J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Thames sketchbooks c.1804-14 > Greenwich Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Verses, and Note on Perspective in Raphael's Tapestry Cartoon 'Paul Preaching at Athens' (Inscriptions by Turner) c.1808

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Verses, and Note on Perspective in Raphael's Tapestry Cartoon 'Paul Preaching at Athens' (Inscriptions by Turner)’ c.1808
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 24 Recto:
Verses, and Note on Perspective in Raphael’s Tapestry Cartoon ‘Paul Preaching at Athens’ (Inscriptions by Turner) circa 1808
D06766
Turner Bequest CII 24
Inscribed by Turner in ink (see main catalogue entry) on white wove paper, 115 x 76 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘24’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CII 24’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
For the longer draft poems to which Turner’s verses belong, see Introduction to the sketchbook. Finberg did not transcribe the verses on this leaf, and the reading given here was first made by Rosalind Mallord Turner for the 1990 Tate exhibition:
The smoking roll is eat with greedy haste
And hope and fear depicted on his face [pace inserted]
His forfeit paid if avarice will allow
To pay save a newly crave[n] cowar[d] blow
Last in privation further loss of self
Such small beginnings are the germ of Wealth
There is also a note on Raphael, written with the sketchbook inverted. This concludes remarks mainly on folio 24 verso (D06767), for which see note for full transcription and comment.

David Blayney Brown
March 2007

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Verses, and Note on Perspective in Raphael’s Tapestry Cartoon ‘Paul Preaching at Athens’ (Inscriptions by Turner) c.1808 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2007, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-verses-and-note-on-perspective-in-raphaels-tapestry-cartoon-r1130859, accessed 20 September 2024.