The depiction of women in the illustrated works of Pierre Louys

by Paul Gervais

The illustrated novels of Pierre Louys are instructive in many ways. Primarily, of course, they reveal evolving artistic responses to the author’s prose and verse, thereby not just illustrating his personal vision but demonstrating- indirectly- what book purchasers were understood to want, and what publishers and their commissioned artists believed they could offer them, within the parameters of law and public decency. In other words, the nature of illustrations can be a record of changes in society- in attitudes to sexuality, gender and the status and rights of women.

Louys’ first books appeared in the last decade of the nineteenth century, notably Les Chansons de Bilitis in 1894 and Aphrodite in 1896. The earliest illustrated editions are distinctly reflective of their era, tacitly articulating contemporary attitudes towards the female gender and the position of women in society. Librairie Borel‘s 1899 edition of Aphrodite, illustrated by Antoine Calbet, is a case in point: his depictions of Chrysis reflect the Academic tradition of life studies, derived from the classical artistic tradition since the Renaissance, and the young Galilean courtesan is depicted very much in the style of Greek statues of Aphrodite and paintings of Venus by Botticelli, Tiziano Vecelli and others thereafter.

The title pages of the Calbet edition

Likewise, when Georges Rochegrosse provided plates for an edition of Ariadne in 1904, what he supplied was a very revealing reflection of the period’s conceptions of bacchantes- frenzied women. In the plate illustrated below, they are seen wreathed in ivy and flowers and leopard skin, about to tear apart the helpless Ariadne. Elsewhere in the same volume, Greek ladies were presented as sedate, respectable, elegant, graceful and beautiful- as in the illustration that accompanied the preamble to The House on the Nile by Paul Gervais, which is seen at the head of this post.

As I have described in other posts, numerous further illustrated editions of the various books written by Louys were to follow, both before and after his decease in 1925. A constant feature of these was women in greater or lesser states of undress, plates that faithfully responded to the text but also very consciously appealed to the primarily male collectors of fine art limited editions of books. Amongst these many examples, the most interesting are probably those designed by women. Those volumes worked on by Suzanne Ballivet, Mariette Lydis and Clara Tice are notable for the quality of their work and for the fact that the latter two were lesbian and brought their own sense of eroticism to their reactions to the texts. So, for example, in her plates for the 1934 edition of Les Chansons de Bilitis, Lydis’ vision of female lovers was far more intimate and subtly sensual than most of the works produced by male contemporaries- such as J A Bresval (see below). Other women who worked on the various titles by Louys included Renee Ringel (Aphrodite, 1944), Yna Majeska (Psyche, 1928), Guily Joffrin (Psyche, 1972) and editions of Bilitis illustrated by Jeanne Mammen, Genia Minache (1950), Carola Andries (1962) and Monique Rouver (1967). The frequency with which female illustrators were employed as the century passed is noticeable, although I hesitate to identify a distinctly feminine style.

Maritte Lydis, plate for Bilitis, 1934

Post-war, new editions of Louys introduced us to new conceptions of his female characters. J. A. Bresval illustrated an edition of Bilitis in 1957, his figures being very much inspired by contemporary film stars like Gina Lollobrigida and Brigitte Bardot. The women have a dark-haired fulsomeness typical of the period; the eroticism is rather cliched, such as the frontispiece to the book, which shows Bilitis with a lover: the latter kneels before her partner, embracing her waist and kissing her stomach; the standing woman cups her breasts in her hands and throws back her head in a highly stereotypical soft-porn rendering of female ecstasy.

However, by 1961 and Raymond Brenot’s watercolours for a new edition of Sanguines, we see a new aesthetic of the female body beginning to emerge: the bosoms may be just as fantastical, but there is a slenderness and, in some of the clothes, a sense of a more liberated and relaxed mood. Pierre-Laurent (Raymond) Brenot (1913-98) was a painter who was also very much in demand to design record sleeves, advertisements and fashion plates (for such couturiers as Dior, Balenciaga, Ricci and Lanvin). More tellingly, he is known as the ‘father of the French pin-up’- consider, for example, his advert for lingerie manufacturer Jessos- “Comme maman, je porte un Jessos” declares a young teen with pigtails, seated with her blouse unbuttoned to reveal her bra (“just like my mum’s”); I have discussed this style of marketing in another post. Brenot’s poster designs, for consumer goods, holiday destinations and films and theatres, regularly featured glamorous young women and, when this work declined during the later 1960s, he returned to painting, producing many young female nudes.

Brenot, Parrhasius in ‘The Wearer of Purple’ from Sanguines

What has to be observed, though, is that most of the nudity portrayed by Brenot was not justified by the actual stories in Sanguines. There are some naked slaves in The Wearer of Purple (see below), and Callisto in A New Sensation does share a bed with the narrator, but most of the rest of the stories are really quite respectable and sex-free (by the standards of Louys), being more concerned with psychology than sexuality. What we see, therefore, is evidence for the tendency to treat the works of Louys as a platform for erotic illustration. Frequently, this was a distinct element in the author’s stories, but it seems that he had acquired a reputation for sexiness which was then applied more liberally, presumably in the knowledge that the name would sell. The same criticism can, in truth, be made of Georges Rochegrosse’s depiction of the bacchae in the 1904 edition of Ariadne (see earlier): what he depicted might perhaps be implied in the text, but what Louys wrote doesn’t wholly warrant the nudity that we see:

“They wore fox skins tied over their left shoulders. Their hands waved tree branches and shook garlands of ivy. Their hair was so heavy with flowers that their necks bent backwards; the folds of their breasts streamed with sweat, the reflections on their thighs were setting suns, and their howls were speckled with drool.”

Ariadne, c.2

Brenot, Callisto in ‘A New Sensation’ from Sanguines

The men who feature in Brenot’s illustrations often seem hesitant, ill at ease or, even, embarrassed at being discovered with the women in their company- his take on the ‘satyrs’ with nymph in a scene from ‘The Wearer of Purple’ is a case in point. In Louys’ story, this is an incident involving a slave girl being assaulted by two other servants so as to create a titillating composition for the the artist Parrhasius to paint. As we can see in the reproduction below, the satyrs appear afraid of the young woman, having lost all their accustomed priapism, whilst she strikes me as indifferent to their presence and in fully control of the situation. Given Brenot’s later output, it’s almost certainly overstating things to say that these plates reflect shifts in social attitudes.

Brenot, two satyrs & a nymph in ‘The Wearer of Purple’ in Sanguines

Coming right up to date, the 1999 edition of Aphrodite demonstrates how visions of women may have developed and advanced (or not). The book was issued in three volumes, the first two being illustrated by two male comic book artists, Milo Manara and Georges Bess respectively. Both have distinctly erotic styles and the results strike me as being, in essence, highly accomplished and artistic reproductions of glamour photography and lesbian porn; for example, George Bess’ picture of the reclining woman, which faces the start of Book 2, chapter 1 of the story, seems to me to be drawn in a style very much influenced by Mucha or Georges du Feure: the streaming hair and the encroaching, twisting foliage all have the hallmarks of Art Nouveau (which is of course highly appropriate given the publication date of the original book). In the modern version, Chrysis is regularly depicted in intimate scenes alone, with her maid Djala or with the two girls Rhodis and Myrtocleia. With their tousled hair, pouting lips and pneumatic breasts, these women are very much the late twentieth century ideal. Most of the time, they are presented as being more interested in each other than in any of the male characters in the story, but my response is that there are really rather high-quality examples of fairly standard pornographic obsessions. When we look at them, it’s worth recalling Pierre Louys’ own description of his heroine, when he wrote to the painter Albert Besnard asking to paint her:

“Chrysis, as womanly as possible- tall, not skinny, a very ‘beautiful girl.’ Nothing vague or elusive in the forms. All parts of her body have their own expression, apart from their participation in the beauty of the whole. Hair golden brown, almost Venetian; very lively and eventful, not at all like a river. Of primary importance in the type of Chrysis, the mouth having all the appetites, thick and moist- but interesting […] Painted lips, nipples and nails. Depilated armpits. Twenty years old; but twenty years in Africa.”

