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~ I wish I could write as mysterious as a cat.

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Through the Looking Glass: death by water

17 Thursday May 2012

Posted by princesslumikko in through the looking glass

≈ 4 Comments

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art, arthur rimbaud, death, death by water, hamlet, ophelia, poetry, shakespeare, suicide, suicide note, through the looking glass, trigger warning, virginia woolf

Trigger warnings: suicide, death
“There is a willow grows askant the brook…
There on the pendant boughs her coronet weeds
Clamb’ring to hang, an envious sliver broke,
When down her weedy trophies and herself  
Fell in the weeping brook.
Her clothes spread wide, 
And mermaid-like awhile they bore her up,
Which time she chanted snatches of old lauds, 
As one incapable of her own distress…”
Ophelia. The innocent maiden who loves Hamlet, respects her father and is caught in a game bigger than her, drowns singing, a flowery and muddy death, too fragile to survive in a world of deceit and revenge. Did she really love Hamlet? Was she simply a good daughter, ready to please her father to the point she refused to be in contact with the prince? Hamlet scares her, puzzles her, and her first thought is always for her father, whose death seems to shock her so much she becomes mad.
However, if we consider the possibility she really loved Hamlet, then her madness could be something entirely different. As devoted as she seems to be to Polonius, is such an attachment normal? Isn’t she at least a little resentful towards a father that seems determined to use her as a political tool, and to decide how she should feel and act? If Ophelia is more than a sweet, beautiful shell, then it is likely that her malleability hides feelings, emotions, as her madness proves later on. If Hamlet teaches us anything is that madness is not a sudden fact, but a long walk on muddy ground, where one missed step can lead to a downfall. Ophelia is on dangerous path, pressed by everybody around her, the queen, her father, her brother, the king, each with their own agenda. Even her interactions with Hamlet are ambiguous, the prince alternates sweet words with insults, and his feelings are unclear as well, does he love her? Is it only a manipulating game? Ophelia is a pawn chess, in a world of king, queens and towers.But her irrilevance is redeemed by her death, which is oh so beautiful!
Art history is full of Ophelias, drawning, dead already, creating flower crowns, and her madness looks as sweet as unmenacing as possibile. Her madness and death are so much more interesting than a life lived in the shadows of power.
Image

Georges-Jules-Victor Clairin- Ophelia in the Thistle

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Linda Joyce Franks

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Arthur Huges

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Carlos Ewerbeck, Ophelia at the River’s Edge, 1900

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Elena Kalis

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Pascal-Adolphe-Jean Dagnan-Bouveret

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Antoine-Auguste-Ernest Hebert

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James Sant

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Antoon Van Waly

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Oh Joong Seok

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Marie Zucker

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Steven Meisel

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John Everett Millais

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Silvia Camporesi

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Dexter Dalwood, “Sunny Von Bulow,” 2003

If we assume that Ophelia was indeed a girl made of flesh and blood, with feelings and depth, then it seems likely that she held some resentment towards her father, who controlled her entire life. It is likely that the lack of freedom affected her and that Polonius’ death did echo her own most secret desires. Besides the conflict due to her loved one killing her father (and metaphorically, this is what every lover is supposed to, taking the place of the father in the daughter’s affection) the real problem lies in the fact that this is her unconscious desire come true. She becomes mad because she cannot face her own feelings regarding her father’s death, which at least partially involve relief. Ambiguity towards our loved ones is a very natural thing, and wishing the death of our parents is equally normal, as long as it stays a fantasy, of course. But for such a repressed individuality, as in the case of Ophelia, these feelings could have been too much to handle. Her freedom comes with a price, and it’s a price she doesn’t know how to pay. She pays for everybody else, for her father’s lack of morals, for her prince’s manipulations, for her king’s crimes, for her own hunger for freedom, love, impurity, life.

Ophelia is no young martyr, dying with a halo, perfectly serene in her departure from the world.

Image

The young martyr – Paul Delaroche

She is indeed troubled, tormented, much more than a beautiful, sexless ideal and that’s why she has been so popular. Hamlet taunts her with vulgar words, and her father is described in the most repulsive way, her purity has been already tainted by the world, by those who were supposed to love her, but see her as nothing more than a body and a hymen.

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Michael Donovan

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Arthur Hughes

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John William Waterhouse

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John William Waterhouse

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W G Simmonds

Can Ophelia be more than a victim leaving a world that is too harsh for her?

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Nadav Kander

Death by water was also Virginia Woolf’s choice. She filled her pocket with stones and drowned herself in River’s House. This is her farewell letter to her husband.

