The Art of Literature

I almost left for my outing in Edinburgh today without my rain jacket and umbrella, but I quickly remedied the problem by going back to my room when I stepped outside and found a light drizzle greeting me. First order of business was to hit the free National Gallery of Scotland. Unlike in the States, Europe gets this right-- these types of national archives should be free! The downstairs hosted rooms and rooms of artwork from Italian and Dutch painters as well as many other nationalities. Titian's "Venus Rising from the Sea" caught my attention because I just watched an Irish movie called Ondine, which is about a fisherman who pulls up a beautiful woman in his net. Of course, mermaids and silks are now in my mind. This connects to a contemporary piece of art that I happened upon today in the Royal Scottish Academy, where I almost did not pay the four pounds for admission. I am so glad that I coughed up the money, though. After viewing a really cool piece of art by Scottish artist Margaret Hunter, which was inspired by the Berlin Wall, I turned the corner and found a piece by Grant Clifford. The poem on the painting got my attention first and then it drew my eyes to the entire life size piece called "Raising the Feminine." It's a mermaid shape coming to the surface of the water and she has ovals of hardened wax on the tail. Inside the wax, rose petals are caught and I wanted to touch them, but I held back, hearing my own teacher-like voice screaming at me like a red light! Here is the poem written by Clifford in May of 2007:

Oh happy man
enjoying its dark deeps
subtle plants, soft flowers,
and mysterious insects
animals and fish
breath side by side,
striving towards the sun
mouthing at the moon
sometimes hungry
if you're lucky and
holding the right bait
she will take a form
you can recognize
and come to your hand


The brief bio of Clifford mentions that he had cancer and after battling it and surviving, he was moved to paint the piece to celebrate a relationship but more so his own joy at living. All of this has got me thinking about a storyline involving the sea and a woman, so I found some inspiration today for an idea that intrigues me. Maybe I will start it at ARVON when I get to writing more.

I also noticed two other pieces of artwork at the National Gallery that kept me coming back to them. Monkeys. Boys blowing on sticks of lighted charcoal. Vice. What am I talking about? Well, the first painting that forced me to stand still for sometime was by El Greco and there is a boy in the center of a darkened canvas, and as holds a candle to a lighted stick in his hands, there is a monkey blowing it on his right and a laughing man in yellow on his left. The write-up talks about monkeys as symbols of vice and that the man could be folly. It also mentions the stick of fire as a possible symbol of lust. This got me thinking about some of my sophomore students (a small stubborn group of 3 or 4) who could not wrap their minds around why an author would intentionally throw symbols into stories to add up to a theme. Theme? "I don't know what the theme is, Mrs. Bentz. Why does there have to be one? Can't I just say appearance vs. reality since that is in everything?" and on and on. I think art history is valuable in this aspect, and maybe I will use a lesson involving paintings and symbols to make my point about literature. Besides this epiphany, I also thought that monkeys are very mysterious and scary. A few rooms away from El Greco's painting I found one by Schalken that immediately reminded me of the painting I just described, only it features a boy by himself blowing on a charcoal stick and holding a candle off to the side. No grimacing monkey. No ghost-like image of a laughing clown. Just the boy. It caught my attention, and it was inspired by El Greco's painting which was inspired by something from Bassanio, BUT the allegory was not as powerful to the imagination without the other characters. On my way out, I saw a painting of just a monkey, which confirmed my earlier thought that monkeys stick with us and Jhumpa Lahiri's short story "Interpreter of Maladies" PROVES that. If you haven't read it or anything by her, get on that--she's wonderful.

The European impressionists drew me to the upstairs rooms before I left the National Gallery, and I was not disappointed. In ONE room, Monet, Gaugin, Serat, Van Gough, and Sargent were "hanging" out--haha--couldn't resist the pun. The Gaugin was the cover of an Impressionist book of art my parents had kicking around out house when I was a kid, and I kept telling myself "I'm actually looking at the REAL painting." Sargent's painting was of a woman who drew me in and I was not surprised when I saw Sargent's name because he always gets my attention. Finally, Van Gough was a revelation to me today. He colors are so deep and vivid and his brushwork is alive. "Olive Trees" is simple, but I feel like I am in that grove with the angle of his strokes. The leaves of the trees curl upwards, the bark of the trees squiggle, and the grass is slanted and the intensity and impression of his handiwork is undeniable. This is also true in his painting "A Garden Without a Path." Authors need to have this effect on their readers. Good writing puts us THERE, pulls us in, and keeps us in the author's imaginary world. Only it's not imaginary--it's real to us. If I can do this, then I'm on the right track.

I did view works by The Glasgow Boys in the Scottish rooms and felt lucky to have a chance to see so many native artists all at once. One painting that literally called me over was by James Christie and it featured the Pied Piper of Hamelin based on the poem by Robert Browning, and it left me thinking about fables and fairytales and their power over us. A town wanted the piper to rid them of the rats and the plague and when he did the town refused to pay him, so he piped his piper and all the children followed him out of the town, never to be seen again! On a final note, I happened to be in a room of Poussin's Seven Sacrament paintings and there was a group of school children gathered around a soft-spoken teacher. They were discussing the last painting and looking at Jesus in particular. What an idea--I wondered if they were part of a Sunday school, as it was Sunday. But they were engaged and curious and the teacher was patient and listened for their questions while guiding them in their exploration. As he sent them out into the main rooms to find pictures of Jesus on their own (and there were PLENTY), I was reminded of why I love teaching so much!