University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Meredith'S Uses Of Points Of View In "Sandra Belloni" And "Vittoria" (Hisitalian Novels)

(USC Thesis Other)

Meredith'S Uses Of Points Of View In "Sandra Belloni" And "Vittoria" (Hisitalian Novels)

PDF

Download a page range

Download transcript

Copy asset link

Request this asset

Transcript (if available)

Content MEREDITH'S USES OF POINTS OF VIEW
IN SANDRA BELLONI AND VITTORIA
(HIS "ITALIAN" NOVELS)
by
Mary Joyce Geiser King
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(English)
September 1972
INFORMATION TO USERS
This dissertation was produced from a microfilm copy of the original document.
While the most advanced technological means to photograph and reproduce this
docum ent have been used, the quality is heavily dependent upon the quality of
the original submitted.
The following explanation of techniques is provided to help you understand
markings or patterns which may appear on this reproduction.
1. The sign or "target" for pages apparently lacking from the document
photographed is "Missing Page(s)". If it was possible to obtain the
missing page(s) or section, they are spliced into the film along with
adjacent pages. This may have necessitated cutting thru an image and
duplicating adjacent pages to insure you complete continuity.
2. When an image on the film is obliterated with a large round black
mark, it is an indication that the photographer suspected that the
copy may have moved during exposure and thus cause a blurred
image. You will find a good image of the page in the adjacent frame.
3. When a map, drawing or chart, etc., was part of the material being
p h o to g ra p h e d the photographer followed a definite method in
"sectioning" the material. It is customary to begin photoing at the
upper left hand corner of a large sheet and to continue photoing from
left to right in equal sections with a small overlap, if necessary,
sectioning is continued again — beginning below the first row and
continuing on until complete.
4. The majority of users indicate that the textual content is of greatest
value, however, a somewhat higher quality reproduction could be
made from "photographs" if essential to the understanding of the
dissertation. Silver prints of "photographs" may be ordered at
additional charge by writing the Order Department, giving the catalog
number, title, author and specific pages you wish reproduced.
U niversity Microfilms
300 North Z s e b Road
Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106
A Xerox Education Company
I
73-743
KING, Mary Joyce Geiser, 1924-
MEREDITH'S USES OF POINTS OF VIEW IN SANDRA
BELLONI AND VITTORIA CHIS "ITALIAN" NOVELS).
University of Southern California, Ph.D., 1972
Language and Literature, modern
University Microfilms, A X ER O X C om pany, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Copyright © by
MARY JOYCE GEISER KING
1972
THIS DISSERTATION HAS BEEN MICROFILMED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED.
UNIVERSITY O F SO U TH ER N CALIFORNIA
T H E G R A D U A T E S C H O O L
U N IV E R S IT Y P A R K
L O S A N G E L E S . C A L IF O R N IA 90007
This dissertation, ’ written by
....................M a ry _ .J o y;ce.G eiser. K in g....................
under the direction of hex.... Dissertation Com
mittee, and approved by all its members, has
been presented to and accepted by The Gradu
ate School, in partial fulfillment of require
ments of the degree of
D O C T O R OF P H I L O S O P H Y
I'Tn
Dean
Date..S.$.$i&mh.&x^.I.9.7.2
DISSERTATION COMMITTEE ✓
PLEASE NOTE:
Some p ag es may have
i nd i s t inet p r i n t .
FiImed a s r e c e i v e d .
U n iver sity Microfilms, A X erox Education Company
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Page
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ...................................... iii
INTRODUCTION ........................................ 1
Chapter
I Uses of Pictorial-Narrative and
Dramatic-Narrative for Points of View . . 41
Political Considerations ............. 54
Treatment of L o v e .................... 92
Family Relationships .................. 136
Aesthetic Theories .................... 162
II Uses of Masks through Which "Voices"
Express Points of V i e w .................. 210
Metaphoric Language as It
Characterizes Masks .................. 217
Voices Expressing Social
and Political Ideas.................. 239
Voices in Denial of Theological
Values and in Affirmation of
Humanitarian Standards ............. 284
Voices Expressing Notions about
Poetry, Prose, and Music (as
well as Using Musical Imagery). . . . 335
III Engagement of the Reader's Creative
Participation in the Novelist's
Points of V i e w .......................... 367
Structuring by Narrative Method
for Intellectual Pleasure and
Instruction.......................... 376
Uses of Voices to Communicate for
Delight and Instruction ............. 410
Uses of Language for Delight,
Instruction, and Motivation ......... 435
CONCLUSION.......................................... 479
LIST OF WORKS CONSULTED . . . .
ii
493
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
In the writing of this paper, I owe a debt of deepest
gratitude to Professor William D. Templeman, chairman of
my committee, A few years ago, Dr. Templeman first led
me to the delight of an acquaintance with the works of
George Meredith; and my working under Dr. Templeman's
direction on an investigation of a "friend" (as Wayne C.
Booth would say) whose work we both enjoy and admire has
been a most rewarding experience.
I am deeply indebted, too, to Dr. Templeman for his
generosity with his time and with his knowledge, including
that of good prose style. It is somewhat painful to me
that my effort does not adequately reflect Dr. Templeman's
dedication to precise communication.
I wish also to extend heartfelt thanks to Professors
Stephen Moore and Robert Blake for their kind attention
and help in the preparation of this paper.
INTRODUCTION
The investigation reported in this dissertation has
been directed to two novels by George Meredith, Emilia in
England (1864)^ and Vittoria (1866-1867). ^ Products of
Meredith's early period, they have not been hitherto given
deeply probing consideration and appreciation as works of
a novelist's artistic construction and, moreover, as works
of his experimentation with technique. Yet they are the
only two novels within Meredith's canon which he meant to
be companion pieces, both having the same heroine, whom
he places in appositive situations. In Sandra Belloni,
Emilia, of Italian-English blood as well as of strong
Italian patriotic feeling, is presented in a microcosm of
English county society. In Vittoria, Emilia-Vittoria is
presented in a macrocosm of national society, at the
center of the Italian struggle for independence against
the occupying Austrians.
■*"Reissued as Sandra Belloni in 1887.
Publication of Rhoda Fleming in 1865 fulfilled a
commitment to the Tinsley Brothers for a short novel (see
Lionel Stevenson, The Ordeal of George Meredith; A
Biography [New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1953,
pp. 141-142]); that commitment caused the publication of
Rhoda Fleming to intervene between the publication of
Emilia in England and that of its sequel, the second
"Italian" novel.
In a letter to Mrs. Janet Ross, written as early as
December 1, 1863, Meredith wrote of the two Italian novels
he declared:
. . . [Emilia in England] is a contrast between a girl
of simplicity and passion and our English sentimental,
socially-aspiring damsels. The Second (In Italy) is
vivid narrative (or should be).3
That he thought of the two novels in tandem is explicit;
that he saw them as offering a shift in focus (the first
a character study, the second a plot novel) is also
explicit. And that he thought of them as offering con
trasting and supplementary views.of human nature as seen
from the short (Emilia . . .) and long ( Vittoria) ends of
the telescope is certainly implicit.
These two Italian novels, meant to be mutually
supporting and enlightening, show deliberate manipulation
of attitudes and tones toward the material and toward the
reader. The attitudes are intellectual and emotional as
they are delineated within the novels themselves and as
they are subtly handled by Meredith in order that they
may be held by the reader. This investigation has thus
been concerned chiefly with that aspect of a novelist's
work which is briefly indicated by the term "point of
view," perhaps also to be understood as point of awareness
since both places for viewing and attitude are involved.
^George Meredith, Letters, ed. C. L. Cline (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1970), I, 236.
The several facets of "point of view" make "points of
view" a more accurate designation. Within the novel,
Meredith uses points of view with discretion. Of first
consideration is perspective, pictorial and dramatic per
spective. Next are the masks for various kinds of
"tellers" and "show-ers" whose "voices" are used in compli
cated ways. Finally, Meredith's sensitivity toward the
reader enables him to create and control the reader's
point of view in moving him subtly toward an intellectual
awareness of the story, that is, toward a consciousness of
what goes on and, moreover, toward a conscious judgment
concerning his awareness of what goes on. His moving of
the reader is also toward an emotional awareness that is
beyond a feeling of entertainment (such as that which
ensues from reading escape literature), since it is a
consciousness of that feeling; in this way, the reader
catches himself assuming a sympathetic or even empathetic
attitude toward a character— an attitude which Meredith
enables him ultimately to judge as either true or false,
often with some amusement when the reader discovers he has
missed or mistaken some of Meredith's artful clues.
Although Sandra Belloni and Vittoria have been men
tioned by many students of Meredith's works, as will
appear, the comments have not been made with the assumption
that Meredith was deliberately developing these novels
with such definite attitudes in mind— both his own as he
would reveal them, and those he wanted to cause the reader
to hold. Chapter I of this study will present the per
spectives within the two novels with special considera
tions of the pictorial and the dramatic methods in their
effects upon the reader. Chapter II will concern itself
with the masks the author creates and the voices issuing
from these masks throughout the two novels, as well as
with the purposes for the masks to reveal attitudes, and
the ways in which the attitudes complement or contrast
with each other. Chapter III will concentrate upon the
rhetorical purposes of the two Italian novels and upon
the language Meredith uses to engage the reader's creative
participation in the novelist's points of view.
In consideration of a novel's points of view, stu
dents, since the early part of this century, have
ordinarily used the broad categories established by
Lubbock, who converted James' written records of his
peregrinations through the creative woods into a statement
of paths which must be rigidly followed in order to avoid
a Slough of Despond and a Vanity Fair (the latter sinful
place of the author's preening being also reminiscent of
some commentators' reactions to Thackeray). Lubbock's
two classifications were (1) picture-making (often to be
called, by those who followed, "scenic" in the sense of
descriptive, though Lubbock himself did not so use the
term), which according to Lubbock "enables the novelist
to cover his great spaces of life and quantities of
experience," and (2) dramatization, which contributes
"intensity of life"^ (this latter then being the term
with which Lubbock contrastingly associated "scenic").
Lubbock argued for the "raising" of "summary . . . to a
power approaching that of drama, where the intervention
of the story-teller is no longer felt" (p. 122).
Lubbock's terms express an essential quality par
ticular to each technique; unhappily, however, he
principally saw "pd :.ure" and "drama" as antithetical
both in method and in worth. Rather than seeing them as
mutually supportive methods to be used in concert, in
contrast, or in dilation, he relegated the pictorial to
a position outside the dramatic scene.
Drama, then, gives the final stroke, it is the final
stroke which it is adapted to deliver; and picture
is to be considered as subordinate, preliminary and
preparatory. (p. 269)
Approaching Harry Richmond, for example, Lubbock, while
enthusiastically praising the "humanity and poetry and
wisdom" of the book (p. 137), was troubled about "a
defect" which he determined to be the novel's method.
Although the novel has "scenes of drama . . . from time
to time," the story is chiefly "given as the view of an
onlooker" (p. 138).
^Percy Lubbock, The Craft of Fiction (New York: The
Viking Press, 1926), p. 118.
By all means, let us have Harry's account if we must
have somebody's, but perhaps there is no such need.
(p. 141)
Lubbock, arguing for dramatization against narrative,
dismissed even the autobiographic technique of Harry
Richmond ("in which the hero reports") in favor of a third
person's rendering of the act itself. Lubbock's prefer
ence, then, was for dramatization of all material,
including the character's inner state of being. In his
enthusiasm for the effects achieved by dramatization, he
was willing to outlaw narration.
Lubbock's influence on subsequent Meredith criticism
may perhaps best be illustrated by its strong presence in
the 1928 work (republished in 1966) of Van Meter Ames,
who wrote that scenic passages, though more free than those
dramatized, are less vivid (see Lubbock, p. 127) and so
make up "the dull part" of any novel.5 Ames' agreement
with Lubbock extends to the notion that first-person
narration in Harry Richmond does not offer the desired
break with the pictorial method. He, too, objects to
Harry's self-analysis, rather recommending that the reader
be enabled "to see into his mind" as if through the
character's own eyes, but "without [the author's] identi
fying himself with the character" (p. 181).
5Aesthetics of the Novel (New York: Gordian Press,
Inc., 1966), pi 179.
Argument concerning Meredith's position among men of
letters,^ circling specially around his choice of points
of view, because they include those of a narrator and of
a philosopher, proceeds with more apology than forgiveness
on the part even of his supporters, the repetition of the
term "intrusion" revealing just how disabling the approach
is to objective interpretation. That is, the critical
path is Lubbock's rather than Booth's broad high road that
would overlook Meredith's appreciation of his chosen form,
both as artist and as publisher's reader, and his ensuing
experiments with it. Missing is recognition that
George Meredith, being just as much interested in
aesthetics as in other philosophical matters,
considered the unity and structure of the novel
to be as important as the exposition in its in
tellectual appeal.7
Even the few concessions made to his ability to deal
with dramatization when he deemed it important to his
purposes did not act to persuade commentators to look with
different eyes at his technique. For instance, although
disappointed in his attainment, Virginia Woolf wrote that
he was a "master of great scenes,"® and Stewart noted that
^Notably, these include Stevenson, Grabo, Pritchett,
Stewart, Stang, Ames, Beach, Bentley, Karl, and Kausch,
whose comments will be cited in the following pages.
^Lionel Stevenson, "The Intellectual Novel in the
Nineteenth Century," Pt. 2, The Personalist, XXXI (Spring,
1950) , 162.
^Collected Essays, I (London: Hogarth Press, 1956),
229.
by the time Meredith finished Vittoria he had achieved
"a certain mastery of the dramatic scene" {though not of
cohesive plot).^
An illustration of the strangely balanced judgments
that occur in Meredith criticism is Lionel Stevenson's
1953 estimation that Vittoria especially suffers from
Meredith's inability to manage well "scenes of action."^-0
However, in his 1950 article cited above, Stevenson gave
Meredith's lack of interest as the reason for Meredith's
"hurrying over major dramatic scenes in order to save
himself space for his long disquisitions . . . some of
these . . . in the conversations of characters; others
expressed by the author himself in commentary" (p. 164).
Karl, too, sees Meredith as shunning "the intense
dramatic scene of confrontation" because of his greater
concern "with general patterns and over-all effects."
Yet Karl notes: "When issues had to be resolved,
Meredith removed himself and related them at second or
third hand."^ Undoubtedly Karl means to intimate with
use of the verb "relate" an absence of drama; however, it
^Donald C. Stewart, "Dramatic Power and Technique in
the Novels of George Meredith," (Unpublished dissertation,
University of Wisconsin, 1962), p. 139.
^ The Ordeal of George Meredith: A Biography (New
York: Charles Scribner's Sons), p. 161.
^-Frederick R, Karl, An Age of Fiction: The Nineteenth
Century British Fiction (New York: Farrar, Strauss and
Giroux, 1964), p. 205.
may be remembered that the technique of removal had been
recommended by Lubbock (pp. 142-143), but denied as
present in, at least, Harry Richmond. Also Grabo does
not refuse to credit Meredith with ability to use .the
dramatic method; he simply ascribes Meredith's neglect of
it and use of the analytic method instead as reason for
Meredith's lack of appeal for the "average reader.
Conrow, approaching the question differently, charges
Meredith with using static and picturesque scenes typical
of the romance, and with jumping from scene to scene in -
such a way as to cause the reader to see "little" besides
Meredith's underlying thesis concerning Emilia; and
contends that both of these techniques resulted in lack
of success for Emilia in England.13
In spite of the eagerness of commentators since
Lubbock to view any presence of a story-teller as embar
rassing gaucherie on the part of the novelist, it is
nevertheless true that "someone must tell the story.
To make absolute recommendation of any one way to tell a
story to the exclusion of another is unreasonable, and the
■^Carl H. Grabo, The Technique of the Novel (New York
Gordian Press, Inc., 1964), p. 101.
■^Margaret E. M. Conrow, "George Meredith: Romancer
and Artist" (Unpublished dissertation, University of
Illinois, 1962), p. 147.
•^Vincent McHugh, Primer of the Novel (New York:
Random House, 1950), p. 114.
10
tendency to do so is itself disappearing since Booth's
fine study of point of view as rhetorical device (although
recent works by Stang, as well as Karl and Conrow, have
presented arguments showing the continuing influence of
Lubbock's position). Most modern readers, however, accept
the notion of Clayton Hamilton, Elizabeth Bowen, and
E. K. Brown whose agreement is with Maugham's narrator in
Cakes and Ale that the "best" approach to novel writing is
according to the prejudice and/or preference of the writ-
15
er. Although no one "point of view may be pronounced
absolutely better than others," Hamilton does make the
observation that there may be "always one best point of
view from which to tell a given novel.
Intrinsic to the choice between the pictorial and
the dramatic modes is the notion of "voice," one in
which earlier commentators demonstrated little interest.
Voice, the means of communication, obviously implies at
least one other person besides the speaker. Dialogue
thus suggests at least two characters; whereas the novel
itself holds within it the awareness of the author for
the reader, an awareness made more explicit through the
use of a narrator. In any case, as Walter Ong points out,
•^E. K. Brown, Rhythm in the Novel (Toronto: Univer
sity of Toronto Press, 1950), pp. 4-5.
^ciayton Hamilton, The Art of Fiction: A Formulation
of Its Fundamental Principles (New York: Doubleday, Doran
and Co., Inc., 1939) , p. 183.
11
the utterance of a word also "implies that the speaker has
a kind of otherness within himself," the source for which
is a sense of participation in the other person to whom he
speaks.^ This sense which makes communication possible
"is the foundation of role-playing," (pp. 87-88) which
some see as the function of the author.
Tracing the growing disaffection of readers for the
narrator and, hence, for a voice extrinsic to the story
itself, Friedman categorized eight methods for telling
the story. According to Friedman's progressive classifi
cations, both "editorial" and "neutral omniscience" offer
shifting perspectives, but the latter eliminates first-
1 8
person reference. In the former case, the mask may be
considered that of the old "epic narrator," whose voice
is heard both telling the story in his own style and
19
including his own comments.
In the second category, the mask of the professional
story-teller is put aside for one with features obscured
as of some anonymous face in the crowd— the face of a
•^"Voice as Summons for Belief," Literature and
Belief, ed. M. H. Abrams (New York: Columbia University
Press, 1958), p. 84.
-^Norman Friedman, "Point of View in Fiction: A
Development of A Critical Concept," Approaches to the
Novel: Materials for A Poetics, ed. Robert Scholes (San
Francisco: The Chandler Publishing Company, 1961),
pp. 124-129.
19Rerie Wellek and Austin Warren, Theory of Literature
(New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1949), p. 231.
12
narrator who refuses to be identified and who is mysteri
ously able to follow the characters even into their most
private retreats. While this narrator's mask may, accord
ing to some scholars, limit the wearer so that he can
convey information about only those matters available
through observation, Friedman's "neutral" teller is not
so limited. In either case, however, this narrator has
more appeal than has the epic teller for the modern
reader, who prefers an impartial, neutral, and dispassion-
ate teller. u Masking of the author as either a neutral
or an editorial teller usually precludes problems with
authority, since such a teller is at a distance safe
enough for the reader's acceptance of his truthfulness.
Vincent McHugh calls characters whose chief function is
to convey action to the reader, whether through "observa
tion, intimation, or report," "viewpoint characters"
(p. 120). Although such a character may not be a
narrator, such a narrator is always a viewpoint charac
ter (p. 113).
The Italian novels, Sandra Belloni and Vittoria,
which are studied in this paper, employ both the editorial
and the neutral omniscient tellers, to. the distress of not
a few commentators. Beach was generally condemnatory of
Meredith's "inveterate . . . philosophical bias," which
^Wayne C. Booth, The Rhetoric of Fiction (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1961), p. 67.
13
caused him to intrude in his own story in order to instruct
and so to destroy "the illusion created by the dramatizing
of consciousness."2- * - As a result of the "bias," Beach
thought Meredith unable to avoid switching from the inside
point of view of the character's "thinking . . . in terms
natural to his own mentality" to the outside point of view
with author analysis (p. 44) . The implication of this
statement, as well as that of Stevenson concerning
Meredith's use of "conversations of characters," for
another category (multiple selective omniscience) will be
treated later.
Critical bias against such "intervention" caused
Stang relief at Meredith's rare use of such an "awkward"
device as the Philosopher in Sandra Belloni; nor did
Stang believe it befitting an admirer of Stendhal's
subtlety to use two narrators, even on the bases that the
Philosopher would present characters' motivations and that
his remarks as well as the narrator's would be restricted
"to the narrative portions" of the novel which Meredith
used to lead "up to the big scene," which "itself was
presented in a purely objective manner.1,22 In his
22-Joseph Warren Beach, The Twentieth Century Novel:
Studies in Technique (New York: The Century Company,
1932), p. 46.
2^Richard Stang, The Theory of the Novel in England
(1850-1870) (New York: Columbia University Press, 1959),
pp. 36 , 106) .
14
explanation-apology for the Philosopher, Stang makes the
usual identification of the Philosopher-narrator with
Meredith himself.
Meredith's structural manner, the "alternation of
preparatory authorial narration and objective scene," is
to at least one student evidence of Meredith's control,
23
and deliberate manipulation of point of view, rather
than of his inadvertent capitulation to an impulse to
philosophize. Further, Long believes use of distancing
to be deliberate as he notes the narrator's closeness to
Emilia, his "warm and humanitarian" treatment intimating
approval, and his removal from "little people," especially
from Wilfrid, to whom he is cold {pp. 72-74) , showing
disapproval. Stang also believes that changes in distance
enable instruction from the "standing point . . . of the
Comic Spirit who sees mer out of proportion" (p. 35).
Kausch, on the other hand, evidently supposes that
Meredith lacks control and moves closer to certain charac-
0 A
ters on the basis of attraction for them. Both Stang
and Kausch agree that the narrator is intrusive.
John M. Long, "The Authorial Rhetoric in Four Novels
of George Meredith" (Unpublished dissertation, University
of North Carolina, 1967), p. 128.
2^Donald E. Kausch, "'Poor Troop of Actors to Vacant
Benches': Perspective in the Novels of George Meredith"
{Unpublished dissertation, Wayne State University, 1964),
p. 247.
15
An interesting recent study, however, labors to
establish the right of "intrusion" in a Meredith novel.
Pritchett, agreeing substantially with others about
Meredith's focus on "the cage of character" rather than
on story,^5 posits "that Meredith is all person. Other
people become him" so that his "novels are the inter
vention. "26 Pritchett seems to illustrate ultimate "role-
playing" when he rests his argument upon the "biographical
necessity . . . of Meredith's very intrusive manner."
Pritchett argues that
Meredith is very much a tailor-novelist with a large
wardrobe who is always trying on new jackets in front
of the reader and the new jacket is for himself (and
for his characters) a new persona. (pp* 33-34)
Whether called jackets or masks, however, disguises are
per se the "symbol of the exteriority of a literary
creation" (Ong, p. 86).
Pritchett's defiant use of biographical reference in
the teeth of its disgrace as a "fallacy" (p. 33) is a
reversion to a long tradition that many Meredith students
have found irresistible, the fascination of the man him
self. Much Meredith criticism has been almost more con
cerned with Meredith than with his works.
25y. S. Pritchett, The Living Novel and Later
Appreciations (New York: Random House, 1964), p. 112.
^^George Meredith and English Comedy (New York:
Random House, 1969), p. 23.
I
16
Although such criticism is of no pertinence to this
paper, which is involved rather with the manipulation of
perspectives and of voices, as these reveal attitudes,
within the two Italian novels, and with the manipulation
of the reader's intellectual and emotional attitudes
concerning the novels' themes, its influence is indicated
by its appearance in Pritchett's 1969 work. The difficulty
inherent in the approach proceeds partially from its not
including the necessary distinction between the author and
the "implied version of 'himself'" whom he "creates" as
"an 'official scribe,1" and whose point of view is inferred
by the reader as the sum of all the parts of the story
{Booth, pp. 70-73).
According to Booth, a further separation occurs in
the implied author's creation of "persona," "mask," and
"narrator," who "may be separated from [the implied
author] by large ironies" (p. 73). The identification of
Meredith himself as the "second self"(also called the
"implied author") or even as the narrator is frequently
made and all too easily misleading for students who are
trying to understand, especially, the Italian novels,
which contain abrupt changes of places of viewing from
Sandra Belloni to Vittoria and, moreover, also reveal two
sharply-differentiated attitudes on the part of their
teller.
A more obscuring disguise for the author than the
17
editorial and the neutral omniscient figures, but one
which Meredith does not employ in the two Italian novels,
occurs in that category which Friedman calls "'I' as
witness" and Lubbock names "a characterized 'I.'" The
mask of a subordinate character is not so helpful, how
ever, in the process of eliminating the author as is the
mask of a main character. It is this latter, which
Friedman categorizes as "multiple selective omniscience,"
that is, as indicated above, of concern in this investi
gation .
The assumption by the teller of the mask of protago
nist ensures a high degree of immediacy, as he seems to
be revealing his own story along with the thoughts and
emotions that accompany his experiences. This, one of
the first methods of novelists, has advantages that
readily secured its approval from Beach and others. In
its crudest form, as perhaps in Nashe's The Unfortunate
Traveler and in Swift's Gulliver's Travels, neither
properly a novel, the protagonist-tellers merely gain
continuity for the works. At its more sophisticated, in
Richardson's Clarissa and Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, the "'I'
as protagonist" method affords psychological depth and
complexity. The increased skill in construction of this
kind of mask from the 1594 work to the 1925 novel also
shows progression in disguise. The mask for Nashe's page
is really a lightly-renovated epic-teller's mask, and
18
Jack Wilton could well be telling of the exploits of some
other scamp, while the "I" mask of Gulliver is clearly
molded to the mariner's exact dimensions, though without
the intimate and artistically-objective details that were
to be supplied by Richardson and Woolf for their protago
nists .
Richardson's voluminous letter writers, just as
Harry Richmond, wear masks both made for them specifically
and, moreover, carved with painstaking detail. Still more
advanced in the artistry of masking with subtlety, Woolf
deals with Clarissa Dalloway and Septimus Smith in such
a way that she seems not to be masking tellers. That is,
Mrs. Woolf's effort was so to eliminate "teller" as to
seem to have no need even for mask. The characters are
present in the essential manner of "being," that is, in
their states of consciousness with the "luminous halo, a
semi-transparent envelope surrounding [them] from the
n 7
beginning of consciousness to the end." The shift of
emphasis within the novel from "voice" as signifying
fleshly presence of others, to "voice" as meaning self-
communion does not, of course, dispense with the connota
tions of the voice of the novel as communication with a
reader, although some students seem eager to forget these
basic connotations.
^ Collected Essays, II, 106.
19
Friedman's label of this point of view as "multiple
selective omniscience" indicates its relationship with
the first two categories. It is important to an under
standing of this investigation that this relationship be
recognized and that the categories not be conceived of as
rigidly polarized and exclusive. Friedman defines multi
ple selective omniscience as streams of consciousness of
more than one character. Similarities with the technique
of the black-garbed and -hooded kurombo or kurogo (best
called "stage assistant" because of his many and varied
2 8 «■
tasks) of the Japanese No theatre call themselves to
attention in this manifestation of the author's dissatis
factions even with masks as he attempts to hide from the
reader need for their e x i s t e n c e . 29 just so, the conven
tion in the No drama is to acknowledge the presence of the
kurombo not as they perform the various "utilitarian"
functions in full view of the audience, but as part of
the "total design" (p. Ill).
The novelist, too, wants to conceal from the reader
any intermediary between him and the character and, more
over, between the reader's mind and the character's. If
28Earle Ernst, The Kabuki Theatre (London: Oxford
University Press, 1956), p. 107.
^Meredith's interest in Japanese culture is instanced
in his later writing the Introduction to G. Okakura's The
Japanese Spirit (1905) in which he cited the "illuminating
books'* about Japan of Lafcadio Hearn (Miscellaneous Prose,
in The Works of George Meredith [London: Constable and
Company, Ltd., 1910], XXXIV, 109).
the reader accepts the illusion that he is at the very
seat of human activity, thought, then he can accept that
disguise is no longer necessary or even possible. Thus
he conventionally ignores the black-garbed and -hooded
author. Without a mask the non-teller merely remembers,
though he remembers with great vividness and excitement.
The nearest example to the desired effect is perhaps
Wordsworth's "spots of time," during which "emotion
recollected in tranquility" becomes enriched and vitalized
in a new experience not just of remembrance, but also of
creative experience.
The illusion created is of the reader's presence at
the "theatre of the mind"3° (this phrase, also used by
Lubbock [p. 144], nicely blends the two popular require
ments for dramatization and for psychological rendering of
events and people). In the illusion is also strong
resemblance to the No theatre since the No stage is built
out into the audience so that the "performance . . . is a
31
part of the audience." There is still the tendency
toward "scenes" with the use of this technique, of things
both inside and outside the mind, the latter via speech
■^Elizabeth A. Drew, The Modern Novel: Some Aspects
of Contemporary Fiction (New York: W. W. Norton and
Company, Inc7, 1926) , p. 247.
•^A. C. Scott, The Kabuki Theatre of Japan (London:
George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1955), p. 49.
21
and act as remembered, of course, or contained in the con
sciousness. "Selective omniscience," having the same
characteristics, differs only in limiting to one mind and
so to a "fixed center" (Friedman, p. 133).
Such a limitation holds dangers of boring the reader
as it "drags one soul out into the light of art, and ana
lyzes it" (Drew, p. 84), and of lessening the degree of
credibility of the story. Therefore, the preferred method
is that of multiple selective omniscience. Perhaps for
the same reasons, Forster recommended "bouncing"32 an(j
Daiches the engagement of a variety of voices to secure
for the novel the "completeness and objectivity" of "great
drama."33
Meredith's approach to the use of multiple selective
omniscience has already been strongly suggested by the form
some of the objections to his point of view have taken,
three of which (Pritchett's, Stevenson's and Beach's)
have already been quoted. In yet another construction of
the same notion, Stewart writes that Meredith "sometimes
unwittingly intrudes and becomes one of his characters"
(italics mine, p. 22). The obvious relationship between
32e. m. Forster, Aspects of the Novel (New York:
Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1927), p. 119.
33oavid Daiches, The Novel and the Modern World
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970) , p. 5" O ' .
22
the "omniscient" categories as established by Friedman,
along with Pritchett's notion of Meredith's powerful
impetus toward role-playing, is highly contradictive of
inadvertency and is supportive of a belief that Meredith
deliberately employed the same techniques as James and
later psychological writers, as well as those of some
earlier writers.
More than one commentator has felt the influence of
Carlyle in Meredith's recording "the inner side" of the
"histories of men and women in the act of living."34 Not
only Victorian poets, such as Browning and Tennyson, but
also Victorian novelists were interested in the psychology
of their subjects, an interest traceable in large part to
Hume's writings.35 In 1878, George Eliot noted that the
modes of telling a story were founded in "processes of
outward and inward life." Ramon Fernandez was to
point out Meredith's manner of dealing with these pro-
V_
cesses:
In Meredith the point of consciousness was the relation
of individuals' characters to their acts, and his
analysis consisted in his becoming conscious of his
^^Ernest Baker, History of the English Novel, IX
(London: Barnes and Noble, 1937) , 13.
35walter E. Houghton, The Victorian Frame of Mind:
1830-1870 (New Haven: Yale "University Press, 1957), pp.
94, 273-274, 307.
36Miriam Allott, Novelists on the Novel (New York:
Columbia University Press” 1959), p. 263.
23
dramatic intuition of beings. He invented— or rather
first utilized with profundity— a new method of psy
chological investigation and literary expression: the
method of dramatic analysis . . .37
In conjoining "dramatic" with "analysis," Fernandez denies
Lubbock's rigid separation of the dramatic and the pic
torial methods and the subordination of the latter to the
former. Moreover, Fernandez uses the term "dramatic" here
with a definition {"the direct and concrete expression of
the action being accomplished really" [footnote, p. 160])
that places his use of the term on the same plane as does
Lubbock's definition of the dramatic method:
The author places their parts in the mouths of the
players, leaves them to make their own impression,
leaves us, the audience, to make what we can of it.
The motion of life is before us . . . (Lubbock, p.
Ill)
Fernandez discerns, as Lubbock did not, however, that
Meredith is able to dramatize the internal as well as the
external lives of his characters.
Hamilton said of the external prospect that it was
the position of the "mind aloof" (p. 167). In a 1938 book
that engendered such great irritation on the part of
Virginia Woolf that she devoted an article to combatting
his treatment of fiction as a "disease" (II, 137),
Hamilton supports the direction of Woolf's writing with
a recommendation that writers avoid the externality of
^ Messages: Literary Essays, trans. Montgomery
Belgion (Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat Press, 1964),
p. 160.
the omniscient author. As with Hamilton, objections
seem to be based on the overt presence of a narrator.
Without careful analysis of method and purpose, and even
with some confusion of author with narrator, with author'
"second self," and with characters, such commentators as
Beach accuse Meredith of being present in his novels
"with a vengeance" (p. 38). Even Phyllis Bentley, who
wrote "It is nonsense to pretend that the novelist is not
there,"38 may be suspected of betraying some disaffection
both for direct comment and for Meredith's technique in
her choice of the word "harangue" (pp. 36, 37).
Friedman's last two classifications have no bearing
here. They are "dramatic mode," which dispenses with
mental states and confines itself to the speech and acts
of characters, being then wholly scenic; and "the Camera,
which gives simply a "passive recording" of a "slice of
life" (p. 135). Friedman believes this last method to be
threatening to the very existence of the novel, since it
is essentially an elimination of the structure which, as
Goodman points out, is crucial in establishing communica
tion between artist and audience.39 it may be seen that
•^Some Observations on the Art of Narrative (New
York: The Macmillan Company, 1948) , p. 38.
39paul Goodman, The Structure of Literature (Chicago
University of Chicago Press, 1954), p. 12”
25
point of view shapes the form of plot since it limits the
story in the telling.
The story is the author's "pageant," its pace to be
slowed or accelerated in order for it to be viewed in any
part or whole; and it may be scanned from a distance, or
studied up close (Bentley, p. 5). The determination of
focus, whether on details of thought and speech, as the
parade is slowed, or on overall "summary" as it is accel
erated, rests on the specific intentions with plot.
Bentley actually defends rather than attacks summary (a
term she prefers to Lubbock's "retrospect") as a "highly
civilized tool" that is a "unique privilege of the
novelist" and is designed to be used intelligently in
conjunction with "scene," or dramatization, rather than
prohibited as improper to the novel on any terms (p. 47).
Summaries, or "narrative blocks," perform, then as "a
kind of architectonic patterns."^®
The importance of point of view in establishing tone
is readily apparent here, too. Simply the voice can be
impersonal (as in an epic), or personal (as in the author's
assuming masks of characters or in his expressing approval
or disapproval [Hamilton, p. 180]). A tone of irony can
follow upon shifts of focus from one character to another
and from narrator to character, as in the Italian novels,
^®Ray B. West, The Art of Writing Fiction (New York:
Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1968), p. 224.
I
26
just as effectively as upon focus on the intelligence of
one character who sees and interprets the whole.^1 Struc
tural matters, including tone, rather than some ungovern
able attraction for certain characters, as Kausch imagined,
dictate Meredith's manipulations of point of view.
The other important perspective for this study of
Sandra Belloni and Vittoria is that of the reader, because
the reading of a work of fiction consists in a fusion of
the author's interpretation of life with the reader's
unconscious contribution "of his own view and his own
personality" (Drew, p. 16). Thus, the reader is one who
does more than understand;^2 he is also a "co-creator"
with the author (p. 311). According to Conrow, the way
is clear for Meredith's reader to be a "co-maker" of
Vittoria, since Meredith's method is to present a charac
ter at repeated intervals, either through detached
description or through the eyes of another character,
without explicitly informing the reader about and so
leaving him "to reflect on the internal events and con
flicts that may have wrought the change" (p. 153). The
same demands upon the reader may be seen to exist in
Sandra Belloni.
4lRay B. West and Robert W. Stallman, The Art of
Modern Fiction (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
1960), p. 209.
^R. G. Collingwood, The Principles of Art (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1964), p. 308.
27
In order to involve the reader on any terms in the
work of fiction, point of view is primary since it secures
the interest that must precede acceptance. The interest,
moreover, in the novel with its characters and events
depends not only on the "illusion of reality," but, also
as Hume had argued in Essays: Moral, Political and
Literary and A Treatise on Human Nature, on the reader's
awareness that the "reality" he is willing to accept is
an illusion.^3 on this basis, then, Rubin takes issue
with the very word "intrusion" used to designate the
author's direct comments to the reader (p. 10), maintain
ing that any offense does not exist in author commentary,
but exists only in author inconsistency (pp. 12-13).
Although Lubbock, too, speaks for consistency of "plan"
(p. 72), he cannot accept the pictorial method to be as
effective as the dramatic method.
The obvious application of Rubin's remarks to Meredith
was made by Foster, who assigned to Meredith's narrators
the function of "insistence" on the reader's recognition .
of the artificiality of the world into which he has momen
tarily stepped.44 Responsibility for forcing the reader's
^Louis D. Rubin, Jr., The Teller in the Tale
(Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1967), p. 8.
^Donald E. Foster, "The Narrative Voice in Three
Novels of George Meredith" (Unpublished dissertation,
University of Wisconsin, 1969), p. 10.
28
awareness of his imaginative involvement in the fiction
rests with the narrator, then, who emphasizes distance of
reader from work. Although identification with the hero
may occur, the reader still stands outside because the
novel, unlike the poem,is an external form, a "bundle of
perspectives of one 'I' which elicits an objective
A ^
approach," whereas poetry, in offering only the perspec
tive of the poet, engenders a more subjective one (p. 159).
. . . no matter how intense the dramatic illusion,
no matter how gripping the plot or believable the
characterization, if we are to enter imaginatively
into a work of fiction we must at all times feel
that it is fiction, that a story is being told to
us. The two parts of the equation— that it be like
real life, and it not be real life— are absolutely
indispensable. (Rubin, p. 9)
The degree to which the reader is imaginatively
active in the novel determines the intensity of his
experience with it. Of course, the author originally
makes possible the reader's intensity by his selections
of the things that the reader will feel and know, and
also of the perspectives from which the reader will
experience these matters. The matrix of the experience
must consist not only of matters peripheral to the epi
sodes upon which the reader successively concentrates
(these peripheral matters being allusive), as well as
^Christopher Caudwell, "Poetry's Dream-Work,1 1 in
A Modern Book of Aesthetics, ed. Melvin Rader (New York:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1961), pp. 159-160.
29
4 6
peripheral to the episodes considered as a whole, ° but
also of those matters extrinsic to the novel itself—
matters, then, which the reader himself brings to his
reading experience to complete it.
Stevenson does not see any such involvement of the
reader in the novel experience, but rather sees the
reader's condition as one of detachment, somewhat as
during attendance at a lecture when only intellectual,
not imaginative, engagement exists. Classifying novels
as entertaining, informative, and intellectual, ostensibly
without any wish to indicate "hierarchy of excellence,"
Stevenson assigns Meredith's novels to the last category.
Here plot and characterization are "weak," subordinated
to the author's insertions of his own ideas. Stevenson
speaks specifically of Sandra Belloni, in which the lovers
enter into a three-page debate about prose style while the
plot bides. Such a novel, Stevenson writes, addresses
itself to a limited audience, one sharing the writer's
point of view and hence predisposed to enjoy "the gratifi
cation of communing with a congenial spirit.Not so
understanding, Elizabeth Bowen, who distinguishes between
"visual angle" (which is in the "breast and brow" of some
4^Howard Nemerov, Poetry and Fiction: Essays (New
Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1950), p. 246.
47"The Intellectual Novel . . Pt. 1, The Personal-
ist, XXI (Winter, 1950), p. 44.
30
teller) and "moral angle" (which "too often means pre-
assumptions--social, political, sexual, national,
aesthetic, and so on"), objects to the limitations such
pre-assumptions impose. She prefers that any validity or
truth conveyed by the work rest solely within the work
itself.
Though Bowen argues for "poetic truth," Stevenson
sees some advantage in the author's being "free to use a
subtle style which assumes the reader is already an
initiate in the secret brotherhood" ("Intellectual
Novel . . ." Pt. 1, p. 44). Further indicative of the
relative passivity of this kind of novel experience for
Stevenson is his criterion for an intellectual novel's
worth: actually "nothing more or less than the extent
to which [the mind of the author] is worth knowing"
(p. 47). Though this statement applies equally to writing
and to speaking, Stevenson's meaning results in a position
for the reader of "thinker" as opposed to that of "maker."
In either case, the position which the reader might assume
in the reading of a novel becomes almost as important as
that which the author takes in telling and/or showing his
story. "A literary work can never get itself entirely
dissociated from this I-thou situation and the personal
involvement which it implies" (Ong, p. 85). This study,
^ Collected impressions (New York: Longmans, Green
and Company, 1950), pp. 257-259.
31
then, necessarily is concerned not only with the points of
view within the two Italian novels, but also with those of
the reader, as Meredith reveals himself both to imagine
them and to attempt to establish them.
Certainly Meredith adapted his language to his pur
poses so that his treatments of micro- and macrocosm are
deliberately scaled with regard to distance and tone, in
the manner of Bowen's "pageant." It is impossible for me
to believe, as Hergenan does, that Meredith denied his
particular vision in Vittoria,^ not only on the basis of
the testimony of the novel itself, but also in view of the
fact that Meredith thought of the novels not as existing
as separate, independent entities, but as one novel
forming an extension of the other.
That a detailed examination of the two Italian novels
as a unit has not yet been attempted (although David Howard
recently published a short study)^0 points rather to the
general uncertainty of scholars regarding Meredith's
attainment. On the one hand, before he died George
Meredith, after being questioned, indicated indifference
A Q
L. T. Hergenan, "Meredith's Attempt to Win Popu
larity: Contemporary Reactions," Studies in English
Literature, IV, 637-651.
"'Delicate' and 'Epical' Fiction: 1. The Italian
Novels; 2. Beauchamp's Career," in Literature and
Politics in the Nineteenth Century, ed. John Lucas
(London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1971), pp. 131-159.
32
toward receiving a baronetcy, although he did accept the
Order of Merit. In his own time he was even considered
"head of letters in the English-speaking world."51 still
it has always been true that he has had a limited audience,
the word "circle" and the implication "enlightened" often
appearing in discussions of his appeal. The array of
admirers of his genius as novelist and poet includes
Swinburne, James M. Barrie, Yeats, James Thompson, Oscar
Wilde, R. L. Stevenson, G. B. Shaw, George Eliot, Thomas
Hardy, and even Henry James. Stevenson and Hardy not only
admired Meredith, but also sought and followed his literary
advice. Even the truculent James, in spite of denigratory
remarks, gave evidence of having been influenced by
Meredith's "personality and career" in "The Pattern in the
Carpet," "John Delavoy," and "The Death of the Lion"
(Stevenson, Ordeal, p. 269). Moreover, no reader of both
Meredith and James can avoid the conclusion— Lubbock
notwithstanding— published by Hergenan that James followed
in Meredith's footsteps in elevating close character study
above plot (pp. 637-651).
Misunderstanding, disagreement, and frank bewilder
ment have long been notes struck in Meredith criticism,
appearing in the early reviews of Emilia in England and
Vittoria. One reviewer, Richard Garnett, in an 1864
51c. L. Cline, Introduction to The Letters of George
Meredith (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970), I,
xxix.
review of Emilia . . . saw the "chief obstacles" to the
novel's success "in the peculiarity of the style, the
quaintness," but, Garnett added parenthetically, this
peculiarity is "pleasant to those who have once, learned
to relish it."^ The sense of superiority inherent in
Garnett's comments (perhaps also latent in Stevenson's
much later remarks about "secret brotherhoods") is also
present in Garnett's distinction of Meredith's style as
an "exquisite condiment," the exclusive savoring of which
would be "like making a dinner of salt— Attic, of course"
(p. 109).
A reviewer of Vittoria for the Saturday Review was
less dainty in his complaints, citing "a wide dispropor
tion between the expenditure of ability and the result
obtained" (p. 137). Perhaps in order not to be thought
overly enthusiastic about that of which he was so uncer
tain, he hedged a compliment on the novel's cleverness by
poising the work neatly "on the verge of genius." None
theless, he continued, the book does not "get on," but
rather offers "a succession of brilliancies which are
never fused into a brilliant whole" (p. 138); the prose
strives to be poetry; the dialogue is "laborious and
unsuccessful"; the plot comprises the "weakest part of the
^Maurice Buxton Forman, ed., George Meredith: Some
Early Appreciations (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
xi>03; , p. 113 .
34
book"; and the characters make "eccentric" exits and
entrances to which he "must really object."
It may be seen that early students approached
Meredith with great caution and a concomitant refusal to
damn his works totally on any given ground; they usually
softened their objections with some faint praise, however
uneasy. So, too, Geraldine Endsor Jewsbury, writing in
The Athenaeum of Vittoria at the time of its publication,
considered the work "unmerciful" in its intricacies, but
admired episode and "individual portraits," especially
that of Barto Rizzo.
As already noted, the controversy rages even today
with almost the same paradoxically balanced statements,
such as originality versus strangeness and Forster's
"the finest contriver that English fiction has ever pro
duced" (p. 136), as against Henry James' indictment of
sentimentality which "shirks every climax," a charge fur
ther balanced by James himself when he lists Meredith,
along with Shakespeare, among the "fine painters of
life."53 Forster also weights the counter-scale when he
finds "the home counties posing as the universe" in
Meredith's works and when he finds fault with Meredith for
sentimentality, for a strident overtone in serious
passages, and for faked social values.
53preface to The Princess Casamassima in The Art of
the Novel: Critical Prefaces (New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1934), p. 67.
35
Though Cline may consider Meredith to have presided
over letters as the "Grand Old Man" (xxix), George
Meredith's reputation, then as now, has ever been sub
mitted to the slings and arrows not only of the public,
but also of influential scholars. However, whatever hits
occurred, they did not succeed in destroying enjoyment of
and enthusiasm for Meredith's work on the part of "bright
young men," as the anonymous Times Literary Supplement
reviewer of December 18> 1970, noted, including those at
Cambridge during the early part of this century, a "con
spicuously bright era" there. In examining Cline's
recently issued new edition of the letters and of Gillian
Beers' and V. K. Pritchett's works as well as the repub
lished Early Appreciations by Forman, the reviewer also
speculated that the Meredith "pendulum" may be "on the
backswing."
Certainly contravening the usual pronouncement,
rejected by both the Times reviewer and Pritchett, that
"no one reads Meredith any more" is the steady trickle of
dissertations through the 1950s and 1960s as well as the
inclusion of treatments of Meredith by important scholars,
no matter what may be their attitudes toward him. His
position, then, has not changed substantially since a
reviewer of 1859 placed him in "a class of fictionists
who are more rare than welcome— more honoured than popu
lar" (Forman, p. 52). The reason this reviewer gave for
36
Meredith's lack of popular success might today be reason
for acceptance; still, that Meredith drew material from
"his modes of thought" rather than "from the manners of
his times" remains reason for his success to be "personal
and distinctive" rather than popular.
As if in testimony to the intimacy of his works, even
before Meredith's death in 1909, books were appearing
which concentrated more upon the man than upon the novels.
In 1891, Hannah Lynch published her biography, in 1907
M. Sturge Henderson his, and in 1908 Richard H. P. Curie
his. After Meredith's death, a deluge of biographies,
and books of reminiscences as well as conversations with
him were written by J. A. Hammerton (1909), Constantin
Photiades (1910), Alfred Austin (1911), J. P. Collins
(1912), Frank Harris (1915), Lady Butcher (1919), S. M.
Ellis (1919 and 1923), Constance Battersea (1922), Rene
Galland (1923), Lucien Wolff (1924), Mary S. Gratton
(1926), and R. E. Sencourt (1929). These have continued
even past the 1930s, perhaps the most notable being
G. K. Ziff's "New Facts in the Early Life of George
Meredith," Harvard Studies (1938); Viscountess Milner's
"Talks with George Meredith," The National Review (1948);
Siegfried Sassoon's Meredith (1948); Lionel Stevenson's
The Ordeal of George Meredith (1953); and Jack Lindsay's
Marxist-oriented George Meredith (1956).
Early too the letter collectors were at work, led by
37
Meredith's son, William Maxse Meredith, whose editing of
a two-volume edition in 1912, while conforming to the
practices of the time, has led to difficulties for modern
scholars and editors. Nonetheless, it has been the only
edition available until Cline's recent three-volume
publication. Until Cline's, periodicals also were repro
ducing small collections of letters. In 1913, a few
letters to Clodd and Sloter appeared; in 1919, some to
Swinburne and Watts-Dunton; in 1923, a few to Alice
Meynell; in 1928, another small collection; in 1960,
three unpublished letters exchanged with W. T. Stead; and,
in 1962, two more unpublished exchanges with Stead.
Fewer in number are the attempts to analyze Meredith's
works. J. B. Priestly (1926), Siegfried Sassoon,
Stevenson, and Lindsay all conducted their examinations
of Meredith's writings in conjunction with his life.
There are also, of course, the reviews of the works that
appeared at the times of their publication and were
collected later by Forman and by loan Williams (1971).
In addition, there have been studies of Meredith's use of
comedy. Beach's (1911) and Pritchett's (1969) have been
concerned with his theory and use of the Comic Spirit.
Meredith's attention to and from French and German
writers and scholars as well as to and from Carlyle,
Peacock, and Galsworthy, has also been examined. Quest-
for-self studies incorporating mythical and archetypal
38
patterns were printed during the 1950s, as were examina
tions of imagery, metaphors, and style, the latter con
tinuing through the 1960s. Study of Meredith's philosophy
as expressed in his works was begun by Trevelyan in 1906;
this has continued through today, a 1964 unpublished
dissertation by R. E. Jones concerning Kierkegaardian
ethics and aesthetics perhaps serving as characteristic.
Other studies have contained looks at Meredith's attitudes
toward and literary treatment of women, of education, and
of nature and society (notably Norman Kelvin's A Troubled
Eden, in 1961).
Examinations of individual works cluster around a
chosen few, the predictable The Ordeal of Richard Feveral
and The Egoist receiving the most attention; but also
Rhoda Fleming, One of Our Conquerors, Beauchamp's Career,
Diana of the Crossways, and Lord Ormont and His Aminta
receive analysis, especially from dissertation writers.
Of course, all the novels receive some attention, varying
according to novel and commentator. Still, in 1968,
F. W. Bateson felt free to write "There is no first-rate
criticism" of Meredith.^4
Sandra Belloni and Vittoria have had little attention
separately and, except for David Howard's brief study (see
page 31 footnote), almost none as a unit. Robert Watson
Guide to English Literature (New York: Anchor
Books, 1968), p. 179.
39
published an article on Sandra Belloni in English Literary
History (1957), in which he dealt with the novel's treat
ment of sentimentality and the Philosopher's role in
helping to delineate sentimentality. Conrow's disserta
tion included a study of the prose of Emilia . . . and
Vittoria along with that of other novels in order to
demonstrate the value of Meredith's work. However, in
1959, Pritchett dismissed Sandra Belloni as an "early"
novel in which Meredith's "powers were not yet formed"
(p. 120). Though it is true that Meredith himself abun
dantly testifies in letters to irritation at the
difficulties he had in the composition of Emilia . . .
and dissatisfactions with it, these very facts make the
novel, especially since it is a companion piece to
Vittoria, a worthwhile study of the development of
technique. Moreover, Pritchett's dismissal of Sandra
Belloni is made further suspect by his ignoring of
Vittoria, with which Meredith was pleased.
In the 1859 The Ordeal . . ., Meredith had outlined
his intention of eschewing the ever-popular "blood and
glory" material in favor of "minute" incidents, "a
picture so little imposing," in hopes that "An audience
will come to whom it will be given to see" its signifi
cance. To such an audience "nothing will be trivial,"
and they will perceive . . . that in real life all hangs
together: the train is laid in the lifting of an
40
eyebrow."55 jn this expression, just four years before
beginning Emilia . . ., of concern about focus and about
readers properly disposed to appreciate that focus,
Meredith might be speaking of the two Italian novels,
for in them are crucial the points of awareness,
intellectual and emotional, within the novel and also on
the part of readers.
55(New York: The New American Library, 1961), p. 207.
CHAPTER I
USES OF PICTORIAL-NARRATIVE AND DRAMATIC-NARRATIVE
FOR POINTS OF VIEW
Viewpoint is crucial to the two Italian novels in
which Meredith mixed the dramatic and the pictorial
handling of material. Direct involvement, as Lubbock
termed it, afforded by the dramatic method certainly
offers a kind of delight in the course of reading the
novels. Therein the reader may have the kind of
experience that, moving him closer to the event, enables
an assumption of characters' experiences as his own, or
an assumption of his own presence at a given time and
place. However, so too does the pictorial technique
produce pleasure during the reading. The truth of
delight from the enabling of the imagination through
dramatic involvement does not then obviate the kind of
pleasure that ensues upon the reader's establishing
himself at a certain distance which, by permitting a
purview, empowers his feelings of superiority to the
situation and to the characters. In this latter instance,
part of the pleasure derives from the reader's having
information unavailable to, or even impossible for the
characters. Adding to this latter kind of enjoyment is
41
42
the presence of a sophisticated, wry, ironical, and
intelligent guide who proves to be most considerate of
the reader's understanding and pleasure as well as,
occasionally, flattering to his intelligence.
Both experiences certainly hold distinctive
pleasures; neither can be damned in favor of the other
although one may be chosen in preference to the other
as idiosyncratic choice. In the Italian novels, Meredith,
while mixing the techniques, gave them different emphases
for different purposes. The pictorial method is used in
both novels in order to prepare for scenes, in order to
speed up passage of time, and in order to discover causes
and purposes. In Sandra Belloni, more than in Vittoria,
philosophical analyses are added to the summaries in order
to examine causes and purposes in greater degree. It is
important to note, however, that neither novel actually
has more of the dramatic method than the other, although
description of action via both the methods is greater in
Vittoria in which philosophical analyses are fewer.
Chapter XIII, Volume I, of Sandra Belloni, entitled
"Contains a Short Discourse on Puppets," definitively pre
sents Meredith's position on point of view in almost the
same terms as, approximately sixty-three years later, Lub
bock was to consider it. First, by utilizing Thackeray's
metaphor of puppets, the narrator implies his acceptance
of the theory of the dramatic element of novels, but also
43
of the overriding presence of a "showman,or man who
does the showing. Next he reveals his recognition of the
"odium" that "frowns on such a pretension to excess of
cleverness" on the part of a showman who explains his
characters' motivations (and so calls attention away from
the play to the manipulator of strings, according to the
charge). Nevertheless, the narrator, with tongue in
cheek, bemoans that he must "tell what [he] know[s]"
(p. 121) .
As usual with Meredith, the passage works on several
levels. First, the narrator establishes his credibility
as a source for both complete and accurate information.
On this level the narrator seems almost naively frank, so
that in his simplicity he will actually be unable to dis
guise from the reader any information, even should he wish
to do so. On yet another level, that of irony, the
narrator somewhat contemptuously, but with seeming
humility, dismisses objections to his technique.^ Both
the substance and the manner convey yet another message to
the reader, this time a warning to be alert and sensitive
to the narrator, who may truly relate all he knows, but
lln Meredith's Works (Westminster: Archibald,
Constable and Co., 1897), V, 121.
^Meredith's letters reveal his awareness of the
criticism of his work. See Forman's Early Appreciations
and also loan Williams' Meredith: A Critical Heritage
(New York: Barnes and Noble, Inc., 1971).
44
will do so most often by indirection and by irony.
The comic irony of Meredith's seeming to confess
compulsion as an apology to the impatient reader (believed
literally by some) is further heightened by his signifying
a nose fixed to the face of the "puppet hero" as analogous
to the "moral added to the tale" (Sandra Belloni, I, 122).
That Meredith had in mind Laurence Sterne's The Life and
Opinions of Tristram Shandy^ is made amusingly suspect by
his narrator's fixing the hero in "his bedchamber"
(p. 121), having his "organs affect his destiny" (p. 121),
announcing that he will "strip" his hero "of his heroic
trappings" (p. 122), and his jibing at Wilfrid's youthful
predisposition to forget that he was "led by his nose,1 1
so that he "sacrificed his deeper feeling [of love for
Emilia] to a low disgust" (italics mine, p. 123). Finally
that which both links Meredith's metaphor to Sterne's most
convincingly and establishes the virulence of his attack
on critics of his technique, whom he seemed to identify
as sentimentalists, is a warning to
our sentimentalists to admit the nose among the
features proper to heroes, otherwise the race
will become extinct. (p. 122)
The Sternean allusion to procreation is in the delicate
•^Meredith had this volume in his library, according
to Bernice A. W. Williams, "The Self-Education of George
Meredith: Philosopher and Poet" (Unpublished disserta
tion, City University of New York, 1969) , p. 361.
45
manner so admired by those addicted to the "Fine Shades."
Volume II of Sandra Belloni continues the playful
tone of handling point of view, though without Shandyisms.
After a musical allusion, the notion of pageant, that
which Bentley was to consider approximately eighty-five
years later, becomes apparent.
. . . a story should not always flow, or, at least
not to a given measure. When we are knapsack on
back, [the Philosopher] says, we come to eminences
where a survey of our journey past and in advance
is desirable, as is a distinct pause in any business,
here and there.4
In these, the Philosopher's words, Lubbock's idea that
the "general survey" acts to prepare the reader (pp. 269-
270) may also be discovered.
The reader's friendly and concerned guide to events,
the narrator, protests against the "garrulous, super-
subtle, so-called" Philosopher's making the novel "rock
top-heavy" and shredding "the puppets' gold robe— illu
sion." His declamations of innocence of the offense that
makes "the public detest the Philosopher" seem to align
him with that protesting public; however, his mock-
apologies, protestations of innocence, and dissociations
from the Philosopher are of the same order as those of the
first volume, in which the narrator's statements gave
evidence of Meredith's awareness of the public's dislike
^In Meredith's Works (Westminster: Archibald,
Constable and Co., 1897), VI, 205.
46
of his technique as well as of his conviction that it
would serve him best. No question can exist, then, of
accidental or incidental inclusion of the Philosopher
along with a narrator, both of whom may seem to "interrupt"
the "comedy" (pp. 202-203), but actually may be proved to
forward it.
That the narrator feels superior to as well as
irritated at the critical public may be inferred from the
ambiguity of his telling of the Philosopher that he is "a
fellow who will not see things on the surface," the
implication being that the public "detests" him because
it does. Superficially, then, the narrator seems to be
condemning the Philosopher and condoning, as well as
agreeing with the public. Meredith causes the narrator
to speak forthrightly, however, in praise for the "acute
and honourable minority," who actually require the
Philosopher's "aphorisms and sentences and . . . fantastic
delivery of verities" in order to find the novel even
"intelligible." This statement, of course, condemns the
"majority" of readers, who are content to read without
desirable fullness of understanding (XI, 251).
"Craving copious sugar" (i.e., entertainment alone),
the majority fail to swallow, along with the sugar, the
"cane" (i.e., the teaching) from which it is the narrator's
"error to deem" the sugar to be "inseparable" (p. 251).
Thus, while the narrator attempts to assure the reader that
47
the Philosopher is his barely-tolerated "partner," he at
the same time argues his function to be deliberate choice,
rather than awkward result of the author's ineptitude.
Furthermore, when, as in Vittoria ("a field of action, of
battles and conspiracies, nerve and muscle, where life
fights for plain issues"), the need for the Philosopher
would disappear, he would "retire altogether" (II, 202).
Meredith's metaphorical explanation for drawing
leisurely pictures, accompanied with philosophical analy
ses, in addition to showing action in Sandra Belloni, is
that
In our fat England, the gardener Time is playing
all sorts of delicate freaks in the hues and
traceries of the flowers of life, and shall we
not note them? If we are to understand our
species, and mark the progress of civilization
at all, we must. Thus the Philosopher. (p. 203)
However, he states, this time more explicitly, that "when
Italy reddens the sky with the banners of a land revived,"
the narrator may look for his release from his partner-
master .
At least partially, then, Meredith's concern was with
distance. How succinctly the word "fat" conveys his some
what impatient prospect of England as indolent, unaware,
and passive and, therefore, able to be viewed up close, at
leisure, and with infinite patience. The observer may be
sure that the creature will not move or do anything to
distract or to cause change. With all care and delibera
tion, he may examine the slow mutations wrought in "the
48
flower of life" (p. 203). With such leisure to stop and
examine, "summing results," an egregious occupation,
becomes admissible; however, in the land of Italy, seething
with activity, the narrator can only present action as
quickly as it passes, making relatively abbreviated
comment when clarification demands it. For this work the
narrator needs no "partnership" (p. 251).
Since the narrator will be alone, without check or
balance, and since he will be dealing with knotty political
issues, he must establish himself, even more— and on a
different basis— than in Sandra Belloni, as trustworthy.
Therefore, he assures the reader parenthetically that
{He who tells this tale is not a partisan; he would
deal equally toward all. Of strong devotion, of
stout nobility, of unswerving faith and self-sacrifice,
he must approve; and when these qualities are dis
played in a contest of forces, the wisdom of means
employed, or of ultimate views entertained, may be
questioned and condemned; but the men themselves may
not be.)5
In Sandra Belloni, the narrator's role as objective com
mentator and informer had related only to the social
situation, but in Vittoria, his concern is with the truths
of a political matter. It is important, then, that,
since one might not trust the word of a patriotic Italian
or of a fiercely defensive Austrian on the merits of the
other's position or character, the narrator be identified
as "objective" and without propagandizing propensities.
^Vittoria, I, in his Works, VII, 13.
49
Along with a statement of position concerning the
issues in Vittoria, announcement of technique is tacitly
included in the above quotation. The narrator's aside
constitutes a transition between dramatic presentation
of the conspirators, with some descriptions of scenery,
during which the narrator has been well hidden, and a
paragraph of summary concerning the conspirators' his
tories. Throughout the novel, this pattern asserts
its.elf: pictorial description and summary operate as
guides to fact. The narrator performs significantly,
though differently, in both novels. In Sandra Belloni,
he is a truthful, though ironic source in the midst of
blind self-satisfaction; and in Vittoria, he is an objec
tive source for truth in the midst of blinding partisan
ship .
Meredith explains his methods, then, as being calcu
lated and purposeful. In examining the matters (political,
social, and aesthetic) which he includes in the two Italian
novels, one can see the pictorial and the dramatic methods,
used both together and separately, in the very ways he
outlines. The connections between the two novels, he
makes explicit, are close, so that throughout Sandra
Belloni references are made to Emilia as she lives in
England as opposed to her as she will live in Italy. In
the first volume these references have to do principally
with her musical training; in the second volume references
50
to the revolution multiply.
Merthyr Powys tells Emilia to be ready to go to
Italy, which is ready to rise (p. 221); she is "almost
moved to plunge forgetfully into this new tumultuous
stream" that is Italy in ferment (pp. 225 ff); Emilia
announces that she "is ready to go to Italy . . . at
once" (p. 300) ; and she progresses from "dead monotony
to active life" as she reads of "blood . . . flowing in
Italy" (p. 305). This last reference also reminds of the
contrast earlier made between "fat England" and Italy.
Then the last words of the novel, occurring in a letter,
sent from "Emilia Alessandra Belloni" to Merthyr in Italy,
that rings with patriotic fervor for Italy, are "Goodbye
to England."
The reader is thus repeatedly and specifically told
that the relationship between the two Italian novels is a
matter not only of content, but also of form. He is even
given an outline of the technique. Therefore, it is
important for even a basic understanding of Meredith's
artistic intention with the two novels to read them with
an awareness of his use of method in conjunction with
the content.
One of the most prominent of Meredith's concerns in
the two Italian novels has to do with society's forms and
faces. The guidelines for the study of the differing
societies of the two worlds was established toward the
end of Sandra Belloni with the distinction between "fat
England" as opposed to a "land revived" (p. 203). The
societal consideration of England is easily seen to have
followed his direction, for the world of Sandra Belloni
was constructed on a minute scale with long, pictorial
descriptions revealing its society in microcosm. The
world of Vittoria, on the other hand, was built to show
the macrocosm of national social and political matters.
The world of Sandra Belloni is made up, for the most
part, of small people with small concerns. Whereas the
techniques of picture and explanation are important during
the course of this novel, effective dramatic handling is
just as apparent. The fact of smallness is, nonetheless,
emphasized by method, that is, the highly detailed examin
ations, as well as by the inclusion of a figure (Emilia)
to contrast against the "little people of the novel"
(II, 292), most of whom are involved in the "Small life
at Brookfield" (I, 296).
It is reasonable, then, that the microcosmic world
of a self-made London merchant, Samuel Bolton Pole, and
of his daughters and son be seen up close, that the focus
be narrowed, and that the look be lingering. Therefore,
the reader sees in great detail the three sisters and
brother who, upon their father's success, have moved from
the urban center which reminds them too strongly of
commerce for their newly-activated "Nice Feelings," into
52
a suburb where the fresh air is supposed to dissipate
reminders of gross origins. Significantly the Poles,
unlike Galsworthy's Forsytes, who also came from the
country to London to make their fortunes, never show any
pride, or even interest in their background or their
forebears.
Into their suburban world enters one of noble soul,
Emilia, who is proud of her family line. She happily
tells Wilfrid that she is "descended from" Andronizetti,
"the composer!" (I, 42). Differing from the Poles in her
artistry and Italianism, she is distinctively not a part
of the merchant world, her existence in it being tenuous
at the least.
Her position in the aristocratic world of Vittoria
is, according to all testimony, more secure. Though not
of "high blood," she is accepted by the Countess Ammiani
as one who will marry her only son and so carry on the
blood line. As a matter of fact, Angelo Guidascarpi,
himself noble, says that she has "a noble heart" (I, 302-
303) and that she may, in marrying Carlo, "perpetuate our
race." He further explains that "low blood may be ele
vated without intervention of a miracle."
It is chiefly Emilia who links the microcosmic Pole
world and the macrocosm of Vittoria in which larger
figures of revolution and self-sacrifice move in a life-
and-death struggle for man's essential being. The issues
53
in the latter are matters not of sentiment, but of passion;
the outcome is not loss of money, of face, or of social
position, but loss of liberty and even of life itself.
The two worlds are not, obviously, self-isolating, for,
along with what has been already cited, in the microcosm
of Sandra Belloni move the larger figures not only of
Emilia, but also of the Welsh brother and sister, Merthyr
Powys and Georgiana Ford, and in the macrocosmic Vittoria
operate still the smaller figures of Wilfrid, Adela,
Mrs. Belloni, and Captain Gambier whose "discomposure at
Georgiana's departure" for Italy, presented toward the
conclusion of Sandra Belloni (II, 225), precedes the
announcement of their engagement in Vittoria.® The eccen
tric impresario Antonio-Pericles also moves in both worlds.
Within the two contrasted societies, the petty
bourgeois featured in Sandra Belloni and the grand aristo
cratic in Vittoria, are differing views of customs and
institutions. Both novels examine society's groupings in
political matters, in love, and in family affairs, as well
as artistic attitudes and expressions. Concentrating on
these four general areas helps to illuminate Meredith's
uses of the pictorial and the dramatic methods.
Vittoria, II, in his Works, VII, 169.
54
Political Considerations
Meredith was too intelligent and too realistic to
approach the Austro-Italian conflict on so simplistic a
basis as blameless patriots versus demonic occupiers. A
letter written after the publication of Vittoria even
indicates that Meredith hoped that, although the novel
"failed to touch the English public," it might not "fail
with the German." For this reason he offered to send it
to a German correspondent whom Cline says may have been
Baron Tauchsitz or Herr Asher.^ In spite of his obvious
confidence in his own objectivity, Meredith did indicate
a belief in national rights and in pride of country and,
so, sympathy with Italians. Moreover, the notion of one
power's forcibly conquering and holding another is a
criminal fact in both the Italian novels. In this concern
Meredith seems to be constructing a pattern for the
thematic preoccupations of later writers such as Virginia
Woolf and E. M. Forster, who were also to be repelled by
the situation of conquest (Woolf signified it as a
forcing of another's consciousness in Mrs. Dalloway, thus
working on a scale comparable to that in Sandra Belloni,
and Forster criticized severely colonialism in Passage to
India, thus indicating a broader canvas, such as that in
Vittoria). However, in spite of the transcendent power
^The Letters of George Meredith, ed. C. L. Cline,
(London: Oxford University Press, 1970), I, 380, foot
note.
55
Meredith seemed to ascribe to national rights, "Genius,
music and enthusiasm" are shown to be able to "break the
boundaries of nationalities" (Vittoria, I, 246).
Meredith's novels, as well as "Correspondence from
the Seat of War in Italy," reveal him to have believed
"right and justice" to have been "undoubtedly on the
Italian side."** The heroine as well as the heroes of both
the Italian novels espouses the Italian cause. In the
second novel, Emilia-Vittoria joins those who have "sworn
to set a nation free, free from the foreigner" (I, 13).
It is in that same paragraph that the narrator announces
his freedom from prejudice (see page 48), so that, though
believing justice to be on the Italian side, he announces
himself to be sufficiently removed to judge individuals
on the basis of their actions, rather than on the basis
of the cause they embrace. This latter he says he will
judge on a separate level.
Although Sandra Belloni is not so closely concerned
with politics as Vittoria, allusions to the Italian con
flict dot both its volumes, performing as one means for
characterizing Wilfrid as unworthy of Emilia's love.
Early in the novel, the hidden narrator says Wilfrid
speaks "frequently" of Italy with "simulated fervor"
simply for its effect upon Emilia, rather than from any
^Memorial Edition (London: Charles Scribner's Sons,
1897), XII, 170.
56
conviction (p. 40). His later joining the Austrian army
is of the same perfidy as his deceit and desertion of her.
To illustrate his duplicity, indirection is the means for
revealing his career. That is, an aside in Adela's
letter (p. 147) and an off-hand remark by Mrs. Chump only
inform of his being "gazetted" in the British army as a
lieutenant, the information coming not from Wilfrid and
the latter public announcement coming after a tender
scene between Emilia and Wilfrid which contains a hint
that he may have already determined to align himself with
the Austrians:
. . . forgetting the hypocritical foundation he had
laid, he said: "How proud I shall be of you!"
"I shall go with you to battle," returned Emilia.
"My little darling! You won't care to see those
black fellows killed, will you?"
Emilia shuddered. "No; poor things! Why do you
hurt them? Kill wicked people, tyrant whitecoats!"
Although the reference to "black fellows" probably con
cerns the Sepoy Rebellion in India or other difficulty
in the Empire (problems in Jamaica were to erupt in an
18 65 insurrection) to which a British lieutenant might
well be sent, an ambiguity does exist which Emilia's
shuddering response heightens. This reading is further
corroborated by the Italian Beppo's response to the German
maid, Aennchen: "These white women are most wonderful"
(Vittoria, I, 161).
Emilia's honesty as well as her devotion to the
Italian cause makes it virtually impossible for her to
57
realize Wilfrid's dishonesty. Later, then, she is
dramatically revealed as suffering over his decision, her
awareness of it having been quite distantly revealed in
Georgiana Ford's letter to Wilfrid (Sandra Belloni, II,
196). A series of dramatic scenes shows Emilia with
Georgiana, then with Merthyr, and, finally, in an inter
view with Wilfrid during which she recounts the tale of
Countess Branciani, of whose dress she wears a becoming
copy (pp. 253-264). At the end of her attempt to prevent
his becoming an enemy of Italy, she extracts only his
ambiguous promise to stay in England as long as she does
(p. 263). Long before this openly divisive scene takes
place, the reader has been prepared for it by a glimpse
inside Emilia's mind that associates her with Italy, "the
dear home of her heart" (p. 118), and by the narrator's
distancing comment upon Wilfrid that identifies him as of
England, "blunt" and without imagination or ideals
(p. 119).
Even though the Austrian occupation of Italy is not
central to Sandra Belloni, it constitutes in it, as in
Vittoria, in which it is a paramount issue, the main
political reference. Morover, in Sandra Belloni, again as
in Vittoria, Meredith uses mirror situations to illuminate
his views of the occupation and the lessons he wishes
drawn from it. In Sandra Belloni, pictorialization sets
forth the conflict between the Ipley and the Hillford
58
groups. In Vittoria, pictorial narration represents the
opera's plot; however, the novel's drama within which the
opera exists (the theatre, its occupants, the stage, and
the actors, with all their tensions) is treated more
dramatically.
In dealing with the English county squabble, the
narrator's ironic commentary provides a pithy statement
applicable, also, to England and its policies as well as
to the foreign situation Meredith actually examines in the
course of the two novels. The narrator comments in his
own person, using the first person pronoun, about the
Hillford Club's "march to Ipley Common" to visit their
seceded brethren.
Hillford had nothing to do with consequences no more
than our England is responsible when she sails out
among the empires and hemispheres, saying "buy" and
"sell" and they clamour to be eaten up entire, (p. 98)
The narrator's blistering comments under the guise of
apology, his usual style, reveal a position inimical to
colonialism or empire-building that would lend itself to
the championship of any country being forcibly occupied
by another.
It is not surprising that the narrator's description
of Hillford's design and methods in Sandra Belloni should
be matched by his telling of Austrian attitudes in
Vittoria. Thus, Hillford is said just to want "to give
Ipley a little music" in return for Ipley's securing
Mr. Pole's donation, one that Hillford had marked for
59
itself. "They were to give Ipley plenty of music; for
Ipley wanted to be taught harmony. Harmony was Ipley's
weak point" (p. 99). The hypocritical representation of
a service to Ipley for its own good is underscored by an
approach to a state of consciousness (with the use of the
first person plural pronoun, in this instance referring
to the Hillfordians). However, also included is a
reminder of the narrator's presence in certain terminology
patently beyond the vocabulary of unlettered men:
"If Ipley understands neither our music nor our
intent, haply we must hold a performance on the
impenetrable sconce of Ipley" (italics mine, p. 99).
The same unenlightened approach to power and possession
finds perhaps simpler expression from the narrator in
Vittoria in regard to the young Austrian officers about
their notion of the correct "method of ruling Venezia":
Italians were like women, and wanted— yes, wanted—
(their instinct called for it) a beating, a real
beating . . . once a month. . . . It was a youth who
spoke, but none doubted his acquaintance with women,
or cared to suggest that his education in that depart
ment of knowledge was an insufficient guarantee for
his fitness to govern Venezia. (Vittoria, I, 96)
The mixture of the pictorial with the dramatic methods
effects the same irony present in the Ipley Common situa
tion, heightened here by the breathless presentation of
the youthful officer's position, as if he speaks for him
self, which contrasts with the smooth addition of the
narrator's criticism via the indirect comment of "none's"
doubting his ability.
60
The application of the primitive principle of force
is a constant in both the situations, even though the
former is entirely dissociated from the Austro-Italian
struggle, except by implication. Moreover, although both
episodes are essentially pictorial in presentation, they
both have effects that resemble stream of consciousness.
It may be seen, however, that the narrator is less visible
in Vittoria than in Sandra Belloni, so that in the former
novel the effect is stronger.
Nonetheless, during the opera scene, both an impor
tant mirror episode in Vittoria and a structurally critical
one, the use of summary is increased. The opera has, for
this reason as well as for its complications of material
and form, especial value for illustration of Meredith's
technique. A drama within a drama, the opera passage
features both the scene upon the stage and that within
the theatre itself, with the narrator as an informed guide
surveying both. However, at moments, the absence of
informed commentary causes the reader to feel almost a
part of the audience and hence reliant upon his own gaze.
The three notable effects from the alternation as
well as mixture of the pictorial and the dramatic during
the three chapters devoted to the opera are, first, that
Meredith's representation of the narrator as a dramatic
presence in the scene gives the reader the feeling of
companionship with someone able to penetrate even the most
61
cleverly concealed secrets of audience members. A second
effect of the technique is completeness of knowledge in
the full-rounded view enabled (to be discussed at greater
length in Chapter II), and a feeling of constant movement
and excitement in the obtaining of that knowledge as the
reader enjoys first a distant prospect of the event and/or
character, permitting one kind of understanding, before a
gradual approach to intimate views reveals different
aspects of the same situation and character. With this
same movement concerning view, alternate looks at stage
and at audience increase tension and activity.
A third result of the mixture of techniques is an
elucidation of the novel's theme since the opera itself
is analogical not just of the political conditions so that
abstracts, such as nations and attitudes, are represented,
but even analogical also of some of the characters in
Vittoria. In this last effect, the opera has some of the
features of the Mousetrap play in Hamlet, although the
former exists with less exactitude and its purpose is
not to catch the conscience of the king, but to inflame a
people. Of course, both are structurally important in
building suspense as well as in conveying certain informa
tion .
This mixture of techniques, so rich in results and
used in both novels, refines the understanding of the
novel. To convey reactions of the principals, both on the
62
stage and in the audience, the emphasis is upon the
dramatic, with the narrator only discreetly at the reader's
elbow. The effect is that by the time the curtain rises
on the opera, the reader feels he has already seen the
curtain rise on the audience. Then, to inform of the
opera's plot, its music, and the acting, the pictorial
method is put into use. Thus, Meredith's technique of
picture-making and dramatic-rendering is exemplified here.
The reader can have the intimate dramatic experience,
desired by Lubbock, but, in addition, he can enjoy the
Olympian atmosphere of superior knowledge. Somewhat as
those sitting in La Scala can participate vicariously and
appreciate knowledgeably, so too can the reader. Our Town,
by Thornton Wilder, may be seen as utilizing the same
technique in reverse. That is, the Stage Manager is an
approximation of Vittoria's discreet narrator, who enters
with the second sentence of Chapter XIX in order to enrich
understanding of the scene.
The chapter opens, then, with a mixture of the two
methods as Countess Ammiani enters her box on Carlo's arm.
With the second sentence, the reader realizes that the
narrator is accompanying them to illuminate the disposi
tion of the principals and of the situation. It is he
who, though not yet visibly present, must be the source of
the information that Countess Ammiani
. . . was a woman who rarely exacted obedience, and
she was spontaneously obeyed. No questions could be
put, no explanations given in the crash, and they
threaded on amid numerous greetings in a place where
Milanese society had habitually ceased to gather,
and found itself now in assembly with unconcealed
sensations of strangeness. (I, 232)
It may be noticed that the narrator's presence is only
hinted in the assumption concerning results of the "crash
and that he could have exited after he focuses back upon
the couple as they pass through the crowd. Certainly he
is absent from the dramatic continuation.
A card lay on the table of the countess' private
retiring-room; it bore the name of General Pierson.
She threw off her black lace scarf. "Angelo
Guidascarpi is in Milan," she said . . .
The remainder of the scene engages the reader directly in
the action as General Pierson enters with Wilfrid and
Wilfrid leaves to tour the house and to visit his sister'
box on his way to see Lena Lenkenstein.
Again, the narrator may only be assumed present with
his summary powers, as Wilfrid leaves Lena's box, to
permit a general survey of the situation:
The delayed absence of the maestro from his post
at the head of the orchestra, where the musicians
sat awaiting him, seemed to confirm a rumour that
was now circling among the audience, warning all to
prepare for a disappointment. (p. 235)
The passive voice in the next sentence is of a pictorial
nature, but the active voice of the following sentence is
dramatic in effect:
His baton was brought in and laid on the book of the
new overture. Rocco paid no heed to it.
The next sentence has within it both the pictorial and
64
the dramatic.
His demeanour produced such satisfaction in the breast
of Antonio-Pericles that he rose, and was guilty of
the barbarism of clapping his hands.
While the tell-tale word "such" intimates another's
presence, that of the narrator, the word "barbarism" seems
to give a look into Antonio-Pericles' mind.
Summarizing paragraphs with dramatic moments inter
spersed tell of Pericles' dashing around the theatre in
an agony of concern that Vittoria be safely away. His
first encounter, given dramatically, is with Carlo, whose
words destroy his confidence in his having successfully
caused Vittoria's abduction. Then summary indicates that
he received "the same tale" from Agostino and from Signora
Piaveni (p. 236); more dialogue, this time with Powys,
dramatizes Pericles' distraction, and builds suspense still
more. A moment within Pericles' tortured mind reveals his
almost religious feeling about Vittoria's voice, now
endangered. The narrator leaves Pericles "tightening his
arms across his chest" to gain "some outward composure"
(p. 23 8) and turns to tell summarily of Carlo's challenge
to Weisspriess. The sequence's high feeling is thus
summarized and dramatized without loss of excitement.
The house had revealed its temper in that short
outburst [the challenge] as a quivering of quick
lightening-flame betrays the forehead of a storm.
(p. 238)
Suspense has been heightened, rather than lessened, by the
narrator's implication of further display.
65
Summary continues with background information con
cerning those actions of the Countess which contributed to
the conspiracy: "In helping Angelo Guidascarpi to evade
the law, she had imperilled her son and herself" (p. 238).
Dialogue between Wilfrid and Countess Lena briefly, but
provocatively, precedes the curtain's rising and the sus
pense that attends the possibility of Vittoria's appear
ance. Paradoxically, but fittingly since it is outside
the main plot, as the curtain rises on the opera the
dramatic method disappears almost entirely and pictorial
narrative gives the opera’s content and the performers'
actions as well as the effects of both upon the audience.
Chapter XX begins with a pictorial summary of the
climactic moment of Vittoria's appearance on stage. The
narrator's analysis permits yet another view of Vittoria's
entrance. First revealing that the new prima donna was
"jealously watched for a sign of inequality" between her
person and the politically significant role that she would
play, the narrator philosophizes:
Men do not heartily bow their heads until they
have subjected the aspirant to some personal contest
and find themselves overmatched. (p. 244)
The enriched awareness of the scene, as well as the
pleasure contained in the articulation of a felt truth to
a specific instance, adds to the reader's enjoyment of the
action. Meredith's purpose during this passage has been
to enable vision, that is, to permit the reader first to
66
see Vittoria's appearance, even as member of the audience
might. Then, as an added layer of enjoyment, he designed
for the reader also to see the audience as it experiences
her entrance. Moreover, he strives in this pictorial
description to enable both sight ("her superb Italian
head, with the dark banded hair-braid") and sound (the
effortlessness of her voice like "a dove," circling and
taking flight). Upon completing his descriptions of the
sensual effects, he announces, "The theme was as follows:"
from which point he again launches into pictorial summary
as he continues the opera plot (p. 244).
Again, the technique engages the reader in full
dramatic realization of the scene, though it is essen
tially pictorially narrated. Meredith labors especially
that the sounds become increasingly possible to realize
with such descriptions as "The song had been massive in
monotones"; "the last note was in the minor key"; and "It
was a masterpiece of audacious dramatic musical genius
addressed with sagacious cunning and courage to the sym
pathizing audience present" (p. 246). The statement that
the audience reacted with "Evvivas, bravas, shouts— all
the out-cries of delirious men" to Vittoria1s performance
precedes a focusing upon the object of the enthusiasm.
With this focus, narration gradually progresses again from
objective summary to a tentative approach, in the third,
fourth, and fifth sentences, to Vittoria's thought. Then,
67
with the last sentence, the stance of more remote summary
is resumed.
. . . the object and source of the tremendous frenzy
stood like one frozen by the revelation of the magic,
the secret of which she had studiously mastered. A
nosegay, the last of the tributary shower, discharged
from a distance, fell at her feet. She gave it un
consciously preference over the rest, and picked it up.
A little paper was fixed in the centre. She opened it
with a mechanical hand, thinking there might be
patriotic orders enclosed for her. It was a cheque.
. . . This dash of solid prose and its convincing proof
that her Art had been successful restored Vittoria's
composure though not her early statuesque simplicity.
(p. 247)
The rest of the paragraph also continues in summary vein
with action telescoped until stopped at the scene of
Countess Lena with Wilfrid and Countess Anna with
Weisspriess, all engaged in dialogue. To show reaction
to the situation as well as to the opera, the method,
again, is of pictorial representation of the agitated
members of the audience with brief snatches of dialogue.
As before the opera began, the technique minimizes the
narrator's role as a discrete personality engaged in
philosophical or political discussion or in comment.
Thus, in the lobby, Antonio-Pericles briefly expresses
"exultation" (p. 248), and, in the Lenkenstein box, the
countesses, Lena and Anna, accompanied by Wilfrid, are
joined by Weisspriess and General Pierson, whose dialogues
stop with a "grand duo between Montini and Vittoria,"
the latter precipitating a leap into Pericles' thought:
68
"I was a fool. . . . I flung my bouquet with the
herd. I was a fool! I lost my head!" He tapped
angrily at the little ink-flask in his coat-pocket.
(p. 250)
A summary paragraph deals with the first act's ending
and with its political message as well as with various
characters' emotional states, after some description of
the conditions of the composer, Rocco Ricci, and the
librettist, Agostino. Following the notation of the
curtain's falling, the dramatic use of dialogue vivifies
their agitation and so the reader's anticipation.
Summarization, with that intriguing approach to conscious
ness that Meredith so frequently inserts, appears again in
dealing with Pericles' reactions.
Pictorially objective with the notation that he "had
this, in his case, singular piece of delicacy, that he
refrained from the attempt to see Vittoria immediately
after he had flung his magnificent bouquet of treasure at
her feet" (p. 252), the paragraph contains information of
his optimism concerning her "forgiveness" in terms reflect
ing his disposition:
. . . her forgiveness of his disinterested endeavour
to transplant her was certain, and perhaps her future
implicit obedience or allegiance bought. {p. 252)
The dramatic state-of-consciousness point of view is
signaled by the words "disinterested" and, even more
"transplant" (see pages 171 and 172) as well as by the
blind, even foolish assumption of Vittoria's future
"obedience or allegiance." The unconscious humor of the
69
descent from desire for forgiveness to a dream of her
subordination to his will is highly suggestive of stream
of consciousness.
In the dramatic method, Pericles is shown as he meets
and speaks with General Pierson, but pictorial summary
tells of Agostino's abortive attempt to see Vittoria as
she sits locked in her dressing room. Toward the end of
the narrator's account of her thoughts and of her emotional
state, the language indicates a brief entry into her mindi
She sat crouching alone till her tire-women called;
horrible talkative things: her own familiar maid
Giacinta being the worst to bear with. (p. 254)
Abruptly the next paragraph begins a summarization of
the opera's second act, the point now being approximately
mid-chapter. The technique is the same as that used for
the first act: plot summarization and commentary con
cerning performance ("The act was weak in too distinctly
revealing the finger of the political squib at a point
here and there" [p. 255]), as well as concerning the
opera's significance ("It was thus that YOUNG ITALY had
too often been treated by the uncompromising, merely
discontented, dallying aristocracy" [p. 257; see also
analogical discussion, pages 73 and 74]).
General Pierson's remark that "It is a question
whether we ought to sit still and see a firebrand flashed
in our faces" (p. 260) effects dramatically the switch
in focus back to the audience. However, the paragraph
70
actually presents pictorially the Austrians' dilemma, a
technique that enables the subtly ironical view of the
Italian "dallying aristocracy" in the person of the para
sitical nobleman, Count Serabiglione, as treated by the
Austrians. He is shown approaching a group of Austrian
officers around General Pierson. Serabiglione walks
