love of learning are the same. There is truth. If we are learning, we are learning it, and that is our way of having it. Bill read the same books over and over and over, with an intensity that never lessened . just a week ago he told me that he now had the Iliad pretty well by heart. The best books never fail us, no matter how often we fail them. The twenty-second psalm begins: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me." But it is followed by the twenty-third, "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want." Bill knew that there was no way to the twentythird except through the twenty-second. And he loved a little meditation of C.S. Lewison the death of Charles Williams. Let me appropriate its last sentence. When the idea of Bill O 'Grady and the idea of death had met, it was the idea of death that had to change. 75 �Lyndsey Pilar Wyman Lawrence Vincent ~lark Anthony Young Heather Elizabeth Michael ft'la.-~~~A__wt-'::"~~ Patrick Joseph ~~ dJ~ ~ , Jacquelaine Denise Robnolt Roger Burton Bernadette Theresa Rudolph ~~ ~ ;(1~ M-l0h. ~ ~ -% t'L ~1\ ~ ~ yrf~ -e.~~ ~"+­ Paul Edward Kelly ~# ~ ~. ~. (/a;,AiJ ~ ~ Carrie Ann Kropeck A.f.U:tV>¢,~~/J1~"f'l~'4-- Andrew Pringle League ~ ~ - ~ Thomas Ste~gren¢~~ ~ Edward . John· S.obiesk Matthew Glenn Morse Ralph Lawrence ~C?~ P~ ~ ;;?'~~~~ ;u w~ ;· Kelli Allison Ostrom Edith Hill. Updike Eric Michael ~ [~ ~ ; _. J t?--~ NathatLJames Walker Reid Allen Walker ~ Teresa Jeannette Wang :::::::tL::::s~e~o 1±: -f;2t~ {4*-~ ~ Vesper~ ;_ - 11 ~ J V1!/L, Robert Anthony Rybarc{yk / / / Readmit Norman Luis Santiago ~ ~ ~ r P~ wdJ Lisa Marie Schnell tl~ fdwtvJ.. l!J~ Adam Edward Weiss John David lllM- Michael Roy Sheck Whitestone ~ IJ~ PIAJ~ Stephen Robert Richard Lee Williams Jl <.Y ; ' ,' -~-~ Christopher Lincoln Stevenson Will~ams ~ e/iz_o.bith }/j[/QJ7TW Richard Christopher -~~ · -w~ · Michael Steven Wright 76 \JJ67C"---. ;} /J/1 ;-;;1,;/.J-<x.-- 11.~ --z;_::__:__,.,_. .-,_ _~..x Laura Hope She dd Willey ~ ;fj~ ~ Elizabeth ''k#-j (/{/;, (_____I ~~ / Lisa Nicole Rose ~ (/l~-11/~ Iau Patrick Webb -a 'll..~ Yolanda Rivera ~~ David Charles Warren ?~~o.f ~Lo-<..a..e 0_.ec..~-1- r y /-- .L.L- •• Stuart Lawrent!:e Sobczynski _,- ~~~ ~-- ~Paul Samuel Emmart P~ ). [rw>1MfSteven John Gere ~~/...-- ~J: ........___ Harry Alexander Hamilton, tii ?::!,. ~& Erik Disbrow Harder ~ ~ ·C._ ~_t;vn;,1~ ~~~A Stephen Scott Smith t?ut~ ..<:::..rl ~ ~ · .>v Peter Anthony Dwyer Darrel Alan Michael Showalter David Lee Smith 7- Marlis Francoise Deck £~ ~ -Jc;A~ George Albert Scott ~~~ Douglas John Sery J/~ y~ 1-t_ _ 1nejJh f~- t{~ J!!f~ Charles Hatton Crutchfiel Daniel John Schoos Keh-Wha Kenneth Shen Be_~,gin f?tw{ John Chua ~- ~~ Mari-Claire Rucell ~1argaret January 26, 1983 CLASS OF 1986 -- ANNAPOLIS CA}!PUS /:1'1,d <?../ ~ � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 78 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1986 Yearbook Description An account of the resource St. John's College Yearbook for the year 1986. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hamburger, Julie (Editor) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1986 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1986 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/15bfcc9529fc776a19dcbd7abd566cfd.pdf d069a849e37a5f1ea9438cbc4a0f12c8 PDF Text Text �The union of the mathematician with the poet, fervor with measure, passion with correctness -this surely is the ideal. William James Our College ought to light up in us a lasting relish for the better kind of man, a loss of appetite for mediocrities. William James ���' -· / ........ . . . . . - -:--...:· - ~- -/ 2 ~ �n's 3 ��5 �1. . ' 6 ��8 �9 �.. • 10 �11 �i:. 12 �FOOTBALL ��IS �16 �17 �18 �19 �OF OUR TEETH - 20 . ' �21 �22 �23 �CLASS 24 �of ��N\. TT·U V: 1 I I·~ 1• J f (' can • t he' all Pi.llf!COlif'~; :me! .i · m. (j l!' i Cllt•n f .JCObS • ·• • • ·• • • ·• • •.· • ;~!~ . R~r~mr,rltlt;; ..·.. ~~].. l..·~l~ ..•• ;.ii. .,. ·, . ..... . .. .··-·.-·.· ;:-:-:-:.:-::;:.ooc;<:,'•'•'····-·.·.···· ···· ·· · --~ ~ -...~ ·.>'l ·. . . . ·· r ;;. "*~ 71 T> /! ~ 'Z ~ �aBut I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. aoh, you cant help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here. l'm mad. You're mad." "How do you know I'm mad?'' said Alice. "You must be, ' said the Cat, aor you wouldn't have come here." 11 AND WE RAN OFF INTO THE NIGHT , , , .. , OUQ FACES PAINTED, ... CHEW ING WEEDS ... . • . A"'D WHEREV ER OUR HEARTS LEAD uS .. .' ...-1 ~ .. -THE END- II + + Sabrina �0 ~ 0 ~ 1\~'(.t.c ~O ( ?''). '"c~ . (r, \ \', ( e < Q• oC ~ · "')o"\1...1:..- �Hano CHOBa Hay'fMTbC.H XMT:h . -AHHa AxMaToBa I must learn to live anew. - Anna Ak.hma tova KIM 30 PAFF£NROTH �~ ~ 'C (.) ~ c._ t, \; " t ~ Burch Harper_~-~ 31 �30 Michael Crawford Most of the points I have made in support of my argument are not such as I can confidently assert; but that the belief in the duty of inquiring after what we do not know will make us better, braver and less helpless than the notion that there is not even a possibility of discovering what we do not know, nor any duty of inquiring after it -- this is a point for which I am determined to do battle, so far as I in word and deed. (Socrates) THANKS, EVERYBODY! Michael McShane Ed Komara ... I am able, both �--- Gillian Schmidt - Wayne Anderson Andrew Sloniewsky /_ .... ... .... :. "'• -4 ... --.... -.... - -.... �··- ~ Heidi Schlipphacke ~ ~ rJ'J c (\$ ~ cf - Q) (\$ ..0 ·:; u rJ'J Q) c -· :; c ·~ t..J �"I Sing the Soul Electric" by Dave "The Daude" Schaller A poem is often the interactive tool I find the easiest to utilize when I have something to say on the level of what I have in me to say to the denizens of this fair college, but it is difficult to stretch my words to cover the wildly divergent people amongst whom I live and move and have my being and my realationships with them in such a restricted format. I am a brash young man. I am noisy, simple and proud, but I love. I love the tantalizing melody of souls that I swim through in daily life. At my best, I am a dynamo of effervescent life exploding off all the surfaces within my sphere of being. I think, when I think about it at all, how easy it would be and how easy it probably is for others to brush me off as insincere, insane, shallow, crude and insufferable in my overtness, but I believe my life is justifiable. I love as hard as I can. It used to make me very sad how little of any one person's life I could touch with mine. I used to be very withdrawn and shy (all my friends gasp in disbelief). I was an extrovert shackled by pitiful insecurities and an unrealizable desire to share deeply with everyone. I got better (in a similar way to the man in Monty Python's Holy Grail who was turned into a newt). I believe that it is possible to spill your guts to someone without truly touching them or allowing them to touch you. I believe true intimacy is a result of honesty in relation with others, not in mandatory depth of involvement. I love everybody. I feel bad that I cannot touch people more, but it is not physically possible. Nevertheless, I believe that if you give of yourself to momentary acquaintances as sincerely as you give yourself to your best and oldest friend, then you sing the soul electric. It is my fervent desire and holiest aim to truly be what I am, where I am, to whoever I am with at any instant. The most casual conversation or interaction can and should be dignified by a true presence and sincerity of being in the participants. The song I sing to you is the song I give my life to. "Shower the people you love with love show them the way that you feel. Things will be so much better if you only will." This poem/essay/story is a love song. I sing to you the soul electric. I sing it to all of you. �Witty Aphorism JOHN SELLERS Sus3an Borden 36 �1P!JUJ 'Ni!Jl:er e~es f;,tttP~fJ Nil/ r--4/'.J .s ~es.s Plf1 !fdu "The knight preserves his love" and at t],c. same time "has comprehended the deep secret that also in loving another person one must be sufficient unto oneself." Kierkegaard "There is at least one spot in every dream at which it is unplumbable -- a navel, as it were, that is its point of contact with the unknown." Freud Irene La Porte Chris Lynch 37 �SEPTEMBER 9 38 6, 1984 �JANUARY ~ ;!~ /}. :!Odb:?~ -r-e ry / ~CA....--t{~ZJ.-v1 7~~cR ~~~ c.t..j~ _)ja.J P~cvd~ c/!tJr_]:;/::£~ ~~~~ ~~~ -/Ja:L~ {/...,.:..L {-k-.·a,· ~ 'ha..-·.. ~ ~~ ~·*-tt gcJww7'Jt 3~G-~~ tft~~ ?'(Q~ m~l(__ s~- %~~ ULu{u~L'(}Jl~ ~ et~4 pvi V-V.JZ -77~-~i.~J( f/w~ ·/L /f_u,,l //z_::::=_ / ~-Y---­ J,_, .,!-'/»~ ~~y ~~~ st~pA.w Ad£~) U:~r· I s~~ ~JJwd~ na/UaO ~ 4P'e-4u-v c;,;k ~I)~ ~~L/~~ 1h;fZ~W~ 24, 1985 �Ben Krauss Angeline Patterson Jack Handy �PA1'1ELA EVE.LYN HALk.ETT '1}\lnk Q(lly at the. ~s-f o. s 1 ii',. rtmtmb-o.rG.t. ~\vc.~ ,, yO'-'.. \) I e~su.r . . :!e&f\e Au!.tef\ ':r o..M ~ ho..ppicsi" c.rdure the. World .... I ~ ho..ppier e.ven 1"<&.(\ ~ej i" Sh.e onl>' .&"m;l.e~ :I Lo.u.~h. J"G.I\C. ~!'\ Sheila Monen 86 J7 87/88 88/89 89/90 90/S 91 I. St.]~~'} :~ f.~llege A~~unatt.'d Studenl Body Card 92/ ~1 Frank -Barnard ---- ~.ll!h David Johnson 41 �tt 1 L0\.~.., 0 \- t~\k of 6oo'u iv'\ o_ \ce>-\\rco""' j """'( Katarina Wong h~ w <A.'t s -C....\\ .,f )o""'e..~'"'j e\se. '} ·15 o.. \ ----j ... ~e... Av...st-~"' ' ' .... "'"'J_ ._,e h.e..-~ CA."\ c:;.et "'"'-1- .,{ .J yell ;.,_j t;....._S!_ sc.r~""'i""j· _ Mr .. 1( ..... +1-Lr, .. >I .,f J~ .... ;or lcr..l,. ~Choral Chort I . II 1':\ ~ 0 -I -~ <t d ll othing I cared, in the l amb wh i te days, that time wou l d take me Up to the swal l ow thron ged l oft by the shadow of my hand In th e moon that is a l ways r i sing, Nor that riding to s l eep I shou l d hear him f l y with the high fie l ds And wake t o t he farm forever fled from th e childless l and . Oh as I was yo un g and easy i n the mercy of his means, Time held me green and dying Tho ugh I sang in my chains li ke the sea . from Fern Hill -- Dylan Thomas 42 Juliet LaGuardia SARAH WATERS �"For he through Sin's long labyrinth had run, Nor made atonement when he did amiss .. ." -Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage Paul Argodale • 0 ~ u C) ~ ro ..c: ~ ·~ ~ 00 :...... All these have never yet been seenBut Scientists, who ought to know, Assure us that they must be so . .. Oh! let us never, never doubt What nobody is sure about! H. Belloc Q.) .t::J Q.) ~ ~ c:: ·- ro > -+-J -+-J 0 u ifl Bernard Masters >. ~ (/) �Each of us had something to learn from the others, and something to teach in return. -St. Augustine Power. Strength. Courage. Ambition. Gentleness. Great Looks. Intelligence. Moderation-John Lavery. Mark Henry Christina Meyer �( I l ~- . .· .··· ·. :: ·: . ·~ : ... .. . ·;, . .. : .· .. .: .··. .. 0. . , ~ · ':'. ..; ,.· ·... .. . .. .. -.. -. , . ::~ ...... . ·•· :~ . .. ) ... • I '·? · ·of .· . .·.· .·'· ... ·:.: .. ., Hugh Brantner 45 �Robert DeMajistre Jeff Falero Karin Johns Come along in then, Iitle girl! Gidon Datan 46 Or else stay out! But in the open door she stands, And bites her lip and twists her hands, And stares upon me, trouble-eyed: "Mother:' she says, "I can't decide! I can't decide! " �• �• 48 �SENIOR PRANK ;,.·.*·~.'' '.,· : ... . ., . \ J· . ' Jt ,' ·-t ·,t '' ., . .. .. , ' '~ 49 �50 �51 �Mr. Wayne Anderson Mr. Paul Argodale "First FigbL Then Fiddle" Myth and Memory Or, "If You· Think About .• · Thl'ngs- You Can Mr; David Gillet Spiritual Unrest .in' W~V Bbd Peace On the Merits of Truth, Myth and Friendship: Plato's Phaedo J'jme ll!ld Again . Or, ·T he Visll)n in the Snow Happiness: A Balance of · Fortune.·and Nature in Shakespeare's As You Like It Where the Lao~ Meets \he Sea: An An~yids of I~ Dinesen'~s "Tempests" Weaving His. Mystl~ Crown An Exaininatlo~;~ of the ·' Foundatio.n s of Charles" Baudelaire's Poetry in 4:8 MS: AJysson Green Unde~ian4:Tbt:,m'' Ms. Eun Back Mr. Frank Barnard Nietzsc!Je• and Nnl1fi!!JD: Back to Eden .. ,;- -Pain, Suffering and Death in Dostoevsky's The Brothers Ms. Pamela "-lkett KaraJiJazov Mr. Daniel Bernstein Mr. JoliJJ Bei'MI:m Ms. Sus3an Borden Mr. Hugh Brantner Mr. Justb. Burke Mr. Paul Butters Ms. sara Cilii)Ja. Ms. JeJ~D CaiQpbell Mr: Samuel Carte,- . Ms. Laurie (:oope.Mr. Michael CJawfbnt Ms. Beth t:"ross M. . s Carole I CunnlNIJ!am \'c Groundings. of Subjectivity in Kierkegaard's Philbllbphital Fragments 'the Quiddity of FIYtng~ lnve and Motion in Dante's Purgatorio Invisibility, Identity and Humanity in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man Marx: The Abolition of Negative Self;Consciousness Goodbye Furies-Hello Eumenides: A DiscusSion on the Institution and Preservation of \he Court of Law in Aescbyjtfo' Eumemdes · A Valfll~ and .Und~etl Hero.: Alyo&ha Karamazov l.nve: A ·P ath to salwtlon Begfnnmj{ ~ See ~th a ·Human ~Ycl} -a DilllOgue 8eh!ree'p Marx d the Invisilile M., A Banquet Within the Fields An Essay in Three Parts Copcemjng ~ and the Perfection ·,of the Hunian: Soul Thoughts 'Qn MadiUDe BOVBJY. ·~- One I Am Must Not Be AbDed to The Other'': Walt WldbJ!Iln a11il lhe ~mocracy Of Experience A lnok at MIU"X and ·" De'focquevllie•:~~ Answer~~ to Alienatll)n The vie:w 11'(11!1: Halic:arDaasuJJ: H.e~l!l$' History the Persian War A Skeptical View of God: E.ssay About-Mollt81gp.e's Apology 'tor ~Sebtind Uberty, !)emoc:rKy, aild die Greatness of Man; Jcl.eali. of Historical Progtefs Kant and Tocqpevllie Monadolqu aoil the Tbeoi'Y. Of RelatiVity " The Mar~ ot War and Pesce · Continuity .Ul~ Understandinlr · 1· Referring to God: .Desire, intellect and Will ·in· Oante•s.· • '· Divine Comedy 1 The Social Organizatiqn: Ideals, Solutions and Dissolutions (An Enquiry ron I Marx and Plato) A Portrait of a Guardian as A Well-Bred Hound Fertility, Human Relations, and Enduring: Thoughts on Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse l.nve Life More Than the Meaning of It: Doubt and Faith in The Brothers Karamazov iot Mr. '!Jobert OeMa}iSfre Ms. Meetra Dqorandlsb , Ms. Pamela ~upuis ·,· • Mr. Marcus EubaniJ. Ms. Jana Giles 52 Mr. Ja~k Haildy i Mr. Bum. Flerus du Mal n..