Caravaggio
A Novel
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
My sight was always good. But color now takes on even greater riches. I no longer need the bright blues and reds, which I did so delight in when I was young. I see a hundred times more beauty now in a dark brown, or the pale tints of quiet flesh. Or a ray of light across a fur or a beaten earth floor or a suit of black armor. Such colors do not distract the eye, but rather let it concentrate on my forte, the human face. There I will have my theater, there my drama, there my applause.
Peachment's imagined Caravaggio, while still a child, overhears his parents discussing one of his sketches, and realizes he has a talent that sets him apart from the world. He leaves family and home forever to map out a solitary traveler's life. Caravaggio became a revolutionary of his time, a rebellious and dangerous man to know, a man governed by his genius, his indiscriminate sexual appetite, and his murderous rage. He was sought far and wide in the late Renaissance world for his art, and there was a price on his head for at least one murder. This is Caravaggio's confession, told in humorous, blasphemous, often brutal prose, which cleverly beguiles the reader into understanding the art that was so celebrated and the life that caused so much outrage.
Peachment's Caravaggio is a gripping story of one man's determination to grapple with the truth as he journeys through Rome, Naples, Malta, and Sicily, encounters lovers and enemies, endures madness, exile, and imprisonment, and faces a final showdown with the Vatican Secret Service. His account is poignant and spirited. It is an adventurous and thoroughly enthralling insight into the mind of a creative genius and the violent world that inspired his paintings.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Caravaggio was one of the most audacious painters of the Renaissance; his dark, brooding canvases, with their violent portrayals of biblical themes, are unsettling even today. In this first novel, Peachment, a British writer with a background in theater and journalism, argues that Caravaggio the man was also audacious: a foul-mouthed hedonist with unrestrained sexual appetites. Claustrophobic and bloody, the novel presents a keen portrait of a bawdy, rage-filled man whose talent flourished despite the dangerous circumstances of his life. Peachment eschews background historical detail to focus on brutal executions, murders and sexual escapades, depicted in the raw. The artist narrates events with unflinching immediacy; typical chapters begin with lines like "They burned Bruno, and I watched it" or "I killed him on a Sunday afternoon late into May." Given Peachment's emphasis, any insight into Caravaggio's art or "painterly" description in creating the setting is secondary to the exploration of the artist's personality. The novel is meant to be read as Caravaggio's confession on the verge of death, and the final entries describe his murder by agents of the Vatican. Written in blunt and direct prose, the novel brings the artist to life with the brio of an adventure story. The result is a harrowing, engrossing read.
