The Spanish Gypsy: A Poem

by George Eliot

Michigan Historical Reprint SeriesThis volume is produced from digital images created through the University of Michigan University Library's preservation reformatting program.

Genres: Poetry

296 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Mary Ann Evans, known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wrote seven novels: Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Romola (1862–1863), Felix Holt, the Radical (1866), Middlemarch (1871–1872) and Daniel Deronda (1876). Like Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy, she emerged from provincial England; most of her works are set there. Her works are known for their realism, psychological insight, sense of place and detailed depiction of the countryside.
Middlemarch was described by the novelist Virginia Woolf as "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people" and by Martin Amis and Julian Barnes as the greatest novel in the English language.

Reviews

[faith adams-michaels · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another timeless George Eliot tale, this time with gypsies instead of Jews. A hundred years ahead of her time, as per usual, as she questions where our loyalties lie when it really comes down to it, and what does it mean to choose your origins over love, wealth, and power, when the people providing those things condescend upon the sunward souls from which you were born. Nothing like the pain stemming from wars that were caused by brutal ethnic stereotyping and totally unnecessary hatred. She almost makes you forget she's English. Almost.

[Dr.J.G. · Rating 3 out of 5]

................................................................................................
................................................................................................
The Spanish Gypsy,
by George Eliot.
................................................................................................
................................................................................................


In a page or two, one gets a clue; George Eliot sets out to write about a time of great upheavals in life of Europe and of Spain. She begins by painting beautiful portrayal of Spain, and of the struggle between two religions, before she mentions Columbus. Is that what it's about? Doesn't explain the title though. It takes a while, some dozen or so pages, before one begins to guess - when a soldier reports that it isn't his opinion that the duke is marrying beneath him, it's the padre who says she won't confess - it is about inquisition, and a young bride caught between her heritage and the force of church, apart from racism.

The epic is divided in five books, and the story, the tragedy is not only budding, it's already set, unfolding, by the end of book I.

Book I is the beautiful introduction- of the story, and before that, of the time and space throat the story is set in; it takes us through the characters, main or others, and having established a love story, reveals a secret, and leaves us at a turn at once filled with suspense, sadness, and also relief. Book II takes it from there, a prior intent on breaking up a marriage and burning the bride alive, if she's found; a bridegroom aware of this, yet intent on defying the prior, finding and marrying her, although subconsciously fearing if the friar is right.

Book III is, in more than one sense, heart of the story, with surprise twists; the scene of confrontation between the three representing different elements - proud Gypsy chieftain, Spanish nobility, and she who is young womanhood that's love, life and joy, but is asked to sacrifice for her people.

An interesting detail, is that a poem titled "Roses", included in the Delphi collection of complete works of George Eliot, is an excerpt from Book III.

Book IV brings, not scenes of battle, but aftermath thereof, grief.

Book V is farewell, almost silent - after words of repentance and forgiveness - that makes one wish the author hadn't ended it thus, that it was turned to an embrace of love and a new life. But the two represent their people, and the author is portraying history through them.
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
Book I.
Book II
Book III
Book IV
Book V
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
Book I
................................................................................................
................................................................................................


