Julian Hawthorne (June 22, 1846 – July 21, 1934) was the only son of novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne and himself a journalist and author. Julian Hawthorne’s biographer notes that “as an author, he far exceeded the literary production of his famous father, composing no less than twenty-six novels and romances, over sixty short stories, almost a hundred essays, and several lengthy works of history, biography, and autobiography.” [Bassan, Maurice Hawthorne’s Son: The Life and Literary Career of Julian Hawthorne. Ohio State Press, 1970.]

Hawthorne visited the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago and wrote extensively about his impressions in a series of pieces published in Cosmopolitan, Lippincott’s Magazine, and New Peterson Magazine. He expanded upon these articles in a collection of essays that forms a sort of a parody guidebook published as Humors of the Fair (E. A. Weeks, 1893).

Hawthorne rarely holds back in his opinions, both favorable and unfavorable, about the 1893 World’s Fair, its architecture, exhibits, and visitors. He remarked that the World’s Columbian Exposition was “the first time that the whole American people had met itself in one place.” [Hirschl, Jessie Heckman “The Great White City” American Heritage October 1960, p. 75.]

Reprinted here is the first installment of Julian Hawthorne’s “The Lady of the Lake” about his June visit to the fairgrounds and published in the August 1893 issue of Lippincott’s Magazine.

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THE LADY OF THE LAKE

by Julian Hawthorne

This title I apply to the enchanting personage who sits on a sort of curule chair, with high, semicircular back, on the poop of the vessel which, propelled by eight maidens only less lovely than the Lady herself, seems to speed forward from the head of the Lagoon at the World’s Fair.[1]

I cannot enough admire this creation of the sculptor’s genius. The Lady’s attire consists of a robe or toga, worn round the body, and supplemented by a light scarf, to envelop the neck and head. But the disposition of this simple costume has been modified by circumstances.

You are to understand that the Old World has just arrived at the Fair, and is at this moment making its entry by way of the triumphal arch in the centre of the great marble colonnade fronting on the Lake. Descrying them from afar, the Lady has cried out “Forward!” to her eight oarswomen,—or gondoliers, rather; for they ply their long oars standing,—and the boat has leaped onward responsive to the impulse given it. At the same moment, the Lady, inspired with emotions of welcome and lofty excitement, has lifted her head and erected her whole body in the chair. Her left arm lies along the high back of it; her right hand holds her emblem of divinity; her bosom is expanded, and her crossed feet just touch the deck. Meanwhile, her toga has slipped down, leaving her white body bare as far as below her loins; and the scarf, in the breeze of her going, flutters far out behind, and will be gone altogether in another moment. The figure thus fully and unconsciously revealed is divinely beautiful, and its extraordinary erectness gives it a special charm,—the charm of immortal life, youth, and vigor. Seen from whatever point of view, it develops fresh delightfulness; I can recall no ancient or modern statue which seems at once more alive, more severely statuesque, and more beautiful. The little vessel dashes onward; the tritons with their steeds of the sea dis port themselves around it; on the prow, a damsel sets a trumpet to her lips; the Lagoon, with its marble margins, and the surrounding cliffs of snowy architecture, extend before it; the blue sky is above, the free air all about it. I have no fault to find with the composition: it is worthy of its place, as the central feature of the most superb architectural scene that was ever—I am bold to affirm—beheld in this world. I know no other design of a fountain that is to be for a moment compared with this, and glad am I to have lived to see it.

At the other end of the Lagoon stands the colossal golden figure of the Republic, with uplifted hands. It is a work on which any artist might be content to rest his reputation. It is massive, stately, simple, and severe. The heavy robe falls in straight folds, like those of the early Greek statues. The pose is at once the simplest possible, and the most impressive. So should stand the human symbol of the mightiest of nations. It is as dignified as a tower, and as splendid as a goddess. I regret only that the head and the arms are gilded [2]. In the great Grecian statue of Pallas the garments were golden, but the face was of ivory. These golden features of the Republic are marred in their effect by the incident and reflected lights, and much of their beauty is lost.

