Shakespeare began Hamlet with the ghost of a slain king, but if there is a lasting phantom that haunts us from the play, it is certainly the character of Ophelia. She has inspired countless works of art, and each generation attempts to explore and reconstruct her in a myriad of ways. My current rabbit hole is the gleeful pursuit…
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Cold Weather Reading
Today has been cold and grey, the kind of day that makes me want to do nothing other than curl up and read. I’ve been reading A Private Disgrace: Lizzie Borden by Daylight, which I recently scooped up at a library book sale. As I set it aside, I thought about the fact that reading a book I’ve never read…
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What Grows from Grief
I have written about William Holman Hunt’s painting Isabella and the Pot of Basil many times before. I included it in a recent Wombat Friday and you can read the story behind it in the post Love, Death, and Potted Plants. It’s a painting that is hard to walk away from when you see it in person; it’s quite large…
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The Personification of Love
Today I have been pondering allegories of love in art. Namely, the choices artists make when representing the concept of Love in physical form. It is usually male and I assume that the root of this lies in Greek myths of Eros, god of love, or his Roman counterpart, Cupid. Seen above is Hope Comforting Love in Bondage by Sidney…
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Love is Enough
William Morris’ Love is Enough has been on my mind this morning. “He makes a poem these days–in dismal Queen Square in black old filthy London in dull end of October he makes a pretty poem that is to be wondrously happy; and it has four sets of lovers in it and THEY ALL ARE HAPPY and it ends well, and…
