January + Edinburgh/Dublin = Turner

Every January the Vaughan Bequest of 38 watercolours by J M W Turner (1775–1851) held by the National Gallery of Scotland is put on public display.  Henry Vaughan was an important art collector in London and in his will in 1899 he bequeathed the whole of his extraordinary collection to the nation and the lucky recipients were Scotland and also Ireland where a further 31 watercolours are conserved in Dublin at the National Gallery of Ireland.   However, the terms of Vaughan’s will stated that the paintings could only be shown in January when the delicate paper and colours would be least likely to be damaged by natural daylight.   As a result, every January the two collections appear on public display, a tradition that now dates back over a century.

There were very few beams of sunlight today in Edinburgh and none penetrated the two rooms where the Turner watercolours are exhibited since they are completely enclosed, down in the Lower Gallery of the Royal Scottish Academy building, illuminated only by carefully regulated and temperature-controlled lighting.  But thanks to this careful treatment, the colours of these watercolours really have retained their brilliance.  The colours range from the brightest azures and acquamarines to deep indigos and greens, mauves and pinks, the faintest blue haze, dazzling yellows and whites.   You can find all 38 here in the National Gallery of Scotland online collection.

Among the watercolours are six of Venice painted during his visits there in 1819, 1833 and 1840, as well as paintings of Lake Albano, Lake Como and Verres in Val d’Aosta painted during his travels through Italy.

These views of Venice have particular resonance at the moment because I am proofreading a wonderful book on the history of Venetian gardens. The book opens with Jacopo de Barbari’s woodcut of Venice made in 1500 that shows the extensive planting and garden areas on the Giudecca and the numerous islands in the lagoon, as well as – surprisingly – throughout the city.  Hidden in courtyards, concealed spaces behind high walls, the gardens in Venice might not be big but they offered cool shade in summer and, above all, vital space for growing herbs and vegetables.

Columbia University’s Department of Art History and Archeology have the most wonderful interactive version of de Barbari’s “bird’s-eye view” map freely available online (you might have to scroll along until you find the map of Venice project).   I have saved one view here which shows a magnified view of gardens (if it doesn’t work try zooming in).  Otherwise, try this one – click on the letter D and then when the image has loaded, move the magnifying glass around.

This is the real power of the internet: offering staggeringly inventive technology, on an inclusive basis.

On a last note about Turner, it is worth noting the major spring exhibition to be held here at the National Gallery of Scotland on Turner & Italy (27 March – 7 June 2009).

It will celebrate the love affair between the artist and Italy.  Featuring over 100 works including oil paintings, watercolours, sketchbooks, and books from Turner’s library… Spectacular loans from collections in Washington, Melbourne, Paris and London will be in the show.  Highlights will include many of Turner’s late masterpieces, such as his 1844 Approach to Venice, which the critic John Ruskin considered ‘… the most perfectly beautiful piece of colour of all that I have seen produced by human hands, by any means, or at any period‘.

High praise indeed – and full marks to Vaughan for having the foresight to preserve the colours of the minor (only in the sense of smaller) gems on show at the moment.

Pound of Flesh

Giving a new twist to the usual flurry of New Year’s resolutions to lose a pound or two of excess weight, a rather bizarre exhibition trial was staged in New York recently. As was widely reported, both in the New Yorker and on Radio 4’s Today programme, the Shylock v Antonio proceedings were –

held in the Cardozo moot courtroom, before a sold-out crowd that seemed to be equal parts lawyers and Shakespeare nuts. Actors did a CliffsNotes version of the play, focussing on the trial scene. Quick refresher: Renaissance Venice, a different era in Judeo-Christian relations. Shylock, a Jewish moneylender, lends three thousand ducats to the Christian merchant Antonio, so that Antonio’s friend can use it to woo the wealthy Portia. Shylock, who hates Antonio, demands a “pound of flesh” as collateral. Some things go wrong, and everyone ends up in court, where Portia, disguised as a doctor of law, gets Antonio off the hook and gets Shylock charged with attempted murder. The staging was contemporary: Antonio wore a suit; Shylock carried a briefcase.

There was an impressive line-up of top-rate barristers, judges from the Federal District court and New York State Supreme Court, a professor of literature and a novelist and law professor, to mention a few.  The case against Shylock was first argued to have been ill-considered by a German legal philosopher, Rudolf von Jhering, back in the 19th century.

There are many fascinating theories about the origins of the Shylock story, as retold by Shakespeare in the Merchant of Venice.  Mark Anderson, author of Shakespeare by Another Name, argues against the conventional theory that the bard was inspired by an Italian tale, Il Pecorone (published in Milan in 1558), of which no English translation has ever been traced, and instead highlights the similarities between the Shylock incident and Edward de Vere, the Earl of Oxford’s disastrous investment in a shipping venture financed to the tune of £3000 by a Jewish moneylender – coincidentally referred to as Micheal Lok.

Whatever the truth of the source of the Shylock, Shakespeare’s knowledge of Italy was most likely gleaned from the large Italian community in London rather than in Italy itself, where he could not have afforded to go except in the retinue of one of his protectors.  Of the many Italians who Shakespeare may have met, one in particular stands out: John (Giovanni) Florio, the translator and lexicographer who lived from 1553 to 1625.  It is interesting that The Merchant of Venice was thought to have been written in about 1596, while Florio was working on his dictionary.

