ABSTRACT
The life and art of Michelangelo was dominated by the problem of struggle. Throughout his entire life, Michelangelo was in desperate fight with everybody, including himself: a struggle for recognition, a struggle to outdo everyone else, then to outdo himself. He might have been predisposed to such a dogged Crusade against the entire world by aspects of biography: an old aristocratic family related even to the Canossa counts, but losing most of its prestige and wealth over the centuries; a father trying to maintain appearances and never at peace with his son’s odd profession, even after Michelangelo had become one of the most famous persons of his times; having as wet-nurse the wife of a stone-cutter which – as Michelangelo firmly believed – had a lot to do with his vocation (Goffen 2002: 82); or inclinations towards homosexuality.