"’T is the warm South, where Europe spreads her lands
"Like fretted leaflets, breathing on the deep:
"Broad-breasted Spain, leaning with equal love
"(A calm earth-goddess crowned with corn and vines)
"On the Mid Sea that moans with memories
"And on the untravelled Ocean whose vast tides
"Pant dumbly passionate with dreams of youth
"This river, shadowed by the battlements
"And gleaming silvery towards the northern sky,
"Feeds the famed stream that waters
"Andalus And loiters, amorous of the fragrant air,
"By Córdova and Seville to the bay
"Fronting Algarva and the wandering flood
"Of Guadiana. This deep mountain gorge
"Slopes widening on the olive-plumed plains
"Of fair Granáda: one far-stretching arm
"Points to Elvira, one to eastward heights
"Of Alpujarras where the new-bathed Day
"With oriflamme uplifted o’er the peaks
"Saddens the breasts of northward-looking snows
"That loved the night, and soared with soaring stars;
"Flashing the signals of his nearing swiftness
"From Almeria’s purple-shadowed bay
"On to the far-off rooks that gaze and glow—
"On to Alhambra, strong and ruddy heart
"Of glorious Morisma, gasping now,
"A maimed giant in his agony.
"This town that dips its feet within the stream,
"And seems to sit a tower-crowned Cybele,
"Spreading her ample robe adown the rocks.
"Is rich Bedmár: ’t was Moorish long ago,
"But now the Cross is sparkling on the Mosque,
"And bells make Catholic the trembling air.
"The fortress gleams in Spanish sunshine now
"(’T is south a mile before the rays are Moorish),—
"Hereditary jewel, agraffe bright
"On all the many-titled privilege
"Of young Duke Silva. No Castilian knight
"That serves Queen Isabel has higher charge;
"For near this frontier sits the Moorish king,
"Not Boabdil the waverer, who usurps
"A throne he trembles in, and fawning licks
"The feet of conquerors, but that fierce lion
"Grisly El Zagal, who has made his lair
"In Guadix’ fort, and rushing thence with strength,
"Half his own fierceness, half the untainted heart
"Of mountain bands that fight for holiday,
"Wastes the fair lands that lie by Alcala,
"Wreathing his horse’s neck with Christian heads."
................................................................................................


"To keep the Christian frontier—such high trust
"Is young Duke Silva’s; and the time is great.
"(What times are little? To the sentinel
"That hour is regal when he mounts on guard)
"The fifteenth century since the Man Divine
"Taught and was hated in Capernaum
"Is near its end—is falling as a husk
"Away from all the fruit its years have ripened.
"The Moslem faith, now flickering like a torch
"In a night struggle on this shore of Spain,
"Glares, a broad column of advancing flame,
"Along the Danube and the Illyrian shore
"Far into Italy, where eager monks,
"Who watch in dreams and dream the while they watch,
"See Christ grow paler in the baleful light,
"Crying again the cry of the forsaken.
"But faith, the stronger for extremity,
"Becomes prophetic, hears the far-off tread
"Of western chivalry, sees downward sweep
"The archangel Michael with the gleaming sword,
"And listens for the shriek of hurrying fiends
"Chased from their revels in God’s sanctuary.
"So trusts the monk, and lifts appealing eyes
"To the high dome, the Church’s firmament,
"Where the blue light-pierced curtain, rolled away,
"Reveals the throne and Him who sits thereon.
"So trust the men whose best hope for the world
"Is ever that, the world is near its end:
"Impatient of the stars that keep their course
"And make ho pathway for the coming Judge."
................................................................................................


"But other futures stir the world’s great heart
"Europe is come to her majority,
"And enters on the vast inheritance
"Won from the tombs of mighty ancestors,
"The seeds, the gold, the gems, the silent harps
"That lay deep buried with the memories
"Of old renown. No more, as once in sunny Avignon,
"The poet-scholar spreads the Homeric page,
"And gazes sadly, like the deaf at song;
"For now the old epic voices ring again
"And vibrate with the beat and melody
"Stirred by the warmth of old Ionian days.
"The martyred sage, the Attic orator,
"Immortally incarnate, like the gods,
"In spiritual bodies, winged words
"Holding a universe impalpable,
"Find a new audience. Forevermore,
"With gander resurrection than was feigned

Gander seems like a mistake; didn't she mean grander?

Now, is this racist?

"Of Attila’s fierce Huns, the soul of Greece
"Conquers the bulk of Persia.

So it's soul of Greece vs bulk of Persia? George Eliot couldn't imagine Persia had a civilisation, a spirit, a soul?

Moreover, she's talking about Islamic forces at war against those of europe; but then, it's Arabic, not Persian! For Persian civilisation and culture, population and language suffered atrocious onslaught from Islamic invasion from Arabs, who massacred people and burnt hundreds of thousands of manuscripts; Persian script was lost and population illiterate in a century.

Which is why India is hated by them - butchering went on for over a millennium, and yet, India's civilisation lives, unlike Persia and Egypt and other lands that were completely converted within a century.

