雙語+MP3|美國學(xué)生世界歷史66 再生

66
Rebirth
再生

     HERE is a long word for you; it is Renaissance.
     It means rebirth.
     Of course, nothing can be born again. But people call this time we have now reached the Renaissance, the time of rebirth. Here is the reason why they call it that.
     You remember the Age of Pericles, don't you, when such beautiful sculptures and buildings were made in Athens? Well, in the fifteen hundreds not everyone was rushing off to the New World in search of adventure. While the voyages that I have told you about were taking place, there were living and working in Italy some of the greatest artists the world has ever known.
     Architects built beautiful buildings something like the old Greek and Roman temples. Sculptors made statues that were almost as beautiful as those of Phidias. People began to take an interest once more in the old Greek writers, whose books were now printed for everyone to read. It seemed almost as if Athens in the Age of Pericles had been born again. That is why people speak of this time as the Renaissance.
     One of the greatest of these artists of the Renaissance was a man named Michelangelo. But Michelangelo was not just a painter; he was a sculptor, an architect, and a poet as well. Michelangelo thought nothing of spending years working on any statue or painting that he was doing. When he had finished, he had done something that people even now go from all over the world to see.
     Nowadays, sculptors first model a statue in clay and then copy it in stone or cast it in bronze, but Michelangelo did not do this. He cut his figures directly out of the stone, without making a model first. It was as if he saw the figure imprisoned in the stone and then cut away the part that closed the figure in.
     A large block of marble had been spoiled by another sculptor. Michelangelo saw a figure of David in it, and, setting to work, he cut this young athlete out.
     He made also a statue of Moses sitting down. It is now in a church in Rome, and when you walk up to it, it is so lifelike that it seems as if you were in the presence of the prophet Moses himself. The guide tells you that when Michelangelo had finished this statue of Moses he was so thrilled by the figure he had created that, feeling it must come to life, he struck it on the knee with his hammer and commanded as he did so, "Stand up!" And then the guide shows you a crack in the marble to prove that the story is true!

Michelangelo at work（米開朗基羅在工作）
     The pope wanted Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. This is the pope's private chapel in Rome. At first Michelangelo didn't want to do the painting. He told the pope he was a sculptor and not a painter. But the pope insisted, and Michelangelo at last gave in. Once having agreed to do the work, however, Michelangelo gave himself to it heart and soul.
     For four years he lived in this room-the Sistine Chapel-and hardly ever left it day or night. Beneath the ceiling, he built himself a platform, and lying on this scaffold, he would read poetry and the Bible and work as the spirit moved him. Locking himself in, he would let no one enter, not even the pope himself. He wanted to be alone and to be left alone.
     One day the pope, finding a door left open went into the chapel to see how things were getting along. Michelangelo, thereupon, accidentally dropped some of his tools, and they just barely missed hitting the pope on the head. The pope was very angry, but he never returned uninvited again.
     People now go from all over the world to see this ceiling, which only can be viewed comfortably by lying on the floor or by looking at it in a mirror.
     Michelangelo lived to be nearly ninety years old, yet he had very little to do with people. He could not stand being bored by them. He lived apart, in the company of the gods and angels that he painted.
     Raphael was another famous Italian artist. He lived at the same time as Michelangelo. Raphael, however, was just the opposite of Michelangelo in most ways. Michelangelo liked to be by himself. Raphael loved company. He was very popular and constantly surrounded by his friends and admirers, for everybody loved him on account of his genius and kindly nature. Young men swarmed about him, drinking in his words and humbly copying everything he did. He had fifty or more pupils studying and painting under him, and they went along with him whenever he went out even for a walk. They almost worshiped the ground he walked on.
     Raphael painted many beautiful pictures. One of the best known is School of Athens. He painted many pictures of the Virgin Mary with the infant Jesus. These are called Madonnas. One of the best known of these pictures of Mary and the Christ child is called Sistine Madonna. It was painted for a little church, but it is now in a great picture-gallery.
     Raphael died when he was still a young man, but he worked so hard and so continuously that he has left a large number of pictures. He painted only the very important parts of his pictures himself-perhaps only the faces. The bodies and hands and clothing he usually left to be painted by his pupils. They were glad to be allowed to do even a finger of a painting on which their master had worked.
     Leonardo da Vinci is another great artist who lived at this time. He could do any number of things exceptionally well. He would be called a jack-of all-trades, but unlike most jacks-of-all-trades, he was good at everything. He was an artist, an engineer, a poet, and a scientist. He made, however, very few paintings, because he did so many things besides, but these few pictures are beautiful and famous. One of these is The Last Supper. It is considered, as is the Sistine Madonna, one of the greatest paintings in the world. Unfortunately, it was painted directly on a plastered wall, and in the course of time much of the plaster with the paint has peeled off, so that there was little left of the original painting. Recently this painting was restored. The colors were brightened up so, once again, we can see its full beauty.
     Leonardo usually painted his women smiling. One of his most famous paintings is the picture of a woman called Mona Lisa. She has a smile that is called quizzical. You can hardly tell whether she is smiling at you or with you.