Alexander Pope’s “The Trumpeter Swan”
By Joseph Stanton
Pope was a lover of animals,
he was known for portraits of dogs
as well as for still lifes
of things not alive.
When he turned
to the popular genre
known as "after the hunt,"
he displayed
the grand white expanse
of America's largest bird,
the trumpeter swan.
In Pope's depiction,
the bird hangs suspended
as in other after-the-huntings,
but, unlike the birds in Harnett,
the gorgeous wings are spread.
Pope painted this, it is said,
in protest, against the overhunting
to near extinction
of the trumpeter swan.
This painting hung
for many years
in the Society for Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals.
Pope wanted
his world to be,
it would seem, entirely
after the hunting.
"Alexander Pope's The Trumpeter Swan" appeared in Stilled Lives, copyright Joseph Stanton 2026, and is used with permission of Shanti Arts Publishing. View the painting here.
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