"The maimed form
"Of calmly joyous beauty, marble-limbed,
"Yet breathing with the thought that shaped its lips,
"Looks mild reproach from out its open grave
"At creeds of terror; and the vine-wreathed god
"Fronts the pierced Image with the crown of thorns.
"The soul of man is widening towards the past:
"No longer hanging at the breast of life
"Feeding in blindness to bin parentage,—
"Quenching all wonder with Omnipotence,
"Praising a name with indolent piety—
"He spells the record of his long descent,
"More largely conscious of the life that was."
................................................................................................


"And from the height that shows where morning shone
"On far-off summits pale and gloomy now,
"The horizon widens round him, and the west
"Looks vast with untracked waves whereon his gaze
"Follows the flight of the swift-vanished bird
"That like the sunken sun is mirrored still
"Upon the yearning soul within the eye."
................................................................................................


"And so in Córdova through patient nights
"Columbus watches, or he sails in dreams
"Between the setting stars and finds new day;
"Then wakes again to the old weary days,
"Girds on the cord and frock of pale Saint Francis,
"And like him zealous pleads with foolish men.
"“I ask but for a million maravedis:
"Give me three caravels to find a world."

George Eliot here speaks of Columbus asking to win more worlds for the cross. Were they then unaware about his Jewish roots, and his attempting to find India so as to help several hundred Jews to escape the persecution thereby?

India was, has always been, a refuge from religious persecution that various people experienced elsewhere, with freedom of thought and freedom of worship, and more; until Israel came into being again in 1948, Jews of India, who had been in India for centuries, had had no reason to leave, and many made the choice even then to stay. One of the first acts of the Knesset of Israel was to pass an official resolution thanking India.
................................................................................................


"The sacred places shall be purged again,
"The Turk converted, and the Holy Church,
"Like the mild Virgin with the outspread robe,
"Shall fold all tongues and nations lovingly
"But since God works by armies, who shall be
"The modern Cyrus?"

No purge as such, nor conversion of Turk took place, but Turkey did get carved. George Eliot, however, doesn't see the contradictions there, or did she? When she says "Like the mild Virgin with the outspread robe, Shall fold all tongues and nations lovingly, But since God works by armies" - is she being devout and matter-of-fact, in the way church adherents do when dealing with colonial imperialism or slavery? Or had she discovered her son of God was, in fact, a warrior for freedom of Jews, against Romans?
................................................................................................


"The silver cross Glitters o’er Malaga and streams dread light
"On Moslem galleys, turning all their stores
"From threats to gifts. What Spanish knight is he
"Who, living now, holds it not shame to live
"Apart from that hereditary battle
"Which needs his sword? Castilian gentlemen
"Choose not their task—they choose to do it well."

It's rare indeed for adherents of church to admit openly that the cross is intended as a threat!
................................................................................................


"See now with soldiers in his front and rear
"He winds at evening through the narrow streets
"That toward the Castle gate climb devious:
"His charger, of fine Andalusian stock,
"An Indian beauty black but delicate,
"Is conscious of the herald trumpet note,
"The gathering glances, and familiar ways
"That lead fast homeward: she forgets fatigue,
"And at the light touch of the master’s spur
"Thrills with the zeal to bear him royally,
"Arches her neck and clambers up the stones
"As if disdainful of the difficult steep.
"Night-black the charger, black the rider’s plume,
"But all between is bright with morning hues—
"Seems ivory and gold and deep blue gems,
"And starry flashing steel and pale vermilion,
"All set in jasper: on his surcoat white
"Glitter the sword-belt and the jewelled hilt,
"Red on the back and breast the holy cross,
"And ’twixt the helmet and the soft-spun white
"Thick tawny wavelets like the lion’s mane
"Turn backward from his brow, pale, wide, erect.
"Shadowing blue eyes,—blue as the rain-washed sky
"That braced the early stem of Gothic kings
"He claims for ancestry. A goodly knight,
"A noble caballero, broad of chest
"And long of limb. So much the August sun,
"Now in the west but shooting half its beams
"Past a dark rocky profile toward thy plain,
"At winding opportunities across the slope
"Makes suddenly luminous for all who see:
"For women smiling from the terraced roofs;
"For boys that prone on trucks with head up-propped,
"Lazy and curious, stare irreverent;
For men who make obeisance with degrees
"Of good-will shading towards servility,
Where good-will ends and secret fear begins
"And curses, too, low-muttered through the teeth,
"Explanatory to the God of Shem.
"Five, grouped within a whitened tavern court
"Of Moorish fashion, where the trellised vines
"Purpling above their heads make odorous shade,
"Note through the open door the passers-by,
"Getting some rills of novelty to speed
"The lagging stream of talk and help the wine.
"’T is Christian to drink wine: whoso denies
"His flesh at bidding save of Holy Church,
"Let him beware and take to Christian sins
"Lest he be taxed with Moslem sanctity."

