RAGE IN SILENCE

The life and times and to a lesser degree, the works of Goya, in Mr. Braider's second reconstruction (El Greco in Color From A Light Within, 1967) which goes on at greater length with somewhat less interest. Mr. Braider begins his novel at mid-point in the life of the artist, a man of peasant origins and untrammeled lusts, after Goya underwent the illness which left him temporarily blind and permanently deaf. While violating his long-suffering wife Josefa with ""more fury than desire,"" his inclinations were dulled until he was summoned by the Duchess of Alba to paint her portrait and become her lover in residence for one year although the relationship endured for much longer. At its close there was the long period of the Napoleonic wars and his own troubles at court--the former recorded in his important series Los Desastres de la Guerra. At the death of the Duchess of Alba, he took on the strumpet Leocadia, fathered the little girl he loved considerably more, and in the later, more somber, period is seen turning toward his private ""black paintings"" as well as religious art of much stronger feeling and significance.... The Longstreet purlieu--which owes as much to the author's imagination (in factitious scenes and dialogue) as to the original source of inspiration.