ITALIAN SCULPTURE IN THE POEMS OF BROWNING.
I. GENERAL STATEMENT.--While forty-nine out of a total of two hundred
twenty-two poems by Robert Browning refer to some one of the five fine
arts--sculpture, music, poetry, architecture, and painting--only eight
mention sculpture; and the references in these poems are comparatively
insignificant. No one poem deals with sculpture as a theme, nor does
any sculptor express his views of the art in dramatic monologue, as
Abt Vogler does for music, and Fra Lippo Lippi for painting. Reasons
for the preponderance of the other arts will be discussed later, in
connection with further suggestions concerning personality and its
relations to art in Browning’s poetry.
It is often difficult to estimate separately Browning’s treatment of
sculpture and painting, since he discusses the two arts together in
several of his poems (for example, _Old Pictures in Florence_) and
since many important Italian artists were both painters and sculptors.
However, the predominant art of the man in question, or the art which
Browning emphasizes most in connection with him, has been taken as
a basis for classification. Estimating in this manner, one finds
that the poet refers, in the eight poems, to seven artists--Niccolo
Pisano and Giovanni Pisano, Canova, Ghiberti, Giovanni da Bologna,
Baccio Bandinelli and Bernini--all of historical interest. Claus
of Innsbruck (in _My Last Duchess_), and Jules (in _Pippa Passes_)
with his companion art students, are purely imaginary. Reference is
made to seven historical works of sculpture: the Psiche-fanciulla
and Pietà of Canova, the statue of Duke Ferdinand, John of the
Black Bands, Pasquin’s statue, the Fountain of the Tritons, and the
Bocca-dell’-Verità. Three fictitious pieces of sculpture which are
named are also introduced, besides a number of imaginary unnamed works.
Such references to sculpture as exist in the poems seem to conform
entirely to the facts of history, where there is any pretense of
historical accuracy. Sculpture is so unimportant a feature of most of
the poems that there was certainly very little temptation to enlarge on
the facts for dramatic purposes, or for any other reason.
II. HISTORICAL SCOPE.--It is improbable that Browning consciously,
or unconsciously either, for that matter, decided to treat different
periods of sculpture until he had covered the historical field, or that
he ever selected any one phase of this art with so general a purpose in
mind. In certain cases he chose some event or characteristic feature of
a period, and before he had finished the poem referred to a sculptor,
or to the condition of the art at that time, as one of the details in
a realistic background for his picture of the times. Nevertheless he
has accomplished, without any definite purpose, a result similar to a
brief historical survey of sculpture in Italy; his references showing
relation to practically every important period of the art.
The first reference to sculpture is in _Sordello_ (1840), where the
lines concerning the Pisani (Book I, l. 574) characterize the art of
Sordello’s time as just dawning into the Renaissance. In _Pippa Passes_
(1841) the poet, passing over something like five hundred years’
development, brings before the reader a picture of nineteenth century
art life among students in Italy. _My Last Duchess_ (1842) deals with
the decadent Renaissance, while _The Bishop orders his Tomb at St.
Praxed’s Church_ (1845) presents a faithful picture of the same period.
In _Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day_ (1850), the pendulum swings backward
to the early days of Christianity, when the church Fathers abhorred the
physical beauty of their art inheritance from Greece. _The Statue and
the Bust_ (1855) relates events of the sixteenth century also; but they
are such as have no historical significance in a chronological way, and
could just as readily have happened in the thirteenth or the nineteenth
century. _Old Pictures in Florence_ (1855) has the early masters as its
theme, with another reference to Niccolo Pisano, the first Renaissance
sculptor, though the poem concerns itself mainly with architecture and
painters. _The Ring and the Book_ (1868-69) can hardly be said to deal
with any particular period in art history.
Chronological order is not followed, nor is there any reason in the
logic or emotion of poetry why such order should obtain. Whether one
denies or affirms on the question of poetical inspiration, one is
compelled to admit that the practice in the past has not been to follow
set formulas of time or place. No poet, unless it be a pedantic one
whose work would fail utterly in spontaneity, would read history and
write a poem on each period as he read.
The diagram below indicates that Browning’s work was no exception to
the normal procedure.
1. Early Art........................e......
2. Dawn of Renaissance...a........./.\...g.
3. Height of Renaissance..\......./...\f/..
4. Decadent Renaissance....\..c__/d........
5. Modern..................b\/.............
a. _Sordello_--1840.
b. _Pippa Passes_--1841.
c. _My Last Duchess_--1842.
d. _The Bishop orders his Tomb_--1845.
e. _Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day_--1850.
f. _The Statue and the Bust_--1855.
g. _Old Pictures in Florence_--1855.
III. POETIC FUNCTIONS OF THE REFERENCES TO SCULPTURE.--Of the function
of portraying the times, _Sordello_ gives an example. Browning became
interested in the thirteenth-century troubadour, and then in his
historical surroundings. In working out the social medium in which
Sordello was to live and move, Browning named the Pisan Brothers to
illustrate the sculptural conditions at the time--one of those numerous
small details of which the ordinary reader is scarcely conscious, which
are yet extremely important in making a perfect word picture. He spoke
of Sordello as--
... “Born just now,
With the new century, beside the glow
And efflorescence out of barbarism;
Witness a Greek or two from the abysm
That stray through Florence-town with studious air,
Calming the chisel of that Pisan pair:
If Nicolo should carve a Christus yet!”