Was it as simple? "’T is Christian to drink wine: whoso denies His flesh at bidding save of Holy Church, Let him beware and take to Christian sins Lest he be taxed with Moslem sanctity."?
................................................................................................


Author describes five men at the tavern, whose conversation carries the tale forward. George Eliot is really good here in that she's writing this epic as play in verse, but the conversation is natural, not stilted, and for this to be achieved when it's not conversation between learned poets, just ordinary men, is no mean feat.


"Like Juan there, the spare man with the lute,
"Who makes you dizzy with his rapid tongue,
"Whirring athwart your mind with comment swift
"On speech you would have finished by and by,
"Shooting your bird for you while you are loading,
"Cheapening your wisdom as a pattern known
"And spun by any shuttle on demand."

"Most like the Fauns that roamed in days of old
"About the listening whispering woods, and shared
"The subtler sense of sylvan ears and eyes
"Undulled by scheming thought, yet joined the rout
"Of men and women on the festal days,
"And played the syrinx too, and knew love’s pains,
"Turning their anguish into melody.
"For Juan was a minstrel still, in times
"When minstrelsy was held a thing outworn.
"Spirits seem buried and their epitaph
"Is writ in Latin by severest pens,
"Yet still they flit above the trodden grave
"And find new bodies, animating them
"In quaint and ghostly way with antique souls.
"So Juan was a troubadour revived,
"Freshening life’s dusty road with babbling rills
"Of wit and song, living ’mid harnessed men
"With limbs ungalled by armour, ready so
"To soothe them weary, and to cheer them sad.
"Guest at the board, companion in the camp,
"A crystal mirror to the life around,
"Flashing the comment keen of simple fact
"Defined in words; lending brief lyric voice
"To grief and sadness; hardly taking note
"Of difference betwixt his own and others’;
"But rather singing as a listener
"To the deep moans, the cries, the wild strong joys
"Of universal Nature, old yet young.
"Such Juan, the third talker, shimmering bright
"As butterfly or bird with quickest life."
................................................................................................


"Host.

"Best treat your wasp with delicate regard;
"When the right moment comes say, “By your leave,’
"Use your heel—so! and make an end of him.
"That’s if we talked of wasps; but our young Duke,—
"Spain holds not a more gallant gentleman.
"Live, live, Duke Silva! ’T is a rare smile he has,
"But seldom seen.

"Juan.

"A true hidalgo’s smile,
"That gives much favor, but beseeches none.
"His smile is sweetened by his gravity:
"It comes like dawn upon Sierra snows,
"Seeming more generous for the coldness gone;
"Breaks from the calm—a sudden opening flower
"On dark deep waters: one moment shrouded close,
"A mystic shrine, the next a full-rayed star,
"Thrilling, pulse-quickening as a living word.
"I’ll make a song of that. Host. Prithee, not now.
"You’ll fall to staring like a wooden saint,
"And wag your head as it were set on wires.
"Here’s fresh sherbet Sit, be good company.
"(To Blasco) You are a stranger, sir, and cannot know
"How our Duke’s nature suits his princely frame.

"Blasco.

"Nay, but I marked his spurs—chased cunningly!
"A duke should know good gold and silver plate;
"Then he will know the quality of mine.
"I’ve ware for tables and for altars too,
"Our Lady in all sizes, crosses, bells:
"He’ll need such weapons full as much as swords
"If he would capture any Moorish town.
"For, let me tell you, when a mosque is cleansed . . .

"Juan.

"The demons fly so thick from sound of bells
"And smell of incense, you may see the air
"Streaked as with smoke. Why, they are spirits:
"You may well think how crowded they must be
"To make a sort of haze."