toward them
. . . with his courtliest semi-ironical smile, on
whom they straightway turned their backs. The
insult was happily unseen, and the count caressed
his shaven chin and smiled himself onward. (p. 260)
Shorn of more than his chin-whiskers, Count Serabiglione
passes from view, although the dramatic treatment does not,
but rather dominates the rest of the chapter. First, an
exchange between de Prymont and Wilfrid takes place; then,
in a scene in Vittoria's room, Rocco, Agostino, and
Salvolo argue about General Pierson's order to eliminate
Vittoria's solo. As they dismiss the consequences of
defiance, "They went their separate ways, laughing"
(p. 263).
In contrast with the dramatic narrative of Chapter XX,
in which the gaily desperate conspirators talk at the end
of the second act, the pictorial opening of Chapter XXI
features the narrator's appearance in his own person. His
subdued presence during the earlier narration, controlled
yet calculated to render the maximum enjoyment and appre
ciation of the operatic performance, has prepared the
reader for his specific comment of concern;
71
I wish that I could pipe to your mind's hearing any
notion of the fine music of Rocco Ricci, and touch
you to feel the revelations which were in this new
voice. (p. 263)
Without doubt, the desire could have been expressed
objectively, or, in the mode of Eliot's objective correla
tive, the wish could have been eliminated and evocative
descriptions presented without comment. However, the
advantageous effect of the narrator as personality {in
the manner Booth established for Austen as "a secret
friend" whose presence "few can resist," or can deny as
"fully as important as any other element in the story"
[pp. 265-266]), is enhanced by his winning wish on the
reader's behalf. Moreover, his expression may gain for
the reader an increased degree of enjoyment as he more
finely tunes his efforts at imagination in almost uncon
scious response.
Pictorial presentation continues to give the sub
stance of the opera as well as the appearance of the
actors and the sounds of the music, with dramatized pre
sentation of the actors' and audience's reactions inter
spersed. For instance, Pericles' irritation at the
sacrifice of music to politics and Carlo's danger from the
"sbirri" are dramatically given. Then, a pictorial des
cription, first, of two of the audience (Countess Ammiani
and Carlo) and, then, of the general mood within the
theatre, as "The audience had caught view of a brown-
coated soldier at one of the wings" (p. 267), precedes
72
the summary of the third act: "Leonardo, wavering
eternally, lets us know that it [the divorce decree] is
weighted with a proviso" (p. 267). Again, the pictorial
representation of the third act alternates with surveys
of the audience and of the stage and with summaries of
the plot and of the audience's reactions to it as well as
to the music and to the actors on stage. As the climax
of the opera approaches, lines of dialogue accompany
Vittoria's veiled appearance with some descriptions of
stage business interlaced.
"Wilt thou unveil?"
"Art thou hungry for the lightning?"
"I bid thee unveil, woman!"
Michiella's ringing shriek of command produces no
response.
"It is she!" cries Michiella, from a contracted bosom;
smiting it with blenched hands. {p. 269)
Nearer the climax, stage directions and comments do not
appear; rather the speeches are set in text as poetry for
approximately three pages.
A change to pictorial description then reveals the
result of the heroine Camilla's (played by Vittoria)
triumph: Michiella's stabbing of Italy's heroine which
introduces yet another section of the libretto set as
poetry. This death scene dialogue occupies a page; at
its conclusion, the narrator flashes to the audience so
that the struggle between Austrians and Italians there may
be revealed through General Pierson's reactions and speech
as well as those of Antonio-Pericles. Quickly a flash-back
73
to the stage continues the recounting of the action there
and of Vittoria's performance.
The oscillation from audience to stage has given the
impression of fast action and of excitement, adding also
information of a general nature. Thus, the narrator
informs that the "fascination of [Vittoria's] voice
extended even over the German division of her audience"
(p. 278). Then, to emphasize the climactic excitement
between the first and the second verse of her great final
solo, he says, "So the great name was out, and its
enemies had heard it"; and between the third and last
stanzas, he notes Vittoria's real, not simulated exhaus
tion as she sinks, yet sings. Finally, the narrator ends
the last of the three chapters devoted to the three acts
of the operatic performance simply, with words evocative
of its conclusion: "The curtain dropped" (p. 278).
The opera performs both as a pivotal device for the
plot and as a mirror and so a clarification of abstracted
issues, almost in the manner of the old morality play.
In this, its analogical function, the opera serves to
separate the political issues per se from the complicating
matters of personality and motive which dominate the novel
and concerning which the narrator promised to remain
neutral. In this way, the opera adds a new dimension, as
well as separating from the novel proper the overt propa
gandizing that the opera's form permits.
I
74
In its simplicity of the morality form, the opera
deals with unalloyed bad as opposed to pure good, i.e.,
Count Orso (Austria) and Michiella (Italian love for
intrigue) are reprehensible figures with but one concern:
to subjugate Camillo (indolent Italy) and to eliminate
Camilla (young Italy). Identified with Count Orso are
the Lenkensteins, Weisspriess, and Nagen; with Michiella
are Count Serabiglione (proud of his "old Italian preju
dices" [p. 128]), Barto Rizzo, Luigi, Countess d'Isorella,
and Irma herself; with Camillo are Count Medole and the
king; and with Camilla are Vittoria, Carlo, Agostino,
Ricci, and all those involved in the struggle against
the occupiers. It need hardly be stated that all these
characters, including the flatter ones, such as Serabig
lione and Nagen, have more complicated reasons for their
actions than do the operatic personifications.
Although, as it has already been stated, Meredith
pictures the political issue as an immeasurably compli
cated one, in Vittoria still do reside some contrasts
between Austrians and Italians, besides those exaggerated
in the opera. Since these differences are principally
delineated through use of imagery, the matter is discussed
in greater detail in Chapter II. Here, however, we should
note the political connotations of the impressive opening
reference to the "Titan-heads" surrounding Monte
Motterone (p. 1), which "wear the look of the revolted
sons of Time" (p. 2). These allusions, classically grand,
become associated with the little band of Italian revolu
tionaries, themselves picturesquely described on their
climb to a rendezvous. Yet shortly appears the cunning
eyed Luigi (p. 50), who, though harmless to the Italian
cause (p. 53), is, according to his own statement, per
fectly designed so that he can "deal double" (p. 51).
Luigi, then, "Never having an idea of spontaneously
telling the whole truth" ( p . 65), is prone to "small and
purposeless lies" (p. 7 0) and so stands testimony to the
corruptibility and the pettiness possible to those of
Italian blood.
The fact that Luigi is uneducated and of the lower
classes cannot alone be reason for his "ingenious mind"
(p. 65). Perhaps because he is "always too full of his
own cunning to suspect the same in another" (p. 66), he
is out-maneuvered by Barto Rizzo, a former schoolmaster
(p. 67), who thus demonstrates that ignorance is not the
basis of a preference for the crooked way. Moreover, the
"parasitical Italian nobleman," Count Serabiglione, amply
demonstrates cunning and duplicity to exist on the aristo
cratic level. The Count, whose house "was a symbolical
sunflower constantly turning toward royalty" (p. 126), is
avoided in society by Italians, as well as by Austrians.
Still he tends to think of all Italy, along with himself,
as a "serpent" that is "probably a match for the bear
76
[Austria-Austrians] in a game of skill" (p. 127). It is
easy to hear the echo of Michiella in these three men who
issue from three levels of Italian society. Even men of
a fourth level, the clergy, are represented by a "village
priest, a sleek gentle creature" (II, 117).
That Meredith does not think duplicity laudable,
even though a characteristic of some Italians, is made
clear not only by making it a trait of those characters
not plainly admirable, but also by the grudging tone of
concession to its value. It is necessary for Italy that
"others of her sons, subtle and adept, intricate as ser
pents, bold, unquestioning as well-bestridden steeds (see
also pages 233 and 234 in regard to animal imagery),
should grapple and play deep for her in the game of
worldly strife" (I, 221). The use of the pronoun "others"
separates Luigi, Rizzo, and Serabiglione from those who
climb Monte Motterone under the signification of the
spirit of Camilla (young Italy). These men and women
employ their daring openly and so with the honesty that
their characters would dictate.
Treatment of Austrians, too, discloses the same
separation of cause from the personalities involved.
Whereas the Italian revolutionaries are dealt with in
terms of epic heroism, the occupying Austrians are com
pared to "vile, domiciliary parasitical insects" which
inhabit "the best peaches" (p. 4). However, even in the
77
over-simplified opera, Austria is pictured as having a
sense of honor, albeit as a means of portraying "the
justice of the feelings of the Italians" (p. 124). Count
Orso's "respect for Law" (p. 259) is shared by Michiella,
who, it must be remembered, represents the Italian love for
conspiracy; it may, however, be her "Austrian heart" that
permits her to dispense with, though reverencing, the
priestly blessing (p. 259) that Anna, too, is willing to
delay (II, 5).
Austrian respect for the law and for the order that
it brings is both pictorially and dramatically depicted in
the novel itself in the attempts of the senior officers
to keep discipline and in the familial relationships of
the house of Lenkenstein. For example, dramatic narrative
shows that Anna's dishonorable actions, designed to kill
Carlo and also wound Vittoria, compel her brother Count
Karl to do all that he can to rectify the family name.
Each member of the family is demonstrated to depend upon
the ordered behavior of the other members.
Italians share in the concern for family honor.
Angelo and Rinaldo Guidascarpi are shown to risk death to
justify the honor of their family; it is also shown that
Carlo, jealous of any slight to his name in General
Pierson's commandeering his mother's opera box, must be
deterred from action and, in reaction to the slanderous
treatment of Vittoria's name, he is ready to kill. Too,
78
the "question of right and honour" is prized by the
Italian army ("Correspondence," p. 194). In the novel,
the plethora of duels for which even Weisspriess begins
to have a distaste are due to the scrupulosity with which
both Italians and Austrians attend to their reputations.
The issues, then,are rather evenly split, honor not
the sole property of the Italians, nor perfidy of the
Austrians. In both ranks occur both noble and despicable
acts and are discernible both admirable and reprehensible
desires and attitudes. Violetta d'Isorella is shown to
use love, even as Anna Lenkenstein; Weisspriess reveals
as much indifference toward truth of feeling in his search
for an advantageous marriage as does Count Serabiglione in
his desire to advance his house, or Luigi his fortune;
Aennchen is a match in lightness of heart and in dishonesty
for Luigi; and the Duchess of Graatli's indifference toward
her marriage vows certainly equals that of Countess Medole,
who agonizes over possible embarrassment for her lover,
Colonel Prince Radocky.
On the other hand, Count Karl's behavior is exemplary,
and even Count Paul's conduct during the Guidascarpi
affair seems not without honor. That is, Count Paul's
conduct is no more suspect than that of Clelia Guidascarpi,
with whom he became involved; as a matter of fact, even
the tale told by the narrator, almost as if in Vittoria's
mind ("Vittoria's imagination could not go by that scene"
79
[I, 128]), indicates Clelia to have the graver responsi
bility in the affair. The youthful Carlo, in his love
for Violetta, also conducted himself with honor. Lena
Lenkenstein does not resemble her sister in revengefulness
or in lack of concern for honor, but rather attempts to
influence Anna to rectify her behavior. In this latter
instance, she is vaguely reminiscent of Vittoria herself
in her generosity, although "Lena could only be generous
upon the afterthought" (II, 253).
Therefore, objective truth may be seen in the fact
that rogues and saints appear on both sides of the con
flict, if they may be seen to exist at all in the novel;
moreover, the characters seem real in possessing both good
and bad traits. Even Vittoria, during the course of this
second novel, reveals herself to have feet of clay, a
fact indirectly hinted in exegetical treatment of the
artist's portrait in Sandra Belloni (see page 190). Even
here Meredith's truth to life may be granted; for only
when she is older and tried, having experienced difficulty
and failure, does Vittoria realize her own potential for
weakness and failure. In Sandra Belloni, it is true, she
tasted failure, but from Wilfrid's betrayal, not from some
weakness or disposition toward evil on her own part. In
Vittoria, however, she does realize her own potential for
weakness and even for evil. She feels attraction for the
formerly-despicable white uniform and knows guilt along
80
with the possibility of betraying her deepest convictions
as well as those she holds dear (II, 139). She does not,
of course, actually betray, and it may be recognition of
weakness along with display of strength that constitutes
her matured greatness.
It is true, nonetheless, that in sheer numbers the
honorable and/or admirable Italians in the novel outrank
the honorable and/or admirable Austrians. On the other
hand, the dishonorable Italians also number more than the
dishonorable Austrians. This latter fact may be somewhat
affected by the further note that of the less important
characters, Lieutenant Jenna and other young Austrian
officers behave more culpably in their positions of power
than the Italians are represented as acting in comparable
positions either within their own ranks, or, more under
standably, in positions of subservience toward the
Austrians.
The antagonism between Italians and Austrians is
both shown and described as it appears in drawing-rooms
and in the theatre. These places permit more or less
sophisticated dialogue, which is less possible in the
streets and on the battlefields where hostilities are
also represented. It is the full and well-rounded
presentation of matters through pictorial and dramatic
methods, especially of the issues of conflict and of the
conflict itself, which is probably the reason for
81
Stewart's belief (see his pages 124-125) that Meredith's
first attraction to war changed to disapproval by the end
of the novel. Examination discloses the greater possibil
ity that the progression in attitude is a matter of tech
nique, as is most else in the novels, rather than a record
of the evolution of Meredith's own thought.
It seems highly significant that Italy's difficulties
in achieving unity, a problem that puzzled Meredith as
he wrote his "Correspondence" from the front (p. 213),
should also be matter for conjecture during the writing
of Vittoria. The narrator attributed Austrian cohesiveness
to the army, which "was in those days the Austrian empire.
Outside the army the empire was a jealous congery of
intriguing disaffected nationalities" (I, 93). No note
of praise exists in recognition of the role that war
played for Austria when "the password" was signified as
"MARCH, and not DEVELOP" (p. 94). Rather,
War did the work of a smithy for the iron and steel
holding her together; and but that war costs money,
she would have been an empire distinguished by
aggressiveness. The next best medicinal thing to
war is the military occupation of insurgent provinces.
The linkage of war to the occupation, which Meredith time
and again went on record as despising (beginning in Sandra
Belloni, within the first one hundred pages), and the
ironical use of "medicinal" can leave little doubt about
his attitude toward armies and war.
In contrast to Austrian cohesion, Meredith noted
82
Italy's condition as "dismembered, jealous, and corrupt,"
though "true to itself and determined to claim God's
gift to brave men," by which he meant freedom (p. 95).
The use of the word "jealous" to describe both Austria
and Italy, as well as the pictures of intrigue, cruelty,
and distrust operant in the ranks of both, balances the
scales as far as Italy’s and Austria's intrinsic worths
are concerned. It is only the matter of freedom that is
at issue, the evil being the denial to another of his
freedom. The motivation then is crucial. For Austria,
war and the occupation serve purposes of unification so
that it profits from another's loss. For Italy, war
serves a cause for freedom; it is the means by which she
must extricate herself from slavery.
Although the war scenes, dramatically rendered,
assuredly are a part of the excitement that Meredith had
earlier promised for Vittoria, to believe that such a
concession to public taste for action is tantamount to
declaring a virtue of war is hardly reasonable. In
further argument against Meredith's demonstrating such a
position, the characters who either espouse or seem to
espouse war itself offer another kind of evidence. The
young Austrian officers who occupy Italy are so inflamed
with the notion of fighting that they court opportunities,
as in the multiplicity of duels they invite; but even
their champion dueler, Captain Weisspriess, begins to see
83
dueling as "equivalent to murder" (II, 213) and tries to
give Carlo honorable means of avoiding a confrontation.
The young Italians' desire to fight, not duels, but in
battle for freedom, is unabated. They do then react to
insult and provocation, as in the street brawls over the
girl who refused to respond to an Austrian soldier's
salute and over the Austrian soldiers' insolent cigar-
puffing .
The Italian rebel leaders also seek combat with the
clear purpose of gaining freedom, rather than for exercise
of strength or demonstration of power, as in the case of
the Austrians. Still, an important leader of the
rebellion, Agostino, who, Carlo writes, "fires a carbine
much more deliberately than he composes a sonnet" (p. 165),
announces himself "for peace" and compares combat to "two
cats with arched backs" (p. 207). Those younger rebels
who are anxious about their own or their families' honor,
including Carlo Ammiani, never announce themselves for
peace during the occupation, but as ready for battle.
Barto Rizzo, on the other hand, no longer young, and
without concern for honor in the same way as Carlo and
the others, is the one character in Vittoria who seems
truly enamoured of war. Therefore, his identification as
one with a "distorted mind" (p. 279) bears with it a
statement about war. Merthyr, who appeared early in
Sandra Belloni as supporting the Italian cause and even
84
as fighting for it, is eager for Italian independence,
but, after being wounded for the second time (his first
wounding was recounted toward the end of Sandra Belloni),
makes known his disillusionment with war when he advises
Vittoria to forsake the cause (see page 180). Finally,
Laura Piaveni and Vittoria are shown as pro-war. It is
the attitude of these two women that is perhaps most
illuminating.
Emilia-Vittoria1s attitude toward war had appeared
only briefly, as from a great distance, in Sandra Belloni.
In a dramatic scene with Georgiana Ford toward the end of
the second volume, she told of her eagerness "to march"
with Merthyr and "to see the fight." She revealed herself,
however, as she repeats her father's words about war, to
be essentially unaware of its realities and to be rather
expressing a continued rejection of her art and a wish for
death.
My voice! I have forgotten music. I lived for that,
once; now I live for nothing, only to take my chance
everywhere with my friend. I want to smell powder.
My father says it is like salt, the taste of blood,
and is like wine when you smell it. I have heard him
shout about it. (p. 226)
In Volume II of Vittoria, six chapters (XXIX through
XXXIV), entitled "Episodes of the Revolt and the War,"
focus both on the conflict itself and on those affairs
behind the lines that concern the principal actors. The
glimpses include the battlefield, the Austrian and Italian
leaders behind the lines, the lovers Vittoria and Carlo,
85
Pericles' frenzied concern for art in the midst of the
chaos, the Lenkensteins' and the Guidascarpis' affairs,
Barto Rizzo's efforts, Merthyr wounded, and, of course,
Vittoria, Laura, and Georgiana Ford on the battlefield.
However, because of the import of Laura's and Vittoria's
first encounter with war and because this episode was
essentially ignored by both Kelvin (pp. 40-51) and
Stewart (pp. 124-139) as they argued that the novel dis
played Meredith's own "inveterate passion for armed
conflict" (Kelvin, p. 42), this passage will be studied
in some detail.
Again, the pictorial and the dramatic methods are
mixed; perspective varies from the distant to the center
of action and thought. For instance, a summary paragraph
indicating the king's general position and movement intro
duces Chapter XXXII. The next paragraph moves closer to
a specific day and place, but still summarily; details of
sights and sounds are alluded to, though distance from the
actual scene is still enough so that no specific item can
be identified. Although the method is still largely
pictorial, phraseology begins to approach the dramatic
with an intimation of state of consciousness.
A pair of eager-eyed women gazing on a battlefield
for the first time could but ask themselves in
bewilderment whether the fate of countries were
verily settled in such a fashion. (p. 108)
Although the remainder of this second paragraph stays
close to the consciousness of the two women, the presence
8 6
of a third mind, one analyzing their feelings and thought,
is felt in expression of ideas beyond the level at which
they could possibly articulate. Moreover, this other mind
is more familiar with Vittoria than with Laura. It is not
strange then that the narrator, for it is he who tells
more about Vittoria, should note that Laura's "savage soul"
leads her to kneel at "Flashes of guns" in the distance
(p. 118) without attempting to explain further the anima
tion of that soul. Though Laura does kneel and is savage
in her attitude toward war, she, even as Vittoria, is
aware of the dichotomy of war. Seeming to express that
which the women feel, the narrator says that the guns of
Italy and Austria both speak
. . . the devilish tongue of the final alternative. . . .
A joyful bright black death-wine seemed to pour from
the bugles all about. The women strained their senses
to hear and see; they could realize nothing of a
reality so absolute; their feelings were shattered,
and crowded over them in patches; — horror, glory,
panic, hope, shifted lights within their bosoms,
(p. 109)
Because this first encounter with war is part of a learning
experience, the non-intellectual emotionalism of their
responses seems instructive.
The fascination and repulsion of the image of Force
divided them. They feared; they were prostrate; they
sprang in praise. The image of Force was god and
devil to their souls. (p. 109)
The pictorial has been delicately balanced during
this long paragraph with the dramatic; yet the distance
is still remote, though movement is ever closer. While
87
the women are in the divided state described above, they
can see only "blocks of men," "blocks of infantry,"
"blocks of cavalry." Nonetheless, vision is clearer than
when only "white powder-smoke" could be "seen from a
distance. . . . like a huge downy ball" (p. 108). Still
distance is such that "it seemed a strife of insects"
(p. 110). It is important, when noting the tone of half-
approval in the women's reactions, that one also note
their distance from that which they judge.
Then, when "one by one, soldiers who had gone into
yonder white pit for the bloody kiss of death . . . were
borne by," Vittoria and Laura enter more deeply into the
truth of combat: "Torture was their key to the reading
of the battle" (p. 110). The manner of narration through
out has been chiefly pictorial, but with enough drama,
mostly in the form of dialogue, so that the scene and
the women's conditions are vividly realized. The third
paragraph, however, is completely summary, giving the
battle disposition.
Immediately with the women's actual involvement in
the war, the fourth paragraph presents a dramatically-
realized scene in which Beppo carries supplies for the
women as they "walked in the paths of carnage" (p. 110).
The balance is thus reversed so that the pictorial method
occurs only occasionally in such sentences as, in comment
upon the sufferings of the wounded: "These scenes put
8 8
grievous chains on Vittoria's spirit, but Laura evidently
was not the heavier for them" (p. Ill). A differentiation
in the narrator's understanding of the two women, as well
as an indication of his continued presence, is contained
in the word "evidently."
The effect of Meredith's use of the pictorial and
the dramatic methods is to give the reader a more certain
and also a fuller view of the action. He sees it from
afar, even as Laura and Vittoria approach, and then comes
progressively closer until finally he arrives near the
center, again even as do the women. But he also sees it
as an historian might, with the perspective of even
greater distance, or elevation, relative to both time and
space, than that which the women could achieve. In these
ways, Meredith enables the reader to have both an intel
lectual and an emotional experience that is fairly objec
tive, showing both sides, but also showing the horror that
is war.
The episode sequent to the first encounter with war
involves a meeting with the spy Luigi. This passage also
mixes summary with dialogue and with Vittoria's reactions.
Although occupying but a paragraph that flows into a
description of another meeting between Vittoria, Laura,
Georgiana Ford, and Pericles, it and the next paragraph
help create an atmosphere of dramatic action. The account
of the second meeting, moreover, shows why readers might
8 9
sometimes question a difficulty in reading Meredith. That
his method, one largely of implication, demands the read
er's close attention is easily granted. So when Pericles'
presence must at first only be assumed, even that assump
tion being unsure, one can only be watchful for clues,
while remaining uncertain. The reader is specifically
informed that Vittoria meets Georgiana, who then is said
to second "strongly the vehement persuasions addressed
by Pericles to Vittoria" (p. 112). At this point, the
time of these particular persuasions, there having been
others, is in question, since Pericles has not been said
to be in the scene. After another sentence in which
Georgiana expresses herself about women on battlefields,
another ambiguous statement informs the reader that
"Pericles had followed the army to give Vittoria one last
chance" (p. 112).
Still, since Pericles was not identified as present
when the group met, the reader cannot be absolutely
certain that he is at his destination. With the next
sentence greater clarity is shed on his present position:
"On first seeing her he gasped" (pp. 112-113). Since the
reader knows this encounter has not previously taken
place, he may assume himself present at their meeting now,
and he begins to picture the completed group: Pericles
accompanied by Luigi has joined Vittoria, Laura, and
Georgiana. The reader, incidentally, had been reminded
90
of Laura's presence with the statement that to her
Pericles "was a fool; but Vittoria enjoyed his wildest
outbursts" because of his "worship of her Art" (pp. 112-
113). Although the reader early knows they are at Oliosi,
he is not able to picture them at an inn until the next
page.
The matter of Pericles' presence is, of course, minor
to the plot so that certainty concerning it is not criti
cal, and the effect of suspense and stimulation to
alertness can be gained without sacrifice of important
information. Moreover, the gradually-dawning awareness
created in the reader effects, in a paradoxical way, a
simulation of his own real presence, for the feeling
itself belongs to experience, even though its application
to this situation is an unnatural application of it. That
is, if one were truly present, he would know immediately
of Pericles' presence in the same way that he would have
immediate knowledge, as a member of a theatre audience,
of an actor's entrance. Moreover, by exercising a certain
control over his material, so that the reader is able to
experience a gradually-developing awareness, and, con
sequently, to have a small sense of climax, Meredith
achieves a feeling of greater drama in a passage treated
as essentially pictorial with much summary. Meredith
here demonstrates a theory about art, which he presents
in the novel, that art is artificially natural (see
91
pages 186 and 187).
As in treatment of politics, in which good and bad
appear on both sides of the match between Austrians and
Italians, so too presentation of war does not affirm its
good or deny its evil in simple terms of contrast. Thus,
while Vittoria employs her voice in the struggle for
freedom, she does, on the other hand, also lose her
beloved husband, and, even, it is intimated, her own
reason for life: "Her soul . . . crossed the darkness
of the river of death in that quiet agony preceding the
revelation of her Maker's will" (pp. 341-342). Part of
the complicated richness of Meredith's technique, with
the mixture of drama and picture, may be seen in the fact
that in the opera the pictorially-described stabbing of
Camilla (young Italy, played by Vittoria) by Michiella
ironically foreshadows the pictorially-told death of Carlo
as well as the end of Vittoria's artistic life. Only
"once more, and but for once," upon Italy's gaining its
freedom, ten years after Carlo's death, "her voice was
heard in Milan" (p. 342).
The narrator's as well as, in Sandra Belloni, the
Philosopher's contributions to an understanding of the
plots and the political considerations of the two novels
have been smoothly integrated into the novels' substance.
Since the pictorial narration is of the very essence of
that substance, to charge interruption and to intimate
92
digression are perverse. The same state prevails in
treatment of love.
Treatment of Love
Just as each novel has a different thematic concern
(in Sandra Belloni, romantic love is of primary concern
and, in Vittoria, a revolution), so too, then, treatment
of love is different. Yet handling of courtship in the
two novels offers a kind of continuous pattern so that
those loves involving Emilia-Vittoria appear at the apex
of their respective novels and there, seeming to bisect
each other, offer comparison and contrast that illuminate
the story of the two novels as they form a continuum.
Thus, three degrees of seriousness, approaching the
tragic, mark the handling of love in Vittoria; whereas in
Sandra Belloni, the treatment of love is on three differ
ent levels of the comic. At the apex, the love of Emilia
for Wilfrid is tragicomic, fulfilling two requirements
for tragicomedy as stated by Abrams: 1) Members of the
lower class are appropriate to comedy (the Poles) and
members of the higher class to tragedy (Emilia by claim of
both a noble and an artistic nature), and 2) serious action
that threatens tragedy ends happily.® Intersecting this
love is, in Vittoria, Vittoria's love for Carlo, which
^M. H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms, 3rd ed.
(New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc".") T971) ,
p. 176.
93
does end tragically.
Marking the contrast, in Sandra Belloni a false and
unworthy lover is finally repudiated by the heroine;
whereas in Vittoria death claims her lover and husband.
On almost the same level of tragedy is the off-stage love
of Laura Piaveni and her husband Giacomo, whose death,
caused also by the revolution, preceded the novel's
beginning. The reader is led to consider the Piaveni
situation a mirror for Vittoria's and Carlo's love, since
such full and matching details of the relationship,
including the fact that two women loved the same man,
are retrospectively given.
On the second level, in Sandra Belloni, is the affair
of Cornelia and Sir Purcell Barrett. Purely comic, it
features two sentimentalists from whom the narrator keeps
the reader distant to prevent sympathy. On the second
level, in Vittoria, though still with a muted motif of a
love to the death, is the triangular affair involving
Barto Rizzo, his wife Rosellina, and Rinaldo Guidascarpi.
Here again is that reflection of classic drama that seems
to have influenced Meredith's handling of the romances in
the two novels, in which commoners are not proper charac
ters for a tragedy. In addition to the fact that Barto
Rizzo and his wife are commoners, whereas Carlo and the
Piavenis by birth and Vittoria by nature are not, other
factors make this situation of a lower order (even though
94
Rinaldo Guidascarpi is of noble blood) than the love of
Vittoria and Carlo. Both Barto Rizzo's essential indif
ference to Rosellina and her inscrutability as well as
the severely limited relationship she has with Rinaldo
Guidascarpi prevent full audience sympathy.
Finally, on the third level of love presented in
Sandra Belloni, that of low comedy, is the farcical affair
of Samuel Bolton Pole and the widow Martha Chump, In
Vittoria, the least serious loves are those of the Lenken-
stein sisters, Anna and Lena, for Weisspriess and Wilfrid
respectively. It is of some interest that with the
Countess Anna-Weisspriess-Nagen triangle there also
appears a revenge plot. That Wilfrid appears on the level
farthest from that high stage consistently occupied by
Emilia-Vittoria is a comment as well as a reminder of the
consistency of his portraiture as one of the "little
people." The comic flavoring of the love scenes in Sandra
Belloni comes chiefly from the narrator's and the Philoso
pher's acerbic comments. Even those scenes in which
Emilia appears with Wilfrid take on a comic note because
of the treatment accorded him. In Vittoria, the disappear
ance of the Philosopher and the more retiring demeanor of
the narrator are keyed to the new tone of seriousness.
It is, as the narrator promised in Sandra Belloni, a
novel of action. But, it should be noted, the differences
are of comedy and tragedy and do not include a choice
95
between the pictorial and the dramatic techniques. In
both novels the episodes, for the most part dramatically
realized, do include pictorial representation that serves
to enrich understanding. In Sandra Belloni, however, the
narrator's contributions, chiefly comic, are given fre
quently in his own person so that he seems a character.
In Vittoria, he does not, as a clearly visible, identi
fiable personality, applaud, scorn, approve, or dismiss
the lovers. Nor is there a separate personality inside
the novel concerned with a study of "our species" for the
sake of the "progress of civilization," as the Philosopher
in Sandra Belloni. The narrator does, however, occasion
ally appear in his own person, mostly in consideration of
political matters.
In Vittoria, the love between men and women is part
of the vortex of passions that also involves the revolu
tion. In this new setting, Emilia, now called Vittoria,
is not the only woman who feels with passion, as she was
in Sandra Belloni. Rather the emphasis shifts so that
only Violetta d'Isorella, Anna Lenkenstein, Countess
Medole, Adela Pole, and the servant Aennchen either play
at love to gain other ends and so are basically unfeeling
themselves, or, as in the case of Countess Anna, permit
their true feelings to subserve baser desires. The women
who love and support their men with true passion have the
same deep emotion about their country: Vittoria,
96
Rosellina Rizzo (with some complication), Laura Piaveni,
and, in the final resolution, even Anna Lenkenstein,
along with her sister, Lena. It is also notable that,
although in Vittoria those not aristocratic usually do not
display nobility of heart (other than Vittoria herself),
both Rosellina and Rosella, the innkeeper's daughter, do
demonstrate loving and so noble natures.
In both Sandra Belloni and Vittoria, although there
are more than ten romantic attachments in each novel,
those which Emilia forms with Wilfrid in the former and
with Carlo in the latter are of greatest interest in
showing technique, especially in the ways they show a
link between the two novels. Emilia is, of course, a
focusing character in both, behind whom the shifting
backdrops (fat, peaceful England and lean, war-torn Italy)
help to illuminate Meredith's use of the dramatic along
with the pictorial technique.
In both Sandra Belloni and Vittoria, Meredith con
siders the different kinds of relationship that can exist
between men and women. Only Emilia, however, of the women
in Sandra Belloni has some experience with both love and
lust (by the time of Vittoria the maturation period has
ended, leaving her free to experience a real and lasting
love with Carlo and also to deal knowledgeably with the
insinuating treatment accorded her by Weisspriess). Of
the men, only Merthyr Powys may be thought to experience
97
love. Pericles does have a love/lust relationship with
Emilia, but chiefly as with a voice, although in Sandra
Belloni, he does briefly respond to her (when he thinks
she has lost her voice) on a secondary basis only, as an
attractive woman. In Vittoria, Carlo Ammiani, of the men,
matches Emilia-Vittoria1s completing and maturing exper
iences by first undergoing sensation of an unworthy love,
almost in preparation for the love he is to treasure in
Vittoria.
In both novels, counterpoising the worthy loves are
the plethora of light flirtations and superficial brushes
with feeling that cannot be defined even as lust much
less as love, most of which are not even to be considered
here. In Sandra Belloni, the scenes of love in which
Emilia plays a major part utilize the dramatic method with
the intermittent presence of an overt narrator. In the
scenes in which the Pole sisters, Lady Charlotte, Mr. Pole
with Mrs. Chump, Braintop with Emilia, and the Pole foot
man with the Tinley maid are prominent, the reader finds
more of the presence of the narrator, who achieves subtle
nuances concerning their attitudes and their actions.
In Sandra Belloni, Wilfrid is an especial source for
exercise of the narrator's and the Philosopher's humorous
insights, and their observations usually occur before or
after Wilfrid has been dramatically shown in a scene with
Emilia. The basis for comic treatment of Wilfrid is his
98
superficiality of thought and feeling, i.e., he is a
sentimentalist. He is able, as Emilia is not, to dally
with love, becoming involved with Lady Charlotte, whose
title excites his father and sisters, after he has com
mitted himself to Emilia. Meredith's consistence in
portrayal of Wilfrid reveals him in Vittoria reacting
nervously and without real understanding to Rosellina1s
devotion to Rinaldo and hopefully to Countess Medole1s
encouragement for his success with the now-married
Vittoria.
Emilia's connections with others, however, is neither
on a frivolous nor a treacherous basis. When she loves,
as she comes to love the deceiving Wilfrid, she does so
completely and solely. Such devotion, given its proper
setting in Vittoria, leads to the tragedy that is only
hinted in Sandra Belloni. Therefore, it is others who
aspire to involve themselves with her: Captain Gambier,
Merthyr Powys, Braintop, and even, as mentioned, Pericles.
However, since Wilfrid is devious, so that his actions
speak one thing and his heart another, both often at the
same moment, the method of drama is insufficient for their
interludes together, even though Emilia does behave as
she thinks, so that her actions reveal, for the most part,
the whole of her heart and make further commentary or
explanation unnecessary.
For example, in the first volume of Sandra Belloni,
99
Emilia's youth, inexperience, and purity are presented
without explanation or other pictorial effect when she
asks of Wilfrid, "Do not kiss me much" (p. 215). Her
truth to life and to nature are then contained in her
gentle response to his continued pressure: "I lose my
peace" (p. 216). Then, in the second half of the last
volume of Vittoria, so that the two episodes are almost
directly opposed over the course of the two novels, the
hidden narrator elaborates her reasons. He has been
summarizing the nature of the misunderstanding that exists
between Vittoria and Carlo, noting that "She might have
kissed him" to stop protests of unworthiness, but that
"kissings were rare between them" since
Unfretful in blood, chaste and keen, she at least knew
the foolishness of the common form of lovers [sic]
trifling when there is a burning love to keep under,
and Carlo saw that she did, and adored her for this
highest proof of the passion of her love. (p. 211)
The two passages offer not only proof of consistency in
delineation of Emilia-Vittoria, but also a pithy contrast
between Wilfrid and Carlo, for Wilfrid had been uncompre
hending and so unappreciative of Emilia's real worth,
considering her demur as only a challenge to "his lover's
sentiment." His misunderstanding of her extends to his
inability to appreciate the source of her "magic" (see
pages 166 and 167) so that he feels a victim of that which
should have been a healing balm. Thus, when he himself
has cured Emilia of her love for him by exhibition of his
I
100
smallness, he accuses her: "You you are changed. You
throw your magic on me, and then you are satisfied, and
turn elsewhere" (II, 261).
In Sandra Belloni, Wilfrid, along with Captain
Gambier, is established as a coxcomb, the former pictor-
ially by the narrator (I, 123) and the latter dramatically
be Lady Gosstre's observation of him and Adela as "Coquet
et coquette" (II, 8). In Vittoria, they are joined by
those military men associated with the Austrians: Captain
Weisspriess, Colonel Prince Rodocky (the Hungarian officer
discovered with Countess Medole), Paul Lenkenstein
(according to the narrator's account of the Guidascarpi
affair), and Luigi. It is complicating as well as enrich-
ening that Carlo, given the excuse of youth, is almost as
concerned about appearance and face in Vittoria as was
Wilfrid in Sandra Belloni. Moreover, those terms of
youthful exuberance and inexperience used by the narrator
to exonerate Carlo are exactly the same as he used for
Wilfrid (Vittoria, II, 188, and Sandra Belloni, I, 123-
124). Emilia, then, may be thought to have found in
Carlo a Wilfrid actually cleansed of youthful imperfections
in the way seemingly promised by the narrator for Wilfrid
when he tells the reader "you are about to see . . .
[Wilfrid] grow" (p. 123). However, Wilfrid is never
pictured as having dedicated himself to a cause that
would enable growth in the same way that Carlo has; nor
101
does Carlo dally with life and with passion, or wallow in
Nice Feelings and Fine Shades. Rather his affair with
Violetta ends long before he even meets Vittoria, and he
is finally able to recognize Violetta as without passion.
The narrator elucidates that she had "merely a leaning
toward evil, a light sense of shame, a desire for money,
and in her heart a contempt for the principles she did
not possess" (II, 206). There is in this description
some echo of Lady Charlotte's characteristics (see pages
111 and 112) to effect further a balancing between the
two novels.
In Sandra Belloni, though Emilia's experience includes
the sordid in her relationship with men, her own innocence
is undisturbed. The fact of her innocence is established
through Meredith's use of the pictorial and the dramatic
methods. First, an early key scene is dramatic, but that
which is dramatized is not the attempted seduction, but
Wilfrid's and Emilia's first significant encounter (their
second meeting). At the beginning of their talk, Wilfrid
asks her to tell him "all about" herself, to which request
she responds by first affirming that he truly does want to
know "everything" (p. 41). The note of her innocence, as
well as her complete frankness, is further sounded in her
lack of any self-consciousness or constraint as she is
described contemplating the scenery before plunging into
her story via a remembrance of her father and of her
102
music. The method of summary in Emilia's own words,
although not Lubbock's favorite method (pp. 130-141), is
extremely effective in securing subtle effects in this
episode.
Meredith is able to convey with special emphasis
Emilia's openness as well as childlike innocence when he
shows her telling her story to one whose good will she
seeks. No designing woman of that time would have chanced
sullying her name with even a casual acquaintance, much
less with a member of a family helping her. Yet Emilia's
story divulges encounters in the park with a mysterious
military man (later to be discovered as Captain Gambier)
who, Wilfrid's reactions inform the reader, attempted to
seduce her. Without Wilfrid's sharply dramatized
reactions, the reader might have been in doubt because
of Emilia's total lack of recognition of motive; yet
via Wilfird's remarks and her reactions to them, the
reader may rest fairly assured of Gambier's intentions
and completely confident both of Emilia's innocence and
of Wilfrid's easy understanding of the coxcomb's opera
tional manner. His muted, though informed reactions to
her continued story about the "Jew gentlemen" to whom her
father wished to engage her reveal his own conviction of
her innocence in order further to confirm for the reader
a trust in Emilia's virtue. Only at the end of the
passage does a sentence summary other than Emilia's occur,
103
for the purpose of exhibiting Wilfrid's duplicity in con
trast to her honesty:
He told his sisters a tale of his own concerning
the strange damsel, humourously enough to make them
see that he enjoyed her presence as that of no
common oddity. (italics mine, p. 57)
Of the twelve encounters between Emilia and Wilfrid
in the course of the two volumes of Sandra Belloni, only
one is completely pictorial without dramatic mixture. It
is an encounter that, at the beginning of the affair
(after Emilia's story of herself to Wilfrid and before her
serious and heart-breaking involvement with him) indicates
the substance and the manner of Wilfrid's interest in her.
After she has donned his foraging-cap, the narrator
comments:
The Philosopher (I would keep him back if I could)
bids us mark that the crown and flower of the
nervous system, the head, is necessarily sensitive,
and to that degree that whatever we place on it,
does, for a certain period, change and shape us.
. . . Woman is especially subject to it. (p. 68)
Therefore, the narrator, having been instructed by the
Philosopher, tells the reader that "Sunlight, as well as
Wilfrid's braided cap, had some magical influence" on
Emilia, causing her unconscious reactions. Involved
irony, of course, resides in the Philosopher's observa
tion; for more important than that it is a foraging-cap
is that it is one belonging to Wilfrid, who habitually
role-plays and, moreover, that it causes Emilia's small,
unconscious participation in that vice, a participation
104
which perhaps helps to make her a victim of his graver
assumption of the role of lover which, at this time,
begins manifesting itself. Emilia does in some small way,
then, contribute to her own suffering, although not to
the degree or with the awareness that would exonerate
Wilfrid. Yet her participation in her fate may be seen
as an expression of her participation in humanity (see
pages 187, 189 , 190) .
The fourth encounter, dramatically rendered, follows
Wilfrid's presence at Emilia's Ipley Common concert and
includes the narrator's performance in a brief transition
between Wilfrid's point of view and Emilia's. Thus, after
a scene which implies Wilfrid's deceit as he acts the
lover, though he is not fully convinced that he does love
her, the next paragraph begins,
Love, with his accustomed cunning, managed thus to
lift [Emilia] out of the mire and array her with
golden dress: to idealize her, as we say. Recon
ciled for the hour were the contesting instincts
in the nature of this youth: the adoration of
feminine refinement and the susceptibility to
sensuous impressions. But Emilia walked with a
hero: the dream of all her days. (italics mine, p.118)
The subtlety of the method may be seen in the fact that,
although the narrator is furnishing the information, the
first sentence is in terms that reflect Wilfrid's attitude
from an ironic point of view above Wilfrid's capabilities
of insight. The middle sentence is from the narrator's
own viewpoint. Then the final sentence is in terms of
Emilia's emotions.
I
105
The paragraph then continues the scene from Emilia's
point of view, i.e., almost as if within her mind. The
irony here, because of the gap between Wilfrid's sensibil
ity and hers, is again more vigorous toward the end of the
episode, when a switch again to pictorial narrative in
forms the reader that the
. . . little episode showed an image of nature weak
with the burden of new love. I do not charge the
young calvary officer with the power of perceiving
images. He saw no more than that she could not sing
because of what was in her heart toward him. (p. 120)
Wilfrid, the narrator continues, felt the "divine love-
confession . . . so deeply, that the exquisite flattery
was almost lost, in a certain awed sense of his being in
the presence of an absolute fact" (italics mine, p. 120).
The method of indirection, which his reader might expect
after Meredith's discussion of technique (see pages 4 3 and
44), operates most ironically here to illustrate the dif
ference between Emilia and Wilfrid, and also Wilfrid's
total and comic inadequacy as her lover.
At the fifth encounter the pictorial and the
dramatic are again mixed as, in Lubbock's words, they
frequently must be "as the turn of the story demands"
(p. 71). The reader first is shown Wilfrid in reception
of Emilia's letter asking for his presence and then
allowed to share his thoughts; after the phrase "Two days
later, at noon," Wilfrid is shown receiving Captain
Gambier's card with Emilia's message on it and then
106
discussing it with Lady Charlotte, who is with him. But
before the drama continues with the actual meeting and
ride (Sandra Belloni, I, 196-200), the reader's seeing is
enriched by the narrator's personal address to one of the
reader's own number:
Some one cries out: "But, what a weak creature is
this young man!" I reply, he was at a critical stage
of his career. All of us are weak in the period of
growth, and are of small worth before the hour of
trial. This fellow has been fattening all his life
on prosperity; the very best dish in the world: but
it does not prove us. It fattens and strengthens us,
just as the sun does. (pp. 196-197)
The allusion to the metaphor of "fat England," and
the reminder of the vitriolic epithet "pig" (given in an
early dissertation on sentimentalists who "are a perfectly
natural growth of a fat soil" and even as "the pig" pass
through "a certain prolonged term of comfortable feeding"
[pp. 6-7]), occur here again with more subtlety but equal
humor. The narrator again misleads by seeming to excuse
and explain. This rather involved technique may seem at
first calculated to induce the reader to excuse Wilfrid's
rather ugly behavior on Wilfrid's own terms. In reality,
however, it encourages a greater awareness of the slight
and really inconsequential testimony (and that ironically
and insincerely given) of his not being yet ready for
"trial." As if the information that prosperity "does not
prove us" were not enough to indicate the baselessness of
the defense, the narrator continues,
107
Adversity is the inspector of our constitutions;
she simply tries our muscle and powers of endurance
and should be a periodical visitor. But, until she
comes, no man is known. (p. 197)
Informative as is this information concerning Wilfrid, it
is even more enlightening as it is demonstrated to pertain
to Emilia as she offers tacit argument against Wilfrid's
slim excuse during the course of the novel.
The paragraph continues the technique and tone of
condemnation through faint defense after a sentence
explaining that Wilfrid was "not absolutely engaged to
Lady Charlotte." Whereas previously Wilfrid had been
"awed" by but uncomprehending of "absolute fact" (p. 120),
he here avoids the absolute entirely in favor of a more
elastic relative fact which permits him to turn "almost
delightedly to the girl he could not escape from" (p. 197).
The narrator's simile here for Wilfrid is of a "wriggling
eel" which, when it cannot get free of "the countryman's
fork . . . twists in a knot around the imprisoning prong."
In addition to the pyramiding of allusions of lower
species in relation to Wilfrid, this reference also mili
tates against Wilfrid's being an evil character and helps
to establish him as a true comic figure.
In spite of the narrator's disclaimer that "This
simile says more than I mean it to say," the simile does
firmly preclude an atmosphere of tragedy's surrounding
Wilfrid's and Emilia's entanglement. Moreover, the
108
peculiar humor of the handling reveals further the
narrator, who becomes an increasingly enjoyable character.
Finally, the evidence of the impudence in treatment of
character and of uncertainty about manner of expression
and its import argues for the Philosopher's required
presence as a wise and gentling influence.
The next paragraph also includes a mixture of methods
as the reader proceeds from Wilfrid's judgment that "A
born lady, on [Lady Charlotte's] assured level stood a
chance of becoming a Goddess; but ladyship was Emilia's
highest mark" to the narrator's comment that "Such is the
state of things to the sentimental fancy when girls are
at a disadvantage" (p. 197). After the narrator's dis
paraging remark, which follows Wilfrid's disparaging
thought, the technique of drama is resumed in a continua
tion of Emilia's action, a characteristic one of openness
and generosity: "She smiled, and held out both hands."
While the comic is not entirely banished from
Vittoria, it does not touch on Vittoria's love, or on the
matters concerning the revolution. Carlo is, as stated,
no coxcomb, or sentimentalist, but a serious leader of
the rebellion. He is wholly committed to the war and to
his love for Vittoria; all about Carlo tends to be
serious, including his mistaken judgments concerning
Vittoria and Violetta, which contribute to his being
killed. In this novel, even those love scenes in which
109
Wilfrid appears with Lena Lenkenstein are not comic,
though Wilfrid himself is still treated somewhat comically,
as when he is described wandering throughout the battle-
zone sporting a white umbrella. It is no coincidence
that, as mentioned earlier, missing with the Philosopher
is so much of the comic irony.
Yet it would be erroneous to believe that the scenes
are more vividly realized in Vittoria than in Sandra
Belloni, or that the characters are more intensely rea
lized, or that scenes enter any more vigorously into the
reader's imagination because the Philosopher is absent.
Although Meredith announced that, as an "action" novel,
Vittoria would need no Philosopher, it is obvious in the
reading that he did not mean Vittoria would thereby be a
more "dramatic" novel in Lubbock's sense of the term. It
is equally obvious that he did mean that between the
dramatic scenes and even within them, fewer explanations
of meaning and purpose would be necessary in order for the
reader to understand a given sector of society, but not
that summary and preparation would be obviated. The
reason that philosophical examination must exist in
Sandra Belloni seems to be contained in the self-delusion
of the majority of its characters, so that while the
narrator concerns himself with event and even with easily
discernible reason, the Philosopher's deeper delving is
required to uncover well-hidden motives.
110
For example, the triangle that is a motif in Sandra
Belloni is repeated in Vittoria with the involvement
of Vittoria-Carlo-Countess d'Isorella and of Laura
Serabiglione-Giacomo Piaveni-Duchess of Graatli. However,
while these triangles mirror the situation in Sandra
Belloni composed of Emilia, Wilfrid, and Lady Charlotte,
they do so without the deception intrinsic to it. However,
in both the triangles in which she is involved Emilia-
Vittoria is of decisively more noble character than her
rivals in love (Lady Charlotte and Countess d'Isorella)
who are titled by birth.
The scenes between Wilfrid and Lady Charlotte, some
times with Emilia's presence, are handled for the most
part dramatically, and serve to reveal the sentimentality
that leads Wilfrid to the grossest dishonesty and vulgar
ity of feeling, of which he is essentially unaware. For
instance, after first pledging himself to Emilia, he
disavows love for her to Lady Charlotte, thinking at the
same time that "Rivalry with Gambier (and successful too!)
did not make Emilia's admiration [of himself] so tasteless"
(p. 196). Then, like a weather-vane cock, when he en
counters Emilia again, he feels "her slave again," the
basis for his emotion being that "here was something
absolutely his own" (p. 198). Grossly unfeeling, as well
as unable to deal with "absolutes" in any manner, his
reactions are again relegated to the soil:
Ill
His own from the roots; from the first growth of
sensation. Something with the bloom on it: to
which no other finger could point and say: "There
is my mark." (pp. 198-199)
In case the "lady" reader be not alert to the danger
of herself being placed with Wilfrid in the "fat soil" of
sentimentality, the narrator specifically informs:
(And, ladies, if you will consent to be likened
to a fruit, you must bear with these observations,
and really deserve the stigma. If you will smile
on men, because they adore you as vegetable pro
ducts, take what ensues.) (p. 199)
Although the narrator here takes opportunity to chide
women who permit such demeaning treatment, it is manifest
that Emilia is not among those who do; and, rather, the
irony is aimed chiefly at Wilfrid with scatter-shots
intended to sting those of the readers who are guilty
(probably the same ones who may be convicted also of
sentimentality in their prejudices concerning novel
technique).
)
Wilfrid's superficiality is further revealed in his
relationship with Lady Charlotte, whom Merthyr has called
"Austrian" (II, 106) and whose character is, the narrator
and others imply, somewhat suspect. Immediately preceding
his recapitulation to Emilia's charms, Wilfrid is inno
cently informed by Emilia that Mr. Powys had told her that
Captain Gambier, whose reputation is already smudged, was
known as Lady Charlotte's "lover" (I, 198). This informa
tion follows upon the narrator's darker intimation con
cerning the lady:
112
She was at the doubtful hour of her life, a warm
hearted woman, known to be so by few, generally
consigned by devout-visaged Scandal (for who save
the devout will dare to sit in the chair of judg
ment?) as a hopeless rebel against conventional
laws; and worse than that, far worse,— though what,
is not said. (italics mine, p. 194T
Gambier himself hints at the "worse" when he tells Wilfrid
that he (Wilfrid) is "in the hands of an infernally clever
woman, who does me the honour to wish to see my blood on
the carpet, I believe" and who "did her best to compromise
your sister with me on board the yacht" (II, 318). Wil
frid himself testifies that "scandal is talked of her and
Lord Eltham" (p. 326). The problem in trying to relate
the narrator's statement that Lady Charlotte is "a woman
of chaste blood" (p. 55) to these implications will be
discussed in the next chapter.
Dramatically illustrated ( I, 122-124), Wilfrid's
lack of real discrimination, in spite of the superficial
fastidiousness (of which the narrator informs the reader
directly), caused his rejection of Emilia to rest on a
remembrance of the smell of cigar-smoke in her hair after
the Ipley Common concert, a smell he was so dense as to
ascribe to the flowering hawthorne tree while he was in
the throes of passion (p. 117). Emilia's tacit comment
is to pluck one of the flowers. Of similar tastelessness
are his declarations to Lady Charlotte, occurring during
the same period in which he is declaring his love to
Emilia. The dramatic presentation of Wilfrid's actions
113
is in contradistinction to the solely pictorial telling
that underlines the unimportance of Carlo's youthful and
terminated affair with Violetta. The dramatic treatment
accorded Violetta's seductive overtures to the now-
betrothed Carlo and his courteous rejection of them and
of her portrays more strikingly the reliability and
worthiness of him as Vittoria's lover.
In both novels, letters are used to forward or to
impede the romances in which Emilia-Vittoria is engaged.
In the first volume of Sandra Belloni, a letter from
Emilia urges Wilfrid to "Come on a swift horse. The
thought of you galloping to me goes through me like a
flame that hums" (p. 195). The Philosopher's later infor
mation that he rides "the Hippogriff" invests Emilia's
request with a rich irony that becomes poignant when we
remember that Wilfrid's regard for "her constancy" upon
receipt of her letter is "as a species of folly." In the
second volume of each novel, letters occur at approxi
mately the same point. In Sandra Belloni, an exchange
of five letters between Georgiana Ford and Wilfrid along
with five between Tracy Runningbrook and Wilfrid (pp. 189-
200) acts to sharpen more the distinction between
Wilfrid's superficiality and Emilia's depth. The revela
tions are especially forceful since they are inadvertent.
That is, Georgiana does not intend, as Emilia's unques
tioning admirer, to write of her flatteringly; but rather
114
Georgiana is Emilia's critic and jealous of her brother's
interest in Emilia. Runningbrook is more interested in
his own affairs, chiefly in the reception of a recently-
published volume of poems, than in Wilfrid's and Emilia's
problems and so has no motive for revealing them in any
particular light. It is also Wilfrid's easy distraction
from his own consuming affairs to a facile concern for
Runningbrook's interest that helps to mark him as shallow.
Although used to a lesser degree in Vittoria, letters
in the novel serve somewhat the same purpose. Exchanges
between Vittoria and Carlo during their separation show,
however, principally their grave concern with the revolu
tion (although Vittoria does urge Carlo to join her soon).
The tone of these letters, as well as the fact that they
do not reveal duplicity and misunderstandings of the same
nature as those between Wilfrid and Emilia, causes them to
serve more to reveal the difficulties against which Carlo
and Vittoria mutually strive. Carlo's and Vittoria's
letters, therefore, deal less directly with their charac
ters (pp. 164-168) than do the letters in Sandra Belloni.
In the same movement toward action, fewer meetings take
place between Vittoria and Carlo (four in each volume to
total eight), a fact supporting the notion that love has
been relegated to a position of less importance in this
sequel.
All four encounters between the lovers in the first
115
volume are handled dramatically. In the second volume,
two of the four meetings are dramatic; one is half summary
and half dramatic. The last encounter is summary with
dialogue filtered through the narrator, a treatment that
lends a dream-like quality and effects a feeling of great
distance in a scene of the immediate present.
In both Sandra Belloni and Vittoria, scenic descrip
tion provides a backdrop for the romantic action. Demon
strating the different approaches for the two novels,
however, is the fact that Sandra Belloni begins with a
pictorial description of the Pole family with the narra
tor's presence announced in the first word:
We are to make acquaintance with some serious damsels,
as this English generation knows them, and at a
season verging upon May: The Ladies of Brookfield . . .
had been told of a singular thing: that in the
neighbouring fir-wood a voice was to be heard by night,
so wonderfully sweet and richly toned, that it required
their strong sense to correct strange imaginings con
cerning it. (p. 1)
Vittoria begins with a pictorial description of the
surrounding scenery with the narrator nowhere in view and
the reader summarily engaged to exercise his own imagina
tion:
From Monte Motterone you survey the Lombard plain.
It is a towering dome of green among a hundred
pinnacles of grey and rust-red crags. At dawn the
summit of the mountain has an eagle-eye for the far
Venetian boundary and the barrier of the Apennines;
but with sunrise come the mists . . . (p. 1)
It may even be thought that with such an approach Meredith
was imitating the effect of the scenery backdrop as the
116
curtain rises upon the stage.
In both novels, the preparatory matter provides the
occasion for the first encounters of the two lovers, i.e.,
of Emilia and Wilfrid in Sandra Belloni and of Vittoria
and Carlo in Vittoria. In the latter novel, however, the
very long description of the Italian landscape forms the
setting for the introduction of the Italian rebels and
their conspiracy, with the almost-inconsequentially-handled
meeting of Carlo and Vittoria as just two of the rebels.
In Sandra Belloni, scenic description of the woods in
which Wilfrid and Emilia meet is exceedingly brief and
incidental, with the movement and dialogue of the Pole
sisters (Wilfrid being quite silent) and with Pericles
as the centers of attention. However, in Vittoria, the
encounter itself is dramatically presented without
narrator-furnished details; in Sandra Belloni, pictorial
narrative is used by the narrator in his own person as
he comments upon the Poles, Emilia, and the scene.
As further instance of contrast between the two
situations, both the narrator and Wilfrid are discreet
in revealing Wilfrid's reaction to Emilia upon first
meeting her. He expresses a desire to help her with her
harp (p. 15) and "to throw the fair unknown a dozen
bouquets" (p. 17). It is, of course, fitting that one
imbued with the "Nice Feelings" of a Pole would exercise
some reserve in seeing "opportunity" for himself in the
117
prospect of her becoming an actress since she is one who
his sisters note had a "boot-lace hanging loose" (p. 15).
Carlo, on the other hand, quickly and frankly reacts to
Vittoria, seeing her first as a "dark Madonna," (p. 24)
upon whom his "eyes dwelt fervidly" (p. 25). After
Vittoria demonstrates the power and the beauty of her
voice to the rebels, at Agostino's urging, Carlo "breathed
as one who draws in fire" (p. 32) and dared to argue per
sistently against her appearance in the opera because of
the danger she would invite to herself {pp. 36-38).
Carlo is thus shown to react naturally and even
passionately, as does Emilia-Vittoria, rather than in the
constricted, self-conscious manner of Wilfrid Pole and his
sisters. Carlo's nature is further dramatized in his
proposing wild substitute schemes that would protect
Vittoria, at the cost of Ugo Corte's contempt for his
"unseasonable exhibition of . . . manifestly a lover's
frenzied selfishness" (p. 3 8). The narrator does reveal
that Carlo's lack of self-consciousness delays his reali
zation that he has "betrayed himself in the presence of
others" (p. 41), but his naturalness also works to
associate him with Emilia-Vittoria, who, too, always acts
guilelessly. Although the narrator then does supply some
information, the scene is dominated by Carlo's words,
actions, and, to a minor degree, thoughts. Of course,
there has also been some attention to the words and
118
actions of other conspirators. All Vittoria's words and
thoughts during this first meeting with him who is to be
her husband concern only the cause that has occasioned
their meeting, that is, the revolution.
It has already been noted that a major difference
between the characters of the two novels, which obviously
dictates their treatment, is the openness of the principal
characters in Vittoria, as demonstrated above, in contrast
with the hidden natures of those in Sandra Belloni, with
the exception of Emilia herself. Only Emilia intuitively
accepts, without debilitating self-consciousness, her own
nature; all the other characters (with the possible excep
tion of Merthyr Powys) deceive themselves with idealized
conceptions of their own characters and actions as well as
the causes for those actions. Even in the case of Powys,
a need for an outside narrator exists in order to explain
his actions, since he conceals his love for Emilia in a
way that puzzles her so that she can hardly believe it
true when Georgiana's speech reveals it (II, 237-239).
Emilia labels his treatment of her "cold" (p. 243).
The incompatibility of Emilia's and Merthyr's natures
is thus established in Sandra Belloni and proved in
Vittoria, not only by the appearance of one who is demon
strated as truly suited for her, but also by Laura's
judgment indicating Powys' distance from Vittoria in
feeling and thought (I, 18). Later Laura is to note that
119
Merthyr is loved by Vittoria intellectually: he is "the
husband of her spirit," whom she can love and "still be a
faithful woman in the bondage of the flesh" (II, 258) .
Kausch believes that Meredith laid a trap to cause the
reader to commit the sin of sentimentality in expecting
Merthyr and Emilia to be married (p. 140). That the trap
is a real one was demonstrated by Wagenknecht.
We follow Emilia through two long novels to find out
whether she will wed Merthyr Powys or not, but when
the last page of Vittoria has been turned, we do not
know. ^-0
To follow Emilia-Vittoria through two long novels for such
a purpose and to the rigid exclusion of other plot con
siderations and clues, including Emilia's statement that
she loves "nobody" (II, 260), is to find illustration
of Meredith's reliability when he early gave indications
of the involved technique he would employ (see pages 43
and 44) .
Against Powys' hidden love is the measure of the
frank adoration which Carlo feels for Vittoria, a love
which she as frankly returns. Carlo's and Vittoria's
emotions concerning the revolution that involves them are
also openly displayed. The revolution again is the main
issue of their second encounter, also dramatically pre
sented. Their dialogue is only of most serious matters
l^Edward Wagenknecht, Cavalcade of the English Novel
(New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1954), p. 347.
120
and does not contain instances of the deceptive trifling
in which Wilfrid indulges himself in Sandra Belloni. The
dialogue between Carlo and Vittoria is early established
as reliably presenting their true feelings in a way that
Wilfrid's declarations to Emilia, cited earlier, do not.
Carlo speaks and acts in conformance with his thought and
belief, just as does Emilia-Vittoria.
Carlo's integrity makes it unnecessary for the
narrator to analyze hidden depths of Carlo's psychology
in the way that the Philosopher had to dissect Wilfrid's
psychology in Sandra Belloni. Rather Carlo's thoughts are
handled in much the same direct way as Emilia-Vittoria's.
Worried about Vittoria, "He had a vision of himself
pleading to secure her safety" (p. 150). The narrator
then corroborates the honesty of Carlo's feeling by
revealing that "not at all in self-abasement . . . he
perceived the stature of Vittoria's soul" (p. 151).
Toward the end of this paragraph, the narrator adds that
Carlo's love approaches worship in a way that Wilfrid had
stated impossible, except for the titled Lady Charlotte:
"the passion of the young man’s heart magnified her image"
(Vittoria, I, 151).
Neither the narrator's comments nor Vittoria's early
dramatized reactions to Carlo show her at first to have
any special feeling about him. In the first encounter
she only recognizes his favorable judgment concerning her
121
resolution to sing as signal for the uprising. Notable
during this first meeting, as opposed to that in Sandra
Belloni, is a total absence of romance. In Sandra Belloni
romantic interests were paramount.
The third encounter, in which Vittoria's feelings are
still primarily involved with the revolution, utilizes
more of the pictorial method. Yet the scene has dramatic
elements as it presents to the imagination the two young
rebels, their actions, and their conversation. The first
indication that Vittoria may be inclined to favor Carlo
occurs somewhat off-handedly in a mixture of dialogue and
thought:
"Dear Friend," she said, becoming aware that there
might be a more troubled depth in Ammiani's absence
of speech than in her own.
"Yes," said he quickly, as for a sentence to follow.
None came, and he continued, "The signora Laura is
also your friend."
She rejoined coldly, "I am not thinking of her."
Vittoria had tried to utter what might be a word of
comfort for him, and she found that she had not a
thought or an emotion. (I, 169-170)
The narrator's explanation of Vittoria's condition in the
last sentence is followed by the brief statement that "She
was stringing her hand to strike a blow as men strike, and
women when they do that cannot be quite feminine" (p. 170).
In both her intuitive reaction to Carlo and in the
narrator's commentary are intimations of a burgeoning
interest, albeit one with which Vittoria is not yet ready
to deal.
122
By the third encounter, then, at mid-point in the
first volume, the memory that he has kissed her hand is
for Carlo "a song of tenderness in his blood" (p. 186),
and he is referred to by the hidden narrator as "a lover"
into whose imagination she passes as the door closes on
her person. In this passage also, for the first time
concerning their relationship, the technique of summary
is used to allude to their meetings, the purpose of the
allusion being to express Ammiani's understanding (one
Wilfrid never achieved) "that there lay an unspoken depth
in her, distinct from her visible nature" (p. 192).
Then, the fourth and last meeting in the first volume,
a meeting which also constitutes the central one of the
eight in the novel, is highly dramatic. Occurring at the
end of the opera, this encounter is recounted by de Pyr-
mont, a method of telling that secures great distance not
only because of his absence from the stage on which the
meeting takes place, but also because his emotional limita
tions enable the crude comment, made fittingly to Wilfrid
(both because Wilfrid also has a blunted sensibility and
because he still yearns after Emilia-Vittoria), that
Carlo was "seizing the occasion to plant a trifle or so
in her memory— the animal!" (p. 230). Dramatically given
from a distance far enough to prevent understanding of its
nature, the lovers' relationship receives a new richness,
via the contrast, as, still with dramatic handling, the
123
couple are next presented from a closer angle. Vittoria's
love for Carlo is revealed for the first time in her reply
"lover" to his "impassioned" murmur in her ear of "My own
soul I" At this point pictorial narration resumes, with
the narrator's comment that this, "Their first love-
speech," created "a divine circle around them in the
storm" (p. 282).
Not until approximately a third of the way through
the second volume does the fifth encounter of the two
lovers take place. It, and the battle to which it is
subordinated, are dramatized. However, the narrator first
describes Vittoria's awaiting the battle's end so that
Carlo can approach her. Her reactions, when he does, are
given from her point of view. Seeming "harsh of eye and
tongue," he is "not like the gentle youth she had been
torn from at the door of La Scala" (p. 142). The scene
that follows, dramatically presented, as she promises
to obey him (p. 143), represents a major change in their
relationship, as well as in his character. He assumes the
superior position formerly held by her, probably because
of his maturing experiences with war, but also perhaps
because of her former power to begin the uprising and
because he had been unsure of her feeling toward him. At
any rate, this scene reveals that he now performs as the
leader not only of the revolution from which he has come,
but also of Vittoria. Meredith's mastery of the dramatic
124
method may be seen in the fact that no narrator commentary
is necessary in order to convey this important information.
The sixth encounter is pictorial in a way to empha
size the distance that has come to exist between Carlo
and Vittoria, who appear as "two passionless creatures."
Carlo's avoidance of Vittoria as he sends "love-messages"
via Agostino is pictorial (p. 177), but it is followed by
a dramatic scene with Vittoria and Agostino as he informs
her that the probable cause of their estrangement is the
Countess d'Isorella. Pictorial narration continues to
portray their rift in the seventh encounter.
She could not doubt that she was beloved, in spite
of the colourlessness and tonelessness of a love
that appealed to her intellect. (p. 185)
This passage and its substance is made more important
since it too reaches back to Sandra Belloni to show the
contrast between Merthyr Powys' essential coldness, that
becomes characterized as an intellectual love, and Carlo's
appeal to her intellect, which is but a part of a total
commitment that involves the whole person. Whereas she is
able to accept this manifestation of his caring, she is
less able to cope with the fears that the distance between
them has engendered. They are rendered as close to her
consciousness.
She could have told him that keeping her in the dark
among unknown terrors ruined her courage; but the
minutes were too precious, his touch too sweet. In
eyes and hands he had become her lover again. The
blissful minutes rolled away like waves that keep
the sunshine out of the sea. (p. 186)
125
She and Carlo part, then, as lovers in the flesh.
The final encounter in the two volumes is entirely
pictorial, the dream-like quality mentioned earlier being
lent by the dialogue's being rendered through a third
person (pp. 210-211). Their marriage, too, had been
revealed distantly, though not pictorially. A dramatic
scene, from which the lovers are themselves absent, occurs
in which Laura tells Violetta (p. 225) and Wilfrid reacts
with a "much broken" aspect and "pallid cheeks" (p. 226).
The distant manner of handling of both of these incidents
foreshadows the tragic ending. Then, even greater dis
tance is established as an epilogue contains a pictorial
narrative of Vittoria's reception of Carlo's dead body.
Vittoria, even as Sandra Belloni, holds other love
situations that act as reflectors, whether by comparison
or contrast, for Carlo's and Vittoria's love. Of.less
tragic dimensions, though essentially on the same level of
seriousness as Vittoria's and Carlo's story, is the fore
boding love of Laura Piaveni, that lives beyond the death
of her husband, whom Vittoria had never met. The similar
ity between Laura's passion for her dead husband as it is
entangled with her passion for Italy's cause is told as
a darkening of the mirror. Countess Ammiani's situation
is also somewhat similar, although the brevity of its
treatment in comparison with the space alloted the Piaveni
story, as well as the young Countess' removal from her
126
husband's revolutionary activities, serves to remove her
situation farther from her son's experience.
On a second level of seriousness, Barto Rizzo's
wife's case does have certain resemblances to Vittoria's
in that Rosellina is deeply involved in the struggle for
freedom. High drama characterizes the episodes concerning
Rizzo, his wife, and Rinaldo Guidascarpi (the triangle,
it has been pointed out, being a repeated pattern through
out the two novels). In spite of Rosellina's efforts
for Italy's cause, which require her to perform almost as
a soldier, her apparent lack of intelligence and her
relationship with her husband remove her story from the
higher, more tragic stage. Rosellina is Barto's "tool,"
"instrument," and "slave" (I, 194-195) and is never trusted
by him or even treated with humanity, much less with love.
Her slight whimper that he never trusts her and even that
he "make[s] a woman try to deceive" him (p. 194), when
measured against the repeated examples of his contemptuous
treatment of her and against Rinaldo's gentle considera
tion, amply explain the "fulness and softness void of fire"
that mark her eye as she gazes on Rinaldo (II# 71). Any
faithlessness of which she might be accused is that of the
heart, almost as a reflex action in human response to long-
awaited compassionate treatment.
In Sandra Belloni, the love of Cornelia and Sir
Purcell Barrett is of the second order in movement away
127
from the tragicomic love of Wilfrid and Emilia that inter
sects the tragic love of Vittoria and Carlo. Neither
Adela nor Arabella is shown to approach romance to the
degree that Cornelia does. Actually all three sisters
and, it is demonstrated, their brother are more concerned
with "perpetually mounting" (p. 5). However, Cornelia
and Wilfrid do feel faint stirrings not strictly to be
defined as "mounting" symptoms; those of Wilfrid have
already been discussed. Chapter XXII presents Cornelia
and Mr. Barrett also via the two methods of pictorial
and dramatic. The narrator first provides the framework
by reminding that "sentimentalists . . . the fat body of
mankind" (p. 235) are such "right good comedy" that he
can "almost love them" (p. 236).
Prior to this encounter and sequent to the narrator's
comments, Cornelia's musings appear in a mixed manner that
tends heavily toward the dramatic as she is described
posing and exclaiming. Then, as she meets Mr. Barrett
with Emilia, the three are presented dramatically and
externally before a paragraph gives both Emilia's and
the narrator's reactions in a way that causes them to
complement as well as to contrast with each other. That
is, the reason for Emilia's perplexity is explained by
the narrator's knowledgeable interpretation of Cornelia's
dilemma: "The pitfall of Sentiment yawned visible, but
this lady's strength had been too little tried for her to
128
lack absolute faith in it" (p. 239). In addition to
Cornelia's problems with the "absolute," her basic dis
honesty and her untried strength show her to have a strong
likeness to her brother. Mr. Barrett's honesty is also
involved in their leave-taking.
"My friend," she said half in self-defense; and
they, who had never kissed as lovers, kissed under
the plea of friendship. (p. 244)
Implicit also in this passage is a contrast with the
chaste Emilia who eschews such light conduct.
In the second volume of Sandra Belloni, the narrator
is more obviously present, describing Cornelia and Barrett
almost entirely pictorially. His telling that the "two
were in a dramatic tangle of the Nice Feelings: worth a
glance as we pass on" (p. 183) imparts knowledge about a
couple that could not be so effectively told in another
way. A purely dramatic rendering would hardly achieve
its translation; the viewpoint of either of the partici
pants again would be totally incapable of conveying their
own true state in opposition to that in which they see
themselves (this being the whole point); and, finally, no
other character is capable of such insight (certainly not
any member of the Pole family, or even Emilia, whose own
thoughts, during a later repetition of this kind of
"bloodless" interview, show her accurately to feel "no
kinship with such flesh" [p. 238]). Nor are other of
the characters of a type capable of having the kind of
129
knowledge that comes from the perspective of a "Comic
Spirit."
On the third level in Sandra Belloni, Pole's and Mrs.
Chump's romantic scenes, which are the source for some of
the novel's broadest comedy, also employ a mixture of
picture and drama. That is, in them, too, is the employ
ment of the essentially dramatic with a pictorial umbrella
of commentary that enables greater understanding and so,
in this and the previous case, greater comedy. That which
Lubbock usually labels "pictorial" may also be described
as stage direction or scene setting as in the comic supper
scene. As the two sit at the table imbibing,
a suspicious eye had the option of divining that they
used the shelter of the tablecloth for an interchange
of squeezes. (II, 21)
This information precedes the comic description that all
Pole needed was to
smooth his hair a bit. . . . Mrs. Chump performed
this service lightly for him in the midst of his
muttered comments on her Irish. (p. 22)
The farcical supper scene of Volume II features only
one sentence that indicates the presence of someone other
than the actors. It occurs in comment upon the Pole
sisters' dropping of eyelids, as they enter with guests,
to see their father freely drinking with Mrs. Chump:
"Caesar assassinated did a similar thing" (p. 21). The
comic temperature is notably elevated by the telling use
of contrast which exactly catches the Pole sisters' unreal
130
estimate of themselves as innately noble, as well as their
exaggeration of their father's offense, since it is aimed
at them. Again, it is questionable if the effect could
have been achieved so swiftly and economically by another
means. Perhaps the statement could have originated with
Tracy Runningbrook, or with another of the guests; but
credibility would have been stretched to accept the con
tention that one of those present had the ability to
pierce the sisters' consciousness to such a degree.
Although the technique of a later continuation of the
same theme of drunkenness is entirely different and would
undoubtedly be called by Lubbock pictorial, since the
dialogue is given at second hand, the effect is singularly
dramatic in that the scene has a lively appeal to the
reader's imagination. Pole and Mrs. Chump, as well as the
sisters' attitudes and actions, are clearly presented.
But after dinner came the time when the painfulest
scene was daily enacted. Mrs. Chump drank Port
freely. To drink it fondly, it was necessary that
she should have another rosy wine-glass to nod to,
and Mr. Pole, whose taste for wine had been weakened,
took this post to be his duty. The watchful, pinched
features of the poor pale little man bloomed unnatural
ly, and his unintelligible eyes sparkled as he emptied
his glass . His daughters knew that he drank, not for
his pleasure, but for their benefit; that he might
sustain Martha Chump in the delusion that he was a
fitting bridegroom,and with her money save them from
ruin. (p. 178)
The play on the word "fondly" and the irony concerning
pleasure and benefit afford a deeper comedy that is avail
able only through the insight of the narrator, whose
131
presence does not make the liveliness of the scene any
less .
Resemblance of father to son in the matter of romance
may be seen in the above, as well as in other episodes
(see page 144). Just as Wilfrid can deceive Emilia
without too much pain from conscience, so too can Mr. Pole
deceive Mrs. Chump, it even being clear that he enters
her room by night to rob her (pp. 17 5-183). Moreover,
just as Wilfrid is capable of derogatory comments about
Emilia both to himself and to others during the time in
which he is presenting himself to her as a suitor, so too
is Mr. Pole capable of "muttering" about Mrs. Chump's
"Irish" (a curious fact since the deceased Mrs. Pole
had evidently been Irish [I, 170]). Finally, just as
Wilfrid's main concern seems to be for material wealth
and position, even more so does Mr. Pole's.
In Vittoria, Anna Lenkenstein's relationship with
Weisspriess is farthest removed from Vittoria's and
Carlo's tragic affair and so is on the third level in
this novel. Lena's love for Wilfrid and his suit for her
hand is also on this level of least seriousness. More
over, Lena's and Wilfrid's romance has some resemblance
to Wilfrid's association with Lady Charlotte in Sandra
Belloni, especially since, in this novel as in the
earlier one, Vittoria is a significant barrier to the
union of the two. Anna's and Weisspriess' relationship
132
is more independent of entanglement with Vittoria's affairs
even though Weisspriess has been encouraged by Pericles to
seduce Vittoria. Weisspriess1 purposes of entertainment
for himself and creation of jealousy in Anna in order to
hasten her acceptance of him, however, eliminate him as a
serious contender for Vittoria's favors.
Both of the love affairs representative of the third
level in the two novels are marked by some interesting
similarities in spite of the fact that one is of the order
of comedy and the other of the order of seriousness.
Anna's and Weisspriess' involvement, even as Pole's and
Mrs. Chump's, is tainted with consideration of material
affairs. Weisspriess' suit would not exist if it were
not for Anna's money and, presumably, title; similarly,
Mr. Pole's interest in Mrs. Chump is aroused and main
tained solely by financial considerations. Anna values
Weisspriess as an officer of reputation and future
prospects; Mrs. Chump is favorably influenced by Mr.
Pole's supposed business acumen and position. Anna turns
to Nagen when Weisspriess will not serve her; Mrs. Chump
turns from Mr. Pole when she learns he is insolvent.
Weisspriess1 elasticity of feeling permits him to attempt
to transfer his hope for a profitable marriage to Lena
upon Anna's showing disaffection. Mr. Pole's posture of
suitor for Mrs. Chump's hand changes immediately upon his
knowledge that she cannot be of financial help to him.
133
Both affairs are treated chiefly pictorially and both
receive the least attention in their respective novels.
Although Anna's and Weisspriess' affair is hinted at in
Volume I (p. 180), not until the end of the volume does
the reader learn that he is her "favourite" and he plans
to give her a "rude lesson" in order to tame her
"thoroughly . . . for a wife" (p. 331). These matters
are presented in summary form, and distance between the
lovers is maintained by the oblique manner of Anna's
confession of love for Weisspriess; that is, the confes
sion is in a dramatic scene, but one between Anna and her
sister, Lena.
The scene of highest drama concerning them actually
takes place, again with Weisspriess' absence, between Anna
and Vittoria. Anna's only partially disguised distress
upon hearing from Vittoria of Weisspriess' injury (II,
3-4) reveals the feelings she is finally driven to confess
to Lena. Weisspriess' writing, under her eye, a letter of
challenge to Carlo as part of her revenge plot (pp. 212-
213) is pictorially narrated and contains not a syllable
of tenderness. Her later confrontation of him with the
final paragraph he had secretly appended in order to free
Carlo from an obligation to duel is also pictorial with
minimal show of their relation to each other. Minimized
even more, so that they are never shown together, but
rather appear in the narrator's and other characters'
134
descriptions, is Anna's involvement with Nagen, whom she
attempts to mold to her will when Weisspriess will not
serve as a tool for revenge.
In both books, love among the lower classes (those
people not ennobled by title or by nature) is treated
similarly. Clearly Meredith made a distinction between
the affair concerning Barto Rizzo, Rosellina, and Rinaldo
Guidascarpi and the affair of Aennchen, Jacob Baumwalder
Feckelwitz, and Beppo. The most strikingly immediate
factors that separate them are 1) that Barto is educated
as well as attached to the cause of Italian independence,
even though his dedication is said to verge on madness,
and 2) that Rinaldo is of noble family. But perhaps of
even greater importance is 3) that Barto's wife does not
play at love as does Aennchen. This matter of honest
passion is the decisive factor in the relationships be
tween men and women in the two novels. It is handled in
the same way in Sandra Belloni, in which the Tiniey maid
is concerned primarily with the Pole footman's gifts; nor
does he mean his attentions to be preliminary to marriage.
Thus, when two people are insincere, comedy is near; when
one only is sincere, the matter becomes only slightly
more serious; when both are sincere, tragedy approaches.
The affairs of the lower classes are more than merely
matter of instruction, just as are the affairs of their
betters. They too are structurally important. In Sandra
135
Belloni, the information off-handedly given the Tiniey
maid enables the furtherance of the plot on several levels.
First, the dialogue performs to explain the Tiniey know
ledge of the Pole affairs so that, for instance, explained
is Albert Tiniey's sudden proposal to Cornelia (he had
much earlier dared to propose to an indignant Arabella),
an event which reveals to Cornelia how low they have
fallen according to Pole standards. The dialogue is of
further help in informing of the estrangement of the
Poles from Mr Pericles, a crucial matter in the plot
having to do with Pole's economic situation. Moreover,
the dialogue solidifies for Sir Purcell his determination
to kill himself. In this degree, irony is served, for
the tryst of these servants is at the "fruitless tree"
that served as a meeting place for Sir Purcell and
Cornelia.
The scene has been dramatized with full comic poten
tial, though the comedy is that of irony and exceedingly
subtle, e.g., without explicit reminder of the similari
ties in the relationships between the Tiniey maid and
Cornelia, both of whom desire to forward their positions
in life and to receive momentary gratification of vanity,
and between Sir Purcell and Gains ford, both of whom desire
to secure some kind of comfort from their female compan
ions. Finally, the comedy of Sir Purcell's and Cornelia's
belief that they operate on a plane elevated by "Nice
136
Feelings" high over that of common mortals, including
serving people, is indicated in this scene.
The comic wooing in Vittoria exists for somewhat the
same reasons. That is, the affair involving Aennchen,
Jacob, and Beppo forwards the plot as Beppo eavesdrops
and gleans information from Aennchen's mistress, the
Duchess of Graatli, while dodging the jealous Jacob. In
addition, comic relief is furnished in these scenes. No
deepening of comedy points out the folly or baseness in
love-play, as in Sandra Belloni; but rather the comic
play of this triangle lends the kind of contrast present
in the mixture of comedy with tragedy that occurs in
Shakespearean tragedy.
The interplay of techniques, in this case the light
and the dark, is a favored method of Meredith. Throughout
the two novels, treatment of love constitutes a continuous
pattern of comedy shading into tragedy. Moreover, pic
torial mixed with dramatic treatment performs in effecting
that shading, just as it was seen to distinguish effec
tively the various political ideas and as it may be seen
in the next section to present the attitudes and notions
concerning family life.
Familial Relationships
In addition to, or, more accurately, contingent upon
examination of the relationships between men and women is
Meredith's investigation of family life in the two Italian
137
novels. Perhaps the two most noticeable aspects of his
depiction of family life are that its portrayal is inci
dental to other matters (political or social), and that
ideas concerning it are never directly stated, but rather
left to the reader's powers of deduction on the basis of
the portrayal. Thus, in Sandra Belloni, not even the
Philosopher comments on the family as a family. Relation
ships within the family, then, in both novels are dealt
with more in the manner preferred by Lubbock, and so offer
an instructive contrast to the manner of presentation of
relationships between men and women.
In Sandra Belloni, in which money-making and/or money-
holding is the dominant principle, fatherhood is in focus
(the Pole sisters', Mr. Barrett's, and Emilia's relation
ships with their fathers are shown in greater detail than
their relationships with their mothers). However, in
Vittoria, in which the Austro-Italian war is the chief
factor, motherhood is given the greater emphasis (Vittoria's
father is absent in this novel; Carlo's relationship with
Countess Ammiani assumes greater importance than that with
his father, who exists only in fond memory; and Angelo
Guidascarpi's remembrances of his mother [I, 305] follow
essentially the ideas of the opera in which Italy is
personified as a victim mother, associated with torture
and death [the importance of the opera as a key in the
novel has already been discussed]). Finally, in Sandra
138
Belloni, family relationships are chiefly a social study;
whereas, in Vittoria, the family descriptions become
involved with the political complications.
In Sandra Belloni, the family receiving the bulk of
the attention as a unit is the Pole family, with the
Bellonis and the Barretts providing contrast in station
in life and in degree of mutual devotion. In Vittoria,
the family most frequently presented is the Ammiani, with
the Lenkenstein family also receiving much attention. In
the Pole family, the mother is absent; in the Ammiani
family, the father is dead. While neither parent appears
in the depiction of the Lenkenstein family, the acknow
ledged head is the eldest, Count Lenkenstein. Moreover,
the brothers and sisters of that family reveal intense
concern for one another's welfare, in the same way that
mother and son of the Ammiani family show a devotion that
Carlo and the narrator both reveal to have been shared by
Count Ammiani, as husband and father, while he lived. In
the Pole family, as presented in both novels, is a degree
of callousness between family members, who reveal them
selves to be, indeed, polarized in their relations to one
another. In Vittoria, the relationship between Adela
Pole Sedley and her invalid husband continues a reflection
of the coldness she shared with her sisters and brother in
Sandra Belloni; nor, in Vittoria, is any increase in
warmth shown to exist between Wilfrid and his sister.
139
Although depiction of family life in both the Italian
novels is, as stated, often associated with material
concerning romance, especially in regard to the ideas
affecting the relationships between husbands and wives,
nevertheless, the pictures of family units show that
often at least one of the marriage partners is missing,
or, if both are present, there are no children. On one
level, the families of both novels may be divided into
the aware (socially, or politically, or aesthetically),
who display sensitivity, and the unaware, who are merely
sentimental, there being degrees within each division.
Although for the most part the aware or sensitive families
also have position, exceptions, notably the Bellonis, do
exist. In Sandra Belloni, besides the Bellonis, the
Mancinis, Powys and Ford (the Welsh brother and sister
portrayed without parents), and, because of their sensitiv
ity to others, Farmer Wilson and his wife, as well as the
Brancianis (just alluded to, not met) may be considered
aware and so sensitive. In Vittoria, those who show sen
sitivity are, again, the Bellonis (mother and daughter),
the Ammianis, Count Serabiglione's daughters (though not
the Count himself), the Guidascarpis, the Lenkensteins,
and, also again, Powys and Ford. The insensitive in Sandra
Belloni are, outstandingly, the wealthy Poles, and also
the Tinieys (although they are not pictured in their
family circle, they are revealed through the Poles'
140
reactions to them and their own actions at Pole gather
ings) . The insensitive in Vittoria are Wilfrid Pole and
his sister, Adela, with her husband; Count Serabiglione;
the peasant Lorenzo and his wife Maria; the innkeeper
Jacopo Cruchi, his wife, and his daughter Rosetta; and
interestingly, Barto Rizzo, an educated man, though not
his wife Rosellina, who is uneducated.
From another point of view the family may be regarded
as actually functioning as a family unit (i.e., one in
which loyalty and concern are operant for the mutual
support of its members), or a unit not so functioning.
Neither novel actually offers any "ideal" family life,
although Farmer Wilson and his wife (no children) seem
to enjoy a happy home, and the Belloni family also may
be considered to constitute a mutually supportive unit,
although certain differences between husband and wife
call their satisfactory existence as such into question.
That is, Mrs. Belloni's picture of married life, given
to her daughter, is not a felicitous one, as Emilia tells
Wilfrid.
"Married!" she exclaimed. "My mother told me about
that. You do not belong to yourself: you are tied
down. You are a slave, a drudge; mustn't dream,
mustn't think! I hate it." (I, 54)
Yet other factors, to be described, do indicate the three
Bellonis to be concerned for one another's welfare.
Also affording mutual comfort and help, in Sandra
Belloni, are Powys and Ford, the Mancinis, and the
I
141
Brancianis (in Emilia's story to Wilfrid). In Vittoria,
Powys and Ford continue their loving relationship; and
Count Serabiglione, this time, and his daughters ("of
whom one had married the patriot Giacomo Piaveni, and one
an Austrian diplomatist, the Commendatore Graf von
Lenkenstein" [I, 126]), the Ammianis, the Guidascarpis,
and the Lenkensteins also offer pictures of mutual concern.
Those not giving this kind of support are, in Sandra
Belloni, the Poles, the Barretts, the policeman and his
wife, and the Tinleys. In Vittoria, they are matched
by the peasant Lorenzo and his wife; the innkeeper Jacopo,
his wife, and his daughter; Barto Rizzo and his wife
(although she does serve him as a "slave"); and the
Countess of Graatli and her husband. The Brancianis
appear in both volumes as, at first, divided; but, as
the story unravels, they are seen as having the same mind
and heart.
Meredith does not in the course of the two novels
reveal himself so prejudiced in favor of the aristocratic
classes that he eliminates them from the ranks of the
