Week 2: Coming of Age as a Skeptic/Believer

This week, as a class, we analyzed the book Brideshead Revisited, a novel that follows the story of a man named Charles Ryder, along with his skepticism towards religion throughout the novel. In order to gain insight to the story, this week we visited locations that focused on the different features - both architecturally and artistically - that distinguish the transitions between time periods (specifically baroque and classical) along with the primary religion of each time.  

 

The first location we visited was Oxford University. Parts of Oxford date back to 1100, and as you can see in this photo, the university exhibits a Gothic style. The particular college that we visited was Christ Church, which is the richest college of the 38 present at Oxford. Christ Church helped establish the Catholic religion at Oxford, which was not very popular when the University first began. A good example of the Catholic architecture at Christ Church can be viewed below, with the stained glass windows.

 

 

On our second day, we visited Eltham Palace, which was a very unique palace, because each part of the palace had a different feel to it, based on the families that resided here. As you can see in the photo above, there is a large architectural contrast between the two portions of the palace. The front portion has a very Classical, Gothic look, similar to what we saw at Oxford. The further section of the building in this photograph demonstrates Baroque features, as the stone disappears, and the look transforms to be appear modernized. This relates to Brideshead Revisited, because Charles states that he has been converted to the Baroque, and the photo above provides imagery for this.

 Our final visit was to Hampton Court Palace, which, similar to Eltham, had elements of the Baroque and Classical periods. However, Hampton Court demonstrated more tension between the Protestant and Catholic religions of the time, and this can be observed by the painting below.

This is a photograph of a mural at the top of William III's living space. William wanted a mural to glorify him, and the triumph of the Protestant faith, and the artist that was hired had to agree to paint this, because he was on contract. However, as you can see, the baby at the top of this photo is "taking a leak" onto the plate below him, and essentially the whole painting. While this is very subtle, it is an example of the tension between the Catholic and Protestant churches at the time.


Throughout Brideshead Revisited, Charles Ryder struggles with where he stands in his opinion of the church. By visiting these locations, we were provided insight into Charles' world, and we were able to better understand his religious journey throughout the novel.