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Chapter 10: Somewhere in the Darkness
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Marriage Portrait, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Art, Voyeurism, and Control
Duality and Identity
Gender Roles, Male Violence, and Female Solidarity
Primal Freedom vs. Civilized Imprisonment
Destiny vs. Chance
Summary
Analysis
On Lucrezia’s wedding day in 1560, her room is filled with servants bustling about and getting her ready. They plait her hair while the wedding dress lies on the bed. One scarred maid (Emilia) is gentler than the rest. Lucrezia wishes she could be alone with her thoughts and that she could paint the lilies in her bouquet. The servants are anxious—Eleonora instructed them to make Lucrezia look like a duchess, because that is what she will be. The late Duke of Ferrara (Alfonso’s father) is dead, and he has returned from France to fill his shoes. There was much celebratory entertainment last night, but she was not allowed to attend, as it is improper for the bride to be seen.
Juxtaposing this busy scene with the prior one, in which a lonely Lucrezia fights to stay alive, the novel shows how much Lucrezia’s life has changed from the beginning of her marriage. Here, she longs to be alone to paint, as she is far more comfortable in the role of observer than being observed. Though Lucrezia’s appearance is of the utmost importance, she again feels objectified, this time by the servants attending her. That she is not allowed to enjoy her own wedding entertainment again demonstrates how little agency she has in her own life.
Active
Themes
Lucrezia’s veil is affixed to her hair, which has never been cut. She recalls Sofia’s advice for the wedding night: to submit, something Lucrezia has always struggled with. The servants encase her in the lavish wedding gown. The maid with the scar (Emilia) seems to feel sorry for her. Lucrezia makes her way through the palace, passing by Maria’s old chambers, whose doors are inexplicably open. She feels the urge to double back and make sure her sister is not inside, and senses that everyone watching her feels it should be Maria in this dress, not her. Lucrezia wants to run as Vitelli escorts her downstairs.
Sofia’s advice recalls Eleonora’s submission to Cosimo’s sexual advances in an earlier chapter, reflecting the patriarchal views that women exist to satisfy men’s pleasure. Notoriously rebellious, Lucrezia worries she will not be able to conform to the role of submissive wife. The pity she reads on Emilia’s face suggests that other women recognize Lucrezia’s entrapment but are equally powerless to help her. Desperate for escape, Lucrezia looks—impossibly—for Maria. Her sister’s absence seals her fate, even as Lucrezia suspects everyone is thinking of her as a poor substitute.
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Vitelli guides Lucrezia through the palace’s gates out into the piazza, where a crowd of Florentines are waiting and cheering for her. She is hoisted into an open-top carriage, where her parents are waiting. Eleonora remarks that the dress suits her and demands a kiss. She smiles at the crowd while Cosimo nods gravely as they move through the city. Lucrezia becomes aware of her “fraught and frayed” bond with her mother, and wishes she could rectify it before her childhood ends and she is sent away. She wants to remind Eleonora of the little animals and the art tutoring—tokens of her mother’s love.
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Feeling there is no time to say everything she wants to, Lucrezia asks Eleonora if she loved Cosimo straight away. Eleonora reveals that she saw Cosimo see her in Naples, that she knew then “how things would be.” Lucrezia feels she is least-loved by her parents. But it does not matter anymore, because she is about to start a new life. She enters the church in awe of its opulent interior. Though she longs to paint it, she takes solace in the thought that nothing bad can happen in such a beautiful space. Her father leads her to the altar, where a strong hand takes hers, its owner obscured by her veil. She realizes it is Alfonso, in the flesh.
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The marriage ceremony begins. Alfonso lifts Lucrezia’s veil. They stand together before the priest, who drones on about God and unions. Lucrezia is preoccupied by Alfonso’s presence, his large body. She looks up into his face and sees that he, too, is bored and amused by the priest’s ramblings. This makes Lucrezia smile, as does his repeated impression of a mouse. She wants to ask how he remembers that moment, and whether he wishes Maria were here instead of her. Outside the church, Alfonso asks about the stone marten portrait, and if the painted creature will live happily in Ferrara. Lucrezia thinks she will.
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