Incidentally, this blog owes Florio a huge debt because I named it after his Italian-English dictionary, A World of Words, first published in folio in 1598, and then as an expanded edition (the frontispiece is shown below)  in 1611.

After Frances Yates’ seminal work on Florio (John Florio: The Life of an Italian in Shakespeare’s England. New York, 1968), a notable recent addition was provided by Michael Wyatt in The Italian Encounter with Tudor England: A Cultural Politics of Translation (Cambridge, 2005).

Another tributary of the anti-Stratford school of thought has suggested that Florio himself might also have written the plays and sonnets under the nom de plume William Shakespeare – a theory most recently put forward by Lamberto Tassinari in a book entitled  Shakespeare? E’ il nome d’arte di John Florio (2008).

The prevailing antisemitism of the time is evident in the dictionary where Florio’s entries confirm the general mistrust with which Jews were regarded, a misunderstanding that was not necessarily malevolent: “a Jew,” Florio writes is “an incredulous or misbelieving man”.  But we must beware of letting our interpretation of Florio and his contemporary, Shakespeare, be coloured by our 21st-century perceptions.  Although virtually impossible to achieve, we have to roll back the layers of historical events and lives, wipe out our knowledge of later pogroms and, above all, the Holocaust, then we might attempt to understand relations between Christians and Jews at the time.   Shylock is a moneylender – a profession reserved primarily to  Jews  – but rather than seeing his treatment here as antisemitic, we should remember that he is nonetheless a fictitious character, a stereotype of the “Jew preying on meek Gentiles” and – as Anthony Julius argues –  an “antisemitic fantasy”.

Coming back to the New York trial, the judges were divided in their ruling but nonetheless succeeded in reversing Shakespeare’s own verdict.  With a five to two majority, a ruling was passed in Shylock’s favour, stating that he deserved to be repaid his money but differing on the question of interest (Shakespeare’s pound of flesh).  Anthony Julius was on the losing side and pointed out that the others “sided with Shylock for reasons unrelated to the legal merits. They side with Shylock because they think that the play is antisemitic and he deserves a better deal than Shakespeare gives him.”  Instead, Julius believes that “within the logic of the play itself Antonio and his lawyer have the better arguments.”

Certainly, Portia’s speech on the quality of mercy is one of the most poignant and persuasive Shakespeare ever wrote.

What, if anything, can be extrapolated from Shakespeare’s original plot or indeed from this retrial in terms of our attitude towards our modern moneylenders – the Bernard Madoffs of this world – who have taken money and pounds of flesh from savers and businesses the world over is quite another matter.

The Swinging Sporran

It is a truth universally acknowledged (at least in Scotland) that the longest nights of the year are best warmed by a ceilidh and the company of friends and family. This year, after a long gap, I was one of a large party who drove miles along frosty roads to go to the Oban Ball in Argyll. It was a fantastic occasion with everyone dressed in their finery and looking wonderful – men in kilts and women in the most glamorous dresses.

Old hands will be familiar with the bible of reels for these occasions – The Swinging Sporran – but perhaps it’s worth noting for anyone who has not come across it because it is such a gem and brilliantly captures this eccentric yet fantastically successful form of dancing.

The Swinging Sporran was first published in 1972 by Andrew Campbell and Roddy Martine and has been reprinted several times since – an updated edition was printed by Birlinn in 2006.

But the illustrations of the original edition are particularly brilliant and so true to life.  The text is equally tongue-in-cheek.  Here is their description of the teapots, best known from the reel of the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh.

“Teapots is the name given to a particular movement used in the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh (so called because of the correct posture which should be taken up by the dancer to resemble a teapot. The left or right hand should be placed on the hip so that the arm represents a handle, and the other arm should be elevated to form a spout. The left hand is rarely placed on the hip when dancing nowadays). The popularity of this dance has meant that the name ‘teapots’ is used for a similar movement in some other reels, namely the wheel (Teapot of four). A teapot is a movement where three dancers, two of one sex and one of the other, raise and join either their right hands or their left hands in a type of policeman’s halt grip, and turn once round using the travel step.”

But in all the whirling, spinning and setting, one thing makes Scottish reels completely distinctive from other forms of dance: you have to focus a hundred percent on the other people dancing with you, because otherwise you’ll fail to be ready to set, swing or weave into a figure of eight with whoever is dancing at the time.  For this reason, reels are the ultimate social dance, mixing all ages and abilities, and requiring a level of altruism not found in other more “individual” forms of dancing.

The all-time favourite Reel of the 51st has an extraordinary history.  It was devised by Lieutenant ‘Jimmy’ Atkinson of the 7th Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders while he and other fellow Scotsman where imprisoned in a German POW camp in Laufen Castle near Salzburg.  Its diagonal lines were inspired by the Saltire flag.

Another popular reel the Eightsome – and its follow-up the Foursome – seens to have evolved out of an earlier version danced in the 16th century, the Threesome reel which was probably based on a travelling figure of eight.  However, the modern versions of the best-known reels we danced the other evening – Hamilton House, Speed the Plough, Duke of Perth, etc. – are all the work of two enthusiastic women who made it their mission to standardise the steps and music: Mrs Ysobel Stewart of Fasnacloich (a distinguished family from Appin, Argyll) and Miss Jean Milligan (a teacher of physical education at Jordanhill Teachers’ Training College) who published the results as the Scottish Country Dance books.