Walter Pater Il Rinascimento ( The Renaissance, 1873 )
( Sandro Botticelli )
But he is far enough from accepting the conventional orthodoxy of Dante
which, referring all human action to the simple formula of purgatory,
heaven and hell, leaves an insoluble element of prose in the depths of
Dante's poetry. One picture of his, with the portrait of the donor,
Matteo Palmieri, below, had the credit or discredit of attracting some
shadow of ecclesiastical censure. This Matteo Palmieri--two dim figures
move under that name in contemporary history--was the reputed author of
a poem, still unedited, La Citta Divina, which represented the human
race as an incarnation of those angels who, in the revolt of Lucifer,
were neither for Jehovah nor for His enemies, a fantasy of that earlier
Alexandrian philosophy about which the Florentine intellect in that
century was so curious. Botticelli's picture may have been only one of
those familiar compositions in which religious reverie has recorded its
impressions of the various forms of beatified existence--Glorias, as
they were called, like that in which Giotto painted the portrait of
Dante; but somehow it was suspected of embodying in a picture the
wayward dream of Palmieri, and the chapel where it hung was closed.
Artists so entire as Botticelli are usually careless about philosophical
theories, even when the philosopher is a Florentine of the fifteenth
century, and his work a poem in terza rima. But Botticelli, who wrote a
commentary on Dante, and became the disciple of Savonarola, may well
have let such theories come and go across him. True or false, the story
interprets much of the peculiar sentiment with which he infuses his
profane and sacred persons, comely, and in a certain sense like angels,
but with a sense of displacement or loss about them--the wistfulness of
exiles, conscious of a passion and energy greater than any known issue
of them explains, which runs through all his varied work with a
sentiment of ineffable melancholy.
which, referring all human action to the simple formula of purgatory,
heaven and hell, leaves an insoluble element of prose in the depths of
Dante's poetry. One picture of his, with the portrait of the donor,
Matteo Palmieri, below, had the credit or discredit of attracting some
shadow of ecclesiastical censure. This Matteo Palmieri--two dim figures
move under that name in contemporary history--was the reputed author of
a poem, still unedited, La Citta Divina, which represented the human
race as an incarnation of those angels who, in the revolt of Lucifer,
were neither for Jehovah nor for His enemies, a fantasy of that earlier
Alexandrian philosophy about which the Florentine intellect in that
century was so curious. Botticelli's picture may have been only one of
those familiar compositions in which religious reverie has recorded its
impressions of the various forms of beatified existence--Glorias, as
they were called, like that in which Giotto painted the portrait of
Dante; but somehow it was suspected of embodying in a picture the
wayward dream of Palmieri, and the chapel where it hung was closed.
Artists so entire as Botticelli are usually careless about philosophical
theories, even when the philosopher is a Florentine of the fifteenth
century, and his work a poem in terza rima. But Botticelli, who wrote a
commentary on Dante, and became the disciple of Savonarola, may well
have let such theories come and go across him. True or false, the story
interprets much of the peculiar sentiment with which he infuses his
profane and sacred persons, comely, and in a certain sense like angels,
but with a sense of displacement or loss about them--the wistfulness of
exiles, conscious of a passion and energy greater than any known issue
of them explains, which runs through all his varied work with a
sentiment of ineffable melancholy.
Traduzione di Aldo De Rinaldis, 1925 ( Napoli, R. Ricciardi ) :
Ma egli ( Sandro Botticelli ) è a bastanza lontano dall’accettare la convenzionale ortodossia di Dante, la quale, riferendo tutte le azioni umane alla semplice formula del purgatorio del paradiso e dell’inferno, lascia un insolubile elemento di prosa nelle profondità della poesia dantesca. Una sua pittura con sul davanti il ritratto del donatore Matteo Palmieri si ebbe il merito, o il demerito, di attrarre qualche ombra della censura ecclesiastica. Questo Matteo Palmieri ( due distinte persone portano tal nome nella storia del tempo ) era il reputato autore di un poema rimasto inedito, La Città Divina, che rappresentava la razza umana come incarnazione di quegli angeli che, nella rivolta di Lucifero, non furono né per Geova né per il suo nemico : una fantasia di quell’antica filosofia alessandrina della quale era così curiosa la mentalità fiorentina di quel secolo. Il quadro di Botticelli non era forse che una delle consuete composizioni, nelle quali lo spirito religioso registrava le sue impressioni dell’esistenza paradisiaca – una Gloria, come si diceva, simile a quella ove Giotto dipinse il ritratto di Dante; ma, ad ogni modo, fu sospettato di dar espressione pittorica all’illecito sogno del Palmieri, e la cappella ov’era stato collocato fu chiusa. Artisti così completi come Botticelli sono di solito incuranti di teorie filosofiche, anche se il filosofo sia un fiorentino del Quattrocento e la sua opera un poema in terza rima : ma Botticelli, che scrisse un comentario di Dante e divenne discepolo di Savonarola, poté ben essersi lasciato penetrare da teorie siffatte. Vera o falsa, la storia interpreta molto del particolar sentimento ond’egli informò le sue persone sacre e profane, concepite con grazia e, in qualche modo, alla maniera d’angeli, ma con un senso di abbandono e di vuoto nel loro animo – tristezza d’esuli – conscie di una passione e di una energia più grande di ogni loro consueta manifestazione, la quale corre, traverso tutta la varia opera botticelliana, con un sentimento d’ineffabile malinconìa.
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