While the entire passage is carefully subordinated to the main purpose
of studying Sordello, it also clearly pictures the dawn of the
Renaissance light upon sculpture.
_The Bishop orders his Tomb at St. Praxed’s Church_, and _My Last
Duchess_, deal with characteristics of their times; but in neither
case is sculpture used as a mere detail in the picture. Because of the
extensive art treatment in each, the two will be discussed together
under the head of Renaissance decadence.[170]
Besides being important enough in itself to deserve somewhat extensive
treatment, the art element in _Pippa Passes_ is notable because it
marks the only instance in which Browning concerns himself with the
life of modern art students. He certainly did did not begin the poem
with the intention of making the artists a theme, nor did he attain
any such unexpected result. Instead he began with the thematic idea
of the power in unconscious influence, and through four sections of
this dramatic poem developed this idea by recording the effects of the
song of Pippa, upon murderers, an art student, a fanatical patriot
and a scheming bishop. About one-fourth of the poem deals directly
with the student life of artists. Canova, who is frequently mentioned,
represents the ideal of sculpture; and Jules, the young student who is
seeking to attain. In contrast to Jules, the idealist, is the group
of evil-minded students who induce him to marry a model, under the
impression that she is a cultured Greek woman. It is Browning’s best
example of the “other side,” as illustrated by the group of plotting
would-be artists. This is the only example in all of Browning’s poetry
(with the exception of _A Soul’s Tragedy_) in which the poet descends
to the level of prose as a medium of speech, and here it is used by
knaves and villains. All the crude reality of life among low-minded
students, their jealousy of one with higher ideals than their own, the
poet gives us in detail by means of their prose speeches; returning to
blank verse, however, for the ideals of Jules and the aspirations of
Phene’s awakening soul. Love of personality, that great guide to the
appreciation of Browning from whatever position we approach him, and
the possibilities of human development, are written large throughout
his works. Nowhere are these ideas in relation to art more clearly
expressed than in the words of Jules. An artist of the highest ideals,
he has just realized through the singing of Pippa, that a woman’s soul
is in his keeping. He meditates:
“Shall to produce form out of unshaped stuff
Be Art--and further, to evoke a soul
From form be nothing? This new soul is mine!”
Then, since art is the expression of personality, and Jules has met
with so great a change in ideals, he resolves to break his ‘paltry
models up To begin Art afresh.’ His change in personality, it should
be noticed, is due to the fact that he realizes the soul has greater
significance than art--an idea exactly expressing Browning’s view.
_My Last Duchess_ (1842) is entirely imaginary, but it sums up, in a
short poem, the entire decadent Renaissance attitude toward art so
fully that no historical names could improve it. Its one mention of
sculpture is in the closing lines:
. . . . . “Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!”
In two and one-half lines it gives a powerful suggestion of admiration
for art because it was fashionable, of emphasis on technique rather
than content, of the classical subject matter and bronze material
that were in vogue at the time, and of the character expressed in the
intellectual but heartless Duke’s purpose of taming the Duchess.
_The Bishop orders his Tomb at St. Praxed’s Church_ (1845) is imaginary
in its narrative, and probably in all the sculpture named, though the
church of Santa Prassede, in Rome, by its richness of decoration, and
by a tomb similar to the one the Bishop is represented as desiring,
gave the suggestion for the poem. Probably in all literature there is
no more skilful summary of a corrupt churchman’s attitude toward his
church, his fellow churchmen, the future, earthly love, and art. The
characterization is both fearless and powerful. This poem and _My Last
Duchess_ are companion studies. Both the Duke and the Bishop are fond
of power and prestige, both are jealous and envious, each displays his
attitude toward woman and toward art. The Bishop has more feeling,
though it is largely feeling for himself; and the Duke possesses more
icy pride. Each values art, particularly sculpture, as something for
display, something luxurious and (contrary to the highest ideas of art)
something beyond the power of common people to appreciate. The poems
deal with the same period, but _My Last Duchess_ is a summary of the
secular attitude, _The Bishop orders his Tomb_ presents the view of an
official of the church.
_Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day_ (1850), in a section devoted to the
reverie of the seeker for religious truth after his inspection of
Catholicism at Rome, censures the attitude of the early church toward
the physical beauty of the statuary Italy had inherited from Greece.
While the subject of the poem is religion, not art, incidentally it
contains one of Browning’s best defences of the nude. He viewed the
nude as a fitting expression of the beauty God has placed in the world,
and rejoiced in the “noble daring, steadfast duty, The heroic in
action or in passion,” or even the merely beautiful physique--all as
presented in sculpture. In Chapter VI will be found further mention of
the nude, in connection with _Francis Furini_ (1887).[171] _The Lady
and the Painter_, a non-Italianate poem, published in the Asolando
group (1889), also throws further light on Browning’s attitude toward
the nude. These two poems are of interest in the present discussion,
however, only because they prove the attitude expressed in 1850 to have
been a permanent one.
