'Of marble men and maidens': sin, sculpture, and perversion in Nathaniel Hawthorne's 'The Marble Faun'

Patricia Pulham

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

This essay considers the mediation of desire in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Marble Faun: Or, the Romance of Monte Beni (1860) through key sculptural figures including the Faun of Praxiteles and other antique statues in the Capitoline Museum in Rome, William Wetmore Story's statue Cleopatra (1860, the model for Kenyon's statue of the same name in the novel), Harriet Hosmer's statue of Beatrice Cenci (1856), and the Medici Venus. It argues that statuary functions as a means to negotiate homoerotic desires that emerge via the triangular erotic relationships between the characters in the text.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)83-102
Number of pages20
JournalThe Yearbook of English Studies
Volume40
Issue number1-2
Publication statusPublished - 2010

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