Aphrodite, chapter 1, Milo Manara, 1999

Bess, plate for Aphrodite, 1999, Book 2, c.1, ‘The Garden of the Goddess’

A fascinating contrast to the the first two volumes of the 1999 edition is to be found in the third, illustrated by Claire Wendling (born 1967). She is a French author of comic books and her response to the text is interesting because it is so much darker and less obviously ‘sexy’ than that of her male collaborators. The plates are, literally, dark in tone and, although they tend to focus on solo female nudes, rather than lascivious eroticism is there is a mood of mental and physical suffering entirely appropriate to the final section of the book, in which Chrysis is arrested, sentenced to death, executed and buried. Her cover image evokes- for me- thoughts of Gustav Klimt in its decoration, but the twisted, crouched posture of the woman doesn’t look seductive- rather she’s supplicatory or, possibly, predatory.

At the start of this post I proposed that the book illustrations published with successive editions of the works of Pierre Louys can be a record of changes in society- in attitudes to sexuality, gender and the status and rights of women. I think that this is true, but that the evidence does not necessarily reveal huge steps forward in those areas. Far more women are involved now in commercial art, and the works of Louys provide vehicles for the expression of lesbian desire on their own terms: albeit in the service of illustrating books written by a man in which his sympathetic views of same-sex attraction compete with heterosexual masculine eroticism. Art styles have evolved, but the attitudes expressed by what’s depicted have not necessarily developed at the same pace.

Richard Müller- German symbolist

Liebesbotschaft (Love Message), 1921

Richard Müller (1874-1954) is an artist whose work has already been mentioned. He was a German painter and graphic designer whose imagery is characterised by a strange combination of symbolism and surrealism. Given his nationality and the era through which he lived, there are also controversial aspects to his career.

Müller was a weaver’s son. His artistic talent and his skills in draughtsmanship became apparent at early an age and, in 1888, he applied to the painting school of the Royal Saxon Porcelain Factory in Meissen, encouraged by the porcelain painter Hans Theil; Müller was immediately accepted. In 1890, he moved to Dresden on his own and without financial support, in order to study at the city’s art academy. Again, he was accepted, even though he was below the required entry age. In 1893 he started his career as a painter in Dresden, staging his first exhibition only a year later. The next year, Müller met the symbolist painter Max Klinger , who taught him how to etch. In 1896 the young artist’s etching of ‘Adam and Eve’ won the Prix de Rome of the Prussian Academy of Arts, worth 6,000 gold marks.

Der dreiste Freier (The Bold Suitor), 1923

Müller undertook military service, apparently shortened to only a year through the intervention of influential friends in the art establishment, and was then able to visit Italy. Another exhibition prize in 1899 established him as a leading artist in Dresden and he became a professor at the academy; amongst the students he was to teach were George Grosz and Otto Dix. Müller abandoned etching after 1924 in favour of realistic, often erotic drawings and paintings. He was a prominent professor for thirty-five years at the Dresden Academy, where he steadfastly resisted the new artistic movements of expressionism and modernism.

Auf Freiersfüßen (On suitors’ feet), 1914

In 1933 Müller was appointed rector of the Dresden Art Academy, a recognition of his artistic and professional standing. However, only two years later he was dismissed by the Saxon Minister of Education, Wilhelm Hartnacke, who was at the time trying to demonstrate his Nazi credentials. Like Hartnacke, Müller had joined the NSDAP (Nazi Party) in 1933 and soon after was involved in the dismissal from the academy’s staff of his former pupil and colleague Otto Dix, an early target of the new regime. Dix’s art was regarded as ‘degenerate’ by the Nazis- his Venus in Black Gloves of 1932 may be the sort of challenging image that disturbed the regime. Even so, and despite his later actions, Müller was not actively involved in the Dresden exhibition so-called Degenerate Art in 1933 and, in fact, in March 1935 he was expelled from the Nazi party as well as losing his teaching position because of “subversive tendencies in his art.” What they might have been will soon become clear.

In hellster Begeisterung (With the Greatest Enthusiasm), 1915

In spite of these problems, Müller’s art continued to be highly regarded during the Nazi period. His work was included in the ‘Great German Art Exhibitions’ in Haus der Deutschen Kunst in Munich in 1937, ’38, ’39 and ’41. Amongst these was a drawing of Adolf Hitler’s birthplace (shown in 1937 and ’39) and, in 1938, Hitler himself bought two of Müller’s drawings from the exhibition. In August 1944, Hitler included Müller in a list of ‘God-Given’ (Gottbegnadeten) German painters that was compiled by Goebbels and which recognised the importance of these individuals and gave them protection from military service. These signs of approval and respect make it clear there is a major contradiction at the heart of Müller’s art: the fact that he could both appeal to the Nazis and yet seem suspect and potentially ‘degenerate.’ A glance at any online collection of his work indicates how this could be. He produced lots of pictures of the German countryside and townscapes, peopled with honest burgers and peasants, just the sort of healthy Aryan material the regime promoted- and then there was his weird stuff…

Rural Idyll, 1933

Like his mentor Klinger, Müller emphasised symbol and metaphor in his works, which are notable for their fantastic, sometimes macabre, imagery. At the same time, though, there’s evidence of an ironic sense of humour and playful lack of seriousness. Müller’s nudes are courted by grotesque animals and birds, while a bear-artist performs for a monkey public; the women often wear masks or are seen in some kind of bondage. The Aryan Aphrodite of Rural Idyll above is just the sort of Bäuerliche Venus (Peasant Venus) that Goebbels lauded; then there’s the equally buxom dancer (in the same red headscarf) seen below, inexplicably prancing with a bear. More ambiguous still are those pictures which combine elements of normal rural life with nudes to produce ambiguous and disturbing results. The figure below evokes the myths of Europa or Pasiphaë and evidently represented a significant symbol for Müller, as it is one of several such pictures.

Die Stärkere, Nackte auf dem Rücken eines Stiers (The Stronger- A naked woman on the back of a bull)

Muller’s mysterious imagery could be unsettling and irreverent. It suggests a complex philosophy or mythology lying behind it which we can only partially grasp; it hints at an odd sexuality, with suggestions of bestiality, about which we must conjecture. It seems a surprise to me that he didn’t get into more trouble.

Tänzerin mit Tamburin und Bär (Dancer with a Tambourine & Bear)

A Return of Aphrodite- on the Venusberg

In his short story, An Ascent of the Venusberg, written in 1903, the author Pierre Louys explored the possibility of encountering the goddess of love in the contemporary world.

The Venusberg, as I have previously described, is a mountain in Germany near Eisenach in Thuringia, now called the Hörselberg. The peak is the focus of folklore and myth, being immortalised in the story of Tannhäuser by Wagner, Aubrey Beardsley, William Morris, Swinburne and- even- Aleister Crowley. 

In Louys’ version of the story, a Frenchman is visiting Eisenach after attending performances of Wagner at Bayreuth. From his hotel room, he can see the Venusberg, which- due to his “sinful disposition”- looks to him “exactly like the swelling breast of a woman… It quivered; positively seemed to be alive at certain hours of the evening… [giving the impression] that Thuringia, like a goddess reclining… was letting the blood rise, in her passion, to the summit of her bare breast.”

He decides to climb the mountain one day. There is a small hostelry at the summit, where he has a meal; one of the two sisters running the place has an “obliging disposition” and makes it clear that sex is available too on top of the peak. The tourist settles instead for directions to the Venushöhle, the Grotto of Venus. It is only a short walk away, but she warns him of the madman to be found there.

The grotto of the goddess looks exactly as one might anticipate: “it was small, in the form of a vertical ellipse crowned with slender brown brambles.” The madman is also present, warning the visitor not to enter because “Venus dwells there herself in the flesh with her millions of nymphs about her.” This scarcely discourages the Frenchman, so the madman begins to rant. It seems he was once a godly and pure young man; even though he married, he renounced the temptations of the world and he and his wife lived together in a “state of grace” (or so they thought). He has learned, though, that this attempt at austere self-denial was utterly wrongheaded: it was “a lie, each day, to the law of life.” Now it is too late- he is old and still a virgin: “Woe to all virgins! For the love they have rejected all their short lives will justly torture them in the infinity of the wrath to come!”

The man sits on the mountain peak daily to commune with Aphrodite, because every evening “the Goddess sings a sweet song… she calls to me from afar, she draws me to her.” Eventually, he will perish by falling down into the Venushöhle and thence into the furnace in which the chaste are punished.

The pair wait and then “a breath of perfumes bore to our ears the languishing echo of a Voice…”- and the story ends abruptly. We can only assume that, as this is told as a reminiscence, this “sinful” young man met with no punishment from the goddess.

