When in college I was introduced to that troublesome figure from the English Renaissance - Christopher Marlowe (1564-93) - one of the first things that I was told about him was that he was - cough, cough, gulp, gulp - a homosexual. That late sixteenth-century manscript (prepared from the information provided by Richard Baines) was quoted from where Marlowe is attributed the statement - among other newsworthy soundbytes - that "Christ was a bastard and his mother dishonest...That St. John the Evangelist was bedfellow to Christ and leaned always in his bosome, that he used him as the sinners of Sodom." I have often wondered where Marlowe got that extraordinary notion of St. John resting his head on Christ's chest from, but have never bothered to search too assiduously for the source of that notion. In fact I had forgotten all about it till yesterday when I bought a book simply called "Sculpture" (2007). In that book I was stunned to find a couple of images that brought back to my mind with lightening speed that remark attributed to Marlowe about Christ and St. John. I found myself staring open-mouthed at photos of two wooden sculptures from 1300 A.D., depicting Christ and St. John in exactly the same posture as described, allegedly, by Marlowe. What was even more fascinating was that these two sculptures dated from 1300, a mere seven years before Edward II ascended the throne of England and started living a life which would interest Marlowe enough less than three hundred years hence to write a play on the king! So, not only would Edward II have been aware of these sculptures, but Marlowe would have known about these artefacts too. Which is why, he doesn't talk much about David and Jonathan (Edward II and his supposed boyfriend Gaveston were apparently spoken of in their time as "David and Jonathan") but he speaks of Christ and St. John. Now we know where Marlowe got that notion of St. John leaning on Christ's bosom from! I wonder if there are other statues from that time - the 14th century - where Christ and St. John are depicted in this rather odd manner. I mean, just look at the two. These are not two friends indulging in a bit of bromance! The posture of St. John speaks of a coyness which hints at an emotional relationship between the two which appears not have been restricted to the Platonic. I mean, if instead of St. John the sculpture had shown a woman would Joe Public still consider the posture purely Platonic? I don't know enough about the two sculptures, but will now try to find out more. I understand that in the Gospel According to St. John the disciple is shown leaning on Christ during the Last Supper, but the manner in which the sculptures depict St.John and Jesus gives one the impression that the two men are a loving couple in a cosy posture and not two of several people attending a dinner. And it seems Marlowe was not the first to suggest that Christ and St. John were more than guru and disciple. In 1550, fourteen years before Marlowe's birth, a libertine being tried in Venice had confessed to believing in the heresy that St.John was Christ's catamite! By the way, the sculptures can currently be checked out at Bayerisches National Museum, Munich (this is the statue depicting St. John in a green tunic) and the Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin. Both, as I have mentioned, are made of painted and gilded wood. I shall post here if I find anything interesting about the two sculptures in the future. 
No comments:
Post a Comment