sentimentalists (the Barretts in Sandra Belloni) or of the
reprehensible (Count Serabiglione in Vittoria). Nor does
Meredith refuse commoners the possession of nobility of
heart and behavior (Emilia-Vittoria, Rosellina Rizzo, and
even, to some degree, Barto Rizzo, who "punishes royally"
[II, 149] and is tortured finally by his suspicion that he
142
has acted unjustly toward Vittoria [pp. 279-282]).
In Sandra Belloni, as the Pole family is presented
at their family prayer meetings, dinners, and various
consultations, they are first shown to have severely
limited relationships with each other. Rigidly excluded
are plain speaking and acting. Thus, Wilfrid is shown
reading an "exercise in Fine Shades" from Adela which
precipitates his impatient "Why doesn't she write plain
to the sense?" (p. 148). Later, during another dramati
cally-rendered interview with his sister Cornelia, from
which the narrator is absent, Wilfrid asks if she wants
"plain speech," which "She wanted . . . still less" than
(the reader must presume, since her thoughts are not
given) any speech at all on the subject of love (p. 163).
Estrangement exists also in the relationships the
Pole brother and sisters have with their~father. It may
even be seen through his daughters' treatment of him,
that they feel a tolerance tinged with contempt for their
father. The exact nature of their relationship with him
is captured in the terminology (given as from the thoughts
of the "Ladies of Brookfield") describing Arabella's
reaction to her father's instructions to apologize to
Mrs. Chump for arrogant behavior toward her: "An Eastern
queen, thus addressed by her Minister of the treasury,
could not have felt greater indignation" (p. 57). The
greater irony involved in this choice of vocabulary
143
resides in the fact that the narrator has previously
informed the reader that money is a taboo subject for the
Poles.
The polarity hinted by the family name is presented
early in Sandra Belloni and repeated throughout. (It even
appears in Vittoria. In a humorous scene on top of Monte
Motterone that contrasts with the previously-presented
meeting of the rebels there, Adela Sedley corrects, with
a stamp of her foot and a flush, Captain Gambier's use of
her family name, Pole, Saying "I detest that name," she
rejects father, family, and home.)
The narrator is implicitly present in approximately
eleven of the nineteen episodes of the Pole family inter
course and explicitly present in one. His function is
only to clarify the social and financial muddles for the
reader, a notably necessary function since "plain talk"
is prohibited by the Poles. However, he does not draw
lessons or conclusions from the incidents about families
or about family life. He does, of course, inform the
reader of moods, inclinations, and intents; he summarizes
situations and furnishes background information. He does
not, it is important to repeat, interpret his information
in the light of proper family relations or lessons to be
learned. Moreover, the Philosopher also does not comment
on family matters.
Carrying out part of his responsibility for informing
144
the reader, the narrator notes that Mr. Pole's "Daughters
had completely cut him off from his cronies" to make his
home "alien territory" for him (I, 60) and that his son
"bled him of a considerable sum of money" (p. 208); but
he does not invest these or any other comments with signi
ficance concerning characterization pertaining to family
life. The reader is left to formulate his own conclusions.
However, the narrator does go so far as to place respon
sibility for lack of communication and of mutual under
standing .
Mr. Pole had endowed his daughters with a temperament
similar to his own; and he had educated it. . . . Shy
as himself, their shyness took other forms, and devel
oped with warm youth. . . . There were subjects they
had no power to bring their minds to consider. Money
was on the list. . . . It is not surprising, therefore,
that they hurried over it as speedily as they could,
and by a most comical exhibition of implied compre
hension of meanings and motives. (I, 142)
Then, with exquisite irony, in a dramatic scene, the
sisters are shown as they bid their father goodbye:
"Dear, simple, innocent old man!" was the pitiful
thought in the bosoms of the ladies; and if it was
accompanied by the mute exclamation, "How singular
that we should descend from him!" it would not have
been for the first time. (p. 144)
Later Wilfrid is shown to have inherited the same "shyness"
(p. 209) and, as has already been mentioned, evinces the
same attitudes in courting.
The narrator's explanation makes pungent such scenes
as those of "domestic discussions" concerning the purchase
of Besworth, as well as prevents such sympathy for Mr. Pole
145
as to cause his dilemma and later decline to seem tragic.
The ladies are unable to penetrate to the reason for their
father's urgent questions, "What does it lead to? What's
to come after?" Uncomprehending, they merely take as a
hint their father's comment, "If your brother had proposed
it . . . but he's too reasonable" in order to write for
"his concurrence and assistance" in urging the purchase
(p. 127). Obtuseness, the essence of insensitivity, leads
to the crassest vulgarity of disloyalty and inservility
of child to parent. Cornelia "placidly" observes that her
father's chastising and warning remark to Arabella that
"You're like a youngster playing truant that he may gain
knowledge" is just "A smart piece of City-speech." The
sisters' contempt for the city and for its affairs is thus
translated into an expression concerning their father.
Their disdain is even more explicitly given in Cornelia's
further statement, ironic in its import since it applies
at least as much to the sisters as to the father, that
"Vulgarity never contains more than a minimum of the
truth" (p. 133).
The reader receives then both pictorial and dramatic
evidence for the essential coldness of the Poles, "Pole,
Polar and North Pole," these "three shades of distance"
(p. 3) and for the sisters' relative indifference to their
father's welfare. With ironic insensitivity, in view of
the pride they take in their supposed possession of the
146
"Nice Feelings" and the "Fine Shades," they are shown to
begin at last to wonder if their father's problem might
be "After all, money!" {p. 174). The actual acceptance
that it is indeed "Money!" (p. 320) comes extremely slowly.
The recognition, given scenically, again exactly delineates
the sisters1 relationship with their father.
Curiously, too, [Adela] had no occasion to ask how
it was that money might be supposed to have operated
on her father's health. Unable to realize to her
self the image of her father lying ill and suffering,
but just sufficiently touched by what she could con
ceive of his situation, the bare whisper of money
came like a foul insult to overwhelm her in floods
of liquid self-love. . . . Cornelia and Arabella
caught her hands. . . . It gratified them that Adela
should show a deep and keen feeling. (p. 320)
Illustrating again, with palpable irony, the sisters'
total lack of sensitivity, the scene also demonstrates the
importance of the narrator in conveying the sisters'
facile acceptance of a pale reflection of feeling that, in
actuality, constitutes hypocrisy for all involved.
Although Emilia's family life cannot be called ideal,
her own testimony serving to characterize her parents'
relationship as imperfect as well as to reveal her father's
attempt to sell her to "Jew gentlemen," it does contain
some evidence of mutual devotion and support, as well as
consistently honest expression of feeling, that is not
present in the Pole family relationships. The picture of
Emilia's family emerges mainly from the story she herself
tells Wilfrid at his request (pp. 42 ff). Thus, although
the method is essentially pictorial, it is a first-person
147
account and hence colored with a convincing intimacy and
truth.
As Emilia tells of her family, it becomes clear that
its members do enjoy a certain solidarity with absence of
pretension and hypocrisy. Emilia is importantly present
in her tale, both as teller and actor, and makes live the
scenes of her father's "dreadful passions" with wig and
violin (pp. 44-45) and with potatoes (pp. 50-51), as well
as of her mother's fearful obsequiousness, "a slave to
work" (p. 47), who will not disobey even her daughter if
Emilia "act[s her] father, and tower[s] over her, and
frown[s], and make[s] her mild" (p. 56).
Emilia's words give three of the four glimpses into
her family life in Sandra Belloni. The first of the
three accounts has just been detailed. A later theatre
scene amplifies Emilia's feelings for her father as she
spies him in the orchestra at the farce she attends with
Mr. Pole. Afraid to let him see her because of the
danger he threatens with his "Jew friends," she yet pities
him as "miserable— a child of harmony among the sons of
discord" and resolves to "make him happy" (p. 278). She
can pardon him "the sin" of trying "to sell" her because
he "had no money at all" (p. 294), as she tells Pole in
the course of her pleas that he permit his son, Wilfrid,
to marry her.
The same tenderness, though without fear, marks her
148
feeling for her mother. Although she is to tell Georgians
that she hasn't the "habit of being respectful" to her
mother (II, 240), the sequent passage does not show her to
assume even the kind of "towering" that she had earlier
exercised in order to compel her mother's help in fleeing
from her father's machinations. Rather this dramatic
scene shows her holding "up her mother's chin fondlingly
between her two hands" and speaking longingly of her
"wish" that her father would send "news to make [her]
happy about him; or come and run his finger up the strings
for hours, as he used to" (p. 241).
The Belloni family at least approaches more closely
to desirable family relations, not only in the accident
of both parents' presence, but also in the substance of
their caring about and working for each other, than do the
other two families shown in any detail, the Poles and the
Barretts. The Pole family appears both pictorially and
dramatically in more passages, almost as a center balance
against the Bellonis on the one hand and the Barretts on
the other, each of these latter having two living parents
and one child. The Barrett family picture, too, is
painted more through characters' comments about it than
through the reader's direct view of the family itself.
Yet the manner in which the comments are delivered differs;
rather than the child revealing the family life, other
characters' comments do so more obliquely, effecting
149
greater distance and less warmth. Nonetheless, the com
ments are contained in dramatic scenes.
At Richford, Lady Gosstre's and Powys' chat discloses
that Barrett's mother preferred the "musical accomplish
ments of a foreign professor of the Art" to any her hus
band, Sir Justinian Barrett, might offer (I, 95). Later,
during a dinner entertainment at Mr. Pole's home, Mr.
Barrett reddens as he makes reference to his own situa
tion: "a young man should not be subject to his father's
caprice" (p. 141). Then, in Volume II, the Besworth
party, which occasions the match-making efforts of Adela,
brings to light, through Adela's ruminations, Barrett's
disinheritance because of his organ-playing when his
father hates music. With this background, all dramati
cally provided, Cornelia's encounter with Barrett provides
her a "fatal glimpse of the false light in which his
resentment coloured the relations between father and
children" (p. 184). Of course, the irony involves
Cornelia's own "false lights" and the hypocrisy intrinsic
to her character. Neither the narrator nor the Philoso
pher provides additional comments or insights into these
parental and filial matters, which, as a matter of fact,
are strongly reminiscent of the situation in The Ordeal
of Richard Feverel.
Toward the end of the novel, however, the narrator
does become philosophic regarding Sir Purcell's sentiment
I
150
and death as these pertain to his family history. He adds
few new facts about Sir Purcell's background, although the
reader does learn that the young Baronet's mother was
"flighty," and that his father gave him "no profession
beyond that of the obedient expectant son and heir," yet
caused "the youth's dependency" in a way to precipitate a
"breach" (p. 282) between them. The purpose of the
chapter is to allow the narrator's examination of the
"springs" for Sir Purcell's mode of life and death as a
particular exercise in sentimentalism. The narrator con
cludes his discussion by noting that it is "our last
halt, I believe, and last examination of machinery before
Emilia quits England" (p. 285). The narrator's function
ing as a philosopher in this case seems to be indicative
of a kind of maturation under the Philosopher's influence
and so of the independence he may exhibit in the next
novel, as well as of the thematically less important nature
of the Barrett family case.
In Vittoria, half of the ten scenes showing the
Ammiani family, whether in retrospect or in the present,
mix the pictorial and the dramatic narrative methods.
Nevertheless, there are fewer narrator comments, even of
the reserved type found in Sandra Belloni, and these few
are mostly retrospective concerning Carlo's dead father,
the Italian count and general of the army, and concerning
his mother's history as a young girl and bride. In
151
addition, the narrator briefly describes Countess Ammiani's
interference in the affair of the youthful Carlo and
Violetta and of the Countess' feelings about Vittoria as
her son's choice for wife (II, 257-258). These all, it
should be repeated, are woven in with dramatic scenes.
The first reference to the kind of relationship
Carlo had with his father occurs in a dialogue during
which Vittoria asks him if his "father [were] a soldier."
He answers that "He was a general officer in what he
believed to be an army of Italy. We used to fence to
gether every day for two hours." Carlo thus himself
characterizes the special relationship they bore to each
other, as well as his dissent from his father's political
affiliation, the intimation appearing that Count Ammiani,
in a deluded belief in the army, stood for old Italy
(though without Serabiglione's duplicity), even as his son
represents young Italy. Carlo's words as well as Emilia's
response that she "love[s] fathers who do that" assume a
significance in the novel concerning their relationship
to each other so that this passage is referred to again
(p. 168). The next reference to "that fiery Paolo Ammiani"
as the father to Carlo, whose "soul was black with
passion," occurs in the midst of a dramatically-handled
episode of intrigue when, interpreting signs at the
"Pope's mouth," Carlo believes the revolution to have
collapsed (pp. 192-193). The mixture of techniques here
152
serves to give understanding of cultural differences
between a character and the reader.
Englishmen will hardly forgive [Carlo] for having
tears in his eyes, but Italians follow the Greek
classical prescription for the emotions, while we
take example by the Romans. There is no sneer due
from us. He sobbed. It seemed that a country was
lost. (p. 193)
The rapid transition from admonition to observation
immediately catches the reader back to witness the scene
after having been prepared for an acceptance of Carlo's
mode of expression.
The closeness of the Ammiani family unit with their
mutual devotion and support is dramatically conveyed by
their behavior toward one another. Often, as in the
case with the deceased father, as indicated above, their
dialogue is contained in tales of action. The same
method is used in the portrayal of the Guidascarpi,
Lenkenstein, and Piaveni families. Even the parasitical
Italian nobleman, Count Serabiglione, whose family has
been split through the exercise of avarice and of the
political pragmatism that is a tradition in their
family, shares feelings of loyalty and love with his
daughters, who are allied by marriage to Austria (the
Countess of Lenkenstein) and to Italy (Laura Piaveni).
Because they are political enemies of the Ammianis
(although Carlo was once Lena's "old playmate, and once
her dear friend" [II, 217]), the Lenkenstein family provide
an interesting study in conjunction with the Ammiani. It
153
is notable that, first of all, their treatment as a family
is delayed until the second volume; their first appearance
is pictorially represented, the narrator discreetly pre
sent in the summarizing lines that represent their close
ness :
Vittoria heard [from the maid who had recognized her]
that Laura and her sister and the duchess had gone
down to Meran. Countess Lena von Lenkenstein was
riding to see her betrothed [Wilfrid] on a neighbouring
estate. Countess Anna had disappeared early, none knew
where. Both these ladies, and their sister-in-law,
were in mourning for the terrible death of their
brother, Count Paul. Aennchen repeated what she knew
of the tale concerning him. (p. 2)
This family is next seen through both pictorial and
dramatic narrative. A summary treatment of the division
between Count Lenkenstein, "who had one face for his
friends and another for the reverse party" (p. 36), and
his wife's sister, Laura Piaveni, occupies the major
portion of a paragraph, the end of which brings the
scenically-realized display of the quarrel, which occupies
approximately two pages (pp. 36-38). The broad land
scapes of relationships involving the three aristocratic
families tied by marriages (one of these Austrian, the
Lenkenstein, and the other two Italian, Serabiglione and
Piaveni) finally change so that, though separate looks are
given each of the branches, the Lenkenstein group is
chiefly concentrated upon. After the separation of the
branches so that the Lenkensteins appear en famille, the
formidable Count Lenkenstein, a "tall and courtly man"
154
whom Laura, his sister-in-law, considers "a hangman"
(p. 36), appears less frequently than Count Karl, "young
and handsome, with . . . pleasant eyes, a contrast to his
brother Count Lenkenstein" (p. 133).
One charming scene of the Lenkensteins in their
Milan home reveals Count Karl's droll wit. Irma di Karski,
visiting the Austrian family, has vociferously complained
about Vittoria; Count Karl, lying "on the sofa" because of
a wound, at last "gave a long-drawn sigh" and said "Alas,
that [Vittoria] should have brought discredit on Fraulein
di Karski1s profession!" (pp. 171, 173). No further
comment is needed nor does the narrator provide one. The
entire scene has been dramatically rendered and contains
strong implications concerning the Lenkensteins as a
family and Count Karl as an individual.
It is, however, the sisters, Anna and Lena, and their
closeness, which they are intimated to share with their
brothers (Count Karl, the now-deceased Count Paul, and
Count Lenkenstein), that receive the most attention.
Their open display of feeling, which certainly contrasts
with the distance maintained by the Pole sisters with
each other, does, however, become complicated by Anna's
self-delusion. Denying that she is "revengeful" (p. 219),
Anna names her desire to avenge herself on Vittoria, whom
she accuses of having "murdered [her] brother Paul" and
trying "to murder [her] brother Karl" (p. 151), "justice."
155
Honesty is at last attained with the help of her sister
when Anna is shown "in Lena's arms, sobbing out one of
the wildest confessions ever made by woman" (p. 313).
She tells of her plot to secure Carlo's death and of her
machinations which involve estrangement from Weisspriess,
whom she loves, and liaison with Nagen, whom she des
pises (p. 313).
Lena's devotion to her sister matches Karl's belief
that in Anna "he had a sister magnificent in Soul" (p.319).
(That she has a harsher personality than her sister is
dramatically shown to be recognized by Count Karl when,
wounded, he asks "Is it my Lena?" and to the response that
"It is your Anna," moans "I should have known" [p. 150].)
On her part, Anna is "glad to have deluded him" in order
to retain his good opinion (p. 319). Still, just as Lena
continues in support of her sister, Karl too, even when
he is "bitterly humbled" by the truth (p. 325), does not
desert her, but rushes to rescue Carlo from the trap she
has set, in order both to rectify her mistake for her and
to protect the family honor.
Just as the Lenkenstein family pictures reveal only
sibling relationships, the Barto Rizzo "family" may more
readily be seen as a man-woman relationship; they do not
seem to have formed a family unit in the usual sense of
maintaining a home. Barto Rizzo considers his wife, as
stated earlier, as "his tool" to help him in his efforts
156
for the revolution, even as "a small brass gun on the
barricade" that sends "charges of shot into the rear of
the enemy" (p. 78). For her good performance, he rewards
her with "a red-wine evening in the house, shut up alone,
my snake! my pepper-flower!" (I, 84). In further illus
tration of his attitude toward Rosellina, Rizzo calls the
small brass gun, as he kisses "the black lip of his little
thunderer, . . . his wife, his naked wife; the best of
mistresses" (II, 78-79).
But, if this husband and wife do not seem to consti
tute a family unit, four other small units, two in Sandra
Belloni and two in Vittoria, do seem like families. In
Sandra Belloni, Farmer Wilson with his wife and the
policeman with his wife and, in Vittoria, the peasant
Lorenzo with his wife Maria and the innkeeper Jacopo with
his wife and daughter Rosetta offer brief glimpses of
family life on socio-economic levels not examined at any
great length in either novel. The rural setting for the
Wilsons may be partial reason for the atmosphere of peace
fulness and security in their home as opposed to the
atmosphere surrounding the policeman and his wife. Cer
tainly Emilia testifies that her "head is a wilderness"
when she is in London; she can scarcely bear the "London
noise" (II, 226).
However, the city-country opposition is complicated
by the Poles' testimony that their felicity was actually
157
greater in the formerly-despised city where "life" is
"unutterably sordid" (p. 98). The sisters' sentiment
marks their separation both from Emilia and from nature.
That is, their reasons for coming to the country were
artificial, a ploy for "mounting." Although Emilia is
received into both the Wilsons' country home and the
policeman's city home on a paying basis, the surrounding
factors of her reception and stay contribute to the
notion that the country does afford the happier and the
healthier environment within the context of the novel.
Farmer Wilson's hospitality, according to Emilia's
tale of it, is spontaneous and warm-hearted. She finishes
the story of her life by telling Wilfrid that
In the train I met farmer Wilson. . . . He was kind
and asked me about myself; and I mentioned lodgings,
and that I longed for woods and meadows. Just as we
were getting out of the train, he said I was to come
with him; and I did, very gladly. (p. 56)
In her story Emilia omits any specific mention of
payment, although it is implicit in the word "lodgings."
In an earlier conversation with Pericles, Emilia had also
said that "While my money lasts, I shall stay in the
country" (p. 33). However, missing is the kind of pressure
for payment to be found in the arrangement with the police
man and his wife.
That Farmer Wilson and his wife elicit Emilia's fond
regard is presented dramatically, without any narrator
comment, in her address to them at the Ipley Common
158
concert:
"Dame! dame!" cried Emilia, finding her way quickly
to one of the more decently-bonneted women; "Am I
not glad to see you here! Did I please you? And you,
dear Farmer Wilson? I caught sight of you just as I
was finishing. I remember the song you like, and I
want to sing it." (p. 105)
That her happiness in their home and her fondness for them
is a necessary reflection of the peace and contentment of
their home life may be confirmed by the comfortable feeling
elicited from the brief glimpse of the husband-wife
relationship:
Dame Wilson jogged her husband’s arm, to make him
remember that talking was his dangerous pastime . . .
(p. 105)
Any notion of easily generous or spontaneous sharing
departs with the country air in the episode concerning the
policeman and his wife. This passage, too, is pictorially
narrated, this time not by the protagonist but by the
narrator (such telling ensures a greater distance).
Although the narrator is the source for the information
that the policeman is "friendly" (II, 160), he also says
that his kindness proceeds from his suspicion that she is
"one of the eccentric young ladies who are occasionally
missing and have advertizing friends" (pp. 158-159).
Rather than offer the shelter of his home to her when he
sees her obvious need, he withdraws, saying, in response
to her request that she be taken to his wife, "that the
best of [women] knew what bad suspicions was" (p. 161).
159
Yet Farmer Wilson did not believe his wife's reactions
would be of a suspicious nature. The narrator also
states that "The woman . . . was kind," yet the monetary
basis of her association with Emilia is immediate and
predominant. Emilia
. . . took the woman's hand, asking permission to
remain under her protection. The woman by and by
named a sum of money as a sum for weekly payment,
and Emilia transferred all to her that she had.
(p. 161)
In this case, Emilia had asked not for "lodgings" but for
"protection" so that her need is presented on a humani
tarian rather than on a commercial basis. The woman's
hesitation in responding to such a cry for help and then
placing her agreement upon a business basis indicates the
harshness of the environment and its effect on human
nature.
Emilia's treatment in this house, given without
commentary, further works to portray the characters of the
man and his wife and the nature of their relationships
with others, including a verification, then, of the police
man's original fear of his wife's reactions. Their home
is only slightly less comfortless than the London streets
where Emilia has befriended two poor little children.
Agonizing over their fates and her own lost voice, Emilia
. . . fell into fits of crying. Her friend the
policeman came by and took her arm with a force
that he meant to be persuasive; so lifting her
and handing her some steps beyond the limit of
his beat, with stern directions for her to
proceed home immediately. (p. 163)
160
Emilia's obedience secures for her no increase in warmth.
Next day she asked her hostess to lend her half-a-
crown. The woman snapped shortly in answer: "No;
the less you have the better." Emilia was obliged
to abandon her little people. (p. 16 3)
Then,
When the week, for which term of shelter she had
paid, was ended, her hostess spoke upon this point,
saying, more to convince Emilia than from any un
kindness: "Me and my husband can't go on keepin'
you, you know, my dear, however well's our meaning."
Emilia drew the woman toward her with both hands,
softly shaking her head. (p. 163)
The acted-out facts speak for themselves. Absolutely no
commentary exists upon the policeman and his wife. The
descriptive word "kind," however, as it comes from the
narrator, and not from Emilia, whose warm and forgiving
heart might be accused of prejudicing the fact, causes the
reader to follow more closely other clues given concerning
the city and its effects. From the objective presentation
of the narrator, then, the reader is led not to condemn
the policeman and his wife as heartless villains, but
rather to pity them as themselves victims of the unnatural
city even as Emilia herself is.
In the same way, the children of the London streets
whom Emilia feeds little cakes but finally must desert are
presented as victims of the city. Although the little
Italian boy and English girl "never" have "supper" (p. 157),
even after long days at their begging tasks, and although
they expect regularly to be "beaten" (p. 15 8) , the total
absence of parents and of home life, either pictorially or
161
dramatically reported, causes them to seem only hapless
children of the city. In Sandra Belloni, these two are
the only small children represented.
In Vittoria, too, presentation of small children is
accomplished virtually without showing or telling of
family life. Little Giacomo and Amalia Piaveni are not
city-dwellers in the way the nameless children of London
are, nor are they homeless. But they do seem orphaned
because, although only their father is dead, their mother,
Laura, is "more inspired by the remembrance of her husband
than by consideration for her children" (I, 131). Seeming
joyful and well-treated as they are shown playing with
Vittoria (who in both volumes appears as giving them more
attention and affection than their mother does), they are
specifically shown to be relegated to the care of the
nurse Assunta, to whom Laura sends them "out of her sight"
after a short greeting and kiss. Laura's preoccupation
with the revolution, which consumes her energies and time
to the exclusion of her children's demands for them, is,
of course, consistent with her portrayal as one of "savage
soul" and it is significant that, although she is shown
to eschew the role of mother in favor of that of rebel,
she is not treated unsympathetically. That is, her
dedication to the cause of Italian freedom is handled
approvingly, and her children are not depicted as sacri
ficial victims of her zeal.
162
It may be seen that the wide variety of family
situations and of the ways in which family members relate
with each other is dominated by that which also animated
the examination of love's faces. That is, truth of feeling
and honesty of expression are determiners of worth, exclu
sive of political, social, or cultural matters. Even
without the informed commentaries of the narrator or of
the Philosopher that attend investigation of love's
illusions and deceptions in Sandra Belloni, and the
narrator's in Vittoria, the pictorial and the dramatic
methods enable as full and complete a picture of the ways
in'which families may operate.
Aesthetic Theories
Meredith's use of the pictorial and the dramatic
methods also achieves a well-rounded presentation of
aesthetic notions. In combining the narrative methods,
Meredith is able to convey, economically, an integrated,
aesthetic position from three different perspectives:
that of the artist-performer (Vittoria and Irma di Karski
in contrast), that of the artist-composer-inventor (Agos-
tino, Rocco Ricci, Runningbrook, and even Zotti in com
parison and in contrast), and that of the audience and/or
critic. Meredith indicates levels of accomplishment in
the exercise of each activity, that is, of performing,
making, and appreciating, and also examines the place of
163
training as it relates to the innate abilities of per
formance, composition, and appreciation.
Sources for aesthetic pleasure examined in the two
novels are, primarily, music, and also poetry, with some
consideration of nature which includes, at least for
Tracy Runningbrook and Wilfrid (of the barn- and farm-yard
associations) beautiful women. Music is, of all these,
indicated to be of the sublimest order, poetry coming in
a rather distant second, at least on the surface. The
inspiration of nature's beauty may be inferred from
Emilia-Vittoria's reactions to it. However, since true
art is finally revealed to be a cultivated, i.e., trained
accomplishment, nature is eventually shown not really to
rank as an art. In the same way, woman's beauty receives
no real ranking as an aesthetic accomplishment. As a
matter of fact, Tracy Runningbrook is shown to be extreme
ly short-sighted, to the detriment of his own poetic art,
in his wish to limit Emilia's achievement to cultivation
of her appeal as a lovely girl, a wish finally confessed
even by him to be in error.
Underlying all artistic consideration in the two
novels is the basic notion that art is not and cannot be
isolated from life, but rather must be a thread of the
social (in Sandra Belloni) and of the political (in
Vittoria) fabric. In his treatment of artistic questions,
as well as in dealing with political matters and those
I
164
concerning the family , Meredith does not employ the
narrator or the Philosopher to define or discuss with
approving or condemning statements the differing atti
tudes toward art. Unlike, then, the treatment given to
the relationships between men and women, the lessons
about art are implicit in the conduct, speeches, and
principles of the characters; thus, these attitudes are,
for the most part, dramatically presented.
Both the achievement of Emilia's as-yet-untrained
art and her intense desire to please appear in the scene
set in the Ipley Common booth. Pictorial narrative shows
her simple audience, who, in spite of their unfamiliarity
with the foreign words and style of the song, respond
with twinkling eyes and with "mouths pursed in a kind of
half-protesting pleasure" to her song. But Emilia "may
have had some warning sense" that "admiration is only an
ingredient of homage" (I, 104). The warning sense is, of
course, part of her artistic nature, which impels her,
as the narrator informs, to strive for "true affection"
from her audience. Even Wilfrid can see "plainly," and
so testifies, that she sings "to give happiness" (p. 107).
Meredith conveys the notion of the inseparability of
art and life positively through the commitments as well
as experiences of Emilia-Vittoria and also negatively
through the mistaken judgments and denials of various
characters, especially those of Antonio-Pericles. In the
165
microcosmic world of Sandra Belloni, Emilia's commitment
is to the aesthetic pleasures and the material and emo
tional needs of those for whom she cares. In the macro
cosm of Vittoria, in addition to her concern for intimates,
she struggles for a national cause, one serving the good
of all Italy. Pericles' obsession in both novels, and so
in the two differing worlds, is solely for her art and so
for her voice. He dismisses not only the personal and
political needs of all others, but even those of Emilia-
Vittoria herself. Most often he cannot even comprehend
these needs.
On the other hand, as already mentioned, in both
novels are characters who tend to dismiss her art and
voice in favor of social attributes and accomplishments
(in Sandra Belloni) or political causes or advantages (in
Vittoria). Thus, in Sandra Belloni, an opposition is
set up primarily between the natural and passionate human
with talent (Emilia) and the sentimentalists without even
real appreciation of talent, much less talent themselves
(the Poles, Sir Purcell Barrett, and, it must be added,
Runningbrook). In Vittoria, the opposition is between
Vittoria and the Austrians (especially Anna Lenkenstein),
and also the political fanatic Barto Rizzo. Other con
flicts concern the opposition of Austrian and Italian
interests and were dealt with, therefore, in the first
section of this chapter.
166
At the beginning of Sandra Belloni, the little party
of Pole sisters with their escorts, including Wilfrid and
Pericles, is shown walking through the wood in search of
the source for a mysterious voice. Description of the
wood, of their reactions, and of the sound of that voice
and its effect upon them are all interwoven with their
conversations and actions to effect a vividly-realized
episode, although the technique is primarily pictorial.
The paragraph telling of their first view of Emilia, whose
voice they have heard, is perhaps revealing of the tech
nique. Her location in the wood is described with the
additional information about a former habituee, "An old
woman, hopelessly a witch" (p. 11). Then the approach
and view of the Pole party is given as if the narrator
accompanied them, but distantly: "They could discern
nothing save the glimmer of the instrument and one set of
fingers caressing it" (p. 12). The concluding two
sentences of this paragraph continue that narrative tech
nique although the narrator's actual presence is still
only hinted at.
How she viewed their rather impertinent advance
toward her, till they had ranged in a half-circle
nearer and nearer, could not be guessed. She did
not seem abashed in any way, for, having preluded,
she threw herself into another song. {p. 12)
The narrator is dimly felt behind the adjective
"impertinent" since the Poles and their companions show
no indication of so considering themselves. That her
167
reaction to them "could not be guessed" and that "she did
not seem abashed" as she sang again indicate the narrator's
removal from Emilia as well as from the members of her
audience. The distance and the mystery attached to the
incident are created, too, by a faint echo of the nine
teenth century notion concerning the spirit of creativity
in Meredith's association of a witch with Emilia, H not
only in location, but also with the mystic half-circle
by which they range her. The fact that, in Vittoria,
Pericles also calls Vittoria a "witch" (II, 208) encour
ages some association with the kind of spirit that Shelley
utilized in, for instance, "The Witch of Atlas" and in
"Mont Blanc," in which "the witch poesy" is represented in
a "still c a v e . "12 por Shelley, the witch, or poetry,
represented all art or invention.13
Also connected with Shelley's vision of the witch as
representative of the good and as a benefactress of man is
Usee Harold Bloom's The Visionary Company: A
Reading of English Romantic Poetry (New York: Doubleday,
1961) and M. S. Abrams' The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic
Theory and the Critical Tradition (New York: W. W. Norton
Company, Inc., 1963).
12"Mont Blanc," in English Romantic Poetry and Prose,
ed. Russell Noyes (New York: Oxford University Press,
1956), p. 977, 1. 44.
Hwilliams' Appendix of "Meredith's Reading" shows
"Mont Blanc" only to have been in Meredith's library. His
listing is, however, an "accumulation of titles . . . not
offered as final" (p. 313). Moreover, even if the other
titles were not in Meredith's library, he might have read
"The Witch of Atlas" and "A Defence of Poetry."
168
the depiction of Emilia as feeling that her voice is her
contribution to others. Both shown and told throughout
both novels is that she values her voice first and fore
most as it pleases or enriches others. Never is she
revealed to consider her art as an autonomous element;
rather she always subordinates its use to the needs and
pleasures of others. Her position, then, is exactly the
opposite of Pericles' although he would indulge her wish
to sing the simple folk music, not damaging to her voice,
at the Ipley Common booth. The Poles and others at the
party condemn as foolish her wish to please the villagers.
The same conviction concerning, and dedication to service
influence her later choice to please her lover by relin
quishing the opportunity of developing her art's full
potential in order to serve him better as wife.
Pericles, on the other hand, in his blind passion for
art, considers her musical ability not only paramount, but
excluding of all other human needs. He is heavily con
demnatory when she refuses to go to Italy for training.
Her voice must determine her life; once she is trained,
so that her voice is no longer a "thing of caprice"
(Sandra Belloni, I, 228), love can be made to serve in
order to "sharpen" it. Then he would permit her to "lofe"
until she stabs herself (p. 229).
Almost as verification of the sincerity of Pericles'
dramatized reactions to Emilia's announcement that she
169
will sacrifice musical training for Wilfrid, the narrator
comments,
The musical connoisseur drew on his own disappointment
alone for eloquence. Had he been thinking of her, he
might have touched cunningly on her love for Italy.
Music was the passion of the man; and a millionaire's
passion is something that can make a stir. He knew
that in Emilia he had discovered a pearl of song
rarely to be found, and his object was to polish and
perfect her at all cost: perhaps, as a secondary and
far removed consideration, to point to her as a thing
belonging to him, for which Emperors might envy him.
(I, 229-230)
Essentially Pericles' position unfolds as anti-life, or
anti-human. Convinced of the superiority of "a stage to
life" (Vittoria, II, 267), his attitudes demonstrate the
narrator's statement that he lacks "a human nature"
(Sandra Belloni, II, 146). Vittoria is a "machine," in
the same way that he seems to consider everyone else to
be; only, in her case, she is a machine with a voice, a
position couched in the terms of Tracy's denial of her
voice's real importance.
A seeming inconsistency during the course of the two
novels in Pericles' portraiture may be seen as non-existent
upon close examination. In Sandra Belloni, he is presented
distantly as a rich impresario, courted by the Poles, the
Tinleys, and even Emilia; but he is also said to be Pole's
shrewd, rather conscienceless business associate. In
Vittoria, his business activities become invisible, and he
seems almost a dilettante, even a comic one. Those
threatening aspects of his character seem to dwindle in
170
Vittoria except in his treatment of Fraulein di Karski
and Countess d'Isorella when they threaten Vittoria's
artistic performance.
However, it may be seen that his power in both novels
is monetary, a power he exercises in different ways in the
two novels. Moreover, the comic aspects of his personal
ity that become more manifest in Vittoria are certainly
latent in Sandra Belloni. "Muffled in a superbly-mounted
bearskin" (p. 8), Pericles is pictured early in that
novel as he "knocked against branches, and tripped over
stumps, and ejaculated with energy" (p. 10). Then, in
Vittoria in a scene of comic relief after Rinaldo Guida-
scarpi's "execution," he is shown lying "prostrate on
the floor," moaning "that he was wounded!" when he had
only heard, not stopped shots. Vittoria first snaps,
"Bleed to death" and then mutters "Dreadful, craven
man"; when he cannot elicit sympathy, he adjusts his
attitude to express concern for her and denial of worry
for himself. His comic leap into activity as soon as he
detects "delicious silence" (p. 132) is described without
comment.
Conversely, in Vittoria, in which he is pictured as
exercising less power, he is shown with some dignity in
the midst of battle as he attempts to rescue Vittoria,
albeit against her wishes. As she looks out of the
carriage from which she had banished him,
171
The watchfires of the Austrians encamped in the
fields encircled her; and moving up and down, the
cigar of Antonio-Pericles was visible. He had
not eaten or drunk, and he was out there sleepless;
he walked conquering his fears in the thick of war
troubles: all for her sake. She watched criti
cally to see whether the cigar-light was puffed in
fretfulness. It burned steadily; and the thought
of Pericles supporting patience quite overcame her.
(II, 123)
Dramatic scenes in both Vittoria and Sandra Belloni
do offer evidence for condemnation of Pericles' life-
denying activities, yet the leavening of comedy, as well
as of his sincerity, softens that condemnation. Thus,
although he may at times be even contemptible in his
treatment of, especially, the young Emilia, and in his
ravings about her voice to the exclusion of her person,
the reader must be influenced by her understanding, even
fond forgiveness of him. She realizes that which animates
him:
My ancestors adored Goddesses. I discover ze voice
of a Goddess: I adore it. So you call me mad; it
is to me— what you call me— juste ze same. I am
possessed wiz passion for her voice. So it will be
till I go to ashes. It is to me ze one zsing divine
in a pit, a porpoise world. (p. 124)
Nonetheless, that worship of her voice is dehumanizing, as
further indicated by the terms in which he refers to her
as a "marble chamber" for it, to be converted into a
"palace of cedarwood" when she is exposed to love so that
her voice will be lent greater "fragrance" (I, 177). Later
Pericles tells Laura and Georgiana that Vittoria
17 2
. . . is a casket for one pearl. . . . Her voice has
but a sole skin; it is not like a body; it bleeds to
death at a scratch. A spot on the pearl, and it is
perished. {II, 113)
Still later he wishes her "voice" were "in an iron
body" (p. 266). The pyramiding of terms such as "marble
chamber," "palace of cedarwood," "casket," and "iron
body" performs amply not only to dehumanize, but also to
convey the deadening influence that Pericles would have
upon his artist and, so, ultimately upon art itself.
Herein lies a paradox, for, at the end of the second
novel, Pericles confesses that although her "voice
tsrilled" him, "her soul possessed" him (p. 248); and it
is, of course, Emilia-Vittoria's soul that gives her voice
its magnificent power (see pages 187, 189, and 190 for a
more detailed discussion of the artist's soul).
The distance established by the manner of describing
Emilia's first appearance in Sandra Belloni suitably
represents the distance to be maintained between Emilia
and most of the mortals she encounters during the course
of both the Italian novels, especially those portrayed
in Sandra Belloni. Certainly none of those whom she meets
in that first scene in the fir-wood, including Pericles,
ever understand her overwhelming need "To be of worth"
(II, 133). Intricate handling of the pictorial and the
dramatic methods also emphasizes the distance between
Emilia and Wilfrid as she first realizes his falseness.
Not summary, but Emilia's absence from the action achieves
173
the desired effect. She appears only at the end of a long
dramatic scene between Lady Charlotte and Wilfrid. After
Lady Charlotte has lead Wilfrid to abjure Emilia's love,
she says, "'For God's sake, spare the girl!' Emilia stood
in the doorway" (p. 101).
Appearing so briefly and dramatically in a matter
affecting her so importantly, she again disappears, only
to be met again in the next chapter through the concerned
conversation of others. First, Georgiana tells a puzzled
Merthyr of Lady Charlotte's ruse to cure Emilia of loving
Wilfrid. Then, further talk of her is alternated with
the frivolous matters that concern the members of the
yachting party, until the narrator informs the reader
that Merthyr received a note from Madame Marini telling
of Emilia's disappearance.
When the focus is finally returned to Emilia, it is
in a chapter entitled "She clings to her Voice." A close
mixture of Emilia's thought and the narrator's commentary
repeats this source for her life and hope.
She had no thought of value, but only an eagerness
to feel herself possessor of something. Wilfrid
had appeared to her to have taken all from her,
until the recollection of her voice made her breathe
suddenly quick and deep, as one recovering the taste
of life. (p. 124)
The terms in which she is directly represented as thinking
of her problem are musical: "She wanted a reason to make
[Wilfrid] in harmony with his acts, and she could get
none" (p. 124). Without her voice, she would think
174
herself out of harmony with life,too, and so would "feel
as" Sir Purcell in desiring death (p. 127).
The mixture of techniques continues with a direct
quotation, "Now," followed by the narrator's explanation
that she had failed "upon an attempt at simple 'do, re,
mi, fa.'" Then, without quotation marks until the end,
her thoughts are continued:
Was it the laugh, that stopping her at "si," made
that "si" so husky, asthmatic, like the wheezing
of a crooked old witch? "I am unlucky tonight,"
said Emilia. (p. 132)
The witch allusion is, of course, reminiscent of both the
location and the power Emilia's song had during her
encounter with the Poles, although there is no attempt to
link the two other than through implication. The reminder
here, however, runs contrary to the creative notions
earlier associated with "witch," an association occurring
again in Vittoria, as mentioned earlier. Here, however,
the use of witch seems to signify absence of art or of
creativity, unless it be employed as a hint of Emilia's
really untarnished powers.
The next sentence continues with the narrator's
analysis of Emilia's psychological state.
Or, rather, so said her surface-self. The submerged
self— self in the depths--rarely speaks to the
occasion, but lies under calamity quietly apprehending
all; willing that the talker overhead should deceive
others, and herself likewise, if possible. (p. 132)
The narrator tells of Emilia's careful dressing which
"betrayed that she divined those arts she was to shine in,
175
according to Tracy, and betrayed that she had a terrible
fear of a loss of all else" (italics mine). Since Tracy
judges her not as an artist but as an attractive girl,
the loss the narrator notes is an essential one. Yet, as
indication of her artistic nature and as a foreshadowing
of the future, the desperate pressures of thought that
without her voice she had "nothing to give" enable "Clear,
full, sonant notes; the notes of her true voice" (pp. 133-
134). The manifestation of her undiminished gift and the
use of the adjective "true" support the notion that the
witch allusion is a clue to her voice's continued life.
Nevertheless, the stress caused by her discovery of
Wilfrid's perfidy does result in a temporary voice loss.
Building suspense, Meredith uses a series of dramatic
episodes to show Emilia in decline, again with a close
mixture of her thought and the narrator's quiet additions.
In a continuation of the episode quoted earlier, she first
interprets the trouble she is experiencing with her voice
as a symptom of a cold.
Running upstairs, she tried a scale of notes that
broke on a cough. "Did I cough purposely?" she asked
herself; but she had not the courage to try the notes
again. While dressing she hummed a passage, and sought
stealthily to pass the barrier of her own watchfulness
by dwelling on a deep note, from which she was to rise
bursting with full bravura energy, and so forth on a
tide of song. But her breath failed. . . . A panic
caught at her heart when she heard the sound that
issued. "Am I ill? I must be hungry!" she exclaimed.
"It ij3 a cough! But I don't cough! What is the matter
with me?" (p. 132)
176
The narrator's concealed presence may be discovered in
such phrases as "sought stealthily," an interpretive
statement and so distinguishable from Emilia's thought
in the quoted material. The psychological depth gained
by presenting Emilia's thought and feelings by means of
the narrator's overriding interpretation enriches the
reader's understanding of Emilia's drive to produce.
Shown next are Emilia and Sir Purcell in the midst
of London, "engulfed in fog," which she protests "kills"
her and which is compared implicitly to the "thickening
mist" (p. 133) of her psychological state. Under Sir
Purcell's escort, she finds and informs Pericles that she
is ready to go to Italy for training. Though the scene
is, as indicated, essentially dramatic, pictorial narra
tion details the sounds of Emilia's voice as well as her
and, minimally, Pericles' thought. Emilia's reactions to
his hostility and taunting, in addition to her distress
at the foggy and noisy city, cause her to ask for a delay
in demonstrating the condition of her voice, a request he
refuses to grant. The narrator then tells of Emilia's
added anguish when Pole, arriving at the door, rushes
away upon seeing her. The curious mixture again details
her psychological state.
"Does my face frighten him?" Emilia thought. It made
her look on herself with a foreign eye. This is a
dreadful but instructive piece of contemplation; acting
as if the rich warm blood of self should have ceased
to hug about us, and we stand forth to be dissected
unresistingly. All Emilia's vital strength seemed to
177
vanish. (p. 145)
The narrator next informs the reader of Emilia's
departure, fancying she has been "robbed" of her voice,
in response to Pericles' repeated "She is ruined" (p. 146).
Earlier the narrator had informed the reader that Pericles
actually suspected only a "temporary deprivation of voice"
(p. 147). His dishonesty, as well as his inability to
consider the voice as a part of the person, or the art as
part of life, makes Pericles' behavior reprehensible since
it is potentially destructive. In demonstration of his
lack of humanity, he is shown, in a dramatic scene with
pictorial touches, rejecting Emilia's desperate promise
that her "voice will reward" him {p. 152) and,, that
failing, her offer to marry him. In summary the narrator
first tells of his reply that he is "not a man who
marries" but designs other plans for "the woman whom he
. . . distinguishe[s] by the honours of selection"
(p. 153) and then tells of her seeming acquiescence to be
part of those plans. A switch to dramatic technique
reveals her nature to be other than that which could
respond to an invitation to sit on his knee in such a
cold-blooded arrangement; she forbids him to touch her
(p. 153) .
The conviction that her voice is indeed gone along
with the loss of Wilfrid's love causes Emilia to feel
completely alienated from all those she loves. Dramatic
178
narrative shows her so desperate to be admitted into some
social grouping, now that she is cut off from family and
friends, that she even joins a "troop of sheep . . . that
made a piteous noise" as if "something broken" were "in
their throats" (p. 155). Then, walking the London streets,
she feels "some friendliness gone" as darkness falls
(p. 157). In the paragraph which begins pictorial narra
tive, she establishes a kind of social group herself,
feeling grateful for the company of two little waifs.
However, a policeman is said to frighten them away so
that her "feeling of security went with them" (p. 159).
"Active despair" sends Emilia back to the "friendly
policeman" to whose home she pleads to be taken (p. 160).
Dramatic narrative shows her being forced to leave even
this sanctuary after a few days. She is said to be un
able to "conceive of a way being open by which she might
return to her father and mother, or any of her friends"
(p. 163), since she has lost that which made her worthy,
i.e., her voice.
Through narrator information as well as Emilia's
thoughts and actions, approval is thus shown to be an
essential component of her nature. For her, her person
and her voice/art are inseparable. Her musical talent is
her gift to society, and, because of it which she can
share with others, she sees herself as a worthwhile human
being. Awareness of Wilfrid's falsity, however, becomes
179
the source for her awareness of an unnatural dichotomy
between love, which is life, and art, which is also life.
Therefore, one result of Wilfrid's rejection of her,
revealed as if through her mind and as representative of
the beginning of recovery, is that "her love [for him] had
given her consciousness of infidelity to her Art" (p. 143).
In further testimony of the ill effects of this false
love, she later tells Merthyr Powys that art's effects on
her identity and self-confidence occur "Only by fits and
starts now. Once I never thought of myself" (p. 246). As
a whole human being, well integrated in all facets of
life, she was unself-conscious. This fact is, of course,
a primary point of separation between her and the Poles,
sisters and brother as well as father.
Another dramatization of Emilia's need to be of use
and to be valued occurs after her London suffering. When
Wilfrid again convinces Emilia of his love by accosting
her in the dark with an embrace, she
. . . conceived wilfully that she had seen an appari
tion, so strange, sudden, and wild had been his coming
and going: but her whole body was a song to her. "He
is not false: he is true. . . . After all, power is
mine to bring him to my side." Almost it seemed to
her that she had brought him from the grave. (pp. 215-
216)
A practical realization of her returned power is then
demonstrated in a later dramatic episode, even though
Pericles reveals "wrath and spite" over her involvement
with Wilfrid. After the dramatization of her appearance,
180
the narrator reveals that "She had never sung better."
The narrator also reveals that "Wilfrid knew himself the
fountain of it all" (p. 227). A narrow boundary separates
Wilfrid from being a villain, rather than a buffoon; but
the narrator and the Philosopher, as indicated earlier,
do provide that separation in description and in termin
ology .
Pictorial narrative and dramatic narrative also show
Merthyr Powys' concentration of flattery upon Emilia as
part of a program to rebuild her self-confidence, after
she has accepted the fact of Wilfrid's rejection of her,
as well as Georgiana's conflicts regarding her desire to
be all to her brother, and have him be all to her, versus
her desire to gratify his every wish, even should that
involve his love for another, i.e., Emilia. However, the
narrator does plant clues that Merthyr's passionlessness,
which makes Emilia doubt Georgiana's information about his
love for her (see page 118) , makes him inadequate as a mate
for Emilia. His reservation in manifesting warmth toward
her as a person, which would also indicate his misunder
standing of her nature, becomes translated, in Vittoria,
into a lack of understanding both for her love of Italy
and for her artistic necessity for the inter-relation of
her art with her life. He advises Vittoria to "keep to
your Art; and don't let it be subservient to anything."
His "final injunction to her," and this a most insensitive
181
one, "was that she should get a German master to practice
rigidly" (p. 18). The younger Emilia had indeed been
tortured by the German "master" (probably Beethoven
[Sandra Belloni, I, 215]), who, "a black angel" to her,
made her "worship him in spite of [her] hate" (p. 214).
Merthyr's position may be seen to have some resem
blance to that of Pericles in that neither is able to see
that for Emilia-Vittoria her life and her art are in
separable. Both Vittoria and Laura, who are fond of
Merthyr, react similarly to his advice, explaining away
his support of the revolution, of Italy, and of Italians,
and even his feeling for Emilia-Vittoria herself. Vittoria
"could only look at Laura" after his words, while Laura
remarks, "He is for us, but not of us" (p. 18). An
understanding of art and life as Emilia-Vittoria exper
iences it is thus demonstrated beyond even Merthyr, who
cannot comprehend, when they are finally in Italy, that
she had been "depressed by a secret feeling that there was
a divorce between her love of country and devotion to her
Art," this occurring after her fleeing La Scala the night
of the opera, nor that when "both passions were in union,
both active, each aiding the fire of the other, she lived
a consummate life" (p. 96).
His understanding of her is, however, superior to
Pericles' in that, when she is missing, he searches until
he finds her and, then, after she tells him "I am useless.
182
My voice is dead" (p. 169), does prescribe the program
of flattery which aids in securing the return of her
confidence and so of her voice. The program's success
is tied, of course, to its entailing manifestations of
approval and so, Emilia believes as she pleads for tangi
ble evidence of it in the forms of hugs and kisses, of
love.
The return of her voice is also dramatically revealed,
although the introductory matter is pictorially handled.
Just as the loss of her voice took place in noisy, fog
bound, and dirty London, its return occurs in "the icy
hush" of the moonlit wood under larches and oaks on a
May night that Emilia tells Tracy "seems made for" her
(pp. 321-322). It was in the same setting, also in
spring, that Emilia had first demonstrated to the Poles
and to Pericles the superiority of her art.
Both pictorial and dramatic descriptions have been
used to convey the felicity of the country's influence
upon Emilia's art. In the city she is oppressed by her
father's ambitions concerning her marriage to certain
"Jew gentlemen" as well as by the dangers she innocently
fronts, as in the park incident with Gambier which Wilfrid
immediately suspects for its implicit threat. Again, when
Emilia has suffered disillusion because of Wilfrid, the
city noise, fog, dirt, and cold intensify her sufferings.
Additionally, the "friendliness" of the policeman and his
183
wife holds tacit contrast with the friendliness earlier
shown to be had from Farmer Wilson and his wife. In
Vittoria, too, an echo of the heartlessness and savagery
that the city imbues in man is contained in the statement
that the cry of blood in a city, especially in a southern
city, "rouses the wild beast in man to madness" (II, 59).
At any rate, in Sandra Belloni the scenes of Emilia's
greatest musical triumphs are in the country. Her gain
"in force and fullness" is essentially demonstrated
through her listeners' reactions. Pericles is only des
cribed distantly as gesticulating "in his wildest manner."
Tracy Runningbrook's reactions are given in greater detail
and more dramatically since his long-delayed surrender to
her art is involved. In dialogue with Lady Charlotte,
who reminds him that he had "slighted music," he says that
for him Emilia is "a goddess . . . from this moment" with
"the voice they hear in heaven" (p. 325). The term
"goddess," which repeats Pericles' reaction to Emilia's
voice, holds within it a further statement of Wilfrid's
insensitivity and so inability to appreciate the woman he
deceived, for it was by the same term that he had denied
her worth.
The influence of nature upon Emilia-Vittoria's art
becomes less immediate, though not less important, when
her voice is trained. Conversely, this conviction that
art must serve life becomes even more vital in Vittoria
184
once her voice is trained. In the midst of nature, at
the novel's beginning, she does give proof that her now-
trained voice is a "power" that can transform "hard and
serious men" (p. 31) who have met to lay plans for the
battles for freedom. When she sings, that "power was an
emanation, free from effort" (p. 32). Testifying that
she will sing in spite of threats of imprisonment, or even
of death, she receives the chief's approval: "Such as you
will help to give our Italy freedom. You hold a sacred
flame, and know you hold it in trust." In some mysterious
way, the flame is her song which is also her power, so
that her song will be more than mere signal. The secret
of her power had been disclosed in Sandra Belloni by the
narrator, as if inside Mr. Pole's consciousness, in a way
that foreshadows the definitive description of the artist
in the poster-portrait (see pages 187, 189, and 190).
Mr. Pole
. . . read power in her: the capacity to concentrate
all animal and mental vigour into one feeling— this
being the power of the soul. (I, 288)
Vittoria's appearance at the opera at great personal
risk and in spite of a fear that makes her pettish (see
page 190) is the climactic moment of her art. Although
she sings later ("for three weeks . . . in full operatic
career" at Turin in order to provide for "the treasury of
the insurrection" [II, 96] and once for a cause for the
Lombard widows [p. 245]), her life as an artist seems to
185
give way to her concerns as the betrothed of Carlo Axnmiani.
However, the unabated power of her voice over men and, it
is suggested, even over nature is dramatically presented
in a moonlit scene: "Her voice possessed the mountain-
shadowed lake" (p. 209).
Significantly, however, once Carlo is killed, it is
intimated that her involvement with the world and its
issues are over. She does not sing again, except, as the
epilogue details, at the crowning of Italy's king, an
event marking the revolution's triumphal end. "And then
once more, and but for once, her voice was heard in Milan"
(p. 342). The qualifying phrase, "in Milan," may intimate
other, later concerts. However, in this last sentence of
the final novel, Emilia-Vittoria's silence seems announced
in a way that manifests the theory that art is a part of
life and since her "soul had crossed the darkness of the
river of death in that quiet agony preceding the revela
tion of" Carlo's death (pp. 341-342), her voice too had
ceased to be heard.
Although training has prepared her for the climactic
moment of her art, the results of the training are, as
Pericles predicted they would be in Sandra Belloni, in
volved with Emilia-Vittoria's total personality. Her
artistic powers strengthened, her art and her life are no
longer at the mercy of accidents, such as of other people,
or places, or even of her own emotional reactions to these
outside stimuli . However, this does not mean that her art
is not an expression, if not an essential part of her life,
a life that ended with Carlo's death. A dramatic scene
with Wilfrid and Emilia in Sandra Belloni supports this
idea, even though her determination to "give up Italy"
and all that it meant in development of her art repre
sented a useless sacrifice. In this instance, then, she
tells Wilfrid that she feels "like a little beggar"
because she only feels "rich" when she is giving. Without
the development of her voice, she continues, she will
have "nothing to give" (I, 218). Her successful efforts
for the revolution fulfill that need to give, again ended
with Carlo's death, which coincides, at least in the
telling, with Italy's triumph.
The matter of training presents somewhat of a paradox
in the two Italian novels, for while it is mandatory for
Emilia's voice to be trained, a concomitant requirement
resides in absolute naturalness of expression. Of central
consideration, then, is that whereas Emilia's artistry
is unquestionable, the need for her training is a matter
approaching a life and death seriousness. Furthermore,
Emilia-Vittoria's ability to learn is contrasted with the
fact that Irma, who takes notes "in the manner of a cock"
is "unteachable" (p. 199) . The artistic gift is thereby
shown to be intrinsic to its possessor's nature and to
carry with it humane attitudes, but training is indicated
187
to enhance as well as to secure both the gift and the
attitudes; yet training can destroy true art, as it does
for Irma and Lebruno, by leading to tasteless and unjusti
fiable exhibition of the techniques used (I, 242, 259).
In demonstration of his notion concerning innate
talent, Meredith uses both the pictorial and the dramatic
techniques to cause Emilia-Vittoria to represent its
manifestation. The objective and distancing technique of
summary first establishes the general principles, their
application to Emilia merely implicit. Thus, Emilia, in
despair at the loss of her voice and wandering in London,
happens upon a poster-portrait of a successful singer.
The narrator's description of the singer's face emphasizes
that
The spirit animating it was intensely human; but it
was human of the highest chords of humanity, indif
ferent to finesse, and despising subtleties; gifted
to speak, to inspire, and to command all great emo
tions. In fact, it was the masque of a dramatic
artist in repose. (II, 156)
The emphasis on the artist's humanity and hatred of subtle
ty is especially significant in linking the description to
Emilia; whereas the gifts of inspiration and command help
to foreshadow her life as the matured Vittoria.
In case the reader has not associated the description
with Emilia, he further learns that artists, "as a fore
most qualification for Art, feel harmoniously" (p. 156).
It is in this matter especially that Emilia has been
188
pictured. She feels harmoniously with all creation,
responding to people, no matter what their station
(baronets, millionaires, rich middle class merchants, and
even farm laborers, waifs, and city policemen), as well
as to nature. Again, dramatic contrast shows Emilia's
sensitivity as she pleads with the gardener to "spare
those daisies" against Adela's view that they "disfigure
a lawn." Adela's insensitivity characterizes her lesson
to Emilia as she "picked one, called it a pet name, and
dropped it" (I, 69). Distasteful as is the hypocrisy of
the act, Meredith underlines the actual lesson to be taken
from it by Adela's further discussion of the incident with
her sisters and Mr. Barrett:
You know how greatly our Emilia rejoices us when she
shows sentiment, and our thirst is to direct her to
appreciate Nature in its humility as well as its
grandeur. (p. 69)
The irony of the patronizingly-said "our Emilia," to whom
the Poles aspire to teach what they do not know, is
heightened by Mr. Barrett's comment that "One expects
[Emilia] to have all poetical feelings" (p. 69). Then,
Victoria, in addition to the sensitivity that Emilia
had revealed for the gentler aspects of life in people
and in nature is Vittoria's concern for and understanding
of humanity's suffering and its need for freedom. Since
the opera, which informs analogically as well as performs
structurally in Vittoria, has been discussed in detail in
the political section, only relevant aesthetic matters
I
189
will be mentioned here.
The opera reveals that those who devote their talents
to some service involving others are those who excel. A
major factor of the difference between Vittoria and Irma,
besides the matter of training and/or teachability, has to
do with the fact that Irma's "humanity" is disclosed to be
in question. Irma is concerned not with others, but only
with self. The same difference separates Agostino, who
devotes his life and talents to the revolution, exem
plified in the creation of the opera's libretto, from
Tracy Runningbrook, who merely dabbles. "Agostino's
transfigurement from lymphatic poet to fiery man of
action" (I, 225) is never attained by Runningbrook.
Runningbrook's inferior understanding of life's
meaning, from which one may deduce his inferiority as an
artist, was implied in the narrator's analysis of the
anonymous artist's face as it applied to Emilia:
. . . for Art she promised unspotted excellence;
and, adorable as she was by attraction of her
sex, she was artist over all. (II, 156)
Thus Runningbrook's vision may be seen to be limited to
the surface of things. He had earlier said, somewhat
vulgarly, of Emilia that "She's meant for more than to
make a machine of her throat" (I, 35) and so he is able
to write Wilfrid that he does not think, as "some may, a
pity" that Wilfrid has stolen her voice because he "would
rather have her in a salon than before the footlights"
190
(II, 193). Tracy, in dialogue with Emilia, even hints
of infatuation for her, thereby setting up an association
of his limitations with those of Wilfrid:
"... dear little woman . . . I ought to be grateful
to you, for, by heaven! you give me, every time I see
you, the greatest temptation to be a fool and let me
prove that I'm not."
"A fool!" Emilia said caressingly; showing that his
smart insinuation had slipped by her. (p. 307)
It may also be a gauge of Emilia's father's artistic
ability that he, too, seems to have suffered from the
same inability to appreciate his daughter's art, so
that he believes her achievement to be limited to an
advantageous marriage. Certainly he is never indicated
to have attained real success as a musician in the same
way that Emilia is shown to achieve.
The distantly-rendered portrait of the unknown artist
also, as mentioned, helps to prepare the reader for
Vittoria's character in the second novel. That Emilia-
Vittoria, like the artist in the portrait, is of
"harmonious nature," does not lessen the fact that she,
as the artist, has in her character those "littlenesses
of which women are accused" (p. 156). Emilia's "little
ness" may have been instanced in her unconscious abandon
ment to the seductions of vanity in the foraging-cap
episode. By the time of Vittoria, when experience and
training have rendered her more aware of herself, Vittoria
knows "how low she was sinking" when she suffers "a sort
I
191
of jealousy" of Irma (I, 254). Within seconds of her
feelings of jealousy, she feels irritation at her "tire
women," and especially at Giacinta. Whereas her perversity
is understandable, considering the strain she is under,
her jealousy and intolerance must be thought evidence not
for magnanimity but for "littleness."
Of a different order of "sinking" is Vittoria's
"haggard imagination" (II, 29) of herself as "a vile
figure . . . aping smiles and tender meanings to her old
lover," Wilfrid. Urged by Laura to follow this course in
order to help save Angelo Guidascarpi's life, Vittoria
feels "her simplicity . . . already soiled by a base
comprehension of the abominable course." Vittoria can
see "no distinction between being ever so little false
and altogether despicable," but the tell-tale rationali
zation implicit in such phraseology, that expresses a
distinction, indicates a weakening in regard to principle.
Already operant is the kind of "hypocrisy," also connected
with playing "coquette" and tricking "her womanhood with
false Allurements" (p. 27), "which comes from shame"
(p. 28). In further progression of "degradation," ex
pressed also with the word "sinking," Emilia desires,
while dreading, to hear Wilfrid "speak of passionate
love . . . to hear one crave for what she gave to another"
(p. 29).
Her new feelings of degradation cause her to shrink
192
before Rosellina Rizzo, who is "blood to her gaze"
(II, 134). As she meditates upon the Guidascarpi tragedy,
a thought precipitated by Rosellina's recent execution of
Rinaldo, she wonders "could it happen to me" to love a
"white uniform" and smiles as she "half-fashioned the
words . . . 'It is a pretty uniform'" (p. 139). Her own
former horror of the white uniform, that caused her such
suffering when she learned Wilfrid was to don it, is
perhaps echoed in the "hiss of ’Traitress'" that comes
from Rosellina's lips (pp. 138-139).
None of these exhibitions of weakness may be con
sidered as detrimental to her being a great artist, any
more than may have been any "littleness" that may have
been attributable to the singer of the poster-portrait.
Pictorial narration has helped to corroborate the achieve
ment of Emilia's musical art even from its first signs at
the impromptu rural concert. Dramatic contrast to
Emilia's achievement is offered in Pericles' cringing
reaction to the Pole sisters' efforts to reproduce
Emilia's song at the next morning's breakfast table.
Emilia's high level of performance is undoubtedly keyed
to her critical honesty regarding it. The narrator first
indicates that Emilia's musical standards are advanced.
At an evening party, in reaction to bad singing, "Mr.
Pericles and Emilia exchanged scientific glances. . . .
She was merciless to indifferent music" (I, 28).
193
Then her rigidly-demanding standards regarding her
art are shown dramatically to extend to herself. When
her turn comes to sing, she fails to "give volume" to a
note that had enchanted Pericles and the Poles earlier.
Her response to Pericles' cruelly said "Fiasco" is given
as if from her thought:
That was better to her than the silly kindness of
the people who deemed it well to encourage her with
applause. Emilia could not bear the clapping of
hands, and fled. (p. 31)
She tells Pericles that she does not "care for praise
from people who do not understand music. . . . I only like
to please them" (p. 32). Thus, Pericles, the "exquisite
lover of music" (p. 18) whom Emilia recognizes as a
"connoisseur" (p. 31), is able to exercise a "mysterious,"
to Wilfrid, influence over her life (p. 34). Emilia tells
Wilfrid that Pericles will take her "to learn in the
academy at Milan" (p. 40). In Vittoria, when experience
and training have made Vittoria free of dependency upon
Pericles, even though she laughs at his idiosyncracies and
becomes impatient at his lack of understanding of the
principles of her life, she still feels for him something
like "love" because of "his worship of her Art, and
representation of her dear peaceful practice of it"
(p. 112). Of course, her nostalgic remembrance of her
life in England entails her forgetting the sufferings she
endured there.
In further demonstration of Emilia's sensitive appre
ciation for music, she reveals pain at the villagers' inept
trombone-, horn-, and pipe-playing: "Why do they try to
play anything but a drum?" (I, 73). Her question antici
pates the narrator's dictum, in Vittoria, that the drum
produces the "song of the flat-headed savage in man" (II,
306) and so does not require any great musical ability.
Yet Emilia's desire to please is extended to those without
great musical talent or appreciation, a desire demonstrated
in her determination to sing on Ipley Common in spite of
the objections posed by her patrons and friends. Actually
she made no differentiation between her promise to sing
for Lady Gosstre's guests and that to sing "to those poor
people, who never hear anything but dreadful music--not
music at all, but something that seems to tear your flesh"
(I, 83). Here, in her certainty of the "poor people's"
favorable response is corroboration of her closeness both
to humanity and to the nature of which they are a part.
Almost the same kind of reaction,on the same level, is
elicited from Pericles in response to martial music. He
finds military music "horrid," resembling "twenty sossand
doors jam on horrid hinge" (Vittoria, II, 267). On the
other hand, Violetta responds even to the "dull ringing
step-drum" which,"beating unaccompanied," struck her "mind
with the real nature of battles." As she listened to its
"unvarying note, and a savage's dance in the middle of the
195
rhythm, . . . Her heart quickened with alarm lest she
should be going to have a fever" (p. 306). Whereas her
reaction to the primitive music is consistent with her
portrayal as one with undeveloped moral sense, Violetta's
case nonetheless is almost equalled in Vittoria's struggle
"not to feel" the "romantic flavor" of Austrian bugles.
Although the bugle is not a primitive instrument, there is
in Vittoria's attraction something of the same kind of
"sinking" of which she accused herself in finding the
white uniform attractive, i.e., a momentary lapse or
instance of "littleness."
The artist must be close enough to and have a deep
enough understanding of nature to be able to control his
emulation of her. In proof of her superior artistry,
Vittoria, under all the pressures of her appearance at
the opera (the "flattery of beholding a great assembly
. . . bound glittering in wizard subservience to the
voice of one soul" and the agony of feeling "Italy's
shame, her sadness, her torture, her quenchless hope,
and the view of freedom" that "sent her blood about her
body in rebellious volumes"), still "had too severe an
artistic instinct to court reality" (I, 258). The lesser
talent, Irma, on the other hand, "painted her Austrian
heart with a prodigal waste of colour and frank energy"
(p. 259). The subtle irony is in Irma's playing without
conviction a part that she actually lives, of one involved
196
with Austrians and with intrigue.
As he portrays his artists and art, Meredith seems to
suggest the notion of a hierarchy, as well as of degrees
of accomplishment within a given art form. There is
nature's art to which Emilia responds with sensitivity
and understanding and to which Adela and Barrett are
oblivious. Then, there is the art of the common people
which, like that of nature, is untrained, uncalculated,
though sure in its truth. Exemplifying this level of art
is the military drum and the "exciting" steinbock song
played on the zither by a "stout fellow in green braces"
at a wedding of a maid of Sonnenberg to "a peasant of
Meran" (II, 19) . The zither, an humble and "melancholy
instrument," may exhibit "plaintive thin tones" to cause
the song of "a Tyrolese maid"; but also "when the strings
are swept madly," it may awaken "mad dancing" as "it
catches at the nerves" (p. 20).
Yet another art form of the people may be the farce
which constitutes the theatrical experience contained in
Sandra Belloni. Fittingly matched to this comic novel,
the farce is not given the detailed handling that the
opera receives in Vittoria. Only the facts that there
are separate "plays" and that there is orchestra accom
paniment are included. In Vittoria, of course, the opera,
a more elevated art form, is a structurally important
element in the novel, and the heroine of the novel is
197
portrayed as having the lead role in the opera. Emilia
had only been in the audience of the farce, again an
instance of propriety for she is younger and untutored
during the course of the first novel as opposed to her
condition when she performs in Camilla. Moreover, the
farce is on a lower artistic level than is the opera (it
is significant that it is Emilia's father who participates
in the farce). Thus, a balance is effected between the
light farce represented in the microcosmic and comic
world of the English middle class and its handling, versus
the tragically serious opera in the macrocosmic and tragic
world of Italian revolution, that cuts through all social
classes, and its handling.
The opera is, of course, in contradistinction to
folk expression in that it is a refined or created art.
Agostino and Rocco Ricci create poetry and music respec
tively for the opera. It is interesting that their
principles of creation resemble those followed by Zotti,
who invents palate-pleasing works; all these creators
articulate their ideas in dramatic scenes. For instance,
Agostino traces for the chief the sources for his
libretto: "part . . . to a neat little French vaudeville
. . . and again to a certain Chronicle that may be
medieval, may be modern, and is just, as the great
Shakespeare would say, ’as you like it'" (I, 29).
Agostino's study, that has enabled his use of the "modern,
198
the medieval, and the antique" (p. 30), a key notion in
invention, is thus emulated by Zotti, who must also
"study . . . work . . . invent" (p. 19 0) in order to
produce his "original conceptions" (p. 191) that "the
soul seizes and remembers" (p. 190). Indicated here is
almost a preview of Eliot's notion of the organic nature
of art. Agostino's and Zotti1s testimony to their in
debtedness in creation and Agostino's allusion to
Shakespeare, the great borrower, are highly suggestive
concerning the creative process.
Nor does the opera's music spring from a vacuum, but
. . . from a fresh Italian well; neither the elegiac-
melodious, nor the sensuous lyrical, nor the joyous
buffo; it was severe as an old masterpiece, with veins
of buoyant liveliness threading it, and with suffi
cient distinctness of melody to enrapture those who
like to suck the sugar-plums of sound.
The note of indebtedness is especially sounded, in addi
tion to the comparisons and the notion of a "well" in
Italian art, in the fact that Vittoria's "devotion to an
ideal of classical music . . . had directed" the "compo
sition" of the opera's music (p. 254).
It is music that receives the bulk of the attention
given to art in the two novels, and it is generally
depicted as superior to poetry, much less to Zotti's
confectionary creations. Yet, toward the end of the
opera episode, Agostino's "last verses" assume the
greater importance:
199
Rocco's music floated them in solemn measures, and
Vittoria had been careful to articulate throughout
the sacred monotony so that their full meaning
should be taken. (p. 276)
For the most part, however, belles-lettres receive
slighting treatment. For instance, the two champions
of poetry are Sir Purcell Barrett and Tracy Runningbrook,
both of whom have been shown to be severely limited even
in their capacity for appreciation of art. Moreover,
they have as antagonist in their championing of poetry
over music Emilia, who throughout both novels demonstrates
a superior taste as well as talent.
She does not care "much" for poetry because "It
seems to be walking on tiptoe; like animals in cages,
always going to one end and back again." During the
same conversation with Sir Purcell, she explains her
objection to be to the inherent limitations of words.
. . . when you use words— I mean, if you are in
earnest— how can you count and have stops, and—
no, I do not care anything for poetry. (I, 131)
To Runningbrook's remark that "Music's the vine,
verse the tree," Emilia responds "Not if they grow
together," thus pointing out the problem that, the
narrator explains, resides in Tracy's clinging to the
"graphic phrase . . . not always supple enough for
nuptials with modulated notes" (p. 245). It may well
be, as suggested by reviews of some of his
poetry,^ that Meredith is, in the ironical manner that
animates so much of his view of man and his efforts,
working out some of his own frustrations and dissatisfac
tions with poetry. Even Agostino, the poet, denigrates
his own productions as they compare with music when he
remarks to Carlo: "It's my libretto, and you know we
writers always say 'my opera' when we have put the pegs
for the voice" (italics mine, p. 36). Later, as
"lymphatic poet," he had been working on a poem entitled
"Lovely Age of Gold" (I, 225). The characterization
"lymphatic" in conjunction with a title recalling
Peacock's Four Ages of Poetry (in Meredith's library,
according to Williams' listing) effects a complicated
association. That is, for Peacock the golden age was
representative of the Homeric, or epic tradition; yet
Agostino seems to be engaged in writing a comparatively
effete lyric in praise and, therefore, to be himself
open to Peacock's criticism of the "modern poet" who
composes a "modern-antique compound of frippery and
barbarism, in which the puling sentimentality of the
present time is grafted on the misrepresented ruggedness
of the past."-*-^ Of course, Agostino's role as lymphatic
-L^See Forman's Early Appreciations, I. Williams'
The Critical Heritage, and B. A. W. Williams' The Self-
Education of George Meredith.
English Romantic Poetry and Prose, p. 1249.
201
poet is mere cover for his identity as "fiery man of
action" and his "Lovely Age of Gold," then, probably
also is designed to help mask the revolutionary nature
of the libretto which had to be gotten past the censors.
Together the pose and the poetic reputation constitute
a protection and a guarantee for the success of his
part in the plot.
Actually both Agostino and Vittoria worry over the
"inferior quality" of the poetry as well as of the music
of the opera's second act (p. 253), intimating by their
dual concern an equal importance of the two arts. The
heavy responsibility of the libretto in the success of
the opera, both artistically and politically, is also
indicated by Agostino's "moaning over his artistic
depravity" which led him to indulge in the obvious "poetic
political squib . . . here and there" (p. 255). Carlo's
writing, on the other hand, is purely political prose
for the purposes of serving openly the cause of the
revolution. His journal, censored by the Austrian
"polizia," has evidently become merely an activity used
to disguise his more active efforts for the revolution,
contrary to Laura's political pamphlets, "Midnight Lamps,"
which continue a sub-rosa revolutionary effort.
Carlo's assay of his journalistic efforts in a letter
to Vittoria in which he announces his "farewell to
journalism" is that is was a "young nonsense," thought to
202
be "truth," but actually "rubbish" (II, 100). Two contin
gent facts are, however, that the letter is written in
the midst of battle, a more exhilarating effort for a
young rebel, and that Carlo had been pictured with "his
journalistic pen" as it "traversed seas and continents
like an old hack" (italics mine, I, 277), a simile that
pointedly calls his writing ability into question. More
over, it is not indicated that Carlo, like Agostino,
Ricci, and Zotti, studied his art in order to polish it.
Still, when Carlo briefly returns to Lago Maggiore from
the battlefield, he tells Vittoria of a plan for a "new
journal . . . the Pallanza Iris. . . . Once an editor,
always an editor" (II, 17 6) .
Taste to enjoy the various beauties of art also
varies, seeming in some degree to be associated with the
ability to produce art. Emilia has the most finely-tuned
appreciation of music and of nature, though not, as indi
cated, of poetry. Agostino has the talent of judging music
as well as poetry. Tracy Runningbrook's initial inability
to appreciate Emilia's art is eventually corrected, though
evidently his ability to produce poetry is not.
Critical reception of Runningbrook1s poetry appears
second-hand through Wilfrid's and Runningbrook's letter
exchanges in which comments of a nameless critic concern
ing a volume of Runningbrook's poetry are reflected.
Because the hostile review and the reviewer's grammar
203
are presented solely from Wilfrid's and Runningbrook's
points of view, with some indication of Barrett's
concurrence, the truth of the matter is somewhat obscured,
their judgment being suspect. At any rate, this matter
more properly belongs in the next chapter of his paper.
The dramatic incident concerning the daisy on the
lawn had already indicated that Barrett's ability to
respond to nature is limited, unlike Emilia's, The
daisy as the bloom against the- lawn as background does
not destroy the appearance of the lawn, but enhances
it. The daisy might be seen as a manifestation of nature's
artistry in its very presence on the lawn, even as
Emilia's voice against the background of ordinary voices
and her character and nature against the background of
ordinary people represent the glory of "our species"
against the background of "small people."
Moreover, just as Sir Barrett is unable to appreciate
nature, or Emilia, he is also unable to attain to a full
appreciation of art in general. In a conversation with
Emilia, the funereal baronet contends that "sadness [is]
more musical than mirth." Citing "all things of nature
that rejoiced and revelled," Emilia, rather than con
vincing him of the truth about art, rather reinforces his
earlier conviction, formed upon his interpretation of the
daisy incident, that she has no "soul" and so is no match
for Cornelia. Ironically, Cornelia, whom he would make
204
his ideal, fails him and, so doing, is partial cause for
his final statement in denial of life (II, 129).
Obviously, then, the kind of person advocating a
given aesthetic position performs as a partial gauge for
the value of that position. Sir Barrett, Adela, and
Cornelia have warped ideas about life and, also, are
incapable of forming accurate judgments about art.
Emilia, on the other hand, the "natural woman," is
unerringly right in her spontaneous reactions to nature
and to music. Pericles' position is a more complicated
one so that through his attitudes, not only per se, but
also as they reflect against Emilia-Vittoria's, is revealed
a more complex conformation of ideas concerning art.
Pericles possesses such an appreciation that Emilia
confesses "a little grief" that he "loves music more
deeply" than she does (p. 337). However, even though he
acts as a patron, he has a potentially deadening effect
because he is not able to see, as Emilia-Vittoria does,
that art has its proper place in the midst of life,
rather than being a substitute for or a representation of
life. Illustrating his lack of understanding is the
dramatically-represented scene in which he rejects Emilia
at a time of her greatest need, and does that in spite of
his suspecting that her voice is not really lost. The
accumulation of his words and actions throughout the two
novels demonstrates that he is not able to recognize her
205
voice as part of her person, nor her art as part of her
life. Both voice and art are, for him, disembodied.
Meredithian irony, then, portrays Pericles' potential
for destroying that which he most prizes.
Yet his short-sighted view does have some aspects
that excite sympathy. His fury that the opera "is a
musical harangue in the market-place," as "illusion" is
destroyed and the opera "reduced" to a "mere vehicle
for a fulmination of politics," is a sentiment with which
"some" of the audience (whether Italian or not is not
mentioned, although the affirmative is hinted) "might
have sympathized" (I, 277). Strangely, the fact that
Pericles' manner of expressing appreciation is a commer
cial one is not ranked as an offense against the purity
of art, as is the fact here that art is subordinated to
politics.
Dramatic narrative, as if in Pericles' consciousness,
records that "the most splendid" manner of expressing
appreciation for Vittoria's superb singing was to give
the "golden italics of praise" that he had had the
"consolation" of awarding (p. 252). While it is true
that his "cheque" gave to the "frozen" Vittoria "convincing
proof that her Art has been successful" and so "restored
[her] composure" after her first appearance, her goal and
reason for singing are entirely other than a cheque's
fall at her feet (p. 247). Certainly she accepts and
206
appreciates his monetary help, even as she had sought it
in Sandra Belloni, not only for herself, but for the
bankrupt Poles (II, 328). However, just as the voice is
paramount for Pericles, and money the supreme means for
expressing approval, so the human service that the voice
and the money render are more important to Vittoria-
Emilia.
Emilia-Vittoria has been consistently portrayed as
aware of the practical needs of life. In Sandra Belloni,
she worked to feed her family, even though the meals
consisted primarily of potatoes. Then she learned what
it was to starve as she wandered the London streets.
Both she and Rocco Ricci have the foresight to "secure
[their] property before the opera." Notion of greed is
forestalled by Vittoria1s offer to share her property
with Salvolo in order to gain his consent for the opera's
continuance in the service of Italy (p. 262). One of her
functions after the opera is to get money for the cause
by singing appearances. Here, as in much else con
cerning art and life, is the notion that proportion is
important.
The idea of proportion also underlies Agostino's use
of "the modern, the medieval, and the antique, all in one"
(p. 30), just as in the allotment of types of music in the
opera. Rocco Ricci also tells Irma, with some exaspera
tion, that because her "ability . . . is not in proportion
207
to the courage" with which she attempts "every fioritura
and bravura passage," she only "subdues," rather than
"learns," only "accomplishes," rather than "conquers"
(p. 184). Emilia-Vittoria, on the other hand, had early
been aware of the flaw of which she was guilty in "always
ornamenting" and determined to become an "accurate singer"
(Sandra Belloni, I, 46). When she attains her goal, she
exemplifies the harmonious balance of nature that was
definitively presented via the description of the artist's
face in Sandra Belloni (II, 155-156).
Although the audience and/or critic reaction has been
handled throughout this chapter, interlaced with the
matter to which it pertains, it may be noted here that
critical reaction as depicted in the novel is also pro
portioned to the matter to which it relates. That is, the
importance of the opera elicited much more detailed
examination of reactions to it in all its facets (that is,
the plot, the political meaning, the music, the acting,
the singing, and even the actors' appearances) than does
the farce attended by Emilia, Mr. Pole, and Braintop in
Sandra Belloni. As part of the audience, Emilia reacts
with "delight" at "being in a theatre," and with sadness
at the thought of giving "up the stage" (I, 275-276);
but no detailing of the matter of the farce, much less of
audience reaction to elements of it, appears. Emilia
does see her father "sullenly fiddling" in the orchestra
208
as if "ashamed" of his involvement with "sons of discord"
(p. 278), but this matter is more concerned with Emilia's
personal problems than with the farce itself. In the same
way, her observance of Braintop's solemn attention to the
farce leads to her conclusion that he is hungry (p. 277)
even as she in her "potato-days."
Thus, in presentation of the farce, unlike presenta
tion of the opera, the narrator makes no attempt to link
the activities on the stage with those in the audience.
However, as in presentation of the opera, description of
activities in the audience does reflect the general mood
of the farce. The comic presentation of Braintop with
his mirror and his secret yearning for Emilia's good
opinion is entirely unrelated to the farce, though match
ing its mood. Thus, the importance of proportion under
lies Meredith's adaptation of the theatrical experiences
to the different tones and themes of the two novels.
In both novels, drama and picture have contributed
to the completeness and to the profundity of passages as
well as to the novels as a whole. Moreover, the pictorial
narrative provided by the narrator (and the Philosopher in
Sandra Belloni) have secured a greater understanding of
the microcosmic world of Sandra Belloni and the macrocos-
mic arena of Vittoria. The narrator's and Philosopher's
responsibilities, differentiated in Sandra Belloni and
then assumed, on a severely limited basis, entirely by
the narrator in Vittoria, are part of a valid, complicated,
and distinctive technique exercised by Meredith with
sophistication and skill to achieve differing distances
and views. The narrator's observations on life are those
of a charmingly-impudent personality with a wicked sense
of humor. The Philosopher's more serious observations
are filtered through the narrator's humor. These and
other matters dealing with the "voices" in the novel will
be treated in the next chapter.
CHAPTER II
USES OF MASKS THROUGH WHICH "VOICES"
EXPRESS POINTS OF VIEW
As explicitly stated in the Introduction to this
paper and as implicitly contained in Chapter I, the
dramatic and the pictorial methods necessarily involve
voices, i.e., the ones actually doing the telling and/or
showing at any given moment. Of course, in the last
analysis, the novel form is one of telling, a telling of
a story to a reader. However, for the purposes of
determining technique, especially since so much of the
unfavorable criticism directed against Meredith's work
has been based upon Lubbock's work, his differentiation
between summarization and analysis as telling, and action
and dialogue as showing were followed in Chapter I.
In this chapter an extension of that concern brings
under study Meredith's uses of the various voices within
the novels to express points of view as attitudes, ideas,
and values. The many, often contradictory, voices play
against each other to reveal complications of story
progression as well as of attitudes with varying degrees
of reliability invested in the different masks through
which the voices speak. Chapter III, then, will deal with
210
211
the voices and with the novel form itself as they
communicate with the reader. In this chapter, however,
the concern is limited to the harmonious or cacophonous
orchestration of voices within the two Italian novels.
It is fitting that the two Italian novels, which
feature music as the primary art form, should utilize
the voices in almost a system of harmonics as they
speak through the masks of editorial, neutral, and
multiple selective omniscience (see pages 11 to 25).
One can discern through the novels a chromatic
progression of voices issuing from the masks with
enharmonic variations, heightened by counterpointing
or harmonizing. A tracing of the voices as they perform
in solo, in concert, and in counterpoint performance
helps not only to illuminate the characters and the
concepts, but also to demonstrate once again that the
two novels exist as a continuum.
That Meredith thought of voices as functioning
musically is testified to both within and without the
novels. Among his readings, as indicated by Williams'
list, was James Odell's 1806 Essay on the Elements,
Accents, and Prosody of the English Language, which
contains a discussion of musical sounds as they apply
to speech (Williams, p. 350). Whereas Odell concludes
that "in modern speech, any thing like a musical tone"
212
evokes "universal disgust, still monotony in speech is
avoided by its "melody," which gives to speech a "force,"
felt, though not acknowledged (p. 65). An 1863 letter to
his good friend William Hardman playfully treats voice-
music as Meredith mentions his hope that Hardman will
encounter Augustus Jessopp while in Thun.
. . . haply you may hear him out of tune. . . . But,
if you hear him, you can't mistake him. Think of a
cock-chafer informing the world that his wife has
run away from him: — so deep, so desolate, the voice
of Jessopp. Take to thy mind Nature's bassest note:
conceive a voice millions of fathoms below this
crust of earth: — the incarnation of three minor
canons, primed for their holy labors on port: — a
cathedral voice: a voice that you shake to and
curiously look to see whether one works his coat
tails as bellows to inflate and give inspiration to
such a voice: — even such the voice of Jessopp.
(Letters, I, 213)
Again, before marriage to Marie Vulliamy, he demonstrated
his close association between music and poetry by writing
that he called her his "dumb poet. But when she is at the
piano, she is not dumb. She has a divine touch on the
notes" (p. 265). Then, after their marriage, he
rhapsodized
I have the sweetest bride in the world. I have never
tasted happiness before. . . . She is like music
folding through every minute of my existence. (p. 284)
In explicating the opera, Meredith seems also to be
partially describing his own efforts with voices. Pro
liferating the novels are such arrangements as the
- L (Hildesheim and New York: George 01ms Verlag, 1806,
reprinted 1969), p. 57.
213
"tricuspidato, or a three-pointed manner of declaring . . .
divergent sentiments in harmony" (Vittoria, I, 267) and
the "duet," such as the dialogue between Wilfrid and
Emilia (Sandra Belloni, II, 263), as well as the various
quartets and solos (especially by the narrator, although
he also performs in duet with characters, both as if he
were a given character and spoke for him, and as if he
were inside a character's mind and spoke of him and even
as him). It seems reasonable to believe that much of
the objection to Meredith's obscurity and of the mis
readings (as in the case of those who believed Merthyr
Powys and Emilia-Vittoria would some day marry) are due
largely to inattention to the intricacies with which
"voices" are used throughout the novels.
In telling his stories, Meredith does not scruple to
employ as many different masks, and so to give voices to
as many different perspectives, as he considers are
necessary to lend depth and play to the events, to the
characters, and to the ideas. He once again simulates
life experience in that the truth or reality is not
always immediately apparent and, hence, must be arrived
at through a sifting of all the evidence (much of it
