Review: Sir John Vanbrugh: Storyteller in Stone, by Vaughan Hart

Abstract

Book Review| June 01 2010 Review: Sir John Vanbrugh: Storyteller in Stone, by Vaughan Hart Vaughan Hart; Sir John Vanbrugh: Storyteller in Stone. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2008, 288 pp., 198 color and 169 b/w illus. $65, ISBN 9780300119299 Anthony Geraghty Anthony Geraghty University of York, England Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians (2010) 69 (2): 276–277. https://doi.org/10.1525/jsah.2010.69.2.276 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Anthony Geraghty; Review: Sir John Vanbrugh: Storyteller in Stone, by Vaughan Hart. Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 1 June 2010; 69 (2): 276–277. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/jsah.2010.69.2.276 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentJournal of the Society of Architectural Historians Search Sir John Vanbrugh (1664–1726) was by turns a merchant, soldier, playwright, architect, and herald. But he is best remembered as the architect of Castle Howard, Blenheim Palace, and numerous other country houses in England. The pattern of Vanbrugh's career, therefore, invites the challenge of relating architecture to other things. Vaughan Hart's new book attempts to understand "the interrelationship of Vanbrugh's diverse interests" (xiv). In particular, Hart sets Vanbrugh's architecture against the plays and, more broadly, against the literary culture of late Stuart and early Georgian England. All Vanbrugh scholars—Hart included—quote Jonathan Swift: "Van's genius, without thought or lecture" was "hugely turned to architecture" (29). These lines, however, have surely exaggerated the significance of Vanbrugh's amateurism. The same could be said of Christopher Wren, Robert Hooke, Roger Pratt, and William Talman. The myth of Vanbrugh's amateurism, however, is central to Hart's thesis, which is broadly thus. Lacking a "formal architectural education,"... You do not currently have access to this content.