Restoration England. Charles II, the Arts, and Pornography

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Description

This program is not for those who attach fig leaves to Michelangelos. The historical fact is that the pendulum in 17th-century England made some wide sweeps, from the Virgin Queen to the witch-loving James I, the beheaded Charles I, the Puritans, and the final counter-swing, the ultimate negation of Puritanism: the Restoration. Charles II was a libertine, rake, roue, and the model of sexual excess for his countrymen. The chronicler of London, Samuel Pepys, collected erotica; Henry Purcell, composer of some of England's loftiest anthems, wrote bawdy ballads. The program shows some of the excesses of this period, sometimes executed with great artistry, more often not. Regardless, the role of sex in Restoration England cannot be downplayed-politically, because it was the king who created and dominated the style, and artistically, because this was the way station between the lofty Metaphysical poets and the loftier Age of Reason.