There are many aspects of this little account typical of Louys. He treats the ancient pagan deities as still alive and actively present in the modern world. Secondly, sex and sexuality are to the fore- though for very obvious reasons, given the subject matter. Thirdly, the author took pleasure (as he often did) in inverting and reversing the tenets of Christianity. The Venusberg is the gateway to hell, but punishment here is for the “niggards of the flesh” those who have lived “solitary lives in revolt against the great divine law.” Hell is a place full of “thousands of millions of naked women dancing,” placed there to torment those who denied themselves the pleasures of their bodies during their lives. In the philosophy of Venus (and Louys) carnal delight is good and virtuous and abstinence is unnatural. The writer had said the same six years previously in Aphrodite, when he described how “virginity displeases [the goddess].” Here he expanded on the idea, stating more clearly the principle that underlay so much of his work.

See my Louys bibliography and details of my various publications on the poet, as well as details of my book on the goddess herself.

The power of the image

Sandro Botticelli, La nascita di Venere

In a number of recent posts I’ve argued for the impact of book illustrations in shaping our reactions to and impressions and memories of literary works. I suggest that this influence derives in part from the experience of reading a book in conjunction with the illustrations provided with it, as the mental pictures evoked by the words are moulded and directed by the accompanying plates. Separately, though, images on their own have a power to create abiding impressions, a process which we often take for granted.

Various great paintings have become iconic because of the memorable quality of the scene or figure represented and because, over time, that image has come to be the sole way in which we are able to conceive of the subject. Repetition naturally entrenches this, making it ‘natural’ or ‘inevitable’ to imagine the subject in this manner or form. Botticelli’s Birth of Venus has embedded a particular perception of that goddess; the same could very well be said for our mental images of Jesus and Mary, which owe a great deal to the constant repetition of a particular look by Renaissance painters such as Fra Angelico, Raphael and Perugino.

What about literary characters? Once again, the book illustrator is proved to wield considerable power and influence. Is it possible to imagine Lewis Carroll‘s Alice without John Tenniel? He fixed the clothes and the hair for evermore. The same might be said of E H Shepard’s Piglet. The Walt Disney cartoon versions of these characters may be what most people now initially imagine, but they were drawn from the originals.

It might be significant that my last two examples came from children’s literature; the young reader is likely to be especially impressionable and well composed images could well have a greater chance of being absorbed. Confirmation of this appears to come from the Flower Fairy series of books by the English artist Cicely Mary Barker. Recent research has demonstrated how adults raised on these books are now inclined to believe that this species of fairies actually exists. As a result of this, individuals they shape their expectations of what a fairy would look like, if seen, to the ‘canonical’ form of Barker’s paintings. Never mind that the fairies were modelled by little girls attending Barker’s sister’s nursery in their garden in Croydon, dressed up in outfits they’d made themselves: her fairies are now, for many, what real fairies look like.

Images absorbed at an early age are highly influential but, even for adults, seeing can very often be more powerful than reading and imagining alone. The role of Disney films in shaping perceptions has already been mentioned: I’d suggest that Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings series has now indelibly affected the way that generations will conceive of Legolas (and elves generally), hobbits, orcs and so on; equally, can Jane Austen’s Mr Darcy ever now be separated from Colin Firth in a wet shirt? Perhaps during the last fifty to seventy years the cinematic image has displaced the artistic in determining how we feel about and remember dialogue and narrative, but that does not detract from my fundamental argument- that image and word combined reinforce each other. Hence my interest in the illustrated editions of the works of Pierre Louys in particular, and a broader interest in the partnership and interplay between art and literature as found in fine art, limited editions of books.

Dionysos & Aphrodite- some modern literary recreations

Louis Icart, Chansons de Bilitis, 1949

I have written a great deal recently about the French author Pierre Louys. I first encountered his work when I was researching my two books on the Greek classical deities, Aphrodite and Dionysos (respectively, Aphrodite- Goddess of Modern Love and Dance, Love & Ecstasy– The Modern Cult of Dionysos/ Bacchus– published by Green Magic Publishing in 2021 and 2022).

As their titles suggest, these two books are just as concerned with our reactions to and understanding of Aphrodite and Dionysos today as they are to outline their cults in classical times. I demonstrate how the two deities have pervaded our culture- through literature, art, music, theatre and our world view- since the late nineteenth century. The writing of Pierre Louys, I argue, made no small contribution to this, as- although he set about recreating the worship of these gods in a partially imaginary ancient world- he was speaking to contemporary problems and preoccupations. Having encountered what are probably the two most significant and famous books by Louys, I proceeded then to read the rest of his output. He wrote other recreations of ancient mythology, but he also transferred his attention to the modern world in which he lived, creating utopias and other fictional settings in which to put his ideas into practice. 

In Les Chansons de Bilitis (Songs of Bilitis, 1894), Louys sought to articulate the worship of Aphrodite/ Astarte/ Venus and of Dionysos as living faiths which formed the backdrop for everyday lives and everyday ways of approaching the world. By this means, he was able to express his own views on morality and lifestyles in an oblique manner from behind a façade of fiction and past societies. In the world of Bilitis, Pan and the nymphs are alive and present in her home in Pamphylia and she contacts Aphrodite directly and physically in the branches of trees (songs 1 & 24). When Bilitis moves to Mytilene, she meets her first love, a girl called Mnasidika, who wears on a necklace a little statuette of Astarte, the goddess who acts as her guardian and is “the Most Amorous One.” 

Later, on Cyprus, the island home of the goddess, Bilitis dedicates herself more fully to her cult. Astarte/ Aphrodite is dual in many ways (virgin and mother, fire and foam of the seas); she is the one who unites “the multiple species of savage beasts and the sexes in the forest.” Bilitis becomes a maenad, ecstatically praising Dionysos through orgies in which “they offered you again the love you cast within them.” This line, with the verb ‘jeter‘ (to throw or fling), suggests to me a measure of randomness and variability in the results of the god’s actions. Some translators prefer the verb ‘pour,’ which indicates something more specific; ‘cast’ instead admits differences between individuals- or, in other words, varying preferences. Some of the maenads may prefer men, others women, some, both; Dionysos himself is portrayed as bisexual in the Greek sources and I think it’s clear from all of his work- especially his earliest books- that Louys celebrated the relaxed pansexuality of the ancient world (as he perceived it, anyway). In Bilitis’ account of the bacchic celebration, the moon is rising; it is the white body of Aphrodite whose light trembles on the sea “a thousand tiny lips of light- the pure sex or the smile of Kypris Philommeides.” Hesiod named Aphrodite Philommeides (genital-loving) because she is said to have sprung from the severed member of Uranus. Louys plays on this ambiguity of meaning in his choice of words- “mille petites lèvres de lumière.;” obviously, both could be appropriate to a goddess of love. When the moon sets, the priestesses of Astarte make love together- a secret female rite dedicated to the Mother of the World, the untiring and irresistible lover (songs 92-97). To the Venus/ Aphrodite of Louys’ books, all love is acceptable: in song 102, ‘The Torn Robe,’ a girl is cross when a man steps on and rips her dress at the back: “my yellow dress is all torn and if I walk the streets like this they’ll take me for a poor girl who serves inverted Venus”- this is the Venus Aversa, whom I have described previously; the speaker is concerned that walking round with her bottom exposed may give the wrong idea to some.

Louys returned to these themes in his next novel, Aphrodite (1896), which is set in and around the temple of the goddess in Ptolemaic Alexandria. The shrine is surrounded by the booths of courtesans whose work is devoted to the goddess; if they give birth to girl children, the infants are immediately married symbolically to Dionysos “for virginity displeases Aphrodite.” They are then dedicated to training in the temple’s famous school to learn “all the erotic arts.” This education continues until such time as they feel they are ready to serve the goddess themselves- “because desire is an order of the goddess who must not be thwarted” (here I understand an implication that both the timing and the manner of honouring the goddess of love are indicated). In Alexandria too, the goddess is worshipped by priestesses in orgiastic rites, but she also receives more humble and ordinary offerings and prayers from the faithful. These gifts may be flowers and clothing, but they can be acts of love and even the bodies of the faithful, whilst the prayers may reflect the worshippers’ own concerns- as when the two flute players Rhodis and Myrtocleia ask Aphrodite to accept offerings “from our joined hands if it be true that the gentle Adonis alone does not satisfy you and that an embrace still gentler delays, at times, your slumber” (Aphrodite, Book 2, chapters 1 & 6).

