@MattЭллен @StoneyB thanks for the feedback, here is draft #2 (using Georgia instead of Baskerville, reducing the size of the bottom text, and darkening up the writing hand a little). I keep going back and forth on the spacing and the font sizes.
I'm still playing with the spacing around the text boxes
draft #3
I'm happy with that last one, if you guys are. I think it should link to the meta post, since that will give people background info and then sent them here
I've just learned something. Guys: never again pay attention to anything I say about imagery. All the versions look much better when I move them from the hires 1920x to the medres 1280x monitor. Or zoom in on the hires monitor. Bah. What's the point of a grafix-quality monitor if it makes the grafix look like shit?