"Blasco.

"I knew not that.
"Still, they’re of smoky nature, demons are;
"And since you say so—well, it proves the more
"The need of bells and censers. Ay, your Duke
"Sat well: a true hidalgo. I can judge—
"Of harness specially. I saw the camp,
"The royal camp at Velez Malaga.
"’T was like the court of heaven,—such liveries!
"And torches carried by the score at night
"Before the nobles. Sirs, I made a dish
"To set an emerald in would fit a crown,
"For ....

[Dr.J.G. · Rating 3 out of 5]

................................................................................................
................................................................................................
The Spanish Gypsy,
by George Eliot.
................................................................................................
................................................................................................


In a page or two, one gets a clue; George Eliot sets out to write about a time of great upheavals in life of Europe and of Spain. She begins by painting beautiful portrayal of Spain, and of the struggle between two religions, before she mentions Columbus. Is that what it's about? Doesn't explain the title though. It takes a while, some dozen or so pages, before one begins to guess - when a soldier reports that it isn't his opinion that the duke is marrying beneath him, it's the padre who says she won't confess - it is about inquisition, and a young bride caught between her heritage and the force of church, apart from racism.

The epic is divided in five books, and the story, the tragedy is not only budding, it's already set, unfolding, by the end of book I.

Book I is the beautiful introduction- of the story, and before that, of the time and space throat the story is set in; it takes us through the characters, main or others, and having established a love story, reveals a secret, and leaves us at a turn at once filled with suspense, sadness, and also relief. Book II takes it from there, a prior intent on breaking up a marriage and burning the bride alive, if she's found; a bridegroom aware of this, yet intent on defying the prior, finding and marrying her, although subconsciously fearing if the friar is right.

Book III is, in more than one sense, heart of the story, with surprise twists; the scene of confrontation between the three representing different elements - proud Gypsy chieftain, Spanish nobility, and she who is young womanhood that's love, life and joy, but is asked to sacrifice for her people.

An interesting detail, is that a poem titled "Roses", included in the Delphi collection of complete works of George Eliot, is an excerpt from Book III.

Book IV brings, not scenes of battle, but aftermath thereof, grief.

Book V is farewell, almost silent - after words of repentance and forgiveness - that makes one wish the author hadn't ended it thus, that it was turned to an embrace of love and a new life. But the two represent their people, and the author is portraying history through them.
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
Book I.
Book II
Book III
Book IV
Book V
................................................................................................
................................................................................................
Book I
................................................................................................
................................................................................................


"’T is the warm South, where Europe spreads her lands
"Like fretted leaflets, breathing on the deep:
"Broad-breasted Spain, leaning with equal love
"(A calm earth-goddess crowned with corn and vines)
"On the Mid Sea that moans with memories
"And on the untravelled Ocean whose vast tides
"Pant dumbly passionate with dreams of youth
"This river, shadowed by the battlements
"And gleaming silvery towards the northern sky,
"Feeds the famed stream that waters
"Andalus And loiters, amorous of the fragrant air,
"By Córdova and Seville to the bay
"Fronting Algarva and the wandering flood
"Of Guadiana. This deep mountain gorge
"Slopes widening on the olive-plumed plains
"Of fair Granáda: one far-stretching arm
"Points to Elvira, one to eastward heights
"Of Alpujarras where the new-bathed Day
"With oriflamme uplifted o’er the peaks
"Saddens the breasts of northward-looking snows
"That loved the night, and soared with soaring stars;
"Flashing the signals of his nearing swiftness
"From Almeria’s purple-shadowed bay
"On to the far-off rooks that gaze and glow—
"On to Alhambra, strong and ruddy heart
"Of glorious Morisma, gasping now,
"A maimed giant in his agony.
"This town that dips its feet within the stream,
"And seems to sit a tower-crowned Cybele,
"Spreading her ample robe adown the rocks.
"Is rich Bedmár: ’t was Moorish long ago,
"But now the Cross is sparkling on the Mosque,
"And bells make Catholic the trembling air.
"The fortress gleams in Spanish sunshine now
"(’T is south a mile before the rays are Moorish),—
"Hereditary jewel, agraffe bright
"On all the many-titled privilege
"Of young Duke Silva. No Castilian knight
"That serves Queen Isabel has higher charge;
"For near this frontier sits the Moorish king,
"Not Boabdil the waverer, who usurps
"A throne he trembles in, and fawning licks
"The feet of conquerors, but that fierce lion
"Grisly El Zagal, who has made his lair
"In Guadix’ fort, and rushing thence with strength,
"Half his own fierceness, half the untainted heart
"Of mountain bands that fight for holiday,
"Wastes the fair lands that lie by Alcala,
"Wreathing his horse’s neck with Christian heads."
................................................................................................


