The psychological and religious introspection seen in Eliot's other novels is also seen in Romola. Richard Hutton, writing in The Spectator, in 1863, observed that "[t]he greatest artistic purpose of the story is to trace out the conflict between liberal culture and the more passionate form of the Christian faith in that strange era, which has so many points of resemblance with the present". [4] The spiritual journey undertaken by the title character in some ways emulates Eliot's own religious struggle. In Romola, the title character has a non-religious and scholarly, yet insular, upbringing. She is gradually exposed to the wider religious world, which impacts her life at fortuitous moments. Yet continued immersion in religious life highlights its incompatibility with her own virtues, and by the end of the story she has adopted a humanist, empathic middle ground. [5] Literary significance and criticism [ edit ]

If you do not want us to use your data for our or third parties you will have the opportunity to withhold your consent to this when you provide your details to us on the form on which we collect your data. Why feature Romola in a celebration of the 200th anniversary of George Eliot’s birth? As an historical novel, it is atypical of Eliot’s output, and is the least popular of Eliot’s major works. Nello the barber – Florentine barber, who fancies his establishment as a meeting place for the Florentine intelligentsia and a forum for political and philosophical discussion. He is a staunch supporter of Tito Melema. Levine, Caroline, and Mark W. Turner, eds. 1998. From author to text: Re-reading George Eliot’s Romola. London: Ashgate. Blumberg, Ilana M. 2013. Sacrificial Value: Beyond the Cash Nexus in George Eliot’s Romola. In Economic Women: Essays on Desire and Dispossession in Nineteenth-Century British Culture, ed. Lana L. Dalley and Jill Rappoport, 60–76. Columbus: Ohio State University Press.There are other minor irritants – such as the feeble illustrations, which are mostly borrowed from cheap Victorian editions of the novels. Yet Carlisle has produced a richly considered study that brings one close to the heart and mind of a great writer and a wise soul. The information that we collect and store relating to you is primarily used to enable us to provide our services to you. In addition, we may use the information for the following purposes: She began writing on 1 January 1862 and finished on 9 June 1863, having taken some time off to write Silas Marner in the middle. Eliot found the process stressful, not least because (unlike her previous novels) she wrote it for serial instalments in the Cornhill Magazine from July 1862 until August 1863, so had to come to terms with the rhythms of serial publication. Showalter, Elaine (1999). A Literature of Their Own. Writers in Their Time. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-00476-5.

Romola was the only George Eliot novel illustrated in its first edition, and this gallery, curated in collaboration with the George Eliot Archive, features the original illustrations by Sir Frederic Leighton. Eliot had requested that a talented artist illustrate the novel, and Leighton was known for his historical genre paintings, especially his Florentine Renaissance scenes. He seemed an ideal illustrator for a novel set in fifteenth-century Florence. While Eliot was pleased with his work overall, there were some conflicts. At one point, she wrote to Leighton, "I am quite convinced that illustrations can only form a sort of overture to the text" (Barrington 1906, 4: 55-56). We invite you to consider the relationship between text and image-- as well as the relationship between an author and an artist corresponding throughout the installments of a serial publication-- and we offer this gallery as an artifact for multi-disciplinary inquiries in Victorian studies.The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot. Photograph: Wordsworth Classics The one to make you laugh out loud The Florence of Savonarola— a world of vibrant life, evil, and tumult overshadowed by the dark figure of the great Dominican — is the scene of this unusual novel by George Eliot. Bardo de' Bardi – Blind classical scholar living in Florence. He has one estranged son, Dino, and a daughter, Romola. Bardo is a descendant of the once-powerful Bardi family, but is living in poverty with his daughter, who helps him with his classical studies. He is an ally of the Medici family. He maintains a classical library, and tries to preserve it beyond his own death. The novel first appeared in fourteen parts published in Cornhill Magazine from July 1862 (vol. 6, no. 31) to August 1863 (vol. 8, no. 44), and was first published as a book, in three volumes, by Smith, Elder & Co. in 1863. Before I critique this book, I have to critique this cover. Eliot could not make it clearer that Romola is a blonde. Her golden hair is referenced over and over again. Who is the dufus who chose this cover photo? Sorry, but all Italians must be raven-haired? I’m not thinking Eliot would have been impressed.

