SUPERBIA

Pride: O image in the looking glass / A black tail hangs down from your ass!

L'Orgueil: Image dans le miroir, / C'est toi à la queue noire !

"L'Orgueil" (Pride) is the most polyphonic of all the variations, and constitutes, in fact, a fughetta in which the original theme is truncated and presented as a subject to be "mirrored" in all the voices, just as the vain woman wearing a showy headdress in Bosch's painting sees herself reflected in the mirror held up to her by her alter ego—a black-tailed demon in the same headdress. The music here, though elegant, is extraordinarily ornate, as Bosch's prideful woman is given to the outward display of her finery and rich ornaments.