contradictory). Of course, as stated, the different
voices may be considered as issuing from masks assumed by
the author ("jackets," as Pritchett argues), who is, at
bottom, the "voice" of the novel as it communicates with
214
the reader. Although this last consideration will be the
subject of Chapter III, it is here interesting to note
that the manner in which Meredith employs multiple selec
tive omniscience has some of the technique of the black-
garbed and -hooded kurombo or kurogo (see pages 19 to 21
and 372 to 373) of the No theatre. That is, the narrator
may be viewed as a "stage assistant" who arranges for
the reader to be privy to as much knowledge as he needs
for understanding. He makes available the direct views
into characters' minds, especially into Emilia-Vittoria1s,
as in the episode in which the psychological stress of an
unhappy love affair results in the loss of her voice (see
pages 17 5 to 178). The narrator does not withdraw himself
entirely from the stage in the Italian novels as do the
tellers in the works of Woolf, Joyce, and Faulkner, nor
does he remain for long obscured. He is himself a part
of the "total design" (Ernst, p. Ill), even as are the
kurombo. Moreover, his is sometimes the perspective of
editorial omniscience as he wears the epic teller mask,
and sometimes that of neutral omniscience; at other times
he disappears and characters wearing the multiple selec
tive masks are heard by the reader; and at still others, as
noted above, he weaves his voice closely in with theirs.
The analysis of the opera chapters in Vittoria to disclose
the use of the pictorial and the dramatic techniques also
reveals a particularly adept manipulation of all these
215
various masks and virtuosity of performance with them
(see pages 60 to 73).
In the opera chapters occurs yet another technique
that has resemblance to the No theatre in which the stage
is built out into the audience in order to secure audience
participation. The narrator, too, comes forward, without
disguise, to engage his reader in the drama. This tech
nique was also seen to work in the address to the "lady"
reader who might permit herself to be considered a
vegetable growth, and in the narrator's wry comment that
his Philosopher insists upon rushing "forward to the
footlights" (see page 318).
Since there are so many viewpoints, it is a good
general rule in reading the two Italian novels not to
place a great deal of credence in anything said from any
one character's point of view until it has been corro
borated by the narrator's commentary, whether given
directly or indirectly. In addition, since the narrator
is often not serious in Sandra Belloni, but rather ironic
and satiric, the reader must be sure to listen carefully
to his voice (see page 43) as it is orchestrated with
those of others. In Vittoria, however, the narrator is
not only the removed and truthful witness, that he is also
in Sandra Belloni, but he is a serious and direct one. In
Sandra Belloni, the reader must be particularly alert to
implications underlying his statements.
216
As the narrator's tone is predominantly comic in
Sandra Belloni and serious in Vittoria, some readers see
the two novels as having two different personalities as
tellers. That is, Sandra Belloni's masked personality,
if telling the story of Vittoria, would have emphasized
its comic possibilities, and, conversely, Vittoria's
masked teller would have emphasized the tragedy inherent
in Sandra Belloni. However, the supposition is unreason
able that a teller of a comic tale is incapable of dealing
with a tragic story, or vice versa. Moreover, as indi
cated earlier, the narrator may be seen as maturing
throughout Sandra Belloni, his high spirits having been
held in check by the Philosopher until toward the end of
the novel, when he (the Philosopher), for the first and
only time, speaks in his own person. He is stopped by
the narrator because his analysis of Wilfrid's condition
is "absurd" and because "there is a little piece of action
in store" (II, 317). The reasons imply the narrator's
promise that the Philosopher (but not the narrator) would
be absent from the sequel — Emilia in Italy (in publica
tion called Vittoria)— because it would be an action novel.
The same general approach used in Chapter I, with
the necessary adjustments, will be used for this chapter,
except that the orientation will be principally toward
the attitudes and the ideas being expressed by the
characters. First, the use of imagery within the two
217
novels will be examined in order to discover Meredith's
use of metaphor and simile to reveal mask characteristics.
Then, in a study of the political ideas within the two
novels, Emilia-Vittoria's maturing attitudes regarding
the Austrian-Italian conflict, the position of women in
politics,and issues concerning leadership will be inves
tigated. Because notions about war were detailed in
Chapter I, a brief look will suffice for this chapter.
An examination of the social values in the two novels,
using still the broad areas of love and family, will be
directed toward a consideration of the humanitarian
notions that predominate in the novels. Finally, voices
will be studied as they express ideas about poetry, prose,
and music.
Metaphoric Language as It Characterizes Masks
Examination of the imagery in connection with the
voices in the two Italian novels reveals that in all four
volumes the narrator's voice is the one voice most often
heard in use of metaphor and simile, and also that the
tone of the imagery differs in Sandra Belloni from that
used in Vittoria. That is, in the former novel, the
narrator's voice most often gently banters his characters
as they display sentimentality, or as he presents some
activity illustrative of human folly, such as the Ipley
Common brawl. In Vittoria, the narrator's voice is
218
usually heard in more solemn and, if not always approving,
at least thoughtful tones of explanation about characters1
feelings and thoughts, and of presentation of the action
of the novel. However, it must be noted that the impish
humor exercised in Sandra Belloni by the narrator makes
intermittent appearance in Vittoria, especially in
connection with Wilfrid Pole and with his sister, Adela
Sedley, but also with Luigi, Beppo, and Jacopo Cruchi.
The examination of imagery offers further proof that the
Italian novels must be considered to perform together and
not as separate and/or unrelated stories.
Broadly speaking, images fall most frequently within
the categories of fire, water, nature (earth), and animal.
(Of less frequent occurrence and so not included in this
discussion are images of food and kitchen, games, war, and
light. Discussion of music is treated separately in this
chapter, as it is used to characterize Emilia-Vittoria and
Sir Barrett [see pages 360 to 364].) Insect allusions,
such as moth, butterfly, parasite, and worm are included
in the count of animal images as are bird and fish refer
ences. The nature/earth category includes all those
references to the pleasurable and the painful aspects of
nature (wind, storm, flower, weed, grove, tree) except
those related either to fire or to water. Since the
count was made only to discover tendencies within the two
novels and relationships between the imagery of the two
novels, the totals given are approximations only.
Attention to the imagery indicates that Volume I of
Vittoria performs as the climactic volume of the four
volumes of the two Italian novels. It is in this volume
that Emilia-Vittoria arrives at the peak of her powers
both as an artist and as a contributor to humanity, and
that her involvement in the Italian revolution arrives
at its climactic moment in the opera scene. In Volume I
of Sandra Belloni, the young Emilia longed to go to Italy
to fight for the freedom of her father's people, and in
Volume II she prepared to leave for Italy. In Volume I
of Vittoria she fulfills her longing and her destiny by
performing as the voice of the uprising; the handling of
the opera scene especially supports its being the climac
tic moment. As already demonstrated in Chapter I,
Vittoria's marriage and widowhood are not rendered in
Vittoria1s Volume II with the suspense and consequence
of the handling of the opera scenes. The chart below
also indicates that Volume I of Vittoria, in which the
most poetic language occurs with the greatest frequency,
is indeed the climactic volume.
I S.B., II Vi.tjL^., I YiJcL../ II
Fire
Water/ice
Nature
24 27 30 27
12 12 20 22
21 25 30 17
Animal 55 39 89 65
The narrator most often is heard using metaphoric
language in Volume II of Sandra Belloni, in which he
utters almost half the imagery; in the other three volumes
of the two novels, the narrator is responsible for only
approximately one-third of the metaphoric language. He
voices twenty-one of the twenty-four fire images in
Sandra Belloni, Volume I, and fifteen of the images in
each of the other three volumes. These fire images are
not used exclusively in application to Emilia-Vittoria,
though they are predominantly so used. Thus, the
narrator says that she has "fiery" eyes (Sandra Belloni,
I, 54); "sings with . . . fire" (p. 163); loses "the fire"
from her lips upon renouncing Italy for Wilfrid (p. 217);
cries out "fierily out of languor" in telling the Poles
of her leaving England (p. 238); is "Tame Fire as opposed
to Cold Steel"(Georgiana [p. 139]); and has a "fiery
fancy" (II, 129). In addition to the narrator's so
defining Emilia, Tracy writes Wilfrid that she is "imagin
ative fire" opposing "animal courage" (Lady Charlotte
[p. 103]) .
In Vittoria, Agostino says, in argument with Ugo
Corte, who objects to Vittoria's joining their band, that
"The Vestal's fire burns straight" (I, 18); and Guido
Bandinelli notes her "scorching eyes" (p. 20). After the
opera, the narrator reveals that the fire affects
Vittoria herself as the "lightnings . . . shot across her
221
brain, but wrote no legible thing; the scenes of the
opera lost their outlines as in a white heat of fire"
(pp. 284-285). He says further of Vittoria, as well as
of Laura, that she is a "firebrand" (II, 51), Vittoria
also taking "fire" at the notion of going to the battle
field (p. 104); and he also relates that Vittoria reacts
to the idea of being "apart from Italy" as if "her
inflamed spirit" had been shocked as in a "pause in
martial music" (p. 105). She herself writes Carlo that
the "whisper" that tells her not to delay in going to him
"is like a furnace" (p. 167).
In all these images, as well as others, no matter
who utters them, fire when associated with Emilia-Vittoria
is symbolic of passion and of purity. However, fire
images are used for other characters, too, although
usually not to indicate superior humanity. For instance,
Tracy Runningbrook's hair is frequently mentioned to be
"red as blown flame" (Sandra Belloni, I, 27); Mr. Pole
was Mrs. Chump's "old flame" (p. 29); and "the magnanimity
of Beer would have blazed effulgent," but that "the fire
on the altar of Wisdom was again kindled by Folly," in the
form of the attack upon Ipley by Hillford (p. 107). In
Vittoria, Luigi tells Beppo that he is "a fire balloon"
(I, 172). Perhaps most representative of the tone of
many of the images in Sandra Belloni, as they are used
for characters other than Emilia, is the fire image used
222
in connection with the "fair sentimentalist," Cornelia,
whom the narrator describes as she muses on her affair
with "Mr. Penniless Barrett."
A goal gloriously illumined blazed on her from the
distance. ' "Too late!" she put a curb on the hot
coursers in her brain,and they being checked turned
all at once to tears and came in a flood. (I, 237)
The narrator's subtle mocking of Cornelia features a
descent from the fiery and sublime to the ridiculous in a
teary dousing.
The narrator uses the same anti-climactic fire image,
with the mixture of the water image, for Wilfrid. Respond
ing to the demands Emilia makes for his declarations of
love for her and for his statement disavowing love for
Lady Charlotte, he declares himself to her with heat.
Then, Lady Charlotte's appearance "fell upon the furnace of
Wilfrid's heart like a quenching flood" (II, 327). A more
serious use of the fire and water image is the narrator's
in describing Tracy Runningbrook's "tender reverence" for
Emilia's grief at not being able to fight at Merthyr's side
in Italy. Tracy feels Emilia's "tears as a rain of flame
on his heart" (p. 328).
Thus, whereas many of the references have a comic
value when used for others, all do not. Pericles is
called by the narrator, most fittingly in view of his
cold treatment of Emilia, "cindery" (Vittoria, I, 176).
Luciano worries that "poor sparks, who’re afraid to drop
on powder" may rise before the rebels are ready
223
(p. 202) . And Anna is said by the narrator to have a
"fiery temperament" along with "the patience of hatred"
(II, 222) .
Water images are used to a lesser degree, and only a
few refer to Emilia-Vittoria, but these few are highly
significant for her person and for her art. The narrator
voices some twenty-four of the approximately sixty-six
water/ice images used throughout both novels. An example
of the identification of Emilia with water is the
narrator's description of her, as she waits for Wilfrid
to return to Brookfield, as "some gray lake . . . full
and smooth, awaiting the star below the twilight" (I, 185).
The Wordsworthian use of lake to mean mind, imagination,
and poetry, as well as the obvious association of water
with voice, a frequently recurring allusion in the Ita
lian novels, seems at work in this passage. In a similar
use of "lake" as a part of nature and hence a felicitous
image of receptivity and sensitivity to nature and to
humanity, the narrator also describes Merthyr, as
Vittoria comes into his sickroom, in almost the same
terms: "The face of the wounded man was like a lake-
water taking light from Vittoria's presence" (Vittoria,
II, 174) .
^The Prelude is in Williams' listing as part of
Meredith's reading.
-^Kenneth MacLean, "The Water Symbols in The Prelude,"
in Toronto Quarterly, XVII (July, 1948), 372-389.
224
Another example involves the narrator's use of
nature/earth imagery as he notes that Emilia, "full of
. . . burning passion, . . . intensely . . . looked her
misery [loss of Wilfrid] in the face." Continuing in a
hopeful vein, the narrator speaks as if inside Emilia's
consciousness:
. . . a blue-hued moon stepped from among the clouds,
and hung in the black outstretched fingers of the tree
of darkness, fronting the troubled waters. (Sandra
Belloni, I, 290)
The complicated imagery here affords an especially
interesting example of Meredith's nature/earth references.
The "troubled waters" seem to represent Mr. Pole's
disjointed speech of refusal for permission for Wilfrid
to marry Emilia. (Other examples of this use of water
to mean voice will be given later.) The "tree of dark
ness" is, along with "woods," a recurrent symbol" in
Meredith's work, used often to illustrate "selfish
terrors and undemanding serenity" (Stevenson, The Ordeal,
p. 249). Here the "outstretched fingers" and the
"darkness" are indicative of those "selfish terrors"
especially associated with Wilfrid, as well as with
Mr. Pole. In Vittoria Amalia de Graatli is to write to
Laura Piaveni that Laura is her "pine-grove leading to
the evening star" in a use of the symbol to mean
"undemanding serenity" (I, 158).
The moon had for Meredith, as for most nineteenth
century poets, connotations of creative imagination and,
225
within that framework, of "the memorable, the true,/ The
luminous as a moon uncloaked.Emilia's moon, however,
is not fully "luminous," or "uncloaked," but rather "blue-
hued," seeming to mean obscured or cloaked. This
condition, the terminology seems to promise, will be
corrected. Herein is a recurrence of the motif of promise
contained in defeat, as in the previously-noted use of
"witch."
As indicated, water is frequently used by Meredith
as a conventional symbol for voices. The narrator, as if
speaking in Beppo's person, describes "fresh feminine
voices" running on as "a brook" (Vittoria, I, 162); in
his own person, the narrator also described Ugo Corte's
"thick difficult voice" as seeming "to pour out . . . a
water-pipe in a hurricane of rain" (p. 27); as if in
Vittoria's consciousness, the narrator notes that tumbled
rocks give "the green water" of a mountain stream "one
onward voice" for her as she struggles to escape pursuing
Austrians (p. 303). In description of Wilfrid's and
Vittoria's conversation, the narrator comments that it
"bordered the old life which they had known, as a rivulet
coming to falls where it threatens to be a torrent and a
flood" (II, 128).
4"The Night-Walk," in Poems (London: Constable and
Company Ltd., 1910), p. 141.
226
Water images are also used, though more sparingly,
to signify music. The narrator, detailing Emilia's
perturbation as Wilfrid appears in the church while she
is playing the organ, says that "she managed to swim into
the stream of the sacred melody again" (Sandra Belloni, I,
251). More frequently, the water image is used, again
conventionally, to signify life. Emilia, when she is
young and before she has tasted life, muses, as she sits
beside Wilming Weir,
. . . that water is the history of the world flowing
out before me, all mixed up with kings and queens,
and warriors with armour, and shouting armies;
battles and numbers of mixed people; and great red
sunsets, with women kneeling under them. (p. 219)
There is here a seeming vision of the scene that is to
occur in Vittoria when Emilia-Vittoria and Laura arrive
at the scene of battle (II, 110).
After Emilia has been played false by Wilfrid, the
narrator relates, as if inside her consciousness, that
she "felt herself as a ship sailing into perilous waters,
without compass" (Sandra Belloni, II, 248). Finally, at
the end of Vittoria when her experiences have multiplied
until they have included the death of her husband, the nar
rator says that death was for her "another shore"(p. 342).
Nor is Emilia-Vittoria the only character for whom life and
its experiences are like water or the sea. Mr. Pole says
that in business "we don't swim with corks"(Sandra Belloni,
I, 27); whereas for Luigi lying is indeed swimming through
I
227
life "with corks" (Vittoria, I, 52). Adela Pole, when she
vaguely apprehends that her family's fortunes may have
sunk, gasps "I have been walking on a plank" (Sandra
Belloni, II, 37). Mrs. Chump, it is revealed by the
narrator, thinks that because of the wickedness in the
world of "the great . . . they were all in a boat going
to perdition," but, nonetheless, she "owned to the intoxi
cation of gliding smoothly— gliding on the rapids" (p. 111).
In this connection, people are frequently referred to as
"boats" or "vessels." For instance, Laura says that in
marriage Vittoria became "merely a little boat tied to a
big ship," Carlo (II, 258).
In Vittoria, water or the sea often refers more
specifically to the revolution and the struggles it
involves. The narrator says that Vittoria drinks at the
"positive springs" of war information (I, 25); Angelo,
"white as madness," tells Vittoria that he was promised
"a sword and a sea to plunge it in" when he joined the
rebel forces (pp. 304-305). The narrator describes the
young rebels' feelings of discouragement as feeling their
efforts are "as little feeble waves" against the "iron
wall" that is Austria (p. 206) . A more puzzling water
reference, linked with an earth allusion, occurs twice in
Vittoria, Volume I. Speaking in his own voice, Carlo
warns Vittoria that if she undertakes to sing the signal
song at La Scala, she will "be tossed like a weed on the
228
sea" (p. 39). Some pages later, the narrator, as if
inside Carlo's mind, says that Vittoria will be "tossed
like a weed along the torrent of bloody deluge waters"
(p. 170) .
Although "weed" may not seem as fitting an image as
"flower" in connection with a heroine, especially in the
words or thoughts of a lover, in Meredith's earth-lexicon
"weed" is clearly the superior image. It seems to signify
a closer connection with simple and real nature, like the
daisy on the lawn, so annoying to the Pole sisters, than
does "flower." Thus, the Pole sisters think of themselves,
as the narrator implies, as a "nosegay of flowers" who
have "no fit room for an exuberant vegetable," by which
description the narrator implies their opinion of Mrs.
Chump (I, 30); and Barto Rizzo, who has no understanding
of women in general, nor any real affection for his wife,
calls Rosellina his "pepper-flower" (Vittoria, I, 84).
However, after Emilia has been wounded by Wilfrid, the
narrator makes a tentative association of her with a
flower, although not in his own, but in Merthyr's con
sciousness. The narrator says that Merthyr "was as
patient [with Emilia] as one who tends a flower in the
Spring" (Sandra Belloni, II, 210). Emilia herself, upon
donning the Branciani dress, says that she feels as if she
looks out of a rose (p. 241), thereby indicating the dress,
as the artificial creation, to be the flower.
229
In further consideration of the water image, it,too,
is used negatively. The Poles are generally referred to
as "frozen." The narrator characterizes Cornelia as
."an iceberg . . . with the freezing indifference of the
floating colossus" (I, 3). He further notes that she
speaks in "frozen monosyllables" to those she considers
socially inferior (p. 59). Then, with some raising of
the temperature, though with a desire to wound, Mrs.
Chump tells Braintop to write to the "garIs" to the
effect that they are "a cold bath" to her "in bed" (II,
73). Later, Mrs. Chump will say in astonishment at
Arabella, "If ye're not as cold as the bottom of a pot
that naver felt fire" (p. 187). Meredith does not seem
to use in either of the two Italian novels water as
"symbolic baptism, symbolic cleaning of the soiled self"
which Buckley noted as a "constant theme in the diverse
gospels of Victorian Christianity."5 Buckley, moreover,
cites The Ordeal of Richard Feverel as an instance of that
which he maintains Meredith did "more deliberately than
Dickens," which is to integrate "the water symbol into
several intellectualized studies" (p. 101).
It may be seen that there is some consistency in use
of images either in praise or in denigration, and for
^Jerome Hamilton Buckley, The Victorian Temper: A
Study in Literary Culture (New York: Vantage Books,
1951), p. 98.
230
humor as for tragic intensification. Of the characters
in each novel, it is Mrs. Chump's voice that is heard
most in Sandra Belloni in metaphor and simile of a homely
and a comic note. In Vittoria, Agostino's voice is heard
most often in literary images.
Mrs. Chump, who, it has already been demonstrated,
has a penchant for encapsulating the "little people" of
Sandra Belloni, calls Pericles "the driest stick that aver
stood without sap" (I, 225), and recalls her deceased
husband as "a little puffed-out bladder of a man" (p. 206).
She says to Emilia that Cornelia can be fancied as "a tall
codfish on its tail" (p. 206). In further use of colorful
language, she asks "Ad'la” not to crush her with "great
cart-wheels o1 words" (II, 48), as she pleads with the
Pole sisters and brother for acceptance as their step
mother. She finally dubs them as "three owls" and "a
raven" (p. 49).
Agostino's specialty, on the other hand, is the
sustained metaphor, an achievement seemingly beyond the
short, breathy attempts of Mrs. Chump. It was Agostino
who characterized the occupying Austrians as "vile,
domiciliary, parasitical insects, inhabiting "the best
peaches" (see page 76). Less political is his rhetorical
figure when Luciano and Carlo rush to tell him the latest
rumors and the news that Vittoria will sing that night
at La Scala. Moved to try to stop her, he says,
231
Ah, what a thing is hurry to a mind like mine. It
tears up trees by the roots, floods the land, darkens
utterly my poor quiet universe. (I, 225)
Although discussion of earth imagery has been handled
as it occurred in conjunction with the water or other
imagery, it should be mentioned that the narrator's voice
presents approximately sixty percent of such metaphors
in the first volume of Sandra Belloni, forty percent in
both the second volume of Sandra Belloni and the first
volume of Vittoria, and approximately thirty-three percent
in the second volume of Vittoria. Further, since earth,
fire, and water imagery appears with such regularity
throughout the two Italian novels, it is of interest that
air or wind imagery is also used, although to a much
lesser extent than that for the other elements. Wind is,
however, used in the sense of creativity or inspiration,
a common nineteenth century notion. In Sandra Belloni,
the narrator says that Emilia's "voice had the wire-like
hum of a rising wind" (I, 2 87) as the pleads with
Mr. Pole to let Wilfrid marry her; significantly it is at
this point that the narrator tells the reader of Pole's
realization of Emilia's power (pp. 287-289). And in
Vittoria, Vittoria "seized the hearts" of her listeners
"as the wind takes the strong oak-trees, and rocks them
on their knotted roots, and leaves them with the song of
soaring among their branches" (I, 32). Wind becomes
associated with the passion of love when Vittoria writes
232
Carlo that she seems "to be hanging on a tree for you,
swayed by such a teazing wind" (II, 167).
The most frequently-used images in both novels are
the animal images, a few of which have already been cited.
In both volumes of Sandra Belloni, the narrator utters
approximately forty percent of these; approximately twenty-
five percent in Volume I of Vittoria, and thirty-five
percent in Volume II. As the chart on page 219 indicates,
the most dramatic increase in the use of these images
occurs in the climactic volume of the two Italian novels.
The general term "animal" is, like "weed," in
Meredith's use of it, a desirable indication of a oneness
with earth and so with nature:
That natures at interflow
With all of their past and the now,
Are chords to the Nature without,
Orbs to the greater whole:
First then, nor utterly then
Till our lord of sensations at war,
The rebel, the heart, yields place
To brain, each prompting the soul.
Thus, our dear Earth we embrace
For the milk, her strength to men.®
The importance of "chord" or music in realization of
earth's union is just one indication of Emilia-Vittoria's
harmony with nature. She is said early in Sandra Belloni
by the narrator to be "an animal" rather than the deli
cately cultivated "flower" that insensate Wilfrid would
®"A Faith on Trial," A Reading of Earth in Poems
(New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1899), p. 362.
233
prefer (p. 39). Emilia herself tells Wilfrid that, in
reaction to the pattings of the "Jew gentleman," she
"felt herself like an angry animal" (p. 53).
Wilfrid, who lacks understanding of earth and, hence,
of Emilia's nature, fastidiously objects to the "animal-
ities" he discerns in her character (p. 221) . His misun
derstanding then leads him to believe, erroneously, that
Adela's husband, the "millionaire, city-of-London merchant,"
who "has drunk himself gouty on Port wine," is "an animal"
(Vittoria, II, 32). Adela, caught in the same kind of mis
understanding as her brother, thought herself "an animal"
(Sandra Belloni, II, 52) because she, too, was concerned
with food and drink (although in a different way from Mr.
Sedley's) during the unpleasant trips to London with Wil
frid in search of Emilia. Another blunted sensibility is
that of de Prymont, who designates Carlo as "animal" when
he believes that Carlo is using the excitement of the opera
to press an advantage with Vittoria (Vittoria, I, 2 80).
The real meaning of "animal" with the freedom en
tailed in truth to nature that Emilia-Vittoria exemplifies
is contrasted against Wilfrid's tortured, because unnatural,
attitudes and actions. The eel simile previously cited
(see page 107) expressed his ignominious condition as a
prisoner of constrictions which cause him to act against
his own interests and freedom. Working in the same
direction is the narrator's additional characterization
of Wilfrid as having a "heart" that performs "like any
234
milk-white steed in the circus" (I, 68). In an extension
of the trained, and so artificially-conditioned animal
metaphor, the narrator notes that Wilfrid is "in harness
to" Lady Charlotte.
In love we have some idea whither we would go; in
harness we are simply driven, and the destination
may be anywhere. (p. 193)
Emilia's natural innocence prevents her understanding
of Wilfrid's unnaturalness so that she believes him to be
as real and truthful in consonance with nature as she is
herself. Her use of the same imagery, then, as she writes
him to "come on a swift horse" and says that the "thought
of you galloping to me goes through me like a flame that
hums" (p. 195) is sadly ironic. She sees him using the
horse, rather than being associated with a circus or work
animal as in the narrator's more accurate allusions to
Wilfrid.
As the youngest and least disciplined sister, who
can play Mrs. Chump successfully enough to fool her
father and to shame her sister, Adela specializes in ani
mal characterizations. She says of herself, when
uncomfortable at Mrs. Chump's remarks about romance,
that she feels "like a live fish, frying, frying, frying"
(I, 225); and she notes that her father "went like a pony
being broken" as he tries to discover her attitude toward
his marrying Mrs. Chump and toward the purchase of
Besworth (p. 134). She silently calls Wilfrid, her
I
235
"chameleon brother," with more truth than she knows, when
he seems to change his attitude in favor of accepting
Mrs. Chump (p. 160).
Many of the same animals appear in the two novels,
only in different contexts. Thus, while the narrator
slyly and comically intimates the Poles to be pigs
(Sandra Belloni, I, 6), in Vittoria, in a more serious
vein, Pericles also designates the Austrians to be
"swine," although his reason is their disregard for the
artistry of the opera (I, 253). Even more serious are
the cries of "'Pig of a German1 . . . and 'Porco, porco1
. . . sung in a scale of voices" as Lieutenant Jenna
deliberately tantalizes the Italians with his cigar smoke.
Later Pericles is to tell Wilfrid that Violetta craves
even the "worship of swine" (II, 252), by which he could
mean either the Austrians or Bartg Rizzo, who also
"worships" Violetta. Laura is more political than
Pericles when she angrily tells Vittoria that the village
priest "chronicled a pig that squeaked" (p. 117).
Some differences exist between the two novels not
only in number of animal allusions and tone of their use,
but also in the kinds of beasts signified. Serpent
references are rare in Sandra Belloni, although Emilia
does tell Merthyr that the river which almost became for
her "the gates of death" was "like a snake with a sick
eye" (II, 170). In a foreshadowing of her desperate
I
236
experiences that almost lead to her death, when she has
to wait ten minutes for Wilfrid (a waiting which causes
her "moodiness"), Emilia says that the water seems to her
"like a pool of snakes, and then they struggle out, and
roll over and over, and stream on lengthwise. I can see
their long flat heads, and their eyes: almost their
skins" (I, 216). When Emilia is convinced that she has
lost her voice, she tells Georgiana, "My voice is like a
dead serpent in my throat" (II,226), and also that she
"felt at times like a snake hissing at [her] folly" in
promising Wilfrid not to leave England when Merthyr is
already there fighting (p. 303).
In Vittoria, the references are both more frequent
and more political. Count Serabiglione's and the
narrator's references are to Italy as "a serpent" (see
pages 75 and 76), and the old rebel, Agostino, ironically
refers to himself in the manner he knows the censors to
conceive of him: "rendered tame and fangless by a rigor
ous imprisonment" (I, 29). He also calls Luigi "more
serpent than eagle" as well as a "vampyre who feed[s] on
patriot-blood" and a "goose walking into a den of foxes"
for his folly in climbing into the rebels' Monte Motterone
meeting place (p. 46). Barto Rizzo calls Rosellina his
"snake" (pp. 84, 196). Carlo Ammiani calls Barto one as
well as a "weazel" and a "tiger" in another of the accumu
lation of images that occur frequently. The narrator also
237
notes that Barto's speech is "serpent-like" (p. 196) and
that Michiella is a "fangless snake" (p. 257). Barto is,
however, most frequently referred to as "The Great Cat,"
in deference, evidently, to his stealth, his "elusive
contrivances," and his "claws" (p. 79).
Consistent as the serpent image usually is in signi
fying that which is deadly in threat and perfidious in
action, the difficulty in its association with Italy, in
view of Meredith's championship of that country's cause,
has already been discussed (see page 76). (There is no
such difficulty in Barto’s calling his wife "snake" in
view of his distrust of her.) Meredith does, however,
make careful separation of those "cunning" Italians who
are signified as "serpents" from the heroic rebels who
are associated with Titans. In the same way of seeming
inconsistency, Pericles is associated with the bear, the
symbol for Austria, as he appears in the early scenes of
Sandra Belloni wrapped in a bearskin. At the end of the
first volume, he places that skin over Emilia's shoulders
so that she is described by the narrator as wearing "a
trailing black barbaric robe" (p. 326). The puzzle may
be solved by remembering Meredith's position toward the
Austrians (see page 240) and by noticing that Meredith
uses the bear allusion in connection with Austria most
sparingly, and that only in the conventional sense and
without the development that he gives to the serpent
238
image (i.e., no individual Austrians or Germans are
referred to as bears). Moreover, the primary significa
tion in the use of bear for Pericles and, then, in later
association with Emilia, is as one with power or having
sway over other men. And, finally, Pericles, indifferent
to politics and to the conflict, associates with Italians
and Austrians alike and, by so doing, does not merit
Emilia-Vittoria1s contempt, or even her protest. It may
be that Pericles' transcendence over national boundaries
is a manifestation of the superior effects of music or
art, although, if so, his is on a lower level than is
Vittoria1s.
The wolf is the more frequently-used predator in both
novels. The "fleshly fairy" of the theatre calls Pericles
"wolf" in exasperation, but this is one of the few in
stances of its use in Sandra Belloni. It abounds, however,
in Vittoria. The narrator calls attention to Pericles1
"wolfish aspect" as he protests Vittoria's persistent
devotion to the revolution from which "he alone was
striving to rescue her" (I, 236-237). The opportunistic
Jacopo complains that he is "lean as a wolf" as Angelo
forces him to accompany him in dodging the Austrian
soldiers (p. 320). The narrator also describes the action
of Angelo's "stilet" in an unequal "duel" with Weisspriess
as taking "a glut of blood, as when a wolf tears quick
at dripping flesh" (p. 346). The Milanese, as they
scramble for the cigars Wilfrid tosses, are said by the
narrator to be like "a pack of wolves . . . diverted by
a garment dropped from the flying sledge" (II, 54), Count
Karl calls the Guidascarpis, whom he believes to have
murdered his brother, "wolves," "ruffians," and "brutes"
(p. 135). Laura says of Rosellina that she has been
like a "trapped she-wolf" since she shot Rinaldo
Guidascarpi (p. 260). And the peasant Lorenzo calls the
Tedeschi "wolves" (p. 337).
Meredith's use of imagery in the Italian novels is
important both to content and to the form of the novels.
That is, imagery has aided, especially, in developing
characterization, and also in creating atmosphere, build
ing suspense, and establishing the novels as existent on
a continuum. The poetic language also provides for an
enrichment as it contributes to layers of meaning.
Voices Expressing Social and Political Ideas
Attitudes toward the conflict between Austrians and
Italians and toward the fact of war itself were given some
attention in Chapter I in examination of the uses of the
pictorial and the dramatic techniques. It was there
pointed out what the author's second self, or the implied
author, reveals in the course of the two novels: Meredith
did not, probably could not condemn the Germans or the
Austrians, to whom his letters record he reacted favorably.
The letters of 18 61 from Switzerland and the Tyrol
feature favorable references to both Germans and Austrians.
Commenting upon the kindness his son Arthur received in
their travels, Meredith includes the boy's remark "that
'these Germans are nice people'" (Letters, I, 91). It
is important to remember that his acquaintance and inter
views with individual Germans and Italians must have been
affected by his inability to speak Italian (p. 100) as
opposed to his facility in the German language. A few
days after writing of Arthur's opinion of Germans,
Meredith writes of his wonder that the French beat the
Austrians: "A finer set of men than the Austrian soldiers
you cannot see anywhere. Their drill seems good" (p. 94).
The presentation of the two ideas about fine men and good
drill does not make one a contingency of the other, as
Kelvin would perhaps argue (pp. 49-50). Not only are they
separated in sentence structure with no indication of a
logical connection, but also a further comment by Meredith
on the same subject would prevent their association.
In spite of Meredith's sympathy with the Italian
cause, he was able to see the faults on both sides of
the quarrel.
Viennese crinoline and the tyrant Whitecoat do their
best to destroy the beauties of St. Mark's. Charming
are the Venetian women! . . . Should one smile on a
Whitecoat, she has the prospect of a patriotic dagger
smiting her fair bosom, and so she does not; though
the Austrians are fine men, and red-hot exclusiveness
for an abstract idea sits not easy on any ladies of
241
any land for longer than— say, a fortnight?
(p. 114)
A repetition of the opinion of the Austrian Whitecoats
as fine men accompanies the indication of an equal
responsibility of Italian women in creating this parti
cular kind of dangerous situation.
Both the situation and the attitude find their way
into the novel Vittoria, in the occasion for Weisspriess'
first duel as recounted in the novel; in the substance
of the Countess Medole and Colonel Prince Radocky ren-
. dezvous; and in the street brawl precipitated by a pretty
maid's unwillingness to continue her friendly demeanor
toward the Austrian soldiers. Another street brawl
incident in the novel also indicates the mutual respon
sibility of the Italians and the Austrians. Lieutenant
Jenna's voice reveals the Austrian responsibility in the
"miserable and menacing" (Letters, I, 98) street scene;
yet his is essentially a position of innocence in the
sense that he responds, albeit as one of General Pierson's
"children" (an oft-repeated nomenclature for the soldiers
[Vittoria, II, 98, 101]), to the crowd's "yells . . .
hootings" and to their mobbing him (II, 54). The
narrator's voice aids in placing Italian responsibility
when he identifies the crowd as a "band of the scum of
the population" of Milan (p. 54) and the winter's day as
"the holiday of rascals" (p. 55). Cigars are "dashed"
242
from mouths (p. 56), and "a douse of water from a window"
puts out Jenna's and Wilfrid's cigars (p. 57). Jenna's
reaction is good-humored. He
. . . wiped his face deliberately, and lighting
another cigar, remarked— This is the fifth poor
devil who has come to an untimely end within an
hour. It is brisk work. (pp. 57-58)
When this cigar, too, is "scattered in sparks from
his lips," he picked it up "miry" and cleaned it, "observ
ing that his honour was pledged to this fellow" (p. 58).
Then, he tells Wilfrid, as if they were boys on holiday:
Keep an eye on those dogs behind us, and manoeuvre
your cigar. The plan is, to give half-a-dozen bright
puffs, and then keep it in your fist; and when you
see an Italian head, volcano him like fury. (p. 5 8)
The boyish derring-do and the indifference to consequence,
or "coolness," as Wilfrid is said to view it, is lacking
in real malice. Jenna seems more to be enjoying a game of
wits and will. As an indication of the inevitable con
sequences of such a game, Jenna longs for the "time" when
he can "storm the houses" from which water and "skillfully
flung" hats emerge (p. 58). Jenna and his young associates
are not concerned with the abstract causes of the conflict,
but see the matter as a chance to provide an outlet for
high spirits; the older officers, like the fat major,
view it as an employment by which they may support their
families (I, 323). The Italian voices heard in praise or
condemnation of war are usually concerned more with the
issues that caused the war than with the fact of combat.
243
As stated earlier, attitudes toward war were used
by Meredith to demonstrate the characters', especially
Emilia-Vittoria1s, developing awareness of war as an
important factor in the plots and in thematic progression.
Meredith's letters present evidence that during the time
of writing Emilia in England, the earlier novel, he was
perfectly capable of making the kind of negative judgment
about war that Kelvin assumed him unable to make.
We cannot expect Meredith, writing in the 1860s of
a war that took place less than two decades earlier,
to challenge the meaning of war itself. (p. 49)
Yet, challenge it Meredith did in an 1862 letter in which
he ironically ended a commentary about the fighting in
Naples and the battle between the Monitor and the Merrimac
by writing
Science, I presume, will at last put it to our option
whether we will improve one another from off the face
of the globe, and we must decide by our common sense.
(p. 139)
A comment made in the 1970s could be no more modern in
denial of Kelvin's contention. And it is this basic
position against war that also issues from the author's
second self as an "extractable meaning" as well as "the
moral and emotional content" (Booth, p. 73) of the sec
tions on war (see also pages 74 to 91).
A study of the pictorial and the dramatic techniques
used to present Laura's and Vittoria's reactions on the
battlefield revealed the psychological and technical
244
mastery that Meredith continually exercised. A more
careful study of Emilia-Vittoria1s, Merthyr's, Laura's
and Carlo's voices also acts to contradict Kelvin's
accusation that an "inveterate passion for armed conflict"
prevented Meredith's control of his material, as well as
Stewart's similar belief that Meredith, "enamoured of
the spectacle of war" (p. 124), did not realize its
"horror" until "near the end of Vittoria" (p. 125).
Examination of Emilia-Vittoria's voice throughout
the two Italian novels reveals a deliberately-contrived
use of the political situation to convey maturation.
Actually Emilia-Vittoria says relatively little about
Italy and its problems; her statements mostly center
upon her feelings concerning the plight of Italy. None
theless, in Sandra Belloni she and Merthyr Powys are major
sources for information about the Italian conflict.
Another important source, the narrator, comments indirect
ly through the Ipley-HiIlford mirror situation and more
directly, and in duet with the bluff Briton, comments
again at the conclusion of the novel. Thus, editorial,
neutral, and multiple selective omniscience are the
methods employed to illuminate political matters.
Emilia's own speeches in Sandra Belloni, Volume I,
are cunningly matched to her immaturity and her inexper
ience. She reveals, as she tells Wilfrid "everything"
about herself, that her love for Italy is actually a
245
reflection of her feeling for her father and, at this
point, little more.
My father says I shall never be so great [as
Andronizetti] because I am half English. It is
not my fault. My mother was English. But I feel
that I am much more Italian than English. (pp. 42-43)
Even more specifically does she indicate the source of
her hatred for Austrians and of her partisanship when she
tells that her
. . . father did something against the Austrians
when he was a young man. . . . My father had to
run away to save his life. He was fifteen days
lying in the rice-fields to escape from the
soldiers— which makes me hate the whitecoat.
(italics mine, p. TTj
By the time the first volume is more than half over ("By
Wilming Weir"), her advance in understanding of the revolt
as well as her progression toward the part she will play
in it in Vittoria is disclosed. She is moved to tell
Wilfrid, her "English lover," that she is "like Italy in
chains to that German [probably Beethoven] and you"
(p. 215). Of course, her "German," who "is not a brute,"
represents music, while Wilfrid represents, through her
mistaken apprehension, love; both have in common a
forcible detention of her spirit, which she signifies by
her feeling that she is in chains and which she identifies
with the slavery Austria imposes upon Italy. This early
identification of herself with Italy, only tangential at
this point, grows until she writes to Merthyr, as she
prepares to leave England for Italy,
246
If Italy knew as well as I, she would never let her
voice be heard till she is sure of it: — Yes I from
foot to head, I knew it was impossible to fail. If
a country means to be free, the fire must run through
it and make it feel that certainty. Then— away the
whitecoat! (p. 337)
In ascribing a voice which is unsure to Italy, in echo of
her own experience, and, conversely, in seeing in Italy's
enslavement her own predicament, Emilia closely identifies
herself with Italy for the reader. He is prepared during
the course and especially in the conclusion of Sandra
Belloni for her role in Vittoria.
As important as are Emilia-Vittoria's few statements
concerning her love for Italy and espousal of its cause,
the interweaving of other voices gives her words greater
pitch and force. The play of voices brings out the
harmonic progression in feeling and attitude. Already
partially demonstrated has been the importance of the
narrator's voice. In Sandra Belloni, his subtle touches
help to identify Emilia with Italy: the narrator tells
the reader that she sings only Italian and Neapolitan airs
as she delights her informal audience in the fir-wood;
then Pericles says that Emilia's own composition is
"Italian— yes, I swear it is Italian" (p. 13). However,
it is the narrator who performs as the chief source for
her connection with Italy when he reveals her imagining
"the bright Italian plains" on which "Fancy" enables her
to march with Wilfrid in company with the "regiments of
247
Italy, under the folds of her free banner," singing to
"the victorious army" and, finally, "turning to him, the
dear home of her heart, yet pale with the bleeding of his
wound for Italy" (pp. 118-119) . The revelation is, though
from the narrator, in the dreamy tone of a young girl's
imaginings, but with enough underlying reality to make the
imaginary scene one that is to be actually realized in
Vittoria's singing as a service to the cause and at the
triumphal ceremony "at the grand Duomo," and her nursing
of unknown wounded soldiers on the battlefield and of
Merthyr. Other voices which help identify Emilia with
Italy are Lady Charlotte's, in stating that for Merthyr
Emilia is "Italy in the flesh" (II, 106), and Marini's,
in writing that Merthyr "sees [Italy] in her face— her
voice— name— anysing! And a day passed, and I could not
lose her for my own sake, and felt a somesing, too!"
(p. 120).
The narrator's and Colonel Pierson's voices combine
with Emilia's to help in displaying her partisanship in
yet another way. The narrator tells the reader that
Colonel Pierson, visiting his sister's children and his
brother-in-law Pole on a leave from the Austrian army
quartered in Verona, observes "one day at table," that
"the chief men" of Milan should be flogged to teach that
city a lesson. Calling his statement an instance of
"senseless arrogance," the narrator informs the reader
248
that "Emilia looked at him until she caught his eye" and
then her voice is heard to say, "I hope I shall never meet
you there" (pp. 249-250). In further riposte, Emilia
replies to the colonel's statement that it is "only the
women who do anything over there," with "And that is why
you flog them!" by which quiet comment, the narrator
explains, she causes the colonel to redden again (p. 250).
The depth of Emilia's feeling is evidenced by the contrast
here with her retiring and polite demeanor throughout the
rest of Sandra Belloni as well as her discomfort during
Laura's breakfast-table jousting with Count Lenkenstein in
Vittoria.
Actually, however, it is only after her own maturing
experiences, recounted later in the first volume, which
include her own (not her father's) fleeing and hiding
from misunderstanding, mistreatment, and defeat, that her
dislike for Austrians rests on a broader base of princi
ple. Still, with psychological truth, an echo of her
first bias resides in her cry (which seems extreme without
this explanation of it) that "Those Austrians make children
betray their parents" (II, 256). Nonetheless, filial
matters have become secondary in her development as a
"true Italian"(p. 254). For her, as for the Brancianis,
dying and spilling blood do not seem a "waste" if they are
for the Italian cause (p. 255) . By the end of Sandra
Belloni, she writes in the letter to Merthyr that she
249
goes to Italy "a daughter . . . like a machine ready to
do [her] work." Her words reveal her to be aware of the
Italian political situation without the earlier dreaminess.
I see the faults of my country— Oh, beloved Brescians!
not yours, Florentines! Not yours, dear Venice! We '
will be silent when we speak of the Milanese, till
Italy can say to them, "That conduct is not Italian,
my children." I see the faults. Nothing vexes me.
(p. 339)
Her growth in feeling and understanding about the political
situation, beginning with the simple taking up of her
father's ideas, has been indicated to be tied to her
personal growth. Before her final comment in Sandra
Belloni, quoted above, her strongest support of Italy had
occurred in her attempts to dissuade Wilfrid from taking
a commission in the Austrian army. When he does not
respond to her argument constructed around the Branciani
case, she cries,
You understand us no better than an Austrian. He
handed in names— yes! He was obliged to lull sus
picion. Two or three of the least implicated
volunteered to be betrayed by him; they went and
confessed, and put the Government on a wrong track.
Count Branciani made a dish of traitors— no true
men— to satisfy the Austrian ogre. . . . he weeded
the conspiracy! (p. 263)
Emilia's calling those least implicated men, who, rather
bravely it seems, volunteered, "no true men" appears
unreasonable unless viewed as a measure of her heated
state at the moment, due both to her perturbation over
Wilfrid and her fervor for the Italian cause. Moreover,
the unreasonable harshness provides a measure for her
250
growth as it almost exactly balances in positioning within
the two novels with her healing action in helping a lamed
Whitecoat toward the end of Vittoria (p. 332). The prom
ise she finally extracts from the wily Wilfrid is to
remain in England so long as she also remains. Thus, she
hopes to keep him from the cruel and perverse influence
of the Austrians, who would cause him to murder her
countrymen and flog the women (p. 304) in a way that his
uncle seemed to countenance.
In Vittoria, Emilia-Vittoria's identification is with
Camilla, the part of Young Italy which she plays in the
opera and which is especially reflective of the parts
that both she and Carlo play in the revolution. It is,
incidentally, the manner of reflection, as Emilia-Vittoria
looks to other characters and to the narrator, and even
her own reflections upon the past, that constitute the
chief ways in which she is revealed also in Vittoria as an
Italian patriot. The narrator's description of Vittoria's
appearance on the mountain with the band of conspirators
is tacit announcement of her zeal for the cause. Then her
own voice sounds against objections to her involvement on
the bases that she is only a woman and so not a good
soldier and that she will place herself in extreme danger.
Next the narrator's voice is heard again, to let the
reader see her as she listens to the chief speak. She
sits with
251
. . . her hands disjoined, and she stretched her
fingers to the grass, supporting herself so, while
her extended chin and animated features told how
eagerly her spirit drank at positive springs, and
thirsted for assurance of the coming storm. (I, 25)
Later the narrator explains that Carlo had discovered that
not a poetic declamation about Italy, but rather "a sharp
display of figures" in support of Italy's cause "kindled
her cheeks and took her breath" (p. 192). The fact that
some speak disparagingly of her patriotism helps to convey
its strength: Luigi quotes an exasperated Pericles as
having said, "A patriot is she!" when he is forced finally
to explain his presence on Monte Motterone as due to
Pericles' anxiety about her safety (p. 51).
Again, as in Sandra Belloni, Vittoria makes relatively
few patriotic speeches herself in Vittoria. The effect is
that she seems preeminently concerned with acting on
behalf of the cause. She does, however, write a letter
again to attempt to dissuade Wilfrid from wearing "the
detestable uniform" of the enemy: "When you are beaten
back, you can have no pride in your country, as we
Italians have; no delight, no love." Identifying him with
Austria in this manner, she still seems to hope that he
would sever his alliance "with a band of butchers" if she
could tell him the "story of Giacomo Piaveni" (p. 87).
In this last hope she evidently forgets the failure of her
earlier attempt to influence him with the story of the
Brancianis.
252
Her devotion to the cause also underlies another
instance of her insistence, unless forbidden by the Chief,
upon singing the signal song, over objection this time
because of the butterfly warning. She avers that she
dares "nothing" in "simply" doing her "duty" (p. 150).
Even in this scene, however, her voice is subordinated
not only to Laura's, but also to the narrator's. The
latter actually conveys much more about Vittoria and the
strength of her conviction and loyalty to the cause by
noting Laura's "sharp stinging utterances," which come more
rapidly than "Vittoria's unwavering replies, less frequent,
but firmer and gravely solid" (p. 150). It is also the
voice of the narrator which presents Carlo's reactions to
Vittoria in this scene in a further support of her
character: Carlo "perceived the stature of Vittoria's
soul." He thinks, the narrator continues, that the
Chief's support of her "perhaps" exists because he "has
known a one such as she" (p. 151). And, indeed, the
Chief had said,
. . . let no strong man among us despise the help of
women. I have seen our cause lie desperate, and
those who despaired of it were not women. Women
kept the flame alive. They worship in the temple of
our cause. (p. 25)
Involved, then, is a concert of voices speaking either
directly or indirectly of Vittoria in order to strengthen
the notion of her commitment.
Even Laura's voice joins in positive comment with
253
the narrator's and Carlo's in the above scene, as opposed
to her earlier negative speeches, to comment that Vittoria
"talks like the edge of a sword," although she continues
her protest in saying that Vittoria will cause blood to
flow needlessly. Carlo's sustained support of Vittoria
counterpoints Laura's objections as he refuses to condemn
Vittoria for "inconsiderate wilfulness" in her determina
tion to give the signal for the uprising (p. 152) . This
scene illustrates the ways in which voices sound through
out the two volumes of Vittoria to weave an intricate
melody of intrigue and of suspicion involving the heroine
so that even her friends sometimes suspect her of indis
cretion, or for other reasons try to deter her from serv
ing in the way she believes she must. Barto Rizzo's
distrust of Vittoria, which precipitates some of the
plottings against her, is based upon a "general contempt
for women" (a subject to be discussed in more detail on
pages 268 to 276). He therefore works that she should
not "give the signal" (I, 81). The innocent letter by
which she hoped to keep her English friends, Adela Sedley,
Captain Gambier, and Wilfrid Pierson, from injury seems
to this arch-conspirator to be indicative either "of
imbecility or of treachery" (p. 81). The real reason
(Emilia-Vittoria's closeness to earth and so true impetus
toward charity or, more truly, toward union and harmony)
is quite beyond him. Throughout both volumes, Barto's is
254
the main voice of opposition, although Corte also argues
against Vittoria's participation in the conspiracy.
(Anna, Violetta, and Irma are hostile toward Vittoria
for other reasons than political; they are jealous either
of her person, her power, or her voice.) Barto, however,
identifies her as a threat to Italy:
Twice betrayed, his dreams and haunting thought cried,
"Shall a woman betray you thrice?" In his imagination
he stood identified with Italy: the betrayal of one
meant that of both. (p. 82)
Barto Rizzo's accusations then provide a sounding-
board against which other voices play, usually in defense
of Vittoria. The narrator speaks for Luigi, from whom
Barto hopes to discover damning evidence against Vittoria.
When Barto indicates his suspicion of Vittoria, Luigi is
astounded that he should question one
. . . who had undertaken a grave, perilous, and immi
nent work. Nothing but the spontaneous desire to
elude the pursuit of a questioner had at first in
stigated his baffling of Barto Rizzo, until, fearing
the dark square man himself, he feared him dimly for
Vittoria's sake; he could not have said why. She
was a good patriot: wherefore the reason for wishing
to know more of her? (pp. 70-71)
Both Agostino's and Carlo's voices also rise in
defense of Vittoria's name against Barto Rizzo's malign
ings. Agostino, however, vacillates in his attitude to
cause the reader to be unsure of him and to wonder about
Vittoria, even as Agostino and Laura had been made to do
(to be discussed in Chapter III). Agostino first ascribes
Barto's machinations as "a device of the enemy" (p. 120);
255
but, later, after listening to Count Medole's acceptance
of Vittoria's not being "trustworthy," he believes "an
indiscretion . . . possible" (p. 123). In answer to
Carlo's angry protest, Agostino sharply reminds that "the
question concerns the country, not the girl" and adds that
Carlo's strong indications of love "scarce give her much
help" (p. 124). Later Agostino says that his primary
concern is that his "daughter shall never help to fire a
blank shot," for "if she sings that song" while Medole
has stopped the rising, "the ear of Italy will be deaf
to her for ever after" and her efforts will be only
"dedicated to a brawl" (p. 225). Still in the same mood,
Agostino says he is ready to "throttle" Barto, "the
sinner," because, in going "too far, too far," he put a
"blot" on Agostino's "swan" (p. 226). His vacillation is
finally explained through the narrator's presentation of
Carlo's reactions as due to Agostino's own nature and not
to any fault of Vittoria:
Agostino had betrayed his weakness to the young man,
who read him with the keen eyes of a particular
disapprobation. He delighted in the dark web of
intrigue, and believed himself to be no ordinary
weaver of that sunless work. It captured his
imagination, filling his pride with a mounting
gas. Thus he had become allied to Medole on the one
hand, and to Barto Rizzo on the other. (p. 227)
Here again is demonstration of the close attention Meredith
demands in the reading of the Italian novels. Yet Meredith
is also careful in providing occasion for the reader's
256
comfortable acceptance of truth here by providing the
narrator's reinforcement of Carlo's voice, a support
required by that upon which Agostino had commented: that
Carlo's love for Vittoria and his earlier impassioned
defense of her calls into question his ability to judge
objectively.
It is also interesting that the narrator identifies
all those who oppose Vittoria's political efforts as
"conspirators," a designation which seems to have a
meaning different from that of the term "conspiracy" in
which all the rebels, including Vittoria, are involved.
Corte has "the conspirator's head" (p. 15); Barto is many
times identified as "a conspirator" (p. 67) and it is
through the traits that he exemplifies that the reason
for Vittoria's differences are made clear. Barto, "the
Great Cat," believes himself the "mainspring of the
conspiracy" (p. 76) and trusts no one, not even his wife.
The narrator says that he has conspired "sleeplessly for
thirty years" (p. 77). Medole, on the other hand,
possesses an "intemperate vanity," according to the
narrator, that Carlo says causes him to try to "wind and
unwind the conspiracy like a watch" (p. 200). He is then
pictured as one who plays at being a conspirator. Carlo,
on the other hand, is more of a fighter than a conspirator.
Laura's words that he only "fancies he can intrigue" (II,
261) are borne out by the narrator's tale of Carlo's
entrapment that leads to his death.
Laura's reactions to Barto's warning with the
butterfly reverse Agostino's. As indicated earlier, she,
Carlo, and the narrator combine voices to disclose the
complications of her feelings. Before she had seen the
butterfly, she had, with ambiguity, told the Count, her
father, "there is not the slightest doubt of her capacity,
secretly meaning Vittoria's ability to forward the con
spiracy, adding ". . .we trust her to do what she has
undertaken to do" (I, 134). Later, Vittoria will defy
Laura in ironic support of this very insight. Now,
however, in order that her father not "trap" her into
revealing more than she should, Laura adds, the narrator
says, that Vittoria "has easy command of three octaves"
as her means to transform her "allusions . . . from
politics to Art" (p. 134). Her intent had been to cham
pion Vittoria as an active member of the rebellion, and,
as a matter of fact, her feelings about Vittoria are
closely interwoven with her love for Giacomo Piaveni and
so for Italy:
. . . you love what he loved. He seems to live for
me when they are talking of Italy, and you send your
eyes forward as if you saw the country free. (p. 139)
Carlo then explains Laura's initial lapse in belief
in Vittoria as due to her formerly having ignored the
warning Rizzo had sent to her husband, one that "would
have saved him." She was left with "evidently a rooted
258
superstitious faith in these revolutionary sign-marks.
. . . She loves you and believes in you, and will kneel
for forgiveness by-and-by" (p. 144). The narrator then
informs the reader that, in response to Vittoria's quiet
tears, Laura does confess herself to have been "a cruel
sister to her," as she draws "Vittoria's head against
her breast" {p. 146). Laura herself says, "I am despi
cable in distrusting her for a single second." Nonethe
less, she questions Beppo and prevents his leaving her
side while she goes to Duchess Graatli's, partially on
Vittoria's behalf (to discover any danger threatening
her if she sings) and partially to double-check on
Vittoria's innocence. To complicate the matter still
more, the narrator says that Vittoria too still worries
about "some grounds for special or temporary distrust"
(p. 147), so conscious is she, in her own words this
time, of "the lives that hang on" her part in the revolu
tion (p. 147). This tendency to distrust, or at least to
question her own motives is important in Meredith's
determining the ways in which to use voices (see pages 319
to 328) .
Against Rizzo's position and so in support of
Vittoria's continued effectiveness, the narrator notes
that
Ammiani, who moved in the centre of conspiracies
[note that he is not identified as a conspirator,
but that the phraseology denotes rather the opposite],
259
met at their councils, and knew their heads, and fre
quently combated their schemes, was not possessed by the
same profound idea (as Vittoria's] of their potential
command of hidden facts and sovereign wisdom. (p. 147)
Carlo goes on to charge Barto Rizzo as the trouble-maker
of the revolutionists.
. . . this devil, Barto Rizzo. . . . is the fanatic
of the revolution, and we are trusting him as if he
had full sway of reason. What is the consequence?
. . . where two hours previously, there was union and
concert, all are irresolute and divided. (p. 147)
The substance of the implied narrator's prejudice against
conspirators is contained in this charge: since the high
est ideals of the two Italian novels are those achieved by
the artist, or the leader, in effecting union and harmony,
the conspirator's effects of disunity and discord make him
an enemy of earth's forces for good. (Although the Austrian
army does unite, its is an artificial conjoining ["smithy"]
that prevents development and causes disharmony [see page
81] .)
This same problem of disunity, that of Italy's
fragmentation into provincial interests, lessens the
effectiveness of the uprising for which Vittoria does
indeed give the signal. Thus, although she functions in
the way designed, thrilling all who hear her, only out
breaks of fighting throughout the kingdom result, since
Italy will not unite under a common leader, whether the
Chief or Carlo Alberto. The fanatically suspicious Rizzo
and the proudly aristocratic Medole perform to instance
the wilful dismissal of orders that causes chaos within
the ranks of those Republican followers of the Chief,
these being also at odds with the royalist followers of
260
the king. In this way the signal's greatest effectiveness
is prevented, and not through any failure of Vittoria or
her song.
After her performance at the opera, in which she
gives absolute and distinctive demonstration of loyalty
and courage, no one but the fanatical Barto Rizzo and
the malcontent Corte seem to question Vittoria's loyalty
or the undeviating concentration of her efforts for the
revolt. Carlo's disagreement with Vittoria's attitude
toward the king elicits his written criticism, as well
as Laura's spoken one, but only on the grounds of
Vittoria's judgment, not her loyalty. Concern for
betrayal by Vittoria, whether it would be inadvertent or
not, is missing from the second volume of the novel,
except as it issues principally from the maddened Barto
Rizzo.
Vittoria proves in other ways that she will maintain
truth as she sees it, although her tendency to self
questioning causes her to be more forceful in defense of
others and of issues than she is of herself. It is with
courage as well as honesty that she will not, in order to
protect her reputation much less her opportunities to
perform for the cause, simulate a belief in the Lombardy
campaign, which she thinks an error. She bluntly tells
the crazed Barto Rizzo that she is not for it, knowing
that he will erroneously conclude that she is "not heart
261
and soul" in the rebellion and that he was correct in
dismissing her as "a little woman, a lovely thing, a toy,
a cantatrice" (II, 282-283).
The same spirit of honesty and courage animates
Vittoria as she confronts the formidable Ugo Corte, who
had resisted her right to serve from the first. She tells
Corte that she is as willing to sacrifice her own even
as her husband's life, both of which "belong to Italy,"
but that she objects to the current campaign as
"misdirected":
The King is in Ticino; the Chief is in Rome. I
desire to entreat you to take counsel before you
act in anticipation of the king's fortune. I see
that it is a crushed life in Lombardy. In Rome
there is one who can lead and govern. He has
suffered and is calm. . . . I know the hour is late;
but it is not too late for wisdom. (p. 286)
Revealed in this speech are her relative positions
toward the Chief and toward the king, another matter which
caused dissension to swirl around Vittoria. Just as even
those closest to her cannot understand her desire to help
her English friends, neither can they understand other of
her "humanitarian" impulses. Actually because of the
greater understanding and insight stemming from her
artistic nature, she is able to proceed independently of
the opinions and even the pressures of her fellow rebels.
Thus she supports the king in spite of the disaffection
of the crowd, the horror of Carlo, and the disapproval of
Laura. In answer to Carlo's letter objecting to her
262
having petitioned to kiss the king's hand, she asks if he
would have her "go against [her] nature" by denying the
king whom she had seen "upon the battlefield" and whom she
had heard speak"of Italy and our freedom" (pp. 165-166).
It is actually, then, by her own testimony, against her
nature to be untrue to her instinct, much less to dis
continue reliance upon that instinct which impels her
toward reconciliation and to harmony.
However, other complications attendant upon Vittoria's
support of the king in the face of the objections of her
betrothed, of her closest friend Laura, and of the noisy
crowds are well worth the attention to the various voices
raised concerning them. Again, the strains of Vittoria's
own voice, quietly and richly assertive of the truth as
she sees it, have as background the disagreement, agree
ment, and explanation of Carlo, Laura, and the narrator.
The republican forces' dislike for the king, based on
Carlo Alberto's indecisive and inconsequential efforts
to expel the Austrians, were early indicated in Vittoria
by Carlo and Agostino during an encounter with a young
mountaineer on their climb up Monte Motterone, and even
earlier by the narrator's words toward the end of Sandra
Belloni: "Great things were expected in Piedmont, though
many, who had reason to know him, distrusted the king"
(II, 305).
Following a dialogue with Violetta d'Isorella, during
263
which she first urges Carlo to join Count Medole in giving
"his adhesion to the King" for whom "Italy is a foremost
thought" and then reminds him of her former information
that "Vittoria is enamoured of the King" (p. 88), the
narrator's voice joins in to tell of Carlo's "thinking
moodily over the things she had uttered of Vittoria1s
strange and sudden devotion to the king" (p. 91).
Effecting a mystery, to be slowly unravelled with the
help of voices going back even to Sandra Belloni, Mere
dith's technique of multiple selective omniscience along
with editorial and neutral omniscience becomes immeasur
ably complicated. The neutral narrator's voice first
explains that Violetta's liking for kings is in her seeing
"neither master nor dupe in a republic" (p. 95). Then in
contrast he notes that Vittoria's support is made of a
strange mixture:
She had seen the king of late; she had breathed
Turin incense and its atmosphere; much that could be
pleaded on the king's behalf she had listened to
with the sympathetic pity which can be a woman's best
judgment, and is the sentiment of reason. She . . .
had thought that if the Chief could have her oppor
tunities for studying this little impressible, yet
strangely impulsive royal nature, his severe con
demnation of him would be tempered. (p. 97)
The neutral teller's attitude toward the king, going back
to Sandra Belloni and discernible here in such phrases as
"could be pleaded," implying the contrary, and the intima
tion of the heady influence of the court, is one contrary
to Vittoria's more tolerant opinion. An especial
264
indication of weakness in Vittoria's position in this
instance is that she is subject to the "sentiment of rea
son" toward the king. She is not here, nor is she ever,
indicated to possess sentiment of feeling; moreover, it
is important to note that the sentiment of reason is
ascribed to her sex and handled with patronizing tolerance:
In fact, she was doing what makes a woman excessively
tender and opinionated; she was petting her idea of
the misunderstood one: she was thinking that she
divined the king's character by mystical intuition;
I will dare to say, maternally apprehended it. (p. 97)
The kind of attitude toward women's inferior intellectual
ability that Meredith's own letter about women's diffi
culties with assimilation of abstract ideas had shown
occurs here in reference to the narrator's "pet," Emilia-
Vittoria. More importantly, however, is that the narrator
indicates that Vittoria's apprehensions have in them
something of a true evaluation of the king's character,
in that it was one "strangely open to feminine perceptions,
while to masculine comprehension . . . a dead blank, done
either in black or in white" (pp. 97-98) . There is here
a further separation of the modes of knowing in "feminine
perceptions" as opposed to "masculine comprehension,"
whether or not the former mode performs successfully.
The complications regarding attitudes toward women
are examined in more detail on pages 2 68 to 276 and 430;
here it may simply be noted that Laura, whose personality
is more aggressive and so a more masculine one than
265
Vittoria's, is more cautious in her acceptance of the king,
supporting him only "so long as he is true to Italy"
(p. 98). Carlo, on the other hand, writes to Vittoria in
urgent protest:
For the sake of the country, do nothing to fill me
with shame. The king is a traitor. I remember
things said of him by Agostino; I subscribe to them
every one. . . . if one could say that you cherished
a shred of loyalty for him who betrays [the country].
Great heaven! Am I to imagine that royal flatteries--
My hand is not my own! (p. 99)
Although Carlo's fear for the influence of "royal flatter
ies" smells of the "incense" of Turin's air, his major
objection is based on Agostino's opinions which he himself
sees as flawed by Agostino's love for intrigue. The
narrator also adds his voice in vindication of Vittoria
against a charge of utter fatuousness. She puts the king
to a test by petitioning, and gaining permission for
Agostino's return to Piedmont. Still, the narrator, too,
adds a reminder of Turin incense and royal flatteries in
noting that the king's praise of her "high courage on the
night of the Fifteenth" causes "an inexplicable new
sweetness running in her blood" (pp. 101-102).
In further argument against too great trust in the
king, Laura's voiced criticism of his lack of "masculine
ambition" is that it causes him to be "luckless" and so
"ungenerous." Such a king is potentially "mischievous";
these fears, the narrator says, are based on Laura's
knowledge of the king's "past deeds, which were not plain
266
history to Vittoria" (p. 104). Clearly then Vittoria's
position has within it some error, though much truth, as
does that of Carlo, whose stance exactly opposes hers.
Laura's middle position seems to have about it the most
valid notions about the king as they issue from the im
plied author and as they are corroborated in the epilogue.
That is, Laura's voice seems to warn of a possible defec
tion on the part of the king, which the neutral teller
may be seen also to suspect; whereas Vittoria's voice
shows her to have intuited his final vindication.
The narrator notes that Vittoria, in spite of the
"deepest wrath of the city" against the king as he leaves
"Milan to its fate," still "committed a public indiscre
tion." The implication is that she acted with her usual
high courage. Carlo's letter provides the reader with the
details of her kissing the king's hand in front of "the
poor bleeding people of Milan" (pp. 163-164). Even though
Carlo is angered by her act and implores her to "cease"
thinking "at all" for herself, he affirms that
To me your acts are fair and good as the chronicle
of a saint. I find you creating suspicion— almost
justifying it in others, and putting your name in
the mouth of a madman who denounces you. . . . Re
member that my faith in you is unchangeable, and I
pray you to have the same in me. (pp. 164-165)
It is further significant that Vittoria's sympathy
for and hope in the king, touched even though it may be
by the kind of royal adulation that Carlo shudders to
267
imagine, does not lessen her loyalty to the Chief or her
determination to serve him. Moreover, it is important to
note that no other evidence exists in either of the two
novels to indicate Emilia-Vittoria to have susceptibility
to title-worship; it is questionable, on the basis of
Meredith's intricate handling of voices in presenting the
truths of the novel, to place credence in one instance.
Certainly Vittoria's support continues to lie with the
Chief, of whom an unexpected view gives her, the narrator
says, a "bitter joy" (p. 157). It is bitter because she
is removed from the struggle and forbidden by the Countess
Ammiani, under whose care she now awaits Carlo, even to
stop and listen. She tries to imagine the Chief's
"utterance until her heart rose . . . A delicious stream
of music, thin as poor tears . . . like a life reviving"
(p. 158).
A study of Vittoria's voice, especially as it is
played against by the voices of Carlo, Merthyr, and Laura,
and as it is reinforced by the narrator's, reveals that
the focus is upon her maturation and growth within the
framework established by the analysis of the Queen of
Song's portrait in Sandra Belloni, that is, of her
humanity. As an artist, she is of the finest humanity,
and devoted to the highest in it. Her inclination, then,
is toward reconciliation. Appreciation of her performance
in the opera transcended any bitter line of separation,
268
even that as absolutely and feverishly maintained as
between Italians and Austrians (I, 246).
Even though, as mentioned earlier, the validity of
Vittoria's impulse of kindness and sympathy for the king
is supported in the novel's resolution, a problem of
women's role in politics or in national events centers
upon Emilia-Vittoria. However, the issue is also
illuminated by the voices of Rosellina Rizzo and Laura
Piaveni, and of those dealing with their situations. To
her husband, Rosellina is a tool to be employed, and, in
spite of the lack of intelligence from which the narrator
tells us she suffers, she resents Barto's treatment of
her, protesting that it could make one plan to betray him.
The narrator's description of her soft eyes and "maternal
aspect" when she is looking upon Rinaldo Guidascarpi
amply performs to demonstrate her difference from Barto's
other "wife," the small brass gun, and thus prove Barto's
error of judgment and of action.
It may be wondered, in examining Laura's speech and
that of others concerning her and her affairs, if she does
not represent one extreme and Rosellina the other.
Laura's is perhaps also not admired by the implied author
whose lessons on proportion as the ideal were presented
in the previous chapter. Certainly Laura's position is
also different from Emilia-Vittoria's, as is Rosellina's;
so that if the attitudes of these two women represent the
269
the two extremes, Vittoria's attitude is somewhere in the
middle, effecting a balance between or a harmonious
blending of the two.
Vittoria's voice is heard several times to indicate
an easy and accepting awareness of the lesser role she is
assigned because she is a woman. In the speech in which
she urges the rebels to look to Rome and to forsake the
Brescian campaign, she says, "Forgive me if I am not
speaking humbly" (II, 2 86) . Again, when she insists upon
singing the signal song, she softens the effect of aggres
sive determination by saying,
I know that a woman should never attempt to do men's
work. The Chief will tell you that we must all serve
now, and all do our best. (I, 41)
The fact that Merthyr disapproves of even Emilia-Vittoria's
moderate position appears in Sandra Belloni, where he
speaks disapprovingly not only of the "Carbonaro mysteries"
that Marini and his Chief indulge in, but also of the
"mixing-up of women in political matters" (Sandra Belloni,
II, 58). However, Merthyr has been demonstrated not to
understand Emilia-Vittoria's nature and so his voice may
not be accepted as presenting an attitude approved by
the narrator, especially since Carlo, who also assumes an
attitude of disapproval (only after their engagement does
he object on grounds other than real danger), is proved
to be wrong, and, moreover, Vittoria's involvement is
supported by the Chief (see page 252).
270
Certainly Vittoria's attitude contrasts with Laura's,
who, it will be remembered, dismisses even her duties as
a mother if they interfere with her revolutionary activi
ties (see page 161). Vittoria longs to escape the war by
joining a convent and then accuses herself of being a
"coward," a "thing of vanity," and a "mere woman" (11,9).
Later she longs to assume the responsibilities of marriage,
albeit at a time when she is wearied by the strife (her
words also mark another stage in the progression of her
attitudes toward the conflict):
She wept with longing for love and dependence. She
was sick of personal freedom, tired of the exercise
of her will, only too eager to give herself to her
beloved. The blessedness of marriage, or peace and
dependence, came on her imagination like a soft
breeze from a hidden garden, like sleep. But this
very longing created the resistance to it in the
depths of her soul. (p. 162)
That the longing is natural and perhaps even good may be
implied by the use of the "breeze" image. Vittoria does,
however, dismiss it in favor of the higher duty of her
service to the revolution, performed in this instance by
a ministry to the wounded Merthyr.
Laura never expresses any such longing for what seems
to be a more passive female role; instead she describes
herself as "an old volcano, cindery, with fire somewhere"
(p. 169). She would prefer to "be dragged through the
Circles of Dante" than to remarry, and then would "loathe
the stranger" who would attempt to replace her husband
271
(p. 169). Yet, she cries "with delight" at hearing of
Carlo's and Vittoria's marriage and sentimentalizes to
Amalia of the "two little lovers lying cheek to cheek!"
Immediately afterwards, she berates herself for forgetting
that "there may be dead men unburied still on the accursed
Custozza hill-top" (p. 231). Laura's sentimentalizing
over Vittoria's marriage may be because of nostalgic
remembrance of her own marriage with Giacomo. However,
as indicated, she quickly recovers herself with thoughts
of her present commitment. Nor does Laura ever show the
kind of reserve when in the band of conspirators that
Vittoria was shown to express. It may be argued that
Vittoria as a younger and an unmarried woman would natu
rally have a more reserved manner among the rebels than
would the widowed Laura, whose husband was important in
the movement. However, a glance at the manner of the
Countess Ammiani, whose husband was a general, as she
sits with her son and his young companions, serves to
inform the reader that Laura's manner is of itself more
assertive than is common among the women of her time and
place.
The narrator's voice first tells the reader that
Laura was "celebrated for her public letters, and the
ardour of her declamation against the foreigner" (I, 131).
He then tells the reader of the "aggressive war" she wages
against the Lenkensteins at the duchess' breakfast table.
272
Vittoria, he also informs the reader, is "not only inca
pable of seconding" the war, but "sickened at the
indelicacy" of it (II, 14-15). Laura's voice, with its
particular bias, is heard to say in later analysis of
the marriage of which she was so delighted to learn that
Vittoria "should lead the way" (p. 259; see also page 280
of this paper). Her belief, strained through the bias of
her personality, is not completely representative of the
truth as the implied author presents it throughout the
two novels. Her prejudice causes an over-stateraent
about Vittoria's political talents that are nowhere else
corroborated. That is, the power of Vittoria's nature
and of her artistic gift and her concomitant insight do
not give her a talent commensurate with the Chief's in
leading the revolution, or with Carlo's in leading
revolutionary forces.
The reactions of Vittoria and Laura on the battle
field have already been carefully detailed in Chapter I;
however, in full illustration of the notions that Emilia-
Vittoria's ideas are in a climactic order of growth and
that they contrast with Laura's, a brief mention of her
attitude toward war itself is necessary here. In Sandra
Belloni, "a wild April morning" is described by the
narrator as if from inside Emilia's consciousness. A
"cloud streaming by" bears
273
. . . the aspect of her life itself with nothing
hidden behind those stormy folds, save peace. . . .
The heavens were like a battle-field. Emilia shut
her lips hard, to check an impulse of prayer for
Merthyr fighting in Italy; for he was in Italy, and
she once more among the Monmouth hills: he was in
Italy fighting, and she chained here to her miserable
promise! (II, 300)
The longing for an active part seems to act as a check on
the seeming passivity of prayer as it relates to fighting,
but even more perhaps as a check on a feeble and perhaps
even hypocritical act while she is "in Monmouth" safe.
The repetition of "he was in Italy" and "fighting" also
contrasts against "Monmouth" and "chained," not only as a
contrast of place, but also of state of being, implicit
in the present participial ending of "fighting" and in the
past participial ending of "chained."
However, perhaps more important here is the fact that
behind her longing for involvement, Emilia also sees peace,
with a cessation of murder and flogging. Laura's vision
does not extend beyond storm clouds at any point, but
includes only scenes of dealing with "the white butchers."
She longs for cannon: "I worship cannon! They are the
Gods of battle" (I, 148). The uprising, she tells Carlo,
"is my husband to me" (p. 149). The narrator explains
that she is in a state "of anguish of hopeless remem
brance and hopeless thirst of vengeance" (p. 159) as the
widow of the slain Giacomo Piaveni. However, her nature
and manner of viewing life may also be involved in her
274
attraction for battle; she sees that men and women exist
in "two hostile camps" between which there may be "a sort
of general armistice," but also "everlasting strife of
individuals" (II, 45) . Her zeal for struggle never seems
to abate. Even though she recognizes that "women are
not allowed to fight," the key word "allowed" intimating
that she thinks them able, she believes they "forge the
sinews of war" through contributions of "lire and soldi"
(p. 96) .
Laura has none of the hesitation or self-doubt, much
less of the soul-searching propensities of Vittoria, who
"asked herself whether a woman who has cast her lot in
scenes of strife does not lose much of her womanhood and
something of her truth" (p. 154). Vittoria's question
recalls a similar reservation about women's involvement
in the narrator's comment about her inability to respond
to another human being when "she was stringing her hand
to strike a blow as men strike" (see page 121). But
Vittoria does not forget her human needs in viewing the
"tragedies written in fresh blood" on the battlefield:
"She felt as one in a war-chariot, who has not time to
cast more than a glance on the fallen" (p. 154). The
thought, although in the narrator's words, comes as if
from inside Vittoria's mind and reveals that she stands
outside her own dispassionate attitude and regrets its
existence. Laura, on the other hand, has no regret or
275
even concern for possible loss of womanhood. When
Vincenza is mentioned, she
. . . burst out: They are not cities, they are living
shrieks. They have been made impious for ever. Burn
them to ashes, that they may not breathe foul upon
heaven! (p. 16 0)
Regarding women's place in the rebellion, then, the
Chief's voice supports their effectiveness; Carlo at first
denies (on the successive bases of fear for Vittoria's
person and then jealousy of her as his betrothed and young
wife) and then affirms her personal effectiveness, thereby
implying the worth of the sex in its efforts toward the
revolution. Barto Rizzo consistently and vehemently
denies women's worth as revolutionaries, whereas Ugo
Corte has serious misgivings, as does Merthyr Powys.
Rosellina, Vittoria, Laura, and Countess Ammiani by their
words and their actions demonstrate the truth of the
affirmative position. However, the Countess Medole,
Violetta d'Isorella, and the Duchess Graatli (in her
affair with de Prymont, the Austrian officer) demonstrate
the truth of Meredith's own negative comment contained in
the letter quoted earlier about women's inability to
serve an abstract idea. The author's second self in the
two Italian novels, however, has no such generally cynical
view of women, even though he permits his heroine momentary
lapses, in admiration of the white uniform and of the
Austrian bugles (both of which can be seen as indications
276
of her movement toward a final realization of harmony),
and presents much controversy over her worth as an insur
gent and her judgment in selecting a leader.
The issues at stake regarding the claims of the
Chief and the King for loyalty and support have substan
tially to do with the question of leadership. A minor
issue, it nonetheless appears in both novels. In the
microcosmic world of Sandra Belloni, it has to do with
social matters; but, as indicated, in Vittoria, the matter
is political. Early in Sandra Belloni, the narrator
reveals Mr. Pole as totally incapable of the leadership
of men. Able to deal with money in his merchant world,
he does not know how to cope with people, as with the
Hillford and Ipley groups. The narrator, as if within
Mr. Pole's consciousness, relates that he was uneasy at
their appearance, although "aware that he was being treated
to the honours of a great man of the neighbourhood." The
narrator also tells that Mr. Pole "grew aware of the
unnecessary nervous agitation into which the drum was
throwing him" (p. 73). (The morally-underdeveloped
Violetta is also to have an extreme reaction to the
primitively-beating drum in Vittoria.) Mr. Pole is able
successfully to name "the amount of his donation" to the
Ipley group, but upon the disgruntlement of the Hillford
men and their jeering song, his own voice is heard in
helpless protest:
277
What could I do? I couldn't subscribe to both. They
don't expect that of a lord and I'm a commoner.
(p. 82)
Confessing that he had been made to feel "uncomfortable,"
he expresses a preference for London, where "you make your
money, pay your rates, and nobody bothers a man" (p. 82).
In sum, the narrator characterizes Mr. Pole as
. . . one of those men whose characters are read off
at a glance. He was neat, insignificant, and nervously
cheerful; with the eyes of a bird that let you into
no interior. {p. 125)
The narrator also informs the reader that Mr. Pole's
children deal with him as with an employee, a "treasurer,"
and their voices are heard giving evidence that neither
they nor the servants treat him with any loyalty. Wilfrid
comments upon Gains ford's manner as "a specimen of the
new plan of treating servants" (I, 149); the "plan" is
that of Pole's daughters, however, since he relinquished
all control into their hands. Laura Tinley gives even
more direct and ironic comment on the state of Pole's
mastery in his own home when she notes, what she has good
reason to know, that "more gossiping servants than the
Poles always, by the most extraordinary inadvertence,
managed to get, you never heard of!" (II, 311). A more
overt instance of Mr. Pole's lack of authority over his
servants is their refusal to obey his direct order.
During Mrs. Chump's excited accusations of robbery, "Mr.
Pole had several times waved to the servants to begone;
but they had as always the option to misunderstand author
itative gestures" (I, 181). That his order is a mere
"gesture" and that theirs is the habit of disobedience
testifies well to Mr. Pole's ineffectuality as a leader
of men.
His daughters inherit, too, an inability to lead,
although the narrator informs the reader that their
highest hopes are involved with "queenly" ambitions "to
become the heads of a circle" (p. 23). Therefore, in
their maneuverings,"Adela was ordinarily the promoter,
Cornelia the sifter, and Arabella the director of schemes
(p. 28). Lady Gosstre is their model in their attempt
to gain
. . . a quality beyond art, beyond genius, beyond
any special cleverness; and that was, the great
social quality of taking, as by nature, without
assumption, a queenly position in a circle, and
making a harmony of all the instruments to be found
in it. (p. 37)
The gravest implication of improbability of success in
their endeavors is included in the necessity to make
harmony. The narrator also tells the reader that Ara
bella's success as a hostess at Besworth ironically
results from accidental conditions:
. . . the pressure of grief and dread, and the con
trast between her actions and feelings, forcibly
restrained a vain display. As a consequence, she
did her duty better, and won applause from [Lady
Gosstre's] moveable court. (II, 1)
Lady Gosstre’s leadership ability is described by the
279
narrator for contrast. Her "hint to Georgiana and Lady
Charlotte, prompt lieutenants," effects the dispersion of
a too-crowded circle and elicits Adela's comment that she
"never" will "understand" Lady Gosstre1s gift of tactics
(pp. 8-9). Nor is Wilfrid successful in his attempt to
extricate himself from the relationship into which he has
drifted with Lady Charlotte. The narrator says that
Wilfrid was "too much of the straw at the moment to be
capable of leading-moves" (p. 93). It is significant, in
view of the horse imagery used for Wilfrid (see pages 233
to 234), that Lady Charlotte, who "led gallantly" when "in
the hunting-field" (p. 4), and to whom Wilfrid is "in
harness," should be clearly in command of Wilfrid.
In Vittoria the leadership issue involves Italy's
freedom. Vittoria clearly has some power to rally and to
unite through her Art, but she serves, in the arena of
politics, under the chief; and she is not shown to have
talents of political administration. The main considera
tions of leadership in Vittoria have to do with the
republican Chief versus the royalist king, with a man of
the people versus a member of a royal house, and with
personal charisma versus the "incense" emanating from the
court. Already noted are some of the claims of the Chief
as opposed to those of the king for the loyalty of the
people. Vittoria's impulse, also noted earlier, has been
to effect reconciliation and so unity and a greater
280
strength. Her vision is, as also indicated, eventually
realized.
Of the two men, the Chief is early established by the
narrator to be of leadership caliber. His capabilities
are "a capacious and a vigourous mind" with eyes that a
side view reveals have "a quick pulse of feeling" (I, 10).
Besides an "orbed mind," he has also an "orbed nature.
The passions were absolutely in harmony with the
intelligence" (p. 11). This harmonious blending of
passion and reason is expressive of Meredith's ideas of
virtue as presented throughout the Italian novels as well
as in his poetry, especially in "The Woods of Westermain."
It perhaps should be noted here that in the narrator's
description of the Chief's mind (one "both reasoning and
prompt . . . supplying its own philosophy, and arriving
at a sword-stroke by logical steps" [p. 10]) some dis
tinction is set up between his intellectual abilities and
Vittoria's more intuitive perception, in order further to
eliminate her from consideration as a leader in the same
way.
The king, on the other hand, is characterized by
Laura, according to the narrator, as one who is "not to
be confided in firmly when standing at the head of a great
cause" (II, 103). But Laura's voice is not alone in
expressing lack of confidence in the king. The narrator
in his own person notes that "others work for the king"
281
before he himself "had done a stroke to conquer the
Austrians for the people" and, again, that "all Italy was
ready to bow in allegiance to a king of proved kingly
quality," the inference being that he had not appeared.
The king is not portrayed as having the harmonious nature
and the gifts that the Chief has.
It is the narrator who also informs the reader that
Austria "conceived that she had but one man and his feeble
instruments and occasional frenzies opposed to her," by
which the Chief is signified as if from Austria's point
of view:
It was her belief that if she could seize that one
man . . . she would have the neck of the conspiracy
in her angry grasp. (p. 220)
With the next sentence, the narrator confirms Austria's
belief, though at first still using the metaphoric term
of a fowl:
Had she caught him, the conspiracy for Italian
freedom would not have crowed for many long
seasons; the torch would have been ready, but
not the magazine. (I, 220-221)
Vittoria, who had begun serving under the Chief even in
Sandra Belloni, contrary to the disapproval of Merthyr
(see also pages 269 to 270), discerns "the sudden unveil
ing of [the Chief's] mastery," as she listens to him
speak. His words constitute the source for her discovery:
The hope in the bosom of a man whose fixed star is
Humanity becomes a part of his blood, and is extin
guished when his blood flows no more. To conquer
282
him, the principle of life must be conquered. And
he, my friend, will use all, because he serves all.
(p. 28)
Vittoria's understanding of the Chief is based on her
understanding of herself and, of course, traces to her
artistic nature.
Those who look "hopefully to Charles Albert" are
nobles whose detestation for republicanism springs largely
from a desire to avoid "payment of fifty to sixty percent
to the Government on the revenue of their estates" (p. 80).
Of that number is Count Medole, whose inability to regu
late the conduct of his wife is evinced in her affair
with Prince Radocky. Medole's "pretensions to leadership"
on the basis of a mistaken "reliance on his powers of
mind" actually result in his being a dupe for Barto Rizzo,
who accepts employment from him in order to "wield a tool
for his own party" (pp. 80-81).
Rizzo, whose forte is conspiracy and intrigue rather
than leadership, actually succeeds in using Medole, rather
than leading him.
. . . master of the machinery of plots, he was
ready, upon a whispered justification, to despise
the orders of his leader, and act by his own light
in blunt disobedience. (p. 77)
Thus, although he dominates his wife Rosellina by spying
and startling as well as by bribing with wine dinners,
and even dominates Luigi through terror and guile, he is
not a leader, but rather a disruptive force by reason of
283
his mad suspicions. Yet even Rizzo is said by the
narrator to yield finally to the Chief "through adhesion"
(p. 81) .
Even within the Ammiani family, some division of
loyalty appears. Countess Ammiani, whose husband served
with the old army, deplores her son's republicanism,
although she supports his efforts. It is as an aristocrat
that the narrator says she defends Count Medole:
Her soul shrank at the thought of the revolution
being yielded up to the theorists and men calling
themselves men of the people— a class of man to
whom Paola her soldier-husband's aversion had
always been formidably pronounced. (pp. 207-208)
Carlo, moreover, although aware of "changed" times and
"necessities of the hour," cannot "gainsay her when she
urged that the nobles should be elected to lead, if they
consented to lead; for if they did not lead, were they
not excluded from the movement?" (p. 208) . Luciano
Romaro, Carlo's close friend and fellow rebel, rejoins
that "men who are born" to leadership, i.e., the aristo
crats, should have the "first chance." But, though the
"people owe them their vantage ground," if they try and
fail, "decapitate them" (p. 208).
The author's implied self thus may be seen to admire
the Chief (a character based on Mazzini^), but to support
^Jack Lindsay, George Meredith: His Life and Work
(London: The Bodley Head, 1956) , p. 166.
the right of leadership on behalf of the able aristocracy.
In employment of imagery and of masks through which the
voices speak, the author's second self also displays a
relatively advanced attitude toward war, one integrated
from the beginning of Sandra Belloni and calculated to
reveal, along with attitudes toward art and toward love,
Emilia-Vittoria's growth as a woman and as an artist. He
may also be seen to have a moderate view concerning the
position of women in politics and, hence, in the serious
business of life. His is not the extreme position of
either Barto Rizzo or Laura Piaveni; but rather that of
his heroine, Emilia-Vittoria, who possesses a "proper"
recognition of her limitations as a woman along with a
fitting realization of her capabilities and talents. And,
finally, the talent for leadership may be seen to be
revealed by the author's implied self as residing in the
same kind of harmonious balance that constitutes the
talent for artistic performance and composition.
Voices in Denial of Theological Values and
in Affirmation of Humanitarian Standards
Humanitarian, not theological values are those around
which the virtues assemble, including those which animate
love and vivify the family. Dedication to others and
truthfulness within relationships were demonstrated in
the previous chapter to be both pictorially and dramati
cally presented. Whereas the weight of the argument for
285
humanitarianism over religiousness rests on a positive
presentation of the attitudes toward love and the family
(again as represented in Chapter I), voices within the
two novels combine to present explicit denials that good
ness and virtue reside in the conventional, church-going
pattern of life. (Meredith himself had intimate knowledge
of this pattern as he testified when, "as witness in a
case brought by a certain James Pinnock . . . in 1890,
against Chapman and Hall," he stated that he had "learnt
his Catechism" in his "youth."®) As already seen, the
pious practices of the Poles, taken up laterly along with
habitation in the country, have no power to transform
either their relationships with each other or the sterility
of their lives.
Godlessness is not a factor in the Italian novels;
eschewing of traditional religious observances is. Even
though Meredith did object to Christianity per se, the
only organized religion specifically mentioned in the
novels is Roman Catholicism. Obviously Meredith, a
Victorian writing in the wake of the Oxford Movement,