"To keep the Christian frontier—such high trust
"Is young Duke Silva’s; and the time is great.
"(What times are little? To the sentinel
"That hour is regal when he mounts on guard)
"The fifteenth century since the Man Divine
"Taught and was hated in Capernaum
"Is near its end—is falling as a husk
"Away from all the fruit its years have ripened.
"The Moslem faith, now flickering like a torch
"In a night struggle on this shore of Spain,
"Glares, a broad column of advancing flame,
"Along the Danube and the Illyrian shore
"Far into Italy, where eager monks,
"Who watch in dreams and dream the while they watch,
"See Christ grow paler in the baleful light,
"Crying again the cry of the forsaken.
"But faith, the stronger for extremity,
"Becomes prophetic, hears the far-off tread
"Of western chivalry, sees downward sweep
"The archangel Michael with the gleaming sword,
"And listens for the shriek of hurrying fiends
"Chased from their revels in God’s sanctuary.
"So trusts the monk, and lifts appealing eyes
"To the high dome, the Church’s firmament,
"Where the blue light-pierced curtain, rolled away,
"Reveals the throne and Him who sits thereon.
"So trust the men whose best hope for the world
"Is ever that, the world is near its end:
"Impatient of the stars that keep their course
"And make ho pathway for the coming Judge."
................................................................................................


"But other futures stir the world’s great heart
"Europe is come to her majority,
"And enters on the vast inheritance
"Won from the tombs of mighty ancestors,
"The seeds, the gold, the gems, the silent harps
"That lay deep buried with the memories
"Of old renown. No more, as once in sunny Avignon,
"The poet-scholar spreads the Homeric page,
"And gazes sadly, like the deaf at song;
"For now the old epic voices ring again
"And vibrate with the beat and melody
"Stirred by the warmth of old Ionian days.
"The martyred sage, the Attic orator,
"Immortally incarnate, like the gods,
"In spiritual bodies, winged words
"Holding a universe impalpable,
"Find a new audience. Forevermore,
"With gander resurrection than was feigned

Gander seems like a mistake; didn't she mean grander?

Now, is this racist?

"Of Attila’s fierce Huns, the soul of Greece
"Conquers the bulk of Persia.

So it's soul of Greece vs bulk of Persia? George Eliot couldn't imagine Persia had a civilisation, a spirit, a soul?

Moreover, she's talking about Islamic forces at war against those of europe; but then, it's Arabic, not Persian! For Persian civilisation and culture, population and language suffered atrocious onslaught from Islamic invasion from Arabs, who massacred people and burnt hundreds of thousands of manuscripts; Persian script was lost and population illiterate in a century.

Which is why India is hated by them - butchering went on for over a millennium, and yet, India's civilisation lives, unlike Persia and Egypt and other lands that were completely converted within a century.

"The maimed form
"Of calmly joyous beauty, marble-limbed,
"Yet breathing with the thought that shaped its lips,
"Looks mild reproach from out its open grave
"At creeds of terror; and the vine-wreathed god
"Fronts the pierced Image with the crown of thorns.
"The soul of man is widening towards the past:
"No longer hanging at the breast of life
"Feeding in blindness to bin parentage,—
"Quenching all wonder with Omnipotence,
"Praising a name with indolent piety—
"He spells the record of his long descent,
"More largely conscious of the life that was."
................................................................................................


"And from the height that shows where morning shone
"On far-off summits pale and gloomy now,
"The horizon widens round him, and the west
"Looks vast with untracked waves whereon his gaze
"Follows the flight of the swift-vanished bird
"That like the sunken sun is mirrored still
"Upon the yearning soul within the eye."
................................................................................................


