"In the land of the lotus eaters" by Homer from The Odyssey
Beowulf
"Invocation to Ceres" by Shakespeare from The Tempest
The Gilgamesh Epic: Tablet 1 (translated)
but I chose:
Here is my concept paper I wrote and I am still working on my actual drawing. I found some great paper to use and am going to sketch out a
"historiated initial" "S" to go with the first line which is "So I descended from the first enclosure"
After that I'm going to draw a border around the text to depict different aspects of Dante's Hell. Here is a picture of the page I'm using for inspiration.
Following is my paper. We had to come up with a title and not just something like "Illuminated Dantes Inferno", so I came up with this one. Tell me what you think, ok? ok!
Bad Bird Begat Brilliant Bard
When the class was first handed the
texts to use on this final project, I was excited to see familiar titles;
familiar as in I had seen them on a shelf before. So, having not ever read any
of these works of literature, I admit that I did refer to Cliff Notes for each
one just to get a general overview of the synopsis and a feel for each story.
I was immediately drawn to two: The Odyssey by Homer and Inferno by Dante. Homer seems to be a
master at weaving an incredible yarn of commitment and bravery and I would have
been content to discover more about it (and I may still do so). However, the
reason I chose Inferno is, even
though I’m not a Christian and don’t claim any religious or non-religious group
(because I don’t feel that the act of religion is important), I’m always
fascinated by what people believe to be a sin and how they themselves will be
dealt with in the afterlife for committing such acts.
Not only did I read and envision
Canto V – as per the scope of the project – but when I set out to read the
entire poem, I started to wonder what the heck did this guy eat to give him
such vivid and detailed dreams like these? To answer this, I skimmed through
sections of the book Italian Cuisine: A Cultural History. I enjoyed
reading this for my research because I like to cook and to experience food, not
just eat it. I learned that veal and fowl, to include pheasant and gray
partridge, were popular dishes back in the Middle Ages served to pretty much
all classes and were often accompanied by garden vegetables and herbs such as
mint and marjoram.
Realizing that not only does what
one eats affect a dream, I researched the events of the authors’ life. According
to a timeline, there was a lot of war, economy expansion and church building
going on at the time Dante started to write Inferno
(Heilbrunn). Plus, a noted chronology of Dante’s life explains that he served
in battle, lost a loved one, held public office and was banished from Florence
then interrupts writing a series of books in order to write Inferno (Renaissance). I’m telling you, whether he ate bad fowl or
not, his life experience up to this point was inspiration enough to dream about
the seven deadly sins. As a matter of fact, Sandra A. Thompson, author of Cloud
Nine: A Dreamer’s Dictionary, states, “Dreams can nudge us toward a
question that needs to be faced or answered in our conscious life, or a growth
direction that needs to be respected.” Considering Dante’s life, I believe her.
In wondering why did Dante chose Virgil,
an Ancient Roman poet, to be the main characters' guide through Hell, I read the
lecture by Robert Hollander. The short answer is, nobody knows, but Hollander
goes on to write, “We must conclude that Dante willfully chose a pagan as his
guide, leaving us to fathom his reasons for doing so.” I then read a short
description on Wikipedia about the epic Aeneid
written by Virgil to get a feel for that guy. I believe Dante chose the Roman
to be his guide because he idealized him as a fellow writer for his seemingly
open pagan opinions. And he was already dead, so why not?
In Canto V, where we are described
the levels of sin, and Minos, the king of this realm who judges those who have
sinned, I started to wonder what Minos and the sinners of the second realm
looked like and then I realized that any painting or illustration I found would
only be another artists interpretation anyway, so I decided to draw my own,
based on the style of the day.
After a general search on the
school’s library website for early Renaissance illuminated manuscripts, I found
out that the New York City Public Library has mounds of wonderful pictures and
information for what I was searching. I weeded through pages of beautiful
illustrations until one caught my attention: a page from a psalter showing a
simple, full painted border with an astounding historiated initial “O” showing
Dives and Lazarus (Psalterium). Until I read the description of this particular
page, I thought this depicted a psalm about a home like the sparrow making a
nest. I did not identify the story I know of the rich man denying the poor man
food and drink. At any rate, I still liked this illustration and decided to use
it as inspiration for my own. Added inspiration for the idea of Hell came from
a favorite poem “Hell in Texas” which I enjoyed re-reading in order to
visualize some of the scenery.
In searching for a font to use for
my project, I researched the early printing process. When I read that Windelin
of Speyer set his edition of Inferno in
a miniature gothic type – which was usually reserved for religious texts – I
knew he was my kind of rebel (Renaissance). I began to look for a modern take
on a similar typeface and found one called “Bradley Gratis” by a designer named
Justin Callaghan. The designer describes it as a fantasy font and maybe that’s
why I was attracted to it, but I can see the Gothic elements present such as
the angle of the stem strokes at the apex and terminals of letters, the thin
crossbars and the shapes of the counters and bowls.
Since I love books, I was stoked
about being able to create a page of my own design. I believe my understanding
of the poem selection and illuminated manuscripts in general along with my
enthusiasm for the project shows through in my work.