-pe.- The Nature of Number and • \fatbelaillical Proof: A 1 Critique of: Pedekind's ~ Cq'IItlnulty aild lrrstion!d tl(uben King H.enry v: Be;Ooa ills Country'• Elipeclallo.na Beloved so~ Bene4ktlon::- A New A,pproatb oT 1'bailb Mr. Bauclelairel My Sbl Ia· Ever ~re Me: the lmpQrtaoce of Memory jn Collfe,tslon Ms. ~beth Ha)oe. Mil. Janet Hayes r'. .M ark Henry ~· .,...,iel Hob on M$ C.lherine Hollnef M" Gretchen Jacobs Ms. Kat;1n John!! A Voyage Andre and: Pier~: :A Seart.li for God How Natuoll 'Is Natural Man? Ml'• Dayjd Johnson Mr. ~Kastel Mr. S"-ott Klebe Mr. Edward Komara · .Mr. Ben~ln Krausa;. Mr. Ma~ew Krawiet! An Euay on..RCJ:U!!8e11U The A~plal)ce Ql Oedipus: Ali ;fnttodudion 1<t Sopbod~· Oedlpu ,a t Co/onus Morality ud Truth as R~Dections of the Will Revealed R~n Qd Absolute Kn~g Noble Anna OVerldJIIn Billy Budd Or, How ClaggUt Uid Vere Wanted BDiy Dealt ~and Knowle.d&e ln Plato'i!.Meno t t SENIOR �\ '· Mr: Sq~ar Peri~ . I. ~- \., ' FneclOalr' .?~s:';Jennifer. ~pham ~~ ~.!.· .,.~ '<-, ; I ._ "'· .;Ms. 'Irene laPorte MA; Joy larkin Mr: itnlln lavery ·r " ¥. . ,...~~ !\ts. Ellen Schwindt . ,1 Ms. Shan_ oo ~ay n Mr. "Grace Comes Somehow Violent" An Examination of Clytaemnestra and Phaedra as Tragic Heroines The Lamentatiop of Doctor · · Faustds ·· .Banne~ :Purde'n s and ti';frald McNabb lot•.., ' "With. Reason As Our Guide" An Examination of Misology and the Second Sailing in Plato's Pbaedo Hobbes and Human Nature Monsters in Racine's Pbedre ' "A Dream ThaJ C~ptured . the Heart of ~ in the ~oment of <;.~lion: The Focus of a Lift!Worth Living" ' ... Visions of a Dhu;'ken Boat 1 , • ~ir~. I'll 1Te~~h Th~ · a \Spee~J. 'S~~king ',and ,f'afiu re jn King LA~lm 7 !Music and-·Noise .An Exposition Toward ~· Goniprellending tile '', _ ( ··. · ··-t. ., Ne\¥ M~sic , .f •._ '>~ , Asklng, "How ThelShaliW~ ·- . Lfyei" and Liv;ni 'With The ' Answer/'· · ..... ' 1 · · A Paln'ful Cas~' On the Irreligious Criticism of Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud On the Role of Poetic Wisdom in Giambattista Vico's uThe New Science" Learning to Live Without the Good The Christmas Kontakion of Ramanos: Kenosis of (the Holy Spirit 1 ···~~- L\flc~ei ' M!:Shane I' I i' .'/ Ms. Christina Meyer Ms. .D~aShaw Mr.' John Sisko Ms, Erin Milnes Ms. Caron Craig-Sisko ' Mr. Andrew Sloniewsky / . -Ms, Sb:!!lla Monen ~- . \ i -~ M ...~ck O',Donn.ell, i · , Mr. Jani!!Ji O'Gara tir. N~tllan Oliver · I' Mr. Klin ;Paffenroth Ms. Sabrina Wald Ms. Sarah Waters Mr. Alan Wilcuts Ms. Erika Wilson 88 ESSAYS Ms. katarina Wong !J'be Promise of Insight Through Investigation in Hegel's Phenomenology of Splrit An ExPforation of MIUl's Fall on Milton's Paradise Lost or What An Apple Can Do For You Odysseus and Alyosha: Lovers of J Towards a More Caring Society The Shade of Samuel The Power of the Grand Inquisitor in Schiller's Don Carlos and Dostoyevsky's Tbe Brothers Karamazov Babble on: Salvation and Damnation in Flannery O'Connor's A Good Man ls Hard to Find 5 �- VV I l 54 �TER ( I 5! �56 ��,,!' I �59 �TUTORS STAFF and �61 �--:--. ~....··•·!r' .'f!!J/ \ 62 �63 �• 64 �IT'S SPRING TIME '' •• 65 �66 �67 �68 �69 �70 �71 �THE PARENTS Congratulations and Best Wishes to the Class of 1988 Franz and Annie Alt Dr. and Mrs. Francis H. Barnard Dr. and Mrs. Jack Berstein Ms. Jette Butters Mr. and Mrs. Nicola Caiola Mr. and Mrs. Charles Carroll Carter Mr. and Mrs. T.F. Deddens, Jr. Dr. and Mrs. Dariush Doorandish C.A. and Mary Ann Eubanks Mr. and Mrs. Thomas R. Gillett Don and Lorna Girod Mr. and Mrs. Ian W. Halkett Carol Handy Vonda, Glenn, and Mark Harper Mr. and Mrs. Thomas P. Hayes John D. Henry Toni, Joanne, Steve, and Joe Hinrichs Mr. and Mrs. J. Arthur Johnson August and Diane Kastel Edward and Marie Klebe 72 Jerry and Nancy Klein Mr. and Mrs. Rex S. Kuntavanish James Craven and Adele Laporte John Lavery's Family John K. and Julie D. McNabb James and Carol McShane Raymond and Mary Anne Oliver Mr. and Mrs. Jason Paransky Dr. P. Bertrand and Mrs. Judith Phillips Bill and Lola Ritsinias Ed and Gerry Scarfe David and Skip Sellers Borah and Charlotte Shnaider Dr. and Mrs. A.R. Sloniewsky Mr. and Mrs. Joon W. Sub Mom and Parry, Mike, Alice, Allie, and Nick Mother, Dad, and Gran Trigg Eloise M. Wald Dr. Paul F. and Captain Catherine G. Waters �THE STAFF David Pisarra, Editor Charlie Schlueter, Photography & layout Editor Betsy Blume, Advisor Joan Iverson, Legend Photographers: Valerie Pawlewicz Stephanie Takacs Oran Barber Dimitri Seletzky Steve Sobel Scott law �Index Page4 Jeanne Duvoisin Britt Silkey Gillian Schmidt Dimitri Seletzky Brian Cole George Moulton Charles Randles Brigham Bechtel Mr. Zuckerman Page 12 Wayne Anderson Braulio Agnese Raymond Gifford Charles Schlueter Jesse Maanao Page 13 David Schaller Robert DeMajistre Eileen Marion Mr. Dink John Lavery Steven Bloom Bernard Harberts Garfield Goodrum Justin Burke Louis Elias Scott Stenger Spyros Ritsinias Dale Phillips Thomas Suh Nathaniel Herz Page 5 Sapna Gandhi Ken Colston Paul Sipe Joe Hrisko Cecilia Baillie! Mrs. Baillie! Page 6 Jennifer Mischer Padraic Taaffe Page 7 Alexander Lo Sapna Gandhi Frank Alden Thomas Quigley Larry Saporta Page 16 James McShane George Turner Chris Lewis Amanda Dalton Pam Kennerly Braulio Agnese Page 8 David Walter Karl Meyer Aaron Hoover Melanie Mason Charles Wight Munir Hussein Kenneth Paradis Ray Rivera Gerard Sparaco Kevin Depew Richard Morrell Page 17 Rachel Frey Teodor Holmberg Karl Brown Eliot Duhan Mary Braden Steven Sobel Dimitri Seletzsky Page 9 Dwayne Rodgers Benno Belhumeur Brad Stuart David McNeill Mr. Berns Braulio Agnese Brady Bowman John Obenauer Page 18 Uncle Morty Ben Krauss and Class Mortimer and Alysson Green Page 10 Louis Elias Linnah Neidel Andrew Ghiz Collins Duodu-Bonsu Patricia Dawson Andrew Sloniewsky Chris Gillen Anne Boynton Page II Ronald Long Larissa Pqwer Jennifer Girod Sahena Dharmapuri Brady Bowman Axel Christensen Michael Taylor Page 19 Michael Pfister Bruce Heavner Jim Frame President Dyal Dean Slakey Page 20 Jennifer Mischer Rachel Frey Graham Redgrave Matthew Gaffney Grey Valenti Sara Larson Adam Bockhorst Erika Wilson Vicki Sills Page 21 Amanda Dalton Eliot Duhan Andrew Pausley Mary Braden Jennifer McKenna Eric Lyon Adam Bockhorst Donna Stroh Dianne Cowan Dariush Doorandish Vicki Sills Melanie Mason David Ruy Page 22 George Moulton Andrew Pietrus Ty Yancey Christopher Tegeler Melissa Sawicki Sara Valentine Aaron Hoover Nell Sweeney Christopher Marks Jennifer Johnston Picot Floyd Grey Valenti Page 23 George Mashour Graham Redgrave Beatrix Kaussen Robert Klinger Jeaneen McAmis Benjamin Hargrave Page 24 Beth Cross Greg Ferguson Allyson Green Daniel Hoh Dale Phillips Susan Searle Daniel Touey Steve Virgil Matthew Szweda Page 25 Paul Argodale Pam Dupuis Meetra Doorandish Ben Krauss The Navy Aaron Rosenbaum Simon McNabb Sheila Monen Claudia Probst Ellen Schwindt Sabrina Wald Page 48 Pam Halkett Spyros Ritsinias Dave Schaller Sus3an Borden Michael McShane David Tappen Paul Argodale Ben Krauss Steve Virgil Irene Laporte Janet Hayes Sabrina Wald Claudia Probst Juliette Laguardia Ann Boynton Daniel Hoh Sara Larson Edward Slowik George Moulton Andrew Pausley Lyon Jemison Heather Miller Bernard Masters Kurt Ruzsits-Redfield Page 55 Joe Sawyer Amanda Dalton Fernanso De Ia Cruz Ty Yancey Juliet LaGuardia Diana Shaw Edward Komara James McShane Teodor Holmberg James Fallon John Lavery Gregory Ferguson Eden Brenner Scott Vineberg Beatrix Kaussen Paul Argodale Grover Bynum Andrew Sloniewsky Dwayne Rodgers Page 49 Patrick O'Donnell Paul Argodale and Friend Sus3an Borden Kenny Turnbull Chris Mangum Frank Alden Bill Rodi Mark Kreider Students vs. Faculty: Trivium Pursuit Page 50 Spyros Ritsinias Samuel Carter Mr. Kutler Tennesse Moulton David Schaller Jack Handy Wayne Anderson David Gillet Christina Freeman Meyer Mr. Meyer Matt Krawiec Irene LaPorte Jennifer Lapham Scott Klebe Mr. Higuera Sheila Monen Jean Campbell Page 56 Linnah Neidel Robert Loftis Munir Hussein Jennifer Asmuth Adam Eggers Padraic Taaffe Carin Calabrese Page 58 Simon McNabb Steve McNamara Dave McNeill Shelly Nicoll Ange Mlinko Beatrix Kaussen Jeaneen McAmis Chri stine Robertson Page 54 Dan Bernstein Sukumar Periwal Jennifer Lapham Paul Speck Melissa Sawicki Monique Mooney Ruth Frame Ben Krauss Scott Stenger Diana Klatte Louis Eliii!i Juliet Burch Brad Stuart Page 61 Tyrie Porter Nellie Wilkerson John White Stewart Umphrey Mera Flaumenhaft Brother Robert Nancy Lewis Malcolm Wyatt Kitty Kinzer Caroline Christensen Michael Comenetz Henry Higuera David Townsend Chris Colby Page 62 Stacy Bolton April Dobbs Kevin Lixey Nancy Upperman Tidge Holmberg Jennifer Mischer Denise Troug James McShane Travis Hardaway Page 57 Cathy Gross Katrina Zap! Sapna Gandhi Lee Mendelson Page Nicolas Daniel Raffin Deborah Lin Page 51 Michael McShane Barbara Hahn Scott Vineberg Jeff Smith Rhonda Datcher Gretchen Jacobs Janet Hayes Ed Komara Juliet LaGuardia Eleanor Hamburger Sus3an Borden Bob DeMajistre Page 60 Wayne Anderson Dean Slakey Paul Butters Dan Touey Sara Caiola Gordon Carlton Tina Davidson Ben Milner Chester Burke Carol Clark Leland Giovannelli Roberta Rusch Dana Commodore Marilyn Mylander Page 59 Janet Orlin Dariush Doorandish Andy Nelson Benno Belhumeur Gerik Eberts Deanne Draeger David Tappan Kim Kern Alex Edelglass Katrina Zap! Page 63 Nora Briody Sandro Battaglia Steven Bloom Scott Walters Robin Faux Brian Cole Andy Nelson Oran Barber Page 64 Brian Cole Marcus Eubanks James McShane Suzanne Baker Kurt Ruzsits-Redfield Scott Young Paul Speck Oran Barber Jennifer Johnston Page 65 Sandro Battaglia Munir Hussein Will Rachmiel Jason Unger John Pronko Dave Gillet Vivian Strache James McShane Marcus Eubanks Dahra Latham Page 66 Brad Fischer Jana Giles Chandran Madhu George Turner Pam Halkett Anthony Nyberg Bob DeMajistre David Dillard Jeanne Duvoisin Pam Halkett Jana Giles Anthony Nyberg Ben Krauss Pam Halkett John Lavery Page 67 Mr. Dyal Miss Leonard Baby Christensen Jeanne Duvoisin Page 68 The Grand PooBah Andrew Pausley Stacey Brown Dwayne Rodgers John Obenauer Page 69 Ky Herreid Jennifer Lapham Catherine Holmes Ben Krauss Paul Argodale Leslie Sheppard Roberta Rusch David Starr Grey Valenti Ziya Onat Joe Miller Graham Redgrave Munir Hussein Joe Evans Page 70 Ken Colston Kevin Depew Peter Feltner James Mattingly Gillian Schmidt Page 71 Susie Attar Marcus Eubanks Rena Kuntavanish The Pleasure Palace! Congratulations and Best Wishes to the Class of 1988 Commercial Residential envelope and prinlin8 co. inc. 1300 N. Fulton Avenue Baltimore 523-1500 Ballimore. Md. 21217 Annapolis 636-3380 Washing1on 470-7500 o.o. Zindorf 37 Hudson Street Annapolis, MD Heating & Air Conditioning, Inc. • 301-266-5007 MARYLAND NATIONAL BANK We want you to grow.® .. th e envelope people .. Church Circle Branch, Annapolis, MD 21401 , (301) 268-4343 (301) 732-7575 ACCURATE BINDING CO. Reliable Printing Plates Inc. 204 S. Chapel Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21231 1100 Wicomico St. Baltimore, MD 21230 Congratulations to the Senior Class! COMPLETE PRE-PRESS SERVICES 74~------------------------------------------------~ �5 North Haven St. Baltimore, Maryland 21224-1687 ~ Litho Supp'f Inc. MARYLAND 800-492-1344 OUT OF STATE II(J()..638..2566 BALTIMORE - (301) 327-1111 Con gratul ation s and Best Wi shes for Your Future! 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After it looks great on paper, nt~-lJu·- . - -- give it to us and we'll make it work, I beautifully. 1 ~ I _ :.J Lru J3: I ASSOCfATES, f INC. j l ' 110 Lakefront Dr. Hunt Valley, MD 21031 (301) 584-7300 L-------------------------------------------------------------------------------~75 �The Badass Buddha Strikes Again Sitting in the Nirvana Cafe, toking a Camel and sipping Maxwell House, I get a call from Dave the Truth-Seeker. "Bodhisattva Mike;' he says, "it's been a while since us Truth Seekers and Dharma-bums have gotten the Word from on High. Could you lay a rap on us?" "Sure kid," I reply, blowing a badass smoke ring, "only call me Michael. What do you have in mind?" "You know, I seek classy truths about this way-station out of the cave, SJC. Like, did Miss Giovannelli really flash at the '78 Reality?" "Bad karma, boy. Howard alone has looked on beauty bare. Seek real enlightenment." "Okay, okay. Tell me the Way to Truth." "First, you must assiduously study . . . " "Whoa Michael-you mean study at St. John's?" "The price of Enlightenment is high. Now, don't interrupt. Next, you must find persons of serious disposition with whom to discuss what you've read . . . " "In seminar? Get real!" "Hush boy, I'm on a roll. Next you must think dialectically, meditating within yourself during most leisure moments:' "You call that leisure? What if you have a short attention span?" "You want Truth, you gotta think. You're pissing me off, kid." "Sorry, Michael, but could we cut to the chase? Let's try another question. Tell me the Meaning of Lite:' "You don't want much, do you?" "Well, how about a hint?" "Okay. Some say that the Meaning of Life is pleasure, others that it is the avoidance of pain. Some say that we should cultivate apathy, and live in accord with Nature, others that we should seek the satisfactions of contemplation and philosophical friendship. Still, others suppose that we should kill the questioning mind. There are those who find the Meaning in devotion to God, and others in the disinterested discharge of duty. Some are mystics, and others politicians. Some like to read Hegel, and others prefer the National Enquirer . . . " "Is this going somewhere?" "You do have a short attention span:' "What does the National Enquirer have to do with the price of tea in China?" ''Ah, China. The Tao which can be spoken of is not the true Tao." "Why didn't you just say so in the first place?'' ''I'm just trying to help." "Sounds like you're just trying to confuse me." "Right. See you're not so dumb:' "Well, thanks, I guess:· "Where's your sense of humor?" "I thought you said I should be serious?" 