would be safer in criticizing by name this religious body,
without the risk of estranging his reader, than in scoring
the established church. However, his attacks on both
8 Amy Cruse, The Victorians and Their Reading (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company", 1935, reprinted 1962), p. 287 .
286
Catholicism and a nameless English church are somewhat
gentled by his belief that Christianity had performed as
"a light" and had done "a service to men" in its early
history. Still he hoped for the time when "men's minds"
would "be strong enough . . . to escape from the tutelage
of superstition" (Letters, I, 322). Certainly he was
distressed at "those bleeding tortured images by the
wayside" in Catholic Italy, images which he must have
considered especially illustrative of the kind of "super
stition" to which he objected.
Thus, although Meredith does criticize a nameless
English church (which, it must be assumed, was Anglican,
on the grounds that the socially-conscious Pole sisters
would not waste time with a socially-unacceptable funda
mentalist group), his more overt criticism of Catholicism
was based on real feelings in addition to possible economic
considerations. Yet Meredith's reading (though incom
pletely revealed in Williams' listing) does not seem to
indicate his having done much reading of philosophy at
all, much less of Catholic philosophy. (Of course, his
knowledge of the Anglican church came from personal
experience.) The preponderance of authors, even when the
works are about Catholic saints (Joan of Arc and Anselm),
are non-Catholic writers. He did have a transcript of
Joan's trials by Jules Quicherat, who had a Catholic back
ground. Interestingly, two of the other authors with
287
Catholic background, represented on his reading list, are
Ernest Renan, who left the church in 1845, and the
Reverend F. Mahony, a defrocked Jesuit priest.
Meredith, of course, was not incapable, when on the
continent as well as in England, of observation and of
conversation about Catholicism with religious men and
women (although it will be remembered that he did not
speak Italian). However, both of these methods of learning
about religion and philosophy have some limitations, even
if Meredith had been so fortunate as to have encountered
people able to articulate cogently their deepest beliefs
about God and religion. At any rate, in spite of distaste
for religion, whether Catholic or Anglican, and probable
ignorance of the Catholic, Meredith had a deep respect
for Christianity's moral teachings. In 187 2, he was to
write to his elder son, Arthur:
. . . that at the same time [as voicing criticism
you] can recognize [religion's] moral value, is
matter of rejoicing to me. The Christian teaching
is sound and good: the ecclesiastical dogma is an
instance of the poverty of humanity's mind hitherto,
and has often its hideous fangs and claws shown whence
we draw our descent. (p. 455)
A letter written even closer in time to the composi
tion of the two Italian novels (1865) to his friend
Frederick A. Maxse reveals an even friendlier attitude
toward the "outworn creed":
. . . Christianity will always be one of the great
chapters in the History of Humanity: that it fought
down brutishness: that it has been mother of our
288
civilization: that it is tender to the poor, maternal
to the suffering, and has supplied for most, still
supplies for many, nourishment that in a certain state
of intelligence is instinctively demanded. . . . Since
it did such a service to men, men I think should not
stand out against it without provocation. (p. 322)
And, indeed, the 1864 Sandra Belloni seems dedicated not
so much to criticism of any explicit religion as to the
criticism of attitudes toward it, or to the religiosity
of the "little people" in the microcosmic merchant world.
In this commentary, as well as in the criticism of the
church and the clergy that does exist, the removed
narrator's ironic voice is most often heard with the tone
of an indulgent, though sometimes impatient Comic Spirit.
Neither the Poles themselves, nor any other voice
concerning them, testify to their having a vital and
vitalizing belief. All evidence points to their attend
ance at church while at Brookfield as at a social event;
they later praise the organ-playing and ignore the fact of
a sermon. However, since the narrator does not indicate
Emilia, either, to have any interest in Mr. Marter, the
Curate's messages (I, 251), it may be that he truly is
more remarkable for the music his church offers, although
the narrator tells of Arabella's writing that his interest
in "Gregorian chants" makes his orthodoxy suspect (II, 6 2).
Moreover, Meredith's own experiences with sermons caused
him to think of them as "dull"^ and "horrors of ennui"
^Letters, ed. C. L. Cline (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1970) , II, 619.
289
(I, 181). He especially complained of a death oration
as having less "life" than the "spoken reality" of death,
being rather "like the dust of an artificial puffball
compared with a natural one" (II, 714).
Church-going is a country, not a city pastime for
the Poles. Arabella's letter to Wilfrid about their
poverty and the consequent necessity for their father's
marriage to Mrs. Chump implies a nostalgia in the
remembrance for their "old peaceful City-life" with the
"bells for Evening Service," which called forth, she
admits her comment with some rue, "the dowdy population
of heaven!" Arabella's remorse is not for lack of
belief, it may be noted, but rather for the disappearance
of happier days and, possibly, for a state seemingly
more contented. As she writes, the "dowdy population
. . . at least do not feel that everything they hope for
in human life is dependent upon one human will— the will
of a mortal weather-vane," by which she implies Wilfrid
himself (Sandra Belloni, II, 85). No indication of reform
either in their reminiscences or in the subsequent speeches
of any of the Poles can lead the reader to conclude that
the reason for religious observances will become a
matter of conviction of the truths of Christianity,
and so less hypocritical.
The events of the morning prayer service are told
290
primarily by the narrator, whose positioning "overhead"10
ensures maximum comic irony. The office of morning
reader, quite new to Mr. Pole, who has only taken it up
at his daughter's insistence along with his new role of
"first squire of Brookfield," is said to be stumblingly
rendered. As part of the general comedy, the narrator
includes the information that earlier services have been
marked by Gainsford's struggle against "a devil of
laughter" as he watches Mrs. Chump's uncertainties as to
"the condition of the hooks of her attire" and her
"mother's feeling for one flat curl on her rugged fore
head, which was often fondly caressed by her, for the
sake of ascertaining its fixity" ( I, 177-179).
The services are respectably Protestant; Adela,
after Mrs. Chump has "missed" one "by her late descent,"
asks "You are Protestant, ma'am, are you not? . . . Mrs.
Chump assured her that she was a firm Protestant" (p. 177).
That she is a firm one may have been especially important
since she has a brogue to counteract. The sisters do not
try to intimidate Lady Charlotte, who does attack Chris
tianity, seemingly without the "provocation" that
Meredith's letter showed him to think necessary. It is
also significant that, after Lady Charlotte's diatribe
l^George Meredith, "An Essay on Comedy," in Comedy,
ed. Wylie Sypher (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday Anchor
Books, 1956), p. 47.
291
against "the cant of a detestable school" that would con
sider "kindness" the mark of a "Christian gentleman,"
Emilia says simply, "I have not understood you at all"
(pp. 311-312).
Whereas Emilia is puzzled, Adela is self-righteously
disapproving. In the letter she writes to Arabella, she
protests Lady Charlotte's "detestable fling" at the clergy.
In this instance, as in the one above, discussion of
Merthyr precipitated the comment that "all priests" are
"hypocrites"; Lady Charlotte's "liking for Merthyr" is on
the basis that he "is never a buffoon nor a parson" (II,
63). The voices combine to reveal in Lady Charlotte's
a tone of undue harshness and in Adela's a typical hypoc
risy, not only because she pretends outrage at something
toward which she is utterly indifferent, but also because
she writes that which she will not speak to Lady Charlotte
herself.
Emilia's own voice, as well as the voices of others,
reveals that she is as ingenuous in her church attendance
as in all other facets of her life. The narrator helps
to reveal that her church-going is joined with her art
in that it, too, is to give pleasure. He summarizes the
Pole sisters' opinion that she plays the organ "in a
masterly manner" (I, 21), and Arabella's voice is heard
to call Emilia's music "a treat" (p. 21). In contrast,
Sir Purcell Barrett's organ-playing is on a business
292
basis; he receives a stipend from the church and is nowhere
indicated to have either a desire to give pleasure or a
belief in Christianity. Rather he states himself to be
lieve that
. . . through certain times and periods . . .
poisonous influences . . . touch my fate in the days
to come. I know I am helpless. I can only wander
up and down. (p. 170)
Retreat to a position of helplessness and the phraseology
of aimlessness and so lack of self-direction contradict
his denial to Cornelia that his "creed" is one of "fatal
ism"; he says it is "a matter of nerves" (p. 170).
However, it is fatalism that underlies "his determin
ation . . . to write his uncle . . . and to live as a
pensioner, if only Cornelia came to [their] tryst"
(II, 295). The happenstance of her meeting or not meeting
him as it will affect his living or dying is joined to
yet another manifestation of belief in chance. He loads
only one of the two "pocket-pistols," in order to launch
"luxurious speculation on the choice any hand might
possibly make of the life-sparing or death-giving of those
two weapons" (p. 295). The self-indulgence and the
caricatured romanticism are traits of the sentimentalist,
who also has a tendency to reproach "Providence" like a
boy who has "the natural sense to be ashamed of ill-luck,"
even when he lacks "courage to struggle against it." But
the narrator instructs, "the reproaching of Providence by
293
a man of full growth, comes to some extent from his mean
ness, and chiefly from his pride" (p. 281). The pagan
cast of Barrett's observance of "providence" appears in
the narrator's continuing explanation of Barrett's mean
philosophy:
He remembers that the old Gods selected great heroes
whom to persecute, and it is his compensation for
material losses to conceive himself a distinguished
mark for the Powers of air. One who wraps himself
in this delusion may have great qualities; he cannot
be of a very contemptible nature; and in this place
we will discriminate more closely than to call him
fool. (p. 281)
The narrator's forbearance in not calling Barrett either
contemptible or foolish is not to be mistaken for
approval, for Meredith stated that "from the Pagan divinity
to the Christian," he saw "an advanced conception" which
he believed nearer "to a general belief in the abstract
Deity" and so to a "comprehension of the principles
(morality, virtue, etc.) than which we require nothing
further to govern us" (Letters, I, 322).
Barrett is thus farther removed from such an ideal
point even than sincerely-practicing Christians (the
Poles, of course, are not that either). Perhaps it is
this difference from the Poles that distinguishes him
from "the larger body of our sentimentalists" who acqui
esce, sink, and bend; rather "he unhappily forgot what
was due to his own nature," that is, that as one of the
number of "little people," he must speak "under pressure
of a grief," But, then, the narrator adds, "the primary
task is to teach them that they are little people" (II,
281-282). Sir Purcell's sentimentality enables him to
envision Cornelia with the help of "his heated fancy"
with "every device and charm of sacredness , . . until
her march to the altar assumed the character of a
religious procession— a sight to awe mankind" (p, 295).
He imagines her standing "before the minister in her
saintly humility, grave and white, and tall" (p. 295).
The comically sad misjudgment of "the floating colossus,"
even though there are funny similarities in the two
descriptions, and the saccharine use of empty church
symbols contrasts with a less prettified championship of
Christianity by Barrett's landlady. Her solution to
religion's problems is to drink tea, which would make
men and women "more . . . Christian" (p. 299).
But, then, with a parson it's all kingdom come.
Lose a leg, save a soul— a convenient text;
I call it Tea doctrine, not savouring of God.
("Martin's Puzzle," in Poems, p. 180)
Sir Purcell's religiosity appears also in his comment
upon the Roman Catholicism rejected by Emilia (but evi
dently picked up again by Vittoria, see pages 304 to 307),
who follows "her father, who liked not the priests of
his native land well enough to interfere between his
English wife and their child in such a matter as religious
training" (Sandra Belloni, II, 255). Cornelia first notes
295
that if Mrs. Chump "were a Catholic she would not seem so
gross," implying that faults of the religion could then
be blamed for her character and manner. Sir Purcell
replies, revealing further an ignorance of religion,
which the implied author establishes himself also to
believe is not tied to the truths of Earth, and of poetry,
which must be devoted to Earth's truth and so to the Real
(Letters, I, 161-162) . Barrett says that "some of the
poetry of the religion would descend upon her possibly"
(Sandra Belloni, II, 187). The misunderstanding rests
also on the hypocrisy of these "little people," who give
only lip-service to a creed which is at best "super
stition," anyhow.
In Sandra Belloni heavier ammunition is leveled
against the practices of those who attend the unnamed
English church than against those of Catholics. Criticism
of the latter appears more strongly in Vittoria, especially
in relation to the priests. For instance, in explanation
of Barto's birth, the narrator hesitatingly presents one
of the stories so popular in nineteenth century anti-
Catholic literature of the fundamentalist type:
Barto Rizzo was, it was said, born in a village
near Forli, in the dominions of the Pope; accord
ing to the rumour, he was the child of a veiled
woman and a cowled paternity. (Vittoria, I, 77)
The dissociation of himself from this kind of story by
the narrator, although he does not desist from repeating
296
it, may be sensed in the two qualifiers in the first
sentence. First, "it was said" and then "according to
the rumour." Both emphasize the narrator's separation
from the story's source and question its accuracy. Barto
himself, no matter the accident of his birth, is not a
religious man.
Both Anna Lenkenstein and Laura Piaveni show more
interest in and involvement with Catholicism. Both even
express wishes to enter convents, and, surprisingly, so
too does Vittoria. Of the three women's voices expressing
this desire, Laura's is the most believable. She tells
Vittoria that Father Bernardus does not recognize that
she, more than Vittoria, "would be fair prey for an
enterprising spiritual father, as the destined man of
heaven will find out some day" (II, 52). Anna's desire
is from pique at the failure of her plot against Ammiani,
the loss of Weisspriess, and the unpleasant prospect of
marriage to the "short-sighted" Nagan (pp. 316, 322).
Vittoria's wish is expressed when she lies exhausted
from her travels through the Adige Valley and from worry
over Carlo's imprisonment. "In the desolation of her soul
[she] almost fashioned a vow . . . that she would leave
the world . . . and dedicate her life to God" (italics
mine, p. 8). That she is sincere is not in question, but
that the wish, as framed by the narrator and with the
adverb "almost," is the issue of weariness and
297
heart-sickness that questions "human effort" is of some
importance to the general treatment of religion in the
novel. Since the narrator has dropped the impudently-
mocking tone that he used in Sandra Belloni for the
seriousness of Vittoria, he most often treats of religion,
too, in a more serious, though still reserved manner. At
any rate, Vittoria's is a strange desire for her to have,
since it entails the withdrawal from life and from the
world of one who has been consistently identified as of
the earth and "animal."
In contrast to Vittoria's situation are those of
Anna and Laura, both of whom have lost their loves, Anna
through her own machinations which have estranged her
lover, and Laura through the war which killed her husband.
However, Laura's "By-and-by I think I see a convent for
me" has more of reality about it than Anna's "hysterical
hypocrisy" to "be out of the way" so that Weisspriess can
marry Lena, who has not squandered her money on plots
(pp. 314-316) . All three women, Anna, Laura, and Vittoria,
are also involved in the pictures of priests that are
presented in Vittoria. The gentle German priest, Father
Bernardus, attached to the Lenkenstein house; the "sleek"
village priest encountered by Vittoria and Laura on their
way to the battlefield; and the mild old "ecclesiastic"
connected with the Ammiani family, all offer glimpses of
clerics, and all appear in the second volume, in which
298
the somberness of the story increases, as the excitement,
that surrounded the climactic opera chapters, decreases.
Appearing first is Father Bernardus, whose descrip
tion issues from the mouths of the narrator, of Anna, of
Vittoria, and of Laura. Father Bernardus1 voice is also
responsible for his own delineation. The reliable narra
tor and Father Bernardus himself present the negative
aspects of his character. The final picture, as from the
author's second self, is one essentially unflattering to
the "holy father" (II, 5), even though the duchess calls
him "the worthy man" (p. 10); Laura says "that excellent
Father Bernardus" (p. 18); and Anna thanks God for him
(p. 5). Laura's voice is the most trustworthy, since she
is not undiscriminating in her praise for clerics, as her
words about the village priest will prove. Anna's
expressing gratitude for the priest is ironic, however,
since she dismisses his advice for helping her to bear
the grief of Weisspriess' serious condition after the
duel with Angelo:
Come in and give me tears, if you can; I am half
mad for the want of them. Tears first; teach me
patience after. (p. 5)
The most puzzling approval issues, however, from
Vittoria, who, upon learning that he is "of German birth,"
enigmatically remarks, "that makes it better. Remain
beside me. The silence is sweet music" (p. 7). Thus,
clear though it is that she does not wish to listen to
299
his importunities to confess or to the sweet consolations
of his religion, it is equally manifest that she enjoys
his company {which is "music" to her), not in spite of,
but because of his Germanness. Vittoria's reaction to
his being German, despite the horror she has long felt
for Germans as cruel and the struggle she made against an
attraction for Beethoven's music, can be explained only
in conjunction with a consideration of her total personal
ity and character as these have been presented throughout
the two Italian novels and in the description of the
Queen of Song.
It will be remembered that to be of the "highest
humanity" is to have a harmonious nature. That this is
the source of her attraction is made explicit by the
narrator:
Vittoria was ashamed to tell herself, how much she
liked him and his ghostly brethren, whose preaching
was always of peace, while the world was full of
lurid hatred, strife, and division. (p. 7)
Yet Father Bernardus' own speech offers a suspicious
ly fulsome rhetoric, to which the narrator's pointed
comments call attention. The narrator first introduces
Father Bernardus1 address by telling that the priest
supposed Vittoria to have "come to him with a burdened
spirit":
"My daughter," he addressed her. The chapter on
human error was opened: — "We are all of one family—
all of us erring children— all of us bound to abnegate
hatred: by love alone we are saved. Behold the Image
300
of Love— the Virgin and Child. Alas! and has it
been visible to man these more than eighteen hundred
years, and humankind are still blind to it? Are
their ways the ways of blood; paths to eternal misery
among the howling fiends. Why have they not chosen
the sweet ways of peace, which are strewn with flowers,
which flow with milk?" (pp. 5-6)
The language is so ornamented as to seem insincere, the
calculated stops in its passage recalling Emilia's objec
tion to poetry (Sandra Belloni, I, 131). The narrator's
ironical comment about a "chapter's" being opened also
prevents confidence in the priest's sincerity. The
narrator continues with subtly cautioning hints for the
reader who might be inclined to trust in the priest's
good will as Vittoria is seeming to do:
The priest spread his hand open for Vittoria's, which
she gave to his keeping, and he enclosed it softly,
smoothing it with his palms, and retaining it as a
worldly oyster between spiritual shells. "Why, my
daughter, why, but because we do not bow to that
Image daily, nightly, hourly, momently! We do not
cling to it, that in return it may cling to us."
(p. 6)
Herein the priest convicts himself of the crassest super
stition in worshipping an "Image" and in the impossible
notion of an inanimate Image's clinging to one, unless it
be as the millstone of superstition. Moreover, that the
priest should have "shells," as the passage proceeds,
rather than hands, aids in implying a certain emptiness
and coldness of his belief, and so, by association, of
him, too. His own responsibility for coldness is more
clearly indicated in his adaptation of his manner without
301
true feeling, but rather through unfeeling observation of
the effects he achieves, as in the passage below.
When Vittoria refuses to confess, "thereupon followed
a soft discussion that was as near being acerb as nails
are near velvet paws." The narrator adds that Father
Bernardus1 "inquisitions and the kindness went musically
together." The implications of the word "inquisition"
in connection with Catholicism and the description of the
"shade of discontent" that came over the priest's features
in contrast with his tone of "immense tenderness" seem
Machiavellian, as do his tactics, which the narrator con
tinues to describe. Father Bernardus
. . . was obliged, for the sake of impressiveness,
to speak . . . harshly; until he saw, that without
sweetness of manner and unction of speech, he left
her untouched; so he was driven back to the form of
address better suited to his nature and habits; the
end of which was that both were cooing. (pp. 6-7)
Any tendency of the reader to be lulled into acceptance
of a good-natured man by the intimation of a sweet charac
ter is abruptly dispelled by the descriptive word "cooing."
The wonder is that the discriminating Vittoria would
succumb to such hypocrisy. However, her belief as Emilia
in the Poles and, especially, in Wilfrid set a precedent
for this particular manifestation of innocence. Moreover,
no actual derogation of the priest exists, only subtle
implications that he is, at least, himself a victim of
a delusion.
302
Thus, Vittoria's "perception" of "the dear good
heart of the old man, who meant no harm to her, and
believed that he was making use of his professional
weapons for her ultimate good" is a reflection of her own
ingenuous nature, that would not permit her to pierce the
shell of Wilfrid's hypocrisy. Additionally, the narra
tor's voice in presentation of this analysis of Father
Bernardus does much toward substantiating that his is an
innocent, not malicious involvement in superstition. The
fact is that, besides Vittoria's inability to suspect
others of being either dishonest or unreliable for other
reasons, her impetus is toward union and harmony. This
characteristic is instanced in two other incidents with
Austrians. Her reaction to that "Austrianized Italian,"
the Duchess Lenkenstein, formerly Bianca Serabiglione,
who asks "Am I not a complaisant German?" reveals
Vittoria's wish for reconciliation: "If they were like
you." Laura's rejoinder displays her typically belliger
ent attitude as she adds that then "nothing would be left
for us . . . but to hate ourselves" (p. 13). The other
incident, a more significant one, is Vittoria's feeding
of a "footsore" Whitecoat even as she seeks her husband
on the battlefield on which the Whitecoat is the enemy
(p. 332) .
Vittoria's voice does not, however, defend the "sleek
gentle creature," the village priest, against whom Laura
303
later rages: "Wretch! he makes the marrow of my bones
rage at him. He chronicled a pig that squeaked" (p. 117).
"The delicious creed" which called forth her wrath is
that which approves "a world where there is more evil than
good" in approval of the Austrians, "good Catholics, most
fervent Catholics." The priest's praise for Austrians is
prefaced by a weak affirmation that he would wish them
"to be beaten" (p. 117). Father Bernardus, a German, was
not caught in such a trap of divided loyalties, through
no effort of his own, and so is more acceptable to the
patriotic Laura. In the village encounter, Laura's
sentiments seem more condemnatory of the celibate state
than consistent with her other statements and with her
Catholicism:
"Not to be born a woman, and voluntarily to be a
woman!" ejaculated Laura. "How many, how many are
we to deduct from the male population of Italy?
Cross in hand, he should be at the head of our arms,
not whimpering in a corner for white bread." (p. 117)
The ostensible grounds for designating the priest a woman
is that he does not accompany the troops.
Vittoria does not enter into the condemnation, but
actually is surprised by the vehemence of Laura's attack
upon one to whom she had been polite. Vittoria's
attitude is also an accepting one in the case of the
Ammiani family priest. Here, too, is the somewhat grudg
ing concession, on the part of the author's implied
self, of the priest's character as a man and as a
304
religious, as occurred in the case of Father Bernardus.
The narrator describes the Ammiani priest as "a
comfortable, irritable ecclesiastic" who was "little able
to deal with this rebel [Vittoria] before Providence,
that would not let her swollen spirit be bled" (p. 156).
Herein lies some question about Meredith's care in the
handling of the religion about which he writes in Vittoria.
Hawthorne1s treatment of Catholicism in The Marble Faun,
which Meredith had probably read according to a December,
1865, letter to Maxse,^ does not present the same problem.
The general atmosphere of half repulsion and half accept
ance of the more attractive aspects of Catholicism appears
in both men's novels, although the attraction does seem
stronger in Hawthorne's. Moreover, Hawthorne's familiarity
with and study of Catholicism was evidently more thorough,
since his representation of Catholic ritual and habit
does not present problems of credibility.
The matter at issue is that concerning confession.
Two priests, both Bernardus and the Ammiani priest,
attempt, albeit unsuccessfully, to force Vittoria to
participate in the sacrament of confession; yet she was
IV . . .
Although Meredith does not give the title of his
reading (Letters, I, 319), The Marble Faun had been pub
lished in 1860, and seems to be the work to which he
refers, according also to David Howard, "George Meredith's
'Delicate' and 'Epical' Fiction," in Literature and Poli
tics in the Nineteenth Century: Essays, ed. John Lucas,
pp. 133-134.
305
not, it was intimated by the narrator in Sandra Belloni,
reared in her father's religion, because of his indiffer
ence to it. Therefore, Emilia-Vittoria probably did not
participate in the special sacramental rite which confers
a confession privilege. It is a matter of perhaps small
inaccuracy that Vittoria is encouraged by two priests and
by Countess Ammiani to commit an action sinful in Catholic
eyes. In the case of Countess Ammiani's encouragement of
Vittoria to sin, and Vittoria's participation in a
formerly-rejected rite, character inconsistency is
involved.
Countess Ammiani exacts the "precise words— 'I will,'
and 'I will not fail'" from Vittoria to confess in order
that Vittoria be ready "to espouse" her son when he
arrives (II, 157). The pattern of Countess Ammiani's
life testifies to the sincerity of her concern. The
narrator has said of her that she was the "one lamb of
the family dedicated to heaven," i.e., to the convent,
but that she was "wrenched from that fate to share with
[Paolo Ammiani] a life of turbulent sorrows" (pp. 203-
204). Although there is nothing even vaguely resembling
Hopkins' references to "heaven-haven" here, unless it be
an ironic allusion to a comfortable withdrawal from
"sorrows," the word "wrenched" does indicate some pain
for Countess Ammiani at the change in her destiny.
Moreover, the Countess' anxiety for the name Ammiani
306
and that she not have a "sonless son" as well as her joy
at the "blessed marriage" (p. 229) which she herself
witnesses (as does Angelo Guidascarpi, another Catholic)
and which offers her hope, for "the house wanted resus
citating" and Vittoria "would bear children of strong
blood" (pp. 156-157), all indicate that the marriage
has been properly solemnized. In Catholic Italy, at that
time especially, a religious ceremony is clearly implied.
It will also be remembered that Lena is eager that Wilfrid
should be converted when they marry (p. 3 2).
Even more important than apparent inconsistency in
the character of the Countess Ammiani is that involving
Emilia-Vittoria. The narrator had told the reader that
Vittoria's "foolish trick of thinking for herself" had
caused her to resist the urgings of the priests to
confess. Yet if she uttered the "precise words— 'I will'"
to the Countess, then she capitulated, and, it seems,
betrayed the truth of her life and of her vision.
Vittoria had told the Ammiani family priest "that the
countess possessed resources which she could find nowhere;
and she saw the full beauty of such inimitable grave
endurance" (p. 156) . It is in this kind of uneasy con
cession that Meredith's most resembles Hawthorne's
treatment of Catholicism in The Marble Faun. In Meredith's
work, however, there is immediate withdrawal, one not so
quickly or easily discernible in Hawthorne's novel.
307
"Nevertheless, that the countess suffered more than her
spiritual comforter imagined" is a thought that keeps
Vittoria "obstinate," "unrepentant," and out of the
confessional (p. 156). Given the problem of two irrecon
cilable factors, Meredith seems to have decided simply to
ignore it and thereby save his heroine from having to
indicate either an inconsistent change of mind and heart
or an equally inconsistent indifference to truth. None
theless, the reader is forced to assume that Vittoria has
mysteriously become Catholic, and has confessed, before
she entered into a Catholic marriage.
Within the two volumes of Vittoria are also several
unimportant jibes at the Jesuits, long fair game in
English literature. In the first volume, Count Serabig-
lione is said by the narrator to be "a threading Jesuit"
as he prepares to question his daughter's servants about
the missing money packets (p. 132). In the second volume,
Violetta d'Isorella suppositions to Adela Sedley that the
"something" that Countess Anna wishes to thwart "has . . .
to do with the Jesuits" (p. 196). Although her theorizing
is meant to mislead Adela, it is suggestive that she is
in complicity with some plot. The Jesuit's reputation for
intrigue, dating back to the Renaissance, is being alluded
to. No direct statements occur, however, in either the
narrator's or others' voices.
The narrator is also heard in subtle implication, not
308
in overt criticism, of the papal chair and its occupant.
It has already been indicated that the narrator identifies
Barto's despising of the Pope as groundless, i.e., on the
basis only that "he was Pope" (I, 114). The narrator
also notes that the title "Pope's Mouth" for the "Revolu
tionary Post-office" is
. . . entirely complimentary to his Holiness. Tangible
freedom, as well as airy blessings, were at that time
anticipated, and not without warrant, from the mouth
of the successor of St. Peter. (p. 113)
A note of criticism may undoubtedly be distinguished in
the opposition of "tangible" to "airy" as well as in the
intimation of deception in the balanced prepositional
phrases, "at that time" and "not without warrant." A
slightly more cynical expression underlies the narrator's
further information, especially with the use of the
transitional adverb "then," which performs the same
functions as the prepositional phrases cited above.
After suffering, after walking in the shades of death
and despair, men of worth and of valour cease to take
high personages as representative objects of worship,
even when these (as the good Pope was then doing)
benevolently bless the nation and bid it to have
great hope, with a voice of authority. (italics mine,
p. 114)
The notion of the caliber of men who reject that which is
being subtly represented as idolatry against the weakly
concessive adjective "good" well conveys the implied
sympathies of the narrator.
Too, the manner of handling of the Pontifical divorce
309
in the opera, as it involves the Pope with the machinations
of the villain Count Orso and his daughter Michiella in a
plot against the heroine Camilla and her husband Camillo,
is highly critical of the papal office. The marriage of
Camilla and Camillo is "irrevocable," and the signing of
the decree would "dishonour" Camillo and make of him an
"everlasting outcast" {p. 270). The Pope's complicity in
tampering with the marriage, especially in the face of the
Church's official position on divorce, is reprehensible.
No direct comment is made upon this matter, however, but
the underlying charge is of a grave injustice and of
greed.
Tied to the examinations of Christianity as it affects
harmonious relations between people is a study of its
influence in inculcating the virtues, especially the vir
tue of charity. That gem of ironic exercise, the Poles'
morning prayer service, also provides opportunity for the
narrator's indirect yet devastating commentary upon the
sisters' observance of charity. Gainsford's inability to
keep himself from laughing at Mrs. Chump's problems with
hooks and curls elicits the sisters' forbearance:
The ladies accorded him every extenuation for the
offence. They themselves, but for the heroism of
exalted natures, must have succumbed to the gross
temptation. "It is difficult, dear papa, to bring
one's mind to religious thoughts in her company,
even when she is quiescent," they said. Thus, by
the prettiest exercise of charity that can be con
ceived, they pleaded for the man Gainsford, while
they struck a blow at Mrs. Chump; and in performing
310
one of the virtues laid down by religion, proved
their enemy to be hostile to its influences. (Sandra
Belloni, I, 178)
An even sterner lack of charity, though still repre
sented with humor, occurs in conjunction with the prayer
service. In this case the service is used as a disguise
and a protection for evil. The narrator tells of Mrs.
Chump's "very late" arrival one morning at the service,
in "evident anguish at the necessitated silence." Pole
continues his reading beyond the usual "limit" of prayers,
but her "little muffled shriek" finally stops him so that
she can tell those assembled of a robbery of which he,
at least, is well aware, since he perpetrated it. Yet
he encourages, through innuendo ("How can you bring this
charge against the inmates of my house— eh? I guarantee
the honesty of all who serve me" [p. 181]), her suspicion
of the servants.
Lady Charlotte had actually discerned the problem
with the Pole brand of "kindness" or charity, of which
Blake also wrote in the Book of Experience (e.g., "Holy
Thursday"), when she had condemned, in speech with Emilia,
the "cant of a detestable school." Lady Charlotte dismissed
the "sentimental compromise," denying the "honesty" and
the "intelligence" of those "professors" of such a school,
while admitting that they "catch almost all the raw boys
who have anything in them" (could Meredith have been
thinking of himself?) as well as "young women" needing
311
"comfort" (pp. 311-312). In Sandra Belloni, except
for the natural kindness that springs from Emilia's
harmonious nature and not from any "school," the charity
is suspect in the extreme, having been.early characterized
by the narrator in the sisters' habit of disguising
motive so that "proceedings appear . . . unselfish"
(I, 23).
However, Lady Charlotte's attacking, unprovoked,
Christianity is not laudable, as established by Emilia's
reaction and further supported by the indications (given
by the narrator, Emilia, Gambier, and Wilfrid [see pages
111 to 112]) that her character is not a virtuous one.
There is a consistency in all the matters concerning her
character, with the exception of the narrator's statement
in Volume II that "she was a woman of chaste blood"
(p. 55). Since this statement both succeeds and precedes
those other declarations about her involvement with
"Scandal," Gambier, and Lord Elthan (see also pages 111 to
112) , and since "chaste" refers to a virtue associated
with Emilia-Vittoria (see pages 98 to 99 ), the reader
is flagged to discover a special meaning.
In spite of the seeming inconsistency in the use of
the term "chaste," then, Meredith does make a distinction
and is faithful to his own definition of the indicated
virtue. Emilia's is that which comes from Earth and
312
Which no spring of strength would quell;
In subduing does not slay;
Guides the channel, guards the well:
Tempered holds the young blood-heat,
Yet through measured grave accord,
Hears the heart of wildness beat
Like a centaur's hoof on sward.
("The Woods of Westermain" [1899], p. 77)
These lines echo Emilia-Vittoria's condition; Emilia is
"unfretful in blood," not of "chaste blood"; her "young
blood-heat" is "tempered," not slain. Lady Charlotte, on
the other hand, is cold ("chaste") of blood and so
requires, the narrator informs the reader, "the heat of
Emilia's love," which "plays round and illuminates"
Wilfrid. Lady Charlotte's blood, is then "chaste" in
that it requires a "borrowing of passion" in order for her
to be warmed (II, 108-109); her own cannot be fired or
disturbed in the way that Emilia's has been. Emilia-
Vittoria, it may be remembered, is aware of the disturb
ance in her blood and cautions both Wilfrid and Carlo
not to indulge in casual or frivolous kissing in order
that she might preserve her "peace," and so her character,
as "chaste and keen."
Emilia, close to Earth, has in her nature "Blood and
brain and spirit" joined in "true felicity" ("The Woods
of Westermain," p. 84) .
Once beheld [Earth] gives the key
Rendering Beauty yours, but gaze
Under, and the soul is rich
Past computing, past amaze.
313
There is courage that endures
Even her awful tremble yours. (pp. 83-84)
For Lady Charlotte, and the other characters in Sandra
Belloni, "the sense of Earth [is] misprised,/Brainlessly
unrecognized" (p. 84).
For example, the Pole sisters decide to patronize
Emilia, even though she seems common, because they know
that she will be a "plum" in attracting to the circle
they wish to establish at Besworth (Sandra Belloni, I,
23). They will use her without understanding her or her
power to attract. A different kind of misapprehension,
of a nature more alienated from Earth than Emilia's and
less alienated than her own, is Adela's. She writes to
Arabella that she does-does-not and does-does-not-does
like the "utterly cold" Miss Ford, who "has not an affec
tion on earth" (p. 63). In addition to the ironical pro
jection of her own emotional state unto another, Adela
also betrays inability to understand the emotional storm
which Georgiana is undergoing because of her brother's
love for Emilia. Moreover, if Georgiana can be charged
with any lack of charity, or coldness (and she far outranks
the Pole sisters both in her devotion to her brother,
though it is somewhat warped, and in her donations of her
money and her nursing talent to the Italian cause), she
is aware of her limitations and struggles to cope with
them.
314
Her brother recognizes the flaw in her exercise of
charity during a conversation in which she tells him of
Lady Charlotte's cruelty to Emilia. When she tells him,
in answer to his question, that Emilia had not left her
"cold," but that her pity was really for Wilfrid, "pub
licly ashamed and bearing it," Merthyr replies ironically,
You wept for him! Do you know, Georgey, that charity
of your sex, which makes you cry at any affecting
situation must have been designed to compensate us
for the severities of Providence. (p. 103)
An ironical notice of any mercy on the part of "Providence"
accompanies the observation of female "charity."
Explanation concerning Georgiana's exercise of
charity issues from the narrator, who tells the reader
that she suffers from "a vision of companionship [with
Merthyr] broken," and that she was, moreover, "conscious
that there was some poison in her love" (p. 306). Then
he informs the reader that she at first describes her
problem as being the result of "loving a human being too
well," but that she recognizes her "self-deceit":
No, not too well! I cannot love him too well. I
am selfish. When I say that, it is myself I am
loving. To love him thrice as dearly as I do would
bring me nearer to God. Love, I mean, not idolatry—
another form of selfishness. (p. 307)
The keys to Georgiana's insights being approved by the
author's second self are the use of the word "God," rather
than Providence, and the rejection of idolatry as selfish
ness. She thinks further that human love that "bleeds"
315
as at a wound is "as different from Christian love as a
brute from a man" (p. 307), and herein she deviates from
the true and the real as the implied author has presented
it. Her misconception here leads her to suffering as she
deliberately warps her own nature.
Firstly, Emilia-Vittoria offers evidence for Georgi
ana 's soul's being of a lower order: Emilia-Vittoria
never ponders loving too well or too poorly; she simply
loves without question. Secondly, Emilia-Vittoria is
never, as Georgiana is, "under the delusion that lovers'
love is a reprehensible egoism." Thus, acting in conform
ity with her delusion, Georgiana resolves to be "sensually
dead and therefore spiritually sexless," this being then
truly "reprehensible egoism" according to the implied
author. The price of her deliberate thwarting of Earth's
"two-sexed meanings" ("The Woods of Westermain," p. 98)
is "the torment of a haunting insufficiency," that occurs
even in "her sweetest hours," though it is "fitful, not
consecutive" (Sandra Belloni, I, 308). Although she and
her brother are Welsh and so able to discern "all noble
feelings . . . when untroubled by any mental agitation,"
Georgiana here obscures her vision.
With impaired ability to see, Georgiana notes that
it "is among the mysteries of Providence [a word signifi
cant for error] . . . that one so indifferent [as Emilia]
to the sufferings of others should be gifted with so
316
inexplicable a power of attraction" (p. 219). Georgiana's
bewilderment at Providence's ordinance is not shared by
Merthyr, whose vision has not been damaged. He tries to
explain Emilia's condition by analogy: One "sick with
fever" would not be described as "fretful, ungrateful,
of rambling tongue, poor in health, and generally of loose
condition of mind." Georgiana's refutation of his "thesis"
is on the again erroneous basis that they are more than
"animals— only animals" (pp. 219-220). The description
of humanity in Meredith's poetry, as well as the descrip
tion of its highest ideals in the analysis of the Queen of
Song's portrait, gives the argument to Merthyr:
The features expressed health, humour, power, every
fine animal faculty. Genius was on the forehead and
the plastic mouth; the forehead being well projected,
fair, and very shapely, showing clear balance, as well
as capacity to grasp flame, and fling it. (p. 155)
Harmony, balance, virtue, all are products of the
healthy animal nature and especially involve truth in
relationships with others and, hence, humanitarianism.
The contrary situation is seen in the "little people's"
observances of Christian charity in which love and its
consequence (kindness) are missing, and selfishness and
cruelty are practiced. In Vittoria the exercise of
charity by people not so "little" is truer. For example,
Countess Ammiani, seeing "the abrupt alteration of
[Vittoria's] step and look with a dim surprise," and not
understanding that Vittoria feels Hagar's misery, of
317
which she sings, as her own, asks "What do you conceal
from me?" But then she quickly supplies "the answer by
charitably attributing" her discomposure "to news that the
signora Piaveni was coming" (II, 187) . A small act of
graciousness, it nonetheless contrasts against the petty
meanness of the Pole sisters, both in the degree of
sensitivity to others and in the wish to save another from
discomfort.
Also in Vittoria, even Vittoria herself, who has
never been pictured as lacking in charity, nonetheless
shows advancement in her possession of that virtue (which
the implied author prefers to designate as "harmony").
Even as she searches for her husband, who is in danger
of losing his life in fighting the Austrians, Vittoria
. . . had charity for one who was footsore and sat
cherishing his ankle by a village spring, and she
fed him, and not until he was far behind, thought
that he might have seen the white face of her
husband. (p. 332)
The simple diction and the successive use of "and," the
coordinating conjunction of addition, have a biblical
ring that recall Meredith's admiration of the church's
early history, when the church best served men. Emilia-
Vittoria is shown at the peak of her powers and in pos
session of reasons for real hatred of the Austrians
(rather than the reason of her father's hatred). Yet she
naturally and without rancor concerns herself for the
welfare of a whitecoat. The selflessness of her act is
318
especially denoted by the fact that the narrator states
that the thought that he might have given her information
about her husband does not even occur to her until long
after she has helped him.
It may be noticed that the narrator's voice is the
one chiefly involved in gently irreverent statements con
cerning religion and virtue. As a matter of fact, the
Philosopher's voice is heard only once in the course of
Sandra Belloni; after this his silence heralds his
absence, as promised by the narrator, from the next novel.
Until his final contribution, the Philosopher's words are
filtered through the narrator's mask with the curious
effects of his protestations and apologies ("I would keep
him back if I could" [I, 68]). However, the first
references in the novel are to a lower-case "philosopher,"
as to an unidentifiable member of the readership who must
be cautioned against lack of charity: "Nor let the
philosopher venture hastily to despise [sentimentalists]
as pipers to the dilettante life"(I, 6). Then, the
references are to a capitalized "Philosopher," who becomes
impetuously intrusive, and so hardly philosophical in his
reactions to the story. Moreover, he is associated with
the church and with the theatre as a performer, rather
than as a retiring thinker: "The Philosopher peremptorily
demands the pulpit" (II, 20), and "The Philosopher, up to
this point rigidly excluded, rushes forward to the
I
319
footlights" (p. 271).
The Philosopher seems to be partially a straw-man
and partially a ficelle for the narrator. As indicated,
he is identified with the readership so that Meredithian
irony is involved in the narrator's ascribing the flaws
of his narrative technique to the Philosopher's "peremp
tory" interruptions, which, also ironically, do simulate
the kind of exchange that occurs when one is attempting
to relate an incident to several listeners. Moreover,
it was the Philosopher who "first set" the narrator "upon
the building" of his story (p. 202). However, the
Philosopher's main responsibility is in explicating the
important problem of sentimentalism that is central to
Sandra Belloni and that prevents exercise of virtue, but
encourages hypocritical exercise of the Christian pretense.
Sentimentalism leads to the insanity called "riding the
Hippogriff." which marks "a staring contrast between [the
narrator's] pet Emilia and [the Philosopher's] puppet
Wilfrid" (p. 250) .
A more compelling use of the confidante, almost as if
in anticipation of Henry James' The Golden Bowl (1904), is
also connected with the experiences of love and indicates
some loss of charity as it understands and excuses.
Occurring over the last half of the second volume of
Vittoria, a kind of alternated points of view ensues, as
Vittoria and Carlo become divided in feeling and
understanding. As also was true of Maggie Verver and
Amerigo, Vittoria and Carlo are unable to communicate
their thoughts and emotions to each other, and, hence,
they are conveyed to the reader either through the
characters' self-communings or through the use of a
ficelle. Agostino, Laura, and Merthyr Powys perform this
function for both Vittoria and Carlo, even as Fanny
Assingham is the ficelle for both Maggie and Amerigo.
Meredith does not, however, as James does, severely limit
the reader's knowledge for long sections of the novel,
nor does Meredith rely so heavily upon the ficelle as
does James. Thus, the entire first half of The Golden
Bowl is outside Maggie's consciousness and presents
Amerigo's point of view; whereas the reverse situation
exists in the second half of the novel.
The misunderstanding between Vittoria and Carlo begins
just before their marriage and continues even after that
event. When Carlo writes Vittoria to join his mother, she
considers obedience to him as one of "three paths" open
to her. The other two are to "earn . . . money" by
singing and "to go to war" (p. 105). Not only does she
choose to go to the battlefield, but she does not recant
the "Viva il re" (p. 99) that so distressed Carlo. The
narrator's voice, then, tells of Vittoria's feeling a
"chill" from the "silent blame" when she finally does join
Carlo's mother; it "called up her pride" and prevented her
321
from asking "any question" (p. 175) . Unable to communicate
with her "lover" or with his mother, she talks with
Agostino, who tells her that her "Carlo of yesterday" is
not her "Carlo of today."
You made your summer and left the fruits to hang,
and now you are astounded that seasons pass and
fruits drop. (pp. 177-178)
When Vittoria finally recovers her "stunned head"
(p. 178), she goes "to her room like an insect carrying
a load thrice its own size" (p. 179). Other voices are
then added to Agostino's in exploration of Vittoria's
problem as Laura and the Countess Ammiani convey the
information they have about Carlo's relationship with the
Countess Violetta and her influence upon his conduct of
the revolutionary affairs. Then, at the end of the
chapter, Laura becomes, briefly, Carlo's ficelle in order
for his motivations to be disclosed.
The following chapter is then concerned with Carlo's
point of view; he speaks directly with the Countess
d'Isorella so that their two voices, woven with the
narrator's, will provide witness for Carlo's faithfulness
of mind and body to Vittoria, as well as his loyalty to
the Italian cause. It is the narrator who informs the
reader that Carlo was able to judge Violetta "with cool
accuracy" (p. 204), but Carlo himself is heard to tell
Violetta, as she attempts to seduce him, that he is "madly
in love" with Vittoria. The narrator then explains that
322
it was as an "Italian" that he "kissed her, saying,
'Pardon,'" after she had raised her eyes, looking "like a
cut orange to a thirsty lip" (p. 204). To prevent possi
bility of misunderstanding, in view of Carlo's later
feelings of guilt, the narrator adds that Carlo's attitude
toward Violetta was one of "indifference" (p. 206).
The reunion of Carlo and Vittoria does not heal their
division, however, although "they laughed at themselves,
accused hotly, and humbly excused themselves" (p. 210).
Carlo cannot "help her to see" his resentments. The
matter is complicated by his own feelings of guilt and
the tendency, that he shares with Vittoria, to examine
his own motives with scrupulosity. The narrator tells the
reader that Carlo wonders if he "had taken Violetta for
an ally in all purity of heart" (p. 210); the narrator
had already provided that the reader could rest assured
of Carlo's innocence in this matter. In addition, Carlo
also has something "to brood over" concerning Vittoria's
actions in remaining beside the wounded Merthyr at Milan
rather than joining him at Pallanza.
Vittoria and Carlo are next heard in dialogue to
gether some seventy pages later, after their marriage and
just before Carlo is to leave for the battle in which he
will lose his life; but their speech does not reveal
their hearts or their minds to each other. Their affairs
again are relayed principally through the voices of Laura
323
and Merthyr. Laura's intensity and passionate involvement
in the revolution make her judgments somewhat suspect,
since her biases were demonstrated, in the butterfly
episode, to obscure her more measured thought. Moreover,
long acquaintanceship with Carlo (he was a young admirer
of her husband) inclines her still to think of him as a
"lad" who is "in the season of faults" (p. 261). She
believes, therefore, that his "unripe mind" has caused
him to fall unsuspecting into Violetta's "web" (p. 262)
and that the "curse" of Italian education has produced
an attitude toward women which prevents his recognition of
Vittoria's superior talents. She satirically explains her
analysis of Vittoria's and Carlo's relationship to Merthyr,
It is as if Carlo would say,
Be a good little boat in the wake of the big ship.
I will look over at you, and chirrup now and then
to you, my dearest, when I am not engaged in
piloting extraordinary. (p. 261)
Since Laura, though a confidante of Carlo, inclines
toward overstatement, the narrator had earlier provided
that the reader should place some, though not complete
credence in her analysis. He had noted that Carlo was
. . . spurred by silly passion, pique, and wrath,
to plunge instantly into new political intrigues;
and . . . some of his worst faults had become mixed
up with his devotion to his country. (p. 210)
The "passion, pique, and wrath" were due to Vittoria's
not joining his mother as he had told her to do. The
attitude toward women as it resulted from "Italian"
324
education and as it is shown here is not evidenced in
Carlo's acceptance of Laura and Vittoria in the midst of
revolutionary councils, or even in his response to
Violetta's influence.
Pericles' voice is also heard in unsympathetic com
ment upon Carlo's actions in this section of Vittoria,
although he adds not the viewpoint of a ficelle but
rather that of a distant observer. Moreover, he is
concerned only with Vittoria's condition as it affects
her art, so he is mildly exasperated that Carlo is "a
fool," and a "young man," who "plays false to her"
(p. 266). Only Merthyr's voice is not heard to condemn,
but it does express puzzlement before he is made Carlo's
confidant. He observes to Agostino that Carlo looks
"feverish" (p. 270) , to which Agostino replies that
Carlo has been beguiled by "a curst witch," Violetta.
(The adjective "curst" acts adequately to separate this
use of "witch" from that earlier associated with Vittoria's
art and her humanity.)
Vittoria's self-analysis contains the same tendency
toward self-condemnation that Carlo displays, so that she,
as well as he, demonstrates the need for a more objective
judgment concerning their affairs. She confides to
Merthyr that she is "cowardly" and had long been
"oppressed" with fear of Barto Rizzo (p. 289); yet she
had just demonstrated her courage in facing the threat
325
of Barto's madness and the unhappiness of her husband's
displeasure. Later she braves Colonel Corte's "bold"
address to express her dissatisfaction with the plans
concerning Brescia. Without the benefit of her confession
to Merthyr, the true stature of her actions and of her
character would have been lost.
Merthyr becomes first Vittoria's and then Carlo's
ficelle in effecting the final unravelling of the knot
of their estranged emotions. It is to Merthyr that she
reveals her guilt over Carlo's present danger.
When I was married, I lost sight of . . . every
thing but happiness. I suffer as I deserve for it
now. I could have turned my husband from this black
path; I preferred to dream and sing. . . . my pride
. . . would not let me see his error. My cowardice
would not let me wound him with a single suggestion,
(italics mine, p. 289)
But that the problem began before the marriage and also
before the subsequent need for and use of ficelles indi
cates Vittoria's self-accusation not to be entirely cor
rect. Moreover, the narrator had testified that, whereas
pride had kept her silent before the Ammiani silence,
Vittoria would not keep silent when issues or others'
welfare demanded her speech. She thus exposed herself to
Barto Rizzo's demeaning belief in her inconsequence as a
"toy," rather than even to imply the Brescian campaign to
be a good plan, and, for the same reason, she fronted
Corte's contemptuous treatment.
326
She continues by telling Merthyr of her insights
into Carlo's difficulty and of her consequent feelings of
guilt:
He feigned to think me jealous. . . . Experience of
trouble has made me older than he. When he accused
me of jealousy, I could mention Countess d'Isorella's
name no more. I confess to that. . . . Wretched
cowardice can go no farther. . . . He has trusted
her, for she is very skilful; distrusting her, for
she is treacherous. He has, therefore, believed
excessively in his ability to make use of her, and
to counteract her baseness. I saw his error from
the first; and I went on dreaming and singing; and
now this night has come! (p. 290)
The need for a ficelle, or for someone against whom ideas
can be played, is demonstrated in the mixtures of error
and truth that occur in both Vittoria's and Carlo's
speeches; a further need for an objective narrator occurs
because of the subjectivity, which includes their own
biases, of the ficelles Agostino, Laura, and Merthyr.
However, in this section in which his primary responsibil
ity is that of a ficelle, Merthyr's objectivity seems
quite reliable, as is also indicated by the always-
reliable narrator.
Carlo, too, confesses to Merthyr the same kind of
self-condemnation that Vittoria had demonstrated. Carlo
first tells Merthyr that he will "do execution upon"
himself before Merthyr, whom "above all other men" he
"would have think well" of him (p. 294).
When I was a little younger— I am a boy still, no
doubt— I had the honour to be distinguished by a
handsome woman; and when I grew a little older, I
327
discovered by chance that she had wit. The lady
is the Countess Violetta d'Isorella. It is a
grief to me to know that she is sordid: it hurt
my vanity the more. Perhaps you begin to perceive
that vanity governs me. The Signora Laura has not
expressed her opinion on this subject with any
reserve , . . (p. 294)
The source for both the concession to youth and the blame
for vanity is given with the allusion to Laura; but their
validity is still not certain, and it may be that Carlo's
feelings of guilt have led him to assume the further
burden of her accusations (see also pages 456 to 457).
Carlo continues by confirming to Merthyr the accuracy
of Vittoria's insights into his only having pretended to
believe her jealous. Then, he indicates his realistic
grasp of his present dilemma:
I know that I cannot rely on the king's luck or
on the skill of his generals, or on the power of
his army, or on the spirit in Lombardy: neither
on men nor on angels. But I cannot draw back.
. . . if honour said nothing, simple humanity
would preserve me from leaving my band to perish
like a flock of sheep. (p. 295)
The reference to the "king's luck" is a reminder of Laura's
earlier mention of his lucklessness, which was based on
her knowledge, according to the reliable narrator, of the
king's "past history." The narrator lends further author
ity to Carlo's speech by separating the emotions at play
during it. The narrator notes that the last sentence
above revealed a
. . . profound conviction of his [Carlo's] quality
as leader, that escaped the lurid play of self
inspection which characterized what he'had previously
328
spoken, and served singularly in bearing witness
to the truth of his charge against himself.
(pp. 295-296)
The charge to which the narrator refers is Carlo's con
fession that he had "plunged into intrigues" in response
to the admiration of others as well as to his own vanity.
Exoneration of Carlo from present vanity is performed
now by Merthyr as ficelle. The narrator pictures Merthyr
sitting alone and meditating upon all that he has seen
and heard. His conclusions are filtered through the
narrator in order to lend them greater authority:
Merthyr saw that it was not vanity, but honour; for
Carlo stood pledged to lead a forlorn enterprise,
the ripeness of his own scheming. In the imminent
hour Carlo had recognized his position as Merthyr
with the wisdom of years looked on it. (p. 299)
This technique of filtering through the narrator, so that
his point of view overrides that of another character,
was noted in Chapter I. In this particular instance,
Merthyr's comment upon his own wisdom, the product of
years, as it is matched by the younger Carlo, would also
have had a pomposity and a note of self-delusion that
would have reflected falsely upon Carlo. The narrator's
presentation of Merthyr's thoughts prevents that
happening. Thus truth seems finally revealed, after all
the complications of various characters' reactions to the
events, and Carlo is vindicated as a husband worthy of
Vittoria; his concern for others proves to be of the same
mettle as hers.
329
Carlo's humanity, or virtue, is not pictured as
issuing from religious observance, although he obviously
belongs to the Catholic church. He is not, for instance,
shown to pray even during his painful experiences detailed
above. Prayer is another religious format for which
Meredith includes some consideration in the two Italian
novels. In reply to F. H. Evans, Meredith had expressed
gratitude for a comment upon a "vital line" in The Ordeal
of Richard Feverel which captures well the position of
the implied author of the Italian novels: "Who rises
from Prayer a better man, his prayer is answered" (Letters,
II, 719). This creed, called a "spiritual half-way
house,"12 is proved not so much by Sir Barrett's and the
Poles' observance as by their neglect.
Only Emilia in Sandra Belloni actually and truly
prays. Her prayer is as natural and integrated into her
life as are all other facets of her life. She tells
Wilfrid that she "used to pray to the Virgin that she
would blessedly send me pupils" (I, 44). Her thoughts
are given directly also to reveal that she prays that
Wilfrid will be "safe" (p. 185); and later she tells
Merthyr that her "chief prayer" is to be "what Merthyr
wishes [her] to be" (II, 228). Her prayer seems consistent
l2Robert Peel, The Creed of a Victorian Pagan
(Folcroft, Pa.: The Folcroft Press, IncT^ 1931, reprinted
1969, p. 44.
330
with Meredith's own: "The habit of praying to the unseen
Divinity" should not be lost; for, although "prayer for
worldly goods is worse than fruitless . . . prayer for
strength of soul is that passion of the soul which catches
the gift it seeks" (Letters, I, 466). The notion that
God answers prayers is succinctly denied by Meredith along
with the "finely episcopal" proof of "a spiritual response"
to be instanced by a "material one" (p. 498).
In Vittoria a number of persons, Italian Roman
Catholics, pray, although in this novel are those also
who scoff at religion. That is, although Laura, Angelo and
Rinaldo Guidascarpi, and Countess Ammiani join Vittoria
in serious address to God, Barto Rizzo, Luigi, and
Violetta indulge in either irreverent or casual references
to the deity. It is through the latter three that humor
appears in references to the saints and to the Virgin.
Moreover, the more passionate and direct characters in
Vittoria eschew the word "Providence" and use "God." In
the two volumes of Vittoria only a few allusions to Provi
dence exist.
In Volume I, when Luigi "gave thanks to Providence"
for a drink, Barto Rizzo replies, "We're too low down here
for that kind of machinery. . . . They say that Providence
is on the side of the Austrians" (p. 65). Then, in
Volume II, Barto again refers to Providence when he tells
Vittoria that he does not wish dead "anything not standing"
331
in his way. However, he adds, he has "killed a sentinel
this night: Providence placed him there. I wish for no
death, but I punish" (p. 281).
Luigi makes frequent references and appeals to the
saints with real indifference of motive. In addition to
his gratitude to the Virgin, Luigi notes that it is dark
enough in Barto's house "to make me believe in every single
thing they tell us about the saints" (I, 63), and, in
angry terror at his imprisonment in Barto's dark house,
he hopes for the "devil" to seize Barto as he sleeps
(p. 69). In gratitude to Vittoria for a cigarette, he
quaintly prays "the Virgin [to] sweep the floor of heaven
into her lap" (p. 70). Yet it may be noted that deep, or
even true belief does not appear in his references. Barto
Rizzo shows even less tendency to accept Catholic doctrine;
yet he, too, uses the terminology of religion. He.accuses
Luigi of getting money treacherously, so that it will
"honey [his] legs in purgatory" (p. 72).
Although not pious, in his mad scene with Vittoria
Barto does seriously beg her "in the name of the Father
of the Saints" to help him by confessing her falseness.
He also testifies to the influences of religion when he
says self-righteously that Rosellina "will be damned,
for she would have vengeance before she went" (II, 280).
His insane ravings also include some affirmation of an
afterlife (such religious references have some association
332
with madness; see page 452).
She died blessing you [Vittoria] above me. . . ,
It’s heard by this time in heaven, and it's written.
. . . If she is right, I was wrong; I was a devil of
hell. . . . She said, the soul of Rinaldo Guidascarpi,
her angel, was glorifying you. (pp. 280-281)
The voice of the quieter, less "cunning" Beppo, who
is further distinguished from Luigi, "the spy" (I, 48), by
his army "service," in which he "carried a gun" (p. 50),
is not heard in such frequent and light-hearted blasphemy
as are Barto Rizzo and Luigi. In reply to Laura's search
ing questions about Vittoria, after the finding of the
butterfly, he limits himself to swearing by just one
saint, "the body of Sant' Ambrogio" (p. 156) that Vittoria
"had not been politically (or amorously, if the suspicion
be aimed at her in the softer regions) indiscreet" (p. 155).
Jacopo, too, seems quite sincere in his prayer at a way
side shrine as he prays before the crucifix "for an easy
ankle and the snoring pillow and no wakeners." Afterward
"he was refreshed," perhaps because his was essentially a
prayer for "strength of soul," although he still mumbles
"Does the Blessed Virgin ever consider what patriots have
to endure?" (p. 324) .
Just one other voice is heard in careless reference
to the deity. It is the "passionless" Violetta who shrugs
"lightly" as she recommends to Merthyr that they "all . . .
pray for the success of Carlo Alberto" (II, 301)in an
attempt to elude his searching questions about the
333
betrayal of Carlo. She accuses the Chief of being
"priest-hating" and rejoices that Carlo has been rescued
from following the Chief and enlisted in the king's train
at Brescia (p. 302), In the excitement of "finding
herself . . . on the tide of truth" she swears on her
"faith as a Christian lady" and offers to "kiss" the cross
"like a peasant" and to "swear . . . by the Madonna" that
she knows nothing of the plot that Anna Lenkenstein has
woven for Carlo (p. 304) .
Occasions for Vittoria's more sincere prayer are
greater even than those for Emilia in Sandra Belloni. The
reasons are probably attributable to her matured awareness
of and involvement in the world, as well as the graver
significance of the macrocosmic world of Vittoria. None
theless, her religious observance is reserved to the
extent that Anna thinks, with some irony in view of her
own pride and coldness (II, 5, 218, 322), that Vittoria
"has no religious warmth" (p. 317). Even more ironically,
her remark, having reference to Vittoria's resistance to
the blandishments of Father Bernardus, is actuated by her
desire to counteract the "very strong emotion" Vittoria's
singing awakens in her, along with "an impetuous desire to
take the singer by the hand and have all clear between
them" (p. 317).
Although Vittoria may not have conventional religious
attitudes and may even have some mystery attached to her
334
religious affiliation, the sincerity of her relationship
with God is attested to by her own voice. She urges
Salvolo "in God's name" to believe that he will not suffer
purposelessly, as she urges him not to close down the
opera. It is also "in God's name" that she asks Captain
Weisspriess to release her after he has trapped her in
the dark Adige Valley (I, 338); and, "her throat choking"
with emotion, she bids Angelo "God help you, my friend"
after they have met at the battle site (II, 145). There
is never a note of frivolity, of insincerity, or of incon
sequence in Vittoria's calls upon God.
The voices in discussion of religion, virtue (espe
cially charity or love), and prayer reveal the implied
author of the two Italian novels to have basically the
same attitude as Meredith wished to establish as being his
own. Evidently concerned about "the wild talk" about his
beliefs, he instructed Adelaide Nichols to write a letter,
dated 19 09, explicitly denying that he was an "Atheist."
He said that he believed "in a Spirit of Good unto which
we tend out of the state of brute which causes our
13
wretchedness." It is, then, through observance of hxs
tendencies to the good that man can live in harmony with
his fellowman; Earth, not Christianity, teaches love and
-^Letters, ed. C. L. Cline (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1970), III, 1695.
335
service ("The Lark Ascending," Poems, p. 114). The man,
or woman, who is close to earth is close to other men, is
of the highest humanity, and so practices the humanitarian
virtues that permit him to•live in harmony.
Voices Expressing Notions About
Poetry, Prose, and Music
In the course of the exploring of the mixture of
dramatic and of pictorial narrative in presentation of
Meredith's aesthetic views in the two Italian novels, the
voices of those who hold specific notions were also
necessarily examined in some detail. To be studied in
this chapter, then, are also the individual voices as they
express ideas about poetry, prose, and music, as well as
make use of musical imagery, these matters not having been
so explicitly determined in the previous chapter. Mere
dith demonstrated not only in the novels but also in his
poetry and in his letters the close relationship he saw
music and poetry to bear to each other (see pages 201 and
212) •
Such different voices are heard in regard to poetic
principles as Sir Purcell Barrett's, Cornelia's, Agostino's,
Tracy Runningbrook's, and Emilia-Vittoria's? and in regard
to prose as Mrs. Chump's, Carlo's, and Laura Piaveni's.
The range of attitudes is, therefore, from the "lymphatic"
through the propagandizing to the intellectual. Of those
336
heard propounding theories about writing, whether of poetry
or of prose, only Cornelia and Emilia-Vittoria actually
do no writing themselves, Emilia-Vittoria does, however-
compose music (it may be remembered that the little
Italian song she sings for the Poles and Pericles is of
her own composition; also she actively influences Rocco
Ricci in his composition of Camilla).
Cornelia, who admits to Mr. Barrett that she is "not
imaginative" (Sandra Belloni, I, 70), objects to the
coinage of words that she discerned in "Mr. Runningbrook1s
story" (p. 69). However, undermining for the reader any
importance her opinion might have is the narrator's
information, as he speaks as if within her consciousness,
that her mind is not on the conversation.
But the man [Barrett] had not brought it [the book]
back, and her name was in it, written with her own
hand. (p. 69)
Barrett answers her spoken words by agreeing that Running
brook "forces a phrase here and there," but he goes on to
note that a "writer who is not servile and has insight,
must coin from his own mint." English poetry, Barrett
continues his lecture to Cornelia, is "rich enough,"
English prose having taken life from the "license our
poets have taken. "
Barrett further tells Cornelia that an "imaginative
Englishman, pen in hand, is the cadet and vagabond of the
family" (that is, an English poet can create without having
337
to force his thoughts and feelings to conform with his
language); he goes on to state that, on the other hand,
the French poet is restricted to his inherited language.
Although, according to Barrett, the French language is
"richer" and "wonderfully eloquent . . . the person [that
is, the French author] does not speak." Rather the speak
er, because the French poet must conform, is "one big
Gallic trumpet" with "stereotyped descriptions," which
all say "the same things" (pp. 70-71). In a letter
written to Hardman and tentatively dated March, 1865, by
Cline, Meredith says that he had "nothing to do" with
Barrett's remarks on the French and English languages."
Still he writes,
I would contend that the French are richer in
stereotyped social phrases, and admit them to be
poor in language of passion. Concerning myself,
when I have to use [French], I never coin or hazard
a word. (Letters, I, 306)
Clearly then any distinction between Barrett's ideas
and Meredith's own must be more carefully drawn than one
might at first assume on the basis of other evidence in
Sandra Belloni concerning Barrett's faulty, because
sentimental, judgment (already partially considered in
Chapter I in regard to the disagreement with Vittoria
about the nature of art and of life). Meredith's letter
shows that Barrett does, to a small degree, give some of
Meredith's own position. However, Barrett's ideas on
style may be seen to be contrary to the ideas that
338
Meredith puts into practice as well as presents in his
letters. Fiction, Barrett tells Cornelia, does not re
quire the "perfectly smooth surface" that "the scientific
work and the philosophical treatise" do; "style" is "part"
of fiction, so that whereas scientific works and philosoph
ical treatises wear "classical robe," fiction may wear
"any medieval phantasy of clothing" (pp. 69-70).
As with the complaint against the "counts"and "stops"
of poetry, Meredith seems to be joking here, too. For
Meredith himself, "sound prose is of more worth than
pretentious poetry" (Letters, I, 161). The preference
for soundness is a basic idea in this letter about realism
versus idealism, with Meredith's arguing for "a plain wall
of fact" over the "shuffling of clouds and dealing with
airy delicate sentimentalities, headless and tailless
imaginings." The necessary marriage of substance and form
makes it highly impossible that Meredith would choose
"medieval phantasy of clothing" for the matter of the
novel that deals with "good, plain, strength-giving
Mother" Earth (p. 161).
The narrator of Sandra Belloni states that Cornelia
is struck by "certain fallacies" in Barrett's argument.
That she does not reveal them, in spite of her liking for
argument, conveys further her distraction as she is
involved with her thoughts of "the man" (p. 71). When
she asks why he does not write himself, he responds that
339
his is "not the habit" and that he has "not heard the
call" (p. 71). Here again seems to be a valid presenta
tion of artistic theory; for the requirements for success
ful writing are generally agreed to be practice and
innate gift, although in the reverse order. The implied
author of the two Italian novels supports with some care
these requisites (see Chapter I).
The deeper problems with Barrett's analysis are more
subtly revealed and must be sought under the more obvious
statements, as with the matter concerning style. That is,
his objection to Runningbrook1s "style" and "coinage" is
on the superficial basis that "we shall be inundated" if
"a strong barrier— a chevaux-de-frise of pen points— [is
not] raised against every newly minted word and hazardous
coiner" (p. 71). As absent as an attempt at analysis or
at making distinctions is any real statement about the
merit of Runningbrook's poetry; Barrett talks in vague
generalities.
His approval of Runningbrook's poetry is only implicit
in these speeches, but it becomes explicit in his desire,
told by Wilfrid in a letter to Runningbrook, "to write an
article on [his book] that should act as a sort of rejoin
der" to a harsh critic. It should be noted here that since
Barrett is revealed by the narrator to think of Running
brook, as well as of Emilia, as a humbug (II, 131), there
is here another instance of the kind of hypocrisy that
340
both he and Cornelia are guilty of in their relationship
with each other. Barrett's appreciation of and desire to
support Runningbrook1s current publication (which Wilfrid
indicates may be induced by the wish to earn some money)
is shared by Wilfrid, who closes the letter with a ten-
line quotation from the book, only one line of which the
narrator bothers to include. Although the narrator has
thereby implied his low opinion of the poetry, that one
line performs amply to indicate the poor quality of the
work: "Large eyes lit up by some Imperial sin" (pp. 194-
195) .
His quotation intimates that Wilfrid approves of the
lines for which Tracy's reply brings an apology:
The lines you quote were written in an awful hurry,
coming up in the train from Richford one morning.
You have hit upon my worst with commendable
sagacity. (p. 195)
In addition to equivocation about lines that Tracy con
sented to have set in type and which he undoubtedly
proofread in galley, it is not many pages later that the
reader learns from the narrator that "hurry," and, it
must be presumed, its result, are the usual conditions
of Tracy's work. As Emilia and Tracy collaborate on an
opera,
He wrote with extraordinary rapidity, but clung to
graphic phrases that were not always supple enough
for nuptials with modulated notes. (p. 245)
When Emilia protests, Tracy replies, "Music's the vine,
341
verse the tree," and only becomes perplexed when she
tells him, "not if they grow up together."
Tracy continues to voice evidence that his claim to
the title of poet is weak. He tells Emilia that in "our
romantic opera . . . we do what we like with history, and
make up our minds for asses telling us to go home and
read our Student's Rome" (p. 247). Meredith, of course,
had supported throughout the Italian novels that adherence
to nature and to truth is mandatory for art (see Chapter I),
adding to that argument not only the tacit one of the
opera in Vittoria, but also the evidence of both the
novels.
Although Meredith himself obeys this artistic credo
in both the Italian novels, his growth toward the idea was
relatively gradual. In 1859, he wrote that he did what
he liked with imagined stories, but that "the reality
fascinates me. I feel that I can't beat it" (Letters, I,
43). Within three years, in a letter to Hardman, cited
earlier, Meredith penned a more explicit statement:
Realism is the basis of good composition: it implies
study, observation, artistic power, and (in those who
can do more) humility. Little writers [like Tracy?]
should be realistic. They could then at least do solid
work. . . . A great genius must necessarily employ ideal
means, for, a vast conception cannot be placed bodily
before the eye, and remains to be suggested. Idealism
is as an atmosphere whose effects of grandeur are
wrought out through a series of illusions, that are
illusions to the sense within us only when divorced
from the groundwork of the Real. Need there be exclu
sion, the one of the other? The artist is incomplete
who does this. (pp. 160-161)
342
Meredith's dedication to this concept appears in later
letters about Vittoria. In July, 1865, he wrote Bonaparte
Wyse that he hoped to "run over to Brescia and the sub-
alpine cities, to see to my colouring in the novel
Vittoria" (p. 312), and in December of the same year, he
wrote G. H. Lewes that he had "read a good deal of the
novel to Mdme. Venturi the other day, who says that the
Italian colouring is correct" (p. 3 2 1 ) The wording,
coupled with his previous concern about "colouring,"
indicates that the reading must have been largely to
check accuracy.
Meredith's concern for the detailing in Vittoria is
noted by Kelvin, however, as cause for complaint. That
is, the concession that "the action of the novel faith
fully follows the actual course of events" of the war in
Italy during 1848 and 1849 elicits his comment that
. . . the beginning, middle, and end of Vittoria
[are] controlled by what did happen in Italy, not
by the requirements of plot proceeding from
"character." (p. 41)
There are two matters to be noted concerning Kelvin's
comment. First, it is obvious after a study of points of
view in the two Italian novels that the "requirements of
plot" do proceed from "character," principally that of
-'-^According to Stevenson, The Ordeal of George
Meredith, p. 132, Mdme. VenturiT "as Emily Ashurst, had
been Mazzini's secretary while he lived in London and
had translated his writings into English."
343
Emilia-Vittoria, as demonstrated in Chapter I, whose
appearance in Italy and involvement in those famous
events, as well as conduct in them, seem inevitable from
the first volume of Sandra Belloni.
Second, although no record exists that Meredith
actually read the work of David Hume, he would have found
justification for his artistic formula in that philoso
pher's aesthetic theories.^ Hume wrote that writers of
fiction, "liars by profession," give the illusion of
truth to their works as a prerequisite for pleasure since,
without resemblance to truth, pleasure is not possible.
Thus, Hume notes "tragedians . . . borrow their fables
from some known passage in history . . . in order to
16
procure the easy reception to the imagination." Tracy
Runningbrook shows indifference to, if not ignorance of,
"the basis of good composition."
Disappointed that Emilia chose the "strictly classi
cal" Camillus as the subject for their opera, which he
would "treat . . . as Alfieri conceived tragedy" (Sandra
■ ' ■ ■ ’ Meredith did have on his shelves the works of John
Stuart Mill (Williams' listing, p. 346); and James Mill
had "brought Hume's philosophy to England, and taught it,
combined with Benthamism, to his son ..." (Alfred
William Benn, The History of English Rationalism in the
Nineteenth Century [New York: Russell and Russell, Inc.,
1962] , I, 418) .
l^David Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L. A.
Selby-Rigge (Oxford! Oxford University Press, 1960), I,
iii, 10, 121-122.
344
Belloni, I, 246)— that is to say, as a neo-classicist and
with strict observation of the unities (Alfieri, inciden
tally, is famous as the first to speak of the fatherland,
or a united Italy^)— Tracy says he prefers Clelia in the
"modern style." It offers "the love-business— exactly
where [he] show[s] his strength" (pp. 246-247). He pro
poses for Clelia to confess "in heavy voluptuous ana
paests . . . her love for the enemy of her country"
(p. 247). Only a faulty sense of rhythm could lead
Runningbrook to call the meter of the limerick "heavy"
and "voluptuous," in contradistinction to Coleridge's
description in his "Lesson for a Boy": "With a leap and
a bound the swift anapaests throng."
The reader, habituated to Meredithian irony and
understatement, encounters the Clelia Guidascarpi passage
(Vittoria, II, 136-138) and a patriotic opera actually
entitled Camilla with some doubt concerning Meredith's
purpose in the use of the name Clelia -in conjunction with
a central situation of "love for an enemy." Moreover,
although the incident itself is essentially lurid and
melodramatic in the way that Tracy demonstrated himself
to prefer, the treatment Meredith accords it is classi
cally severe. Nor has any other incident in Vittoria all
-^Edward h. Weatherly and others, The Heritage of
European Literature (Boston: Ginn and Company, 1948), I,
591.
345
the potential ingredients for a florid tragedy of blood:
the "woman of soft heart" who is the sister of revolution
ary brothers, the secret night meetings with a dramatic
discovery at a window, a suicide, and a duel in the cham
ber where Clelia's dead body lay.
The window was barred; six male domestics of the
household held high lights in the chamber; the
priest knelt beside one corpse, awaiting the
other. (II, 138)
In contrast to the sensational material, however, the
diction is simple and notably lacking in imagery. The
sentences are conventionally organized without inversion,
many of them being of simple structure and all having few
modifying phrases or clauses. The classical severity of
the style matches that used for the passage in which
Carlo's corpse is discovered by Merthyr. However, in this
latter scene there is a matching restraint of material.
The Clelia Guidascarpi incident and its treatment remind
the reader of Meredith's warning in The Ordeal of Richard
Feverel that "nothing" is "trivial" and that "all hangs
together: the train is laid in the lifting of an eye
brow" (p. 207). An additional clue as to the incident's
significance is Meredith's writing to Swinburne that he
(Swinburne) "alone [has] hit on the episode of the Guida
scarpi" (Letters, I, 354). It would seem that with the
Clelia Guidascarpi passage Meredith is making comment
both on bad literature in general and, more particularly,
I
346
on the popularity of melodramatic literature that he was
himself criticized for not providing the public.
In more explicit evidence of Runningbrook's lack of
taste and of a sense of proportion (so important to
Meredith's estimation of art) is the lurid word-portrait
of Brennus1 daughter which the narrator labels "forced-
poetic" and which causes Emilia to cry out "in pain"
(p. 24 8). Then, as if in final commentary on his removal
from art by an instance of his removal from life, Tracy
mistakes the reason for Emilia's "sobs" as being "a dry
faggot of history," rather than her agony over the
possibility, brought out by the story, that "one love
[can] stop another" (p. 248). In this instance, as in
others, Tracy is certain that he is right.
Tracy does, however, inadvertently betray some con
scious sense of the vulnerability of his position in the
artistic world in his preferring, contrary to Meredith,
"to have nothing said" in answer to the critic of his
work. Meredith himself, when Vittoria was not well-
received, deeply appreciated Swinburne's "praise" and
accepted enthusiastically his offer to write a favorable
review if he "could get a place to say something" (Letters,
I, 354). Runningbrook reluctantly acquiesces "if it . . .
put money in Barrett's pocket" (Sandra Belloni, II, 195).
The reluctance is further suspicious because the critic,
according to the letter from Wilfrid, who may, however,
347
not be an accurate judge, is in the vulnerable position
of writing ungrammatically. Wilfrid says "there will be
no necessity to call your attention to the critic's
English," to which Tracy replies, also giving evidence
against the critic's grammar, "the villainous dog . . .
can't even pen a decent sentence" (pp. 194-195).
Tracy's feint at dismissal of the critic is unconvinc
ing as he continues to rant about the "infernal trash" of
"the fellow" who should "bark till he froths at the-
mouth, and scatters the virus of the beast among his
filthy friends." Tracy is not, as he attempts to convince
Wilfrid, "mad-dog proof" (p. 195). In yet further com
mentary upon critics, with whom Meredith himself was less
than enchanted, Barrett is portrayed as being one. First,
however, Barrett demonstrates his inability to write
poetry and then his incapacity to analyze it in order to
arrive at a measured and a particular judgment. Barrett's
conclusions are shown to be invalid as he rushes to defend
in print the poetry of one whom he actually thinks a
"humbug" and, furthermore, of one who is unsure of his own
work.
Certainly Meredith reacted to the unfriendly criti
cism given his novels. In an 1864 letter to Augustus
Jessopp, he asks "Have you ever met a Reviewer? It's
curious to see how small this thing that stings can be"
(Letters, I, 255). In spite of the seeming reference to
348
Alfred Austin, whom "Meredith never tired of ridiculing
[for] his tiny stature, his conceit, and his Tory fervor"
(Stevenson, The Ordeal, p. 296), there is no evidence
that he felt for this critic any particular hostility.
Actually Meredith's relations with Austin had been
friendly, as opposed to the kind of relationship Browning
had with Austin. Browning several times lampooned Austin
in his poetry,,, especially in Of Pacchiarotto, and How He
1 8
Worked in Distemper. Meredith's habit of ridiculing
Austin in tandem with his admiration of Browning, whose
praise of his (Meredith's) poetry obviously delighted
Meredith (Letters, I, 148), perhaps caused the specific
reference, although Meredith had been "stung" often enough
by others.
Emilia's commentary upon poetry and upon art, as she
speaks with Sir Purcell, has already been discussed in
Chapter I of this paper. It is important to note, how
ever, that, in spite of her objections to the strictures
of "words," and of the "count" and "stops" of verse, she
likes rhymes. Moreover, since counting and "stops" are
intrinsic to rhythm and of the very essence of music, her
objections seem more of a private joke that Meredith
frequently makes upon himself. Of course, for Barrett,
•^Robert Browning, The Poems and Plays (New York:
The Modern Library, 1934), p. 992 footnote.
349
both Emilia and her "quick friend," Tracy Runningbrook,
are "too real"; and it is on this basis that he dismisses
them as "partial humbugs, entertaining enough" (p. 131).
The opera's libretto by Agostino offers a fuller
examination of poetry; for, whereas Tracy's speech pro
vides most of the testimony, either explicitly or implicit
ly, with only one line of actual poetry, Agostino's
speeches combine with one hundred and sixty-two lines of
the libretto to give a more complete view. As indicated
in Chapter I, Agostino seems to be the better poet of
the two men, a fact which involves his awareness of his
own deficiencies. Runningbrook is rather defensive with
out being analytical about his own work, so that he
betrays only an uneasy and vague sense of inadequacy that
he does not wish to acknowledge even to himself, much less
to expose to others.
Prior to the libretto's reproduction, and not after,
Agostino's qualifications for writing poetry and attitudes
as a poet are represented, sometimes obliquely. Carlo
had noted that Agostino "delighted in the dark web of
intrigue, and believed himself to be no ordinary weaver
of that sunless work" (see pages 255 to 256). This
predisposition may be the source for Vittoria's later
sigh "for a plainer speaker" after Agostino's story of
himself, meant to be instructive for her, as a "raw lad
in Paris . . . looking up at a street lamp" with a "moth
350
in it" (II, 180). The association of the poet with a
maker, or weaver, has classical overtones that associate
Agostino with that order of poet; but the darker associa
tion reveals a flawed talent as does the indication of an
absence of plain speech, this latter reminding of the Pole
sisters' tendency to obscure statements.
Certainly Agostino shows himself to be conscious of
having produced a flawed work in the "guilty" thought
that he had led Vittoria "to anti-climax in the first
act" of Camilla (I, 247). His thought finds voice in
Rocco Ricci's question, asked "with malice," if his fear
be due to his having "put [his] best poetry in the first
act" (p. 251). Although Agostino is heard to deny it,
the narrator adds "angrily," his own previous thought as
well as his further statement that he "should not be
lamenting if the opera were stopped at once," reveals the
first act to be poetically superior (p. 251). Moreover,
Vittoria also, the narrator says, "was not strengthened
by the character of the music and the poetry of the second
Act." Then, the narrator repeats that "a knowledge of its
somewhat inferior quality may have been at the root of
Agostino's dread of an anti-climax" (p. 253).
It may be accepted as significant that Meredith goes
to some pains to establish the first-act poetry's excel
lence as opposed to the second-act poetry's inferiority.
Ricci, Agostino himself, and Vittoria (and in the latter
351
two cases, the narrator's voice is added, as he acts as
the filter through which their thoughts are screened to
give them the greater validity that this technique effects)
provide accumulative testimony of the lesser artistic
accomplishment in the second act. Moreover, the poetry
of the superior first act was summarized in prose, so that
the reader might not determine for himself which is
literal transcription of the libretto and which is merely
recapitulation of its meaning. Meredith seems to wish to
avoid quarrels with the opera's poetry, in order to keep
it from interfering with the opera's more important ana
logical purpose. In addition, he may have wished also
to avoid the possibility that dislike for the poetry could
endanger the success of the novel. Therefore, he goes
about securing the reader's tacit agreement to judge that
reproduced portion of the libretto with some sympathy,
even though Meredith also provides against the reader's
excusing Agostino's "artistic depravity" in sacrificing
his poetry to the "irresistible" temptations of his
revolutionary fervor. Continuing as if in Agostino's
mind, the narrator adds:
Applause scarcely consoled him, and it was with
humiliation of mind that he acknowledged his debt
to the music and the singers, and how little they
owed him. (p. 2 55)
A similarity to, as well as a difference from, Emilia-
Vittoria's artistic nature exists in Agostino's reaction.
352
The similarity is in the ability to recognize and acknowl
edge one's own failure, a faculty Tracy lacks. The
difference is that Agostino receives a degree of satis
faction from the applause in spite of his awareness of
his own inadequacies; whereas Emilia completely rejected
applause in the face of her recognition of her own
failure, and rather welcomed Pericles' "Fiasco" (Sandra
Belloni, I, 31).
Vittoria's identification of the "somewhat inferior
quality" of the second act is presented in the narrator's
voice. Although she notes that "the character of the
music," too, is less than that of the first act, she
concentrates more on the poetry. When she is overcome
by the emotions "within her" of "Italy's shame, her sad
ness, her tortures, her quenchless hope, and the view of
Freedom," she- does "as much as she" can, upon recovering
herself, to correct "the underlinings of Agostino's
libretto" (pp. 258-259). The quality of the third act
too is called into question with the narrator's use of
the word "sentiment": "The libretto of the Third Act was
steeped in the sentiment of Young Italy"(p. 263). Since
Young Italy has been demonstrated throughout Sandra
Belloni , as well as in this first volume of Vittoria (and
also throughout the second volume) to be "steeped" in
passion, rather than sentiment, the act's attainment is
signified as limited with the serious implications this
353
word "sentiment" has in the Italian novels.
The third act music, on the other hand, is identified
by the narrator as "fine"; just the verses lack "a life"
that "Rocco and Vittoria gave" them. Yet the narrator
says he will reproduce them in the pages of his story in
order "that they may assist [the reader] to some idea of
the faith animating [the revolutionary] heads, and may
serve to justify this history" (p. 264). The reminder of
Meredith's devotion to the Real (Letters, I, 161) is again
accompanied by the careful precaution against attack of
the quality of the poetry, as mentioned on pages 350 to 351.
Just before the inset stanzaic presentation, which
contains the approach to the climax as well as the climax
itself, and at the point at which Vittoria appears on
stage, eleven stichomythic lines are handled as if they
were prose, although seeming poetry, along with three
more lines of alternated response interwoven with narrator
commentary:
"It is she!" cries Michiella, from a contracted bosom;
smiting it with clenched hands.
"Swift to the signatures. 0 rival! what bitterness
hast thou come hither to taste." (p. 269)
The gradual approach to the actual libretto contains more
effective examples of poetry than any of the inset lines
that follow. However, the reader has been prepared not
to expect them to show superior artistry.
Thus, although the narrator states that Vittoria's
354
"voice" is "at a starry pitch in its clear ascendancy,"
the reader does not hope for the same ascendancy of verse.
Nonetheless, the sing-song rhythm and the distressing
rhymes are jarring.
Tear up the insufferable scroll!—
0 thou, my lover and my soul!
It is the Sword that reunites;
The Pen that our perdition writes.
Michiella's response offers an even more unfortunate rhyme
in its last two lines than that in the first two lines
above:
Accurst divorced one! doest thou dare
To lie in shameless fondness there?
Abandoned! on thy lying brow
Thy name shall be imprinted now.
Camilla's response is of a higher order as is the sticho-
mythia that follows:
"My name is one I do not fear;
'Tis one that thou would'st shrink to hear.
Go, cool thy penitential fires,
Thou creature, foul with base desires!"
CAMILLO (facing Count Orso).
"The choice is thine!"
COUNT ORSO (draws)
"The choice is made!"
(p. 271)
Camilla's confusing use of "penitential" for
Michiella's "fire" also does not suit the mood of
Michiella's speech that follows a choric stanza: "Yea! I
could smite her on the face," which is calculated to rhyme
with "disgrace," or her even more amusing contention that
355
"A thousand swords are in my veins" (p. 271). Still, as
indicated in Chapter I, the opera chapters offer an
impressive display of virtuosity and control of fictional
material, and, moreover, as demonstrated above, many of
the opera's lines are acceptable poetry. Among these are
the first three stanzas of the opera's final song. The
last stanza foreshadows the novel's ending; Camilla sings,
I enter the black boat
Upon the wide grey sea,
Where all her set suns float;
Thence hear my voice remote: —
Italia, Italia shall be free!
Agostino's imagery for Young Italy's death is the same as
the narrator's for Carlo's death at the novel's end, a
death that, it was previously noted, seems to be accom
panied by Vittoria's "soul" or artistic death {pp. 341-
342) .
Following the opera passages in Vittoria, no more
discussions are heard concerning the art of poetry, al
though the steinbock song and the score of Hagar (the
music being Ricci's, but the librettist unnamed [II, 207]),
are presented without specific comment on the artistic
achievement of either. Discussion of prose, slight as it
is, ended even earlier. There is the great comic scene
in which the narrator tells of Mrs. Chump's efforts to
pen a letter "that should bring them [the Poles] under a
mountain of shame" (Sandra Belloni, II, 69).
I
356
The point, however, was to transfer this mountain
from her bosom, which laboured heavily beneath it,
to their heads. {p. 69)
The ambiguity involved in the terminology of mountains and
bosoms borders upon bad taste, but is sufficiently under
stated by the narrator to be slyly comic.
Mrs. Chump's inability to formulate her feelings into
acceptable epistolary terms is matched by Braintop's. But
the difference between them, in addition to depth of
feeling about the Poles, is Mrs. Chump's previously-
indicated happy facility with the homely image.
Ye make the garls seem to hear, me seemin' to say—
Oooo! I was so comfortable before your disturbin' me
with your horrud voices. Ye understand, Mr. Braintop?
"I'm in bed, and you're a cold bath." Begin like that,
ye know. "Here's clover, and you're nettles." D'ye
see? "Here from my glass o ' good Porrt to your tumbler
of horrud acud vin'gar." Bless the boy! he don't
begin. (pp. 71-72)
Braintop can get no farther than "Ladies," to which Mrs.
Chump, demanding precise language, objects on the grounds
of their behavior to her, and "Women," to which she
exclaims "And every one of 'em unmarrud garls! . . .Mr.
Braintop! Mr. Braintop! ye're next to an ejut!" (p. 74).
To help him with his task, she sends him to church,
"primes him with Sherry," feeds him, and then prompts him
Think of a dinner. Furrst soup; that prepares ye for
what's cornin'. Then fish, which is on the road to
meat, d'ye see? --we pepper 'em. Then joint, Mr.
Braintop— out we burrst. . . . Then the sweets. . . .
And there, Mr. Braintop, ye've got ut all laid out as
flat as a pancake. (p. 75)
357
Indeed she has "laid out" the principles, not of the
classical oration, but of the critical article. Inspired,
especially by appeals to his "swelling vanity" (p. 77) and
a "prospect of advancement in his office" (p. 78), Braintop
at last produces a letter that "would have done no dis
credit" to a "merchant's office," but which makes him the
target for the crumpled paper, pen, and various epithets
from Mrs. Chump "in a fiery bloom" (p. 79). Thus, the
results of this demanding exercise in prose writing never
find expression.
Carlo's prose writing has been discussed in Chapter I
along with the indication that his talents are not ulti
mately those of composition. The very language in which
the narrator pictures him in the process of writing fea
tures a clumsily mixed metaphor and a grammatical error:
"The pen transversed seas and continents like an old
hack to whom his master has thrown the reins" (Vittoria,
