Caravaggio: A Passionate Life

Rating:
Summary: Caravaggio is Caravaggio
Review: Any biography of Caravaggio is bound to be immensely interesting because he was far from ordinary, someone who will never fail to shock and amuse modern readers. While several reviews I have read complain about the brevity of the book, I found its length appropriate-it did the artist justice without bogging the reader down with too much analysis and irrelevant details. It assumes some familiarity with Italy and European history, but it has several chapters devoted solely to discussing the time period, while always making a connection to Caravaggio's life. I found it particularly nice that nearly all of Caravaggio's paintings were discussed and analyzed within the biography. The book has several copies of paintings inserted in its middle, but lacks the majority. Therefore, I found it incredibly helpful to have my Caravaggio anthology nearby so that I could follow the author's discussions. Undoubtedly, anyone that is not a Caravaggio fan would find these sections tremendously boring, but I loved the opportunity to pore over his paintings with a new understanding of their significance and context.

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Summary: A compelling and colorful look at Caravaggio's life
Review: As a longtime fan of Caravaggio's works, I found Desmond Seward's biography to be fascinating and informative. Seward fills his book with wonderful details that help flesh out the social milieu of the artist's lifetime, a picture of a world as violent and yet fervently religious as Caravaggio himself. The writing is crisp and colorful, never failing to evoke the various settings in which Caravaggio lived. I thought perhaps Seward was a bit too fastidious about the possibility of Caravaggio's homosexual side, but on the other hand I appreciate the way Seward rescues Caravaggio from the PC types who would try to claim Caravaggio as a gay icon when he was certainly not exclusively so; nor did the artist live in an era when such personality distinctions were made. I also like the emphasis Seward placed on Caravaggio's faith and his struggles with his temperamental personality, giving us a more rounded picture of a man with many contradictory elements in his character.

Rating:
Summary: an entertaining, compelling story of the artist and his time
Review: Caravaggio was without peer in his time, and it was many years before Rembrandt produced anything comparable to the majesty and beauty of Caravaggio's work. Caravaggio's short and turbulent life is not well documented and we are fortunate that Seward directed his attention to this subject. Seward is an accomplished historian who managed to assemble a plausible life story from the sparse information that is available, and to lend some insight into what may have motivated this genius. The detailed portrait of life and faith in early Baroque era Italy was an added bonus and a pleasant surprise.

Rating:
Summary: A shallow look at a complex painter
Review: Desmond Seward's look at the life of Caravaggio, a genius with a problematic personality, is well enough written as a string of facts, if far from passionate in its prose or its insights. But beyond the ABCs of the life, Seward offers virtually nothing. His major motivation seems to be "rescuing" Caravaggio from his reputation as a homosexual, which reputation he attributes ludicrously to Derek Jarman's recent film rather than the stark sexuality of Caravaggio's male nudes. Mr. Seward is of the opinion that the painter could not have been homosexual, because he was devoutly religious, in fact a quotidian exemplar of counter-Reformation Catholicism. Apparently it has not occurred to Mr. Seward that Caravaggio could have been *both* homosexual and devoutly Christian, or that his difficulties as a person--his numerous duels, brawls, conflicts, assaults--may have arisen from the conflict between his sexuality and his faith, or between his sexuality and the dictates of his Inquisition-period church. But other than repeating his assertion endlessly, Seward offers no particular evidence one way or the other as to Caravaggio's sexuality, and no meaningful explanation of his own for the painter's repeated confrontations with his peers. In fact, the author's take on the pictures is as superficial as his understanding of human sexuality. He repeats fairly ludicrous proto-Christian interpretations of the paintings, then dismisses contrary interpretations out of hand. Seward pooh-poohs post-Freudian analysis of the pictures without, apparently, stopping to consider the psychosexuality of the paintings themselves. Of course, Seward is himself a post-Freudian, if not a psychological critic, and he seems himself to be obsessed with the notion that Caravaggio was obsessed with decapitation. (Could Caravaggio possibly have been obsessed with the idea that he himself could be decapitated if his homosexuality were known?) All in all, the book is useful only as a recitation of the facts of the painter's life. It absolutely fails the promise of its subtitle: "A Passionate Life."

Rating:
Summary: Interesting Account of Caravaggio and his works
Review: Firstly an admission, I had no prior knowledge of Caravaggio or his paintings. My main area of interest is military history but after seeing the beautiful cover on this book I picked it up and browsed through the wonderful colour plates. I had to have the book to read and after ordering it from Amazon.com and sat and waited. It was worth the wait! I enjoyed the story of this most interesting man, yes its a bit short (200 odd pages) but to a person like me who had no prior knowledge or interest in this subject it filled a gap in my education. This was an interesting book to read and I just loved the colour plates of the artists work (16 colour pictures). The book has sparked an interest to learn more of this man, his times and his art. For that alone the book was worth it and the author has done his job. I would recommend this book for those who want to learn a little bit more about this man and his art.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing biography
Review: I decided to write a review of this book because I was mistakenly encouraged to acquire it from the above positive reviews. I found this volume entirely lacking. In terms of discussions of Caravaggio's paintings, you can find more erudite reading elsewhere, including from the hand of Sister Wendy (I'm not kidding!). Regarding the artist's life, in this account Caravaggio is but a pale specter lost in the obscurity of what little information Desmond Seward could accumulate. Where there was no information, the author was bereft of anything to say. This was also the case in describing the colorful world of the Italian baroque, a larger subject that should have resulted in better evocation.

