La matière des images dans The Duchess of Malfi

Abstract

The present paper explores the various types of painters and artists mentioned by John Webster in The Duchess of Malfi. Much like the poisoned portrait in The White Devil, some of the painted and sculpted images that appear in The Duchess of Malfi seem endowed with equally terrifying power over whoever looks at them. Why do some pictures become perfidious in the tragedy? The play recurrently offers descriptions of how images are designed, focusing on the very material from which they are made and upon which they are impressed. Starting from an analysis of the material circumstances of picture-making as shown or described in the play, my contention is that Webster emphasizes the difference between metal crafts and ductile materials, which in turn opens onto a reflection upon time and sound in the creative process, thereby accounting for the pictures’ varying degrees of agency and toxicity.

Keywords

• botanics
• clock
• hand
• metal
• painting
• poison