I, 227). The use of the present perfect with the past
tense, the use of the perjoratively connotative "hack,"
and the seemingly unintentional humor of the horse gallop
ing over the sea, all combine to give the impression of
slipshod performance by Carlo in his writing.
His later writing to Vittoria that though he held to
"the truth and what was felt," his "vehicle for delivering
it was rubbish" (Vittoria, II, 100) indicates that Carlo
does not lack taste. In further proof, he says that he
358
"jump[s] at shaking off the journalistic phraseology that
Agostino laughs at." Another witness to his relatively
inferior attainment in composition, as it also reflects
ineptitude in performance, is that while Carlo's choice
of poetry may be good (so, again, there is no question of
his taste), his "declamation" of it "may be bad" (I, 191-
192). Meredith himself may be hidden behind Carlo's
impatience with the strictures of journalism; Meredith
turned, at least "partly," to writing for newspapers upon
his disappointment at the public's unfriendly reception
of his novels (Letters, I, 354).
Later Carlo indicates that which seems to be his
proper title, when he writes to Vittoria, "Once an editor,
always an editor." He plans a new journal that will
include the writings of others: the "prose, poetry, and
hotch-potch" of "the Legitimists, the Moderates, and the
Republicans" (11,176). Laura's pamphlet writing too seems
to be of the same unprofessional level as Carlo's. When
she senses his amusement at her hortative speech, she
says, "Don't think I am declaiming to you from one of my
'Midnight Lamps'" (p. 149).
The voices in discussion of music were treated
more fully in Chapter I and there is no need to repeat here
except to call attention to the fact that there is not so
much analytical examination of the art of music as of
poetry. The quality of Ricci's music is not discussed to
359
any real degree, whether that of Camilla or of Hagar, other
than by the statement already given: that it, as the
poetry, was of less attainment in the second act than in
the first, but that it is better than in the third. The
steinbock song is also, within its own category of folk
music, indicated to be a successful expression.
It will be remembered that the brief discussion of
Ricci's music in the opera (see pages 19 8 to 199) indicates
that it is "as severe as an old masterpiece," to its
credit, and so does not offer too many of the "sweet
things" that would destroy its "classical" appeal for
the intelligent listener (I, 264). Although Ricci himself
would have succumbed to the temptation to "seduce or
flatter thoughtless hearers," as Agostino did with his
libretto, Vittoria prevents Ricci from doing so. Once
again Meredith seems to be alluding to his own artistic
problems in a struggle to resist pandering to the "thought
less" reader.
There is, then, not an artist represented in the two
Italian novels who does not at one time or another fail to
come up to the highest standards of his art. Even Emilia-
Vittoria is shown to fail several times; it was the aware
ness of her inadequacies as a singer that drove her to
seek training. Even at the moment of her greatest triumph,
the La Scala performance, she feels the need for assurance
in order to have her "composure restored" (p. 247). Then,
360
between the first and second acts, she sits brooding:
She frightened herself with her coughing [a reminder
to the reader of the failure she had experienced as
Emilia], and shivered at the prospect of again going
forward in the great nakedness of stage-lights and
thirsting eyes. (I, 253)
Perhaps the combination of awareness of past failure and
fear of its repetition is that which inspires the artist
to his greatest achievements.
If voices are heard less frequently about music than
about poetry (a somewhat paradoxical fact since, as
indicated in Chapter I, music is the primary art form in
the two Italian novels), they are heard much more fre
quently in musical metaphor. In Sandra Belloni, the
narrator, speaking in his own person, rather than either
as another character, or through another character's con
sciousness, utters three of the eleven musical allusions.
In Vittoria the narrator as himself delivers ten of the
nineteen musical metaphors. When he is dealing with
musical metaphors, his voice blends only with that of
Emilia-Vittoria in both novels, although in use of other
figurative language he frequently speaks as if he were one
of the other characters, or as if he were speaking through
their consciousnesses. The blending with Emilia occurs
twice in Sandra Belloni, and with Vittoria four times only,
Vittoria, Volume II.
The technique aids, along with the other devices dis
cussed in Chapter I, and in the first section of this
361
chapter, in establishing Emilia-Vittoria as herself sym
bolic of the musical principles of harmony and proportion.
Again, it will be remembered, the narrator, as if in her
consciousness, had let the reader see her apprehension of
her father as a "child of harmony" (fiddling in the or
chestra of the farce "among the sons of discord" (Sandra
Belloni, I, 27 8). Also as if inside her mind, the narra
tor tells the reader that in her confusion at Wilfrid's
cruelty she had tried to rind "a reason to make him in
harmony with his acts" (II, 124). Then when she wanders
the streets of London as an outcast, "her unhaunted
spirit" makes "a music" of the sounds:
The rumble and the rattle of wheels; the cries and
grinding noises; the hum of motion and talk; all
under the lingering smoky red of a London Winter
sunset.
These "were not discord to her animated blood" because she
believed that she had "probably no more than another day
to live" (pp. 163-164).
After she had been rescued by Merthyr, the narrator
says that "she compared herself to her father's old broken
violin, that may be mended to please the sight; but would
never give the tones again" (II, 210). In connection with
Emilia and, too, perhaps under her influence, Tracy
Runningbrook attempts a musical allusion in one of the
letters in which he writes myopically of Emilia to
Wilfrid:
362
Love is an instrument like any other thing, and that
we must play on it with considerate gentleness, and
that tearing at it or dashing it to earth, making it
howl and quiver, is madness and not love! (II, 200)
The narrator uses the same metaphor in a more accurate
manner when he says Vittoria's feeling,
. . . that it was she to whom it was given to lift
the torch and plant the standard of Italy, had swept
through her as through the strings of a harp. (I, 168)
In yet another instance of the metaphor, the narrator
speaks as if within Vittoria's mind as she tries to gain
the Lenkenstein sisters' forgiveness for Wilfrid:
She knew that she had been speaking badly, or in
effectually, by the haunting flatness of sound, as
of an unstrung instrument, in her ears.
The narrator continues as if inside Vittoria's conscious
ness to reveal the musical comparison that Vittoria makes
of herself with Anna.
She was herself unstrung and dispirited, while the
recollection of Anna's voice was like a sombre con
quering monotony on a low chord, with which she felt
insufficient to compete. (II, 153)
The symbol of a stringed instrument is a constant for
Emilia-Vittoria from the time she is first said by the
narrator to be playing the harp in the fir-wood. In
addition to those thoughts of Emilia-Vittoria already
cited, the thoughts of her only true lover, Carlo, as
these are given by the narrator, associate her with music.
His memory of kissing her hands is "a song of tenderness
in his blood" (I, 186). Then, when Carlo and Vittoria are
divided in understanding and feeling, but not divided in
363
love, the narrator says that Vittoria "wondered painfully
that [his love] should continue so barren of music" (II,
185) .
It may be seen that to Emilia-Vittoria life is made
up of music, the music of one's own life as well as that
of others and of the earth itself. One may then be
oneself an instrument, and the sounds of living may per
form as a kind of orchestration. The narrator tells that
for Vittoria the Tyrolese mountain songs "spring like
clear water into the air, and fall wavering as a feather
falls, or the light about a stone in water" (II, 140).
Then, as she follows in Carlo's last steps, "The fate of
her husband sang within [any mountain gorge] a strange
chant, ending in a key that rang sounding through all her
being, and seemed to question heaven" (p. 331).
It may be seen that the use of musical imagery and
the purposes underlying its use have been quite consistent
throughout the two Italian novels. Music is one of the
important means for characterizing Emilia-Vittoria, but
Meredith used it in other contexts, too. One of the most
interesting is the narrator's use of this metaphor to
help delineate the negative aspects of a character; the
"feeding devil" of Sir Purcell Barrett is "a constant
irritation" and "complaint against justice." The narrator
addresses the reader to ask,
364
Have you listened to him, ever? He does this: — he
plays to you your music (it is he who first teaches
thousands that they have any music at all, so guess
what a dear devil he is!); and when he has played
this ravishing melody, he falls to upon a burlesque
contrast of hurdy-gurdy and bagpipe squeal and bellow
and drone, which is meant for the music of the world.
How far sweeter was yours! This charming devil Sir
Purcell had nursed from childhood. (II, 2 82)
The technique displayed here of securing the reader's
participation in the novel will be discussed in more
detail in the next chapter.
Meredith's use of the masks of editorial, neutral, and
selective omniscience, through which the voices examine
the various political, social, and artistic matters in
the two Italian novels, results in subtle and complex
presentation of points of awareness. A careful attention
to the voices as they agree and disagree with given notions
leads to the establishment of the concepts which the
implied author wishes to convey to the reader. Often the
implied author may be seen to be in agreement with
Meredith himself as he expressed himself in his letters
and in his poetry. Although many, if not most, of the
ideas are not stated directly, but contained in a complex
ity of statements, they can always be determined from
careful, and even repetitive clues.
However, Meredith's use of voices is made more diffi
cult to follow because all the characters, both those
admirable and those not admirable, voice both acceptable
and unacceptable ideas; that is, ideas that have been
365
established as valid within the context of the novels.
Thus, that a character has the approval of the implied
author is not a criterion for truth, as the novel presents
it, of all that character's speeches. Conversely, the
establishment of a character as at times faulty in judg
ment or character is not a guarantee for the error of all
his statements. For example, it was earlier demonstrated
that both Lady Charlotte and Sir Purcell Barrett, por
trayed as alienated from Earth and from nature, speak both
truth and error in regard to religion (both Lady Charlotte
and Sir Purcell) and art (Sir Purcell). It would seem,
then, that Pritchett's belief'that Meredith is all person.
Other people become him" (p. 23) is an unacceptable over
simplification which does not take into account the com
plexities of Meredith's uses of voice and so of points of
view (see Chapter III).
The intricacies of Meredith's uses of points of view,
including his use of ficelles in Vittoria, gain the
reader's greater participation in the novels as he must
perform himself to distinguish between the subjective and
the objective truths in the novels. In the case of the
use of ficelles, the subjective biases and guilt feelings
of Emilia-Vittoria and Carlo prevent their own objective
judgments from being communicated to the reader, both
because they are too passionately involved to be objective
and because they are unable to communicate with each
other. Yet the confidantes, too, are subject to bias;
and, hence, the always-objective narrator reassuringly
acts as the guide to truth. The next chapter will discuss
the complicated uses of "voice"; the use of the novel's
form, and the use of the language of the novel for
Meredith's purposeful communication with the reader.
CHAPTER III
ENGAGEMENT OF THE READER'S CREATIVE PARTICIPATION
IN THE NOVELIST'S POINTS OF VIEW
As the provider of a communication, a novel implies
essentially just two people: the writer of the novel,
who has something to communicate; and a reader, who both
wishes and is able to attend to and to receive that
communication. Meredith hoped for a reading public with
at least "a moderate degree of intellectual activity,"
since only a "corresponding acuteness" on its part could
guarantee the reception of a lesson aimed at "the head"—
and Meredith said that in a novel written by him the
lesson "must be subtle to penetrate" ("Essay on Comedy,"
p. 3). That Meredith's rhetorical purposes for his two
Italian novels were to delight, to instruct, and "to move,
or 'bend'" the reader-*- may be inferred almost as much from
his probable familiarity with the principles of classical
rhetoric— Cicero's Letters, though not the Rhetoric, are
listed by Williams (p. 323), and Meredith recommends to
his son Arthur that he "study Cicero carefully" (Letters,
I, 465)— as by the pervasiveness of the nineteenth century
• * • Kenneth Burke, A Rhetoric of Motives (New York:
Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1952), p. 73.
367
368
attitude of "earnestness. Meredith designed to "touch
and kindle the mind," not just "through laughter" ("Essay,"
p. 3), but also through representation of the real and the
'ideal (Letters, I, 160-161), as well as through the narra
tive and "voicing" techniques by which he secures the
points of view of the novels.
Close knowledge of our fellows, discernment of the
laws of existence, these lead to great civilization.
I have supposed that the novel, exposing and illus
trating the natural history of man, may help us to
such sustaining roadside gifts. (Letters, II, 876)
Since the two Italian novels may be considered to
belong to the genre of the intellectual novel (Stevenson,
"The Intellectual Novel," Pt. 2, p. 162), their lessons
work toward bending the reader, or moving him to the
intellectual activity of rejection of one mode of behavior
and acceptance of another. Meredith did not hope to reach
all his readers, however, because, while there are those
who demand "cane," or the intellectual stimulation a novel
can provide, there are also those who shun it (Sandra
Belloni, II, 251). The narrator slyly hints that these
latter, who "crave copious sugar" only, are among the
"little people" of the world to whom Sandra Belloni would
teach "that they are little people" (p. 282). The giving
of lessons is for Meredith an important purpose of the
Italian novels.
^Walter E. Houghton, The Victorian Frame of Mind
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957), pp. 218-262.
It would be a mistake to believe the narrator's
ironical inference, however, that the cane constitutes the
only teaching and hence the dull matter of the novels, and
that the sugar comprises the entertainment and hence the
amusing matter. Rather the narrator says that the two,
cane and sugar, are inseparable; Chapters I and II demon
strated that the ideas of the novels, and thus their
teaching, proceed either through the medium of humor
(especially in Sandra Belloni) or through that of dramatic
excitement (especially in Vittoria). Instruction in the
microcosm of Sandra Belloni is most explicitly about the
evils of sentimentality, which suppresses freedom; and
instruction in the macrocosm of Vittoria, as a logical ex
tension of that in the microcosm of Sandra Belloni,
examines passion, which is the free expression of nature.
The development of the lesson includes the progression
from sentimental self-gratification of one person at the
expense of another to the suppression of a whole people by
another people for reasons of self-interest; and the
lesson involves man in his political, social, and artistic
interests and activities. Meredith seems to provide
"proverbs writ large" in the way that, according to
Kenneth Burke, "complex and sophisticated works of art"
may "legitimately be considered" to do.3
•^Kenneth Burke, "Literature as Equipment for Living,"
in Modern Criticism; Theory and Practice, ed. Walter
Sutton and Richard Foster (New York: The Odyssey Press,
Inc., 1963), p. 244.
370
The lessons, given to delight and calculated to move,
appear in the manner of structuring the dramatic and the
pictorial, in the use of "voices," and in the language
of both novels. The "internal structure" is important to
"the art experience" (Goodman, p. 4), and such structure
conveys part of the artist's communication to his reader.
How the artist structures summarization and analysis as
opposed to dramatic action with dialogue, with the differ
ences in distance, performs to instruct the reader about
the differing and often opposing views of the characters,
the narrator, and the Philosopher.
Pictorial analysis and pictorial summary afford in
the novels a removal which permits a dispassionate survey-
ance; dramatic narrative secures a feeling of presence and,
when suitable, of excitement. The reader views fictional
characters and feels in sympathy with them. Hume des
cribes sympathy as that "remarkable" quality which permits
us "to receive by communication" the "inclinations and
sentiments" of others, no matter how "different from, or
even contrary to our own" (Treatise, II, i, 11, 316). In
encouraging sympathy through the structuring of narrative,
Meredith also encourages the reader to contribute his own
experiences to the novel, both those of the reading and
those outside the reading. However, with careful control
of narrative technique, maskings, and language, Meredith
provides that the accumulation of experiences, from the
371
points of view provided, will lead the reader to the
pleasure and the knowledge which the novels are designed
to give.
Meredith uses summary within the novels for different
purposes. As F. R. Leavis notes, "the art of comedy is a
distancing art";^ and for the purposes of comedy in Sandra
Belloni, Meredith does indeed pull the reader back, by
using the distant prospects of the narrator and of the
even farther-removed Philosopher, in order to inspire
laughter. However, in Vittoria distance is most often
secured for ends other than comic; distancing in this
novel prevents interference of subordinate material in the
main plot, both by keeping material of secondary importance
structurally separate and also by forestalling deflection
of the reader's sympathy away from the main characters to
the less important characters. Thus, the Rinaldo Guida-
scarpi-Barto-Rosellina Rizzo triangle is mainly summarized
and analyzed by the narrator so that their affairs do not
distract the reader from the novel's chief concerns (which,
contrarily, are served by the triangle [see pages 126 and
26 8]) and do not excite the reader's sympathy for subordi
nate characters in a way that would jeopardize the novel's
principal emotional experience as Meredith ordered it in
relation to Carlo and Vittoria. Distancing also serves to
^The Common Pursuit (Ithaca, New York: New York
University Press, 1962), p. 264.
372
instruct, as in the description of Vittoria's and Laura's
approach to the battlefield (see pages 8 5 to 90 ), simply
by indicating that the validity of an opinion on a subject
(such as war) depends upon the degree of knowledge about
it.
Meredith's use of masks through which the characters
speak to each other and through which the narrator and the
Philosopher speak to the reader (the narrator chiefly
reporting to the reader his own, but also the Philosopher's
words, and the Philosopher speaking only once directly to
the reader) is basically a simple, but also an effective
technique in securing the different points of view. It
has been noted that in his employment of masks of the
different omniscient types categorized by Friedman, Mere
dith may be seen to use some of the techniques of the No
theatre. That is, the kurombo is dressed in such a way as
to obscure his presence, as the neutral teller is masked
to be featureless (the epic teller and the characters have
masks with discernible features). Both the kurombo and
the neutral teller go about their duties in full view of
the audience or the reader, to arrange the stage or the
details of the story, and to dispose of the actors or
the characters, as the plots demand. At times the
audience or the reader is directly engaged in the drama
or the novel, and at other times he is simply passive.
Thus the narrator displays for the reader certain
373
pertinent information (as the kurombo displays for the
audience his props) which the narrator has obtained from
off-stage (information that sometimes the narrator himself
has in his omniscient role, and' information that sometimes
he brings on stage from the Philosopher). A difference
between the No convention and Meredith's use of his narra
tor is that in the two Italian novels it is not the actors
(characters) who involve the reader in the action, but it
is the narrator, especially when wearing his epic-teller
mask, who addresses the reader. In other ways, however,
the neutral teller does resemble the kurombo: as the
kurombo is on stage and exercises responsibilities and
abilities overriding those of the actors, so does the
narrator control. Only the narrator, whether in his epic
or in his neutral mask, is aware that the story is a means
of communication with the reader and, hence, is aware of
a reader; and, in the play, only the kurombo is aware that
the drama is a drama with artificial requirements for
staging before an audience, and he too reveals a concern
for that audience.
Finally, in this chapter, a closer look at the
language (rhythm, metaphor, diction, and tone) in the
novels as it communicates with the reader shows that the
language is certainly designed to delight, to instruct,
and to move or bend the reader. Since imagery was con
sidered in Chapter II (as it is employed by the various
374
voices and, especially, as it is used to help identify the
various masks), discussion of it here will be small. In
Chapter II the imagery was shown to be an element that
both distinguishes between the two novels and links them
as integrated and interdependent works. Although each
novel can be read separately, each, in its use of imagery,
takes on added pleasure and meaning when read in conjunc
tion with the other. The diction of the two novels is
also differentiating, with remoteness and indirection of
phrasing employed in Sandra Belloni for the Poles espe
cially, to underscore their characterization as "polar"
and as unintelligible speakers; whereas plain speaking
marks the novel of plain issues, Vittoria. The contrast
between the tones of the two novels is even more impres
sive. As mentioned earlier, the graver tone of Vittoria
seems so much at variance with the comic tone of Sandra
Belloni as to indicate two different narrating personali
ties. However, this suggestion has already been indicated
to be less reasonable than that the same narrator tells
both stories.
The structure of the two novels as they complement
each other; their themes; their imagery; their diction;
their tone; the narrator’s stances and habit of viewing
life and people; and the consistent concern for the
reader's growth in understanding, all seem to indicate
that both novels are told by the same neutral and epic
375
tellers. According to Long, authorial personality
"involves much more than point-of-view," since the
"rhetorical personality of the novels modifies and indi
vidualizes . . . the structure, the characters, the themes,
the tone, the emphases" of the novels ("Authorial Rheto
ric," p. 3), the latter two categories having to do more
specially with language. This chapter will examine the
novels' structure, voices, and language as they please
and then instruct the reader (after first securing his
acceptance and/or belief, which Hume states is gained
through delight), in order to reform his notions about
life and also, perhaps, his acts. That is, if the reader
can know better the species to which he belongs, with the
aid of the Philosopher, then he can improve his own and
others' lives.
The Italian novels are not simple, and the message
is complicated, being, as already indicated, a two
pronged one of the evils of imprisoning sentimentality and
the good of freeing passion. However, though the lessons
are not always immediately apparent, one of the pleasures
the novels offer is that a reading of them on the terms
which Meredith establishes reveals a clear and clearly-
intended interrelationship of content and form.
376
Structuring by Narrative Method for
Intellectual Pleasure and Instruction
To engage properly the reader's intellectual consider
ation (Stevenson,"The Intellectual Novel," Pt. 2, p. 162),
Meredith cultivated a "critical distance" that would per
mit the reader's detachment from "the strange new world"
(Long, p. 175) created for his amusement and instruction.
The use of a "narrating personality" both unifies this
world and makes more real the characters' mental lives
(pp. 183, 123). Before entering this world, however, the
reader must first follow Coleridge's injunction to suspend
willingly his disbelief. Then he is ready to start on a
"journey" during which he is to employ "distinct pauses"
in order to make "surveys" of both past events and future
prospects (Sandra Belloni, II, 203). Starting out with
"knapsack on back," he will travel, with the narrator and
the Philosopher as guides, into a "strange new world"
(Long, p. 3), where he will study the "species" of "fat"
England's "garden" and the "battles and conspiracies" of
Italy's "field of action" (Sandra Belloni, II, 203).
During the pauses, he will have opportunity to assay
the surroundings in order to measure and to understand the
present action in relation to the past and in relation to
the future. To help him to this appreciation of the
microcosmic and macrocosmic worlds in which he will be
traveling, he will also, during the pauses, have
377
opportunities to learn how a puppet's "lower limbs" are
manipulated by the "showman" (X, 124-125); to view a "play"
at which the "actors" (II, 280) will sometimes have the
additional help of a Philosopher who "rushes forward to
the footlights" (p. 271); and to attend a church where the
impetuous Philosopher "demands the pulpit" (p. 201). The
narrator is seen to think of the reader, and so to communi
cate with him, on a three-fold basis: as if they share an
adventure; as if the narrator is responsible for the
reader's moral instruction (pulpit); and as if he is re
sponsible for the reader's entertainment (puppet and
legitimate theatres). In addition to moral instruction,
or, more properly, in accord with Meredith's humanitarian
philosophy in the two Italian novels, the narrator promises
"good teaching" about the "flower of life" (p. 203), too.
The different points of view toward which the reader
is being edged in Sandra Belloni have in common the
prospect of the Comic Spirit; that is, the very terminology
indicates that whether on the walking tour, at the garden,
in the theatre, or in the church, the reader will be
protected by the narrator from a stiffly-paced tour guide,
a deceptive "showman," feigning "actors," and a tedious
clergyman. Rather the reader will enjoy pauses, acquire
the showman's secrets of the mastery of his puppets, and
profit from the learned ideas of a Philosopher who is
vigorous and as at home in a theatre as in a church. The
378
Philosopher's versatility argues against his becoming
tedious, but still the narrator rather ostentatiously
watches over the reader's interests in this regard.
The Philosopher's only responsibility is in teaching
about sentimentality; whereas the narrator's is ostensibly
the entertainment. Whether wearing the epic or the neutral
teller mask, the narrator informs the reader entertaining
ly of the events, thoughts, and feelings of the characters.
However, that the narrator must also teach is implied by
the manner of announcement of the Philosopher's presence.
The narrator's words suggest that the Philosopher is
interrupting the narrator, who is, then, already in the
"pulpit" or at "the footlights," and hence informing as
he performs.
The narrator certainly gives instruction in his
examination of the Hillford-Ipley affair (political, not
sentimental), of the Poles' social ambitions and behavior,
especially in regard to Emilia ("The parasite completes
the animal" [I, 66]), as well as of Georgiana Ford's
difficulties with passion and Cornelia's and Sir Barrett's
"dramatic tangle of the Nice Feelings," which is primarily
sentimental. In Vittoria the reader has stepped out of
England's garden-1aboratory into the battlefield. Examin
ation of "springs" is unnecessary as well as impractical
for characters who are passionately involved in a life-
and-death struggle; their motivations are self-evident,
379
and the action in which they are involved is too swift
to permit lingering looks at species' aberrations. The
reader's needs, then, dictate that the construction of
Vittoria differ from that of Sandra Belloni, although in
Vittoria, too, he will be treated to changes of pace and of
prospect as summary and analysis ("surveys" from "emi
nences") are mixed with dramatic action and dialogue.
There is, however, much less analysis and that of a differ
ent kind. That is, whatever analysis exists in Vittoria
(as in the cases of the Chief and even of Violetta) is to
reveal the sources for or the effects of harmony and of
greatness (whether through affirmative, as with the Chief,
or negative, as with the Violetta example).
In both novels, summary and analysis are usually
structured to precede and to succeed dramatic action, and
so to prepare and to post-instruct the reader (the complete
instruction entails the material given dramatically as well
as that given pictorially). For example, the first
chapter of Sandra Belloni presents summarily and analyti
cally the highly comic Poles and the irony of their
situation. Within this frame, the second chapter then
contains the dramatically-presented moonlight expedition
to locate the source for the mysterious voice (Emilia).
The techniques in the handling of these two chapters are
a powerful factor in both the instruction and the pleasure
conveyed by the chapters. The narrator's ironic summary,
380
which essentially dismisses the Poles' consequence, con
trasts instructively with the dramatic presentation of
Emilia, who speaks and acts for herself with directness
and naturalness.
It may be seen that the plot of Sandra Belloni moves
quickly, and that summary and analysis are inserted where
necessary to make the action more instructive and also
more amusing but without causing the reader to be long
distracted from the story-line. The first long "aside,"
a long paragraph analyzing sentimentalism (p. 6), applies
directly to the Poles, whose lives and attitudes are being
summarized in this first chapter. Chapter III continues
the dramatic action of Chapter II; Chapter IV, then,
summarizes and analyzes the Poles in more detail after
they have displayed their own characters in the two
preceding chapters, before switching to dramatic narrative
in the presentation of the Poles as they pursue their
"mounting" ambitions. In Chapter V the dramatic narrative
of Emilia's conduct and her concern for art balances
tellingly against the dramatic and the pictorial narra
tives of the Poles in the preceding chapter. This first
section of Sandra Belloni, which constitutes the exposi
tion of the novel, ends with Chapter VI, in which Emilia
relates to Wilfrid her own history.
The first extended digression does not occur until
Chapter VII, in which the narrator devotes two pages to
381
telling of the ladies being "stormed by Mr. Barrett's
elegant tail" (p. 63). The lesson contained in this
analysis reveals the same wicked humor that spiked the
passage in which Wilfrid's "nose" is related to the preser
vation of the race (see pages 44 to 45). Yet this analysis,
too, is niched in with the dramatically-narrated dinner
scene at the Poles and not made to stand out as a clearly
separate and digressive addition, as with the Philosopher's
later analyses. Both the information and the tone of the
analysis of Mr. Barrett's social success add to the read
er's education about sentimentality and to his enjoyment
of the comedy. Moreover, the lesson and the humor, both
being subtle, may be enjoyed to the degree that the reader
permits himself: they may be hastily tasted or unhurriedly
savored.
More direct instruction is occasionally provided the
reader by the ironical narrator. In a Comic-Spirit address
to "0 man," he counsels the methods of attracting "superior
women," methods based on Barrett's success (p. 65). Since
these "superior women" are indicated to be the Pole sis
ters , whose superiority is a matter of only their own
opinion, the lesson is contained in the irony. It will be
remembered that in an even more direct address, the "lady"
reader is later lectured concerning her encouragement of
man to think of her as a vegetable (p. 199).
The Philosopher, as one of the readership (see pages
318 to 319 and 385), does not appear as a separate character
(with a capitalized initial letter) and teacher until
Chapter VIII. Then the narrator apologetically tells the
reader that the Philosopher insists upon talking of the
"crown and flower of the nervous system," the head, and
the effect of hats there (p. 68). The narrator, conceding
only that "howsoever these things be," does nevertheless
make application of them to Emilia indirectly. That is,
Emilia is not said to be sentimental, but she does par
ticipate in a folly (to which "women [are] especially
subject" [p. 68]). The reader here, as in other sections
of the novel, learns that Emilia-Vittoria is subject to
the "littlenesses" of her sex, even though she is an
artist, like the Queen of Song of the poster-portrait.
This view of women represents Meredith's own attitudes
which were, of course, colored by the times in which he
lived. His gentle portrayal of a humanly inperfect
heroine secures the reader's sympathy and affection, as
well as, perhaps for the female reader, empathy.
The first chapter devoted entirely to analysis is
Chapter IX, in which Wilfrid's "springs" are examined by
the narrator as they offer a problem to his narrative.
Wilfrid, to be identified later as the Philosopher's
"puppet" (Emilia is the narrator's "pet" [II, 250]), is
here abstractly considered as a "puppet-hero" in seven
383
paragraphs of this fourteen-paragraph chapter, and con
cretely examined in dramatic action and reaction in eight
of them. The principle underlying Meredith's treatment
of his material seems to be that
. . . no matter how intense the dramatic illusion,
no matter how gripping the plot or believable the
characterization, if we are to enter imaginatively
into a work of fiction we must at all times feel
that it is fiction, that a story is being told to
us. The two parts of the equation— that it be
like real life, and it not be real life— are ab
solutely indispensable. [Rubin, p. 9)
It is through Meredith's mastery of the equation that
the reader derives pleasure and knowledge, as from the
Hillford-Ipley sub-plot. It has already been pointed out
that this sub-plot has significance not just for Sandra
Belloni, but also for Vittoria, in its political implica
tions. But it is also important in its thematic statement
concerning the outcome of indulged sentiment, and in its
contributions to characters (especially those of Emilia
and Wilfrid) and to plot (it is the occasion for the first
display of Wilfrid's interest in Emilia; the harp pur
chaser has been anonymous for the reader as for Emilia).
In this passage, as in the more openly jibing passage on
the docks, at the end of Volume II, Meredith exposes the
ridiculousness of the smug Briton, the "islander full of
ale," with affinity for "things like unto" himself (Sandra
Belloni, I, 99). Forster's belief that in Meredith's
works "the home counties pos[ed] as the universe" (Aspects,
384
p. 136) cannot be supported by a study of points of view
in the two Italian novels.
The second volume of Sandra Belloni presents less
summary of action and more dramatic action than does
Volume I, but also more analysis, as conclusive lessons
occur, with the final resolutions and the morals of the
tale now being demonstrated. Still pictorial narrative
lends its advantages to dramatic narrative, as in Chapter
XL, after Emilia flees from friends and relatives to lose
herself in the London fog and noise. The neutral omni
scient narrator presents to the reader the pictorial
portion, much of it issuing from within Emilia's mind,
although he also carefully details the environment, in
order (through a description of the world outside her
mind) to lend greater credence to the state of the "orbed"
world within.
Carlyle's influence upon Meredith in a portraying of
"the inner life" (Morris, p. 94) of his characters results
in a representation of two converging worlds, that within
and that without, as indicated above. Sterne's influence
(earlier noted in another context, see pages 4 4 to 45)
results in yet another juxtapositioning as the narrator
straddles, in imitation of the narrator of The Life and
Opinions of Tristram Shandy, two worlds, both real and
both unreal: the world of the novels and that of the
reader. The narrators' functions in both Sterne's and
385
Meredith's works are to connect the two worlds and to make
each more real for the reader in order that they will
enhance each other for the belief that succeeds the
aesthetic pleasure (Hume, Treatise) that, in turn, pre
cedes learning.
In Sandra Belloni the Philosopher is established as
belonging essentially to the world of the reader (see
pages 318 and 319), as that world is created by Meredith,
and so the Philosopher comments upon the fictional world
as an outsider, but also as a co-creator (Wilfrid is "his
puppet"). Meredith's longing for the reader who would
appreciate "cane" is also a longing for the reader who
would invest his own imaginative "assistance" in making
the novels live, even as the Philosopher with whose
"assistance [the narrator] conceived" them (Sandra Belloni,
II, 251). The narrator ironically takes notice of the
objections made by others of his readers (who also are
imposing their views upon the fictional world) to one of
their number doing that which they also do, but do with
less ability, insight, or more ironically, opportunity
than does he. Nonetheless, in his wriest manner the
narrator repeatedly indicates his attempts to exclude
"rigidly" the Philosopher; he exclaims "Enough!" in
response to a statement about "Sentimentalism" (p. 271);
and finally he "intervene[s]" even "at the risk of break
ing [their] partnership for ever" (p. 317). The emphasis
386
in the few remaining pages of Sandra Belloni is upon
dramatic narrative.
In Vittoria, a truly rigid exclusion of the Philoso
pher is effected by the narrator, who also announces his
own non-partisanship. This latter has two implications
for the reader. First, he will not be called upon to
interpret the subtle ironies of Sandra Belloni; second,
since he will be told the story without prejudice, he may
relax his suspicions concerning hidden motives. Of
course, in Vittoria as in Sandra Belloni, characters speak
for themselves; and it is the complete narrative, presented
pictorially and dramatically, that conveys the pleasure
and the lessons of the novel. Although the ironical and
indirect manner of statement is missing from Vittoria,
the narrator's seeming objectivity poses another kind of
difficulty in determining the implied author's attitudes.
Yet here, too, the narrative method helps the reader to
determine these attitudes. For example, the use of
dramatic narrative for the Italian rebels serves to give
them greater life in the reader's imagination and so to
gain them the greater sympathy. The Austrians receive
more pictorial treatment, and therefore remain at a
greater distance and receive less sympathy.
The opera study (see pages 60 to 7 4) indicates the
structuring of pictorial and dramatic narrative for the
most effective engagement of the reader as Meredith
387
designed it for a complicated aesthetic experience,
Meredith causes the reader to see the action from different
positions so as to give him different views. Meredith
first sets before the reader a general view of the
audience; then he sets before him a general view of the
stage; next Meredith presents a particular view of
individual actors on the stage; and, finally, he offers
particular views of certain members of the audience.
Meredith alternates these views, varying the order in
which they are presented, throughout the opera chapters.
In between the acts of the opera, the reader also is
led behind the scenes to hear conversations and to know
thoughts, as well as to wander through the audience,
listening to some conversations there, and to know some
of their thoughts, too. Action, dialogue, summary, and
analysis alternate for maximum suspense and excitement
as the reader is engaged to view the affair from several
different points. The accumulation of viewpoints and of
details from these viewpoints secures acceptance and,
hence, the strength of impact of the passage upon the
reader's imagination. In these opera chapters, the
deliberate utilization of the reader's imagination, as he
is persuaded to participate in the sights and sounds, is
a major factor in the episode's power.
That these three chapters are achieved with masterly
technique and so represent an especial artistic effort on
388
Meredith's part is undoubtedly due to the importance which
the episode holds for the meaning of both the Italian
novels. It was pointed out in Chapter I that the opera
functions analogically to explain most clearly the thematic
matters of both Sandra Belloni and Vittoria and, in Chap
ter II, that it is the climactic episode of the two
novels. In these three chapters, both pictorial and
dramatic narrative are used without particular emphasis on
either one.
That Meredith was not a slave to any one technique,
and certainly not to any "narrator imperative" as some
seem to assume, may be learned not only from his handling
of the opera sequence, but also from his accounts of two
other exciting events. The opera passage, as demonstrated
in Chapter I, uses both the pictorial and the dramatic
methods in fullest degree; the kidnapping episode displays
only the dramatic technique; and the incident of Angelo's
escape uses both narrative methods, but in the use of the
pictorial mode, only summary and not analysis is employed.
The kidnapping, the shortest passage, just fourteen pages
long, proceeds with dramatic swiftness, without "pause"
for analysis or summary. The reader receives no guidance
from instructive paragraphs or the overriding commentary
of the narrator, as he does in the opera passage. Rather
the reader is given only the characters' words and actions,
and from them must deduce meaning for himself.
The reader first learns about the kidnapping from the
duchess of Graatli, whose voice, the narrator adds,
"dropped out of [the eavesdropping] Beppo's hearing" as
she tells Laura of Pericles' "scheme to rescue Vittoria:
to speed her away to [the duchess'] chateau near Meran
in Tyrol" (I, 164). Beppo's agony for Vittoria's safety
and his suspicion of all that happens in the Austrian
duchess' house, instruct the reader of the seriousness of
the threat to Vittoria, even though the plan seems to
originate with those not wishing Vittoria harm. Even more
alarming is the cunning Luigi's eagerness to get rid of
the "honest" Beppo, who is dedicated to serving Vittoria
at all costs; Luigi wants to be free to work his own
"schemes" (p. 173). A conversation between the coachman
of a "light English closed carriage" and Luigi shows him
to be in complicity with this stranger. The "she" who
"must not starve" on the "route" to Schloss Sonnenberg is
easily known to be Vittoria (p. 174), an identification
made more certain both by Pericles' appearance at the
scene and by his concern that there be chocolate available
for the still-unnamed passenger (p. 175).
The reader's doubt concerning the strength of Luigi's
loyalty to Vittoria becomes intensified as Pericles
appeals to Luigi's greed by giving him half his pay for
his part. Then, Pericles speaks of his design for
390
Vittoria to become enamoured of Weisspriess and to suffer
from "the very devil of love" so that she "will scream a
music, and die to melt him with [her] voice, and kick [her]
country to the gutter, and know . . . Italy for a birth
place and cradle of Song, and no more" (p. 176). Ammiani
failed him, Pericles continues, in this "kindling" of
Vittoria "to fire," and so now Pericles will employ a man
who "has done mischief with the inflammable little Anna
von Lenkenstein" (p. 177) .
As Weisspriess now enters, disguised as Herr Johannes,
Luigi, recognizing his "face" and knowing his "reputation,"
finally takes alarm. However, in order that suspense not
drop with the possibility of Luigi's abandonment of his
part in the plot, he is heard only to determine that it
will be Irma to whom Weisspriess will "teach love" and
then is said to react with a "jump" to Pericles' further
offer of "thirty napoleons additional." Torn between
serving his "hand" and serving his "heart," Luigi wants
to sacrifice neither, his irresolve eliciting the reader's
concern both because of the weakness of his loyalty and
because his intelligence and ability seem unequal to
outwitting the combined forces of Pericles and Weisspriess.
The action quickly becomes more complicated as a
carriage is briefly mentioned as having been drawn up and
positioned close by. Then, as Rocco Ricci leads Irma out
391
of the house, another carriage drives up to the door
(pp. 182-183). Luigi watches as Irma waves the carriage
on, receives a dropped key, and "stealthily" lets herself
back into the house (p. 184). Then the action becomes
even more swift and mysterious. Ammiani comes out and
approaches Luigi, who tells him to take home a "female
figure emerging" from the house whom he knows "could not
be Vittoria," but supposes "must be" (pp. 185-186). As
he goes up to her, "three men . . . of bulk and sinew"
prevent Ammiani's interference and take the figure away
(p. 18 6). Only implied is that Luigi's instruction for
Ammiani's protective action toward the first "figure" is
designed to ensure that it is identified as Vittoria.
When the carriage is gone, Luigi, having briefly bewailed
his thirty napoleons and his "professional reputation,"
says "the Signorina is behind you" to Ammiani, who then
knows, along with the reader, that Vittoria is safe (pp.
185-186) . The figure taken off must be assumed to be
Irma, since she is the only other female named as being
in the area.
In the next chapter, Vittoria's comments on the
attempted kidnapping lend greater clarity to the action
and definitely identify Irma as the victim. Her light
hearted treatment of the incident, as a joke on Pericles,
helps to subordinate it and also to provide a comic
392
contrast for the increasingly somber tone as the tragedy
begins to deepen. Vittoria tells Carlo that Pericles
. . . has got his Irma instead of me. . . . I think,
Signor, Carlo, you would do well by going to the
maestro [Rocco Ricci] . . . and telling him that
Irma has been caught into the skies. Say "Jealous
earth that should possess such overpowering loveli
ness," or "Attracted in spite of themselves by that
combination of genius and beauty which is found united
nowhere but in Irma, the spirits of heaven determined
to rob earth of her Lazzeruola." (p. 187)
The slight note of spite in Vittoria's playful speech is
in the character of a "littleness" and also is suited to
the general comedy of this scene.
The kidnapping sequence, handled with dramatic narra
tive exclusively, has also included a mixture of the dark
and the light, that is, of the serious and the comic.
The central situation is one of danger to Vittoria; but
balanced against the threat is Pericles' cheerful
treatment of it. However, fear for her person is then
expressed by Beppo, Luigi (whose desire for money adds
another complication), and Carlo. The gravest threat
proceeds from the dark implication surrounding Captain
Weisspriess' attitude toward her. This menace becomes
even more important in a later development in this first
volume as it intensifies the reader's realization of her
desperate plight in being cornered by Weisspriess in the
Adige Valley; that is, the lesson is similar, though it
is more sinister because without any alleviating comic
393
touches, to those concerning Wilfrid in that they involve
the forcing of another; thus freedom and, in Vittoria's
case, the very source of life and art would be defiled in
the violation of her passionate nature.
It may be that the lesson, which is of paramount
importance in the Italian novels, is embedded in a kind
of amusement or pleasure that Richardson, Defoe, and
others provided more lavishly in their works, that of the
erotic suggestion. It has already been demonstrated that
Meredith was not averse to inclusion of the sexually
suggestive, slyly disguising it so that he who discerns
it may himself be accused of indecency. Moreover, it may
be that the popularity of those authors who titillate
their readers from a stance of virtuous disapproval was
duly noted by Meredith. However, the matter and the
scene are handled with artistic propriety and, moreover,
are not mere adjuncts for ulterior purposes, but are of
the very essence of the novels' development. That is, in
addition to serving the thematic purpose stated above,
Weisspriess' desire and design are in conformity with his
character, and the episode is integrated into the plot
which it helps to forward. Not the least of its effects
is the baleful cast it throws on Anna's revenge plot
against Vittoria and Carlo, and the irony, without comedy
this time, of her employment of Weisspriess.
394
However, before this final use of the kidnapping in
the plot, its mention provides comic relief prior to the
heavy drama of the opera chapters. The confidence that
Pericles, the originator of the plot, asserts in its
success is amusing to the reader who knows it to have
failed. Although the treatment is comic, the matter is
a reminder to the reader of the potential danger to Vit-
toria (to be more specifically realized toward the end
of the volume) as well as of the seriousness of her part
in the revolution.
Throughout the kidnapping sequence, the narrator
has obscured himself so that the passage is handled with
multiple selective omniscience and, thus, in the dramatic
manner entirely, in both the original scene and the later
reference to it preceding the opera. The dramatic tech
nique encourages the reader to a feeling of presence
at the event, even as it does when used in the opera
passage. However, the shorter kidnapping episode does
not have the inherent complications that would profit from
an omniscient teller's special facility in seeing and in
deriving significance. The opera sequence then gives the
reader the additional advantages accruing from the use
of both the neutral and the editorial omniscient tellers,
in addition to the multiple selective omniscient views
available from the various characters. In yet another
395
manipulative use of the different points of view, the
passage concerning Angelo's abduction of the innkeeper
Jacopo Cruchi is chiefly in the dramatic mode, with some
minor instances of summary and without analysis.
The dramatic action moves rapidly over three pages,
from Angelo's forcing of the venal Jacopo to accompany
him, with threats of killing, in order that Jacopo not
have opportunity to betray him. When Angelo and Jacopo
encounter Austrians, the techniques of description and
summarization are used for only one paragraph before the
dramatic narrative is resumed for another four and a half
pages. A long paragraph of scenic description of the Val
di Non locates the action and gives a tangible reality to
the events, as do descriptions of setting in the kidnap
ping and the opera passages. Environmental descriptions
also add meaning, provide relief, and/or heighten tension
in these scenes, somewhat as they do in Shakespearean
drama. The descriptions of the difficult mountain terrain
make more believable the travails of Angelo, as do Jacopo's
complaints about what he has to "endure" in skirting
streams, traversing glaciers, and suffering the icy night
air (I, 322-324) . (A different treatment of the mountains
provided background for the first meeting of the rebels;
in this early section, the majesty of the mountains was
emphasized to gain the special effect discussed on
396
pages 74, 75, and 115. in yet another use of environment,
the gentle beauty of the fir-wood, with the symbolic
implications of groves [see page 2 24], served functionally
to introduce Emilia at the beginning of Sandra Belloni
and to provide the scene for her final triumph toward the
end of that novel.)
Also contributing to the effectiveness of the rather
grim dramatic narrative of Angelo's desperate flight is
a light scene in which Jacopo protects Angelo from the
Austrians by identifying him as a rival of the rustic
Johann for the love of Rosetta, Jacopo's daughter. The
dialogue between Jacopo, Johann, and Angelo, with the
soldiers' cheering cries, as they hope for a fight,
performs as a comic interlude, but also as a succinct
comment on war as well as upon dueling. The technique
of presenting a lesson on an abstract issue by showing
it not as practiced by the higher classes, who usually
act with greater elan, but as done clumsily and hence
comically by those of the lower orders, is another
Shakespearean device that Meredith frequently uses in the
two Italian novels. He several times teaches a lesson
about war in this way (e.g., the Hillford-Ipley episode
in Sandra Belloni; and, in Vittoria, the cigar episode of
the Milan streets, the squabble between Beppo and the
Styrian grenadier, and Angelo's rustic performance). The
397
later private dialogue among Angelo, Jacopo, and Johann,
after the Austrian soldiers have left, re-establishes the
seriousness of Angelo's predicament, which involves his
life.
A brief paragraph of pictorial narrative, Angelo's
dramatically-rendered leave-taking of Jacopo and Johann,
ends the chapter. The next chapter, "Duel in the Pass,"
is the exciting pictorially- and dramatically-narrated
conclusion of the volume, for which the reader had been
prepared by Angelo's mock "duel" with Johann for Rosetta's
favors. The more serious duel ends when Angelo faints,
after having wounded Captain Weisspriess almost fatally
and after having sent him with Vittoria to the "nearest
shelter" (pp. 349-350).
Volume II begins by describing Meran's situation at
the Passeyr (seemingly a German name for the Passerio) and
Adige rivers which meet in the Adige Valley. The next
paragraph is a dramatically-narrated account of Vittoria's
arrival at the destination to which she had been going
during the concluding chapters of the first volume. This
second volume of Vittoria, occurring as it does after the
climactic volume of the two Italian novels, relies more
on summary and analysis than did the first volume. How
ever, it still presents much less analysis than either
volume of Sandra Belloni. Moreover, to counteract any
398
slump that might occur after the climax, Meredith employs
several devices for securing suspense and tension, and
thus delight through which instruction may freely flow,
until the novel's end.
Throughout Sandra Belloni, until the climax in
Volume I of Vittoria, the pictorial and the dramatic
techniques forward the heroine's progress toward the
realization of her artistic and humanitarian destinies in
launching the revolution's great effort for the freedom
of a people. After this work has been completed, the
last half of Volume I of Vittoria and all of Volume II
are structured to keep up the suspense by the pictorial
and the dramatic accounts of the revolutionary activities
and the dangers of the key rebels, especially of Vittoria
and of Carlo in the face of the several plots being
directed against them separately and together. For
example, the second kidnapping plotted by Pericles, which
would this time spirit Vittoria away from the battlefield,
involves the conspiracy not only of Pericles, but also of
Irma, Violetta, and Weisspriess. These latter three con
spire against Vittoria, each for his or her own reasons:
Irma and Violetta are both jealous of her, and Weisspriess
envisions himself as conquering her heart as both a diver
sion for himself and an incentive for Anna to finalize
their marriage plans. Barto Rizzo and Anna plot against
399
Vittoria independently of the others: Barto Rizzo fears
Vittoria as a woman who would destroy his conspiracies,
and Anna sacrifices her wealth and Weisspriess to gain
revenge against both Vittoria and Carlo, a partial motive
also being her jealousy of Vittoria. Anna's is a success
ful plot, resulting in Carlo's death and, in a mystic
manner, in Vittoria's also.
Central to Anna's desire for revenge is the Guida-
scarpi affair, used by Meredith as a sub-plot to build
suspense and to forward the main plot. Pictorial narrative
first gives the reason for the Lenkensteins' absence from
the chateau when Vittoria arrives as being their "mourning
for the terrible death of their brother, Count Paul"
(II, 2). Then, dramatic narrative obscurely hints at
Vittoria's involvement and the subsequent threat to her
and to Carlo. When Vittoria tells Anna of Weisspriess'
having been wounded,
Anna murmured like one overborne by calamity.
"My brother struck down one day— he [Weisspriess]
the next!" She covered her face a moment, and
unclosed it to explain that she wept for her brother,
who had been murdered, stabbed in Bologna.
"Was it Count Ammiani who did this?" she asked
passionately.
Vittoria shook her head; she was divining a dreadful
thing in relation to the death of Count Paul. (p. 4)
Even more threatening, but without accompanying ex
planation by the narrator, is the dramatic scene in which
Anna requests Father Bernardus to examine Vittoria's
"soul":
400
Prove this Italian woman; search her through and
through. I believe her to be blood-stained and
abominable. She hates us. She has sworn an oath
against us. She is malignant. (p. 5)
In this speech, obscure at this point of the novel, for
it is unattended by summary or analysis to explain Anna's
"springs," is foreshadowed the catastrophe of the novel.
Clearly Meredith expected his reader to exercise his
memory in the way that Forster notes an author may expect
his reader to do (Aspects, pp. 132-133).
To complicate the situation for the reader, the
duchess Amalia next tells Vittoria that "Angelo Guida-
scarpi has slain" Count Paul (Vittoria, II, 10), but even
this information is presented gradually. First only "a
charge against" Angelo is mentioned (p. 9); then, when
the duchess accuses them to Laura of being assassins,
Laura refuses to "denounce Angelo and Rinaldo" before
hearing the whole story (pp. 11-12) and defends them also
against her sister, the Countess Bianca von Lenkenstein,
at the breakfast table the next day (p. 16). Next Wilfrid
in dialogue with Vittoria says that Angelo "inveigled
Count Paul to his house and slew him; either he or his
brother, or both" (p. 24). Vittoria's rejoinder reminds
the reader that Angelo is Count Ammiani's cousin and,
hence, that the affair touches Vittoria, too.
A continuation of the dramatic technique reveals the
need for a wounded Angelo to be spirited away from the
401
Meran district and Laura's urging of Vittoria to use
Wilfrid's infatuation to help (pp. 25-26) . After several
pages of silence concerning the Guidascarpi problem,
during which other matters have been presented dramati
cally, a new level of involvement appears in a dramatic
scene in which Lena, unlike Anna, says that she is willing
to forgive Wilfrid for helping Vittoria at La Scala, since
he did not know "that she had touched the hand of that
Guidascarpi" (p. 35). Pictorial summary then notes Count
Lenkenstein1s arrival at Meran "to superintend the hunt
for the assassin, Angelo Guidascarpi," and his attempt to
get Vittoria "to promise . . . to testify" against Angelo
when he is caught (p. 36).
Dramatic narrative is again resumed to detail Wil
frid's and Vittoria's preparation and execution of a plan
to smuggle Angelo out of the ring of "soldiers all round"
them (pp. 39-47). The Guidascarpi affair is not mentioned
again until approximately thirty pages later, when Rinaldo,
imprisoned with Wilfrid by Barto Rizzo, alludes without
detail or names to an "honourable" duel and to his cousin
Count Ammiani's imprisonment on his behalf (p. 7 0). Then
sixty more pages pass before Rinaldo is shot and Count
Karl attempts to justify, in dialogue with Vittoria, the
execution by telling her his version of the story (pp. 135-
136). For the first time in dealing with the Guidascarpi
402
story, the narrator then gives the true story "in brief"
(pp. 136-138). Thus, over almost the entire first half
of the second volume, the dramatically-handled Guidascarpi
affair has contributed suspense and speculation, with its
concomitant entertainment and instruction (concerning
several instances of the forcing of another as opposed to
freedom, and passion as opposed to dalliance), and so has
served as a sub-plot tied inextricably into the main plot.
As may be seen in the handling of this and the other
sub-plots in both the Italian novels, Meredith's manipu
lation of the narrative techniques by which plots and
sub-plots are presented is in the economical manner so
admired by Forster. Not a syllable is wasted, but all
ties in together to forward the action and to enrich the
meaning. Many of the sub-plots act as mirrors for the
main situation, as in the mirrors for both the political
(see page 58) and love (see pages 125 to 126) situations.
The similarities as well as the differences of the
reflecting episodes to the original and central situations
are calculated to make Emilia-Vittoria1s and Italy's
positions and conditions more instructive for the reader
as well as more delightful intellectually as the reader is
permitted to recognize and then piece together the clues
in the puzzles that Meredith provides him.
In this manner the previously-mentioned mock duel
403
between Beppo and a "Styrian grenadier" performs doubly
for structure and for theme. The episode contributes to
the progress toward the catastrophe in that Beppo's
wounding is the major cause for the loss of Weisspriess'
letter to Carlo and, hence, for Anna's employment of Nagen
as her pawn in having Carlo killed. The episode is
thematically connected with the dueling in the novel and
with the killings of Austrians and Italians in that it
contains yet another tacit comment about fighting. It
performs, in other words, in somewhat the same way that
the love affair of Gainsford and the Tinley maid performs
in Sandra Belloni, as a comic comment. The comedy is,
further, ironic, as is the servants' love affair.
After offending the grenadier and being knocked
down, Beppo issues a challenge with comically meticulous
observance of the amenities for this ceremony. Beppo's
defeat of the grenadier makes of him a hero for a moment
and a dupe in a twinkling, for the soldiers insist that
the victorious Beppo fight his adversary's "champion,"
a younger man who defeats poor Beppo to the curses of the
formerly cheering soldiers (II, 213-215). The lesson is
unmistakably exact, especially since it parallels the duels
in the novel.
Not only are the sub-plots important to the main
plots in both novels, as they reflect and comment upon
404
major issues, but their treatment, whether pictorial or
dramatic, and their placement, as preparation or as later
comment, help to guide the reader in the formulation of
the attitudes which Meredith wants him to have. In addi
tion, the pictorial and the dramatic narratives are
handled so as to underline the lessons. Thus, incidents
in which Vittoria and Carlo are involved, no matter their
import and/or gravity, have a "classical severity"; where
as those in which Wilfrid, especially, appears have a
melodramatic flair.
For instance, a few pages before the story of
Vittoria's stabbing is written by Laura to Merthyr with
minimal detail and great restraint, Wilfrid's involvement
in the affair of the Colonel Prince Radocky and the
Countess Medole is related. The latter incident is
spiced with a mysterious female's hand leading Wilfrid
to an apartment lit only by a "darkly veiled lamp," with
Wilfrid's bursting "in to tears" at the "sight of the
fondling lovers," and with his aiding in a melodramatic
escape of the lover from the house (pp. 234-235). As he
leaves, the "lady" tells Wilfrid "never, never love a
married woman" (p. 235), which advice whets Wilfrid's
appetite to approach Vittoria now that she is married
(p. 237). Meredith is here subtly indicating that Wilfrid
is still "on the Hippogriff."
405
Although in both scenes, in which they are separately
featured, Beppo's and Wilfrid's actions are mocked in
order that the reader learn through laughter, a major
difference in treatment of the two episodes has to do
with the object of the laughter. In the former case, it
is the matter of the episode, dueling, that is being held
up to ridicule. In the latter case, it is the man, Wil
frid, who is being presented as ridiculous. This variance
in focus, as well as in narrative technique (sometimes
mixing them, with different emphases, and sometimes using
one alone) and in use of sub-plots to mirror and/or for
ward the main plots, provides maximum delight and learning.
In yet another artful handling of his material,
Meredith also uses the techniques of the drama for his
"plays," as he calls them in Sandra Belloni. Already
noted are his uses of the conventions of tragedy and
comedy and those of the revenge play (including the mal
content character in Ugo Corte). In addition, Meredith
places a confrontation scene in the usual dramatic
position near the end of the novels, contrary to Karl's
statement that Meredith avoided such scenes (p. 205).
Displaying an interesting use of dramatic and pictorial
narrative methods, the scene is comprised of a series of
encounters with Anna, who has masterminded the plot that
finally destroys Carlo. Prior to the scene, a paragraph
406
of summary describes Wilfrid's accusation of Anna to Count
Karl, who challenges him, and Wilfrid's subsequent begin
ning "interview" with the countess (Vittoria, II, 320-321).
Then, dramatic narrative takes up the scene, as Anna is
faced by Wilfrid, Lena, and Count Karl; Weisspriess is
said to open the door and to "whisper in her ear," but his
dialogue with her is not presented (pp. 322-323). Next
the duchess enters to urge Anna not to "allow personal
sentiment to sully [her] devotion to [their] country"
(pp. 323-324). At the highest point of the confrontation,
"the name of Countess Alessandra Ammiani" is called, and
the narrative, remaining essentially dramatic, is as from
inside Anna's mind (see also page 424).
That this confrontation scene performs not just for
Vittoria but for both the Italian novels as a unit, re
affirms that the works are unified in their rhetorical
purposes to delight and to instruct. The lessons are
interdependent in that the reader's learning about the
best way to live involves Emilia-Vittoria's total exper
iences; therefore, an understanding of both novels as
they support each other is necessary. Even the transition
between the two novels, from the dramatic incident of
Emilia's leaving for Italy to the pictorial summary of her
arrival on top of Monte Motterone, is with no more of a
break than that which occurs between chapters within each
novel.
Within the broad categories of pictorial and drama
tic, Meredith shows a sure hand and a boldly experimental
approach. Meredith's explorations of narrative technique
resulted in a number of powerful effects: those of,the
opera, of the kidnapping scene, of Emilia's voice loss
(see pages 173 to 178), and of Emilia's summarization of
her own history (see pages 102 to 103). With this last,
Meredith is able to achieve two almost diametrically-
opposed goals. On the one hand, the summary establishes
distance and so removes the material from the main stream
of the plot: Emilia's telling of that which is in the
past removes it from the reader's view and thus makes it
of less importance than the presently-occurring events in
her life. On the other hand, the passage is closely
involved with the main stream of the plot, since Emilia's
story secures Wilfrid's greater interest in and sympathy
for her. The technique, moreover, dramatically delineates
the differences in Emilia's and Wilfrid's characters and
attitudes toward life: she is shown to be passionate,
natural, and close to earth, and he sentimental, unnatural
(coxcomb), and far from earth's impulses. This passage
then not only helps to prepare the reader for the broken
relationship of Emilia and Wilfrid, but also arranges for
his acceptance of the matured Vittoria's betrothal to
Carlo, whose nature is more suitably matched to hers.
Part of the artistic achievement of Meredith's two
Italian novels is that there are no "loose ends" floating
or untied into the story line (Forster, Aspects, p. 133).
Every detail of the novel is, as shown above, related and
tucked in at its appropriate place of meaning, of atmos
phere, or of characterization. All three of these elements,
furthermore, work to support one another; and the main
plots of each novel are co-related and interdependent. The
main plot of Sandra Belloni tells of the struggle of a
young girl who is increasingly identified with Italy, to
free herself from the bands that prevent her emotional and
artistic maturation. The main plot of Vittoria relates
Emilia-Vittoria's realization of her full potential as a
woman and as an artist (she is connected in both ways
with Italy's fight for freedom).
The sub-plots of both novels support or illuminate
the main plots, which contain the principal lessons. Thus
the Pole sisters' schemes and affairs at Brookfield and
Besworth for "mounting"; Mr. Pole's business problems and
his subsequent relations with Mrs. Chump, not as her
business agent but as her fiance; Lady Charlotte's and
Wilfrid's tentative affair; Georgiana Ford's and Merthyr's
relationships with each other and with Emilia-Vittoria;
Sir Barrett's life, love, and death; Tracy Runningbrook's
poetic efforts— all these and more are involved
409
inextricably with the main plots. They are associated
with Emilia's maturation, and/or prepare for her activi
ties in Vittoria. For example, the Lady Charlotte and
Wilfrid sub-plot is an agent in the freeing of Emilia to
become the Countess Alessandra Ammiani, and the Georgiana
Ford and Merthyr Powys1 sub-plot is a key factor in
aiding Emilia-Vittoria to become involved in Italy's fight
for freedom.
In Vittoria, too, the sub-plots are either supportive
of or illuminating of the main plot. Some of the sub
plots, as in Sandra Belloni, also act as mirrors for the
main situation to cast new light upon it for the reader's
instruction, as the Barto and Rosellina Rizzo relationship,
although these characters are also involved in matters
more directly bearing upon the main plot. The sub-plots
of the Guidascarpi {already shown to be related to the
main plot on several levels, but see also pages 426 to
429), Violetta d' Isorella, Laura Piaveni, Countess
Ammiani, the Lenkenstein family/the affairs of the Austrian
officers; and the dueling sequences--all these can be
seen to affect Vittoria's and Carlo's lives directly or
indirectly.
Structuring of narrative method is thus seen as
contributing importantly to the delight and instruction
of the Italian novels. The lessons, though primarily of
intellectual appeal, are specifically adapted to man's
410
political, social, and artistic problems. The messages
that issue from the author's second self seem clearly to
indicate, as he presents them dramatically and pictorially,
that the way in which to attain a superior life is to
follow nature. Truth to nature frees man from the
stultifying denial of his life-forces and thus enables
him to live a natural and a passionate (which means pure)
life. The pictorially- and dramatically-presented
incidents of Emilia-Vittoria's life provide the chief
examples for the reader to follow.
Uses of Voices to Communicate
for Delight and Instruction
Although the reader receives subtle impressions of
the implied author's attitudes and, hence, is urged toward
points of view by the ways in which the pictorial and the
dramatic narratives are used, with the effects peculiar to
each, the voices used in the realization of these tech
niques are more specifically charged with the responsibil
ity for the implicit lessons and for the amusement. The
narrator's is, of course, the only voice which directly
addresses the reader with undisguisedly instructive words.
Usually these words are his own, but sometimes in Sandra
Balloni he presents to the reader the Philosopher's words,
upon which he adds another layer of commentary, so that
the reader receives a triple-layered instruction: the
411
narrator's, the Philosopher's, and the narrator's further
comment upon the Philosopher's. Sometimes the narrator
remarks upon the characters with the lesson only inferen-
tially applied to the reader, especially if the lesson is
cutting, such as that upon the excellence of England's
prosperity for the production of pigs. However, the main
lessons of both novels actually issue from the implied
author, rather than from just one source, whether that is
the narrator, the Philosopher (in Sandra Belloni), or the
heroine. These lessons are a composite of all the dia
logue, action, summary, and analysis; and the voices in
volved in these techniques are orchestrated in a harmonious
whole throughout the two novels for the reader's instruc
tion and delight.
It was noted in Chapter II that the voices sound in
point and counter-point, and that therefore they must be
carefully measured not only against the back-drop of the
individual speaker's character and personality, with
whatever biases are thereby expressed, but also against
the characters and personalities of the other characters
and those of the narrator and Philosopher. The matrix of
ideas and attitudes is intricate, but with the lines of
truth and error clearly defined (as indicated in Chapters
I and II) , so that the reader, if he responds to the
warnings to be alert, has all the information he needs to
412
receive the lessons and to enjoy to the full the enter
tainment .
To forget that it is the orchestration of voices,
and to isolate any one voice as a guide to the novels'
truths, is to lead oneself into error; the ease with which
mistakes can be made has already been demonstrated (see
pages 118 to 119 and 243). In Sandra Belloni not even the
narrator may always he trusted, since he is sly and
ironical, and deals in obscurities. He is more of an
instructive gadfly in this first novel than he is in
Vittoria, in which he is more serious and, seemingly,
older and more mature. However, the Philosopher (who,
Morris believes, is Meredith himself) actually assumes
the Carlylean position "for the man of letters" (Morris,
p. 57) and so performs more effectively as a gadfly in
the tradition of Carlyle's Teufelsdrockh.
However, a difference exists between Carlyle's
Teufelsdrockh and Meredith's Philosopher; for the former
appears mysteriously from out of nowhere as a "little
red-coloured Infant,"5 whereas Meredith's Philosopher
seems to spring from his (Meredith's) adult, thinking
readership. Moreover, the impish narrator, as he jibes
and stings the reader, seems actually to have a greater
^Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus: the Life and
Opinions of Herr Teufelsdr6*ckh, ecH Charles Frederick
Harrold (New York: The Odyssey Press, 1937), p. 84.
413
concern for the reader's understanding and moral improve
ment than does the Philosopher, who only usurps the pulpit
and steals the footlights, the phraseology intimating that
the narrator and/or characters have been occupying these
places. Of course, it has been the narrator who has
addressed the reader with specific instruction {see pages
380 and 381) and with express concern for his enjoyment
(e.g., in desiring to "pipe to [his] mind's hearing . . .
the fine music of Rocco Ricci" [Vittoria, II, 263]). A
more subtle instance of direct instruction of the reader
than any indicated above is the narrator's analysis of
Sir Purcell's musical "devil" (see also pages 363 to 364).
In the same paragraph in which the reader is told that
"the primary task is to teach [the little people] that
they are little people," the reader is asked if he has
"listened . . . ever" to the "ravishing melody" of a
"complaint against injustice" played by his own "feeding
devil" (Sandra Belloni, II, 282).
The characters in both the novels have no such over
riding responsibilities of teaching the reader as do the
Philosopher and the narrator; and, hence,the characters
of the novel resemble the characters of the No drama. The
characters operate only within the framework of the plot;
thus, Emilia tells Wilfrid the story of her life in order
to satisfy Wilfrid's curiosity, not the reader's. But
the narrator tells his stories at the Philosopher's
request and periodically reminds the reader both of that
Philosopher (who is one of the readership) and of his own
awareness of the reader's presence and of his own concern
for the reader. The narrator, wearing his neutral omni
scient mask, gives Wilfrid's reactions to Emilia's story
("Wilfrid gave a quiet negative" [I, 46]) because he is
concerned for the reader's understanding. To a minor
degree Emilia's thoughts are rendered also by the neutral
narrator's voice in order to give them the added dimension
of objectivity ("Emilia . . . dismissed the subject forth
with in a feminine power of resolve to be blind to it"
[p. 50] and "She did not appear to hear the gallant cor
net's denial" [p. 52]). The narrator is black-garbed and
-hooded as he functions throughout this section; he does
not don his epic teller's mask until the next chapter,
in which he utters an admonitory word concerning the
Poles (". . .as when the earth quakes our noble edifices
totter, their Palace of the Fine Shades and the Nice
Feelings groaned and creaked" [p. 58]). Here as elsewhere,
the lesson is made painless by the narrator's identifying
himself with the reader, a device that also eliminates
any suspicion of tedious preaching.
Especially in Sandra Belloni, but also in Vittoria,
Meredith depends upon the light and comic touch to prevent
415
dullness and to speed the instruction. Inimical to comedy,
which is important to learning, are not only the Puritan
(non-laugher) and the Bacchanalian (over-laugher), but
also those who "have a sentimental objection to face the
study of the actual world" ("Essay on Comedy," p. 13).
These last provide the laughter in Sandra Belloni, al
though they themselves neither laugh nor learn within the
world of the novel. The threads of entertainment and
instruction are inextricable in the Italian novels.
The main lessons in the two Italian novels have to
do with freedom, a difference being that in Sandra Belloni
the focus is more upon its application to the individual
and in Vittoria to groups or nations. This principal
message concerning the right of the individual or the
nation to determine his or its own fate is repeated for
the reader by a full orchestration of voices; thus points
of view vary from the editorial and neutral omniscient
to the multiple selective omniscient. Moreover, the
voices teach by the affirmation of freedom, which leads
to happiness, and the denial of freedom, which induces
grief.
In affirmation of freedom in Sandra Belloni are the
voices of the epic teller, the masked neutral teller, and
the Philosopher, all of whom inform the reader about
sentimentalism as it permits one individual to try to
force others' lives into molds more compatible with their
own or more pleasurable or profitable for themselves (a
forcing made possible because sentimentalism leads to
self-delusion about oneself and others). In the denial
of freedom are the voices of the Pole sisters (in rela
tionship with Emilia, with Mrs. Lupin, with their father,
and with the young men of their "circle"), Wilfrid (in
relationship with Emilia), Sir Purcell Barrett (in re
lationship with Cornelia and Emilia), Pericles (in
relationship with Emilia-Vittoria, Irma, and Violetta),
Barto Rizzo (in relationship with Vittoria, Rosellina,
and Count Medole), Violetta (in relationship with Carlo,
the king, and Merthyr), Anna (in relationship with
Weisspriess, Carlo, Nagen, and Vittoria), Father Bernardus
and the Ammiani family priest (in relationship with
Vittoria, Anna, and Countess Ammiani), the Hillford group
(in relationship with Ipley) , Weisspriess (in relationship
with Vittoria, Anna, and numerous Italian men and women),
General Pierson (in relationship with Wilfrid and his
young officers), and the Austrians (in relationship with
the Italians).
In every instance the reader is shown that the
efforts to manipulate others are vain, if not foolish.
Often the attempts are potentially or actually disastrous.
Often the lesson is contained in comedy, so that the
417
reader learns by laughing at Cornelia and Sir Purcell,
for instance, or at Pericles, or at the Poles (Mrs.
Lupin's vain efforts to suppress her natural inclination
to laughter are extremely funny). Often the lesson is
excitingly dramatic, as Weisspriess' chase and capture of
Vittoria in the Adige Valley. This last attempt to abuse
another's freedom leads almost to Weisspriess' own death.
The novels' heroine, Emilia-Vittoria, is affected in
all three of the major areas examined: the political,
the social, and the artistic. Identified with Italy
throughout the two novels by many different voices,
including her own, she speaks both for and as Italy, not
only as Camilla in the opera, but as an Italian partisan
in both novels. Moreover, in a converse manner, Italy
is associated with Emilia-Vittoria (see pages 246 to 247).
The almost sacred inviolability of her spirit, which
increases to its point of highest humanity to be an
expression of the harmonious balance of "blood and brain
and spirit" ("Woods of Westermain," XXIX, 10 4) in Vittoria,
is not to be forced or imprisoned by another. Neither
blatant deception nor a misplaced concern for one facet
of her identity (Pericles' for her art and Runningbrook's
for her womanliness) is successful in destroying her
"sense of Earth" (p. 103).
Instruction proceeds positively, too, as Emilia-
Vittoria disdains to force others' opinions or decisions,
418
even when convinced she is right. Rather she offers
evidence which she hopes they will consider in reforming
their judgments. During an important council meeting of
the rebels, she does not speak until asked her opinion
of the plan by Colonel Corte in a bold and challenging
manner. After speaking in reply, calmly and logically,
concerning Italy's state and the King and the Chief, she
concludes,
It is not a woman asking for the safety of her husband,
but one of the blood of Italy who begs to offer you
her voice, without seeking to disturb your judgement.
(Vittoria, II, 286)
One of the most important negatively-presented les
sons has been given through Wilfrid's voice and the voices
of the narrator and the Philosopher in commentary upon
him as he misleads and forces Emilia's spirit. Emilia's
attraction to the river in reaction to Wilfrid's mis
treatment of her is, however, clearly distinguished from
the fatalistic and self-destructive action of Sir Purcell,
also in reaction against a sentimentalist's (Cornelia's)
deception. The differences between Emilia and Sir Purcell
have to do with their essential spirits: she is a passion
ate and natural human being, not one of the little people,
but one with a harmonious and wholesome nature who does
not deceive herself about herself, although, when young,
she is open to deception by others; he, on the other hand,
is a sentimentalist himself, who, though not of "the
I
419
larger body" (Sandra Belloni, II, 281), refuses to under
stand himself (see pages 291 to 293) and who himself does
participate in the deception along with Cornelia. There
fore, Emilia's dilemma is solely that of a victim, whereas
Sir Barrett's is as an actor in a drama in which he is
not only deceived by Cornelia, but also is a deceiver
both of himself and of her. Emilia-Vittoria's situation
is thus somewhat similar to that of Italy, which is the
victim of Austria, a country characterized by Agostino
as a vulture over the bleeding mother-victim, Italy.
The freedom motif, which dominates the novels,
appears in relation to the heroine, Emilia-Vittoria, and
to Italy as being connected with nature. The voices
within both novels comment in some way upon freedom. In
Vittoria, Rosellina's voice is raised in feeble protest
against the tyranny of her husband; Barto's voice, that
of a tyrant, demonstrates the insane principles of one
who dehumanizes other human beings in order to serve his
own ends. Pericles' attitude toward his fellow humans is
basically the same as Barto Rizzo's. To Pericles, Emilia-
Vittoria is only a voice; to Barto Rizzo, Rosellina is
only a tool, a gun. Both Barto and Pericles, therefore,
deny the individual her freedom and see her as a "thing"
to be forced to serve that which they themselves prize,
war and art respectively.
420
In an ironical extension of the lesson, each of these
men, who are agreed in principle about the unimportance of
the individual in comparison to their causes, is unalter
ably opposed to the cause of the other. Although they do
not meet and their voices do not sound directly in counter
point, their statements can be heard to complement each
other in denial of freedom and, hence, of humanity, and to
contrast in support of conflicting interests. Barto is
uninterested in and contemptuous of the importance of
art (he can be happy if he can dismiss Vittoria as a mere
"cantatrice" [Vittoria, II, 283]); whereas Pericles is
impatient about and contemptuous of the revolution.
There is great irony involved in Barto's use of
Rosellina in the war for Italy's freedom, since he makes
of her a slave. Meredith, of course, was not a proponent
of equal rights for women, but he was, nevertheless,
convinced that women can operate with greater scope and
power (witness the characters and the actions of Vittoria
and Laura) than many of his contemporaries believed. In
an intricate weaving of themes, this aspect of freedom is
contingent upon all the other facets of freedom examined
in the novels. The revolution in which Laura and Vittoria
are involved is not the only important consideration in
the novels; in Chapter II, freedom in love, religion, and
art were demonstrated to be equally important matters in
the two Italian novels.
421
As also indicated in Chapter II, the import of the
lessons depends upon the voice expressing the idea or the
attitude. For example, extreme subordination through
distancing teaches of the enslavement of Sir Purcell by
his "feeding devil." The narrator introduces a chapter
entitled "The Sentiment of Tragedy" with "There is a man
among our actors here who may not be known to you" (Sandra
Belloni, II, 280). After several pages of explanation of
the baronet's early life, the narrator presents the tacit
and devastating comment on Sir Barrett and Cornelia by
presenting Gainsford and the Tinley maid (see page 135).
The narrator continues with further explication of
Barrett's thoughts and actions as he prepares to kill
himself, before Barrett's own voice is heard in dialogue
with a "little female scrubber" to demonstrate the ab
surdity of a comedy of "little" concerns. The scrubber
insists upon his concerning himself with questions of
toast, "aigs," and a fire in the grate (pp. 296-298), to
the detriment of his sentimental enjoyment of his suffer
ings. The chapter ends on a mock heroic note:
On both sides of him, "Yes" and "no" seemed pressing
like two hostile powers that battled for his body.
They shrieked in his ears, plucked at his fingers.
He heard them hushing deeply as he went to his pistol-
case, and drew forth one— he knew not which [the one
he had loaded or the other]. (p. 300)
The implied question mark seems to edge the reader on not
to suspense but to a conviction of inevitable silence;
422
for the build-up (the voices combining to demonstrate the
inconsequence of Sir Barrett's life, with the lack of any
real impetus to such drastic action) has not been
presented in a way to elicit the reader's sympathy or
concern.
The reader's instruction concerning the dreariness of
Barrett's existence is further achieved by the use of
voices in telling of his death. The narrator first speaks
demeaningly of Barrett's demise as being simply the "tale
of Brookfield" told by Tracy and "all who came to Rich-
ford," where Emilia is staying (p. 307) as if its sole
value is as a bit of interesting gossip. The narrator
then says that "Emilia got the vision," not of Barrett,
but "of the wretched family [the Poles] seated in the
library when the lifeless body" was brought in. Sub
ordinated even in Emilia's consciousness, Sir Purcell
Barrett is not named throughout this initial telling.
The third voice lends still greater distance in
instruction against imprisoning sentimentalism. Laura
Tinley's telling is not even the reason for her mission
to see Emilia. Trying to secure Pericles' good will by
effecting his reconciliation with Emilia, Laura decides
to tell the exciting story that is the talk of the
neighborhood and, by her story, also to vent some of the
spite she feels toward the Pole sisters, whose "treatment"
423
of her, she intimates, she resents (p. 309). The
romantically-designated "fruitless tree," so important
a symbol for the false lovers, Cornelia and Barrett, is
ruthlessly exposed by Laura to be a "pollard-willow . . .
all white and rotten" (p. 310).
As indicated earlier, the fact and the news of
Barrett's death, as all minor events, both support and
forward the main plot. In this instance, Laura's voice,
with its message of Pericles' having Pole in his power
and demanding Wilfrid's apology in order to save Pole
from bankruptcy, prepares for Emilia-Vittoria's action
in the sequel novel. By giving Emilia this information,
Laura wins for the "inscrutable millionaire" Emilia's
promise to go to Italy for voice training, rather than
for revolutionary involvement, in return for a sum of
money which she will give to the Poles. Therefore, the
Poles' final position and the outcome of their affairs
is revealed in the same distant manner as Sir Barrett's
death, and with even greater irony: she who obtains their
succour is the despised Laura Tinley, who actually wished
only to serve her own selfish interests in the interview,
not the Poles, and who would not have been distressed if
she had caused their further suffering. Moreover, Laura's
idle gossiping secures for the Poles the aid of another
person whom they patronized with some contempt, their
424
"plum" of the loose boot-lace, Emilia Belloni.
In yet another instance of the handling of voice for
maximum delight and instruction, the earlier-mentioned
confrontation scene (see pages 405 and 406) reveals
Meredith's stringent control of voice to effect "classical
severity." The highest point of the encounter is at
Vittoria's entrance; moreover, her purpose (to secure from
Anna, who hates her and has arranged the plot, her
husband's rescue) is a passionate one. Yet Vittoria's
voice utters only one brief sentence. The narrator's
voice carries the weight of the narrative responsibility,
but his voice issues from the vantage point of the
"theatre" of Anna's mind throughout much of the passage.
The reader first learns that Anna is impressed by
the
. . . soft splendour of Vittoria's eyes, and the
harmony of her whole figure; nor was the black dress
of protesting Italian mourning any longer offensive
in her sight, but on a sudden pitiful . . .
(Vittoria, II, 324)
The key word "harmony," as it is applied to Vittoria and
has its effect upon Anna, as well as the reminder of the
black that Vittoria wears, performs to reinforce in the
reader's mind not only the strength of Vittoria's character
as an artist but also her love for Carlo and for Italy,
and, finally, to foreshadow the catastrophe. The transla
tion of Anna's hatred into pity accents the foreboding of
the scene.
I
425
Thus the reader is prepared for Anna's capitulation
and the subsequent attempt she makes to stop the machine
she has set in motion. At the end of the scene, Vittoria
states her few words: "I thank you, Countess Anna"
(p. 325) . The narrator says that then Vittoria "was led
out by Count Karl to where Merthyr awaited her." The
narrator's final commentary is calculated to bring to
the reader's attention the simple power of Vittoria's
presence:
All wondered at the briefness of a scene that had
unexpectedly brought the crisis to many emotions
and passions, as the broken waters of the sea beat
together and make here or there the wave which is
topmost. (p. 325)
The combination of voices, as well as the presenta
tion of the reactions of those present in order to
heighten, to strengthen, and to vivify a central concern,
is more effective than would have been an extended
statement by Vittoria of her feelings. It is her passion,
as it is measured in its influence upon others and
characterized by the water image, that contains the
instruction for the reader: her passion is true, simple,
and controlled because it is balanced by "mind" and
"spirit," and, hence, her nature is in harmony. The
underplaying of the scene, rendered at a distance from
the heroine, is a ploy for increasing the reader's aware
ness of tension and power. Vittoria's silent mastery of
I
426
the scene and of persons, including Anna, who has hated and
mistrusted her, is more fittingly portrayed by the objec
tive description of her exit and entrance, after Anna's
reactions have been presented, than by Vittoria's dialogue
or soliloquy. Moreover, as the scene is handled the
reader receives a demonstration of Vittoria's natural
honesty; she neither indulges in the deception of a
gracious-seeming apology in order to gain Anna's favor,
nor does she try to force Anna's will.
Because of his versatility in manipulating the voices
within his narratives, Meredith does not need to place
great reliance upon the narrator (or the Philosopher) in
revealing characters. He is able to inform his reader
from a multiplicity of viewpoints; his use of this multi
plicity adds to the enjoyment and the instruction. One
device, already discussed (see pages 319 to 328), is that
of the ficelle for Carlo and for Vittoria, which enables
the reader to get a comprehensive picture of them and to
enjoy an intellectual pleasure in sifting out the mis
information and the misinterpretation that issues from
the minds of prejudiced characters (Laura, Pericles, and
even Merthyr). The reader thus gains an experience rich
in acceptance and rejection and even of co-creation, as
he becomes closely involved in the imaginative experience.
Indirection, or revelation of one character through
427
other characters' discussions of them, is not reserved
for the main characters, however, although the ficelle
is used only in Vittoria and only for Vittoria and for
Carlo. The obscurity that veils Rinaldo's death and
Barto Rizzo's part in the affair results from the same
handling of voices to engage the reader's participation
in the reading experience as in a simulation of a life
experience (see pages 60 to 62 and 90 to 91 for dis
cussion of narrative method for the same purpose).
Suspense is thus secured through providing the reader
with a sense of gradual assimilation of information.
Vittoria is present at the event; she does not, however,
see the killing.
Vittoria heard a single shot. Rinaldo Guidascarpi
lay stretched upon the ground, and the woman stood
over him. (II, 131)
The narrator limits the range of the reader's knowledge
to coincide with Vittoria's. However, before the event,
he had given the reader some additional clues, although
from the viewpoint of a distant observer and, therefore,
still with some obscurity.
In the great red of sunset the Tyrolese riflemen and
a body of Italians in Austrian fatigue uniform marched
into the village. . . . It seemed as if Count Karl were
declaiming an indictment. . . . Then a procession
walked some paces on. The woman [Rosellina Barto]
followed. She fell prostrate at the feet of Count Karl.
He listened to her and nodded. Rinaldo Guidascarpi
stood alone with bandaged eyes. The woman advanced to
him; she put her mouth on his ear; there she hung.
(pp. 130-131)
428
Great objectivity has been maintained throughout this
section. The neutral teller has not exercised his powers
of omniscience to give insights into the thoughts and
emotions of any of those present (as he does in the opera
passage, for instance), but has limited himself to those
facts which the reader himself could have learned if he
had been present at the scene. Thus, if he had been there,
he might, like Vittoria, have been aware only of the sound
of the shot and have missed seeing the killing. The
clarification of the incident does not actually occur
until some fifteen pages later when a wounded Leone Rufo
tells Vittoria of "the doings of the volunteers" (p. 146).
After the first few sentences given in Rufo's voice, the
narrator begins a summarization of Rufo's tales. The
narrator himself appears briefly, though only in his
neutral mask, in such rare observations during the
summary as this:
Leone dwelt on [Rosellina's maternal devotion to
Rinaldo] the more fervidly for seeing Vittoria's
expression of astonishment. (p. 147)
The narrative summary then continues until Leone arrives
at its high point, Rinaldo's capture; at this time a
narrower focus is accompanied by a concentration upon
Leone's point of view, though still via the narrator's
voice, rather than with a continuation of the narrator's
broader focus:
429
The volunteers devoted themselves to liberate or
avenge Rinaldo. It was then that Barto Rizzo sent
his wife upon her mission. Leone assured Vittoria
that Angelo was aware of its nature and approved
it— hoped that the same might be done for himself.
He shook his head when she asked if Count Ammiani
approved it likewise.
Now a shift in point of view occurs as the narrator's
voice presents Leone's thoughts (theatre of the mind) to
Leone's voice, responding to Vittoria's question:
Signorine, Count Ammiani has a grudge against Barto,
though he can't help making use of him. Our captain
Carlo is too much of a mere soldier. He would have
allowed Rinaldo to be strung up, and Barto does not
owe him obedience in these things. (p. 14 8)
A dialogue examining the incident continues with Leone's
voice explaining and interpreting Barto's motivation and
Rosellina's attitude of acquiescence and fear as she per
forms in Barto's "royal punishment" of her for having
released Rinaldo and Wilfrid.
The narrator's voice then ceases summary and the
dialogue between Vittoria and Leone commences. Vittoria's
question links Rosellina's dilemma to her own: "But why
did Barto Rizzo employ a woman's hand?" (p. 148). Leone's
answer, rendered through the narrator, provides the reader
with the key to understanding the event that had occurred
some seventeen pages earlier, as it relates to the novels'
themes of harmony and of freedom:
Leone alluded slightly to Barto Rizzo's confirmed
suspicion of her, saying that it was his weakness
to be suspicious of women. The volunteers, however,
were all in her favour, and had jeered at Barto on
430
his declaring that she might, in proof of her will
ingness to serve the cause, have used her voice for
the purpose of subjugating the wavering Austro-
Italians, who wanted as much coaxing as women. (p. 149)
Leone's disapproval of Barto’s suspiciousness is a general
conclusion at this place in the novel. However, as pointed
out earlier (see page 254), the reader's own doubt of
Vittoria, and hence his participation in the novel
experience, had been secured through an orchestration of
concerned voices. Barto Rizzo was able to implant doubt
in Laura, Agostino, and Count Medole. Especially as
Laura and Agostino voice the possibility of Vittoria's
having been indiscreet does the reader become uneasy and,
hence, experience an increased concern for the heroine.
Although Leone does not approve of Barto's suspi
ciousness, he seems to be quoting with some approval
Barto's low opinion of the decision-making capabilities
of women. The reflection upon women's intellection (they
rather have "perception") is not at variance with the
implied author's attitude, or, it may be remembered,
with Meredith's own as indicated in his letters (see
also page 264) .
The viewpoint within the "theatre of the mind" used
in this scene and in the confrontation scene (in which
it is used rather to illuminate another character,
Vittoria, through a reflection of Anna's thoughts)
achieves striking effectiveness toward the end of the
first volume of Vittoria, where it is used to illuminate
a character as he himself thinks, in this case, and in
such a way as to provide for a character development that
will seriously affect the progress of the novel. An
exciting scene, often praised for its high drama,® the
duel is, nonetheless, pictorially narrated, featuring
still swift action and minimal dialogue. Upon Weiss-
priess' being "struck thrice" to fall with serious wounds,
the narrator positions himself within Weisspriess' mind
while retaining his own objective personality as a neu
tral omniscient teller. The narrator is then able to
present to the reader objective observations of Weiss
priess as he thinks and as he acts, and, moreover, also
to present Weisspriess as he experiences the delirium
(the mind's theatre), but still with enough objectivity
to be able to comment upon the inner experience, as from
a distance. Additionally, the narrator is able to
present Vittoria's reactions to Weisspriess as well as
Weisspriess' delirious reactions to her. There is, then,