'Two sides of the same coin, son. Anyone really serious suffers, and therefore laughs a great deal in order that the suffering not be unbearable. Only shallow people are humorless." "But some of the tutors are so humorless." "I rest my case." "But why were you trying to confuse me?" "Because I want you to think. If you don't think through something yourself, you don't know it, you only take it on trust:' "I trust you:· "Don't. I could be wrong:· "You? C'mon, you've gotta be kidding me:· "It's been known to happen." "So, how'd you get to be the Badass Buddha?" "Because I looked upon St. John's as an opportunity to think things through, and never stopped. That's the secret of St. John's, buddy-boy, not the ancient/modern split:' "So, we're back to thinking. Is that the Meaning of Life?" "No, certainly not just spinning your gears. But how do you expect to gain clarity unless you sort things out? Let's call that the pre-Meaning of Life, gaining clarity. Does that help?" "Yeah, well, they don't call me Dave the Truth-Seeker tor nothing. I guess I can live with that. Any other hints?" "Sure. Life is tough. Accept that. It'll make things easier." "You mean something like 'suffering is ennobling'?" "Only if you suffer for a noble cause. Naw, don't pretty it up, kid." "But does that mean I've got to be unhappy?" "No, it just means that there is no cure for life, no cure for having a succession of ~oncrete problems to solve or gut out. No amount of right-thinking is going to prevent you from feeling hungry, catching the flu, falling in love, or feeling kicked in the gut if someone you love dies. At best, it'll help you cope. So remember, St. John's and the things you study are very important; thinking things through in the pursuit of clarity is very important; but, they are no panacea. Don't fool yourself. Now look, I gotta make another pot of coffee, so go away and chew on what I said. Okay?" Michael David Blume '78 ��-5 ~ £ .8 0 .c 0.. , I> " \ I ..,. . \ .. :~ "- ...I \ --\ I ~:- (- -7 ~ r / ... / ---....... ) ,,.-' ""' . " � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Yearbooks Description An account of the resource This collection contains yearbooks from St. John's College in Annapolis, MD. Yearbooks are sometimes referred to as the "Rat Tat", "Cicerone", or "Canvas". This collection includes all published yearbooks since 1896.  Please note that yearbooks were not published every year.<br /><br />Holdings: <br />1896 v. 1<br />1898 v. 2 - 1899 v. 3<br />1901 v. 4 – 1912 v. 15<br />1914 v. 17 – 1918 v. 21<br />1920 v. 22 – 1945/1946<br />1947 – 1951/1953<br />1957<br />1982<br />1986 – 1990/1991<br />1992 – 2001/2002<br />2015/2016 – 2017/2018<br />2021/2022 - 2024/2025<br /><br />Click on <strong><a title="Yearbooks" href="http://digitalarchives.sjc.edu/items/browse?collection=21">Items in the Yearbooks Collection</a></strong> to view and sort all items in the collection. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Greenfield Library Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context yearbooks Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper (bound book) Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 80 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 1988 Yearbook Description An account of the resource St. John's College Yearbook for the year 1988. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Pisarra, David (Editor) Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Annapolis, MD Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 1988 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource St. John's College owns the rights to this publication. Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context 1988 https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/sjcdigitalarchives/original/5e0d2cd95f88211a36907c829156c9da.pdf 4707fd9e11c578d2217cad616cccdd1d PDF Text Text C.G. Bell Symbolic History SYMBOLIC HISTORY Through Sight and Sound 31. 19th Century: The Loaded Dream 1) Double: [A] Wilkie, 1804-05, Self-portrait, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, and [B] Toulouse-Lautrec, 1880, Self, aged 16, Toulouse-Lautrec Museum, Albi; + V details of A and B, with returns to the double Let an opening portrait-pair span our theme: the perilous reshaping of two worlds, inner and outer. In Wilkie's 1805 Self (left), God-affirmed inwardness and Rights-of-man outwardness arise together from the hopes of Enlightenment. In Toulouse-Lautrec's 1880 Self at 16 (right), the backlash of such promise fires, in both realms, the crisis of modernity. Where first shall we take the pulse of what was leading, in the arts, from transcendental assurance to Symbolist estrangement; in politics, from constitutional debate to Marx and the anarchists? a2) 2) 2a) A. Böcklin, 1865, Villa am Meer (2nd form), Schack Gallery, Munich (copy of CGB '59, Face and Landscape 68) Böcklin, 1857, Pan in Reeds, Alte Pinakothek, München; first, video, upperspread Same, Böcklin's Pan in the Reeds, lower detail 2b) Same, Böcklin's Pan, upper detail Music: Brahms, 1891, Clarinet Quintet, from 2nd Movement, Deutsche Grammophon, LPM 18278 If the century of Böcklin and Brahms is the Romantic century, Baudelaire's "cimetière abhorré de la lune," its stretch of Spleen and Ideal, "0 serments! ô parfums! ô baisers infinis," makes it an insurgent hatching ground: That corpse you planted last year in your garden, Has it begun to sprout? But if "Romantic," a recurrent pole in man and art, is to designate a time, it cannot be in mere opposition to "Classical": both Hölderlin and Nietzsche were prophet-lovers June 1996 19th Century 1 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History of Greece; the most daring pre-Symbolist of France, de Nerval, says the Muse has made him "l'un des fils de la Grèce" — and from where else did Böcklin get his "great God Pan, down in the reeds by the river"? Nor can Romantic simply oppose Realism: this swamp dappled with sun, with even its frogs and scarab could not more imitate the visual. It is that classical theme and realist body are possessed by some sensuous abandon of romantic soul. (fade Brahms) 3) 3a) 3b) H Daumier, c. 1860(?), The Uprising, Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; + V detail Daumier, 1848-49, The Fugitives, Collection of Mrs. William van Horne, Montreal Daumier, 1854, On the Barricades, National Gallery, Prague; video: detail only Music: Chopin, 1841, Close of Ballade #3, A Flat Major, Op. 47,. (Casadesus ) Col .ML 4798 (or Rubinstein, RCA-V-LSC-2370) Shift to the Revolutionary strand of the century: Daumier's realism, inspired by the Socialist outbreak and brief Republic of 1848; Chopin, part of the musical build-up (with Berlioz, Liszt, early Wagner, the firebrand Verdi); in literature, George Sand, Lamartine and the rest, culminating in Victor Hugo, with his youthful definition of the Romantic as "nothing but Liberalism in literature" — even Stendahl and Baudelaire later amazed at their 1848 intoxication — all swept on a mounting wave of surge, reversal, more radical quest to affirm — as Shelley's first poetic championing of the proletariat after the massacre of "Peterloo," points down the century: Men of England, wherefore plough For the lords who lay ye low? Wherefore weave with toil and care The rich robes your tyrants wear? If we ask what Daumier's force shares with Böcklin's mood, it may give a clue to Romantic Soul: a tide of rising expectations, heightening touch and dream, wish, vulnerability, despair. (end Chopin) 1st 4) Böcklin, c. 1846 Idyll, Neue Pinakothek, München; + V detail V4a) Böcklin, c. 1860(?), Triton and Nereid, Schack Gallery, München (detail from copy of CGB '59, Nature 10) June 1996 19th Century 2 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History It is the time-loading of all physical and psychic bases. The romantic still carries that entire burden of articulated heart and world, as Keats bears the weight of Miltonic pentameter: from Endymion: One faint eternal eventide of gems; to Hyperion: Forest on forest hung about his head Like cloud on cloud. And Baudelaire, even as he moves toward the modern, luxuriates in such visceral fullness: Mère des souvenirs, maîtresse de maîtresses, O toi, tous mes plaisirs, ô toi, tous mes devoirs! 1st 5) Henri Rousseau, 1907, The Snake Charmer, Louvre, Paris; the video having first returned to 4, Böcklin's Idyll V5a) Same, detail Whereas Mallarmé draws the plug which drains that voluptuous "perfume of the blood," refines the forms to a hyaline shimmer — as Böcklin's explicit "Idyll" yields to the innuendo of "Douanier" Rousseau's Snake Charmer. Huxley casts such a spell in his free translation of "The Afternoon of a Faun": Between the reeds I saw their bodies gleam Who cool no mortal fever in the stream Crying to the woods the rage of their desire: And their bright hair went down in jeweled fire Where crystal broke and dazzled shudderingly... Et le splendide bain de cheveux disparaît Dans les clartés et les frissons, ô pierreries! 2nd 4) Again, Böcklin's Idyll, detail; + V return to a larger detail of V4a Romantic had preferred the bases loaded, that we open all stops of the earth-organ — thus the tonal sob-yearnings of Brahms, even in the encroaching estrangement of the Clarinet Quintet — June 1996 19th Century 3 �C.G. Bell Music: V2nd 5a) 2nd 5) Symbolic History Brahms, 1891, earlier in the 2nd movement, Clarinet Quintet (fade) Rousseau, 1910, Dream, Museum of Modern Art, NYC Again, Rousseau's Snake Charmer, central detail (video takes its detail from 1st 5, whole against the dissolving tonalities of Ravel's 1903 Quartet. Music: 6) Ravel, 1902-3, String Quartet in F Major, close 3rd movement, Nonesuch H-1007 Aelbert Cuyp, c. 1660, The Maas at Dordrecht, National Gallery, Washington, D.C.; + V details Of course the rhetoric of fullness the 19th century had to shed was the heritage from Baroque, with its proclaimed grandeurs of space, time, and cause — Leibnitz: Therefore each individual substance expresses the resolves which God made in regard to the whole universe. We grasp it in the light-flooded distances of Cuyp, the ground-bass tensities of a Viola d'Amore sonata, German about 1670. Music: 7) German, c. 1670, Viola d'Amore Sonata, lst movement, opening, AS-19 (fade) Norbert Grund, c. 1670, Flat Sea Coast, National Gallery, Prague; + V detail Music: Haydn, 1772, from 3rd movement, opening, Quartet #1 of 0pus 20, Qualiton SL PX 11 332 a From that heroics much of the 18th century already lightens to the Berkeleian and subjective, as in the Sons of Bach and early Haydn (here from the first quartet of Opus 20), or in such landscapes of sensibility as Norbert Grund's. Though, like Rousseau and Gray ("Wanders the hoary Thames along/ His silver-winding way"), this pre-romantic respects the court manners of rococo. (fade Haydn) a8) b8) C.D. Friedrich, 1828, Ships in Harbor at Evening, Gallery, Dresden C.D. Friedrich, 1818, Woman on the Shore near Rügen, Winterthur June 1996 19th Century 4 �C.G. Bell 8) Symbolic History C.D. Friedrich, c. 1916-18, Setting Sail, Morning Landesmuseum, Hannover; + V detail (here video returns to a detail of b8, then of a8) Music: Beethoven, 1807, 2nd movement, Second Rasoumovsky Quartet, Col. ML 5596 (or Fine Arts Quartet, Everest SDBR 32) Certainly, as far as transcendental melting goes, the Baroque vapored to a veil, it attends the Kantian fruition of that idealism Berkeley had sowed, and to which this Friedrich, with Beethoven, Coleridge, a whole 19th-century horizon are legatees: Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea: No truth therefore is more certain... than that all that exists for knowledge, and therefore this whole world, is only object in relation to subject, perception of a perceiver, in a word, idea... The sea across which Friedrich's morning boats set sail is rayed through with the longing which Schelling's "eternal One feels to give birth to itself." Such the ocean of Nietzsche's rapture, in whose Seventh Loneliness the silver soul-fish swims from the bark; though that timeless love, for all the miscarriage of Enlightenment and Revo- June 1996 19th Century 5 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History lution, still clings to the tonal and spatial touch of earth — Romantic. (fade Beethoven) a9) 9) Rembrandt, 1647, Night Rest on the Flight, detail, National Gallery, Dublin, Ireland (CGB '74) Same, whole (CGB '74) From the same three centuries, fix on night: — 1647, Rembrandt's Rest on the Flight, with Paul Gerhardt's "Evening Hymn." How the poem gleams in darkness, a sure life-prayer: Nun ruhen alle Wälder... The woods are silent now... The stars, golden, glow In the blue halls of the sky... God give you quiet slumber; His gold-bright angels render Armed watch at your bedside. (CGB) Stell euch die güldnen Waffen Ums Bett und seiner Engel Schar. 10) Joseph Wright, 1780-89, Moonlight Landscape, Art Gallery, Brighton; + V detail Another consciousness of ruins, lake, and moonlight broods over Wright of the 1780's, as over Claudius, whose "Abendlied" works mood-variations on Gerhardt: Der Mond ist aufgegangen... The full moon has risen, Gold star-points glisten Over heaven clear and bright; The silent wood is shadowed; Breathing from the meadows, The mist comes strange and white. (CGB) Der weiße Nebel wunderbar... 