Monday, September 13, 2010

Pena

The Palace of Pena in Lisbon was built in the 1800s over the ruins of a monastery destroyed in the earthquake of 1755. What an amazing building. Like Neuschwanstein in Bavaria, it is a work of the Romantic imagination that captures the fantasy of the castle rather than its reality. When I look at this I see an alchemist wearing starry robes at work in a chamber full of retorts, astrolabes, and more obscure instruments, high in a tower, shaping the destiny of kingdoms.

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