Lastly, in his poetry collection Stanzas, Louys composed a song in praise of Aphrodite:

“O goddess in our arms so tender and so small,
Goddess with a heart of flesh, even weaker than us,
Aphrodite by whom all Eve is Aphrodite
And is adored by a man at her knees,

You alone survive after the twilight
of great Olympians submerged by the night.
A whole world collapsed on the tomb of Hercules;
O Beauty! you come back from the past that is running away.

As you were born in the Hellenic light,
You raise the sea, you redden the rosehip;
The whirling universe is intoxicated by your breath
And the breast of a child takes you in whole.

As you were born from the senses of Praxiteles,
Every lover is divine, and I doubt, in his eyes,
Whether Heaven makes you a woman or makes her immortal,
Whether you descend to man or be reborn for the Gods.”

He sees the goddess enduring, simply because love, desire and motherhood are constants of human existence.

Through his sympathetic treatments, especially in Bilitis, Louys helped to establish a modern lesbian identity. As an author, meanwhile, whilst no longer pursuing the pseudo-classical theme so assiduously, Louys continued to work out the same kinds of issues in fictional contemporary settings. The same ideas remained central to his later prose and poetry: he continued (by demonstration rather than by dogmatic declaration) to assert the diversity and equality of love and passion. Removed from imaginary ancient societies, the later stories no longer justified reference to the pagan deities and, shorn of the context of their presence, we may seem to be confronted with unrestrained indulgence of the obsessions and fantasies of Pierre Louys. However, the absence of mention of the old divinities does not mean that Louys had forgotten the world view he had formulated around them. His thesis still seemed to be that the ancient gods and peoples did not discriminate (in both senses of the word) and that modern societies might do well to learn this again from them.

Georges Barbier, from Chansons de Bilitis, 1922

Translation, Interpretation & Illustration- Ways of Seeing Art & Literature

Maurice Julhès’ illustration of the song ‘Uncertainty’ from Chansons de Bilitis Part II

Here, I’m going to test out an argument that the illustration of works of literature may be regarded as a form of translation- from one medium of communication to another. I’d like to propose that, whether the passage is from one language to another, or from the word on the page to the line, the same considerations and difficulties can apply.

Translation is by no means the neutral process that we might suppose it to be. We can all achieve instant AI translations now, at the click of the mouse, but we would be mistaken in accepting these too readily. This may change as AI becomes more intelligent, but- at present- it reflects the choices made by the individuals who created the tools- the very same process of selection made by human translators working directly from a text- but perhaps neither so intelligently or expertly in the case of AI. 

I have written a lot about the work of the Belgian born and French speaking novelist and poet Pierre Louys (1870-1925) and (as I mention on another page) I have had cause in my research to translate several works by him that are currently not available in convenient English editions. Now, I’ll admit, I generally run these through an online translation tool to begin with; it’s quick and it almost instantly gives you a basic text to work with. But what you get always needs tidying up. As we know, words can have several meanings and it is not unusual for online translators to choose the commonest- or perhaps the standard- definition, something that can reduce a sentence to nonsense. To restore what I consider to be the correct sense, of course, I’ve got to make another subjective selection. Slang is often poorly handled by translation tools- especially if it’s from a century ago. Then there are fundamental linguistic differences that have to be resolved: French, for example, often uses the present tense to discuss past events, something which sounds odd in English. Grammar and style have to be sorted out to make a passage easily readable and, all the time, there is an almost unconscious input from the person doing the transcription- preferred ways of saying things; words you’d rather not use (at all or in certain contexts)- a whole constellation of taste and prejudice which can get involved. Then, of course, there’s the question of verse. Do you aim to preserve the meaning, and produce blank verse, or do you try to reproduce something of the metre and rhyme pattern too, which can force you into quite major divergences from the literal sense of the text? This is especially an issue with Pierre Louys, who took a delight in matching the verse forms of classical literature with very rude content. Part of the parody is the contradiction between the sonnet form and the smut. Which do you choose?

In short, a translated work can only be the author’s words filtered through a third party’s well-intentioned, principled and carefully considered prejudices and selections. Perhaps, then, this is an argument for saying that illustrations are a more neutral form of translation, as the illustrator only has to represent what he or she has read. However, as I’ve pointed out several times before, selection and taste always intervene. The artist has to decide: which character(s) or which moment to depict; the manner of that depiction; the general artistic style employed (to choose extremes- a ‘photo-real’ illustration, or something very free and impressionistic?) Once again, all sorts of issues of taste and choice intervene- probably further shaped by a publisher’s editorial policies, house style, target market and so on. Illustration is no less neutral than verbal translation.

So, I turn again to various translations of Pierre Louys’ Chansons de Bilitis, and to wonder whether the 1945 edition illustrated by Maurice Julhès (1896-1986) was one of the most effective combinations of words and image in the long history of publication of this work.

Julhès was born in Sannois, in the Oise valley, and trained in the decorative arts before becoming an illustrator for humorous newspapers after 1918. During World War II, Julhès worked for several magazines that were under German supervision and, as a result, after the Liberation, he was suspended from his work for two years. However, in 1947 he returned to illustrating comic strips and children’s books. Despite his primarily satirical and mocking output, he was commissioned to illustrate adult works such as the Poésies of Sappho or the Fleurs du Mal by Baudelaire- as well as his work on Bilitis. Coming to the work as a cartoonist on this text, Julhès took care to reflect the Greek setting and brought his skills in capturing vivid and concise imagery, as well as the ability to weave the text around the pictures in a dynamic way. 

Julhès: pages from Parts II & III of Les Chansons de Bilitis

In 1999, I might add, a graphic novel version of Aphrodite by Pierre Louys also appeared. The three parts of the book were published as separate volumes with different illustrators; Milo Manara illustrated Book 1, Georges Bess worked on Part 2 and Claire Wendling on Part 3. The books feature lavish full-page colour plates. Other contemporary graphic novel style approaches to the novels of Louys have been mentioned before: Georges Pichard‘s work on the novella Trois filles de leur mere in 1980 and Kris de Roover‘s illustration of the unfinished L’Histoire du Roi Gonzalve in 1990. All these editions (as well as the older ones) will be found to be readily available through Abe Books and Amazon.

My last examples purport to be translations but are actually pornographic pirates of Les Chansons. In 1930 Les Veritables Chansons de Bilitis appeared, a work (probably) of Pascal Pia (1903-79). Born Pierre Durand, he was a French writer, journalist, illustrator and scholar; he used a number of pseudonyms, including Pascal Rose, Pascal Fely and others. In 1922 Pia published the erotic work Les Princesses de Cythère (Cythera being the island of Aphrodite) and followed this up in 1928 with La Muse en rut (The Muse in Heat), a collection of erotic poems. His ‘pastiche’ of Bilitis fits within this genre of writing and perhaps reflects his sense of humour (often expressed in absurdist tendencies). 

Two illustrated versions of Les Veritables Chansons followed, the first with plates by Lucien Metivet (1863-1932) a poster artist, cartoonist, illustrator and author. The text purports to be a new translation of a Justinian manuscript. If this refers to the Roman emperor Justinian (482-565 CE) we are looking at a time period some 900 years after the purported dates of the ‘original’ Bilitis in the book by Louys. The new version is in prose, not verse, and takes various incidents from the original by Louys and expands upon them in detail, going far beyond what the Songs either say or imagine. Hence we have, for instance, a detailed description of Bilitis and Glottis having sex together and a later episode in which Bilitis and Mnasidika decide to enter into a menage a trois with an innocent girl called Galatee. My guess is that this name was borrowed from a character Louys’ Aventures du Roi Pausole, which Metivet coincidentally had also illustrated in 1906. Metivet’s illustrations are in his trade mark red and black ink and reflect the explicit contents of the new version of the story.

The Metivet version

A further edition of the Veritables Chansons appeared in 1946, illustrated by Jean Jouy. This was a further pirating of the original, in the sense that the prose passages from the 1937 version were rendered into verse and matched with large colour plates. The book has moved a long way from what Louys wrote, as there is a large heterosexual element, as well as mixed orgies, both in the text and the images. Jouy’s plates are very attractive, but highly explicit. There is also an undated edition entitled Les Chansons Secrets de Bilitis with illustrations by an unknown artist which are very similar in form and content to Jouy’s.

