Walter Pater and the Language of Sculpture

Reviews / Votes

Winner, Paul Mellon Centre Publication Grant

'Ostermark-Johansen is at her best when she draws out the complexity of Pater's critical writing, as in the fine final chapter, where she extends her characterisation of Pater's sculptural aesthetic to his prose style, both in practice and in his musings on the subject in the essay 'Style' of 1888. The book ends with an intriguing discussion of the visual and material aspects of Pater's texts in both manuscript and print. Ostermark-Johansen's key idea of 'the language of sculpture' thus reaches its point of greatest abstraction, as a concept for interpreting Pater's work, when it addresses the texts in their most concrete form, something Pater himself would surely have appreciated.' Burlington Magazine

'... this is a book that will delight Paterians, surprising and instructing even those who know him well. Ostermark-Johansen's deep respect for her subject informs every line while her impressive breadth of knowledge and imaginative scholarship make this study the essential work of reference for anyone interested in Pater and his relation to style, sculpture, and aestheticism.' The Pater Newsletter

'... in her most recent book [...] Ostermark-Johansen, who is the author of much fine previous work on Pater and nineteenth-century artistic culture, uses sculpture to trace Pater's development as art historian, writer, and thinker... One of the lasting impressions of Walter Pater and the Language of Sculpture is its real enthusiasm for its subject. 'Ostermark-Johansen knows Pater as only few other contemporary critics do, and she captures her subject with a winning mixture of intimacy and critical detachment... She is sensitive to the texture and shades of Pater's allusive prose. Her close readings tease out concealed meanings that are buried in Pater's notoriously knotty sentences. She offers exciting new readings of the spatial dimension of Pater's literary imagination and his experimental use of the senses - prominently, the sense of touch - in his critical writings.' Journal of Pre-Raphaelite Studies

'... besides being a landmark book for Paterian studies, this is a very beautiful object both to the eye and touch, with high-quality sheet paper, 89 black and white illustrations and 20 colour plates... an invaluable and polished monograph on Walter Pater's aesthetics and style that not only provides a comprehensive exploration of all his works in their generic and thematic heterogeneity, but also offers a highly coherent view of that central late 19th-century author through that highly pertinent problematic of sculpture and the relief.' Cahiers Victoriens et Edouardiens

'... this is a study whose sheer richness will reward multiple readings, giving both new and experienced students of Pater a set of fresh connections, contexts, and intertexts with which to conjure.' Victorian Studies

Lene Ostermark-Johansen's well-researched, richly digressive study of the meanings of sculpture in Walter Pater's work expands sculpture's sphere, embracing "engravings, tapestries, anything woven, all kinds of relief, whether low or high, small or large scale."' Romanticism & Victorianism on the Net