DOI Heft:
II. Ostatnie prace Jana Białostockiego
DOI Artikel:Z książek
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19643#0249
THE « MELANCHOLY» AND «KNIGHT»
IN THE ROMANTIC YISION
(Z: Diirer and his Critics 1500-1971, Badcn-Baden 1986)
T
A he German revival of Diirer in the Early Romantic period had been concerned at
least as much with Diirer's personality as with his art, if not more so. It was his role as the
revered head of the Northern tradition of art as opposed to the Italian, of which Raphael was
the personification, which accounted for Diirer's fame and popularity in that era. It is true
that his marginal drawings in the Maximilian Prayer-Book, popularized by Strixner's
publication had found several imitators and played an essential role in German Late
Romantic book illustration1. But one may say that for the critics and writers on art of the
early 19th century it was Diirer as a man, as a great German artist, that was important, more
important in fact than his works.
On the other hand some of his works appealed especially to Romantic mind and they
began to have a life of their own as bearers of symbolic meaning, as objects of specific
attitudes, or as sources of emotional experiences which enhanced typically Romantic moods.
Prints by Diirer were incomparably more important in this respect because by virtue of their
technique they were more widely available than were his more inaccessible paintings and
drawings.
Of Diirer's graphic works two exercised a special spell over 19th century writers and
humanists, the two "Master Engravings" of his maturę period: the Melancholy and the
Knight, or the Rider. With some risk of oversimplification one may say that Melancholy
appealed mostly to the English and French poets while the Knight became an obsessive
image haunting the minds of German philosophers and ideologists.
The Melancholy's career in the Romantic period goes back to an old tradition in literaturę
and in concepts of life. From the 17th century at least England was especially considered a
country of "spleen" and William Tempie gives an account of it in his Obsewations upon the
United Prouinces (1672), saying that the spleen "may arise from the great uncertainty and
many sudden changes of our weather in all seasons of the year. And how much these affect the
heads and hearts, especially of the finest tempers, is hard to be believed by men whose
245
IN THE ROMANTIC YISION
(Z: Diirer and his Critics 1500-1971, Badcn-Baden 1986)
T
A he German revival of Diirer in the Early Romantic period had been concerned at
least as much with Diirer's personality as with his art, if not more so. It was his role as the
revered head of the Northern tradition of art as opposed to the Italian, of which Raphael was
the personification, which accounted for Diirer's fame and popularity in that era. It is true
that his marginal drawings in the Maximilian Prayer-Book, popularized by Strixner's
publication had found several imitators and played an essential role in German Late
Romantic book illustration1. But one may say that for the critics and writers on art of the
early 19th century it was Diirer as a man, as a great German artist, that was important, more
important in fact than his works.
On the other hand some of his works appealed especially to Romantic mind and they
began to have a life of their own as bearers of symbolic meaning, as objects of specific
attitudes, or as sources of emotional experiences which enhanced typically Romantic moods.
Prints by Diirer were incomparably more important in this respect because by virtue of their
technique they were more widely available than were his more inaccessible paintings and
drawings.
Of Diirer's graphic works two exercised a special spell over 19th century writers and
humanists, the two "Master Engravings" of his maturę period: the Melancholy and the
Knight, or the Rider. With some risk of oversimplification one may say that Melancholy
appealed mostly to the English and French poets while the Knight became an obsessive
image haunting the minds of German philosophers and ideologists.
The Melancholy's career in the Romantic period goes back to an old tradition in literaturę
and in concepts of life. From the 17th century at least England was especially considered a
country of "spleen" and William Tempie gives an account of it in his Obsewations upon the
United Prouinces (1672), saying that the spleen "may arise from the great uncertainty and
many sudden changes of our weather in all seasons of the year. And how much these affect the
heads and hearts, especially of the finest tempers, is hard to be believed by men whose
245