Jonah Cast Up by the Fish

Gustave Doré · 1866 (designs for La Sainte Bible, Tours); this printing 1873–1874
National Library of Poland, Warsaw

Jonnard engraved this design; his name is cut at the lower right. Doré builds the plate on contrast: a black sky and dark water above, and a bright strip of surf and beach below, where the story ends.

Jonah, thrown up on the shore, clutches at the slope of the beach, his robe soaked and his hair blown back. Behind him the great fish turns back into the sea, its tail curled out of the water and a double jet of spray rising from its head. Storm clouds still hang over the horizon.

From the text

“the LORD commanded the fish” (Jonah 2:10)

“it vomited Jonah onto dry land” (Jonah 2:10)

Jonah had been inside the fish three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17)

The artist’s own

The “great fish” drawn as a whale blowing a spout, as many readers of the time imagined it

Storm clouds, though the storm in the story came before Jonah was swallowed

Jonah fully dressed, with his robe still on him

Details

Jonah

He grips the sand as he hauls himself up the beach.

The fish

A huge dark back turns away into the sea.

The spout

Two curving jets of water rise from the fish’s head.

The surf

Bright foam breaks on the shore.

Gustave Doré, French, 1832–1883. National Library of Poland (Biblioteka Narodowa), Warsaw — «Pismo Święte Starego i Nowego Testamentu», vol. 2, Warsaw: M. Glücksberg, 1874 (acc. 75.267 A) · Wood engraving after Gustave Doré’s design · National Library of Poland (Polona): the record of the volume gives the licence «Domena Publiczna» (Public Domain), «copyrightProtected»: false; the scan was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons by the library itself («Polona Upload», GLAM-Wiki partnership: “This file was uploaded to Wikimedia Commons as part of a GLAM-Wiki partnership between the National Library of Poland and Wikimedia Polska”), linking its Polona record.