11) 11a) C.D. Friedrich, c. 1836, Pines, Lake, and Moon, Dr. Schäfer, Obbach bei Schweinfurt; video: detail only Friedrich, 1820, Evening, Landesmuseum, Hannover June 1996 19th Century 6 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History With Friedrich, as with Eichendorf's romantic hermit, the love of nature feeds the love of death: Comfort of earth, come, silent night... I weary of the blind daylight; The still wide ocean darkens. Give rest, give ease of wish and want, Until the dawn's eternal font Through the dark wood sparkles. (CGB) Komm, Trost der Welt, du stille Nacht... Der Tag hat mich so müd' gemacht, Das weite Meer schon dunkelt; Lass ausruhn mich von Lust und Not, Bis daß das ew'ge Morgenrot Den stillen Wald durchfunkelt. Novalis had turned from day to the comforting death-mother leaned over the fevered child; as Poe would vulgarize it: "Quaff, 0 quaff this sweet nepenthe". Music: 12) 12a) Schubert, 1825, Nacht und Träume (Fischer-Dieskau and Moore) LHMV-1046 Friedrich, 1830, The Fallow Field, Kunsthalle, Hamburg (CGB '86); + V detail Friedrich, c. 1834-35, Rest at Hay Making, Gemäldegalerie, Dresden Hölderlin's "Evening Fantasy" (like Friedrich's twilight landscapes, or Schubert's Nacht und Träume) suffuses such earth-dusk with infinite longing: Here by his cottage quiet in the shadow sits The plowman, with the smoke of his hearth content. Near in the peaceful village the bell of Evening kindly calls to the wanderer. 13) V13a) 13b) June 1996 F. Schinkel, 1815, Gothic Church above a Cliff, Mod. Mus., Berlin Carl G. Carus, Wanderer at the City Gate at Evening, lower spread (Dr. Otto Frank, Munich, in 1933) [also, cf. 3rd 13] Friedrich, 1817, City at the Rise of the of the Full Moon, Reinhart, Winterthur 19th Century 7 �C.G. Bell 13c) Symbolic History Again, Schinkel, 1815, Gothic Church above a Cliff, upper detail, Mod. Mus., Berlin Back now the seaman turns to the harbor's home. In far off cities gently the market shrouds Its bustling noise, while the still arbor Gleams with the affable meal of neighbors. But I then, whither? Do not all mortals live In reward and labor, with change of toil and rest Finding their joy? Why for me only Then does the bitter thorn not slumber? (CGB) Wohin denn ich? Es leben die Sterblichen Von Lohn und Arbeit; wechselnd in Müh' und Ruh' Ist alles freudig; warum schläft denn Nimmer nur mir in der Brust der Stachel? (fade Schubert) Against the dream radiance of Schinkel's Gothic, 1st 14) French, Early Gothic, 1134-1150/1195-1210, W. Front center, Chartres Cathedral (CGB '59: video has used V14, wider variant (copy of CGB '59, Gothic II 41) V14a) Delacroix, 1822, Dante and Virgil in Hell, Louvre, Paris V14b) Chartres Cathedral, West Front, with Towers how stripped, how severe, the old Gothic of faith, which has plumed such emulation. Music: Franconian, c. 1250(?), Ave Virgo — Ave Gloriosa, (Tinayre) Lumen 32018 Heine, having been called "a dismembered man... a divided soul, a Byron," wrote in 1829: ... complain rather that the world itself is split in the middle. For since the heart of the poet is the center of the world, it must at the present time be lamentably torn apart... Once the world was whole, in antiquity and in the Middle Ages; in spite of superficial struggles there was always an inner unity and there were integrated poets. We honor these poets and we rejoice in them, but every imitation of their unity is a lie that every sound eye penetrates. (fade Ave) June 1996 19th Century 8 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History For 2nd 13) Friedrich, 1809-10, Abbey ruin in an oak grove, Schloß Charlottenburg, Berlin So Arnold, at the monastery of the Grande Chartreuse, "Wandering between two worlds, one dead, The other powerless to be born," implores: "Take me, cowl'd forms, and fence me round, Till I possess my soul again." 2nd 12) Friedrich, 1825, Lonely House by a Forest of Pines, Walraff-Richartz Museum, Cologne; to which video adds the whole of 11, Friedrich's Pines, Lake, and Moon, and then a detail of 12, Friedrich's Fallow Field But since Arnold's "strange disease of modern life" is in fact the fruit of Hegelian consciousness, why not celebrate its ripe introspection — what Coleridge most shares with the Germans: No cloud, no relique of the sunken day Distinguishes the West, no long thin slip Of sullen light, no obscure trembling hues. Come, we will rest on this old mossy bridge... — which Victor Hugo distills in his early plays: Hernani: Regarde: plus de feux, plus de bruit. Tout se tait. La lune tout à l'heure a l'horizon montait; Tandis que tu parlais... Je me sentais joyeuse et calme, 0 mon amant! Et j'aurais bien voulu mourir en ce moment. June 1996 19th Century 9 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History For 3rd 13) Carl G. Carus c. 1825, Wanderer at the City Gate at Evening, whole, which video separates to upper half and lower half, and then returns to 13c, upper detail of 13, Schinkel's Gothic Church Les Burgraves: True, the sun is beautiful. Its rays — The last — now set a crown on Taunus' brow. The river gleams, the forests take the fire... All nature is a flood of life and light! (CGB) La nature est un flot de vie et de lumière. Music: Schumann, 1850, Feierlich, from Symphony No.3, Rhenish Though the cult Gothic of Coleridge's "Christabel," Keats' "Eve of St. Agnes," Schumann's Cathedral in the Rhine Symphony, in Romantic fullness and repletion, For 2nd 14) French Gothic, esp. 1210-30, S. Portal and S.W. Tower, Chartres (CGB '59); video: lower detail only V2nd 14a) Again, Chartres, c. 1210-20, detail of N. Portal (CGB '74) is far from what it hungers after. Music: 15) 15a) (fade Schumann) Same, c. 1250, from "Ave Virgo — Ave Gloriosa," Lumen 32018 (close) P.O. Runge, 1806-07, Christ walks on the Sea, Kunsthalle, Hamburg; + V details Blechen, before 1828, Stürmische See mit Leuchtturm, Kunsthalle, Hamburg Renaissance, Baroque, Transcendental have intervened. Runge's 1806 Christ on the Sea of Galilee shapes the world from subjectivity, no less than Goethe's Faust or "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner": And the coming wind did roar more loud, And the sails did sigh like sedge; And the rain poured down from one black cloud; The Moon was at its edge... The harbour-bay was clear as glass, So smoothly it was strewn! June 1996 19th Century 10 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History And on the bay the moonlight lay, And the shadow of the Moon. What is reached for is Schelling's Primordial Will: The primal longing moves... like a surging billowing sea... But there is born in God himself an inward imaginative response... the first stirring of Divine Being in its still dark depths... Schelling's "birth out of darkness into light" is no less of good from evil: The living Word enters as a firm and enduring center in battle against chaos, and a declared state of war between good and evil continues to the present time, when God reveals himself as Spirit, that is as concrete actuality. 16) Correggio, c. 1532, Jupiter and Ganymede, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien; + V upper detail That revelation is not purely a life-motion. When Goethe made a poem of this Correggio Rape of Ganymede, he gave it the dithyrambs of dissolving: I come. But where? Upward, upward... Clouds of the sky Bend to me, Me; I am here, Seizing, seized — All-loving Father — Upward on your breast. (CGB) Mir! Mir!... Umfangend umfangen! Aufwärts an deinen Busen, All liebender Vater! June 1996 19th Century 11 �C.G. Bell 17) Symbolic History P.P. Prud'hon, 1808, Psyche, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80); + V details With such heart's wish Prud'hon stretches the Græco-Roman Psyche and the style of Correggio. The surface is classical; but neither the vagabond soul of Chenier's loving Neare, nor Keats' Endymion glimpsing his Goddess in dream, cave, or by plashing pool, has wagered more desperately on "a thing of beauty is a joy forever." Against the Satanic mills of actual flesh — ...a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd, A burning forehead, and a parching tongue — those "leaf-fringed legends" of "a Grecian Urn" ("Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness"), that "draught of vintage" of "a Nightingale" ("Thou wast not born for death immortal bird"), beat urgent wings. 18) J.M.W. Turner, 1829, Ulysses deriding Polyphemus, National Gallery, London; + V details Music: John Field, c.1825(?), from Nocturne in A flat major, near close, MHS 4512 When Turner adds to Classical subject (here Ulysses deriding Polyphemus) not only Romantic heart but a color-play that turns whatever could be touched and seen to Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn — then, as in those Field Nocturnes, which inspired those of Chopin, (fade Field) Music: Chopin, c.1830(?), from near close of Nocturne in E-flat Major, 0p. 9, #2, (J. Bolet) Everest LPBR 6079 such life and hunger for life initiate a dissolving (as Turner's blind giant melts into cloud over rocks and sunset sea) which would run in art to Monet and Redon, in music to Debussy and Scriabin. (fade Chopin Nocturne) June 1996 19th Century 12 �C.G. Bell 19) 19a) 19b) 19c) 19d) 19e) Symbolic History L. Richter, 1837, Rhine-crossing at Schrekenstein, Staatsgalerie, Dresden Same, detail of boat Joh. G. v. Dillis, 1817-1831, Quirinal, Neue Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) Friedrich, 1810, Greifswald Harbor, Staatliche Museen, Berlin Again, 19, Rhine-crossing, somewhat nearer; video: detail only M. von Schwind, 1804, Waldkapelle, Schack Galerie, Munich Music: Schumann, 1850, from slow movement of Symphony #3, the "Rhenish," Angel S.36689 What is the aim, on Richter's Rhine-crossing (or Schumann's Rhine) but to take as one the riches of earth and spirit, to foster both nostalgias, of the finite and infinite — as with Mignon and the harper in Goethe's Wilhelm Meister: Do you know the land where lemon trees bloom? — Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn...? ...Dahin, dahin, Möcht ich mit dir, o mein Geliebter ziehn — (fade Schumann) a point of departure for Eichendorf's posthorn, and wanderers singing of the South, of statues and fountains, by moonlight, in summer gardens. Always the orchestrations of "Todeslust": Die Sonne, Funken sprühend im Versinken Gibt noch einmal der Erde Glut zu trinken... Always the soul-flight of "Mondnacht": And my soul spread her pinions Wide in the kindred gloom, Flew through the silent regions, As if she flew toward home — (CGB) Als flöge sie nach Haus. Lamartine would suspend time's flight by returning alone to the lake where the two, boating in silence, had heard, far off, oars and the harmonious waves: Un soir, t'en souvient-il? nous voguions en silence; On n'entendait au loin, sur l'onde et sous les cieux, June 1996 19th Century 13 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Que le bruit des rameurs qui frappaient en cadence Tes flots harmonieux. In Italy Leopardi rears such earth loves over "the infinite vanity of all" — "E l'infinita vanità del tutto." 20) M. von Schwind, c. 1860(?), Midday, Schack Galerie, Munich (CGB '59); + V details Never in history had soul and the ideal so seized on world and flesh. As Jung said, when Freud took off the psychic lid of Europe, he found the whole landscape flooded with sex — Moritz von Schwind's rock-pooled mystery of Midday, queer as Anderson's fairy tales: The Red Slippers, The Snow Queen. Those fish (like a Shakespearean pun: "The bawdy hand of the dial... upon the very prick of noon") around the hair-curtained form and reflection, dream-overcharge the pubic mandala. So in Schumann's "Frauenliebe und Leben." Music: 21) Schumann, 1840, from Süsser Freund, Frauenliebe und Leben, Decca CL 9971 Adolph von Menzel, 1847, Artist's Sister, Neue Pinakothek, Munich; first, video detail (fade Schumann) Though what Adler would find was Will to Power; Jung, will to myth. As in Menzel's 1847 study of his sister (like "Fräulein von Kulp/ Who turned in the hall," "Madame de Tornquist.../ Shifting the candles"), all the bases of desire are loaded. 22) 22a) 22b) Julia Margaret Cameron, 1869, Double: [A] Sir J.F.W. Herschel, and [B] Mae Prinseps as Beatrice Right half of double, Mae Prinseps as Beatrice Left half of double, Sir J.F.W. Herschel, detail; video adds closer details of 22a and 22b Even the photographs — Julia Margaret Cameron's old Faust men and tender Gretchen girls — voice it no less than the sonnet Victor Hugo, past eighty, wrote to Judith Gautier: "La mort et la beauté sont deux choses profondes": Death and beauty are too somber loves, As deep in blue and shade as if to say: June 1996 19th Century 14 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Two sisters, alike fecund and destructive, Bearing the burden of one mystery. Loves, voices, looks, tresses dark and fair, Be radiant; for I die. Hold light, warmth, solace — You pearls the sea rolls in waves up the shore, You birds that nestle, luminous, in the forest. Judith, our destinies are nearer kin Than one might think to see your face and mine. The abyss of all opens in your eyes — The same starred gulf I harbor in my soul. We are neighbors of the sky, and for this cause, That you are beautiful and I am old. (CGB) Judith, nos deux destins sont plus près l'un de l'autre Qu'on ne croirait, à voir mon visage et le vôtre; Tout le divin abîme apparait dans vos yeux, Et moi, je sens le gouffre étoilé dans mon âme; Nous sommes tous les deux voisins du ciel, madame, Puisque vous êtes belle et puisque je suis vieux. 23) Egypt, New Kingdom XVIII Dynasty, c. 1370 B.C., Blind Harper, from Mortuary Chapel of Patenemheb, Mus. Ant., Leyden Has such romantic soul appeared before? No doubt in all ripe civilizations, there is some filling in of conscious touch and longing — the blind harper from an Egyptian tomb of the time of Ikhnaton. 