Romola is the only work by George Eliot in the Durning-Lawrence Library, which is largely devoted to Sir Francis Bacon in the widest sense. It does also hold a few specimens of current literature read by its Victorian/Edwardian owners. Romola, set in Renaissance Florence, is Eliot’s challenging middle work. Written in the 1860s, its tall, dreamy, red-haired heroine would not be out of place in a pre-Raphaelite painting. In this ambitious novel Eliot flexed her creative powers, assembling a hybrid cast of fictional and historical characters – the philosopher Niccolò Machiavelli, the artist Piero di Cosimo, the firebrand monk Savonarola. Impress your friends by explaining how this highbrow novel uses its 15th-century setting to explore grand Victorian themes: the loss of faith, the fragility of patriarchal power. Just make sure you pronounce “Romola” right – as Eliot told one of her fans, stress the first syllable, and the second “o” is short. (Think “gondola”, not “tombola”.) Later, as he walks through the crowded streets, Tito rescues Tessa from some jostling revelers. When he leaves her, he meets the strange monk he had seen gazing at him from the crowd earlier in the afternoon. The monk, Fra Luca, gives him a note that has been brought from a pilgrim in the Near East; Tito wonders why he finds the monk’s face so familiar. The note is from Baldassare, who pleads with Tito to rescue him from slavery. Unwilling to give up his happy life in Florence, Tito ignores his foster father’s plea. To provide you with information requested from us, relating to our products or services. To provide information on other products which we feel may be of interest to you, where you have consented to receive such information. Its dense language has tested the patience of readers from the time of its publication. But the author herself said of it, “I swear by every sentence as having been written with my best blood.”A dramatic, sometimes melodramatic story unfolds, fluently and persuasively written. Savonarola becomes the dominating presence; around him Eliot has assembled a cast of characters whose lives are influenced in one way or another by him. Central is Romola de'Bardi, who in one sense is the Blessed Damozel of the Pre-Raphaelites and in another, the dutiful daughter trying to define herself in a world of male authority. The key question becomes 'where the duty of obedience ends and the duty of resistance begins' - 'two kinds of faithfulness' that preoccupied Eliot. She draws on all that she had learned from Feuerbach and Auguste Comte on the 'religion of humanity' to make these notions flesh and blood in her characterisations. Arguably the greatest of these is Tito, Romola's husband, a figure of Shakespearean dimensions who can 'smile, and smile, yet be a villain'. George Eliot herself described her labour in writing the novel as one about which she could "swear by every sentence as having been written with my best blood, such as it is, and with the most ardent care for veracity of which my nature is capable". [7] She reportedly spent eighteen months contemplating and researching the novel, [5] including several excursions to Florence. The attention to detail exhibited in the novel was a focus of both praise and criticism. Anthony Trollope, having read the first instalment of Romola, expressed wonder at the toil Eliot must have "endured in getting up the work", but also cautioned her against excessive erudition, urging her not to "fire too much over the heads of her readers". [7] His influence has spread in many directions, but as far as the first book of Romola is concerned, its general emphasis is laid on a phase of its influence, most to his renown, the the advancement of Greek learning. The complex Savonarola Attracted to the lovely, grave Romola, Tito spends many hours reading and writing manuscripts with her blind father. One day, when Tito has the opportunity to be alone with Romola for a moment, he declares his love to her, and Romola shyly confesses her love for him. That same day, Monna Brigida pays a call on her cousin Bardo. When she accidentally mentions the name of a Dominican monk, Dino, Tito discovers that the lost son of Bardo is not dead; rather, he has been banished from his father’s house. Tito realizes that Fra Luca is Dino, and he fears exposure of his benefactor’s slavery. He feels the time is right for him to ask the old man for permission to marry Romola; he does so, and Bardo readily consents to the marriage.