Divine Fury (31 page)

FIGURE D I.3.
An image of Voltaire’s sarcophagus and the cart used to “translate” his remains (minus his brain and heart) to the Panthéon in 1791. Voltaire’s
genius
presides over him with a garland in hand, a symbol of his immortal genius.
Bibliothèque nationale de France
.

FIGURE D I.4.
Genius leading genius. A
genius
burning with celestial fire leads Voltaire and Rousseau to the temple of glory and immortality, c. 1794.
Bibliothèque nationale de France
.

FIGURE D I.5.
Genius trumps all. A French revolutionary playing card on which genius has assumed the place of kings, c. 1794.
Bibliothèque nationale de France
.

FIGURE D I.6.
François Rude,
The Genius of the People
, early nineteenth century. The plaster model was likely a study for Rude’s masterpiece
La Marseillaise
that now adorns the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, an image of the people triumphant.
Copyright © RMN–Grand Palais / Art Resource, New York
.

FIGURE D I.7.
Jean-Baptiste Regnault,
Liberty or Death
, 1795. The “Genius of France” is suspended perilously between liberty and death.
Bpk, Berlin / Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg / Hanne Moschkowitz / Art Resource, New York
.

FIGURE 4.1.
Jean-Léon Gérôme,
Napoleon Before the Sphinx
, 1866. This celebration of Napoleon’s ill-fated Egyptian campaign becomes a metaphor for the enigma of genius.
Courtesy Hearst Castle®
/ California State Parks
.

FIGURE 4.2.
Antoine Aubert (
left
),
L’astre brillant
, 1813. Napoleon as master of the universe. The caption reads: “Brilliant and immense star, he enlightens, he enriches, and alone fashions, according to his will, the destinies of the world.”
Copyright © RMN–Grand Palais / Art Resource, New York
.

FIGURE 4.3.
The middle finger of Galileo’s right hand. Galileo’s body was exhumed in 1737, and three fingers, along with a vertebra and a tooth, were removed by admirers. The middle finger has been housed since 1927 at the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza, Florence, which provided permission to use this picture.

FIGURE 4.4.
Louis Édouard Fournier,
The Funeral of Shelley
, 1889. In this rendering of the 1822 cremation, Edward John Trelawny, the poet Leigh Hunt, and Byron are pictured from left to right.
Courtesy National Museums Liverpool
.

FIGURE 4.5.
Eugène Delacroix,
Tasso in the Madhouse
, 1839. The martyrdom of genius.
Collection Oskar Reinhart “Am Römerholz,” Winterthur, Switzerland
.

FIGURE 4.6.
Caspar David Friedrich,
Wanderer Above a Sea of Fog
, c. 1816. The vision of Romantic genius: solitude and transcendence, individuality and mystical communion with nature, spirit, or “the one.”
Bpk, Berlin / Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg / Elke Walford / Art Resource, New York
.