24) Graeco-Roman. lst cent. A.D. (from 3rd cent. B.C. original?), Spring, from Stabiae, Nat. Mus., Naples Or there are those frescoes, 1500 years later, from the Bay of Naples, a pleasure seat of Imperial Rome, its Euripidean and Hellenistic refinements already centuries old. 25) Chinese (Ming), 1470, Shen Chou reading in Autumn, Peking Museum; + V detail and return to whole What civilization could be riper than Ming Chinese? — 1470, Shen Chou reading out of doors — the poem: June 1996 19th Century 15 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The big trees exposed to the west wind are losing their leaves; To be comfortable I've unfastened the collar of my robe; Sitting here, I'm letting the time go by. Doing nothing, I've turned my back on encroaching autumn. I've not finished my book. My spirit has gone wandering in the sky... Who can fathom it? Yet personality, in these anticipations, seems contained in ancient traditions of philosophic and religious lore. 26) Franz von Lenbach, 1860, Shepherd Boy, Schack Galerie, Munich; + V detail Music: Smetana, 1874-9, from Ma Vlast 4, Col. ML 4785, A, band 2 It had hardly ventured on the blossom-and-tear-bearing branch of Lenbach's 1860 Shepherd Boy, or Smetana's Bohemian Fields and Groves — all those Intimations of Immortality from Wordsworth's: ...all the earth is gay; Land and sea Give themselves up to jollity... Thou Child of Joy, Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy! to Longfellow's: A boy's will is the wind's will And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts. 27) (fade Smetana) French, 1316, Roman de Fauvel, Charivari sports, Bibliotheque Nationale, fr. 146 f. 34r, Paris; + V detail Music: French, early 14th century, from Fauvel, Motet, Quant je le voi, ARCHIV 2723045 (2 b) Startling, that a civilization which would go so far in temporal deification, should, in its Gothic phase, have reduced earthly delights to the mumming foibles of religious feasts, under cowled disapprobation; while in that music the major and minor chords essential to romantic joy and grief are passing tones; they melt with the dissonances of June 1996 19th Century 16 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History earth into bare fifths and octaves, beyond the vanity of our moods. (fade Fauvel) 28) Petrus Christus, 1446-47(?), Portrait of a Girl, Staatliche Museen, Berlin; + V detail Music: Dufay, c. 1429(?), La belle se siet, opening, (Munrow) Seraphim SIC-6092 How often we have traced, in that faith-ground, the ripening of what would become romantic personality — how archly tempting here, in Dufay and Petrus Christus, to the time-tree of consciousness. (fade Dufay) 29) Vermeer, 1660-65, Head of a Girl, Mauritshuis, The Hague; first, video detail Music: Bach, c. 1725, Bist du bei mir, close, (Schwartzkopf) Angel 35023 A fruit Vermeer's Girl with the Pearl Earring has gloriously eaten, and what is it but wholesome and good to the taste, sustaining the earth-loves, to which Bach, for Anna Magdalena, gave pre-romantic voice. (end Bach) 30) V30a) V30b) 30c) 30d) Geo. F. Watts, c. 1863, Ellen Terry (his wife), Kerrison Preston, Esq.; + V detail H. Marees, 1863, Bath of Diana, detail only, Neue Staatsgalerie, Munich (CGB '59) Marees, c. 1870(?), Horse Leader and Nymph, Neue Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) Moreau, c. 1865(?), Leda, detail, Moreau Museum, Paris Dante Gabriel Rossetti, 1864-70, Beata Beatrix, Tate Gallery, London; video: close detail only Music: Duparc, c. 1870, L'Invitation au Voyage, 2nd stage, (Simoneau) Westminster W 9604 In the 46 year old Watts' painting of his 16 year old wife, the actress Ellen Terry (to leave him in a year), love, fevered as voluptuous, pants for the specter of a rose, Petronius' "harbor for a stilled desire," "Luxe, calme et volupte," as in Baudelaire's June 1996 19th Century 17 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History "Invitation to the Voyage" — supremely, as set, about 1870, by Duparc. But here we should read a sheaf of Baudelaire, closing perhaps with the condemned "Jet d'eau," erotic fountain: "Tes beaux yeux sont las, pauvre amante" — "Your beautiful eyes are tired... Let them close" — You, whom night so beautifies That it is sweet, bent to your breast, To hear the sad eternal cries Weep to the bowl from the water's crest. Moon, sounding drops, night serene, The melancholy of your mien, Is the mirror of my love. The fountain fills the night With flower-spheres, That in the pale light Of the moon's spears, Fall from the height Like a burst of tears. (CGB) Tombe comme une averse De larges pleurs. 31) (end Duparc) Japan, Kamakura, late 13th cent. Burning of the Sanjo Palace (1160), detail of paper scroll, Fine Arts Museum, Boston Have West and East converged toward modern consciousness? The burning of the Sanjo Palace, as painted (a hundred years after) in thirteenth century Japan, is, like Gothic, mytho-symbolic. 32) Japan, Edo later 17th C., Gay Quarters of Kyoto, detail, Fine Arts, Boston But this Edo screen of the pleasure quarters of Kyoto has the social irony and wit of Molière and the English Restoration, with which it is contemporary. 33) Japan, Hiroshige, 1857, Sudden Rain at Ohashi, Woodblock print; video: detail only June 1996 19th Century 18 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History While the Hiroshige woodblock of 1857 — A Sudden Rain at Ohashi — is abreast with the realism and mood-drama of 19th-century Europe. If the world-community attests such concurrence, 34) Franco-Flemish, Tapestry, c. 1385, detail of Arthur, Nine Worthies, Cloisters, NYC; first, video closeer detail what has arisen in the West, to revolutionize everything, is the assertive consciousness of person. Here it just shows itself, in the time of Wyclif and the first people's wars. As this Arthur takes up the banner, under the angular asperities of creed-invalidation, Gawain, flower of chivalry, returns from the Green Knight bearing about his neck the snaky belt of his temptation and fall, symbolic frailty "of this crabbed flesh." 35) 35a) 35b) V35c) 35d) 35e) V35f) Dürer, 1526, Joh. Klehberger, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien (CGB '59) G. Romano, 1532-34, Cupola with Olympus, Palazzo Te, Mantova Cranach, 1546, The Fountain of Youth, Berlin-Dahlem Museen, Berlin; video: detail only Giorgione, c. 1506, The Three Philosophers (section to the right), Kunsthistorisches Museum, Wien Same, close detail of the bearded old Philosopher Dürer, 1508, Martyrdom of 10,000, detail, upper left, Kunsthisthistorisches Museum, Wien Huber, 1522, Portrait of a Man in a Cap, Staatliche Museen, Berlin In Dürer's 1526 portrait of that dubious operator Kleberger, ego seems to express once and for all its earth-mastery. The same years, Vives, riding the wave that spread with Pico's "Dignity of Man," describes a feast of the gods: The universe was the amphitheater, in the skies the divine spectators; the earth was a stage for the actors. ...They saw man, the mime of Jupiter, take the mask of a plant, of a thousand wild beasts, then his own: prudent, just, friendly, a political and social being. The gods were not expecting to see him in more shapes, when behold, he appeared as one of their own race. He had transcended man and the lower gods, and was piercing into that inaccessible light-indark where Jupiter dwells, king of kings and of gods... While Fugger launched modern capitalism, and Geismayr, leader of the Peasant's Revolt, wrote his bill of reform: June 1996 19th Century 19 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History All privileges shall be done away with, as they are contrary to the word of God... All city walls, castles, fortresses shall be demolished... No profit is to be made, as all things are to be sold at cost... 36) Rembrandt, c. 1655, The Polish Rider, Frick Collection, NYC; first, video detail We have witnessed over Europe and America (that pioneer soil for Protestant and free humanist dreams) how the complex of thrust and counterthrust builds a transformational current, whose eddies and regressive whirls gather head and jet again into the main stream, altering and darkening its course — as under the shades of Rembrandt's Polish Rider, the deepened reality of Leonardo's Horseman strides into the century of brooding Baroque and Milton's Commonwealth. 37) Andreas Schlüter, 1698-1700, The Great Elector (Equestrian), Berlin; + V detail Music: J.K.F.Fischer, 1695, Fugato of Overture, Suite from Le Journal du Printemps, AS 52 How even when that confidence hardens to a wigged pomp of state, (Schlüter's Prussian Elector, Fischer's Overture in the style of Lully) such blatant mutants of the humanist claim, hung as it were between Newton's synthesis and a Dryden heroic play, carry the force that would drive through the ironic whirls of Rococo, to break out in the inalienable Rights of Man — and what right, if not to Vives' enactment of the gods? (end Overture) 38) J.E. Liotard, 1765-70, in his garden near Geneva, Reichsmuseum, Amsterdam; with video details And already in the 1760's of Rousseau's éclat, Liotard had pastelled himself in his own garden. in the mountain canton of Geneva, a way-mark to every Connecticut Yankee in those dogmatic courts. So, on the Easter morning of Goethe's Faust, the people crowd from stone gateways, mills, and vaulted churches, to the natural Resurrection of the Lord ("Sind sie alle ans Licht gebracht"). Had not even Pope said "An honest man's the noblest work of God" — to be taken up by Burns: "A man's a man for a' that"? 39) J.L. David, 1793, Marat Dead, Musée des Beaux Arts, Brussels June 1996 19th Century 20 �C.G. Bell 39a) Symbolic History Same, detail And the world of inertia, oversurge, and backlash being what it is, what could come of that plea but that Marat, champion of the people, murdered first by the intemperance of his aims, should be stabbed by Charlotte Corday in the bath? Were the dying words as she reported, "they shall all be guillotined"? David painted him, his truest picture, art climax of Revolution turning on itself. Let it be stressed again that the Romantic century — Schelling, Friedrich, Hölderlin, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Austen, Beethoven, Schubert, Byron, Keats, Lamartine. Hugo — all varieties of Transcendental immersion and socialist attack, work in the known shadow of that populist tailspin into terror. a40) 40) J.L. David 1805-07, Coronation of Napoleon, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80); video: detail only of Napoleon (cf. Va40) J.L. David, 1824, Mars Disarmed by Venus and the Graces, Beaux-Arts, Brussels; + V detail As for David, he slid through the Coronations of Napoleon and of Josephine to the slickness (in Brussels exile) of this Mars disarmed by Venus, with her aids. The 19th century had to face that degradation too — Revolution gone as vapid as in Von Weber's Freischütz. Music: 41) 41a) C.M. von Weber, 1820, Der Freischütz, Overture, close, (Toscanini) old RCA Victor 11-9172 Austrian Rococo, c. 1750(?), Millionenzimmer, Schloss Schönbrunn, Vienna G. Tiepolo, 1725-26, Angel appears to old Sara, detail, Archiepiscopal Palace, Undine Music: Telemann, c. 1737(?), Concerto for 3 trumpets, etc., from 2nd movement, Nonesuch H-1017 (oboe) So it was the 18th-century rococo, Telemann, and the Millionenzimmer at Schönbrunn, which the royalist regimes of post-revolution would espouse. And why not? Had not rococo shared in Enlightenment, its melodies everywhere beckoning to the heart, its chords loaded with supposititious good? (fade Telemann) June 1996 19th Century 21 �C.G. Bell 42) 42a) Symbolic History French (Vautier), c. 1855, Queen Victoria and Albert greeted by Napoleon III, Windsor Castle; video: details only Friedrich, c. 1818, Woman at Sunset, Essen Museum; video: detail only Music: Berlioz, 1830, Symphonie Fantastique, from 2nd movement, dance, London CM 9227 And what good could be greater than Napoleon III's entertainment of Queen Victoria and Albert in a Paris showy as Berlioz' waltz in the Fantastique — but a show gone hectic, like all the Vanity Fairs of Stendahl, Balzac, Flaubert, de Maupassant, driven to a drugged frenzy — those death-wish Kuragins of War and Peace. Anatole, Ippolit, white-armed Ellen, and through them "The Harlot's House" of Wilde: The dead are dancing with the dead, The dust is whirling with the dust — into which from time to time yearning Emmas and Natashas are drawn. (Berlioz cont., tender phrase, skip to fast) a43) 43) Viollet-le-Duc, 1858, Napoleon III and the Empress, owned by Madame Viollet-le Duc Thomas Lawrence, 1819, Portrait of George IV, Vatican, Rome; first, video detail; cf. V43 "My dearest Clough," Arnold would write: these are damned times — everything is against one — the height to which knowledge is come, the spread of luxury, our physical enervation, the absence of great natures, the unavoidable contact with millions of small ones, newspapers, cities, light profligate friends, moral desperadoes like Carlyle, our own selves, and the sickening consciousness of our difficulties... Great qualities are trodden down And littleness united is become invincible... (end Berlioz) In a depiction of the century, put Sir Thomas Lawrence's 1819 George IV, nine and a half feet high (and in the Vatican), on Byron's sinister side, counter-revolutionary background of whatever he wrote and did. June 1996 19th Century 22 �C.G. Bell 44) Symbolic History William Blake, 1804-18, Rinder Jerusalem, p. 51, Vala's Lifeless Court (with Hyde and Scofeld); + V details June 1996 19th Century 23 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History And on his creative right the continuing fierce vision of William Blake, an eternal doctrine of revolution against any crowned Vala's court of Submission and Death, whether of Rights of Man or Socialist Manifesto — a radical Judgment, for which the musical likeness seems always and only Beethoven's Great Fugue. Music: Beethoven, 1825, Grosse Fuge, from mid-section, Columbia M 5 S 677 Between those embattled extremes, a45) b45) 45) G.F. Kersting, c. 1815(?), Lady Making Wreaths, National Gallery, Berlin G.F. Kersting, 1827, Girl at a Mirror, Kunsthalle, Kiel; + V detail G.F. Kersting, 1817, A Couple at a Window, G. Schäfer, Obbach; + V detail Music: Schubert, 1815, 2nd Symphony, 2nd movement, opening, Nonesuch H-71230 the neo-classic, all over Europe, crossing into the new century, took the quiet glow of Transcendental and early