![\"Oscar](\"http:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/a\/a7\/Oscar_Wilde_Sarony.jpg\/640px-Oscar_Wilde_Sarony.jpg\")
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As far was we know, nobody yelled out “Shut up, you filthy sodomite<\/strong>” to\u00a0Oscar Wilde<\/a>…<\/em><\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n I just finished reading the January\/February 2019 National Geographic<\/a> magazine.\u00a0 I came across this comment from Oscar Wilde<\/a>, about Americans – and their unique hero-worship.<\/p>\n (Not that has anything to do with current events…) \u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n That led me to Oscar Wilde in America – Breaking Character<\/a>.\u00a0 I wanted to verify the National Geographic quote, and maybe get some additional background.\u00a0 Which led me to this:<\/p>\n In Leadville, Colorado he was winched down into the depths of a silver mine and delivered a lecture to the miners on the ethics of art.\u00a0 \u201cI read them passages from the autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini<\/a> and they seemed much delighted,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201c[But] I was reproved by my hearers for not having brought [Cellini] with me.\u00a0 I explained that he had been dead for some little time which elicited the enquiry, \u2018Who shot him?\u2019<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n It turns out that “some little time” was over 300 years.\u00a0 That is,\u00a0Cellini<\/a> (1500-1571)\u00a0was an “Italian goldsmith<\/a>, sculptor, draftsman<\/a>, soldier, musician, and artist.”\u00a0 (He also wrote the “famous autobiography” that Wilde read to the Colorado miners.)\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n And in turns out that nobody\u00a0shot<\/em><\/strong> Cellini…\u00a0 That is, despite his various escapades – sexual and otherwise, described further below – he lived to a “ripe old age.”<\/p>\n I’ve written about Wilde before in Oscar Wilde and \u201cgross indecencies<\/a>,” On Roy Moore \u2013 and Oscar Wilde<\/a>, and Imitation Game\u201d \u2013 Revisited<\/a>.\u00a0 And when I started work on this blog-post, I planned to review those past posts on Wilde.\u00a0 I also planned to write more about Americans today, VIS-\u00c0-VIS<\/a><\/em> their habit of “always tak[ing] their heroes from the criminal classes.\u201d<\/p>\n But as it turns out, Cellini<\/a> was way<\/em><\/strong> more interesting…<\/p>\n But that’s not the interesting part.\u00a0 The interesting part involved Cellini’s “active social life,” if not his frequent run-ins<\/a>.<\/p>\n For example, he boasted in his memoirs of killing five people.\u00a0 There may have been more but no one knows for sure:\u00a0 He never got convicted.\u00a0 (He got pardons from various church officials, including popes.)\u00a0<\/em> But he did<\/em><\/strong> have to bounce around a lot:\u00a0 From Rome to\u00a0Florence<\/a> to France, back to Florence, then to Venice, and so on.<\/p>\n For an example of that<\/em><\/strong> (and other things)<\/em>:\u00a0 In 1548 – he was 48 or so (being born in 1500 helps)<\/em> – a woman in Florence<\/a> accused Cellini of sodomizing<\/a> her son, Vincenzo.\u00a0 To escape the charge he fled to Venice.\u00a0 \u201cThis was not the first, nor the last time, that Cellini was implicated for\u00a0sodomy<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n And this \u2013 Wikipedia noted \u2013 illustrated his strong\u00a0homosexual<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0bisexual<\/a>\u00a0tendencies; (\u201conce with a woman and at least three times with men during his life\u201d)<\/em>.\u00a0 As for penalties:\u00a0 As a young man\u00a0\u201che was sentenced to pay 12 staia (bushels)<\/em> of flour in 1523 for relations with another young man\u2026\u00a0 Meanwhile, in Paris a former model and lover brought charges against him of using her \u2018after the Italian fashion\u2019 (i.e. sodomy)<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 Later still, in 1556 (at<\/strong>\u00a0age 56)<\/em>:<\/p>\n Cellini\u2019s apprentice \u2026 Montepulciano accused his mentor of having sodomised him many times while \u201ckeeping him for five years in his bed as a wife.\u00a0\u00a0This time<\/strong>\u00a0the penalty was a hefty fifty golden\u00a0scudi<\/a>\u00a0fine, and four years of prison, remitted to four years of\u00a0house arrest<\/a>\u00a0thanks to the intercession of the\u00a0Medicis<\/a>.\u00a0 In a public altercation before Duke\u00a0Cosimo<\/a>,\u00a0Bandinelli<\/a>* had called out to him\u00a0Sta cheto, soddomitaccio!\u00a0 (Shut up, you filthy sodomite!)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Cellini described this as an \u201catrocious insult,\u201d and tried to laugh it off.<\/p>\n But he wasn’t done.\u00a0 (For one thing, he outlived\u00a0Bandinelli<\/a> by 11 years.)<\/em>\u00a0 In 1562 – after briefly trying a “clerical career” – he married a servant, with whom he claimed to have five children.\u00a0 In 1563 he was named a member of the “prestigious Accademia delle Arti del Disegno<\/a> of Florence<\/a>, founded by the Duke Cosimo I de’ Medici<\/a> \u2026 under the influence of the architect Giorgio Vasari<\/a>.”