These last two examples are not ‘translations’ as such, but they illustrate how editors and writers adapting the texts of others can depart from the originals they’re working to create almost wholly new books. To return to my thesis at the start, I think it’s not uncommon for readers to take illustrations in books rather for granted but, when done well and thoughtfully, they can be as much part of the visual and intellectual experience as the text itself.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau: glossy nymphs and peasant girls

Nymphs & Satyr (1873)

William-Adolphe Bouguereau (1825-1905) was a French academic painter. In his realistic-looking paintings, he often used mythological themes, giving modern interpretations to classical subjects, with an notable emphasis on the female human body. As one of the principal Salon painters of his generation, he was reviled by the Impressionist avant-garde so that, by the early twentieth century, Bouguereau and his art had fallen out of favour with the public, although he has been rediscovered since the 1980s.

The Birth of Venus (1879)

Bouguereau was born in La Rochelle to a family of wine and olive oil merchants. In 1839, he was sent to study for the priesthood at a Catholic college in Pons, where he learned to draw and paint from Louis Sage, who had studied under Ingres. Bouguereau then reluctantly left his studies to return to live with his family in Bordeaux, where he met a local artist, Charles Marionneau, and commenced formal training at the Municipal School of Drawing and Painting in November 1841. He was the best pupil in his class and decided to become an artist in Paris. To fund the move, he sold portraits, finishing 33 in three months- early evidence of his formidable commitment and work rate.

Before the Bath (1900)

Bouguereau became a student at the École des Beaux-Arts in 1846. To supplement his formal training in drawing, he attended anatomical dissections and studied historical costumes and archaeology. He was admitted to the studio of François-Édouard Picot, where he studied painting in the academic style, an approach that placed the highest status on historical and mythological subjects. Absorbing these attitudes, Bouguereau determined to win the Prix de Rome, which would gain him a three-year residence in Rome, where, in addition taking formal lessons, he could study Renaissance art at first hand, as well as Greek, Etruscan, and Roman antiquities.

Sewing (1898)

After three attempts, the young student won the Prix in 1850 and was able to move to Rome in January the following year. Over the next three years, Bouguereau explored the city and country, making sketches and watercolours as he went. He also studied classical literature, which influenced his subject choices for the rest of his career. He particularly revered Greek sculpture, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo and Titian. He also admired Rubens and Delacroix. An early reviewer observed how the artist had absorbed the lessons of the Italian masters: “Bouguereau has a natural instinct and knowledge of contour. The rhythms of the human body preoccupy him, and in recalling the happy results which, in this genre, the ancients and the artists of the sixteenth century arrived at, one can only congratulate [him] in attempting to follow in their footsteps … Raphael was inspired by the ancients … and no one accused him of not being original.” Raphael was a favourite of Bouguereau and he took this review as a high compliment. One of the requirements of the Prix de Rome was to complete a copy of Raphael’s The Triumph of Galatea. In many of his own works, he was to follow the same classical approach to composition, form, and subject matter whilst most of his religious paintings, crucifixions and Madonnas, are high sheen imitations of Renaissance originals.

The Little Marauder (1900)

Bouguereau’s career flourished after his trip to Rome. He received contracts to paint murals and other decorations in expensive homes, was commissioned to paint Emperor Napoleon III in 1856 and undertook decorations for the chapel of the newly constructed Saint-Clotilde in Paris. He was awarded the Legion of Honour in July 1859- the first of several honours. After this recognition, Bouguereau continued to receive prestigious commissions for portraits, decorations to private homes, public buildings, churches and from European royalty and his work was held in high regard (twelve of his paintings featured in the Paris Universal Exhibition of 1878 for example).

The Broken Pitcher (1891)

Bouguereau was a staunch traditionalist in both technique, style and content. His genre paintings and mythological themes were modern interpretations of Classical subjects, both pagan and Christian, with a focus on nude females. The idealised world of his paintings brought to life goddesses, nymphs, bathers, shepherdesses, and Madonnas in a way that appealed to wealthy art patrons of the era. He also used some of the religious and erotic symbolism of the ‘old masters,’ such as Greuze‘s symbol of the “broken pitcher” connoting lost innocence (see above).

Au bord de la mere

I first came across Bouguereau through his extravagant paintings of cupids, nymphs and satyrs, fantasies that are full of swarms of luscious flesh, but I then discovered that he also worked on more personal paintings, with realistic and rustic themes. There is a huge contrast between the vast, classical canvases with their writhing naked nymphs, and his more intimate studies of peasant girls working or at play in the countryside. These are clearly firmly positioned within the ‘Romantic’ child genre of image, symbolising the prevailing idea of childhood innocence to such an extent that the realist elements in the pictures- the need for children from poor families to labour alongside their parents- are very much diluted or glossed over (on the formulation and meanings of the ‘Romantic’ view of childhood, see Anne Higonnet, Pictures of Innocence, 1998). The result of Bouguereau’s approach was that representations of leisure time (especially swimming) superseded the harsh realities of essential economic activity. The same activities are repeated endlessly, too: sewing, fetching water, even -in La tricoteuse (The Knitter) of 1884, working with thread at the same time as being by a well…

Girl by Stream (1888)

Bouguereau’s country maids can look winsome whatever they’re doing: whether that’s stealing fruit from neighbours’ orchards or looking guilty having been caught in the act (see The Marauder earlier, Petites Maraudeuses, The Mischievous One or En penitence). Their poverty is always picturesque, so that girls eating frugal meals in the fields, comprising just a hunk of bread, can be viewed affectionately. Bouguereau manages to render everything sweet and sentimental. His beggars (La Mendicante or Loin de pays ‘Far from Home’) aren’t in rags or dirty, for instance. The same is true of his gypsy girls, such as Gypsy Girl with a Basque Drum (i.e. a tambourine) of 1867, Gypsy Girls (1879) or The Bohemian (1890) who introduce an exotic, orientalist element to his catalogue of young females. These figures are barefoot and/ or carry musical instruments; their way of earning a living is precarious but they are again picturesquely poor.

Charming as Bouguereau’s country girls are, it has to be recognised that they all start to look the same. This may be because he made use of just a handful of models and because of the rapidity with which he turned out canvases, but there is also an impression of a clear, preferred ‘type’ comparable to John Waterhouse’s ‘ideal’ girl that you see time and again in his paintings- and even replicated side by side in the picture Hylas and the Nymphs. The work (such as it is) that these girls do is often contrived simply to make them look better. Gathering in harvest sheaves, gleaning, collecting berries, nuts or grapes, churning milk, picking flowers- these all locate the subjects in a natural setting and suggest purity, simplicity and freshness on the part of the model. This is frequently reinforced by their white blouses and dresses, which are always clean, despite their outdoor, labouring lifestyles. This highlights the true nature of Bouguereau’s naturalism and realism: it is frequently quite artificial- as demonstrated by the frequency with which there is a large cube of stone perfectly positioned for his subject to sit or lean upon…

La Gue (The Ford)

Bouguereau also perpetuated the ‘girl on a rock by water’ trope that Thomas Couture seems to have invented. In his hands, the Edenic elements are very clear, although he varies between reflective self-absorption and his preferred pose for most of his models- a direct awareness of our gaze as viewers. This can have the effect of making the observer feel like an intruder upon a private moment (understandably- the subject wished to bathe alone and we have trespassed upon her solitude). Then again, the artist partook of a common trend in art of the period, in that he sometimes made the young country women pictured a little too aware of the viewer. Overall, though, his figures are very saccharine and feel as if they may have been contrived to appeal to as broad an audience as possible.

La priere (The Prayer)

La Frillleuse (The Chilly Girl)

Enfant tenant des fleurs
Child Holding Flowers

From the mid-1870s, Bouguereau taught at the Académie Julian. Many of his pupils followed his academic style, but others went on to reject it- for instance Henri Matisse. We shall discuss other artists who faithfully perpetuated the look and themes of Bouguereau’s work in later posts. This made sense, certainly, for during his lifetime, he was considered to be one of the greatest painters in the world by the academic art community (and the buying public)- yet he was simultaneously loathed and condemned by the avant-garde, who viewed him as a competent technician who was hopelessly stuck in the past in terms of both style and content. Degas invented the term “Bouguereauté” to describe the “slick and artificial surfaces” that characterised his work. It is undeniably glossy and highly finished and even at the time some critics attacked his “feeble mawkishness” as being representative of the terminal decline of the old style of painting. convention.” Bouguereau himself that his work was driven by the demands of the marketplace: “What do you expect? You have to follow public taste, and the public only buys what it likes.”