Romantic, as in Kersting of the Friedrich circle, or the delight of Schubert's early symphonies. Here the Faust and fire forms leave a space of calm for the balancing of the leaf. Thus through all nature water counters fire, plant animal, grazer hunter; and if there is truth in Goethe's extending the ratio to woman against man — Women consider more how things are linked in life... since their fate and the fate of their families depends on this continuity — then it is fit that the ultimate perfection in art of the vegetable weft should be in the novels of a woman, Jane Austen. (fade Schubert) Thus the Baronet, in Mansfield Park, of his son and the poor cousin Fanny: Sick of ambitious and mercenary connections, prizing more and more the sterling good of principle and temper... he had pondered with genuine satisfaction on the more than possibility of the two young friends finding their mutual consolation in each other for all that had occurred of disappointment to either... Fanny was indeed the daughter that he wanted... With so much true merit and true love, and no want of fortune and friends, the happiness of the married cousins must appear as secure as earthly happiness can be. 46) J.A.D. Ingres, double: [A] 1806, Mlle. Rivière, Louvre, Paris; and [B] 1851, Madame Inès Moitessier, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. June 1996 19th Century 24 �C.G. Bell 46a) 46b) Symbolic History Ingres, 1806, Mlle, Rivière, Louvre, Paris (CGB '80); video: detail only Ingres, 1851, Madame Inès Moitessier, National Gallery, Washington, D.C.; video: details only Music: Chopin, c. 1845(?), Waltz in C-Sharp Minor, 0p. 64, No.2 (Lipatti) Odyssey St. 32 16 0058 Ingres had begun in that vein (left), this 1806 Mlle. Rivière, in the studied dress and pose of the cult of nature. But if one leaps forty-five years, to a portrait from Ingres' age (right), it is not just that the sitter is heavier and older, or the dress changed from naive white to black Carmen and Cleopatra; what speaks through that is social — the stuffy hardening of the Third Empire. Against the dreams of Emma Rouault's youth — her futile wish for romance in marriage: Ah! if in the freshness of her beauty, before the soiling of marriage and the disillusions of adultery, she could have anchored her life upon some great strong heart... she would never have fallen from so high a happiness — comes the fate (as in a Chopin waltz) to which Emma Bovary is bound: that town circle of hideous trade, the draper tempting her with money, the eternal monotony even of clandestine passion, down to the blind man's song mocking her as she dies: Maids in the warmth of a summer day Dream of love and of love alway... 47) Attributed to T. Gericault, c. 1818, Portrait of Delacroix, Musée des Beaux Arts, Rouen; first, video detail (cf. V47) Music: Berlioz, 1834, Harold in Italy, 4th movement, beginning RCA Victor LSC-2228 The focus on self as affirming center (Gericault's likeness) of his young friend Delacroix) bares, under the flesh-claim, those "fallings from us" and "blank misgivings" of Wordsworth's "Intimations"; Coleridge "Plucking the poisons of self-harm"; Berlioz' Childe Harold. Since behind the romantic as Promethean, 48) T. Gericault, c. 1818, Guillotined Heads, National Museum, Stockholm; first, video detail June 1996 19th Century 25 �C.G. Bell 48a) Symbolic History T. Gericault, 1824, Mad Woman, Musée des Beaux Arts, Lyons lie Gericault's later studies of corpses, guillotined heads, the criminally insane — waveof-terror reminders of Poe's macabre obsession, to be turned to sex by Baudelaire ("Une Charogne"): (viola) Remember, my love... by the roadway, a hideous carrion... With legs flexed in the air like a courtesan... The flies swarmed on that putrid vulva... maggots... Over those rags that lived and seemed to breathe, As if the romantic self were haunted — like Emma Bovary by the blind beggar: She saw the hideous face of the poor wretch standing out against the eternal night like a menace... She fell back upon the mattress in a convulsion. They all drew near. She was dead. (forte) As Dostoievsky's egoists would be haunted by dreams of horses beat down and children tortured. 49) John Martin, 1812, Sadak in Search of the Waters of Oblivion, Art Gallery, Southampton; first, three video details What flowed from "Kubla Khan" — A savage place, as holy and enchanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon lover -- to Poe's "Ulalume" — Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber — This misty mid region of Weir — Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber, This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir — is reflected in the English painter Martin, with whom Heine compared Berlioz — here the wanderings of Sadak in search of the Waters of Oblivion. (fade Berlioz) Yet Martin's slick art of nightmare stems from the same years 50) Constable, 1816 ff., Weymouth Bay, National Gallery, London; + V details June 1996 19th Century 26 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History as Constable's daytime celebration of the actual earth, which, like Jane Austen's peopled scene, smiled through wars and rumors of wars. The radiant is Transcendental, as in early Wordsworth: …the sky Never before so beautiful, sank down Into my heart, and held me like a dream — an almost German mystic presence: …laid asleep In body, and become a living soul; but it gathers a fabric of descriptive color and feel ("Give me a Constable," they used to say, "with the dew on it") — a vibrance later Wordsworth could bring off now and then: There was a roaring in the wind all night; The rain came heavily and fell in floods; But now the sun is rising calm and bright; a51) 51) Constable, 1830-36, River Scene, with a farmhouse near the water's edge, Victoria and Albert Museum, London Constable, c. 1830(?), On the River Stour, Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; first, video detail, to the right The birds are singing in the distant woods; Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove broods; The Jay makes answer as the Magpie chatters; And all the air is filled with pleasant noise of waters. But Constable too had his polarity of peace and storm. What woke up the French at the Paris show of 1824 (so that Delacroix took his Massacre at Chios from the Salon wall to give it the brushwork of broken color), was late Constable's clare-obscure and fury of palette, rooted in the Baroque crisis of Magnasco and reaching for the crisis of Expressionism. As the painter said after the death of his wife: "Tempest on tempest rolls. Still the darkness is majestic." Some would limit "Romantic" to such Storm and Stress of body; but its core is deeper: man and nature one incarnate godhead. "Malgré moi," de Musset protested, "l'infini me tourmente." June 1996 19th Century 27 �C.G. Bell 52) 52a) Symbolic History Diaz de la Peña, 1871, The Storm, National Gallery, London; + V details Theo. Rousseau, c. 1850(?), Sunset at Arbonne, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City Where soul becomes world-flesh, art-violence is a measure of spirit's war on itself. So with the earth and clouds Diaz de la Peña learned from Constable and fomented for half a century (here from 1871). But through calm or fury runs the pantheist thread of de Nerval's "Vers dorés" (Duncan): Man, free thinker! do you believe yourself the one alone thinking. In this world where life bursts forth in everything?... — Un mystère d'amour dans le métal repose — A mystery of love lies concealed in the metal... Beware in the blind wall a gaze that watches you... Often in the obscure being dwells a hidden God; And like a nascent eye covered by its lids A pure spirit grows beneath the skin of stones. How Victor Hugo would spill that earth-soul through his early poems: "Tonight the sun has set in a sky of clouds" — "Le soleil s'est couché ce soir dans les nuées..." a53) 53) Corot, c. 1826-28, Roman Campagna with Claudian Aqueduct, National Gallery, London Corot, 1855-60, Bathing Nymphs and a Child, Art Institute, Chicago In such a field each artist shapes his own path, under relational probabilities. Corot, beginning about 1826 with luminous scenes of Rome, both classic and early romantic, would blur the dark of mid-century to a kind of salon Arcadia — a Greek cult to metastasize in Bougereau, Puvis de Chavanne, Swiss Böcklin, as in academic sculpture everywhere — reaching in poetry through Tennyson, Arnold, Swinburne, to the last gentleman of the columned American south, William Alexander Percy, dreaming of Sappho on the levee over the Mississippi. a54) 54) Hans Thoma, 1875, Valley of the Main, Neue Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59) Delacroix, c. 1849(?), Sunset Sky, Pastel, Louvre, Paris; first, video detail Music: June 1996 Chopin, 1839, Sonata in B-Flat Minor, Op.35, from 3rd movement (Funeral March), tender mid-section, with trill (Horowitz) V-LM-1235 19th Century 28 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Men still thought of themselves as fleeting and nature as eternal — "the immense and radiant world": "Je m'en irai… Sans que rien ne manque au monde immense et radieux." Yet as man's power mounts iron, coal, and steam, the infinite drowning has the feel of mutual death: — with Chopin's Funeral March Sonata, Delacroix and Leopardi ("Sempre caro mi fu quest' ermo colle"): This lonely hill was always dear to me, And this hedgerow, that from so wide a part Of the ultimate horizon shuts the view. But as I look beyond it, I conceive A space which has no measure, a quiet not Of man, a hush and void that draw the heart Almost to the brink of fear. And as the wind Noises in the leaves, I set that voice Against the silence of the infinite, And call to mind the eternal, and lost time, And this that lives and sounds; and so it comes In that immensity my thought is drowned, And sweet to me is shipwreck in that sea. (CGB) (heavy tolling of Funeral March) E il naufragar m'è dolce in questo mare. 55) G. Courbet, 1865, Stormy Sea, Louvre, Paris; + V details To Delacroix's pastel Courbet adds mass and volume — a cloud-gathering reached for in Tennyson: There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail: There gloom the dark broad seas... That mood-space stretches out in Arnold's "Dover Beach": ...on the French coast the light Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand, Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay. In some Meredith "the largeness of the evening earth" clots round us like the blood of Modern Love — Moves dark as yonder midnight ocean's force... To throw that faint thin line upon the shore. June 1996 19th Century 29 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But it is Victor Hugo who most summons the storm — sailors gone down in "Oceano Nox," Dans une mere sans fond, par une nuit sans lune — until the creation he entered as a realm of light rounds to "A great wheel,/ Which cannot move without crushing someone": June 1996 19th Century 30 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Que la creátion est une grande roue Qui ne peut se mouvoir sans écraser quelqu'un. 56) 56a) Victor Hugo, 1858, Fantastic Landscape, Bibl. Nat., Paris Hugo, 1859, The Hanged Man, drawing, Maison de Victor Hugo, Paris (here video returns to 56) Though when Hugo took to ink-wash and watercolor in the late 1850's, he cut through space as Blake had done, reaching back to Bosch and ahead to the surreal — a road he would parallel, with more knowing defiance of the forms, in his last poems: so "The Trumpet of Judgment": I saw a monstrous trumpet in the clouds... Forged out of justice condensed into brass... It lay on a mist that trembled, unfathomable, Out of the world... Oh, what night; nothing there has contour nor age, And the cloud is specter and the specter cloud. Et le nuage est spectre, et le spectre est nuage. Revealing sea-mark for the youth who had declared: "Romanticism... is nothing but liberalism in literature." 57) V57a) 57b) V57c) 57d,e,f) Turner, c, 1843, Eve of the Deluge, National Gallery, Washington, D.C. Same, detail, Sky with Birds (from V57a & c) Same, detail with Alligator Same, closer view of Flocking Birds (also from V57a & c) Triple: [d] Constable, 1820-23, Pond in Branchhill, Hamstead, Evening, Victoria and Albert Museum, London; [e] Pissaro, 1887, Woman in Field, Louvre, Paris; and [f] Cezanne, 1900-06, Trees and Rocks, Museum of Modern Art, NYC (slide show combines three vertical cuts from these pictures; while the video shows them separately, substituting for the second: Monet, 1888, Antibes, detail, Courtauld Institute, London (see V57e) Music: Same Chopin Sonata, to last movement The continuing optimism of the century seemed to be science. How the old Turner's theory and practice of light gives his most pessimistic "apocalypse of heaven" June 1996 19th Century 31 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History (this Eve of the Deluge) the élan of an electrical discovery by Faraday or Maxwell. Or pain-racked Darwin's Origin of Species: to contemplate a tangled bank...plants of many kinds... birds singing... insects flitting... worms crawling... and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms have all been produced by...Variability... the Struggle for Life...Natural Selection...Thus from the war of nature... the production of the higher animals directly follows. There is grandeur in this view... Was the art-cognate of science not the realism of the century, but the search beyond realism? What gave Constable such headway against his moods but the pursuit of painting as "scientific and mechanical"? Later the technique of pure color would rescue Impressionists from the bogs of Baudelaire; while that, combined with geometric analysis, would turn the splenetic solitudes of Cezanne to clarity. As he would say: "I have only painted all my life to escape the ennui." (final forte and close of Chopin) a58) 58) 58a) Anselm Feuerbach, 1870, Medea, formerly: National Gallery, Berlin Feuerbach, c. 1865, Medea, Neue Pinakothek, Munich (CGB '59); + V detail Same, Munich Medea, detail of beach and waves (CGB '59); here video adds another detail of 58 Music: Wagner, 1857-9, Tristan and Isolde, from Overture, Stokowsky, Victor LM 1174 Though the ambiguity which stretches the Wagnerian ocean of Feuerbach's Medea broodings, also had its center in science. As late as 1847 Helmholtz could celebrate the First Law of Thermodynamics: The universe possesses, once for all, a store of energy which is not altered by any change of phenomena, can neither be increased nor diminished, and which maintains any change which takes place on it. Yet Carnot had already proved the motive power of heat fixed solely by the always equalizing temperature gradient — an insight clinched in Clausius' 1850 formulation of the spent energy in any system: "The entropy of the universe tends toward a maximum" — which Kelvin's Second Law would give apocalyptic irreversibility: Within a finite period of time past, the earth must have been, and within a finite period of time to come the earth must again be, unfit for June 1996 19th Century 32 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History the habitation of man as at present constituted, unless operations have been, or are to be performed, which are impossible under the laws to which the known operations going on at present in the material world are subject. 