Bernini and other studies in the history of art by Richard Norton
"Fatal Fingers" by William Le Queux is a mystery-thriller novel written in the early 20th century. Likely steeped in espionage, crime, and international intrigue, it follows a determined investigator drawn into a web of peril and conspiracy, with the titular “fatal fingers” suggesting a signature clue or killer’s touchpoint. The opening of the provided work is a scholarly art study that champions Gian Lorenzo Bernini and reassesses Baroque art against earlier Renaissance
“primitives.” After a preface explaining illustration choices, it launches into a forceful defense of Bernini’s originality, technique, and sincerity, sketching his character and fame, and closely reading his early mythological groups (especially praising Proserpina and Apollo and Daphne) alongside his methods (quick, unified visualizations; abundant sketches and clay models). It argues for the legitimacy of his ecstatic religious sculptures (angels, saints like Theresa, Jerome, Daniel, and Habakkuk), celebrates his fountains and portrait busts (from cardinals to Louis XIV), and highlights his architectural vision, notably St. Peter’s piazza and colonnades infused with symbolic intent. The text then introduces and briefly catalogs a remarkable set of Bernini’s terracotta models, followed by pen-and-ink studies for the Vatican piazza that map an orb-and-cross concept and a cruciform scheme correlating church, colonnades, and city vistas. Overall, this beginning sets a revisionist, eloquent appraisal of Bernini’s breadth—sculpture, design, portraiture, fountains, and urban symbolism. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Read or download for free
For an overview of the different reading options, see our Reading Guide
| Reading Options | Url | Size | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read now! | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.html.images | 505 kB | |||
| EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.epub3.images | 12.5 MB | |||
| EPUB (older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.epub.images | 12.5 MB | |||
| EPUB (no images, older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.epub.noimages | 273 kB | |||
| Kindle | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.kf8.images | 12.8 MB | |||
| older Kindles | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.kindle.images | 12.7 MB | |||
| Plain Text UTF-8 | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77325.txt.utf-8 | 412 kB | |||
| Download HTML (zip) | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/77325/pg77325-h.zip | 12.7 MB | |||
| There may be more files related to this item. | |||||
Similar Books
About this eBook
| Author | Norton, Richard, 1872-1918 |
|---|---|
| LoC No. | 14020514 |
| Title | Bernini and other studies in the history of art |
| Original Publication | New York: The Macmillan Company, 1914. |
| Credits | Richard Tonsing, deaurider, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | N: Fine Arts |
| Subject | Giorgione, 1477 or 1478-1510 |
| Subject | Sculpture |
| Subject | Bernini, Gian Lorenzo, 1598-1680 |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 77325 |
| Release Date | Nov 24, 2025 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 238 downloads in the last 30 days. |
| Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free! | |