Thom Gunn and Caravaggio's Conversion of St. Paul
2010; University of Arkansas Press; Volume: 44; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2374-6629
Autores Tópico(s)Historical and Religious Studies of Rome
ResumoCaravaggio (1571-1610) combined the violent characteristics of Thorn Gunn's poetical heroes: Ben Jonson, who killed a man, and Christopher Marlowe, a homosexual who was stabbed to death. Wounded in a sword fight in Naples, Caravaggio fled the city and died, near Rome, on the beach at Porto Ercole. His corpse was exhumed on the 400th anniversary of his death in an attempt to confirm his elusive identity. He was always a mysterious and controversial figure--artist, invalid, brawler, murderer, convict and exile--and his exalted art contrasted with his wretched life and early death. the fall of 1953, soon after taking his degree at Cambridge University, Gunn won a small travel grant and spent some time in Rome. He was tremendously impressed by seeing Caravaggio's The Conversion of St. Paul (1601) and described it in In Santa Maria del Popolo. the first poem in his third book, My Sad Captains (1961). The church, just inside the old northern gate of the city, between the Tiber and the Pincio Gardens, was erected in the 11th century on the site of Nero's tomb. A veritable museum of art, it had been renovated by Bernini and contains works by Raphael and Carracci well as--in a narrow chapel to the right of the main altar--two paintings by Caravaggio: The Conversion of St. Paul and The Crucifixion of St. Peter. Georgina Masson's Companion Guide to Rome noted that the church was lit and in parts badly cared for; but with a little patience one can usually discover the light switches (215). Wanting to see it in natural light, Gunn patiently waited an hour until the setting autumnal sun illuminated the shadowy and half-hidden Conversion. The mystical epiphany and harrowing conversion of Saul, the fanatical enemy of Christianity, and his transformation on the road to Damascus into the equally fanatical St. Paul, is one of the most famous incidents in religious history. Chapter 9 of the Acts of the Apostles relates how Saul was simultaneously thrust into darkness and granted spiritual insight: as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?... he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me do?... Saul arose from the earth; and when his eyes were opened, he saw no man: but they led him by the hand, and brought him into Damascus. On the Street called Straight, Saul's vision was miraculously restored by Ananias: And immediately there fell from his eyes it had been scales: and he received sight forth with, and arose, and was baptized. By describing Caravaggio's Conversion closely, by interpreting it iconographically, by looking at it with the same attention and intensity the poet, we can see what he saw in Santa Maria del Popolo and make that ideal correspondence between his visual image while writing and the one in our minds while reading. his depiction of this almost cinematic moment, Caravaggio painted the curtained background and earthen floor in a somber dark brown. The massive tan-and-white horse, with dark-and-white mane and prominent rump, dominates the upper three-quarters of the crowded composition. Its head is lowered and held with an embossed bridle by an old, bent, balding, wrinkled-browed, red-nosed groom, whose bulging-veined legs and bare feet appear between the powerful shanks of the horse. Preoccupied with the animal, the groom ignores the spiritual drama. The horse raises its thick, iron-shod right leg if to trample the prostrate saint, who lies on his back on a blood-red cloth. The rough-looking Saul, unshaven and with his eyes closed, wears a red, leather-bound, armored tunic over a white shirt with rolled- up sleeves. His plumed helmet and sword, symbols of his past militant life, are abandoned athis side. Upside down and seen from above, his tense, muscular body is foreshortened and his shaggy head touches the lower edge of the picture. …
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