59) George Stubbs, 1770, White Horse Frightened by a Lion, Walker Gal., Liverpool; + V detail Music: Haydn, 1772, from 4th movement, A Major Quartet, 0pus 20, #6, fugue, near close, Qualiton SLPX 11 332-b Since Rubens, art-power had seized on the beast — horse, pitted sometimes against lion or tiger, in Blake's Bible of Revolution: "the tigers of wrath... wiser than the horses of instruction." So Stubbs had painted them in that England (time of Haydn's Opus 20 Quartets), island cognate for the Storm and Stress of the Continent — bold as mad Christopher Smart's "Jubilate Agno": "For a Lion roars himself compleat from head to tail" — (close of Haydn) and so freshly painted, 60) Gericault, 1817, Horses Held by Slaves, Musée des Beaux Arts, Rouen; first, video detail they changed the art of Gericault when he came to England. Music: Beethoven, 1812, opening of 4th movement, 7th Symphony, Columbia ML 5405 Though Gericault had already ventured on the horses, at the Corso in Rome, and with an elevation of Classic and Romantic like Beethoven's in the Seventh Symphony. (fade Beethoven) 61) 61a) Delacroix, 1860, Horses Coming from the Sea, Phillips Gallery, Washington, D.C. Delacroix, c. 1843, Head of Lion Roaring, Cabinet des Dessins, Louvre, Paris Music: Wagner, 1869-74, Close of the Götterdämmerung (forte) 6-London 1604 By the event of Delacroix' 1860 Horses Emerging from the Sea, Wagner had written Tannhäuser, Lohengrin, Tristan. and much of The Ring. The cult of exotic savagery (Delacroix' splendid tigers, as Clark says, his best self-portraits) was crudening June 1996 19th Century 33 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History toward Lesconte de Lisle's 1869 primeval earth of beast-death and volcanic blood, where "the Creator panted in his creation" — a62) 62) Böcklin, 1878, Battle of the Centaurs, 2nd version, central detail, Meiner Collection, Leipzig Same, Centaurs, whole setting for his sinister superman, Cain: But beyond the lava heights of Gelboë-hor, Charged with a boiling mist of savage smells, Which bears and roaring lions spewed and fumed, Sounded, like seas outraged by cyclone winds, Death-rattles rising from those livid shades. By 1874, Wagner had completed the Götterdämmerung, and Böcklin was midway in his series of battling Centaurs. But what — in the fire-fall of Valhalla, when flames and Rhine flood close the Twilight of the Gods — (music to melting) what is the import of that rippling death-by-water, coming in like a tide of sensuous good? For 63) Monet, 1873, Autumn at Argenteuil, Courtauld Institute, London; first, video detail What the relation of Impressionism's poignant and shimmering dream to the contemporary deep-rooted and wide-spread tree of Romantic and Symbolist pain? — Count Axel's death persuasion: 2nd 62) Again 62, Centaurs, lower detail "Our existence is full, and its cup is running over." Is it, as in the nether abyss of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, when, from the cataract of fire and serpent-folds, the tiger-striped head of Leviathan rears, tinging the black deep with beams of blood, advancing toward us with all the fury of a spiritual existence — and the frightened cherub flees, June 1996 19th Century 34 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History 2nd 63) Monet, 1868, Along the Seine, Art Institute, Chicago; + V detail (for which the slide show substitutes 63a: Monet, 1866-67, Women in a Garden, Jeu de Paume, Paris) and Blake finds himself sitting on a pleasant bank beside a river by moonlight hearing a harper who sung to the harp... (close of Wagner) Are Monet's bright visions outward or within? In any case, it was at the heart of Wagner's Zarathustran and chromatic longing that the tonal dissolutions of musical "Impressionism" (beginning with Saint-Saens) would appear. Music: 64) Saint-Saens, 1868, Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, 0p. 22, from 1st Movement, (Rubinstein and Ormandy) RCA-LSC 3165 J.B. Carpeaux, 1869, The Dance, façade of the Opera, Paris; + V details Sculpture, denied the levitating science of color, hardly got the dance of delight off the ground. Carpeaux' Opera nymphs may hint at a flaw in Romantic joy, even in the greatest — those inadequate allegros, finales of works too searching to be rondo-resolved — from Mozart's G Minor Quintet: Music: June 1996 Mozart, 1787, a phrase, last movement, G Minor Quintet, Columbia ML 5192 (now Columbia D3S 747) 19th Century 35 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History through the dry-leaf whirl after Beethoven's A Minor Adagio: Music: Beethoven, 1825, from closing Allegro, A Minor Quartet, Columbia M5S 677 to the hectic flush closing Schubert's great string Quintet: Music: Schubert, 1828, from last movement, near close, C Major Quintet, Columbia MS 6536 No wonder Beethoven tried radical finales: the choral of the Ninth, the visionary variations of the last Piano Sonato, the Quartet Grosse Fuge. For 1st 65) Rodin, 1882, from the Gates of Hell, lower left, Ugolino Group, Rodin Museum, Paris V1st 65a) Rodin, 1882, separate Ugolino group, bronze, detail, Rodin Museum, Paris (or video can work from 2nd 65) Melville: "The truest of all men was the Man of Sorrows." Let Rodin's Ugolino from the Gates of Hell, against Carpeaux's Dance, twist the intolerable theme of Ibsen's Ghosts. As Oswald tells his mother of the inherited syphilis eating at his brain, he contrasts the old view of life, "a state of wretchedness" under "punishment for sin," For 2nd 64) Rodin, 1886, The Kiss, Tate Gallery, London 2nd 64a) Rodin, 1877, The Age of Bronze, detail, Louvre, Paris with the awakening of Impressionist Paris (Goethe's Easter again, the souls come up from vaults and cellars): Oswald: the mere fact of being alive is thought to be a matter for exultant happiness. Mother, have you noticed that everything I have painted has turned upon the joy of life? And it is just this beaming happiness and presumptive good which is denied when, as the mother pulling the curtains on the sunrise, com- June 1996 19th Century 36 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History forts her son, "Look, Oswald, what a lovely day we are going to have," the attack falls. 2nd 65) Again, Rodin, separate Ugolino group, whole; first, video detail of Ugolino only Oswald: (who has been sitting motionless in the armchair, with his back to the scene outside, suddenly says): Mother, give me the sun... (Oswald seems to shrink up in the chair; all his muscles relax; his face loses its expression, and his eyes stare stupidly. Mrs. Alving is trembling with terror) Mrs. Alving: What is it? (Screams) Oswald! What is the matter with you? (Throws herself on her knees beside him and shakes him) Oswald, Oswald! Look at me! Don't you know me? Oswald: (in an expressionless voice...): The sun — the sun. a66) 66) 66a) Double: [A] P.O. Runge, c. 1802, Self-Portrait, Hamburg, and [B] Cezanne, c. 1875, Portrait of M. Choquet, Cambridge, England Delacroix, c. 1824, Self-Portrait as Ravenswood, Louvre, Paris; video: upper half only Moritz von Schwind, c. 1850, Knight and Water Siren, Staatsgemälde Galerie, Munich Around the middle of the century Gerard de Nerval wrote the transforming symbolist poem, "El Desdichado," from which Eliot quotes one line in The Waste Land and paraphrases another in "Prufrock". But from Poe through Baudelaire to Mallarmé and Rimbaud, Symbolism was abstracting itself from Romantic by a motion of estrangement. In Delacroix' early portrait of himself as Ravenswood, hero-suicide of Scott's Bride of Lamermoor, we grope toward de Nerval's "Disinherited": (CGB) Music: Wagner, 1857-9, Tristan, Act III, shepherd's pipe, RCA-Victor 6700 (5) Je suis le ténébreux — le veuf, — l'inconsolé, Le prince d'Aquitaine a la tour abolie... I am the darkness, widowed, unconsoled, The Prince of Aquitaine of the ruined tower; June 1996 19th Century 37 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History My one star is dead; my lute, star-scrolled, Burns with the black sun of an old despair. 67) Böcklin, 1875, Triton and Nereid, 3rd form, old National Gallery, Berlin; + V details Böcklin, 1875, still holds the intolerable Wagnerian longing, "Empty and waste the sea," which in de Nerval (and even in Wagner's lonely pipe) begins to escape from the causal fabric: You who healed me in the night of the tomb, Give me Posilipo and the Gulf again; Rends-moi le Pausilippe et la mer d'Italie You who fed my life with your bloom, Give me the trellis of the rose and the vine. ...la treille où le pampre à la rose s'allie. For 2nd 66) Delacroix, 1826, Study for Baron Schwiter, detail, Springfield, Mass. Am I Phoebus or Love, Byron or Lusignan? My forehead is red with the kiss of the Queen. Mon front est rouge encor du baiser de la reine; V2nd 67) Böcklin, detail from Sport of the Waves (CGB '59) 2nd 67) Again, Böcklin, Triton and Nereid, detail of Nereid, Berlin I have dreamed in caves where sea-sirens rise. J'ai rêvé dans la grotte où nage la sirène... a68) Vb68) 68) 68a) V68b) G. Courbet, 1845-46, Self with a Pipe, detail, Musée, Montpellier (or Va68) M. von Schwind, c. 1845(?), Luring Wood-fay, Schack Galerie, München Cezanne, 1866-68, Achille Emperaire, Private Collection; + V detail Cezanne, c. 1670, Self-Portrait, Tate Gallery, London Cezanne, 1866, Sorrow (Mary Magdalene), Louvre, Paris Music: June 1996 (fade Wagner) Mussorgsky, 1868 and '71, Boris Godounov, from Prologue, Angel S-3633 19th Century 38 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Conqueror twice, I have crossed the Acheron, Singing by turns to the Orphic lyre, the moans Of the saint, the fay Melusina's cries. (CGB) Les soupirs de la sainte et les cris de la fée. With the 1860's, as in Cezanne's portrait of the painter Achille Emperaire, the monstrous egg of longing begins to crack to the radical and elemental — Mussorgsky and Dostoievsky also beginning what would culminate in Boris and The Brothers. But in that revolt of "The Disinherited," who can tell whether the attack is religious, social, aesthetic? Estranged from what Flaubert called society's "brutal course", Cezanne and Marx meet in Kierkegaard's Knight of Faith, who knows that it is glorious to belong to the universal... but that higher than this there winds a solitary path; he knows that it is terrible to be born outside the universal, to walk without meeting a single traveller... Humanly speaking, he is crazy and cannot make himself intelligible to anyone. (cut Mussorgsky on dissonance) Va69) Goya, 1810-20 (published 1863), Los Desastres de la Guerra, first etching: sad presentiments… Goya, 1813-16, The Forge, Frick Collection, NYC; video: central portion only 69) The poles of day and night, outward and inward, had shadowed Rousseau's Enlightenment with his melancholy. And as Storm and Stress struck through Revolution toward Romantic, the schemes of head, the dreams of heart, meet in repeated transformations, but hardening, from the liberal bourgeois to socialist labor; darkening, from Transcendental to Symbolist. In the first decades of the century, Goya's message of The Forge is contemporary with his black mythologies, Saturn Devouring his Children, a Dog Buried in the Sand. At the storm-center of the French Revolution, Babeuf knowing the rich had let them down, gave his life in conspiracy for a "Society of Equals". His followers were the link between Robespierre and the Manifesto. a70) M. van Raymerswaele, c. 1540, Two Tax Gatherers, National Gallery, London June 1996 19th Century 39 �C.G. Bell 70) 70a) Symbolic History P. Brueghel Jr., 1620, Commodity Finance, Museum, Bruges Same, Commodity Finance, detail The sin which in Dante sets the Usurers clutching their pouches on the hot sand and under flames at the edge of lower hell, had sprinkled the arts of Renaissance and rising capital with satanic extortioners, as in this Peter Breughel the Younger, or about the same time, Sir Giles Overreach in Massinger's Play: [His agent Marrall speaks] The... justice did his part, returning... the certificate, Against his conscience, and his knowledge, too... to the utter ruin Of the poor farmer. Overreach: Twas for these good ends I made him justice... So he serve My purposes, let him hang or damn, I care not; Friendship is but a word. 71) 71a) Daumier, 1834, The Legislative Belly, Lithograph; + V detail Same, The Legislative Belly, another detail; + V closer detail With Daumier, as everywhere in the 19th century, the attack is no longer religious but social. And where the abuse had seemed exceptional, what is caricatured here is the monthly assembly of ruling property, as Daumier titles it, "The Legislative Belly." So Lesconte de Lisle, "To the Moderns": (Neff) Murderers of Gods! the time is near When, sprawled on a great heap of hoarded gold, Having gnawed down to bare rock the nourishing soil, Not knowing what to do with the days and the nights, Drowned in the nothingness of utter boredom. You will die stupidly, cramming your pockets. This is the ubiquitous "Money-Bags" of Marx's Labour Process, who tries to justify his existence: "Have I myself not worked... not performed the labour of superintendence?" — While "His overlooker and his manager try to hide their smiles." [p.215, Modern Library Giant] 72) English Gothic Revival (Barry and Pugin), 1840-52, Houses of Parliament, London; + V details June 1996 19th Century 40 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History The hard-fought sin of Usury has become the baptized fabric of Christian society — Marx: The sphere within whose boundaries the sale and purchase of labor goes on, is in fact the very Eden of the innate rights of man. [p. 195] The English Houses of Parliament, built after the fire Turner painted, are a windowed shell before the operations of imperial banking, manufacture and trade. Ironic inversion — "the religious world is but the reflex of the real world" — that such a shell should take the ancient sacred form of Perpendicular Gothic. But Marx's irony yielded to such a rage — The Pharisee of a capitalist denounces this brutality which he himself creates, perpetuates, and exploits — [p. 432] that he perhaps undervalued the reform Christianity of those "fish-blooded" bourgeoisie. 