Dearest, I feel certain I am going mad again. I feel we can’t go through another of those terrible times. And I shan’t recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can’t concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don’t think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can’t fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know. You see I can’t even write this properly. I can’t read. What I want to say is I owe all the happiness of my life to you. You have been entirely patient with me and incredibly good. I want to say that – everybody knows it. If anybody could have saved me it would have been you. Everything has gone from me but the certainty of your goodness. I can’t go on spoiling your life any longer.

I don’t think two people could have been happier than we have been.

V.

Arthur Rimbaud described Ophelia as a dreamer, a romantic, a child who aspired to Heaven, Love, Freedom. crashed by the infinity and visions too vivid for her soft heart. Killed by Nature, killed by dreams too big to be dreamt.

Sur l’onde calme et noire où dorment les étoiles
La blanche Ophélia flotte comme un grand lys,
Flotte très lentement, couchée en ses longs voiles …
– On entend dans les bois lointains des hallalis.

Voici plus de mille ans que la triste Ophélie
Passe, fantôme blanc, sur le long fleuve noir;
Voici plus de mille ans que sa douce folie
Murmure sa romance à la brise du soir.

Le vent baise ses seins et déploie en corolle
Ses grands voiles bercés mollement par les eaux;
Les saules frissonnants pleurent sur son épaule,
Sur son grand front rêveur s’inclinent les roseaux.

Les nénuphars froissés soupirent autour d’elle;
Elle éveille parfois, dans un aune qui dort,
Quelque nid, d’où s’échappe un petit frisson d’aile:
– Un chant mystérieux tombe des astres d’or.

II

O pâle Ophélia! belle comme la neige!
Oui, tu mourus, enfant, par un fleuve emporté!
– C’est que les vents tombant des grands monts de Norwège
T’avaient parlé tout bas de l’âpre liberté;

C’est qu’un souffle, tordant ta grande chevelure,
A ton esprit rêveur portait d’étranges bruits;
Que ton coeur écoutait le chant de la Nature
Dans les plaintes de l’arbre et les soupirs des nuits;

C’est que la voix des mers folles, immense râle,
Brisait ton sein d’enfant, trop humain et trop doux;
C’est qu’un matin d’avril, un beau cavalier pâle,
Un pauvre fou, s’assit muet à tes genoux!

Ciel! Amour! Liberté! Quel rêve, ô pauvre Folle!
Tu te fondais à lui comme une neige au feu:
Tes grandes visions étranglaient ta parole
– Et l’Infini terrible effara ton oeil bleu!

III

– Et le Poète dit qu’aux rayons des étoiles
Tu viens chercher, la nuit, les fleurs que tu cueillis,
Et qu’il a vu sur l’eau, couchée en ses longs voiles,
La blanche Ophélia flotter, comme un grand lys.

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Through the Looking Glass: secrets

04 Friday May 2012

Posted by princesslumikko in through the looking glass, Uncategorized

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Tags

a game of you, art, beauty, edgar lee masters, mrs sibley, mystery, neil gaiman, order of release, poetry, pre raphaelite. john everett millais, sandman, secret, secrets, spoon river, through the looking glass, victorian, women

John Everett Millais – Order of release

This painting has always haunted me. The composition is perfectly arranged, the lines all meet at the right point. Such a careful crafted composition drives the viewer into the story, makes it impossible to look away.

Golden gnomon in Order of release

Here there is a juxtaposition of the golden gnomon (“obtuse isosceles triangle in which the ratio of the length of the equal  sides to the length of the third side is the reciprocal of the golden ratio”, thanks wikipedia) and the painting in question. I am certain Millais didn’t have the golden triangle in mind when he painted this, I just instinctively associated the two things. Mathematics, after all, is another art form.

I have always wondered what the story behind was: this Jacobine Highlander is saved by his wife, who gives the order of release of the title to the guard, while holding her child and supporting her wounded husband. No doubt she is in charge, the focal point of the painting, the heroine. None of the men look at her, the guard bowing his head, the husband hiding in her neck. Previous commenters have argued that she exchanged sexual favors for her husband’s freedom, but if she did she is certainly not ashamed. She is a mystery to me, her serene expression, her bare feet, her composure.

The secrets of the stars,—gravitation.
The secret of the earth,—layers of rock.
The secret of the soil,—to receive seed.
The secret of the seed,—the germ.
The secret of man,—the sower.
The secret of woman,—the soil.
My secret: Under a mound that you shall never find.

Mrs. Sibley – Edgar Lee Masters.

Dino Valls

“Everybody has a secret world inside of them. All of the people of the world, I mean everybody. No matter how dull and boring they are on the outside, inside them they’ve all got unimaginable, magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing worlds. Not just one world. Hundreds of them. Thousands maybe.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 5: A Game of You

I truly believe this. People are made of secrets.

