Novel
The Last Days of Pompeii
Edward Bulwer-Lytton · 1834
Opening lines
'HO, Diomed, well met! Do you sup with Glaucus to-night?' said a young man of small stature, who wore his tunic in those loose and effeminate folds which proved him to be a gentleman and a coxcomb.
Text quoted from gutenberg.org
Synopsis
Pompeii, in the year 79. Glaucus, a rich and carefree young Athenian, loves Ione, a Greek from Naples whose guardian, the Egyptian Arbaces, priest of Isis and magician, wants to make her his wife. Nydia, a blind slave who sells flowers, whom Glaucus has bought free from masters who beat her, loves him in silence. Julia, daughter of a rich Pompeian, also in love with Glaucus, obtains a philtre through Arbaces; Nydia steals it from her. Apaecides, Ione's brother, who has gone over to the Christians, is about to expose the frauds of the temple of Isis.
Context
The book was written after a visit to the excavations at the end of 1833, and in front of a large canvas by the Russian painter Karl Bryullov showing the eruption, seen in Milan. The novel appeared in 1834, without a name on the title page, signed only as by the author of his earlier novels. An American sculpture by Randolph Rogers, in 1856, took as its subject the blind girl of the book. The novel fed a century of adaptations, in the theatre first, then in the cinema from 1900; two Italian films were made from it in 1913 alone.
Who it is for
Four hundred pages in English, translated into French since 1834. The style is ample and dated; one must accept the addresses to the reader and the tirades.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the most widely read historical novel of the nineteenth century, and a lasting source for theatre and cinema.
Sources for this page 9
The pages consulted to check this page.