Thursday, October 07, 2010

Speaking of Gustave Doré's Geryon . . .


I believe that I've located the inspiration for Gustave Doré's depiction of Geryon! As we see in the image above, Virgil and Dante have just encountered this winged, serpentine creature, which can apparently vary its size, much like the fallen angels, for compared to the Doré illustration, it seems to have miniaturized its enormous bulk . . .

I learned of this denizen of the deep, the sea robin -- also known as the "gurnard" (Geryon - gurnard, mere coincidence?) -- in yesterday's hard copy of the International Herald Tribune, but we find it online from two months ago in a New York Times article, "The Ugliest Catch" (August 14, 2010), by Lawrence Downes:
For the unfamiliar: A sea robin is a rusty-colored fish with a skull-helmet of a head, bulging eyeballs, a maw like a wide-mouth jar, winglike fins and whiskery appendages that it uses to prowl the bottom, where it snaps up baited hooks, earning a very short visit to the boat or dock. The visit is short because fishermen take one look and throw it back.
The article describes the "second annual Garbagefish.com fishing tournament," which Downs informs us is "run by some rude and witty New Jersey fishermen . . . dedicated to the proposition that all edible fish are created equal -- that the way to salvage the dignity of catching sea robins and not striped bass is to pretend you meant to do that."

I guess we now know what to do if we actually catch the genuine Geryon . . .

Labels: ,

17 Comments:

At 4:54 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

I see Satan rather as an Archaeopteryx: half reptile, half bird (angel)...

As for currently living reptiles, there're some species of lizards whose body is quite long but they have just forelegs.

 
At 5:09 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

Doubtless, we could find an entire host of demonic critters if we searched the murky seas or the howling wastelands . . .

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 5:16 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

ahem, errata corrige

Doubtless, we could find an entire host of wonderful creatures if we searched the murky seas or the howling wastelands.

 
At 6:04 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

Okay, "wonderfully demonic" . . .

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 6:10 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

Gimme five! And...

We shall swim out to that brooding reef in the sea and dive down through black abysses to Cyclopean and many-columned Y'ha-nthlei, and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory for ever.

_____HPL

(oh no, one more H-man)

 
At 6:48 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

Love that crafty selection . . .

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 4:18 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

FOR YOUR EYES ONLY

I tried to make a drawing by collecting the many inputs from the Geryon posts. I called it / her / him...

Jeffryon

n.b. Dante didn't specifically say that Geryon had lion paws, just "branche" i.e. hairy forelegs with talons.

 
At 5:57 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

huh... are they crazy??!! they removed the picture from ImageShack because of a "violation" or "by user request"!
Even the Vatican has restored the original Judgement by Michael Angel...


Jeffery, I will send it to you by email.

 
At 7:20 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

I'll look for your email.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 6:12 AM, Anonymous dhr said...

While re-reading the wonderful long poem Gerusalemme Liberata (Jerusalem Delivered) by Torquato Tasso, two interesting discoveries:

1. The unique case in poetry - I think - where Geryon is mentioned in the plural form "Gerioni", Geryons: see G.L. 4.4, v. 6; it occurs in the episode which would inspire Milton's Pandemonium.

2. By surfing the Net, I only found English versions where the "Geryons" were lacking; or, they were mentioned, but the verses nearby were rendered quite differently from the original text.

Traduttore, traditore!
(it takes one to recognize one)

 
At 6:30 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

Thanks for all the wonderful references, Dario.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 6:47 PM, Anonymous dhr said...

You know, when I was at the secondary school, I dreamed that my degree thesis would be on Dante's Geryon. (I read the Divine Comedy for the first time at the age of 10 or so). Now, by putting together your posts + the users' comments, I basically got it. THANKS.

 
At 7:01 PM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

You must have gotten most of it from your own comments since I didn't provide much.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 8:32 PM, Anonymous dhr said...

I didn't provide much

what about the Serpent-Adam, the Serpent-Eve, the Geryon-Serpent, the Fish-Geryon...........?

and especially, the waking of Imagination! (which is God, according to Blake, incidentally)

 
At 9:18 PM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

I was mostly citing others on these because I was too busy grading to do much analysis, but I suppose that I can be credited for some Google searches.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 
At 3:46 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

When my father took me fishing in narragansett bay, we saw many sea robins flying beside the boat for a very short time. When I hooked one, my father told me we could not keep it because it was not edible.

 
At 5:21 AM, Blogger Horace Jeffery Hodges said...

They certainly look inedible! Also incredible . . .

Jeffery Hodges

* * *

 

Post a Comment

<< Home