In _The Statue and the Bust_, the art references were not introduced
for their own sake, but because they suggested a situation with
dramatic possibilities. The statue of Duke Ferdinand exists as Browning
pictured it. The bust seems to be an addition for poetic purposes, but
it conforms to the spirit of the palace decorations, in that it was
made of Robbia ware, for traces of that material still adorned the
palace when the poem was written.
In _Sordello_ (1840), the first poem containing any reference to
Italian sculpture, the castle of Goito, the early home of Sordello,
is rich in sculpturesque effects. “Those slim pillars, ... Cut like
a company of palms--Some knot of bacchanals, flushed cheek combined
With straining forehead, shoulders purpled--A dullish grey-streaked
cumbrous font ... shrinking Caryatides, Of just-tinged marble--” all
present a physical setting. They do more, however, than merely locate.
Their lonely magnificence harmonizes with the tone of the story, and
they exercise an influence on the nature of the dreaming, beauty-loving
Sordello.
The best examples of sculpture used purely for setting are found
in _The Ring and the Book_. Containing only its few references to
pieces of sculpture in Florence and Rome, it is the one of the list
of poems in which this art is least prominent. It presents no picture
of a period, no discussion of an attitude toward art, no poetical
background of the times aided by art references. Each instance tells
us that at such-and-such a place in Rome, in sight of the statue
named, a certain event occurred. “Toward Baccio’s Marble” (Part I, l.
44) is used to help locate the Florentine book-stall where Browning
found the ‘old yellow book’ that became the basis of the poem. Part
I, l. 889, quotes an example of the current gossip in Rome, as taking
place “i’ the market-place O’ the Barberini by the Capucins; Where
the old Triton ... Puffs up steel sleet.” This instance serves as
setting, and further, in a continuation of the description--“out o’
the way O’ the motley merchandising multitude”--contrasts the quiet,
regular play of the fountain to the turmoil of the characters. Part
VI refers to Pasquin’s statue in a double comparison which emphasizes
Pompilia’s innocence in contrast to the bestiality of the squibs that
were formerly posted on the statue. In Part XI Guido says his first
sight of an instrument for beheading was ‘At the Mouth-of-Truth o’ the
river-side you know, Retiring out of noisy crowded Rome’--a reference
which serves as a definite means of location.
Yet all instances from _The Ring and the Book_ prove little concerning
Browning’s interest in art, or his specialized attention to sculpture.
The fact that pieces of statuary serve a man as landmarks in Florence
or Rome implies little beyond an effort at clearness in location. _The
Ring and the Book_, then, in sculpture, is interesting rather for
absence than for presence of such references. In fact sculpture is
not prominent in the Italian art references of Browning. Not only is
it a lesser art quantitatively in Browning’s poetry, but it seems to
be placed on a distinctly lower plane. Reasons for these facts, are,
in part, the predominance of the other arts over sculpture in Italy,
and the particular quality of sculpture as an art which makes it tend
toward the expression of physical beauty instead of the soul.
Though Browning himself did some work in modeling,[172] he used very
few technical terms connected with that art. Since he never put a
sculptor speaker on the stage of his poet-world, one does not expect to
hear the language of that art spoken. The Duke and the Bishop, it is
true, express considerable interest in art, though it is rather in the
dilettante spirit than that of serious criticism. “Caryatides,” used in
_Sordello_, and “caritellas,” evidently used for cartellas[173] seem
to be almost the only instances of technical--or semi-technical--terms
connected with sculpture.
IV. SOURCE OF BROWNING’S KNOWLEDGE.--Proof has already been given of
the statement that Browning had a strong, lasting interest in the
arts, even before he went to Italy. The remark in the letter to Miss
Haworth (1838) concerning disappointment in Canova, implying previous
knowledge, was written during his first visit to Italy. It is certain,
then, that he had formed an opinion of one Italian sculptor before
going to that country. Probably some of his knowledge of sculpture
was gained from reading, also. In every case in which he described a
particular piece of work, he had previously visited the place where
it was located. _Sordello_, while it refers to artists rather than
particular works, and exhibits an art knowledge that was probably
gained from reading, was published two years after Browning’s first
Italian visit in 1838. _Pippa Passes_ (1841) was one of the direct
results of the same trip, when Venice and delicious Asolo were visited.
_My Last Duchess_ contains none but imaginary works. _The Bishop orders
his Tomb_ (1845) has its architectural setting at Rome, one of the
points included in Browning’s second visit in 1844. _Christmas-Eve
and Easter-Day_ (1850) also mentions Rome. _The Statue and the Bust_
(1855) refers to Florence, _Old Pictures in Florence_ (1855) has the
same setting; and _The Ring and the Book_ (1868-9) refers to Rome and
Florence, visited in 1844 and 1847. These data all tend to support
the foregoing statement that the poet had seen the things of which he
wrote.