73) 73a) 73b) 73c) 73d) Photograph, 1870, Steam Hammer of 1861 in the Krupp Works, Germany; + V detail John F. Weir, 1886, The Gun Foundry, from sketches made near West Point, Civil War, Putnam County Historical Society, NY (here the video returns to 73, the Krupp steam hammer) U.S. Industry c. 1880, Rails in a Steel Works, National Archives, Washington, D.C. T. Anschutz, 1880's, Steelworks, left detail, Kennedy Galleries, Inc. Great Witley (ruined mansion), c. 1860, near Stourport Works, Worcester (CGB '66) Not so their Faustian power. That capitalist drone, who did not seem to labor or even superintend, becomes the driving force of a process as staggering as the Krupp steam hammer of 1861, apparent model in Chaplin's Modern Times: In Industry [Marx writes] man succeeded for the first time in making the product of his past labour work on a large scale gratuitously, like the forces of nature. [p.424] June 1996 19th Century 41 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History Now "the work of directing, superintending, and adjusting" [p. 363], required by "all combined labour on a large scale," "becomes one of the functions of Capital". The result is an industrialization labor could never have achieved on its own: a mechanical monster whose body fills whole factories, and whose demon power, at first veiled under the slow and measured motions of his giant limbs, at length breaks out into the fast and furious whirl of his countless working organs. [p.416] Here the Capitalist steps forth in giant boots — such a Faust of accumulations as dwarfs Dickens' Hard Times Bounderby: he ruthlessly forces the human race to produce... those material conditions, which alone can form the real basis of a higher form of society, a society in which the full and free development of every individual is the ruling principle. [p. 649] Self-indulgent Money-bags is almost lost in this devotee. Yet "Two souls, alas, dwell in his breast" — A Faustian conflict between the passion for accumulation and the desire for enjoyment. [p. 651] 74) 74a) Blake, 1789-94 (1826 copy), The Chimney Sweeper, Songs of Innocence and Experience, Rosenwald, Library of Congress; + V details Blake, 1794, Europe: A Prophecy, title page, detail, with Serpent of Materialism, Privately owned (Dover) The predictable fall of that Faust-ambivalence distinguishes dialectic materialism from the poetic cry against the same abuses: Blake's "Chimney Sweeper" — A little black thing among the snow, Crying "weep! weep!" in notes of woe! "Where are thy father and mother, say?" "They are both gone up to the Church to pray." Compare Marx: Previously the workman sold his own labour power... Now he sells his wife and child. He has become a slave dealer... In spite of legislation the number of boys sold in Great Britain by their parents to act as live chimney sweeping machines... exceeds 2000... [p. 432-3] June 1996 19th Century 42 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But to forge that outrage, on the model of Newton's causality (which Darwin also stretched by metaphor), to an equational science of value — Marx, in the face of an organic unfolding of power-riches self-created, reverting to the old a priori "nothing can come of nothing" a75) b75) 75) Blake, 1793-94 (copy 1799 ff), America: A Prophecy, detail of Plate 5: Flame erupts unde the snake-spiral of materialism Again, Blake, 1794, Europe, detail of Plate 2: Social and racial oppression H. Daumier, c. 1850(?), Third Class Carriage, Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC; + V details (the last video detail overflows into the a76 section) and so deriving from the quantified ground of labor all productive machinery and accumulations; where the organizing capitalist supplies nothing, nature costs nothing, cooperation nothing, past labor, congealed in machines, works gratuitiously, and that "live monster that is fruitful and multiplies" must be distrained from the only postulated source: The ownership of past unpaid labour is therefore the sole condition for the appropriation of living unpaid labour on a constantly increasing scale (p.638) — to hammer outrage into the axiomatic net of Das Kapital, Blake might have thought a Urizenic task. Though the rhetoric glows like Luvah — like the dark oils of Daumier's Third Class Carriage: all means for the development of production transform themselves into means of domination over, and exploitation of, the producers; they mutilate the labourer into a fragment of a man, degrade him to the level of an appendage of a machine, destroy every remnant of charm in his work and turn it into a hated toil; they estrange him from the intellectual potentialities of the labour-process...turn his life-time into working-time, and drag his wife and child beneath the wheels of the Juggernaut of capital. [p. 708] a76) 76) van Gogh, 1885, The Potato Eaters, whole, V.V.G. Foundation, Amsterdam (video places the whole after the 76 details) Same, The Potato Eaters, detail; + V closer detail, then the whole June 1996 19th Century 43 �C.G. Bell Symbolic History But all methods for the production of surplus value are at the same time methods of accumulation; and every extension of accumulation becomes again a means for the development of those methods. It follows therefore that in proportion as capital accumulates, the lot of the labourer, be his payment high or low, must grow worse. [p. 708-9] (So Van Gogh's Potato Eaters have sunk from Daumier's Third Class to The Lowest Depths.) Marx: Capital is dead labour, that vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more the more labour it can suck. [p. 257] In Van Gogh, who had preached in the mining region of Mons, evangelical Christianity, socialist sympathy, and Symbolist art all meet in an Expressionist break and "transvaluation of value". 77) 77a) 77b) Russian Traditional, 1714, Domes, Church of the Transfiguration, Lake Onega (or V77 horizontal variant) F. Alexeyev, 1794, St. Petersburg, view of the Palace Embankment from Peter and Paul Fortress, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow Russian (Renaissance-Byzantine), 1555-60, Cathedral of St. Basil, Moscow Russia, battleground of Christian, Symbolist, and Socialist extremes, was a land so bedded in the past that folk building of the 18th century combines the domes of Byzantine and Tartar with the timbering of the Viking north — a land which now at the style-surface telescopes French Rococo, English Liberalism and German Romantic, surging toward the 1900's like Gogol's troika in Dead Souls: And Russia, art thou not too flying onward like a spirited troika that nothing can overtake... What terrifying onrush... What mysterious force... never seen before. Ah, horses — what horses! Is the wind hidden under your manes?... Russia, whither?... She gives no answer. The ringing of the bells melts into music... everything on earth is flying by, and the other states and nations, with looks askance, make way and draw aside. a78) A. Ivanov, c. 1850, Boys Basking in the Sun, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow June 1996 19th Century 44 �C.G. Bell 78) Symbolic History A. Ivanov, c. 1850, Head of St. John the Baptist, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow (video returns to a detail of Boys Basking in the Sun and thereafter to a detail of John the Baptist The troika is our clue to Gogol's plan, that Dead Souls, study of Russia in social decay, should be the first of a regenerative trilogy. He is said to have written the second, a Purgatory of Transition, but burned it dissatisfied, and again, after painful rewriting, by mistake. The third, the Paradiso, was not attempted. This painter Ivanov spent the same thirty years working toward a religious masterpiece, The Appearance of Christ before the Multitudes, of which yearning sketches remain the best fruit. Dostoievsky too, who shifted Crime and Punishment from suicide-course to salvation, intended a trilogy, of which the present Brothers, centered in Ivan, would be the Inferno of a Pan-Slavic ascent of Russia tried and saved. As Father Paissy says: The Church is not to be transformed into the State. That is Rome and its dream... On the contrary, the State is transformed into the Church, will ascend and become a Church over the whole world — which is the opposite of... Rome... and is only the glorious destiny ordained for the Orthodox Church. This star will arise in the east! 79) 79a) I.E. Repin, 1901, Portrait of Tolstoy, State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg; + V details Serov, 1937, Lenin's arrival in Petrograd in 1917, USSR (video adds, from 79, a detail of Tolstoy's head) That destiny was spiritual, but it has come to pass by material–ism, anathema to the great men of the '40's — this Tolstoi, painted in age by Repin — a hint at the reversals of the organizing play. Thus Le Maistre, Tolstoi's Napoleonic source, Catholic and Royalist counterpole to the Liberal ferment, had become a feature of the court of the Czars. In absorbing that skeptic absolutism, Tolstoi turns it to an intuitive surrender to the divinity of the peasant mass, the prompting of Russian soul. So his Platon Karataev ("The Plato who cannot speak well") mediates Pierre's life-acceptance — with the barefoot search in which Tolstoi would close his life. But for Kutuzov's enactment of the Slavic will, already wrenched from Le Maistre's Machiavellian power-politics, to incorporate itself by a further antinomy, the proletarian iconoclasm of Marx, for an actualization the converse of Father Paissy's dream — is a dialectic the aristocrats of Russian soul could hardly have anticipated. June 1996 19th Century 45 �C.G. Bell 80) Symbolic History M. Vrubel, 1890., Sitting Demon, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow; + V details Music: Scriabin, 1903, Etude, 0pus 42, No. 5, close, (Horowitz) Columbia M 31620 Vrubel's 1890 brooding Demon or Genie, its Symbolist forms breaking into the abstract, closes the century. Let it stand with Scriabin, who made his life a medley of visions extolling three things, the new Art, the new Gospel, the new Left: "There must be no more money and no more poor." All his music was in preparation for a great tone poem Mystery, for which he had invented a language of cries and ejaculations; it was to be performed in a hemispherical temple in a lake in India (the reflection completing the perfect sphere), and at its climax Nietzsche's leap to the Superman would occur, and revolution be fulfilled in an ecstasy of Spirit. Though he had bought a cork helmet to explore the site, the World War (as with Thomas Mann, Hesse, and so many) intervened, turning The Poem of Fire to a baptism grosser than those post-Romantics had conceived. (end Scriabin) June 1996 19th Century 46 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History: Through Sight and Sound Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource St. John's College Meem Library Description An account of the resource Scripts of Mr. Charles G. Bell's Symbolic History series. Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Original Format The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data paper Page numeration Number of pages in the original item. 46 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource 19th Century : The Loaded Dream, Symbolic History, Part 31 Description An account of the resource Script of Part 31 of the Symbolic History series by Charles G. Bell. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Bell, Charles G. (Charles Greenleaf), 1916-2010 Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available St. John's College Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant Santa Fe, NM Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource [1988-1990] Type The nature or genre of the resource text Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource pdf Language A language of the resource English Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context SF_BellC_Symbolic_History_Script_31_19th_Century--The_Loaded_Dream Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Meem Library has been given permission to make this item available online.