Sherlock Holmes and the Secret of The Name of the Rose—Post 8

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I own three copies of The Name of the Rose.

The trade paperback pictured above includes

the author's Postscript, which is most

enlightening. In the middle of this post is the

fine hardcover Everyman’s Library edition.

And at the end of the post is the first version

that I read in the 1980s, the first massmarket

paperback.

The question is often asked, “Why did Umberto Eco chose the title ‘The Name of the Rose’ for his first novel?” The answer to this question may be of especial interest because the only substantive reference to a rose in the entire 560-page book is in the last sentence: “It is cold in the scriptorium, my thumb aches. I leave this manuscript, I do not know for whom; I no longer know what it is about: stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus.” (“Yesterday’s rose endures in its name, we hold empty names.”)

Eco’s own explanation in his ‘Postscript to The Name of the Rose’ does little to lift the veil from this enigma. Despite saying many things that frustratingly circle round and round a concrete answer, the most that Eco is willing to say is that the concept of “rose” has bifurcated so many times that it really doesn’t mean anything at all any more. In his words: "The idea of calling my book “The Name of the Rose” came to me... because the rose is a symbolic figure so rich in meanings that by now it hardly has any meaning left..."

On another track, as long as “The Name of the Rose” has been available in English, I’ve been a bit annoyed that I’ve encountered through all these thirty-eight years since publication, little or no credence of the simplest of facts: “The Name of the Rose” is first and foremost a Sherlock Holmes pastiche—right up there with “The Seven-Per-Cent Solution”, “Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula”, and “The Beekeeper’s Apprentice”. Indeed, my library includes a number of books by Eco and about Eco, and any such clear declaration has successfully avoided my earnest attention. Yes, of course, most professional reviewers, throughout these almost four decades, mention that the novel is a mystery set in 1327, and most mention Eco's debt to Arthur Conan Doyle…but most such reviewers seem obligated to muddy the waters by referencing in the same breath Bacon, St. Augustine, Aquinas, and Aristotle. It’s as if they either cannot admit, or admit in public, that the novel is at heart obviously and principally a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes. 

The main character’s name is “William of Baskerville,” and it’s unlikely many would miss the Baskerville reference to Holmes’ most renowned novel; but, likewise, it is just as unlikely that most readers would know the source of “William”. The late Holmesian scholar William Baring-Gould, who imaginatively "filled out" Sherlock Holmes's life and who was so respected for his efforts that his extrapolations were considered very nearly Canon by many of his generation, tells us in his biography of the sleuth—“Sherlock Holmes on Baker Street”—that Holmes's parents had three boys, Sherrinford in 1845, Mycroft in 1847, and Sherlock seven years later. Holmes' father wished to name their third-born son after the 17th century theologian William Sherlock, but his mother preferred naming the child after her favorite author, Sir Walter Scott. "At last," says Baring-Gould, "a compromise was arrived at. The boy was baptized William Sherlock Scott Holmes." Of course, Umberto Eco, polymath and erudite scholar that he was, would have known this. Thus, William of Baskerville, is without doubt a 14th century version of Sherlock Holmes, period. Bacon, Aquinas, St. Augustine, and Aristotle are window dressing in my view.

Thus, this week, while focusing on a Sherlock Holmes project, and of course always being fully aware of the mystery surrounding Eco’s title, I began to wonder if the book title “The Name of the Rose” might have something directly to do with Sherlock Holmes. I pulled out my reference books, opened up my search engines, always looking for a literary point where Holmes and “The Name of the Rose” crossed paths. In due course, I felt my research hit pay dirt! “The Story of the Bald-Headed Man,” the fourth chapter of Doyle’s novel “The Sign of the Four” includes an enigmatic aside spoken by one Mr. Thaddeus Sholto. By way of explaining his nontraditional surroundings Sholto says, ‘I have a natural shrinking from all forms of rough materialism…. I live, as you see, with some little atmosphere of elegance around me. I may call myself a patron of the arts. It is my weakness. The landscape [on that wall] is a genuine Corot, and, though a connoisseur might perhaps throw a doubt upon that Salvator Rosa, there cannot be the least question about the Bouguereau. I am partial to the modern French school."

Salvator Rosa’s “Allegory of Fortune” (1658-59)

The reference to “Salvator Rosa” would be to an unspecified painting in Sholto’s possession by the seventeenth-century Neapolitan painter, Salvator Rosa. It occurred to me that the “Rose” in the title “The Name of the Rose”, might be intentionally misleading.  

Perhaps the “Rose” in the title was intended to be read as “Rosa” (the word as it appeared in the original title, “Il nome della rosa”), and thus a reference to the painter much in the manner we would talk about a Rembrant or a Picasso. In other words, “The Name of the Rose” could be “The Name of the Rosa” referring to some specific Rosa painting. After all, the semilogist who wrote such an amazing novel so full of symbolism and signs, could well have titled it just so, so as to add one last layer of literary mystery.

Playing this hunch and using the Internet I quickly found the perfect candidate for the Rosa, if a Rosa was being referred to: it would be the painting housed at the Getty Museum that is called “Allegory of Fortune,” which would be a perfectly reasonable title for Eco’s novel. But what cinched it for me is the brief description of the painting that is posted on the Getty site ( http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=781 ):

“A personification of Fortune bestows symbols of wealth, status, and power on dumb animals who neither need nor deserve them…. The beasts, portrayed with stark realism, trample the attributes of art and learning, including books and a palette. Draped in the cardinal red of the Catholic Church, an ass shields an owl, the symbol for wisdom, from the light. Bitter over his exclusion from papal patronage, Rosa included personal references: a book bearing his monogram and a pig stepping on a rose, which alludes to his name. As a satire of Pope Alexander VII's nepotistic artistic patronage, this painting nearly sent Rosa to prison. After showing it privately in his studio, he flagrantly disregarded all advice and exhibited it publicly in the Pantheon in 1659. Allegory of Fortune aroused such a furor that only intervention by the pope's brother saved him…. Fortune is usually represented with a blindfold, but Salvator Rosa showed her fully aware of her favors. Similarly, the cornucopia is usually shown facing upward; by depicting it overturned, Rosa expressed reckless extravagance”
 
Thus, it may be that for Eco, the name of the Rosa was “Allegory of Fortune.” 

THOMAS KENT MILLER
By Thomas Kent Miller
(copyright © 2018 Thomas Kent Miller)

 

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