"And so in Córdova through patient nights
"Columbus watches, or he sails in dreams
"Between the setting stars and finds new day;
"Then wakes again to the old weary days,
"Girds on the cord and frock of pale Saint Francis,
"And like him zealous pleads with foolish men.
"“I ask but for a million maravedis:
"Give me three caravels to find a world."

George Eliot here speaks of Columbus asking to win more worlds for the cross. Were they then unaware about his Jewish roots, and his attempting to find India so as to help several hundred Jews to escape the persecution thereby?

India was, has always been, a refuge from religious persecution that various people experienced elsewhere, with freedom of thought and freedom of worship, and more; until Israel came into being again in 1948, Jews of India, who had been in India for centuries, had had no reason to leave, and many made the choice even then to stay. One of the first acts of the Knesset of Israel was to pass an official resolution thanking India.
................................................................................................


"The sacred places shall be purged again,
"The Turk converted, and the Holy Church,
"Like the mild Virgin with the outspread robe,
"Shall fold all tongues and nations lovingly
"But since God works by armies, who shall be
"The modern Cyrus?"

No purge as such, nor conversion of Turk took place, but Turkey did get carved. George Eliot, however, doesn't see the contradictions there, or did she? When she says "Like the mild Virgin with the outspread robe, Shall fold all tongues and nations lovingly, But since God works by armies" - is she being devout and matter-of-fact, in the way church adherents do when dealing with colonial imperialism or slavery? Or had she discovered her son of God was, in fact, a warrior for freedom of Jews, against Romans?
................................................................................................


"The silver cross Glitters o’er Malaga and streams dread light
"On Moslem galleys, turning all their stores
"From threats to gifts. What Spanish knight is he
"Who, living now, holds it not shame to live
"Apart from that hereditary battle
"Which needs his sword? Castilian gentlemen
"Choose not their task—they choose to do it well."

It's rare indeed for adherents of church to admit openly that the cross is intended as a threat!
................................................................................................


"See now with soldiers in his front and rear
"He winds at evening through the narrow streets
"That toward the Castle gate climb devious:
"His charger, of fine Andalusian stock,
"An Indian beauty black but delicate,
"Is conscious of the herald trumpet note,
"The gathering glances, and familiar ways
"That lead fast homeward: she forgets fatigue,
"And at the light touch of the master’s spur
"Thrills with the zeal to bear him royally,
"Arches her neck and clambers up the stones
"As if disdainful of the difficult steep.
"Night-black the charger, black the rider’s plume,
"But all between is bright with morning hues—
"Seems ivory and gold and deep blue gems,
"And starry flashing steel and pale vermilion,
"All set in jasper: on his surcoat white
"Glitter the sword-belt and the jewelled hilt,
"Red on the back and breast the holy cross,
"And ’twixt the helmet and the soft-spun white
"Thick tawny wavelets like the lion’s mane
"Turn backward from his brow, pale, wide, erect.
"Shadowing blue eyes,—blue as the rain-washed sky
"That braced the early stem of Gothic kings
"He claims for ancestry. A goodly knight,
"A noble caballero, broad of chest
"And long of limb. So much the August sun,
"Now in the west but shooting half its beams
"Past a dark rocky profile toward thy plain,
"At winding opportunities across the slope
"Makes suddenly luminous for all who see:
"For women smiling from the terraced roofs;
"For boys that prone on trucks with head up-propped,
"Lazy and curious, stare irreverent;
For men who make obeisance with degrees
"Of good-will shading towards servility,
Where good-will ends and secret fear begins
"And curses, too, low-muttered through the teeth,
"Explanatory to the God of Shem.
"Five, grouped within a whitened tavern court
"Of Moorish fashion, where the trellised vines
"Purpling above their heads make odorous shade,
"Note through the open door the passers-by,
"Getting some rills of novelty to speed
"The lagging stream of talk and help the wine.
"’T is Christian to drink wine: whoso denies
"His flesh at bidding save of Holy Church,
"Let him beware and take to Christian sins
"Lest he be taxed with Moslem sanctity."

