Some illustrations in Unrecorded Histories are pure silhouette drawings, but the first drawing in the book - see last week's blog - contains elements that are not just positive or negative shapes, with areas that appear to be drawn in, such as the balcony, and the window shutters. The illustration accompanying the story 'The New God' likewise contains such elements, especially on the wall, where decorative areas have been drawn, and on the floor, where the contours of a carpet or of marble stones have been sketched.
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| Charles Ricketts, 'The New God' |
At the beginning of the story, Seneca retreats to a small office in Nero's palace, a cool room where the sound of a water organ can be heard. The murals from the time of Tiberius 'represented the Loves of Venus' - one such scene is visible at the upper-hand side. Seneca is seated in the centre, having sunk 'wearily into a chair'.
In the small sketch Ricketts made in 1930, the scene on the wall is difficult to identify; the final illustration shows Venus and Adonis - Cupid hovers in the air to their left.
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| Charles Ricketts, sketch for Unrecorded Histories [Collection British Museum: 1946,0209.122] [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0) license] [© With permission of the executors of the Charles Ricketts estate, Leonie Sturge-Moore and the heirs of Charmain O'Neil] |
The figure pointing upwards (to the left of Seneca) is a prisoner: 'Some call him Saul, others name him Paul.' Paul tells him about his master, Jesus, but Seneca cannot quite follow him. He thinks 'that Paul had no new message; his was the worship of some obscure dual deity, and one of those Asiatic cults that were countless.' Seneca is baffled by the idea of 'One True God':
Nature, Life gave no hint of any guiding purpose. Each separate part seemed at war with each. Nature, like Nero, sometimes disguised her cruelty with beauty.
Nero enters, moist with sweat after a ball game.
The apostle remained silent, he beheld before him the terrible master of the World, the beast of Rome, the vessel of all known abominations who, at that moment, was proffering his naked buttocks to be powdered by his slaves.
Nero - who is charmed by Paul's phrase 'Circumcision of the Spirit' - decides to read one his poems:
I will read you the passage where Venus entreats Adonis, as yet unknowing of his coming death.
Venus tries to persuade 'the reluctant Youth' to take action:
when grief has blinded and removed from sight