CHAPTER EIGHT #3
A junior agreed, “Exactly. Titian painted Religion Saved by Spain to commemorate the Battle of Lepanto, and it was blatant religious propaganda.”
“It was political propaganda. There’s a difference,” someone beside Elliott rebutted. His comment broke out in an argument where a crowd of voices overlapped.
“Titian was pagan, vulgar, and violent. It shows in his work.”
“His paintings were violent and paganic, that doesn’t mean he was. Basic sense.”
“Titian had entire paintings devoted to Ovid’s Metamorphoses, not Jesus Christ.”
“Elliott?” A girl spoke behind his ear. Elliott turned, and she handed him a Band-Aid from her purse. His blood leaked on his desk. He mumbled a thank you, trying to keep his hands still and hidden beneath his desk. Blood smeared onto his pens.
“Don’t mention it. By the way, I think you’re right about the passage of time.” She sounded embarrassed for Elliott, as he had stammered and stuttered earlier. “Try to sound confident next time. More people will listen.”
Elliott didn’t think that was true, but he expressed his thanks.
Callum Han’s voice entered Elliott’s ears. “Titian painted the Crucifixion with Saint Mary and Saint John present in another work.” Callum repeated himself, “Catholicism was the widespread religion at the time. Why do none of you understand that?”
Elliott tried to get a word in edgewise. “Well, think of Plutarch’s Book III of Africa–”
“You mean Petrarch’s Africa,” the student beside him corrected. “Plutarch was Greek.”
“Right.” Elliott was worried he was rambling, he could feel everyone staring at him, and he tried to rush out all of the words piercing through his hectic mind.
“In 1343 AD, Petrarch’s Africa depicts Scipio Africanus as the epic poem’s hero when the Roman General Africanus led the invasion into Africa.
In the epic, Serapis is associated with Apollo–”
Someone behind Elliott groaned. “Fucking hell. Callum is right. Titian wasn’t a worshiper of mythology. None of this is mythology.”
Callum set his sweater on his desk, and asked him, “Alright, then if it’s not about Catholic sin and regret, then what is it about, Elliott?”
“I…It’s loss of innocence.” Elliott earned more groans scattered around the room.
He impelled himself to press on as he adjusted his tie that suffocated him as he explained.
Be confident. “My belief is that people tend to associate violence with youth. Everyone focuses on the mistakes and impatient tempers of the youth as a dog. The reckless sex. The aggressive rages. The careless freedoms. However…look at which are the most violent creatures depicted in the painting. The matured man is a lion, which is one of the deadliest animals in the Savannah. The old man is a wolf which is one of the most lethal carnivores of the forest. A dog is friendlier, affectionate, and in the painting itself the dog is panting with its tongue out. In history, dogs were domesticated from wolves, yet this is in reverse, the dog eventually becomes the wolf. Therefore…I think it’s about how one day as men, we are dogs that will become lions and wolves.
From the pressures, darkness, and struggle of life, every man will need to become a wolf.
It’s about how we become a danger to survive. ”
Brutal creatures. Elliott bit back his words. How boys become brutal creatures when they become men.
“Interesting perspective, Elliott,” Hexley remarked. “There’s not a full-fledged carnivore depicted until he becomes a grown man. That’s a powerful argument. Yes, Brisa?”
A junior with the horn-rimmed glasses raised her hand. “May I ask a personal question, professor?”
“If you want.”
“Professor Hexley, why did you become a professor when your twin was hung at…the winter ritual? In the student newspaper last month, there was a mention of his death.” Every head turned towards her, rumbles of confusion rattled around the room.
Professor Hexley had a brother killed in the winter ceremony?
Professor Hexley was a student at AEscwulf College?
Silence swelled around the lecture chamber as the irriguous air dried out of the cave.
For a moment, the air was the only sound to be heard, before Hexley lowered his head with his voice nearly gone. He hadn’t anticipated the question, but he cleared his throat.
“My twin brother slipped sleeping pills in my coffee that midnight and he took my place in the winter ceremony. Everyone believed he was me. He’d been granted permission from the provost. By the time I woke up, he was already lynched.
” Professor Hexley lifted his head over the collective gasps.
“My brother had wanted to be a professor at AEscwulf. Therefore, I’ve lived his dream for him and I’ve tried to provide comfort to the students he would’ve taught.
That day was fifteen years ago. In those times, no one bothered to take down the ‘Negro boy’s’ body.
Therefore, I took his body down with my bare hands and brought him home.
Year after year, I’ve returned here. For my own atonement. For repayment.”