Romola

A woman of intellect. A husband of deceit. And a city that burns its own soul.

George Eliot's most ambitious novel is a historical epic set in Renaissance Florence, a story of betrayal, religious fervor, and the slow education of a woman's heart.

Romola, the daughter of a blind Greek scholar, marries the handsome, charming, utterly false Tito Melema. He is a man who will sell his adoptive father into slavery rather than pay a debt. He will betray every friend, every cause, every vow. Romola discovers the truth too late. She flees Florence, but is called back by the fiery preacher Savonarola, who tells her that her duty is to stay and suffer. She becomes a nurse, a scholar, a silent witness to the burning of art and the burning of heretics. When Savonarola falls, Romola is left alone, but not broken.

This is Eliot at her most learned and least forgiving: a novel about the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the terrible cost of living according to ideals that cannot be realized. Romola was Eliot's least popular novel with Victorian readers, but it has found passionate admirers, from Henry James to the present day.

• Published in 1862–63, after the success of Silas Marner and before Middlemarch

• Eliot's only historical novel, set in late 15th-century Florence during the rise and fall of Girolamo Savonarola

• A deeply researched work that Eliot considered her most carefully written novel

Available in multiple formats:

• Paperback & Hardcover: Beautifully designed print editions presenting the complete, unabridged text made to last.

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A beautifully crafted edition for your shelf, your device, or your ears—or the perfect gift for anyone who knows that the hardest lesson is learning to live without illusions.

About the Author

George Eliot was the pen name of Mary Ann Evans (1819–1880), one of the leading novelists of the Victorian era. Born in Warwickshire, she was the daughter of a mill manager. She was deeply religious as a young woman but later rejected her faith, translating controversial works of biblical criticism. She moved to London, became the assistant editor of The Westminster Review, and entered into a scandalous unmarried partnership with the philosopher and critic George Henry Lewes, who encouraged her to write fiction. Romola was a departure for Eliot: her first and only historical novel, set in 15th-century Florence. She traveled to Italy to research the novel, studied Italian history and art intensively, and considered it her most serious work. Victorian readers found it too learned, too dense, and too lacking in the warmth of her other novels. Eliot was disappointed. However, Romola has been reassessed in recent decades as a complex, intellectually rigorous exploration of idealism, betrayal, and political failure. Her other major works include Adam Bede(1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Middlemarch (1871–72), and Daniel Deronda (1876). She died in 1880, just months after marrying John Walter Cross, a man twenty years her junior. She is buried in Highgate Cemetery in London.