®See Richard H. P. Curie's Aspects of George Meredith
(New York: Phaeton Press, 1970, first published 1908),
p. 280; S. M. Ellis' George Meredith: His Life and
Friends in Relation to His Work^ 2nd e l d ' . (London: Grant
Richards, 1920), p. 193; Stevenson's The Ordeal of George
Meredith, p. 161; Stewart's "Dramatic Power ancf Technique
in the Novels of George Meredith," p. 126; and Howard's
"'Delicate' and 'Epical' Fiction: 1) The Italian Novels,
2) Beauchamp's Career,"in Literature and Politics in the
Nineteenth Century, ed. John Lucas, p. 15 8.
I
432
a certain removal, but one without relinquishment of the
vantage point of inner awareness.
Distance from the duel itself is established as
Weisspriess is said by the narrator to fall "in a lump"
when struck, with "a look of amazement . . . surmounted by
a strong frown" on his face. Distance is maintained as
the reader is told that Angelo
. . . was hanging above him panting out of wide
nostrils . . . when Vittoria came to them.
She reached her strength to the wounded man to
turn his face to heaven.
He moaned, "Finish me"; and, as he lay with his
back to the earth, "Good evening to the old army!"
(I, 347)
The next paragraph begins with a long (twenty-one line)
sentence that presents the same kind of gradual approach
to stream of consciousness that is elsewhere used by
Meredith with effectiveness (see also pages 173 to 176).
There is less identification on the part of the narrator
with Weisspriess than there was with Emilia, however, in
those parts in which the narrator can be discerned. Too,
in the passage below, there is slightly less subjectivity
in the first few lines:
A vision of leaping tumbrils, and long marching
columns about to deploy, passed before his eyelids;
he thought he had fallen on the battlefield, and
heard a drum beat furiously in the back of his
head . . .
Then, in the lines below, there is a progression into a
representative state of delirium with the marks of fevered
433
thought. An absence of clear separations between thoughts,
and the use of conjunctions and semi-colons, lend the
effect of on-flowing, tenuously-connected thought.
. . . and on streamed the cavalry, wonderfully caught
away to such a distance that the figures were all
diminutive, and the regimental colours swam in smoke,
and the enemy danced a plume here and there out of
the sea, while his mother and a forgotten Viennese
girl gazed at him with exactly the same unfamiliar
contenance, and refused to hear that they were un
intelligible in the roaring of guns and floods and
hurrahs, and the thumping of the tremendous big drum
behind his head— "somewhere in the middle of the
earth" . . .
A key factor in instructing the reader about the use of
voice in this passage is the drum, which appeal’ s three
times with significance.~The first mention is in the
voice of the neutral narrator and, hence, is objective;
the second reference is screened through Weisspriess'
delirium and thus is subjective; the third allusion,
below, comes from a return to the objective narrator's
viewpoint. The passage continues, then, still with the
same sentence, in a progression away from Weisspriess'
fevered viewpoint to that of the narrator, who can then
inform the reader of Vittoria's reaction to Weisspriess:
. . . he tried to explain the locality of that
terrible drumming noise to them, and Vittoria
conceived him to be delirious; but he knew that
he was sensible: he knew her and Angelo and the
mountain-pass, and that he had a cigar-case in
his pocket worked in embroidery of crimson, blue,
and gold, by the hands of Countess Anna. (pp. 347-34 8)
It is necessary for Meredith to convey the power of this
434
experience upon Weisspriess, who here approaches close to
death, in order that the reader will be prepared to accept
that Weisspriess will undergo a dramatic change of
character. From a dueling champion indifferent to the
number of lives he takes, he changes to a man determined
to avoid such killings. Vittoria identifies the trans
formation upon Weisspriess1 returning to her the dagger
which he had taken from her in the Adige Valley; she
believes him to be "no longer the man he had been" {p. 13 4).
These two minor incidents (Weisspriess' wounding and
delirium, and Vittoria's noting his changed character)
are extremely important to the main plot in that they
cause Weisspriess to fail as Countess Anna's tool for
revenge and so provide for her employment of Nagen, who
is indicated to be a more treacherous adversary for Carlo.
The use of "voice" within the novel is an important
part of the communication of the novel itself. Voice, a
means of communication, implies at least two characters;
whereas the novel itself, as demonstrated, signifies that
there is an author and a reader. Moreover, as Walter Ong
points out, the utterance of a word also "implies that the
speaker has a kind of otherness within himself" (Literature
and Belief, p. 84). Meredith's "otherness" is an empathy
with the reader, a sensitivity which expresses itself in
direct address, simulation of experience, and an eliciting
435
of emotions in reaction to suspense, to excitement, and
to comedy. All of these result in the reader's becoming
a co-creator, since he invests his own experiences in his
reading and becomes implicated in a dialogue with the
author as the author speaks through the novels. The
Philosopher's "intrusions" are a kind of symbol as well
as example of the two-way communication (between author
and reader) for which the novels are designed.
Uses of Language for
Delight, Instruction, and Motivation
Meredith uses the rhetorical devices of language to
obtain the reader's acceptance of his instruction and of
his entertainment with as much adeptness as when he manip
ulates the pictorial and the dramatic devices, and when
he orchestrates the voices. Meredith's simulation of the
speech of a character to make more powerful the attitude
about which he wishes to instruct was demonstrated with
the analysis of the breathless, immature language of the
young officer pontificating about the proper way to
handle Italians (see page 59). Making the effect more
striking is that the language of immaturity is located in
the midst of the narrator's more sober account of the
incident, so that the reader receives subtle instruction
concerning the speaker and the validity of his notions,
and, more, is moved to reject the Austrian stance (it
436
having even earlier been made unacceptable in Sandra
Belloni, through General Pierson's championship of it
[see pages 247 to 248] ) .
As demonstrated above in Chapter I and, especially,
in Chapter II of this study in examination of Emilia's
narration of her own early history, Robert Scholes over
simplifies and so misleads when he states that "a story
told all in dialogue would be . . . without a point of
7
view." That Scholes means opinion when he says "point
of view" is clearly indicated when he explains that a
play "has no particular point of view," and that the
"stage directions" are a beginning of a "special point of
view." This concept is tenable only upon a dismissal of
Ong's theories about the novel as communication (see pages
10 to 11). As indicated above,the characters' opinions
and necessarily the language by which they express these
opinions constitute an important part of the novels'
messages.
Scholes indicates tone and metaphor to be two valuable
elements of language and to be "especially important for
the reader of fiction" (p. 27). For this study of the
Italian novels, we add two other components of language,
rhythm and diction, as equally important. Rhythm and
imagery were noted as characterizing elements in Chapter II.
^Elements of Fiction (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1968), p. 26.
437
They will in this chapter, therefore, be considered only
as they lend themselves to instruction, delight, and
motivation. An examination of tone will be especially
concerned with Meredith's use of irony in dealing with
the social, political, religious, humanitarian, and
artistic ideas in the two novels.
To gain some understanding of the ways in which
Meredith uses language that appeals to the intellect in
order to secure the reader's delight, instruction, and
impulse to act (for, as Stevenson notes, Meredith's
novels are constructed to make people think), the signi
ficance of speakers for the validity of a position will
first be examined. Passages of special effects will also
be studied; the speeches of characters under some extra
ordinary stress, or in a disturbed state, are superbly
evocative of condition. In addition, the letters,
especially those in Sandra Belloni, employ language
artistically as they seem inadvertently to reveal the
character of a letter-writer, even when he is unaware
of, or would disguise, his motives. A look finally at the
more hortative language, such as that addressed directly
to the reader by the narrator and that spoken within the
story line by a character, reveals the artistry of
Meredith's use of language.
The narrator's characterization of Pericles as
experiencing "intoxication with the success" of Vittoria
and of the opera is perhaps indicative of a kind of
aesthetic experience which Meredith wishes to arrange
for the reader of his novels. That is, Pericles'
experience is not a neutral one. He is more than a
passive viewer of the opera; he is in part a co-creator
in that he "had foreseen and cradled [Vittoria's success]
to its apogee" (Vittoria, I, 252). Meredith has designed
for the reader the same kind of participation, in that
he designs for the reader to be more than a puppet him
self. Yet, in a paradoxical way, the reader is, in a
sense, a creation, or puppet of Meredith: the reader is
at times the "lady" reader, the "man" who would attract
"superior women," and even the Philosopher himself, who
makes comments upon the narrator's story. Clearly
Meredith means to manipulate the reader, but by showing
..him the "lower limbs" of the character-puppets in order
that the reader-puppet have some knowledge of the modes
of creation and so vicariously participate in their
movement. This is sympathy of a different type from that
envisioned by Hume; even if the reader cannot cause
movement of the kind that the puppet-master can cause,
he can anticipate, understand, and analyze, becoming part
of the matrix of the book's meaning. Without the reader's
investment of intelligence and emotion, a novel has only
partial life and incomplete existence as a work meant to
delight, instruct, and provide impetus to change.
The language reinforces the lessons of these two
novels. It was demonstrated in Chapter II, as well as
in this chapter, that Meredith uses an intricate though
unified orchestration of voices to achieve his effects.
But in addition to the importance of the identities of
the voices in cluing the reader about the implied author'
attitude toward subjects, the power of the language in
its connotations as well as its denotations is essential
in the conveyance of enjoyment and meaning. Thus, ideas
concerning religion were seen to be dependent upon
Meredith's treatment of definition and of implication.
Attitudes toward Christianity and its effectiveness
in producing a virtuous man are defined, though sketchily
only by Lady Charlotte. However, although she is
established as a direct and honest woman, one who will
not stoop to subterfuge or deception, her character-
defects of "blood" place in question her ability to dis
cern truth. Therefore the implications of the conduct
of the Poles, who observe emptily the forms of religion;
of Sir Purcell Barrett, who pays lip-service to them; of
Georgiana Ford, who is misled by religion to deny "blood"
of Countess Ammiani, who suffers in spite of her religion
and of Violetta and other characters who treat religion
440
as a token; all these serve to reinforce the essential
lesson of Lady Charlotte's dismissal of religion as
necessary for the mature and the wise.
As noted in Chapter II, however, Meredith effects a
pervasive atmosphere concerning religion throughout the
two novels, the effects often being subtly achieved and
so being perhaps unconsciously assimilated by the reader.
Father Bernardus' speeches to Vittoria are a case in
point (see pages 299 to 301). The priest's ornamented
language reinforces the narrator's implications that the
source for Father Bernardus's concern for Vittoria is a
basically unreliable religiosity, rather than a real
awareness of the needs of the individual. Thus Father
Bernardus is indicated to be sincere in a wish to help
Vittoria, but to be severely limited in a knowledge of
that which constitutes help, since he is able to conceive
of help only in relation to his religion. Meredith does
not seem to wish to condemn the priest (he is praised
by two reliable witnesses, Vittoria and Laura), but he
does implicitly criticize the priest's attempt to prose
lytize Vittoria. The terminology used for Father Bernar
dus is essentially repeated for the Ammiani family priest
in order to corroborate for the reader that it is this
type of religion itself that Meredith is signifying as
false. Meredith has, however, no qualms about leveling
criticism at a man of the cloth, as he demonstrates by
441
the language of the narrator and of Laura in commentary
upon the village priest, who is shown to be a despicable
character.
The serious treatment of prayer, as a means for
encouraging in oneself a habit of virtuous behavior (to
pray to be virtuous leads one to perform virtuous acts
[Letters, I, 446]) stands in testimony to Meredith's
partial approval of religion on the basis of its past
benefits to man. The tone of the treatment of prayer is,
then, ironic only in relation to the character involved
with it. For instance, Emilia-Vittoria1s prayer was
shown to be treated without irony; Georgiana's with a
gentle irony, for she prays sincerely and makes a brave
attempt to be honest about herself and her feelings for
Merthyr, but she is also without real understanding of
her own nature because she is blinded by the tenets of
her religion. A slight tinge of irony also attends Laura's
effort at prayer when at Pastrengo she kneels and watches,
saying afterward,
"Woman can do some good by praying," she said. She
believed that she had been praying. That was her
part in the victory. (Vittoria, II, 118)
Actually the narrator had said that her "savage soul
. . . was robbed of its share of tragic emotion by having
to hold so far aloof" from the battle, a lesson which has
within it an application to the novel experience itself,
442
as well as to Laura's experience. Nonetheless, there is
in treatment of Laura less irony than that with which the
Poles are treated, for Laura's involvement in life and in
passion is real, as is her honesty about herself. Of
course, irony is an integral part of Sandra Belloni, the
tone being significant for that novel; whereas irony is
a less important component and used less frequently in
Vittoria.
In Sandra Belloni irony is a paramount device of
delight and of instruction. The tone of irony dominated
not only in those incidents which the narrator primarily
handles, as in the Ipley-Hillford quarrel and the
explanation of Sir Purcell Barrett's life and death, but
also in the speech and actions of the principals them
selves, as in Cornelia's and Barrett's dialogue of
romance, in Pericles' statements about protecting Emilia. 1 s
voice by entombing her body, and in poor Mrs. Lupin's
torturous struggle against and shame of her natural
tendency to appreciate and enjoy life.
One of the principal ironies of Sandra Belloni
concerns the narrator's promise to the reader that the
Poles will "emerge" from the "game of Fine Shades and
Nice Feelings . . . considerably shorn, but "purified"
(Sandra Belloni, II, 39). Certainly they are "shorn" of
their possessions by Pericles' more astute business
443
acumen, and, in the same way, they are purified of much
of the inconsequence of their daily routine. For in
stance, they cannot indulge in fetes, or in midnight
chats, or play at being superior to advantageous marriages
(Adela's marriage to Sedley, revealed in Vittoria, is a
final ironic comment on the subject). Their father, who
has been in deadly earnest about his daughters' marrying
well, is also shorn; he has lost his business and his good
name; as an act of purification he must make restitution
of the funds he has embezzled (with the help of money
obtained by Emilia).
Money has been the puppet-master of the Poles' souls;
yet with consummate irony Meredith conveys that it is the
"Nice Feelings" of their father (whom the Pole sisters
believe to lack this virtue of which they are the proud
possessors) which prevent his acknowledgment of the
importance of money. Unknowingly influenced by him, his
children flee from any chance knowledge of money's impor
tance in their lives. It is this aversion to the truth
about themselves, about life as it is, and, hence, about
nature, that results in their ironic devotion to the
"Nice Feelings" and "Fine Shades." Hence they aspire to
what "they know not exactly," but to some "social summit"
(I, 2), with absolute determination to escape "their
circle," which does "not please them" (p. 5).
444
The delicate irony with which the narrator treats
Wilfrid Pole in the final pages of Sandra Belloni marks
the demise of any hopes for his reform as they might have
been encouraged by the narrator's earlier promise of
his learning and growing. In a foreshadowing of the Wil
frid who appears in Vittoria, he remains in Sandra Belloni
a coxcomb and a comic. At the end of his interview with
Emilia, after she has recovered herself from the blow of
his rejection of her and her consequent voice loss, the
reader is told that only when his parting words to her
are "not palpably obscured" by her farewell phrase does
Wilfrid's "artistic sentiment" permit him to leave (p. 264).
Then, unable to accept the "indifference" she has shown
toward him, he remains in the street outside and pens a
note in which he demands that in answer she sign her
"... name in full."
But even in the red heat of passion his born
diplomacy withheld his own signature. (p. 26 5)
It is with this piercing though delicate irony that
the narrator disposes efficiently of the sentimental and
the trivial. The narrator's ironic identification of
Wilfrid as without real passion precedes Wilfrid's random
thoughts, which the narrator represents as if through
Wilfrid's mind. The language is passionless and without
real concern for Emilia herself or guilt for his own des
picable conduct toward her. However, awareness of that
445
conduct does surface. In an obvious thought-association,
he mentally offers a threat to Gambier "if he has been
playing with [his] sister's reputation." Then, revealing
his superficiality, his thoughts leap-frog to a hope that
Emilia has changed the dress in which she received him
so that he will know she wore it especially for him, to
a question of who did the "knot to her back hair," and
to a criticism that "her upper lip isn't perfectly cut"
(pp. 265-266).
Comic exposure of his innate dishonesty as well as
his silliness involves his worry over a "ghastly short
coming" in the distinctness of his phrase "free tomorrow."
Even though he is not actually free at all, but only "can
be . . . if [he] will" (p. 265), a concern that Emilia
will think he means "free to take a walk" (p. 266) sends
him running around "like unto a lunatic" to find a
stationer, before enlisting the help of a saucy "damsel."
His note is not that of a romantic suitor, but rings with
schoolboy importunity:
When I said "Free," I meant free in heart and
without a single chain to keep me from you. From
any moment that you please, I am free. This is
written in the dark. (p. 267)
Although Wilfrid is a "born" diplomat and withholds men
tion of marriage, any threat of the kind that Weisspriess
(another "coxcomb") is to offer to Vittoria in the sequel
novel is missing, especially in view of the comically
446
childish language of the last sentence. The damsel's
pert reaction to Wilfrid, as well as the sardonic advice
of a passer-by for Wilfrid to "keep" to himself the
location of Emilia's bedroom, performs also to help
dismiss Wilfrid as being of no consequence in Emilia's
life.
The narrator's sport with Wilfrid has not yet
finished, however, for he makes Wilfrid provide one of
the funniest episodes in the novel. As the carriage
containing Emilia, Georgiana, and Merthyr pulls away,
. . . Wilfrid started in pursuit. He calculated
that if his wind held till he could jump into a
light cab, his legitimate prey Braintop might be
caught. . . . The run was pretty swift. Wilfrid's
blood was fired by the pace, until, forgetting the
traitor Braintop, up rose Truth from the bottom of
the well in him, and he felt that his sole desire
was to see Emilia once more— but once! that night.
The narrator early scores two direct hits. First, Wil
frid's blood is fired by a physical effort, running, and
is unaffected by any passion; second, Truth is buried
deep and seemingly inaccessibly within Wilfrid, to appear
only upon Wilfrid's inadvertently relaxing his control
over Truth. The comedy then becomes broadly farcical:
Running hard, in the midst of obstacles, and with
eye and mind fixed on one object, disasters befell
him. He knocked apples off a stall, and heard
vehement halooing behind: he came into collision
with a gentleman of middle age courting digestion
. . . finally he rushed full tilt against a pot-boy
who was bringing all his pots broadside to the flow
of the street. . . . and then away shot Wilfrid, wet
447
with beer from throat to knee--to his chief pro
testing sense, nothing but an exhalation of
beer! (pp. 267-268)
Wilfrid has been thoroughly displayed to the reader as
a fool. The narrator's harshly ironic tone serves more
than mere comic purposes, however, for it counteracts
any suspicions the reader might harbor concerning a
future liaison between Wilfrid and Emilia in view of the
strength of her earlier attachment. In this way, as in
the others mentioned earlier, the reader is prepared
for Vittoria's acceptance of Carlo in the next novel.
In Victoria, lessons are taught not so much through
irony as through somber statement, picture, and action.
Also, when used, irony, too, has graver implications. In
Vittoria, one of the most interesting examples of irony,
as well as of a complicated handling of language, is in
the character delineation of Captain Weisspriess. He is
first described by indirection through powerfully des
criptive phrases. The narrator first notes that Weiss
priess "particularly distinguished himself by insisting
that a lady should remember him in public places" and
then, in the next sentence, informs the reader that "he
was famous for his skill with his weapons." The narrator
has thus told the reader most effectively that Weisspriess
is a cad and without moral responsibility. But perhaps
the most revealing language is that concerned with
448
Weisspriess' appearance and habit:
The captain's moustache was straw-coloured; he wore
it beyond the regulation length and caressed it
infinitely. Surmounted by a pair of hot eyes,
wavering in their direction, this grand moustache
was a feature to be forgotten with difficulty. . . .
He stood high and square-shouldered; the flame of
his moustache streamed on either side of his face
in a splendid curve; his vigilant head was loftily
posted to detect what he chose to construe as in
sult, or gather the smiles of approbation, to which,
owing to the unerring judgement of the sex, he was
more accustomed. Handsome or not, he enjoyed the
privileges of masculine beauty. (I, 91-92)
The description of the man's vanity is essentially amusing
and possesses a small echo of the tone with which Wilfrid
is treated. However, there is a more threatening note
here than for Wilfrid in the balancing of a discipline
against dangerous impulsiveness. On the one hand,
Weisspriess has hot wavering eyes and exceeds regulations;
on the other hand, the words "vigilant" and "posted,"
and the description of his posture imply a soldier's cold
control.
Although the tone remains comically ironic, the fact
of death is introduced, but at a distance, so that the
reader is less involved with the idea of death (the vic
tims are unknown to the reader so that sympathy is
missing) than with Weisspriess' flawed character:
This captain of a renown to come pretended that a
Venetian lady of the Branciani family was bound to
make response in public to his private signals, and
publicly to reply to his salutations. . . . Meeting
her one evening . . . he bowed, and . . . bowed
pointedly. She crossed her arms and gazed over him.
449
He called up a thing to her recollection in
resonant speech. Shameful lie, or shameful truth,
it was uttered in the hearing of many. . . . Count
Broncini, attending them. The lady listened calmly.
Count Broncini smote him on the face. That evening
the lady's brother arrived from Venice, and claimed
his right to defend her. Captain Weisspriess ran him
through the body. . . . Count Broncini was his next
victim. There, for a time, the slaughtering business
of the captain stopped. (p. 92)
The narrator's earlier statement implying that he is a
cad is now demonstrated vividly in his behavior with the
"lady"; that he is dishonest is hinted with the word
"pretended," although the narrator refuses to label his
speech true or false; and, finally, that he is indifferent
to human life ("slaughtering business") and lacks knowl
edge of the harmony of nature is confirmed. The trans
formation of Weisspriess from this threatening coxcomb
who appears throughout Volume I of Vittoria into a man
whose "constant inward cry" is "no more blood" (II, 216)
is a drastic one, but one for which Meredith amply
provides (see pages 430 to 434).
Whereas the narrator's language is revelatory in the
ways shown above, that used by characters when speaking
for themselves conveys mood, age, and habit of thought,
as in Emilia's speech (see pages 173 to 176 and 272 to
273) and that of the young Austrian lieutenant (see page
59). Emilia's speech, expressing psychological dis
turbance, is, as the young officer's, expressing immatur
ity, contained within the narrator's so that her
450
sparsely-constructed sentences, each with subject and
predicate, contrast with the narrator's more involved
sentences in the last sentence below. Moreover, the
separation of the compound subjects of the predicate "was
suggested" in lines six to eight below, with the resultant
grammatical error (the after-thought, added with an "and"
after a semi-colon), is not prepared for with the
singular verb "was."
To be of worth was still her fixed idea— all that
was clear in the thickening mist. "I cannot be
ugly," she said, and reproved herself for simu
lating a childish tone. "Why do I talk in that
way? I know I am not ugly. But if a fire scorched
my face? There is nothing that seems safe!" The
love of friends was suggested to her as something to
rely on; and the loving them. "But if I have nothing
to give!" said Emilia, and opened both her empty hands.
She had diverted her mind from the pressure upon it,
by this colloquy with a looking-glass, and gave her
self a great rapture by running notes to this theme . . .
(Sandra Belloni, II, 133-134)
The narrator's information that Emilia was "in a
thickening mist" helps to instruct the reader that her
speech is, at this point, not wholly reliable; but, in
addition, Emilia is able objectively to criticize her
own speech. The language of disorientation, or of mad
ness, or of delirium, or of hysteria used in the novels
does not display this objectivity. Mr. Pole's distressed
speech to Emilia in his London rooms, when she comes to
plead with him; Weisspriess1 delirious speech after he
has been wounded by Angelo; Anna's hysterical speech of
451
confession to Lena; and Barto's maddened speech to
Vittoria toward the end of the second Italian novel— all
are characterized by rhythms and diction as the language
of disordered thought. The different degrees, or even
kinds of mental distress, are reflected in special lan
guage, and, moreover, are calculated to teach a moral
lesson that might be interpreted as the wages of sin is
death (that is, death of the soul or spirit). Even
though Emilia is in a "thickening mist," her speech
never shows the marks of disordered thought. Thus she
is separated from the others, since she is a victim of
those who would steal from her her freedom as well as
her destiny. Emilia never loses her essential harmony
of spirit, as her language consistently indicates.
It has been noted in this paper that Meredith's
lessons have to do essentially with freedom, whether in
relationship with the society in which one lives, in
national politics, in love and in the family, in
religion, or in art. Usually the language is not
hortative, but is pervasively indirect: Meredith's
"lessons" are repeated many times, in many situations,
and by many voices, in both positive and negative ways,
throughout the two novels. As in the case of Meredith's
presentation of the coercive and stultifying effects of
certain types of religion, no negative word is actually
452
offered to the reader; the ideas and the feelings emerge
primarily from the words and actions of the principals
of both novels, rather than from the words of the
narrator.
The narrator does, however, identify Barto's as "the
language of a distorted mind," but without drawing con
clusions; those he leaves to the reader.
"Emilia Alessandra Belloni! Vittoria! Countess
Alessandra Ammiani! pity me. Hear this: — I hated
you as the devil is hated. Yesterday I woke up in
prison to hear that I must adore you. God of all
the pits of punishment! Was there ever one like
this? I had to change heads."
It was the language of a distorted mind, and lament
able to hear when a sob shattered his voice.
"Am I mad?" he asked piteously, clasping his temples.
(Vittoria, II, 279)
The multiple address, as in an attempt to secure fixity
in the midst of whirling and confused thoughts, first
marks disturbance. The references to the devil, God, and
the hell of punishment are here, and will again be,
connected with mental disturbance. However, the thought
processes may still be seen to follow some thread of
logic, as in mania in which the thread of thought is not,
however, objectively reasonable. Thus in the face of
conclusive contradictory evidence Barto insists upon the
coherency of his belief in Vittoria's disloyalty to the
cause. It is Barto Rizzo's obsession concerning women
that is at the base of his illogicality.
Mr. Pole's speech shows no madness or delirium, as
453
does the speech used by Barto and that used by Weisspriess.
A train of logic with an obsessive concern that keeps
recurring and to which all other thoughts are subordinated
characterizes his speech, but his obsessive concern has
basis in objectively verifiable facts, not in subjective
delusions. Weisspriess1 language, on the other hand,
as rendered through the narrator chiefly, shows a dis
cordance and dissociation of thought; the patterns of
thought are organized by his imagination rather than by
his reason.
Pole's obsession revolves around his incipient ruin
at the hands of Pericles (due, however, to his own in
discretion) ; he suffers further at the knowledge that
his dilemma threatens his family's welfare. The obsession
is revealed chiefly through indirection and rarely re
ceives the narrator's interpretive remarks. Thus, as
they ride on a London street to supper and a "farce,"
Pole calls Emilia's attention to "three dusty windows."
There, he informs her, lives a "bankrupt," but
He hadn't a family, my dear. Where did the money
go? He's called a rascal now, poor devil! Business
brings awful temptations. You think, this'11 save
me! You catch hold of it and it snaps. That'll
save me; but you're too heavy, and the roots give
way, and down you go lower and lower. Lower and
lower! The gates of hell must be very low down if
one of our bankrupts don't reach 'em. (Sandra Belloni,
I, 273)
Without the reader's knowledge of Pole's financial
454
trouble, his speech seems, too, a disjunctive expression
of a "distorted mind." But, with that knowledge, his
speech appears made up of ideas arranged in logical
sequence. That his thought processes are not completely
normal, however, may be seen in the sinking and hell
allusions which the narrator labels as "distorted" for
Barto Rizzo.
As the pressures of his problem mount during the
evening, Pole's speech becomes even more disorganized.
In addition, the narrator's remarks inform the reader of
Pole's deteriorating condition.
To speak at all and arrange his ideas, was a
vexation to the poor merchant. . . . Emilia's naive
confidence . . . brought on a fresh access of the
nervous fever lurking in him . . . "Well, you can't
have him [Wilfrid] and there's an end. You must give
up— confound! Why! do you expect to have everything
you want at starting? There, my child— but, upon my
honour! a man loses his temper at having to talk for
an hour or so, and no result! You must go to bed;
and— do you say your prayers? Well! that's one way
of getting out of it— pray that you may forget all
about what's not good for, you." (p. 289)
As the old man talks on, his speech discloses even more
disorientation and, increasingly, a tendency for his mind
to drift:
Why, you're almost like a young man, when you set
your mind on a thing. Bad! won't do! Say your
prayers regularly. And, please, pour me out a
mouthful of brandy. My hand trembles— I don't
know what's the matter with it; — just like those
rushes on the Thames I used to see when out fishing.
No wind, and yet there they shake away. I wish it
was daylight on the old river now! It's night, and
no mistake. I feel as if I had a fellow twirling a
455
stick over my head. The rascal's been at it for
the last month. There, stop where you are, my
dear, don't begin to dancei (p. 289)
Even without the narrator's information of Pole's
difficulties in arranging his ideas, Pole's speech tells
the reader that he is disturbed. Especially toward the
end does the incoherence of his thought become more
apparent. In its rambling, Pole's speech resembles both
Weisspriess' and Barto Rizzo's; all three show increasing
reliance on memory and imagination as the ability to
reason recedes. Pole, disturbed but not mad, himself
notes the physical symptoms of distress; whereas neither
the fevered Weisspriess nor the maddened Rizzo is able
to make objective judgments about his own condition.
As Pole tells Emilia not to dance, the narrator,
as if in Pole's mind, says that he was "half under the
impression that she was taking a succession of dazzling
leaps in the air" (p. 290). A later state of the
merchant's disintegrating grasp on the present is des
cribed by the narrator, who tells the reader that Emilia
is
. . . startled to hear him laugh. A slight
melancholy little burst; and then a louder one,
followed by a full-toned laughter that fell short
and showed the heart was not in it. (p. 293)
Implicit here is irrational conduct; for, although he
recognizes that both Emilia's and his own conditions are
desperate and, moreover, although he has some sympathy
456
for her suffering, he indulges himself in a laugh that
is without mirth.
The narrator's function is here important for the
reader's understanding in a way different from that in
a scene between Laura and Carlo in which Laura, as
ficelle for Carlo, is reacting in ways most instructive
for the reader. Meredith's methods for indicating Laura's
mind on the matter of Carlo's deliberately mysterious
reasons for isolating himself from Vittoria and for
pursuing the revolution in a manner dangerous to himself
and distressful to Vittoria are of three definite types:
first, Laura's thoughts are given in her own words;
second, the narrator interprets her reactions as if from
outside her mind, and so objectively; and, third, the
narrator presents her thought as if from inside her mind.
The first two methods appear below:
"Love-sick," was Laura's mental comment. Yet when
Carlo explained his position to her next day, she
was milder in her condemnation of him, and even
admitted that a man must be guided by such brains
as he possesses. (Vittoria, II, 191)
An alternation of the narrator's places of viewing,
from inside and outside Laura's mind, results in objective
verification of her subjective state:
On the whole, though against her preconception, Laura
thought him an honest lover, and not the player of a
double game. She saw that Vittoria should have been
with him in the critical hour of defeat, when his
passions were down, and heaven knows what weakness of
457
our common manhood, that was partly pride, partly
love-craving, made his nature waxen to every im
pression; a season, as Laura knew, when the mistress
of a loyal lover should not withhold herself from
him. . . . And vain as Carlo was (the vanity being
most intricate and subtle, like a nervous fluid), he
was very open to the belief that he could diplomatize
as well as fight, and lead a movement yet better than
follow it. (pp. 193-194)
The first two sentences above have flags that indicate
they are presented by the narrator as he objectively views
Laura in her study of Carlo. The third sentence, however,
is without such a flag (i.e., such a word as "thought,"
"saw," or "knew") and thus seems to issue from inside
Laura's mind, the narrator then seeing Carlo as if he
were Laura. Nevertheless, the objectivity implied by the
absence of quotation marks helps the reader to achieve a
clear understanding of the message and a conviction of
its soundness.
In the passages of disoriented speech previously
being considered, short, choppy sentences with few
modifiers reflect an inability to sustain thought.
Moreover, the simple, conventional order of subject and
predicate is used. Meredith's employment of the rhythms
of speech to achieve various effects, including the rough
rhythm of disturbance, is an indication of the effort he
makes to delight and to instruct, or rather to delight
in order to instruct. Actually the delight is possible
even without much awareness of technique, for the reader
458
is pleasurably affected almost subconsciously by the
rhythms. However, as in the demonstration of Meredith's
discussion of the "cane" of the novel, the instruction
discloses itself completely only to the curious, who then
see that the technique undermines the reliability of the
speaker and who then arrive at the truth as the author's
second self contrives to convey it.
Anna's speech differs from Pole's, Barto's, and
Weisspriess' in being identified directly by the narrator
as "hysterical." Her language is actually more a demon
stration of a distemper of conscience than are the other
speeches cited as distorted. Revealed in Anna's dialogue
are self-love, self-deceit, and self-indulgence, as she
gives vent to her feelings of guilt and anger rather than
of real regret. In reply to Lena's assertion that
Captain Weisspriess loves her, Anna answers,
Yes, he loves me! he loves me! or would he come
to me after I have sent him against a dozen swords?
But he is poor; he must, must marry a wealthy woman.
I used to hate him because I thought he had his eye
on money. I love him for it now. He deserves
wealth; he is a matchless hero. He is more than the
first swordsman of our army; he is a knightly man.
Oh, my soul Johann. (II, 314)
Because Anna is in control of her mental faculties so
that her speech is not rambling, the narrator's analytical
remarks are important to an understanding:
She very soon fell to raving. Lena was implored by
her to give her hand to Weisspriess in reward for his
heroism— "For you are rich," Anna said; "you will not
459
have to go to him feeling that you have made him
face death a dozen times for your sake, and that
you thank him and reward him by being a whimpering
beggar in his arms. Do, dearest! Will you? Will
you, to please me, marry Johann? He is not unworthy
of you." And more of this hysterical hypocrisy,
which brought on fits of weeping. (pp. 314-315)
The narrator's characterizing remarks may be seen as
more important in dealing with Anna's hysterical speech
than in treating Pole's, Barto's or Weisspriess' speeches,
since only in Anna's case is her conscience, and not her
mind, affected. However, in Weisspriess' speech, the
narrator's language is important in a different way because
it is almost singly responsible for the presentation of
Weisspriess' delirium, with only a few words represented
as Weisspriess' own words. The technique may be mildly
disappointing for the student impressed with Meredith's
other performances with the language of mental disturbance.
That thought is only retrospective, however, for the pas
sage itself is a tour de force with several places for
viewing to heighten the implications not only of Weiss
priess ' delirium, but also of Vittoria's and Angelo's
plight. The episode expresses the novel's principal les
son in counterpoising the oppressed and the oppressing.
Vittoria and Angelo have been in flight from the Austrians
and, hence, from Weisspriess, who is an oppressor both
because he is part of the Austrian forces and because of
his own nature. His defeat, then, is made to seem at his
own hands.
I
460
All these speeches instruct the reader concerning
vice through the language of dissociation. The characters
in states of stress (Anna, Pole, Weisspriess, and Barto
Rizzo) are responsible for their own disturbance; some
definite desire or act of disharmony is at the seat of
their difficulties. Barto creates his own disordered
state through suspicion and plotting; Anna's jealousy
and desire for revenge undermine her peace of mind;
Pole's avarice and indifference to the welfare of those
not of his own family cause his illness; Weisspriess'
vanity and moral irresponsibility lead to his defeat.
The author's second or implied self thus teaches the
error of conduct disruptive of the harmony of life
through vivid depiction of the suffering that follows
such conduct.
With his demonstrably adept handling of language,
Meredith seldom strikes a false note in the mind's ear
of one reading these novels more than one hundred years
after they were written. Yet in two notable instances
his language courts disbelief. Both of these occur in
descriptions of the relationship between two women. An
especially unfortunate example of phraseology uncomfort
able for the modern reader is the narrator's description
of Vittoria's maid Giacinta as she acts "a mother" with
Vittoria. Giacinta and Vittoria must be approximately
461
the same age, Vittoria now being perhaps nineteen years
old. The narrator does not here, as he did in the case
of Carlo's shedding tears, prepare the reader for accept
ance; he simply plunges into the description without
explanation or apology.
The earlier explanation for Carlo's tears also
explains Vittoria's need to cry, it being the Greek notion
that under the pressures of grief one must weep or suffer
a psychological disorder. It does not prepare the reader
for the exchange between the two women; nor could Meredith
have predicted the twentieth century reader's heightened
awareness of sexual aberration, an awareness which causes
distaste at the displays of physical affection between
members of the same sex. Meredith was aware of and
protesting the unnatural suppression of emotion, which
he saw to result in sentimentality, or "riding the
Hippogriff," in an attempt to find a suitable substitute
for that which is proscribed.
The scene of questionable taste occurs in the
carriage that carries Vittoria and Giacinta away from
La Scala after Vittoria has given the signal for the
uprising. She last sees Carlo being detained by "dark-
clothed men"; in distress, she goes from "recollection
to oblivion . . . like a caged wild thing" (I, 2 85).
Seeing her state,
462
Giacinta had to be a mother with her. The poor
trembling girl . . . tore open the bands of her
corset and drew her mistress's head against the
full warmth of her bosom, rocked her, and moaned
over her, mixing comfort and lamentation in one
offering, and so contrived to draw the tears
from her . . . (p. 285)
The language of necessity, "had," and the reminder that
the "tears" must be induced are clear indications that
Meredith's purposes with the scene are other than erotic;
and that rather he is portraying the naturally-maternal
peasant "girl" as she reacts to the human situation.
Vittoria's "Italian" response is also simply and naturally
described:
. . . Vittoria, after one long-drawn wavering sob,
turned her lips to the bared warm breast, and put
a little kiss upon it, and slept. (p. 286)
While the reader can, even if somewhat uneasily
(post-Freud) adjust his concept of maternalism and of the
relationship between two young women on the basis that
the narrator suggests, he is confronted with a paragraph
in which the language gradually becomes more erotic in
description of Giacinta's reactions to her sleeping
mistress.
. . . after a tumult of the blood [the excitement
of the escape as well as of the opera] women have
a tender delight in one another's beauty. Giacinta
doted on the marble cheek, upturned on her lap,
with the black unbound locks slipping across it;
the braid of the coronal of hair loosening; the
chance flitting movement of the pearly little
dimple that lay at the edge of the bow of the joined
lips, like the cradling hollow of a dream. At whiles
it would twitch; yet the dear eyelids continued sealed,
(p. 287)
463
A maternal delight in the beauty of a girl-child is
certainly not unusual; and that a peasant-girl, a girl
who has lived close to nature, may feel about one she
serves, even though she is almost her own age, in a
maternal way is also understandable (though with greater
difficulty). However, the next paragraph uses language
that even more closely resembles the language of a lover
than does the language above.
Looking at shut eyelids when you love the eyes
beneath, is more or less a teazing mystery that
draws down your mouth to kiss them. The lashes
seem to answer you in some way with infantine
provocation; and fine eyelashes upon a face bent
sideways, suggest a kind of internal smiling.
Giacinta looked till she could bear it no longer;
she kissed the cheek, and crooned over it, gladdened
by a sense of jealous possession when she thought
of the adored thing her mistress had been overnight.
(p. 287)
The suggestiveness of the language is relieved by the word
"infantine"; but it is Vittoria's request, "Shut my
window, mother," after being awakened by "one of
[Giacinta's] hugs," that levels the language off to a
more reasonable tone (pp. 286-287).
Of less uncomfortable proportions is the extravagantly-
worded note Amalia writes to Laura. Although the note has
overtones of a love letter, one not inferior to those
written by Carlo and certainly much superior to those
written by Wilfrid, the language is less overtly erotic
than that of the former scene, especially since it does
464
not entail descriptions of physical expressions of
affection. Amalia addresses Laura as "Best beloved," in
a convention less acceptable today. In the letter she
then calls Laura "my heart" and bids farewell to her as
"Laura mine, I am for ever 'thy Amalia'" (I, 158). The
imagery involved in Amalia's designating Laura her "pine-
grove leading to the evening-star" is, although fulsome,
readily understandable in the light of Meredith's poetic
complex of images; these appear in countless poems, as
well as in the Italian novels (see page 224).
The argument that these passages are simply part of
Meredith's statement in the two Italian novels against
sentiment and for passion, as illustration of the honest
flow of passion (whether grief or love), fails. The very
fact that the lapses in taste, which they represent, are
rare in the two novels, which are more than thirteen-
hundred pages long, makes them the more unacceptable. In
all other instances, Meredith has met the requirements of
Sainte-Beuve for a "classic." He
. . . has rendered his thought, his observation,
[and] his discovery . . . under [a] form . . .
broad and large, refined, sensible, sane, and
beautiful in itself . . . [and] has spoken to all
in a style of his own which yet belongs to all the
world, in a style which is new without neologisms,
new and ancient, easily contemporaneous with every
age. 8
®"What Is a Classic?" in his Select Essays: Chiefly
Bearing on English Literature, ed. and trans. AT
Butler (London: Edward Arnold, n.d.), pp. 5-6.
465
Although Meredith may be unsuccessful in gaining a
modern reader's sympathy in these instances of depicting
the relationship between women, he achieves success in a
perhaps more difficult task. Toward the end of Sandra
Belloni, he inserts an undisguisedly hortative passage,
without directly addressing the reader, but with clear
intention of mocking and thus uprooting a popular attitude.
His purpose is to cause the reader to despise the
ignorantly-complacent "Briton's" position and to enter
into the lists of freedom, even if only through "sub
scription" of funds.
Meredith achieves with his writing of the Briton's
dialogue the effect of language best characterized for
the American reader by the film actor Nigel Bruce in his
filmed interpretation of Doctor Watson in the screen
series based on The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In his writing, Doyle himself
does not succeed, as Meredith does, with the dialogue.
Meredith masterfully achieves on the printed page that
which Bruce establishes by his acting: a portrait of the
islander "full of ale," insularity, and self-satisfaction,
albeit with a blundering good nature that is endearing.
The scene is on the dock, where, among the passengers
debarking, is a "crippled" Merthyr Powys. The general
"sentiment" of the other passengers toward Merthyr's
466
condition is that they
. . . seemed to entertain an impression that he had
no business at such a moment to be crippled, and
might be put down as one of those foreign fools who
stand out for a trifle as targets to fools a little
luckier than themselves. (Sandra Belloni, II, 3 29)
Upon learning that Merthyr "is English," a representative
speaker emerges, stating, "If he is, he deserves what he's
got" (p. 330). He continues in language that is charac
teristic of some Englishmen whom Meredith would instruct:
"By George! ma'am," cried the Briton, holding out
his newspaper, "here's a leader on the identical
subject, with all my views in it! Yes! those
Italians are absurd; they never were a people:
never agreed. Egad! the only place they're fit
for is the stage. Art! if you like. They know
all about colouring canvas, and sculpturing. I
don't deny 'em their merits, and I don't mind
listening to their squalling, now and then: though,
I'll tell you what: — have you ever noticed the
calves of those singers? — I mean, the men. Per
haps not— for they've got none. They're sticks,
not legs. Who can think much of fellows with such
legs?" (p. 331)
The superb irony with which Meredith handles this speech
begins with the first sentence, which reveals that the
Briton does not think for himself, but has his opinions
formed by and in the popular press; yet he is ready to
label others as absurd, and that on the basis of the
shape of their legs. The absence of any logic in a
connection between government, unity, artistic ability,
and leg shape, in addition to an excessive use of exclama
tion points, testifies to the speaker's need for aid in
forming his judgments. Finally, he is a barbarian,
467
incapable of appreciating art, as he refers to singing,
the predominant art form in Sandra Belloni, as "squalling."
His unthinking susceptibility to the winds of impulse
is indicated by his reaction to the news that one of
those meeting the ship has "lost her husband, I dare say!"
(p. 330). Formerly condemnatory of Italians, the Briton
turns on the Austrians who "reply" to a request to be
"merciful"
. . . like the grunt of a savage beast! Hanged!
shot! — count how many for one day's work! . . .
If we enter into another alliance with those
infernal ruffians! — if they're not branded in
the face of Europe as inhuman butchers! if I— by
George! if I were an Italian I'd handle a musket
myself, and think great guns the finest music
going. Mind, if there's a subscription for the
widows of these poor fellows, I put down my name;
so shall my wife, so shall my daughters, so will
we all, down to the baby! (p. 331)
The comic circling, with the about-face in attitude, from
initial condemnation to empathetic bellicosity in support
of the Italian cause, is a comic lesson for the reader who
must then be warned of the ridiculousness of such a chain
of reactions, and so be ready himself to assume a more
reasonable and humane position.
The narrator does not permit the lesson to remain
only implicit, however. He ironically observes that it
was "in the pride of his manliness" that "the male Briton"
spoke. Certainly the lesson is vividly represented in
the Briton's own language, however.
The language in dialogue is not always so precisely
handled within the two Italian novels as it is in the
instances of the Briton, and of the young Austrian officer
(see page 59). That is, wide disparity of speech patterns
does not always mark the speeches of characters who are
enormously separated by differences in age, intelligence,
education, and social background. Already indicated was
the narrator's presence in lines which ostensibly
represent the thought of ignorant villagers (see again
page 59). It was also noted (see pages 217 to 239) that
the imagery used serves more to characterize the one
spoken of than the one speaking. That is, the imagery,
employed to influence the reader toward the idea or
attitude proper to the novels' lessons concerning freedom
and goodness, establishes by association the nature and
the way of life of the characters. For example, the free-
flowing water images signify Emilia-Vittoria's closeness
with nature, whereas the static, frozen images for the
Poles indicate their distance from nature and the "natural"
life.
A study of the language of action given summarily
and pictorially, and of action given directly with dia
logue and dramatically, reveals few differences in lan
guage. Meredith's prose is actually in the medium style,
but without much inversion of the structural elements.
469
Dramatically-presented action is more briefly stated, but
the reason is that analysis is omitted. The abstruseness
of Meredith's style does not proceed from long, difficult,
inverted syntax, but proceeds from, the withholding of
information, as noted earlier. Even when analyzing motive,
or presenting the Philosopher's analyses, in Sandra
Belloni, the narrator employs few modifiers, whether
clauses or phrases. A case in point is the narrator's
chapter of analysis of Sir Purcell's sentimentalism as
it becomes involved with Emilia's desperate situation:
All the morning Sir Purcell had been combative,
owing to that subordinate or secondary post he
occupied in a situation of some excitement [Emilia's
in losing both Wilfrid and her voice]; — which
combativeness is one method whereby men thus
placed, imagining that they are acting devotedly
for their friends, continue still to assert them
selves. (Sandra Belloni, II, 149)
The above, balanced sentence contains two independent
clauses, each of which has a present participial phrase
and an adjective clause, the latter also having a noun
clause (the object of "imagining").
Whereas the structure of the sentences and the
general style of the language in the two novels are
essentially medium and the language does not widely differ
from speaker to speaker (except as already indicated),
but bears the mark of the teller, the ideas expressed
and the types of diction do offer some contrast. For
example the exchanges of letters between Wilfrid and
470
Iracy Runningbrook reveal Wilfrid's manner of expression
to be the more prosaic one. Tracy uses figurative lan
guage (he will give Wilfrid's "conscience a nightcap"
[p. 192] and wishes "great Mother nature had given a
house of iron to this soul of fire," Emilia [p. 199]).
Wilfrid's letters reveal his habit of thought to be
connected with his military career; he refers to a "shot
at [his] forehead" (p. 192), to his being "unmanned"
(p. 191), and to certain "intelligence" reaching Emilia's
ears (p. 196). Georgiana Ford's letters, also included
in this grouping, resemble Wilfrid's only in being
prosaic; her diction reveals her habit of thought to be
somewhat structured by moral considerations. She refers
to "principles" (p. 196), to "heavenly light," and to
"noblest feelings" (p. 198). Although both Wilfrid and
Georgiana allude to prayer, his reference is a to-be-
demonstrated hypocritical one. When he uses subterfuge
to accost Emilia, he contra ' ~: * . his assertion that he
prays that he "may not haunt . . . to defeat" Georgiana's
efforts to restore her "peace" (p. 192). Georgiana's
habit of prayer, on the other hand, is not only demon
strated to be sincere in the course of the novel (she is
shown at fervent prayer), but is unostentatiously given,
in opposition to Wilfrid's flagrantly sycophantish asser
tion as he curries favor with Georgiana. Georgiana
471
reports simply that Emilia "asked . . . whether [she]
prayed before sleeping," and, without giving an explicit
answer, Georgiana says only that she "remained . . . with
her for a time" (pp. 189-190). Of course, Georgiana's
reference to "heavenly light" also holds implications
of attempted converse with God.
Like her speech, Emilia's letters are direct and
powerful in their simplicity. She summons Wilfrid to come
to her, the first sentence stating simply and objectively
that it "is time for [her] to see [him]." Her love is
implied in that factual statement as well as in her
simile that the thought of him "goes through [her] like
a flame that hums" (I, 195). Her farewell letter to
Merthyr, whom she says to call "beloved . . . would be
false," is equally direct, but dwells more on the revolu
tion and her plans for the future than does her letter to
Wilfrid. In closing, she finally does name Merthyr
"beloved" although she asks, in her honest way, that he
"be under no deception," but see her as she is (II, 340).
In her letter, she has been completely open and frank,
concealing nothing, not even her feeling, although her
natural passion and expression have led her to be wounded
severely by the deception in which Wilfrid had indulged.
She even confesses to Merthyr that Georgiana proved her
self to love him more than she (Emilia) does, that she
472
(Emilia) failed him in caring more for the Poles' welfare
than for his, and, as important to Emilia, that Pericles
loves music more than she (Emilia) does. In all these
confessions, but especially in the first two, she runs
the risk of losing Merthyr's support of her. However,
this petty thought is not represented as even occurring
to Emilia. Nor does she reflect upon herself flatteringly
when she writes of her awareness that when she sang for
Pericles, he "twisted as if [she] had bent him in [her]
hand" (p. 337).
In Vittoria, Emilia-Vittoria's letters and speeches
are as open and ingenuous as her letters and speeches in
Sandra Belloni; she seeks to conceal nothing, even accuses
herself when she thinks proper. The narrator announces
her response to Carlo's written accusations of improper
behavior, in signifying approval of the King, to be a
"straightforward affirmative." She then spends five long
paragraphs explaining her reasons for showing her favor
of the King, one paragraph affirming her love for Carlo,
and then only a few lines explaining her absence from his
mother's side in disobedience to his order (this being a
matter which bears upon the catastrophe [see pages 320
to 328]) and urging him to join her in Pallanza (Vittoria,
II, 165-168).
Carlo's letter is very similar to Vittoria's in
473
tone, diction, and style; he, too, is direct in statement,
even in accusation of her, although generous in excuse.
He is informative about others in his company and strong
in affirmation of his love for Vittoria. It is especially
in contrast with Wilfrid's letters that Carlo's serve to
illuminate his character as one well-suited to Vittoria's.
A briefer letter than hers, his note reflects really only
the difference in their situations: he writes from the
battlefield, and she from behind the lines where she
nurses Merthyr; therefore, she has a leisure and an
opportunity to reflect that he does not have.
As important as are narrative method and treatment of
voices within the two Italian novels, the language {im
agery, diction, and tone), is perhaps even more important
in establishing them as unified works with definite
rhetorical purposes. Moreover, the language also testi
fies with great effect in the arguments about "intrusion,"
"role-playing," and ability to present "scenes of action"
in Meredith's works, especially in these two Italian
novels. The reason for the language's especial importance
in establishing unity of the novels is that its primary
function is to unify (see imagery section), whereas the
primary functions of the narrative methods and of the
manipulation of voices is to present differences.
That is to say that a novel, as a complicated means
of communication, represents in some sense "a sign of
special alienation" of the author (Ong, pp. 86, 95). The
alienation reveals itself through the differing places of
viewing and often conflicting attitudes that are indicated
by the pictorial and the dramatic narrative techniques
and by the employment of various voices. A special
creative effort achieves the necessary separation of the
creating self from the characters created. In one sense
only, the writer of the novel is the "I" of the novel,
but actually his "thou" awareness is multiplied by all
the masks he must create, including the mask of the
reader (see also pages 381, 382, 384, 385, and 386) .
The examination of voices in Chapter II revealed
Meredith's mastery in orchestrating the different voices
to affirm, deny, and confirm the various attitudes which
he sought to inculcate in the reader. That is, Wilfrid's
position is not that of Emilia-Vittoria, nor is Emilia-
Vittoria's always that of the Philosopher, or of the
narrator; the narrator's stated position (in Sandra
Belloni) is ostensibly not that of the Philosopher, nor
is either of these latter two positions always that of
the author's second self. The characters' communications
with one another within the novels show a further dis
sociation of Meredith from the masks which he creates.
The alienation or movement away from the center of
475
authorial self-awareness surely is made deliberately as
great as possible. The kind of awareness for which
Pritchett argues, when he attempts to justify Meredith's
"intrusion" on the basis of inveterate "role-playing,"
seems inadequate to indicate Meredith's skill with the
pictorial and the dramatic methods as they permit different
viewing places and, even more, his skill with the voices
as they express such a complex arrangement of attitudes
and ideas. Pritchett's explanation connotes a creative
approach diametrically opposed to that which Meredith
seems to be pursuing; that is, Pritchett argues that the
author creates characters through identification with
author's self rather than of separation from that self.
Both of these experiences are probably present in the
creative act as in the aesthetic experience; and Prit
chett's emphasis upon identification {with the sacrifice
of separation) is a denial of the force and the artistry
of the Italian novels as they are revealed in this study.
As Ong states, an awareness of the distance separat
ing "I" from "thou" is strengthened even in the creation
of a mask (Literature and Belief, p. 95), a phenomenon
that resembles that which Keats signified by "negative
capability. Thus,
9John Keats, Letter to George and Thomas Keats, in
English Romantic Poetry and Prose, ed. Russell Noyes
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1956), p. 1211.
476
It is not necessary to suppose that Meredith or
Shakespeare actually felt the emotions of his
characters, but only that he understood them.
Doubtless such emotional sympathy may be, and
probably often is, present as well, but, if it
is, it is present to add fuel to the excitement
of the proper creative tendency, the tendency,
I mean, to expression not in the ways of anger
or remorse or love, but in the ways of speech or
movements of the hand directing brush or chisel.
It is as one views the novels to reveal a deliberate and
calculated separation of the author from his creations
(puppets) in order that they live and move as real beings,
and not as wooden instruments to reflect his own person
ality or character, that Pritchett's thesis can be seen
to mislead. It is an over-simplification, in other words,
for the reader to believe that each character represents
some facet of Meredith's personality, or in still other
words, that each character speaks for Meredith, or as if.
he himself is speaking through a mask.
Part of the artistic accomplishment of the Italian
novels is in the extension of the I-thou awareness on the
part of Meredith: he created characters from whom he
maintained an aesthetic distance, and as a result it
seems that
. . . people . . . move themselves, — are moved
from their own impulsion, --and that no arbitrary
hand has posted them to bring about any event and
heap the catastrophe. (Sandra Belloni, II, 2 03)
10S. Alexander, "The Creative Process in the Artist's
Mind," in The Problems of Aesthetics: A Book of Readings,
ed. Eliseo Vivas "and Murray Krieger (New York: Holt,
Rinehart and Winston, 1966), p. 145.
477
The novels, then, are designed to be
. . . told from the novelistic point of view that
transcends the perspective of any one character,
and . . . is designed to evoke in the reader a mood
of ironically sympathetic contemplation.H
Whereas only Sandra Belloni is in "essentially a comic
mood," both novels are "essentially humane (in that vices
depicted . . . are viewed not as villainy, but as folly"
[p. 225])
Wilfrid certainly is not a villain, but a buffoon.
Weisspriess proves to be not the villain that he seemed
to be until his wounding at the end of Volume I of
Vittoria. Barto Rizzo behaves abominably, but is excused,
in the course of the novel, from being a villain, on the
basis of his "distorted mind." Medole is an unvillainous
cuckold. Not even the Austrians are deep-dyed villains;
they have good and bad characteristics. The Lenkensteins
are portrayed sympathetically. Only Nagen seems to have
no redeeming traits, but he is more puppet than person,
seeming to have been created only to perform as Anna's
dupe. Certainly he never comes alive for the reader as
do the other characters of the novels. Thus, in both the
Italian novels, Meredith's purposes may be seen to delight
and to instruct through the exposure of the folly of
^Kenneth Burke, Language as Symbolic Action: Essays
on Life, Literature, and MethocT (Berkeley and Los Angeles:
University of California Press, 1966), p. 225.
inharmonious thought and action, and so to lead men to
a better life. His uses of the pictorial and the drama
tic narrative methods, of voice, and of language are
artistically integrated to achieve these purposes.
CONCLUSION
As both a thorough craftsman and a purposeful
communicator, Meredith informs the reader c " the ways in
which Sandra Belloni and Vittoria should be read (see
above, pages 376 to 379). Critical judgment of these
two works should, therefore, be based in conscious part
upon a reading in accord with the directions provided
by Meredith, who was "as much interested in aesthetics
as in other philosophical matters" (Stevenson, "The
Intellectual Novel," Pt. 2, p. 162). In creating the
microcosmic and the macrocosmic worlds of the two Italian
novels, which overlap "the empirical world but [are]
distinct in [their] self-coherent intelligibility"
(Wellek and Warren, p. 221), Meredith devises places from
which the reader should view his worlds. That is,
Meredith supplies the places and the attitudes for view
ing within the novel, from which the narrator and
characters present action and ideas; and, in addition, he
provides the places and the attitudes for viewing outside
the novels, from which the reader sees and responds.
These latter places are indisputably provided, although
the fact that Meredith is supplying them is transmitted
subtly.
479
For example, Meredith has his narrator refrain from
telling the reader to imagine the sounds and sights of
the opera, but instead causes the narrator to express a
strong desire for the reader to join him in a delightful
experience, in order to inspire the reader's greater
imaginative effort in response (see pages 70 and 71). In
yet other instances of directing the reader by subtle
means, the narrator addresses readers directly. However,
not always is the reader instigated to feel that he is
himself addressed; sometimes he is led to believe that he
is himself a spectator at a dialogue (imagining an anony
mous reader's responses from information that the narrator
presents). The reader is subtly led, then, into a feeling
of superiority, such as a feeling of superiority to the
poor fool who allows men to treat her as a vegetable (see
page 111) , or to the simpleton who takes the Poles for
desirable companions (see page 381). Meredith in this
way forms the reader's attitudes and notions, though not
so directly as the fact of the narrator's address to the
reader might suggest. The technique has the greater
power for its suggestiveness.
Meredith's own position, then, must be seen as an
uneven and also complicated mixture of the two opposed
artistic attitudes named by Collingwood. Although some
students believe that the two Italian novels reveal only
481
the "artist inclined to give himself airs" in approaching
his work as "a kind of transcendent genius whose meaning
is always too profound for his audience of humbler mortals
to grasp in more than fragmentary ways," more obviously
present is the artist who takes
. . . his audience's limitations into account when
composing his work; in which case they will appear
to him not as limitations . . . but as conditions
determining the subject-matter or meaning of the
work itself. (Collingwood, pp. 311-312)
A consultation of Meredith's letters reveals that he did
not, in writing his novels, consciously "give himself
airs"; rather he longed for an audience to understand,
appreciate, and buy his work.
The book [Emilia in England] is to be published at
my risk and for my profit. It will be out in a
fortnight. In a month from that date I can draw
something. . . . If this novel does not pay well,
I shall retrench rigidly, book my bills, deny
friends, and have no purse, and look above the head
of the crossing-sweeper. (Letters, I, 247)
Not consciously, then, but only subconsciously could
there have been any of the attitude that Meredith reflected
toward poetry:
As to the Poems: I don't think the age prosaic for
not buying them. A man who hopes to be popular,
must think from the mass, and as the heart of the
mass. If he follows out vagaries of his own brain,
he cannot hope for general esteem; and he does smaller
work. "Modern Love" as a dissection of the sentimental
passion of these days, could only be apprehended by
the few who would read it many times. I have not
looked for it to succeed. Why did I write it? — Who
can account for pressure? (p. 160)
Whereas Collingwood's definition of the "transcendent
482
genius" captures the sense of Meredith's statement about
his poetry, Meredith's words about his purposes for
writing his novel deny their application here. His desire
to appeal to the buying public, i.e., the "mass," pre
cludes his having considered
. . . himself as a mystagogue, leading his audience
as far as it can follow along the dark and difficult
path of his own mind . . .
as he did in his poetry writing, and, lather, supports
his thinking of
. . . himself as his audience's spokesman [at least
in some instances], saying for it the things it wants
to say, but cannot say unaided. (Collingwood, p. 312)
Meredith's identification with his reader was early
noted in such manifestations as the expression of a felt-
truth when the narrator estimates the mood of the audi
ence's anticipation of the appearance of a new diva
(see pages 65 and 66); as the assumption of the reader's .
desire to hear the beauty of the operatic score (see
page 71); as the intimate knowledge of the reader's
attitudes toward the Philosopher's "interruptions" (see
pages 42 to 46); and as the certainty that the reader
would enjoy, along with the narrator, such comic pictures
as that of the Poles at home:
Mr. Pole had received a curious short epistle from
Mrs. Chump, informing him of the atrocious treatment
she had met with at the hands of his daughter; and
instead of reviewing the orthography, incoherence,
and deliberate vulgarity of the said piece of writing
with the contempt it deserved, he had taken the
483
unwonted course of telling Arabella that she had
done a thing she must necessarily repent of, or
in any case make apology for. An Eastern Queen,
thus addressed by her Minister of the treasury,
could not have felt greater indignation. (Sandra
Belloni, I, 57)
Meredith constructs his world of English county life
and his world of European national life to effect a
harmonious integration of form and content in order to
teach about the harmony of life itself. The form of the
novels thus strengthens the impact of their message, so
that the novels exemplify the harmony which Meredith
wishes to influence his reader to attain. Moreover,
Meredith's providing of definite and specific places for
views and attitudes through narrative method, voicing,
and language reveals his artistic ideals of harmony and
good proportion (see pages 206 to 208). In the Italian
novels Meredith presents these ideals as issuing from
nature— nature (or Nature) which acts as the model both
for a good life and for an ideal art, and also performs
as the source for harmony and for good proportion (see
"The Woods of Westermain"). Thus, Emilia-Vittoria
naturally and unconsciously uses nature as the model for
her life and for her art; at the same time, Emilia-
Vittoria 1 s closeness to nature identifies it as the
source for the harmony of the "blood and brain and spirit"
of her being, as a woman and also as an artist. The scene
in which Emilia protests the elimination of the daisy from
484
the lawn represents symbolically nature's importance for
her as both model and inspiration (see pages 203 and 204).
Living in harmony with Earth, man can achieve happiness;
for harmonious relationships with nature evolve into
harmonious relationships within oneself and also within
human society:
I hold that to be rightly materialist— to understand
and take Nature as she is— is to get on the true
divine highroad. That we should attain to a healthy
humanity, is surely the most pleasing thing in God's
sight. (Letters, I, 247)
The skill with which Meredith interrelates the plots
and the sub-plots of the novels has already been pointed
out. This skillful combining of the social and the
political considerations, of the patterns of love between
individual men and women and among the family, and of the
artistic matters over the course of the two novels,
results in their forming together a coherent and a com
prehensive communication. The social and the political
matters relate to and affect each other (e.g., the issues
of authority and leadership and of the stealing from
others their rights of self-determination). Then, allied
to these issues are the matters of love and of the
family, which, moreover, are connected with each other
(e.g., the questions of honesty and of passion, as
opposed to the problems of sentimentalism). Related,
again, to all the above, especially since it inspires
485
harmony and illuminates wisdom and goodness, is art.
Finally, overriding all these and still allied, of
course, is the philosophical matter of causes, i.e., of
what makes man do that which he does. The novels'
answer, which is also that of Meredith's poetry, is not
a religious one, but rather a humanitarian one (as in
dicated in Chapter II), which finds its origins in
nature. The harmony of the "orbed" self, found in this
identification with and imitation of nature, creates a
harmony of life that can, nonetheless, be disturbed by
discordant personalities. The promise that the novels
demonstrate is a progression from a harmonious individual,
to a harmonious home, to a harmonious society, and,
finally, to a harmonious world, as people assume their
proper relationships with Earth and thus with their
fellowmen.
The examination of Meredith's notions concerning art
and its principles as presented in the two Italian novels
reveals the same conviction that art, too, must serve man.
The novels support a position strongly hostile to that
described as "art for art's sake." Moreover, Meredith
designed that the novels themselves as an art form should
exemplify his lesson and, hence, serve his serious
rhetorical purposes for the good of the species.
The intricacy of execution built upon the simplicity
486
of conception of the two Italian novels demonstrates the
high attainment of Meredith's craft, which makes all the
more understandable his influence upon such men as
Stevenson, Hardy, and James. The skill with which
Meredith employs the pictorial and the narrative methods,
the "voices" of the novels, and the language to convey
and to engender points of view--this skill of his is
testimony against the accusations of ineptitude, of
obscurity, and of inadvertency of method that appear
in some of the criticism of Meredith's Italian novels.
For a demonstration that in all facets of life,
both personal and public, good proportion and harmony
must reign for a balanced nature, Meredith uses Emilia-
Vittoria, as the heroine, to exemplify especially the
ideal. To a lesser degree, the Chief and Carlo act as
models. The Chief is not fully developed in Vittoria as
a character and so is not fully known to the reader.
However, the brief descriptions of him indicate his
resemblance to Emilia-Vittoria (see page 280). Carlo's
character, on the other hand, is well developed in
Vittoria (the reader's memory disclosing that his
character was even implicit in Sandra Belloni as contrast
to, and fulfilled promise of, Wilfrid's character) and
becomes known as well-suited to that of the heroine,
Vittoria. The other characters of both novels teach
487
through their flawed natures, which prevent, to varying
degress, their having "blood and brain and spirit" joined
in a harmonious whole as Emilia-Vittoria, the Chief, and
Carlo have.
In the two Italian novels, then, Meredith provides not
only for the reader's "subjective" pleasure, but also for
his "objective" appreciation.^- Delacroix defines the
subjective experience as that
. . . pleasure of the novel, [which,] nearly always,
is to communicate to us [an] imaginary life, to put
us in the place of the hero, to give us the illusion
of living an adventure. (p. 282)
The objective pleasure is that which is involved with
"objects, their relationships, and action . . . in them
selves" (p. 283).
Implicit in Delacroix's theory concerning the subjec
tive pleasure with art is the notion that the reader's
pleasure precedes the reader's learning because, unless
the reader is pleased, he is not drawn to accept instruc
tion from the writer. Meredith shows repeatedly in his
published writings that he wishes the reader to be in
structed. The fact that Meredith admired Carlyle and Mill
(Letters, I, 408) is indication of the strength of his
concern for giving moral teaching to help the reader
through pleasure to hold appropriate attitudes toward
what he is reading. Carlyle had criticized Sir Walter
iHenri Delacroix, "Varieties of Aesthetic Experience,"
trans. Joan Krieger, The Problems of Aesthetics: A Book
of Readings, ed. Eliseo Vivas and Murray Krieger (NewYork:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966), pp. 282-283.
I
488
Scott for not having served seriously a cause for
education.^ And, in his Autobiography, John Stuart Mill,
unhappy about the sad effects of his father's educational
plan, which was dedicated solely to development of the
intellect, had advised the reading of poetry for delight,
especially, Wordsworth's.
Tolstoy's expression of the nineteenth-century
notion of the moral responsibility of the artist is also
well-suited to Meredith's artistic manner. Tolstoy noted
that the "one indubitable sign distinguishing real art
from its counterfeit" is its "infectiousness." By
"infectiousness," Tolstoy meant the evocation of
That feeling . . . of joy and of spiritual union
with another (the author) and with others (those
who are also infected by it).4
Moreover, art fostered
. . . the evolution of feeling . . . feelings less
kind and less necessary for the well-being of man
kind being replaced by others kinder and more needful
for that end. (p. 462)
Whereas Tolstoy was arguing for Christian art, his views
^Thomas Carlyle,"Sir Walter Scott," Scottish and
Other Miscellanies, ed. James Russell Lowell (New York:
E. P. Dutton & Co., 1950), p. 101.
3(New York: Columbia University Press, 1960),
pp. 104-105.
^Leo Tolstoy, "What Is Art?" trans. Aylmer Maude, in
Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Criticism, ed. Marvin
Levich (NewYork: Random House, 1963), pp. 459-460.
489
are essentially those, with the obvious modifications,
expressed by Meredith in his letters and implied in the
Italian novels.
Richards terms the result of any reading experience
C
a "mental event."
No one is ever quite the same again after any
experience; his possibilities have altered in some
degree. And among all the aspects by which a
widening of the sphere of human sensibilities may
be brought about, the arts are the most powerful,
since it is through them that men may most co
operate in these experiences that the mind most
easily and with least interference organizes itself.
(pp. 132-133)
Meredith organized his thought and his gifts of fiction-
writing toward the education of his fellows for the
betterment of the "species." In his task, he addresses
himself both to the "little people" who must be taught
"that they are little people" and ose who, like the
Philosopher, demand "the cane" along with "the sugar"
of the novels. An effort to gauge the degree to which
Meredith achieved his moral goal might resolve itself
into a series of questions: Would any of the young who
lead wasteful and/or self-deceptive lives be moved to
become any more active on behalf of their fellowmen?
Would any who have listened to the "piping" of their
own "feeding devils" be alerted to its dangers and so
^1. A. Richards, Principles of Literary Criticism
(New York; Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1925), p. 81.
490
forewarned against its temptations? Would any "lady"
or "man" readers who are cautioned against the dangers
of insincerity toward those of the other sex be reformed
in their attitudes? Would any who attempt to isolate
art from the good of society be made aware of the unhappy
effect of this unnatural stifling of art'? and, finally,
Would some be inspired by the examples of Emilia-Vittoria,
the Chief, and Carlo to move closer to nature, and, hence,
to cultivate the harmony of their own lives and, in
consequence, the harmony of others?
An answer of "Yes" to any of these questions would
indicate Meredith's mastery of rhetoric as "the creator
/T
of persuasion," and, thus, would indicate his effecting
a notable "mental event" on the part of the reader. The
result of this event is that progress, or "moving forward,"
which Meredith tried to achieve by his creation and
manipulation of the points of view in these two novels.
Thus, Meredith's achievement includes the providing of
Delacroix's "subjective" and "objective" pleasure to the
reader of the two Italian novels and, through this pleas
ure, certain mental instruction; the reader's pleasure is
caused in part by Meredith's effective inculcation of
appropriate attitudes that help a reader to experience a
C .
Benedetto Croce, Aesthetic; As Science of Expres
sion and General Linguistic, trans. Douglas Ainslie, "rev.
ecL (New York: The Noonday Press, 1966), p. 423.
"mental event" (in Richards' terminology). Sandra
Belloni and Vittoria, then,constitute a success that
deserves to be called artistic with the most careful
meaning given to the term "artistic."
LIST OF WORKS CONSULTED
4 9 2
LIST OF WORKS CONSULTED
Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms. 3rd ed.
New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1971.
_____________. The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory
and the Critical Tradition. New York: W. W. Norton &
Company, Inc., 1958.
Alexander, S. "The Creative Process in the Artist's
Mind." In The Problems of Aesthetics: A Book of
Readings, ed. Eliseo Vivas and Murray Krieger. New
York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1966.
Allen, Walter. The English Novel: A Short Critical
History. New York: E. P. Dutton and Co., Inc., 1954.
Allott, Miriam. Novelists on the Novel. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1959.
Altick, Richard D. The English Common Reader: A Social
History of the Mass Reading Public (1800-1900).
Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957.
Ames, Van Meeter. Aesthetics of the Novel. New York:
Gordian Press, line. , 19 66 (first published 1928).
Bailey, Elmer James. The Novels of George Meredith: A
Study. New York: Haskell House Publishers, Ltd.,
1971 (first published 1908).
Bailey, F. E. Six Great Victorian Novelists. London:
MacDonald & Co., Ltd., 1947.
Baker, Ernest. History of the English Novel, Vol. X. New
York: Barnes and Noble, 1957.
Bartlett, Phyllis. George Meredith. Writers and Their
Works, No. 161. London: Longmans, Green and Company,
1963 .
Bateson, F. W. A Guide to English Literature. 2nd ed.
New York: Anchor Books, 196 8.
Beach, Joseph Warren. The Comic Spirit in George Mere
dith: An Interpretation. New York: Russell and
Russell, Inc., 1963.
493
494
Beach, Joseph Warren. The Twentieth Century Novel:
Studies in Technique. New York: The Century Co.,
1932.
Benn, Alfred William. The History of English Rationalism
in the Nineteenth Century. 2 vols. New York: Russell
and Russell, Inc., 1962.
Bentley, Phyllis. Some Observations on the Art of
Narrative. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1948.
Bloom, Harold. The Visionary Company. Garden City, N.Y.:
Doubleday, 19 61.
Booth, Wayne C. "Distance and Point of View: An Essay
in Classification." In The Theory of the Novel, ed.
Philip Stevick. New York: The Free Press, 1967.
_______________ . The Rhetoric of Fiction. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1961.
Bowen, Elizabeth. Collected Impressions. New York:
Longmans, Green and Co., 1950.
Brooks, Cleanth, and Robert Penn Warren. Understanding
Fiction. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc.,
1959.
Brown, E. K. Rhythm in the Novel. Toronto, Canada:
University of Toronto Press, 1950.
Browning, Robert. The Poems and Plays. New York: The
Modern Library, 1934.
Buckley, Jerome Hamilton. The Victorian Temper: A Study
in Literary Culture. New York: Vantage Books, 1951.
Bullough, Edward. "Psychical Distance as a Factor in Art
and an Aesthetic Principle." In The Problems of
Aesthetics: A Book of Readings, ed. Eliseo Vivas and
Murray Krieger. New York: Holt, Rinehart and
Winston, 196 6.
Burke, Kenneth. A Grammar of Motives. New York: Prentice-
Hall, Inc., 1954.
_______________ . Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on
Life, Literature, and Method. Los Angeles: Univer
sity 'of California Press, 196 6.
495
Burke, Kenneth. "Literature as Equipment of Living." In
Modern Criticism: Theory and Practice, ed. Walter
Sutton and Richard Foster. New York: The Odyssey
Press, Inc., 1963.
. A Rhetoric of Motives. New York:
Prentice-Hall” Inc"."', 19 " 5 ' 2 ' .
Butcher, Lady. Memories of George Meredith. London:
Constable and Co., Ltd., 1919,
Carlyle, Thomas. Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions
of Herr TeufelsdrQckh, ed. Charles Frederick Harrold.
New York: The Odyssey Press, 1937.
_________________. "Sir Walter Scott." In Scottish and
Other Miscellanies, ed. James Russell Lowell. New
York: E. P. Dutton and Co., 19 50.
Caudwell, Christopher. "Poetry's Dream-Work." In A
Modern Book of Aesthetics, ed. Melvin Rader. New
York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1961.
Chapman, Raymond. The Victorian Debate: English
Literature and Society (1832-1901)^ New York: Basic
Books, Inc., Publishers, 1968.
Chesterton, G. K. The Victorian Age in Literature. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1966 (first published
1913).
Chislett, William. George Meredith: A Study and an
Appraisal. New York: Haskell House, 1966 (first
published 1925).
Collingwood, R. G. The Principles of Art. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1964.
Conrow, Margaret E. M. "George Meredith: Romancer and
Artist." Unpublished dissertation. University of
Illinois, 1962.
Cooke, John D., and Lionel Stevenson. English Literature
of the Victorian Period. New York: Appleton-Century-
Crofts, Inc., 1949.
Croce, Benedetto. Aesthetics as Science of Expression
and General Linguistic, trans. Douglas Ainslie. New
York: The Noonday Press, 196 6.
496
Cruse, Amy. The Victorians and Their Reading. Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Co., 1935 (reissued 1962).
Curie, Richard H. P. Aspects of George Meredith. New
York: Phaeton Press, 197 0 (first published 1908).
Daiches, David. The Novel and the Modern World. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 19 60.
Delacroix, Henri. "Varieties of Aesthetic Experience,"
trans. Joan Krieger. In The Problems of Aesthetics:
A Book of Readings, ed. Eliseo Vivas and-Murray
Krieger. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
1966.
Drew, Elizabeth. The Novel: A Modern Guide to Fifteen
English Masterpieces. New York: W. W. Norton and
Company, Inc., 1963.
________________ . The Modern Novel: Some Aspects of
Contemporary Fiction. Port Washington, N.Y.:
Kennikat Press, Inc., 19 26.
Eliot, T. S. After Strange Gods. New York: Harcourt,
Brace and Company, 1934.
Ellis, S. M. George Meredith: His Life and Friends in
Relation to His WorkT 2nd ed. London: Grant
Richards, 1920.
Ernst, Earle. The Kabuki Theatre. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1956.
Fernandez, Ramon. Messages: Literary Essays, trans.
Montgomery Belgion. Port Washington, N.Y.: Kennikat
Press, 1964.
Forman, Maurice Buxton. George Meredith: Some Early
Appreciations. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
1909.
Forster, E. M. "Anonymity: An Inquiry." In The Atlantic
Monthly, CXXXVI (1925), 588-595.
______________. Aspects of the Novel. New York: Harcourt,
Brace and World, Inc., 1927.
Foster, David E. "The Narrative Voice in Three Novels of
George Meredith." Unpublished dissertation. Univer
sity of Wisconsin, 1969.
497
Fowler, H. R. "George Meredith: A Study of the Comic."
Unpublished dissertation. University of Michigan,
1969.
Frank, Joseph. "Spatial Form in Modern Literature." In
Criticism: The Foundations of Modern Literary
Judgment, ed. Mark Schorer and others. Rev. ed.
New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1958.
Friedman, Norman. "Point of View in Fiction: A Develop
ment of a Critical Concept." In Approaches to the
Novel: Materials for a Poetics, ecu Robert Scholes.
San Francisco: The Chandler Publishing Company, 1961.
Gardiner, Harold C. Norms of the Novel. Garden City,
N.Y.: Hanover House, 1959.
Goodman, Paul. The Structure of Literature. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, HTST!
Grabo, Carl H. The Technique of the Novel. New York:
Gordian Press^ Inc., 1964 (first published 1928).
Granville-Barker, Harley. "Tennyson, Swinburne, Meredith
— and the Theatre." In The Eighteen-Seventies:
Essays by Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature,
ed. Harley Granville-Barker. New York: The Macmillan
Company, 1929.
Gretton, Mary Sturge. The Writings and Life of George
Meredith. New York! Haskell House Publishers, Ltd.,
1970 (first published 1926).
Hamilton, Clayton. The Art of Fiction: A Formulation of
Its Fundamental Principles! New York: Doubleday,
Doran & Co., Inc., 1939.
Hammerton, J. A. George Meredith in Anecdote and Criti
cism. Edinburgh: Grant Richards, 1911.
Hergenan, L. T. "Meredith's Attempts to Win Popularity:
Contemporary Reactions." In Studies in English
Literature, IV (Autumn 1964) , 637-651.
Hofstadter, Albert, and Richard Kuhns, ed. Philosophies
of Art and Beauty. New York: The Modern Library,
1 9 6 4 .
Houghton, Walter E. The Victorian Frame of Mind (1830-
1870). New Haven! Yale University Press, 1957.
I
498
Howard, David. "George Meredith: 'Delicate1 and 'Epical'
Fiction." In Literature and Politics in the Nine
teenth Century: Essays, ed. John Lucas. London:
Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1971.
Howe, Susanne. Novels of Empire. New York: Columbia
University Press, 19 49.
Hume, David. Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L. A. Selby-
Bigge. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1960.
James, Henry. The Art of the Novel. New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1934.
Jung, Carl G. "On the Relation of Analytical Psychology
to Poetic Art," trans. H. G. and Carl F. Baynes. In
The Problems of Aesthetics: A Book of Readings, ed.
Eliseo Vivas and Murray Krieger. New York: Holt,
Rinehart and Winston, 1966.
Kausch, Donald E. "'Poor Troop of Actors to Vacant
Benches': Perspective in the Novels of George Mere
dith." Unpublished dissertation. Wayne State
University, 1964.
Keats, John. Letter to George and Thomas Keats. In
English Romantic Poetry and Prose, ed. Russell Noyes.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1956.
Kelley, Sister Mary Edith. The Irishman in the English
Novel of the Nineteenth Century. New York: Haskell
House Publishers, Ltd., 1939.
Kelvin, Norman. A Troubled Eden: Nature and Society in
the Works of George Meredith. Stanford, California:
Stanford University Press, 1961.
Kettle, Arnold. An Introduction to the English Novel:
Defoe to the Present. 2~vols"! New York: Perennial
Library, 1968.
Knight, G. Wilson. The Wheel of Fire. London: Methuen
& Co., Ltd., 193 0.
Lanier, Sydney. The English Novel and the Principle of
Its Development. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
1883.
Leavis, F. R. The Common Pursuit. New York: New York
University Press, 1964.
499
Leavis, F. R. The Great Tradition: George Eliot/ Henry
James, Joseph Conrad. London: Chatto & Wmdus, 194 8.
_________. Revaluation: Tradition and Development in
English Poetry. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., Inc.,
1947.
Leggett, H. W. The Ideas in Fiction. London: George
Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1934.
Lindsay, Jack. George Meredith: His Life and Work.
London: The Bodley Head, 1956.
Long, John McMillan. "The Authorial Rhetoric in Four
Novels of George Meredith." Unpublished dissertation.
University of North Carolina, 1967.
Lovett, Robert Morss, and Helen Sard Hughes. The History
of the Novel in England. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 19 3 2.
Lubbock, Percy. The Craft of Fiction. New York: The
Viking Press ,' "1957 (first published 1921) .
MacCarthy, Desmond. Portraits. London: Douglas Saunders
with MacGibbon & Kee, 1955.
MacLean, Kenneth. "Water Symbols in The Prelude." In
Toronto Quarterly, XVII (July 1948), 372-389.
Marshall, William H. The World of the Victorian Novel.
New York: A. S. Barnes & Company, 1967.
McHugh, Vincent. Primer of the Novel. New York: Random
House, 1950.
Meredith, George. "Correspondence from the Seat of War
in Italy." In his Works, XII. Memorial Ed. New York:
Charles Scribner's Sons, 1897.
_________ • "An Essay on Comedy . " In Comedy, ed .
Wylie Sypher. New York: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1956.
_________________ . The Letters, ed. C. L. Cline. 3 vols.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970.
_________________ . The Letters, ed. William Maxse Meredith.
2 vols. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1912.
_________________ . Miscellaneous Prose. In The Works of
George Meredith, XXXIV. London: Constable and Com-
pany, Ltd., 1910.
500
Meredith, George. The Ordeal of Richard Feverel: A
History of Father and Son. New York: The New Ameri
can Library, 1961.
_________________ . Poems. New York: Charles Scribner's
Sons, 1889.
Poems. In The Works of George_Meredith,
XXIX, XXX, XXXI. Westminster: Archibald Constable
and Co., 18 98.
_________________. Sandra Belloni. In The Works of George
Meredith', V and VI. Westminster: Archibald' Constable
and Co., 1897.
________________ . Vittoria. In The Works of George
Meredith, VII and VIII. Westminster: Archibald
Constable and Co., 1897.
Mill, John Stuart. Autobiography. New York: Columbia
University Press’ ^ 1960 (published from the original
manuscript in the Columbia University Library).
Miller, J. Hillis. The Form of Victorian Fiction:
Thackeray, Dickens, Trollope, George Eliot, Meredith,
arid Hardy. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of" Notre
Dame Press, 1968.
Morris, John W. "Thomas Carlyle's Influence on George
Meredith's Theory of Literature." Unpublished
dissertation. University of Tennessee, 1954.
Muir, Edwin. The Structure of the Novel. London: The
Hogarth Press, 1967.
Nemerov, Howard. Poetry and Fiction: Essays. New
Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1963.
Odell, James. An Essay on the Elements, Accents, and
Prosody of the English Language. Hildesheim and
New York: Georg 01ms Verlag, 1969 (first published
1806) .
Ong, Walter J. "Voice as Summons for Belief." In
Literature and Belief, ed. N. H. Abrams. New York:
Columbia University Press, 1958.
Peacock, Thomas Love. The Four Ages of Poetry. In
English Romantic Poetry and Prose, ed. Russell Noyes.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1956.
501
Peel, Robert. The Creed of a Victorian Pagan. Folcroft,
Pa.: The Folcroft Press, Inc., 1931, reprinted 1969.
Priestley, J. B. George Meredith. London: Macmillan &
Co., Ltd., 1926.
Pritchett, V. S. George Meredith and English Comedy.
New York: Random House, 1969.
________________ . The Living Novel and Later Appreciations.
New York: Random House, 196 4.
Richards, I. A. Principles of Literary Criticism. New
York: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc., 1925.
Rubin, Louis D., Jr. The Teller of the Tale. Seattle,
Wash.: University of Washington Press, 1967.
Sainte-Beuve, Charles Augustin. "What Is a Classic?"
In his Select Essays: Chiefly Bearing on English
Literature, trans. A. J. Butler. London: Edward
Arnold, n.d.
Saintsbury, George. The English Novel. London: J. M.
Dent & Sons, Ltd., 1913.
Sassoon, Seigfried. Meredith. Toronto, Canada: Longmans,
Green & Co., 1948.
Scholes, Robert. Elements of Fiction. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1968.
Schorer, Mark. "Technique as Discovery." In The Theory
of the Novel, ed. Philip Stevick. New York: The
Free Press, 1967.
Scott, A. C. The Kabuki Theatre of Japan. London:
George Allen & Unwin, Ltd., 1955.
Shelley, Percy Bysshe. "Mont Blanc." In English Romantic
Poetry and Prose, ed. Russell Noyes. New York:
Oxford University Press, 1956.
Sherman, Stuart P. On Contemporary Literature. New York:
Henry Holt & Co., 1917.
Sitwell, Sir Osbert. The Novels of George Meredith and
Some Notes on the English Novel. London: Oxford
University Press, 1947.
502
Stang, Richard. The Theory of the Novel in England (1850-
1870). New York: Columbia University Press, 1959.
Sterne, Laurence. The Life and Opinions of Tristram
Shandy, Gent. Garden City, N.Y.: Dolphin Books, n.d.
Stevenson, Lionel. The English Novel: A Panorama.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 196 0.
___________________ . "The Intellectual Novel in the
Nineteenth Century." In The Personalist, XXXI (Winter-
Spring 1950) , Pt. 1, 42-57 and' Pt. 2, 157-166.
___________________. The Ordeal of George Meredith: A
Biography. New York: Charles.Scribner 1s Sons, T953 .
Stewart, Donald C. "Dramatic Power and Technique in the
Novels of George Meredith." Unpublished dissertation.
University of Wisconsin, 1962.
Tillyard, E. M. W. The E^ic Strain in the English Novel.
London: Chatto and Wmdus, 195 8 .
Tolstoy, Leo. "What Is Art?" trans. Aylmer Maude. In
Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Criticism, ed. Marvin
Levich. New York: Random House, 19 63.
Trevelyan, G. M. The Poetry and Philosophy of George
Meredith. New York: Russell and Russell, 1966 (first
published 19 20) .
Van Ghent, Dorothy. The English Novel: Form and Function.
New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1953"
Wagenknecht, Edward. Cavalcade of the English Novel. New
York: Henry Holt and Company, 19 54.
Warren, Austin. "The Nature and Modes of Narrative Fic
tion." In Approaches to the Novel: Materials for a
Poetics, ed. Robert Scholes. San Francisco: chandler
Publishing Company, 1961.
Watson, Robert. "George Meredith's Sandra Belloni: The
'Philosopher' on the Sentimentalists." ELH, XXIV
(1957), 321-325.
Weatherly, Edward H., and others. The Heritage of Euro
pean Literature. Boston: Ginn and Company, 19 48.
503
Weitz, Morris. "The Role of Theory in Aesthetics." In
A Modern Book of Aesthetics, ed. Melvin Rader. New
York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1961.
Wellek, Rene, and Austin Warren. Theory of Literature.
New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1949.
West, Ray B., Jr. The Art of Writing Fiction. New York:
Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1968.
West, Ray B., Jr., and Robert W. Stallman. The Art of
Modern Fiction. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston,
1960.
Williams, Bernice A. W. "The Self-Education of George
Meredith, Philosopher and Poet." Unpublished disser
tation. City University of New York, 1969.
Williams, loan. Meredith: A Critical Heritage. New
York: Barnes and Noble, Inc., 1971.
Woolf, Virginia. Collected Essays. 2 vols. London: The
Hogarth Press,
Wright, Walter F. Art and Substance in George Meredith:
A Study in Narrative. Lincoln, Nebr. : U'niversi'ty
of Nebraska Press, 1953.
Writers at Work: The Paris Interviews. 3rd Series.
Introduction by Alfred Kazin. New York: The Viking
Press, 1967.
Zabel, Morton D. Craft and Character: Texts, Method, and
Vocation in Modern Fiction- ! New York: The Viking
Press, 1957.

