Victorian Visual Culture

SALOMÉ

I am ready, Tetrarch.

[Salomé dances the dance of the seven veils.]

HEROD

Ah! wonderful! wonderful! You see that she has danced for me, your daughter. Come near, Salomé, come near, that I may give you your reward. Ah! I pay the dancers well. I will pay thee royally. I will give thee whatsoever thy soul desireth. What wouldst thou have? Speak.

SALOMÉ

[Kneeling].

I would that they presently bring me in a silver charger….

HEROD

[Laughing.]

In a silver charger? Surely yes, in a silver charger. She is charming, is she not? What is it you would have in a silver charger, O sweet and fair Salomé, you who are fairer than all the daughters of Judæa? What would you have them bring thee in a silver charger? Tell me. Whatsoever it may be, they shall give it you. My treasures belong to thee. What is it, Salomé?

SALOMÉ

[Rising].

The head of Jokanaan.

The Dance of the Seven Veils is a great mystery; it is not described explicitly, and it is not even called as such in its original Biblical context. When the veil is thin, some sort of truth is close—through seven, though, nothing is clear. Wilde’s Salomé is chock-full of what can be seen set right against what cannot be seen. Throughout the work, we are constantly reminded of (or bombarded with, more like) Salomé’s beauty: her fair skin, her supposed sweetness. In a course on visuality it is striking to address a work that has visual absence at its core just as much as visual presence. What is left to the imagination is the very heart of the story.

Salomé’s dance has been interpreted in a variety of ways, through a variety of mediums — paintings, theatrical productions, operas. We assume that it must be seductive, that she is enticing and beguiling. It, after all, earns her the favor of Herod. Maybe she twirls, lifts the veils up and around her body, gestures towards herself suggestively; with each raise of the fabric, she is obscured farther while making herself a spectacle all at once. She emerges from the shroud of fabric around her, kneeling before her stepfather and preparing to ask for her promised reward. What use is it that we never see the dance? The steps she takes, the music that might’ve played for her to move to. The very thing which seals the fate of Jokanaan is never discussed in detail. 

What we do see, though, reveals more about what we cannot; Salomé’s first wish is a silver plate. She begins with the set dressing: a pedestal to put her prize upon. The silver charger she requests is not described in detail but we know its color, can perhaps infer that it shines, and also can assume that it’s round in shape (as charger plates tend to be). There is something familiar about this, especially given one of the images the play continuously circles back to: the moon. Bright, silver, beautiful, and now being prepared for all to view. Salomé plays with truth and falsity, the seen and unseen, the known and unknown, and first demands that which reflects something which looms large over the story. Her stepfather pushes; “What is it you would have in a silver charger…?” (Wilde) You have shown me what cannot be repeated; you have earned any and every wish. You would like the moon, and I shall grant it—but this is not enough. What shall I place upon the moon for all to see, for you? Clearly it was quite the performance.

 Salomé stands from her kneeling position to assert her last wish, one which dooms both Jokanaan and herself: she wants his head. Salomé begins the play like the moon, fair and for all to see. Highly visible, yet mysterious. The dance, in its secrecy, is an unveiling just as much as it is a veiling (seven times over), and it is what gives her the power to forsake her stationary, to-be-seen-only status. Now Jokanaan’s head is held aloft, he can be placed on the silver platter, and Salomé herself can master the moon.

Sources:

Wilde, Oscar. “Salomé.” The Project Gutenberg eBook of Salomé, by Oscar Wilde., http://www.gutenberg.org/files/42704/42704-h/42704-h.htm. Accessed 12 December 2025