Historians are divided as to whether Bouguereau simply pandered to the market with his genre paintings, or whether it was his aim to elevate the status of the French peasantry because of his admiration for their nobility and humility. The art historian John House has described Bouguereau’s genre scenes as “broadly idealist… treating his peasant women as if they were Raphael Madonnas.” As I mentioned before, there is rarely any suggestion of tiredness, want or ill-health. Generally his approach to the Naturalist style was highly commercial and there is no suggestion from the pictures that Bouguereau had strong moral or sociological opinions about the position of the rural poor.

For more information on Victorian era art, see details of my book Cherry Ripe on my publications page.

At the Foot of the Cliffs (1886)

Bouguereau was a dedicated painter, often completing twenty or more easel paintings in a single year. He claimed his time was worth one hundred francs a minute- and churned out the genre scenes at a rate that proved this. Even during the last years of his life, he would rise at dawn to paint six days a week and would continue in his studio until nightfall. Throughout the course of his lifetime, he is known to have painted at least 822 paintings, although many have been lost. This very productivity possibly didn’t assist the artist’s reputation, either during his life or after his death in 1905. It suggested mass-produced and uninspired works and with the rise of modernism he fell quickly out of fashion, although his work has been reappraised in more recent decades.

Girl with Bouquet (1896)

Dangerous Liaisons- Mortals and Gods

William Blake Richmond, Aphrodite & Anchises

I have written numerous times about the gods and their lovers, but in this posting I want to focus on the perils for mortals of getting mixed up with divine partners. My starting text will be that ever-quotable scholarly work, the film Notting Hill (1999). Towards the end discussing the return of ‘The American’ to London, this exchange takes place:

“Max: Let’s face facts, this was always a no-win situation. Anna’s a goddess: you know what happens to mortals who get involved with gods.
William: Buggered, is it?
Max: Every time.”

Facts are, indeed, facts, and the record of human-deity romances is a sobering one. Aphrodite had several mortal lovers, including Anchises and Adonis. Neither were consensual partners- the goddess simply took them because she wanted to and she could. Their ends are almost always tragic too: the red rose is the flower most emblematic of the goddess because, according to one story, roses sprang from the blood of Aphrodite’s lover, Adonis, when he was gored by a boar and bled to death in the goddess’ arms. In other versions of the story, the boar was either sent by Ares, who was jealous that Aphrodite was spending so much time with Adonis, by Artemis, because she wanted revenge against Aphrodite for having killed her devoted follower Hippolytus, or by Apollo, to punish Aphrodite for blinding his son Erymanthus.

As for Anchises, Aphrodite pretended to be a Phrygian princess so as to be able to seduce him, only to later reveal herself and inform him that they would have a son named Aeneas. At the same time, though, the goddess warned Anchises that if he told anyone about her being the mother of his child, Zeus would strike him down with his thunderbolt. He failed to heed her warning and was duly struck down, either dying or being blinded.

The same applies to Dionysos/ Bacchus. One of his most famous partners is Ariadne, abandoned by Theseus on the island of Naxos after they slay the minotaur. In most accounts, Dionysos saves her and they have a happy marriage, although Ariadne dies young. However, the Belgian author Pierre Louys approached the relationship in a far darker manner. In his short story Ariadne, published during the 1890s and later included in his collection The Twilight of the Nymphs, he presented a unique interpretation of the interaction between the Minoan princess and the god.

Having been abandoned by Theseus on Naxos, Ariadne awakes to sound of bacchantes, satyrs and pans approaching. The maenads are described vividly: “Their hands waved branches of trees and shook garlands of ivy. Their hair was so laden with flowers that their necks bent backward; the folds of their breasts were rivulets of sweat, their thighs glowed like setting suns and their shrieks were spotted with flying foam.” They cry out to Iacchos- “Beautiful God! Mighty God! Living God! Leader of the Orgy!” imploring him to “Incite the multitude! Drive the rout and the rapid feet! We are yours! We are your swelling breath! We are your turbulent desires!”

As soon as the frenzied women see Ariadne, they tear her limb from limb and scatter her remains. Dionysos then appears, dismisses them, and resurrects their victim, intoning over her dismembered corpse “Arise! I am Awakening. I am Life. This is the road of Eternal Peace.”

Then, rather than marrying Ariadne, as the traditional story tells, this Dionysos makes her his queen, of a place “where you shall never again see the sun too glittering not the night too shadowy… you shall never again feel hunger nor thirst nor love nor fatigue…” He is the “Ruler of Shades, the Master of the Infernal Water” and she shall sit beside him on his throne presiding over a land where “the anguish of death is miraculously transfigured in the intoxication of resurrection,” where pain and trouble become ecstatic and where a great eternal peace reigns. Ariadne is overjoyed with this prospect- and then he annihilates her completely. Louys chose to explore the strand of the ancient myth that made Dionysos an equivalent of Hades/ Pluto and lord of the underworld; hence, his uniquely bleak and savage conception of the god is not without classical authority.

Dionysos in fact had multiple partners, mortal and divine, female and male. His affair with the Thracian boy Ampelos also ends in tragedy:

“It’s said that the beardless Ampelos, son of a nymph and a satyr, was loved by Bacchus on the Ismarian hills. Upon him the god bestowed a vine that trailed from an elm’s leafy boughs, and still the vine takes from the boy its name. While he rashly picked the ripe grapes upon a branch, he tumbled down from the tree and was killed. Bacchus bore the dead youth to the stars.”

In another version, Ampelos was killed while riding a bull maddened by the sting of a gadfly sent by Atë, the goddess of folly- the beast threw the boy and then gored him to death. Another doomed male lover is also recorded: according to several writers, Dionysos was guided during his journey to the underworld to rescue his mother Semele by a man called (variously) Hyplipnus, Prosymnus or Polymnus, who shamelessly requested, as his reward, to be Dionysos’ lover. Sadly, he died before he got his reward and the relationship was consummated.

The mention of Semele highlights another tragic divine-human love affair. Dionysos was conceived when Zeus had sex with the mortal woman Semele (whose name in fact means ‘Earth’ in Phrygian- hence Dionysos is again born of a union of sky and earth). In one version of this story, she asked to see her lover in his true, divine form. Zeus appeared to her as a bolt of lightning, which struck and killed the pregnant woman. Zeus was able to save his son, though, sowing the baby up in his own thigh until he could be born. This episode underlines what Max said to Will about the perils of divine partners. Either they will prove fatal for you- or other gods will be jealous or vindictive and take their revenge upon the vulnerable mortal.

Cultural Revolution II: the Church of Aphrodite

In a posting last year, titled Cultural Revolution I: the Albion Free State Manifesto, I published a transcribed copy of the manifesto released by Albion free State to coincide with the 1974 general election in the UK. Over the next few postings, I’m going to pursue the links between Albion Free State, the developing alternative culture and music during the 1970s. To begin with, though, I’ll say a little about the little known Church of Aphrodite Pandemos (the suffix means ‘of the people,’ she is a deity for all)

I’m going to be looking at the Windsor free festivals, which were held between 1972 and 1974, discussing their organisers, their ideals and political aims, and their outcomes. One of the groups involved in the first free festival was the Church of Aphrodite and, as I’ve written about the goddess numerous times in earlier posts, I decided to deal with this group separately from the discussion of the festivals themselves.

Aphrodite & Windsor

The Church of Aphrodite announced in a leaflet that the first Windsor free festival in August 1972 would be a revival of an ancient Greek tradition and that theatre, the Olympics and “wild sexual orgies” had all started as popular festivals.  The rest of the organisers were committed squatters who repeatedly said that the event was about boycotting rents; as was often the way with the Church of Aphrodite, it had its own agenda (albeit it not wholly out of step with the ideas of the other people involved).

The leaflet declared that, for the previous two thousand years, religion had been used by the authorities to enslave people, restricting their thinking, stifling their emotions and chaining their bodies.  Except for the few who benefitted from this situation, religion had become tyranny.  This had not always been so, though, and need not continue this way.  Greek religion had been an expression of our natural joy in living, and this is what the Church of Aphrodite wanted to revive.  It wanted to restore the grace, beauty and freedom of former times so that people could live their lives to the full.  Nothing was prohibited, as long as no-one else’s freedom was infringed; Greek religion was all about complete freedom.  There were no priests or priestesses in the Church of Aphrodite; all were free to express themselves through their minds and their bodily functions.  This libertarianism chimed easily with the anarchism of many of the others involved with the event.

