Divine Dioramas

In the opening chapter of Vincenzo Consolo’s novel Retablo, a Sicilian monk named Isidore puts off his tunic, declares his carnal love for the fair Rosalia, and crosses the threshold of Palermo’s Oratorio di San Lorenzo, taking with him the reader who has just opened the book. “I stepped through the door: it was as if I’d set foot in paradise. All around me, on walls, ceilings, vaults, altars were handsome stucco carvings, frames, panels, statues, and cornices of milky white, here and there inlaid with gleaming solid gold, garlands, scrollwork, flowers, foliage, cornucopia, tongues of flame, seashells, crosses, sunbursts, plumes, tassels, looping lanyards… There were niches featuring stories from the lives of St. Lawrence and St. Francis, angels rejoicing, chubby little putti teetering precariously on the tops of clouds, cascading curtains, billowing into volutes and tight spirals.” Inside the Oratory a kindly gentleman greets them with a radiant, affable smile; he is garbed in a “vast white periwig, a frock coat, billows of lace, a walking stick and dress sword, a waistcoat emblazoned with chains and medals.” The novelist thus presents “his excellency Giacomo Serpotta”, handcrafter of wonders and magnificence, against the gleaming white backdrop of his creations.