Was it as simple? "’T is Christian to drink wine: whoso denies His flesh at bidding save of Holy Church, Let him beware and take to Christian sins Lest he be taxed with Moslem sanctity."?
................................................................................................


Author describes five men at the tavern, whose conversation carries the tale forward. George Eliot is really good here in that she's writing this epic as play in verse, but the conversation is natural, not stilted, and for this to be achieved when it's not conversation between learned poets, just ordinary men, is no mean feat.


"Like Juan there, the spare man with the lute,
"Who makes you dizzy with his rapid tongue,
"Whirring athwart your mind with comment swift
"On speech you would have finished by and by,
"Shooting your bird for you while you are loading,
"Cheapening your wisdom as a pattern known
"And spun by any shuttle on demand."

"Most like the Fauns that roamed in days of old
"About the listening whispering woods, and shared
"The subtler sense of sylvan ears and eyes
"Undulled by scheming thought, yet joined the rout
"Of men and women on the festal days,
"And played the syrinx too, and knew love’s pains,
"Turning their anguish into melody.
"For Juan was a minstrel still, in times
"When minstrelsy was held a thing outworn.
"Spirits seem buried and their epitaph
"Is writ in Latin by severest pens,
"Yet still they flit above the trodden grave
"And find new bodies, animating them
"In quaint and ghostly way with antique souls.
"So Juan was a troubadour revived,
"Freshening life’s dusty road with babbling rills
"Of wit and song, living ’mid harnessed men
"With limbs ungalled by armour, ready so
"To soothe them weary, and to cheer them sad.
"Guest at the board, companion in the camp,
"A crystal mirror to the life around,
"Flashing the comment keen of simple fact
"Defined in words; lending brief lyric voice
"To grief and sadness; hardly taking note
"Of difference betwixt his own and others’;
"But rather singing as a listener
"To the deep moans, the cries, the wild strong joys
"Of universal Nature, old yet young.
"Such Juan, the third talker, shimmering bright
"As butterfly or bird with quickest life."
................................................................................................


"Host.

"Best treat your wasp with delicate regard;
"When the right moment comes say, “By your leave,’
"Use your heel—so! and make an end of him.
"That’s if we talked of wasps; but our young Duke,—
"Spain holds not a more gallant gentleman.
"Live, live, Duke Silva! ’T is a rare smile he has,
"But seldom seen.

"Juan.

"A true hidalgo’s smile,
"That gives much favor, but beseeches none.
"His smile is sweetened by his gravity:
"It comes like dawn upon Sierra snows,
"Seeming more generous for the coldness gone;
"Breaks from the calm—a sudden opening flower
"On dark deep waters: one moment shrouded close,
"A mystic shrine, the next a full-rayed star,
"Thrilling, pulse-quickening as a living word.
"I’ll make a song of that. Host. Prithee, not now.
"You’ll fall to staring like a wooden saint,
"And wag your head as it were set on wires.
"Here’s fresh sherbet Sit, be good company.
"(To Blasco) You are a stranger, sir, and cannot know
"How our Duke’s nature suits his princely frame.

"Blasco.

"Nay, but I marked his spurs—chased cunningly!
"A duke should know good gold and silver plate;
"Then he will know the quality of mine.
"I’ve ware for tables and for altars too,
"Our Lady in all sizes, crosses, bells:
"He’ll need such weapons full as much as swords
"If he would capture any Moorish town.
"For, let me tell you, when a mosque is cleansed . . .

"Juan.

"The demons fly so thick from sound of bells
"And smell of incense, you may see the air
"Streaked as with smoke. Why, they are spirits:
"You may well think how crowded they must be
"To make a sort of haze."

"Blasco.

"I knew not that.
"Still, they’re of smoky nature, demons are;
"And since you say so—well, it proves the more
"The need of bells and censers. Ay, your Duke
"Sat well: a true hidalgo. I can judge—
"Of harness specially. I saw the camp,
"The royal camp at Velez Malaga.
"’T was like the court of heaven,—such liveries!
"And torches carried by the score at night
"Before the nobles. Sirs, I made a dish
"To set an emerald in would fit a crown,
"For ....

[Nate James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible drama by George Eliot! If only she had written more!

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Self and Life is my favorite in the book.