In classical religion, all activities had been dedicated to the gods, with every aspect of human life being approved by a specific deity, and the Church simply wanted to resume this: wine would be drunk in honour of Dionysos, music played in honour of Apollo and couples would have sex in celebration of Aphrodite and Priapus.  “Everything we do is approved by a god or goddess since there is a deity for every aspect of human life… the smoking of cannabis pleases all the gods and they would be offended were it not performed to the full.”[1]

Accordingly, another expression of freedom that the Church of Aphrodite promoted was to be found in the whole idea of a free festival for the cannabis-smoking, sex-loving ‘freaks,’ which was exactly why the group was actively involved.  At its foundation the Church had planned a bacchic festival of Dionysos in the Lake District, but this idea came to nothing.  The Windsor event was plainly a good substitute.  The leaflet promised that the Church was going to participate fully in the People’s Festival, sharing “sacrificial cakes, [along with] sex-rites, athletic competitions and all those things pleasing to gods and men.”  They were closely involved in organising the event, but where did the group come from?

The London Church

The Hellenic Group, or the London Church of Aphrodite, was set up in London in 1971 by Polish immigrant Paul Pawlowski, a former Maoist in his forties. He had arrived in Britain in 1959 from Poland and, in 1966, was tried at the Old Bailey for making threats to murder a magistrate in a letter.  He refused to acknowledge the authority of the court or to speak throughout the trial, but was acquitted. Pawlowski later recalled that he had been converted to Greek polytheism having read the Iliad whilst in Brixton prison; he spent 3 months in gaol because he had obstructed a footpath at Marble Arch selling Maoist literature.[2] 

In the spring of 1970, a group of six people had met at Pawlowski’s home in Tooting to discuss reviving ancient Greek paganism, given the libertarian potential of such a group.  Subsequently, advertisements were placed in underground and alternative newspapers and magazines, such as Peace News, Socialist Leader, International Times and Roadrunner, and thousands of leaflets were distributed at demonstrations and meetings, such as the Acid Symposium in London in April 1971 (which had been organised by Bill Dwyer and Anarchy magazine with a view to creating a ‘Head Liberation Front’). Pawlowski conducted something of a stage invasion at the event and invited everyone to an orgy the following week (see later). 

By this time, Pawlowski’s one bedroom flat at 26, Elmbourne Road, SW17, had become official base of the London Church of Aphrodite and he started to refer to himself as Father Fuck.  This name was chosen in imitation of the Mother Fuck of the Psychedelic Venus Church- see next paragraph.[3]

The London Church was set up in close co-operation with the Psychedelic Venus Church, which the Rev. Jefferson F. Poland had founded in California in 1969 as “a pantheistic nature religion, humanist hedonism, a religious pursuit of bodily pleasure through sex and marijuana.”  It was one of half a dozen or so similar contemporary groups that treated cannabis as a sacrament.  The church’s deity was “the sex goddess Venus-Aphrodite… in her psychedelic aspect. We see her presiding over nude orgies of fucking and sucking and cannabis: truly venereal religion.” The church operated in the San Francisco area, offering new members two joints by post and holding frequent orgies that combined a cannabis eucharist with a nude party.  Bisexuality was encouraged at these events. For example, the church’s special ritual in honour of Kali and Shiva had everybody taking turns to lick warm honey off the genitals of a man and woman who laid nude and blindfolded on the altar. The church had quickly gained 700 members by 1971, but collapsed in 1973.

Just like the Psychedelic Venus Church, the London Church described itself as a “sex and pot” cult and dedicated its orgies to the goddess Aphrodite. She was a symbol of hedonistic pleasure and, in her psychedelic aspect, represented direct spiritual revelation.  The group’s motto was “Fucking, sucking and smoking is our religion.” Two thousand leaflets were distributed inviting the public to attend their first open meeting, a Holy Communion to be held on the evening of April 30^th, 1971, at the church (Pawlowski’s home).   The leaflet declared that this meeting’s purpose was to organise the incorporation of The Church of Aphrodite, which would use cannabis as its preferred sacrament (although other psychedelics and even wine might be employed).

Alerted by this publicity, the police almost inevitably raided the inaugural event.  Ten officers and a sniffer dog arrived at Elmbourne Road, just outnumbering the people who had responded to the leaflets.  The property was searched for three hours and Pawlowski was questioned about the source of the cannabis he’d mentioned. He admitted to authoring the flyer, but told the police that “mushrooms and plants were used in the religious ceremonies of the Hellenes [ancient Greeks] and we wouldn’t be true to our religion if we excluded them.”   Pawlowski suggested that the Church might apply to the Board of Trade for a licence to import one pound of cannabis monthly for use in its ceremonies, and reminded the officers that the church members’ religious freedom was protected under the United Nations charter on human rights.  As it was, the police’s dog found no trace of cannabis at the property, but the police seized evidence (all the files and correspondence related to the church, plus all the tapes for his reel-to-reel recorder) and threatened that they might return with an arrest warrant for Pawlowski on charges of “inciting people to consume cannabis.”[4]

Some Mary Whitehouses are led away…

Church Activities

The number attending the Church slowly grew to fifteen over the summer of 1971.   Pawlowski recorded that they would meet on a Saturday, smoking cannabis and talking and- occasionally, having an orgy, with “half a dozen au pair girls: Swiss, German and Finnish.”

On September 25^th 1971, as part of an activist coalition against Mary Whitehouse’s reactionary Christian Festival of Light movement, a rally was held in Hyde Park to coincide with a Festival of Light assembly.  Amongst members of the Gay Liberation Front and feminists, the Church of Aphrodite got involved, with Paul Pawlowski addressing the crowd.  The entire event was meant to be a good natured demo with a serious purpose. Hence, quite a few GLF members appeared in drag as Mary Whitehouse (you’ll see a few of these false Marys being arrested in the photo…). Pawlowski recalled day and its aftermath:

“We always have younger cannabis in the Church of Aphrodite at Elmbourne Road in Tooting… we keep it in the chalice on the altar. We… said that our church’s contribution in the Festival of Light will be a sacrificial cake baked in the shape of a phallus with half an ounce of cannabis as one of the ingredients, that we’ll take it to Hyde Park and share it with the people as the sacraments of the church.  Some six people took part in the baking of it and three of us took it to Hyde Park in the afternoon.  Then I got up on our sacrificial altar and a crowd of about a hundred heads gathered round me.

I told my listeners that the prick is the symbol of our Church because the prick with a lovely pair of balls is the symbol of life and the cross is the symbol of death. The heads were saying ‘Let’s have the sacrament now.’  I thought it was a bit too early so I put it to a vote… some fifty pairs of hands shot up so I said OK.  I performed the religious ceremony: I broke off the knob of the prick, crushed it in my fingers and as the crumbs were falling to the ground I was praying aloud ‘For Peace, For Love, For Freedom.’ Having thus prayed I broke off another piece of it for myself and handed the rest to the people to be shared as the sacrament of our Church.

Man, you’ve never seen a faster castration of the prick. It just disappeared in ten seconds.  Great, great, great happiness all round!  Everybody having a great time- a true festival of life!”

Pawlowski then had the crowd dance Ring o’ Roses around the altar.  He next tried to re-erect the sacrificial altar nearer to the Festival of Life meeting.  It was at this point that about half a dozen constables moved in.

“Later I got a bit closer to the Jesus people, put up our altar, got on it and started to indoctrinate my listeners… about a hundred people were listening to me, some Jesus people, some heads… I was grabbed by a bobby and about six of them started to drag me to the waiting police van… Then they drove us to Hyde Park police station. A bobby says to me ‘What’s your name?’ ‘Reverend Father Fuck’ says I. ‘Occupation?’ ‘Minister of religion’ says I. ‘Will you sign for bail?’ ‘Yes’ says I. ‘In what name?’ ‘Reverend Father Fuck’ says I. ‘I can’t accept that name’ says he and they lock me up in the cell till Monday.’”

Pawlowski then appeared before Marlborough Street magistrates (not for the first time) but refused to face the court, instead informing the public gallery that “The prick with a lovely pair of balls is a symbol of life and cannabis is our sacrament.”  He was remanded for a week in prison but, on his return to the court, once again refused to engage, declaring that the court had no jurisdiction over matters of religion.  He was fined £5, which was taken from the money found on him when he was arrested.  Pawlowski still maintained that “If it is right to speak in the park then, when prevented by the police, it is right to continue this speech in court.”[5]

Next, on the afternoon of October 10^th of the same year, Pawlowski officiated at a wedding in held in the open in Hyde Park (“Will you take this man for a husband until you get fed up with him?”).  After the ceremony, a phallic wedding cake made with cannabis was consumed by the congregation.  A marriage certificate was signed by about forty people in the crowd and the happy couple went off to talk to reporters whilst Pawlowski spoke to the crowd about the “soft delights” of Aphrodite and the other Greek gods.