Most of the open-air statuary in this magnificent quadrangle is good, though I think the groups that ornament the pavilions of the Administration Building [3] are somewhat too much like the violent, acrobatic conceptions of old Bernini [4],—he who designed the Fountain of Trevi in Rome. And the array of figures that surmount the colonnade on the Lake suffer by the discovery that they are all thrice or four times repeated.[5] The same criticism applies to the groups of yoked oxen and drivers which are multiplied over the Agricultural Building.[6] They are identical; and they also are devoid of artistic interest or merit. No such creatures as these horned beasts were ever seen in life. But, to atone for it, the gigantic figures of bulls and horses on the margins of the Lagoon are finely done.[7] On the various bridges, as I have remarked elsewhere, are the matchless creations of Edward Kemeys,—the bears, the bison, and the panthers. The more one studies these, the more marvellous seem the art and knowledge that gave them existence. Kemeys is less sensational than his only rival, Barye [8], and more true to nature, and more subtle in the expressions he conveys. By the bye, it seems to me little less than deliberate cruelty on the part of the Art Directory to place side by side with these masterpieces by Kemeys the amorphous and anomalous concoctions of the unfortunate young man who got the commission for the polar bear, the elk, and the jaguar [9]. It would be cruelty in me to comment further upon them. Kemeys is a great artist: the kindest thing to be done for the other gentleman is to forbear mentioning his name.

I am glad I first came here in winter, while the interior of the Buildings was as yet clear of “exhibits.” Those who have never seen their stupendous emptiness have lost a unique sensation. Those illimitable, bare floors, stretching away to horizons on all sides, with only, insignificant atomies of men crawling over them here and there, have now disappeared under the piled-up confusion of the minor structures. The impression now conveyed is that of little cities, walled in and roofed over. Necessarily, all architectural harmony is at an end. You must give that up, and apply your mind to detail. Of course, no conceivable “exhibit” could compare in beauty with the vast white palaces which house them. They are on another plane altogether. But, when you have adapted yourself to the situation, there is no denying that the “exhibits” are of absorbing interest. They grow upon you; they exhaust you, and yet they lead you on. You cover miles of ground without knowing it—until you get home! On a careful calculation, I found that I walked certainly not less than fifteen miles during each day of my visits to the Fair. You can be wheeled in a chair, if you like; but no one who has both a soul and legs will endure to do that. Many who have only legs, or only a soul, do.

The fact is, the Fair is both too large, and too small. It is too small for the exhibitors, and too large for the visitors. No one pair of eyes can even see it all in six months: as to digesting what you see, that is out of the question. For here are amassed samples of everything that the civilized world produces. There is too much of it; but it cannot be helped, for the reason is that the civilized world has grown too large. It is so large that the barest epitome of it is practically unmanageable. In future years it will be worse still; and the only solution of the difficulty that I can propose is, that a continuous World’s Fair should be established, in some convenient place, permanently accessible to the public, and to be enlarged and modified as occasion may demand. When our flying-machines [10] are perfected, we can get to the central point easily, and the only precaution to be observed will be to select a site where the Fair can indefinitely expand.

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NOTES

1. Hawthorne never names the subject of his article, his “Lady of the Lake.” She is Columbia, the central figure in the MacMonnies Fountain.

2. Early designs of the Statue of the Republic called for her arms and face to be ivory in color, but this was not the final design. Several histories of the Columbian Exposition repeat this error in describing the statue’s appearance.

3. Sculptural work for the Administration Building was executed by Karl Bitter.

4. The Trevi Fountain in Rome (famously appearing in Roman Holiday and Federico Fellini’s La Dolce Vita) was designed by Nicola Salvi and completed by Giuseppe Pannini. Gian Lorenzo Bernini prepared sketch for a fountain more than a century earlier.

5. Sculptor Theodore Baur provided the figures surmounting the Peristyle (which Hawthorne calls “the colonnade on the Lake”), Casino, and Music Hall.

6. The sculptures of yoked oxen on the Agriculture Building were by Philip Martiny.

7. Bulls with Maiden by Daniel Chester French and Edward Potter stood in front of the Agriculture Building. Bronze castings today adorn Garfield Park in Chicago.

8. French sculptor Antoine-Louis Barye (1795–1875) specialized in animal sculptures.

9. The unnamed “unfortunate young man” earning Hawthorne’s scorn was thirty-three-year-old Alexander Phimister Proctor, developed into renowned artist and one of the nation’s foremost animal sculptors.

10. Machine-powered flight was still a decade away.