<\/p>\n So aside from being a talented artist, he knew how to make some pretty influential friends.<\/p>\n And finally, when he died in\u00a0Florence<\/a>\u00a0in 1571 he was “buried with great pomp in the church of the\u00a0Santissima Annunziata<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 As to what caused<\/em><\/strong> his death, some modern readers may think that was a result of his lifelong various escapades, sexual and otherwise.<\/p>\n But the fact is that despite all those turmoils, run-ins and escapades, he lived to the ripe old age of 71.\u00a0 And this was at a time when the average life expectancy was 30 to 40 years<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 (See for example What was life expectancy in the 1500s \u2013 answers.com<\/a>,\u00a0and\/or\u00a0Life Expectancy From Prehistory to Today<\/a>.)\u00a0 <\/em>And from all this we might glean two points of note:\u00a0 For one thing, “I’m sure there’s an object lesson<\/a> here, but darned if I can figure out what.”\u00a0<\/em> For another:<\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n On the other hand – as far as we know – Cellini<\/a>\u00a0never got tried for “gross indecency.”<\/em><\/p>\n * \u00a0 * \u00a0 * \u00a0 *<\/p>\n \u00a0I borrowed the upper image from\u00a0Oscar Wilde and \u201cgross indecencies<\/a>.”\u00a0 In turn, the image is courtesy of\u00a0Oscar Wilde\u00a0\u2013 Wikipedia<\/a>, with the caption: \u00a0\u201cPhotograph taken in 1882 by\u00a0Napoleon Sarony<\/a>.\u201d\u00a0 Here’s what Oscar Wilde in America \u2013 Breaking Character<\/a>\u00a0said about the photo:\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n The most iconic images of Wilde we have today [including the image at the top of the post]\u00a0were actually taken in New York at the studio of Napoleon Sarony at 37 Union Square.\u00a0 It was in America that Wilde perfected his image, and it\u2019s ironic that this image was the subject of a lawsuit that changed US copyright law forever.\u00a0 Sarony successfully sued a company that had reproduced 85,000 copies of this picture of Wilde, claiming ownership over the copyright of a photograph for the first time in legal history.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n And re:\u00a0 Wilde’s comment on American hero-worship.\u00a0 It was on page 88 of the paper edition of the “January\/February 2019 edition of National Geographic<\/a> magazine.”\u00a0 <\/em>See National Geographic History – January 2019 Free PDF<\/a><\/em>, for an electronic version, and\/or National Geographic (Ebay)<\/a><\/em> for an image of the paperback cover.\u00a0 Also, the web article <\/em>“Breaking Character<\/a>” did in fact verify the quote:<\/em><\/p>\n Wilde lectured in Saint Joseph, Missouri two weeks after Jesse James had been murdered there and found the whole town in mourning.\u00a0 \u201cAmericans are certainly great hero-worshippers, and always take their heroes from the criminal classes,\u201d he observed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n For more on Cellini, see 13 surprising facts about Cellini – DorotheumArt<\/a>, <\/b>How many people did benvenuto cellini kill? | Yahoo Answers<\/a>, and The Bedevilment of Benvenuto Cellini \u2013 EsoterX<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Re:\u00a0 The “Bandinelli<\/a>” who called out to Cellini, “Sta cheto, soddomitaccio!”\u00a0 He was a “Renaissance<\/a> Italian<\/a> sculptor<\/a>, draughtsman and painter” (1488-1560).\u00a0 He had a “lifelong obsession with Michelangelo,” but was also – according to\u00a0Giorgio Vasari<\/a>, “a former pupil in Bandinelli’s workshop” – he (Bandinelli) “was driven by jealousy of Benvenuto Cellini<\/a> and Michelangelo<\/a>.”<\/em><\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/8\/89\/Robert_Ford_shooting_Jesse_James.jpg\")
Wilde was visiting America – specifically, St. Joseph, Missouri – a week after Jesse James<\/a> was killed.\u00a0 (By\u00a0<\/b>the “coward Robert Ford<\/a>,” illustrated at right.)\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Wilde thus “witnessed firsthand the mad clamor for relics of the outlaw at an auction of Jesse’s household belongings.”\u00a0 That led him to observe: “Americans are certainly great hero-worshipers, and always take their heroes from the criminal classes.”<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/e\/e9\/Persee-florence.jpg\/240px-Persee-florence.jpg\")
For one thing, he was “one of the most important artists of\u00a0Mannerism<\/a>.”\u00a0 (Which includes\u00a0a variety of approaches “associated with artists such as\u00a0Leonardo da Vinci<\/a>,\u00a0Raphael<\/a>, and early\u00a0Michelangelo<\/a>.\u00a0 Where High Renaissance art emphasizes proportion, balance, and ideal beauty, Mannerism exaggerates such qualities, often resulting in compositions that are asymmetrical or unnaturally elegant.”)\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>And he’s “remembered for his skill in making pieces such as the\u00a0Cellini Salt Cellar<\/a><\/i>\u00a0and\u00a0Perseus with the Head of Medusa<\/a><\/i>.”\u00a0 (Seen at left.)<\/em><\/p>\nWho says history can’t be fascinating?<\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n
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