Once again, ten police were present in the crowd of about one hundred onlookers and Pawlowski was interrupted and arrested for a breach of the peace. At his hearing the next day, despite defending his prosecution of the grounds that possession and use of the drug was part of his religion, he was bound on sureties of £50 to keep the peace and be of good behaviour- or face three months committal.[6]  The defendant, however, didn’t feel that his religion permitted him to make such promises so, instead, he “proposed the magistrate apologise to me and order my immediate release from prison, compensate me in the sum of five pounds for every day he has kept me in prison, and give me his promise to keep the peace and be of good behaviour for twelve months.”  Pawlowski was committed to Pentonville Prison for three months and the church was temporarily closed.[7]

In the same article in which he described his arrest at the wedding (and his mistreatment by police) Pawlowski announced his intention to sacrifice a sheep at the Aldermaston peace march that coming Easter.  It would be killed on an altar; the flesh would be burned- a tenth going to the chosen god and the rest being consumed- and the congregation would then dance ring o’ roses around the altar in honour of Apollo. 

Later History

As described, the Church was involved with Windsor free festival in August 1972, no doubt boosting its numbers with the Reverend Paul’s promise that sex and drugs would play a prominent part in the event.  Given the cakes just described, we can now readily imagine the nature of the sacrificial cakes promised to festival crowds in the flyer. However, it’s nor clear how much Church actually contributed to the festival itself. Pawlowski were arrested on drug charges, being stopped on his bicycle by the police before he even arrived (and a loaf of bread in his bag being taken away for ‘inspection’). The Church was certainly not involved in the subsequent years’ events.

By 1973, the Church of Aphrodite’s membership was growing, and a ‘branch’ in Bradford had celebrated the start of spring by staging an ancient Greek play in collaboration with a local arts college. The performance concluded with a ritual to Persephone and the sacrifice of a lamb- which was actually made of bread. Pawlowski was present, overseeing the ‘sacrifice’ by a student dressed as a priest; the lamb, along with grapes and wine, were then shared with the audience at the city’s Library Theatre.[8]

Once again, the Church’s reputation attracted trouble.  An RSPCA inspector attended the play and was told that a real lamb had been sacrificed to Hermes about a month previously.  He threatened to report Pawlowski for animal cruelty; meanwhile the Church was expelled from the Council of Themis, a pagan umbrella organisation, presumably because it disapproved of its rituals (whether this was sex with au pairs or killing sheep, I don’t know).

Undiscouraged, Pawlowski (by then living in a commune in Charrington Street, St Pancras and described as “a nice nut, but lately one has to dig deeper to get at the niceness”) planned another lamb sacrifice at midday on the August 25^th in Great Windsor Park (on the first day of that year’s Windsor festival).  This was to be conducted in collaboration with the Nudist Congress. He even advised the Crown Commissioners of his plans, although they warned he would have to obtain a license to perform the ritual lawfully.  As it was, the sheep was stolen and was not recovered and the sacrifice to Helios didn’t take place to inaugurate the festival.[9]

Interviewed early the next year, Pawlowski declared that the oil crisis was a punishment by Helios, the sun god, for the offence shown to him the year before (and perhaps by the burning of fossil fuels?).  Further sacrifices would be needed to appease him, he warned.  As it turned out, this was pretty much the last that was heard of the Church of Aphrodite, although Pawlowski continued to be active in various radical campaigns, reverting to his revolutionary, anti-monarchist and republican past.  He also, apparently, did for a while consider re-establishing the Church in Accrington, where he was then living, in 1981.[10] 

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[1] Leaflet distributed prior to the 1972 Windsor free festival: the text is taken from the Church’s pamphlet Fucking and Sucking and Pot is Our Religion.

[2] National Archives, CRIM 1/4520; The Times, May 25th 1966, 13 & August 15th 1967, 3.

[3] Attila (Brighton’s radical magazine), no.2, Saturday, May 15^th 1971, 5.

[4] Pawlowski, ‘Bobbie Bust Aphrodite,’ in Berkeley Barb, 14-20 May 1971, 13.

[5] Barry Miles, London Calling- a Countercultural History of London since 1945, 2010, c.24.

[6] Lamp of Thoth occult magazine, issue 2, ‘Pandora’s Box,’ 25.

[7] Pawlowski, ‘London Bobbies Expose Park as Shuckville,’ in Berkeley Barb, Jan. 21^st-27^th 1972, 4.

[8] The Guardian, March 21^st 1973, 5.

[9] Reading Evening Post, August 17^th 1973, 7; JR, ‘Lamb in Sheep’s Clothing,’ Freedom, vol.34, no.36, September 8^th 1973, 7; The Times, August 25th, 1973, 3.

[10] Reading Evening Post, February 25^th 1974, 8.

For a much fuller discussion pf the Reverend Paul and the Windsor festivals, as well as much more, see my recent book, Waiting for Utopia (on Amazon as an e-book and paperback).

Satyrs & Pans- age and alcohol…

Jacob Jordaens, Satyr Playing the Pipe, 1629

I have written numerous times about satyrs, fauns and Pans (and, for that matter, faunesses), but have not so far paused to highlight an interesting fact about the iconography of these beings. We tend to be used to heroes and divinities of myth as being young, healthy and beautiful, but the satyrs are different. Their mythology tends to describe them as older males, albeit still priapic in their natures, and one of their regular companions is the elderly and often inebriated Silenus. Satyrs, in fact, are often allowed considerable diversity; they don’t have to be in peak physical form, it seems.

Sex and wine are the two main preoccupations of satyrs, as is widely known. We have to admit, though, that these are an ill pairing- the ability to enjoy the former wanes the more the latter is indulged in. Wine, plus age, are the curses of the satyr, so that we often see them reduced to a gaggle of drunken old men, as in Hodges’ painting below, characters relying on each other for both physical and psychological support.

Charles Howard Hodges, Silenus & Three Satyrs

We see diversity constantly displayed, as at the head of the page with Jacob Jordaens’ figure. He leads an active, outdoor life, to be sure, but the artist doesn’t shy from representing the aging, sagging flesh and signs of a pot belly. The same is the case with his two much older satyr heads, seen below. Wrinkled skin, gnarled joints and white receding hair are honestly portrayed.

Jordaens, Head of a Satyr

Jordaens, Old Satyr with a Flute

All the imperfections of the mortal body can be excused and depicted when it comes to satyrs, it seems. We see the blissful, unashamed indulgence in greed of David de Haen’s figure, whilst Gerard van Honthorst’s loving pair remind us that, after all, you don’t have to be Adonis (or, apparently) have any teeth) to find a lover…

David de Haen, Satyr Drinking from Grapes

Gerard van Honthorst, Satyr & Nymph, 1623

The raddled flesh of the male satyrs could be matched by that of faunesses, as Tiepolo showed us. They are not a well-favoured race, on the whole, being every bit as goaty and hairy as we would expect. Add age and over-consumption of wine, and we must confront the truth that they day will come when their nymph chasing charms start to wane, leaving only thwarted desire. We get a sense of this in Sebastiano Ricci’s canvas, which shows a frustrated elderly satyr contemplating assaulting the sleeping goddess of love. It’s surely not wise, but the opportunity has presented itself and he can barely contain his lust.

Giovanni Batista Tiepolo, Satyress with Two Putti, 1740

Ricci, Venus & Satyr

Age may stand for decay and impotence, but it can also represent the wisdom of experience. This was the approach taken below by Peter Paul Rubens; his mature satyr retains a cheerful disposition, even when placed beside the memento mori of a semi-corrupted skull.

Rubens, Satyr

These honest portrayals of the physical realities of the mortal body were taken to their frankest extreme by Joel-Peter Witkin, who confronts us with a disabled satyr. The image may shock- even, perhaps, offend some- but its lineage can clearly be traced, as I’ve shown.

Joel-Peter Witkin, Satiro (Satyr)- Mexico, 1992

This posting expands on the subject matter covered in my 2021 book on the Great God Pan (Green Magic Publishing).