Fainting in classical art.
Publisher Summary Fainting (syncope) is a temporary loss of consciousness and posture. Fainting is far commoner than epilepsy, but in art, epileptic seizures are more commonly depicted than fainting. Syncope typically happens in particular situations such as hot crowded environments, including restaurants or aeroplanes, in the doctor's surgery, or in the bathroom at night; specific triggers include prolonged standing, emotional trauma, and pain. Emotional turmoil, particularly grief, usually causes the syncope shown in art; the common causes of syncope in real life, such as prolonged standing and being in hot environments, are rarely shown. Moreover, women in art are much more likely to faint than men, and typically are young, beautiful, and reacting to grief; in real life, the sex ratio only slightly favors women. When men are shown to faint in art, it is often through serious, even life-threatening causes such as severe blood loss or terminal illness. Simple faints in art, particularly in women, often has overtones of a psychogenic component (‘‘swooning’’). Thus, the fainters are often painted with pink skin, eyes closed, and held upright, seemingly without coming to harm.
Epilepsy, Viewed Metaphysically: An Interpretation of the Biblical Story of the Epileptic Boy and of Raphael's Transfiguration
Summary: Raphael's last painting reveals, in the upper half of the picture, Christ's transfiguration on Mount Tabor and, in the lower half, the young boy's epileptic seizure at the foot of the mountain in the presence of the other disciples. Raphael depicts both events, which are told in succession in the Gospels, as if they took place at the same time. By synchronizing both scenes Raphael demonstrated a significant correspondence between Christ and the epileptic boy, which reveals the epileptic seizure as a symbolic representation of a transcendent event. This metaphysical aspect of epilepsy depicted by Raphael can also be found in the corresponding biblical passages. In the Gospels, the metamorphosis caused by the epileptic seizure is used as a simile for Christ's transfiguration through suffering, death, and resurrection.
Carnival of Shame: Doctorow and the Rosenbergs
“Literature can turn language, for the moment at least, against the sentence of death.” Considering the national and international furor provoked by the sensational early 1950's “atom spy” trial and execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, one may be surprised that these dramatic and traumatic events have not inspired more literary artistry than they have. But a prominent playwright, Arthur Miller, did write The Crucible (produced in 1953) in part as a response to the rabid McCarthyism of that era, and two highly regarded novelists in a later decade composed ambitious novels drawing directly on the Rosenberg affair: E. L. Doctorow in The Book of Daniel (1971) and Robert Coover in The Public Burning (1977). In 1987, Sidney Lumet produced the little noticed film Daniel, based on Doctorow's novel, and still more recently Tony Kushner's Pulitzer Prize-winning play, Angels in America, with Ethel Rosenberg as one of the characters, has been playing on Broadway.