Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-4hhp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-16T12:42:02.419Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Chapter 20 - Painting

from Part V - Life, Illness, and the Arts

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2024

Thomas Austenfeld
Affiliation:
University of Fribourg
Grzegorz Kość
Affiliation:
University of Warsaw
Get access

Summary

Throughout his lifetime, Robert Lowell was intrigued by or even obsessed with the visual arts. It was a preoccupation that started during his school days at St. Mark’s and lasted to the final poem of the last volume he published, “Epilogue,” his ode to painter Johannes Vermeer. This chapter investigates what this passion about especially painting reveals about his writing. Lowell admired and was envious of Old Master painters and sought to emulate their gaze at the world through language. He was more suspicious of photography and contemporary art, although he wrote amply about those art forms as well. By zooming in on Lowell’s creative process and his idiosyncratic revision process of two case studies – “Cranach’s Man-Hunt” and “Misanthrope and Painter” – it becomes apparent that Lowell used the visual arts to consider how he thought about his chosen art form and profession, and how he thought about the world.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×