“Bread crumbs”(perhaps how you got here)

(Originally posted August 1st, 2008)

Sweet Dreams (1901) By John William Godward (1861-1922)

Godward was a younger follower of Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, who was famous for the meticulous care with which he reconstructed images from the Classical World. Here we have a a young woman (Roman, I assume, judging from her clothing; probably the unmarried daughter of a wealthy aristocrat). The painting’s title suggests that she is daydreaming. But why? She seems bored or exhausted - probably both, since the light and her garb make us think the time of the year is summer or maybe early fall.

Then again, maybe she is just "horny." Well, in Godward's day, they would have said "amorous."

There is, beneath the sumptuous surroundings and the woman’s posture, something else: a wanton invitation to a sexual encounter. The posture of her arms, the slight opening of her legs, and (most of all) the soft, pale flesh ... But this woman is not an active creature. She is desirous, but not willing to do much. She is not alert, but she wants novelty. She is trapped in her sweet dreams, in her luxuriant depression.

Could it be that she is what we see as the result of long-continued suffering or despair?

In my Celeste novels, it is possible to imagine the heroine as looking like this, except that she would never have been so passive, so stifled by the environment. Then, too, Celeste’s hair is shorter.

As for Godward himself, he was perhaps the last active artist of the “English Academic” school; eventually he became a sort of joke. Yet his works combined both technical brilliance and a deep sensuality, even if they were mostly confined to “reconstructions” of Classical subjects. He was, ultimately, one of the first victims of the abandonment of affection for Classical Antiquity. Today, except for those susceptible to a curious kind of nostalgia, he is mostly forgotten.

 All text on this page is the work of J W Durham and is licensed only under terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Other licensing terms may be available. E-mail me