The Young Man Betrothed to a Statue: Additional Note

Extract

Through the kindness of Professor R. M. Mitchell, of Brown University, who has sent me his copy of Venus in Rom, I am now able to give an account of Wilibald Alexis's rendering of the story of Venus and the ring. The materal is handled very freely — tant pis. The scene is laid in the Rome of the Renaissance, where (as one of the characters says) “winkt uns das Alterthum lockend in seine Wunderwelt zurück.” The first half— the whole is a novelette of thirty thousand words—is very slow-moving. Hubert von Stein, a German nobleman, has come to Rome to visit his friend, Theodor Savelli; who has, however, mysteriously disappeared. There are glimpses of Roman social life, of a necromancer and hermit named Palumbus, of the beautiful Viola Gritti, of Savelli's half-deserted palace (with a broken statue which has injured the workmen who were removing it), and even of Raphael painting in the Vatican. And there are violent thunder storms, strange meetings, dreams, visions, at night; a manifest attempt to create an atmosphere of the supernatural. The latter half is more lively. Savelli has appeared, half insane; he tells of a ball game on the day of his wedding, of putting the inconvenient ring on a Venus statue, of his consequent marriage with the goddess and fearful visits to the Venusberg. Hubert's wife Mathilde comes from Germany to find her husband … with a Roman mistress, Faustine, and a baby. Enter Martin Luther. There is an attempt on Leo X's life, a street riot, in which Hubert, denounced as a heretic, defends himself for several pages single-handed against the mob, escapes by leaping into the Tiber, is rescued by his mistress (who dies defending him), and counter-rescued by his faithful spouse. At the end Savelli, still insane, regains his ring— not, however, through Palumbus's aid,—returns to his wife Viola, persuades her to drink poison, burns his palace after an elaborate funeral, and becomes a pilgrim. Palumbus dies. Mathilde and Hubert return to Germany, with little Guido, Faustine's son.