Lafcadio Hearn

The Temptation of Saint Anthony / La Tentation de Saint Antoine (Version 1849 Illustree) Lafcadio Hearn

The Temptation of Saint Anthony (French La Tentation de Saint Antoine) is a novel upon which the French author Gustave Flaubert spent his whole adult life working fitfully. Translation by Hearn (1910), with an introduction by Elizabeth Bisland. With Hearn's essay "Argument," which addresses "Frailty, the Seven Deadly Sins, Heresiarchs, the Martyrs, the Magicians, Gods, science, Metamorphosis, Monsters, Lust & Death. In 1845, at age 24, Flaubert visited the Balbi Palace in Genoa, and was inspired by a painting of the same title, then attributed to Bruegel the Elder (now thought to be by one of his followers). Flaubert worked at the subject in three versions, completed in 1849, 1856 (with extracts published at that time) and 1872, before publishing the final version in 1874. It takes as its subject the famous temptation faced by Saint Anthony the Great, in the Egyptian desert, a theme often repeated in medieval and modern art. It is written in the form of a play script, detailing one night in the life of Anthony the Great, during which he is faced with great temptations. The 1849 French Version is illustrated by Odilon Redon ( 1840 - 1916), a French symbolist painter, printmaker, draughtsman and pastellist. During his early years as an artist, Redon's works were described as "a synthesis of nightmares and dreams", as they contained dark, fantastical figures from the artist's own imagination. His work represents an exploration of his internal feelings and psyche. He himself wanted to place "the logic of the visible at the service of the invisible".