What was particularly lamentable about this book was that Seward had taken upon himself to prove that Caravaggio was heterosexual. It is a leitmotif that hammers through the entire text with a persistent, numbing thud. Instead of taking on over two decades worth of scholarly debate on the epistemology of the closet and why so many people think Caravaggio was gay, Seward only draws upon Derek Jarman's fantasy movie about Caravaggio. When analyzing the preponderance of anecdotal evidence that Caravaggio was probably gay, or at least bisexual (which is in itself illuminating as there is already so little information about his life), Seward summarily dismisses the stories as mere hearsay. Because he gives so little information on Caravaggio's life, we are left with the paintings, which speak volumes. However, when the author is faced by the image of St. Francis in ecstasy while laying in the lap of a beautiful, male angel, or when examining the multitude of fair boy beauties, Seward declares that these images are a result of Caravaggio's bowing to his patrons' neo-Platonist tastes. Strangely, Seward later discusses Caravaggio's naturalistic realism, which is the complete antithesis of neo-Platonism. Seward tries to have it all ways and ends up looking like a fool. The last straw is when confronted with the handsome male youth holding a bowl of fruit, his shirt saucily pulled down revealing a naked shoulder and sensual neck, Seward says only that the meaning of this image is unknowable. That may very well be so... for a short-sighted, heterosexual male.

Given the remarkably vibrant hero of the story, as well as the fascinating times, this book's greatest crime is it's cold, graceless prose. Seward has said that he was inspired by the Count of Monte Cristo in writing this biography, but Seward's book has none of the sweep, beauty, nor heart-pounding sense of life that you find in Dumas' work. The only redeeming virtue in Caravaggio: A Passionate Life is its brevity. If you want the Cliff Notes version of Caravaggio's life and times, this can be an adequate place to start, as long as you're prepared for the author's shortcomings. For more insightful writing on Caravaggio's life and works, I suggest you search elsewhere.

Rating:
Summary: A Brillant Concise Biography
Review: It is no secret among my friends that Michelangelo Merisi da Carvaggio is among my favorite painters. Because Caravaggio's paintings have a narrative quality, an almost universal appeal and real drama, they have long spoken to me. When the National Gallery of Ireland loaned its newly discovered Caravaggio - one of the best and notably, one that hasn't suffered at the hands of overzealous restorers of past centuries - to our own National Gallery of Art, I flew to Washington to see it. Even hanging in the gallery of Baroque masterpieces, it stood out as a sublime work of art. Like his paintings, Caravaggio's life was a study in contrasts. While he painted soaring religious masterpieces, he lived his life in the gutter, fighting, killing, gambling and whoring. So, enjoying his work as much as I do, it is with pleasure that I share a elegantly crafted, well-written little monograph titled "Caravaggio: A Passionate Life." The author, Desmond Seward, is not an art historian but a historian of the Middle Ages and because of the number of art historians with an agenda; this is almost certainly a good thing...instead of being filled with jargon or far fetched theories, he has provided readers with a consise, well-written monograph on a epoch creating artist!

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Summary: author explores inspiration for writing this biography.
Review: Like most people, I was first attracted to Caravaggio by his breath-taking pictures. Many have only been discovered during the last fifty years and almost certainly more await discovery, adding to his mystery. Then, as a Knight of Malta myself, I was intrigued by his becoming a Knight and living on Malta, even if he was expelled from the Order after half-murdering another Knight in a duel. The idea for the book's structure came partly from the film Amadeus, which compared Mozart's musical genius with his shabby private life: there was an alarmingly dramatic contrast between Caravaggio's wonderful paintings and his police record as a vicious brawler and killer. However, there are far more secrets about him than about Mozart, secrets that scholars are uncovering only now. Was he gay or did he love women? How many men did he kill, and how many in cold blood? Why did he paint so many severed heads, including his own? Was he murdered or did he die of disease? And where is he buried? I found the story so exciting that, while using the latest scholarship, I decided the best way to tell his story was in the form of a nineteenth century romantic novel, like Dumas's Count of Monte Cristo.

Rating:
Summary: Caravaggio is Caravaggio
Review: This may be the best of the new Caravaggio books. As a painter and a student of art history, I found this book by Seward to be absolutely absorbing. Seward not only gives insight about Caravaggio's life, but also delves into the events that may have inspired his paintings. Please read this exciting book!

Rating:
Summary: you'll love it.
Review: This may be the best of the new Caravaggio books. As a painter and a student of art history, I found this book by Seward to be absolutely absorbing. Seward not only gives insight about Caravaggio's life, but also delves into the events that may have inspired his paintings. Please read this exciting book!