From Ovid’s Metamorphoses to Goethe’s Faust, here are eight classic works of literature accompanied by superb paintings and illustrations. All free.
Ariosto
Orlando discovers that Angelica has already married, and goes mad. Paintings by Delacroix, Böcklin, frescoes and Doré’s prints.
Summary of the plot in the first half of Ariosto’s epic, with links to detailed accounts, and paintings by Delacroix, Rubens, Böcklin, Ingres and others.
Leon takes Ruggiero back to Paris and confesses his deception to Charlemagne. At Bradamante and Ruggiero’s wedding banquet a black knight shows up, bringing more trouble.
Ruggiero is thrown into jail, about to be cruelly killed, when his opponent for the hand of Bradamante helps him escape. Things then go from bad to worse.
The burial of Brandimarte, and death of his wife. After that, Charlemagne celebrates the triumph of his paladins, before Ruggiero and Bradamante’s marriage is called off.
Rinaldo is told of two stories about unfaithfulness and the tricks husbands and wives use to catch one another out.
Orlando quickly finishes off Agramante and Gradasso. Rinaldo’s love for Angelica has become an obsession, and he sets off to find her in the east.
While Ruggiero ends up shipwrecked on a rock, Orlando and his team of paladins face combat with Agramante on the island of Lampedusa.
As Agramante looks for a way out, Orlando leads an assault on the city of Biserta, which destroys it. But what plan is Agramante hatching against Orlando?
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