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| Edward Burne-Jones Head of a man in profile 1890s lithograph British Museum |
PARABLE
Christ came from a white plain to a purple city, and as He passed through the first street, He heard voices overhead, and saw a young man lying drunk upon a window-sill. 'Why do you waste your soul in drunkenness?' He said. 'Lord, I was a leper and You healed me, what else can I do?' A little further through the town He saw a young man following a harlot, and said, 'Why do you dissolve your soul in debauchery?' and the young man answered, 'Lord, I was blind, and You healed me, what else can I do?' At last in the middle of the city He saw an old man crouching, weeping upon the ground, and when He asked why he wept, the old man answered, 'Lord, I was dead, and You raised me into life, what else can I do but weep?'
– Oscar Wilde (1856-1900)
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| Jan Veth The carpenter Adrianus Ravestein 1898 lithograph British Museum |
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| Frederic Leighton Woman in profile ca. 1895 lithograph British Museum |
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| Henri Fantin-Latour Poet and Muse 1895 lithograph British Museum |
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| Odilon Redon Old Knight (Vieux Chevalier) 1896 lithograph British Museum |
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| Theodoor van Hoytema Two Bearded Vultures ca. 1898-1900 lithograph British Museum |
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| Theodoor van Hoytema Birds ca. 1898-1900 lithograph British Museum |
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| John Singer Sargent Study of a Young Man 1895 lithograph British Museum |
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| John Singer Sargent Study of a Young Man 1895 lithograph British Museum |
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| John Singer Sargent William Rothenstein, drawing at a lectern 1897 lithograph British Museum |
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| William Rothenstein Portrait of a woman in a theatre box 1896 lithograph British Museum |
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| Eugène Carrière Nelly Carrière (the artist's daughter) 1895 lithograph British Museum |
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| Eugène Carrière Le Sommeil (the artist's son) 1897 lithograph British Museum |
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| Marius Bauer De Sfinx late 19th-early 20th century lithograph British Museum |
"The form of my poem rises out of a past that so overwhelms the present with its worth and vision that I'm at a loss to explain my delusion that there exist any real links between that past and a future destiny worthy of it."
– Hart Crane, in a letter to Waldo Frank, as quoted by Susan Howe in Spontaneous Particulars : the Telepathy of the Archives (New York : New Directions, 2014)
I am grateful to the British Museum for making these images available.