Isabella and the Pot of Basil
George Henry Grenville Manton (1855–1932), "Isabella and the Pot of Basil"
October the 31st, 2015
It is an interesting coincidence that tomorrow, shortly before All Saints' Day, British will celebrate the 220th birth anniversary of John Keats, English Romantic poet. For this occasion, we found a picture telling us a spine-chilling story of endless love and sorrow, based on Keats' poem "Isabella or The Pot of Basil" (1818). A noble girl falls in love with Lorenzo, family servant. However, her brothers, having decided to marry Isabella to “some high noble and his olive trees”, kill Lorenzo. A ghost of Lorenzo appears and tells Isabella how to find his tomb. She exhumes the body and buries the head in a pot of basil. She forgets everything in the world, caring for the basil obsessively and watering it with her tears.
In the picture, death and grief converge with perfect beauty, blooming, bursting with life outside world. The painter was not a member of Pre-raphaelite brotherhood, but was inspired by its aesthetic principles. You might have noticed that in the paintings by pre-raphaelites death and pain are often depicted by such bright, vibrant colours and in such a beautiful background, that any juxtaposition between the ugly and the beautiful, life and death disappear.
In the picture, death and grief converge with perfect beauty, blooming, bursting with life outside world. The painter was not a member of Pre-raphaelite brotherhood, but was inspired by its aesthetic principles. You might have noticed that in the paintings by pre-raphaelites death and pain are often depicted by such bright, vibrant colours and in such a beautiful background, that any juxtaposition between the ugly and the beautiful, life and death disappear.