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Through the Looking Glass: Swans

18 Wednesday Apr 2012

Posted by princesslumikko in through the looking glass

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Tags

art, ballet, beauty, emily temple cute, fairytale, fashion, giles, poetry, svetlana zakharova, swan, swan lake, swan maiden, swans, swans in fashion, through the looking glass, tim walker, yeats

Lord of the rings

I have an obsession with swans. I think they are beautiful creatures and they play a big role in my imaginary.

One of my favourite things is tracking down swans in fashion. Of course, the first example that comes to mind is the infamous Bjork dress.

Bjork

But many fashion designers have used swans in their designs. The latest example comes from Giles spring/summer 2012 runway.

black swan

white swan

and even red swans

red swan

But Giles Deacon wasn’t the only one drawing inspiration from swans. Here it is Miu Miu spring/summer 2011 swan dress

swan dress

and Givenchy haute couture spring/summer 2011

givenchy

And Marc Jacobs

Marc Jacobs

For a more casual look Emily Temple cute recently came out with swan dresses and jewels

emily temple cute

emily temple cute

Swans have a big role in art, too. One of the most common themes is Leda and the swan, telling the tale of Leda’s rape by Zeus, who used to disguise himself in various forms to commit his acts of adultery/violence, and took the form of a swan to violate her.

William Butler Yeats retold the story in the poem “Leda and the swan” and he didn’t shy away from the violent and disturbing connotations of the myth as many artists did when choosing how to portray the story.

 A sudden blow: the great wings beating still     Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed

By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,

He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.

How can those terrified vague fingers push

The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?

And how can body, laid in that white rush,

But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

A shudder in the loins engenders there

The broken wall, the burning roof and tower

And Agamemnon dead.

Being so caught up,

So mastered by the brute blood of the air,

Did she put on his knowledge with his power     Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

Leda

Leda by Adolphe Mossa

As many other popular themes of classical and Renaissance art, Leda and the swan was reinvented in the 19th and 20th century. I am particularly fond of Louis Icart’s Leda and the swan, which shows a Leda completely in control, a sensual woman, a tempress, and a black swan rather than a white one. There is humour, and this painting looks more like a consensual act of passion rather than rape/a woman submitting herself to the mighty God who wishes to take pleasure with her.

Leda and the swan

A modern take of the myth was issued in Love and titillates us with its ambiguity. Is she a victim? Is she dead?

Mariacarla Boscono by Mert and Marcus

My favourite costume designer, Eiko Ishioka, who sadly passed away in January, realised this swan gown for Mirror, mirror.

Eiko Ishioka for Mirror mirror

And an honorable mention goes to Black swan, who made Swan lake popular with the masses.

Swan lake is one of my favourite ballets and if you haven’t seen Svetlana Zakharova telling the heartbreaking story of Odette you definitely should check youtube, they have the whole ballet up.

My favourite photographer, Tim Walker, often uses swan imaginary in his photo shoots, and I made a little photo set of the best examples of his work concerning swans.

The swan maiden tale is very popular in folklore: a girl who is able to transform herself into a swan, thanks to her swan skin or a magical vest, is taken captive by a human man who hides her magic robe, forcing her to give up her powers and swan-form and to marry him. After many years and after having born children to her husband, the swan maiden finds her garment again and flies away. It is again a tale of violence and coercion. A creature that doesn’t belong to the mundane life of common human beings is forced to give up her freedom, her homeland and her family by a man too smitten with her to ask for her opinion. She submits but never stops longing for her lost powers and when given the chance abandons the world she doesn’t belong to without remorse (and why shouldn’t she? she has been raped and forced into marriage by a complete stranger).

The Swan Maiden by Howard Pyle

The wild swans by Hans Christian Andersen tells the story of a beautiful princess who sacrifices a lot to be able to rescue her eleven brothers from the curse that transformed them into swans. A story about sacrifice, siblings’ devotion and a virginal heroine who defies all odds.

Harry Clarke

The other famous Hans Christian Andersen fairytale involving a swan is The ugly duckling, which is not the story of how any humble duck can become a beautiful swan, but how your fate is set the day of your birth. You can only become what you already were at birth, no matter if it may take some time to reach your full potential.

Pedro Bascon

After this journey in Swan land it seems like these graceful animals are often associated with the most gruesome aspects of life, social injustice, rape, violence, death. Is is only a volative impression? Are our tales concerning other animals more forgiving? Probably not. In the end, our tales tell something about who we are, more than being appropriate reflections of animal behavior.

Better end on a humorous note with these crazy swan shoes by Kobi Levi

sources:

style.com

thefashionspot.com

fairytalesnews.blogspot.com

surlalunefairytales.com

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