The Oval portrait by Edgar Allan Poll. The chateau into which my valet had
ventured to make forcible entrance rather than permit me, in my desperately wounded condition,
to pass a night in the open air, was one of those piles
of commingled gloom and grandeur which have so long frowned among the Apennine, not
less in fact, than in the fancy of Missus Radcliffe. To all appearance,
it had been temporarily and very lately abandoned. We established ourselves in one
of the smallest and least sumptuously furnished apartments. It lay in a remote turret
of the building. Its decorations were rich, yet tattered and antique. Its
walls were hung with tapestry and be decked with manifold and multiform armorial trophies,
together with an unusually great number of very spirited modern paintings in frames of rich
golden Arabesque. In these paintings, which depended from the walls, not only
in their main surfaces, but in very many nooks, which the bizarre architecture
of the chateau rendered necessary. In these paintings, my incipient delirium perhaps had
caused me to take deep interest, so that I bade Pedro to close the
heavy shutters of the room, since it was already night, to light the
tongues of a tall candelabrum, which stood by the head of my bed,
and to throw open far and wide the fringed curtains of black velvet which enveloped
the bed itself. I wished all this done that I might resign myself,
if not to sleep, at least alternately, to the contemplation of these pictures
and the perusal of a small volume which had been found upon the pillow,
and which purported to criticize and describe them. Long long I read, and
devoutly, devotedly, I gazed, rapidly and gloriously. The hours flew by,
and the deep midnight came. The bozza of the candelabrum displeased me,
and, out reaching my hand with difficulty, rather than disturbed my slumbering ballet,
I placed it so as to throw its rays more fully upon the book.
But the action produced an effect altogether unanticipated. The rays of the numerous
candles, for there were many, now fell within a niche of the room,
which had hitherto been thrown into deep shade by one of the bedposts.
I thus saw in vivid light a picture all and notice before it was the
portrait of a young girl just ripening into womanhood. I glanced at the painting
hurriedly, and then closed my eyes. Why I did this was not at
first apparent even to my own perception. But while my lids remained thus shut,
I ran over in my mind my reason for so shutting them. It
was an impulsive movement to gain time for thought, to make sure that my
vision had not deceived me, to calm and subdue my fancy for a more
sober and more certain gaze. In a very few moments, I again looked
fixedly at the painting. But I now saw aright. I could not and
would not doubt for the first flashing of the candles upon that canvass had seemed
to dissipate the dreamy stupor which was stealing over my senses, and to startle
me at once into waking life. The portrait I have already said, was
that of a young girl. It was a mere head and shoulders done what
is technically termed a vignette manner, much in the style of the favorite heads
of Sully. The arms, the bosom, and even the ends of the
radiant hair melted imperceptibly into the vague yet deep shadow which formed the background of
the whole. The frame was oval richly gilded and filigreed in moresque as a
thing of art. Thing could be more admirable than the painting itself. But
it could have been neither the execution of the work, nor the immortal beauty
of the countenance which had so suddenly and so vehemently moved me. Least of
all could it have been that my fancy, shaken from its half slumber,
had mistaken the head for that of a living person. I saw at once
that the peculiarities of the design, of the vignetting and of the frame must
have instantly dispelled such idea, must have prevented even its momentary entertainment. Thinking
earnestly upon these points, I remained for an hour, perhaps half sitting,
half reclining, with my vision riveted upon the portrait. At length, satisfied
with the true secret of its effect, I fell back within the bed.
I had found the spell of the picture, in an absolute life likeliness of
expression, which, at first startlingly, finally confounded, abdued, and appalled
me with deep and reverent awe. I replaced the candelabrum in its former position,
the cause of my deep agitation being thus shut from my view, I
sought eagerly the volume which discussed the paintings and their histories. Turning to the
number which designated the Oval portrait, I there read the vague and quaint words
which follow. She was a maiden of rarest beauty, and not more lovely
than full of glee and evil was the hour when she saw and loved and
wedded the painter, he passionate, studious, austere, and having already a
bride in his art. She a maiden of rarest beauty, and not more
lovely than full of glee, all light and smiles and frolicsome as the young
fawn, loving and cherishing all things, hating only the art which was her
rival, dreading only the palate and brushes and untoward instruments which deprived her of
the countenance of her lover. It was thus a terrible thing for this lady
to hear the painter speak of his desire to portray even his young bride.
But she was humble and obedient, and sat meekly for many weeks in the
dark high turret chamber, where the light dripped upon the pale canvas only from
overhead. But he, the painter, took glory in his work, which
went on from hour to hour and from day to day. And he was
a passionate and wild and moody man, who became lost in reveries so that
he would not see that the light which fell so ghastly in that lone turret,
withered the health and the spirits of his bride, who pined visibly to
all but him. Yet she smiled on and still on, uncomplainingly, because
she saw that the painter, who had high renown, took a fervid and
burnt pleasure in his task, and wrought day and night to depict her,
who so loved him, yet who grew daily more dispirited and weak, and
in sooth. Some who beheld the portrait spoke of its resemblance in low words,
as of a mighty marble, and a proof not less of the power
of the painter than of his deep love for her, whom he depicted so
surpassingly well. But at length, as the labor drew nearer to its conclusion,
there were admitted none into the turret, For the painter had grown wild
with the ardor of his work, and turned his eyes from canvas, merely
even to regard the countenance of his wife. And he would not see that
the tints which he spread upon the canvas were drawn from the cheeks of her
who sat beside him. And when many weeks had passed, and but little
remained to do save one brush upon the mouth and one tint upon the eye,
the spirit of the lady again flickered up as the flame within the socket
of the lamp. And then the brush was given, and then the tint
was placed. And for one moment the painter stood entranced before the work which
he had wrought. But in the next while he yet gazed, he grew
tremulous, and very pallid, and aghast, and crying with a loud voice,
this is indeed life itself. Turned suddenly to regard his beloved. She
was dead. End of the Oval portrait