Linked assets

University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Conceptually similar

PDF

An Index And Encyclopedia Of The Characters In The Fictional Works Of William Faulkner

PDF

A Study Of Images In The Poetry Of Jonathan Swift

PDF

An Analysis Of Selected British Novelists Between 1945 And 1966, And Their Critics

PDF

Theory And Practice In The Black Mountain Poets: Duncan, Olson, And Creeley

PDF

The Development Of Method And Meaning In The Fiction Of 'Saki' (H. H. Munro)

PDF

The Concept Of The 'Mystical Body Of Christ' In Selected Poems By Gerard Manley Hopkins

PDF

Imagination And Reality In Wallace Stevens' Prose And Early Poetry

PDF

Moral Ambiguity In John Updike'S Short Stories

PDF

Some Social Factors Affecting The Power Structure And Status Of A Professional Association In Reference To Social Work

PDF

Cleanth Brooks And The Formalist Approach To Metaphysical And Moral Values In Literature

PDF

Characterization In The Novels Of Samuel Butler (1835-1902)

PDF

Variant Forms Of English And Scottish Popular Ballads In America

PDF

An Analysis Of Selected Presage Criteria Of Reciprocal Student And Teacher Ratings In Beginning College Speech Classes

PDF

The Feminine World View Of Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

PDF

Studies In The Influence Of The 'Commedia Dell'Arte' On English Drama: 1605-1800

PDF

A Study Of The Origin, Content, And Literary Significance Of The 'Eloges Academiques' Of Jean Le Rond D'Alembert

PDF

Symbolism And The Rhetoric Of Fiction In Hemingway'S Novels

PDF

Kingsley Amis: Writer As Moralist

PDF

The Significance Of George Meredith'S Revisions Of 'The Ordeal Of Richardfeverel'

PDF

The Concept Of The Ideal Prince In The Literature Of The French Enlightment (1700-1780)

Asset Metadata

Creator King, Mary Joyce Geiser (author)

Core Title Meredith'S Uses Of Points Of View In "Sandra Belloni" And "Vittoria" (Hisitalian Novels)

Degree Doctor of Philosophy

Degree Program English

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag literature, English,Literature, Modern,OAI-PMH Harvest

Language English

Contributor Digitized by ProQuest (provenance)

Advisor Templeman, William D. (committee chair), Blake, Robert M. (committee member), Moore, Stephen C. (committee member)

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c18-766424

Unique identifier UC11363214

Identifier 7300743.pdf (filename),usctheses-c18-766424 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier 7300743

Dmrecord 766424

Document Type Dissertation

Rights King, Mary Joyce Geiser

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the au...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus, Los Angeles, California 90089, USA