Pompeii in the Public Imagination from Its Rediscovery to TodayShelley Hales, Joanna Paul The city of Pompeii has had an enormous impact on Western imaginations since its rediscovery under the ashes of the volcano that destroyed it in 79 CE. In the 250 years since excavations began, Pompeii has helped to bring the ancient world to life for everyone, from music hall audiences to gentleman scholars, and it continues to have an impact on the way in which we think about the past, and the human condition itself. The contributors to this generously illustrated volume, who include the novelist Robert Harris, in a recorded interview, investigate how Pompeii has been used in film, fiction, and art on both sides of the Atlantic over three centuries. They explore the many different ways in which Pompeii inhabits our imaginations: as ghostly relic of human suffering, romantic ruin, model of cultural inspiration, home of a distant, decadent culture, and comforting model for everyday life. |
Contents
Ruins and Reconstructions | 1 |
Goethes Repeated Approaches to Pompeii | 15 |
William Beckford as a Visitor to Pompeii | 34 |
Plinys Letters to Tacitus and Angelica Kauffmanns Pliny the Younger and his Mother at Misenum | 48 |
Pompeii and Vesuvius in Corinne or Italy | 62 |
Recreating the City | 75 |
Necromantic Pathos in BulwerLyttons City of the Dead | 90 |
Souvenir de Pompéi | 105 |
15 Experiencing the Last Days of Pompeii in Late NineteenthCentury Philadelphia | 215 |
16 In Search of Lost Time and Pompeii | 232 |
Vittorio Spinazzola and the Via dellAbbondanza | 246 |
Art Architecture and Aristocratic SelfFashioning in the MidTwentieth Century | 270 |
19 Pompeii in Roberto Rossellinis Journey to Italy | 286 |
20 The Censorship Myth and the Secret Museum | 301 |
Looking at Looking in Pompeiis Brothel and the Secret Cabinet | 316 |
An Interview with Robert Harris | 331 |
Chassériaus Pompeii in NineteenthCentury Paris | 118 |
10 Italian ClassicalRevival Painters and the Southern Question | 136 |
11 Cities of the Dead | 153 |
12 Christians and Jews at Pompeii in Late NineteenthCentury Fiction | 171 |
Freudian Archaeology | 185 |
The Last Days of Pompeii in the Early American Republic | 199 |
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accessed May 2011 aesthetic ancient sexuality antiquity arabesques archaeological archive Arria Marcella artefacts artistic audience Baths Beckford brothel Bulwer-Lytton cast century characters Charlus Chassériau Christian classical collection colour contemporary context Corinne culture Days of Pompeii dead death depicting described destruction Diomedes dream erotic eruption of Vesuvius excavations exhibition fictional film Fiorelli frescoes Freud Gabinetto Gautier's Gell Getty Getty Villa Giuseppe Fiorelli Glaucus Goethe Greek Herculaneum House Ibid imagination Isis Italian Italy Jean-Léon Gérôme Joanna Paul journey Kauffmann Last Days Latin letter literary material modern Museum Naples narrative nineteenth nineteenth-century novel Nydia Octavien Oswald Paris past photographs Pliny Pliny the Elder Pliny the Younger Pliny’s Pompeian Pompeii popular Portici present Proust readers reception remains Roman Rome scene sculpture Secret Museum slave Spinazzola statue story streets suggests Tacitus Temple Tepidarium tion tour tourists Vesuvius viewers Villa visitors volume woman