{"product_id":"2940012124739","title":"Leonardo da Vinci A PSYCHOSEXUAL STUDY OF AN INFANTILE REMINISCENCE","description":"When psychoanalytic investigation, which usually contents itself with\u003cbr\u003efrail human material, approaches the great personages of humanity, it is\u003cbr\u003enot impelled to it by motives which are often attributed to it by\u003cbr\u003elaymen. It does not strive \"to blacken the radiant and to drag the\u003cbr\u003esublime into the mire\"; it finds no satisfaction in diminishing the\u003cbr\u003edistance between the perfection of the great and the inadequacy of the\u003cbr\u003eordinary objects. But it cannot help finding that everything is worthy\u003cbr\u003eof understanding that can be perceived through those prototypes, and it\u003cbr\u003ealso believes that none is so big as to be ashamed of being subject to\u003cbr\u003ethe laws which control the normal and morbid actions with the same\u003cbr\u003estrictness.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eLeonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) was admired even by his contemporaries as\u003cbr\u003eone of the greatest men of the Italian Renaissance, still even then he\u003cbr\u003eappeared as mysterious to them as he now appears to us. An all-sided\u003cbr\u003egenius, \"whose form can only be divined but never deeply fathomed,\"[1]\u003cbr\u003ehe exerted the most decisive influence on his time as an artist; and it\u003cbr\u003eremained to us to recognize his greatness as a naturalist which was\u003cbr\u003eunited in him with the artist. Although he left masterpieces of the art\u003cbr\u003eof painting, while his scientific discoveries remained unpublished and\u003cbr\u003eunused, the investigator in him has never quite left the artist, often\u003cbr\u003eit has severely injured the artist and in the end it has perhaps\u003cbr\u003esuppressed the artist altogether. According to Vasari, Leonardo\u003cbr\u003ereproached himself during the last hour of his life for having insulted\u003cbr\u003eGod and men because he has not done his duty to his art.[2] And even if\u003cbr\u003eVasari's story lacks all probability and belongs to those legends which\u003cbr\u003ebegan to be woven about the mystic master while he was still living, it\u003cbr\u003enevertheless retains indisputable value as a testimonial of the judgment\u003cbr\u003eof those people and of those times.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat was it that removed the personality of Leonardo from the\u003cbr\u003eunderstanding of his contemporaries? Certainly not the many sidedness of\u003cbr\u003ehis capacities and knowledge, which allowed him to install himself as a\u003cbr\u003eplayer of the lyre on an instrument invented by himself, in the court of\u003cbr\u003eLodovico Sforza, nicknamed Il Moro, the Duke of Milan, or which allowed\u003cbr\u003ehim to write to the same person that remarkable letter in which he\u003cbr\u003eboasts of his abilities as a civil and military engineer. For the\u003cbr\u003ecombination of manifold talents in the same person was not unusual in\u003cbr\u003ethe times of the Renaissance; to be sure Leonardo himself furnished one\u003cbr\u003eof the most splendid examples of such persons. Nor did he belong to that\u003cbr\u003etype of genial persons who are outwardly poorly endowed by nature, and\u003cbr\u003ewho on their side place no value on the outer forms of life, and in the\u003cbr\u003epainful gloominess of their feelings fly from human relations. On the\u003cbr\u003econtrary he was tall and symmetrically built, of consummate beauty of\u003cbr\u003ecountenance and of unusual physical strength, he was charming in his\u003cbr\u003emanner, a master of speech, and jovial and affectionate to everybody. He\u003cbr\u003eloved beauty in the objects of his surroundings, he was fond of wearing\u003cbr\u003emagnificent garments and appreciated every refinement of conduct. In his\u003cbr\u003etreatise[3] on the art of painting he compares in a significant passage\u003cbr\u003ethe art of painting with its sister arts and thus discusses the\u003cbr\u003edifficulties of the sculptor: \"Now his face is entirely smeared and\u003cbr\u003epowdered with marble dust, so that he looks like a baker, he is covered\u003cbr\u003ewith small marble splinters, so that it seems as if it snowed on his\u003cbr\u003eback, and his house is full of stone splinters, and dust. The case of\u003cbr\u003ethe painter is quite different from that; for the painter is well\u003cbr\u003edressed and sits with great comfort before his work, he gently and very\u003cbr\u003elightly brushes in the beautiful colors. He wears as decorative clothes\u003cbr\u003eas he likes, and his house is filled with beautiful paintings and is\u003cbr\u003espotlessly clean. He often enjoys company, music, or some one may read\u003cbr\u003efor him various nice works, and all this can be listened to with great\u003cbr\u003epleasure, undisturbed by any pounding from the hammer and other noises.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt is quite possible that the conception of a beaming jovial and happy\u003cbr\u003eLeonardo was true only for the first and longer period of the master's\u003cbr\u003elife. From now on, when the downfall of the rule of Lodovico Moro forced\u003cbr\u003ehim to leave Milan, his sphere of action and his assured position, to\u003cbr\u003elead an unsteady and unsuccessful life until his last asylum in France,\u003cbr\u003eit is possible that the luster of his disposition became pale and some\u003cbr\u003eodd features of his character became more prominent. The turning of his\u003cbr\u003einterest from his art to science which increased with age must have also\u003cbr\u003ebeen responsible for widening the gap between himself and his\u003cbr\u003econtemporaries. All his effo","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47068350710000,"sku":"2940012124739","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012124739_p0.jpg?v=1763552748","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012124739","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}