“If God touches his heart and lends power to my words, fine. If not, He’ll help us find another solution. “
We can’t take our eyes off this character, whether he is stroking his beard at Agnese’ or quietly sitting amongst Don Rodrigo’s noisy entourage. He’s working it out.
The village at the foot of Don Rodrigo’s fortress is a mini fortress in itself, “like a miniature capital of his miniature kingdom,” peopled by brawny, gruff ruffians with big forelocks, toothless old men ready to gnash their gums at the least provocation, insolent children, and my favorite--“Women with mannish faces and muscular arms that served to aid the tongue whenever words failed.” 💪🏼 Wonderful description.
"Even the expressions and movements of the children playing in the street implied something insolent and provocative." Excellent. This made me chuckle.
In Chapter 5, it seems to me, there is a subjext that is a political argument ahead of its time. Here I can't help but contextualize the novel in the time of its publication. "The Betrothed" is a historical novel was published in it current form 200 years after the events it dramatizes (coincidentally, we are reading the Betrothed about 200 years after the current version was published). In the wake of Napoleon's destruction of the Holy Roman Empire, movements were a foot for the unification of Italy into a modern nation. (The revered Italian historical novel "The Leopard" dramatizes the evens of the 1860s as these movements were reaching their climax.) Here, at Don Rodrigo's table, we see the corruption, selfishness, callousness, cruelty, ineptitude, godlessness of pre-Enlightenment feudal Italy. And while the novel is not blind to the clergy's complicity, here it is a cleric, Padre Cristoforo, who has the liberal humanist wisdom and point of view.
I read in an essay recently that claimed that politically conscious novels that endure are ones where the political themes are submerged enough that the novel resonates in any epoch. Today we can as much as ever relate to a system of oligarchs indifferent to the suffering of multitudes over whom they rule or their petty or atavistic ambitions affect.
The notion that Fra Cristoforo is capable of, and has committed, violence gives this upcoming clash an evenness I like. We often forget how tainted with religion violence can be, and vice versa. Also reminded of how priesthood was on level with the military in terms of prestigious careers (cf. The Scarlet and the Black).
The hovels at the foot of the peak that held Rodrigo’s palace bring to mind the crowded and dangerous favelas on the hillsides in Rio de Janeiro and slums on the side of the steep mountain slopes in Caracas. The fraught existence of the dwellers in those hovels says something about the guy at the top of the hill.
Today's reading sent me scurrying for idiom origins. "Don't shoot the messenger." (Shakespeare, 1598 - should have known that one!) "Pulling our leg" (1820s - source unknown, either from pickpockets who pulled at people's legs to distract them or from the practice of mercifully ending a hanging quickly by pulling on the victim's leg) "Say his piece" (late 1500s, source unknown or at least I couldn't find it!) I wonder if these were as banal in his time as they are today. I kept imagining a writing workshop writing cliche next to all of these!
I did, but I know nothing about it, so I'm not sure I'm getting the connection, except I see it was published in the late 1500s. Is that the origin of saying his piece?
Interesting how Fra Cristofero is a listener, not a talker, like toadies at Rodrigo's table. And how both of them say little, but observe much, and the power they hold because of this.
“He can use even a nobody like me to humble a…”. That says it all. Also like the foreshadowing.
I'm all caught up. And my favorite line this morning: "The weak can never win by showing their teeth."
I wonder whether this is or was already or became a common proverb because of its use here.
“If God touches his heart and lends power to my words, fine. If not, He’ll help us find another solution. “
We can’t take our eyes off this character, whether he is stroking his beard at Agnese’ or quietly sitting amongst Don Rodrigo’s noisy entourage. He’s working it out.
The village at the foot of Don Rodrigo’s fortress is a mini fortress in itself, “like a miniature capital of his miniature kingdom,” peopled by brawny, gruff ruffians with big forelocks, toothless old men ready to gnash their gums at the least provocation, insolent children, and my favorite--“Women with mannish faces and muscular arms that served to aid the tongue whenever words failed.” 💪🏼 Wonderful description.
"Even the expressions and movements of the children playing in the street implied something insolent and provocative." Excellent. This made me chuckle.
In Chapter 5, it seems to me, there is a subjext that is a political argument ahead of its time. Here I can't help but contextualize the novel in the time of its publication. "The Betrothed" is a historical novel was published in it current form 200 years after the events it dramatizes (coincidentally, we are reading the Betrothed about 200 years after the current version was published). In the wake of Napoleon's destruction of the Holy Roman Empire, movements were a foot for the unification of Italy into a modern nation. (The revered Italian historical novel "The Leopard" dramatizes the evens of the 1860s as these movements were reaching their climax.) Here, at Don Rodrigo's table, we see the corruption, selfishness, callousness, cruelty, ineptitude, godlessness of pre-Enlightenment feudal Italy. And while the novel is not blind to the clergy's complicity, here it is a cleric, Padre Cristoforo, who has the liberal humanist wisdom and point of view.
I read in an essay recently that claimed that politically conscious novels that endure are ones where the political themes are submerged enough that the novel resonates in any epoch. Today we can as much as ever relate to a system of oligarchs indifferent to the suffering of multitudes over whom they rule or their petty or atavistic ambitions affect.
The notion that Fra Cristoforo is capable of, and has committed, violence gives this upcoming clash an evenness I like. We often forget how tainted with religion violence can be, and vice versa. Also reminded of how priesthood was on level with the military in terms of prestigious careers (cf. The Scarlet and the Black).
The hovels at the foot of the peak that held Rodrigo’s palace bring to mind the crowded and dangerous favelas on the hillsides in Rio de Janeiro and slums on the side of the steep mountain slopes in Caracas. The fraught existence of the dwellers in those hovels says something about the guy at the top of the hill.
but the people at the foot of Rodrigo's palace are not just subject to him, they're his soldiers, his bravi
Today's reading sent me scurrying for idiom origins. "Don't shoot the messenger." (Shakespeare, 1598 - should have known that one!) "Pulling our leg" (1820s - source unknown, either from pickpockets who pulled at people's legs to distract them or from the practice of mercifully ending a hanging quickly by pulling on the victim's leg) "Say his piece" (late 1500s, source unknown or at least I couldn't find it!) I wonder if these were as banal in his time as they are today. I kept imagining a writing workshop writing cliche next to all of these!
Did y9u notice that they authority they cited to decide the question was
Tasso, author of the chivalric epic, "Gerusalemme Liberata."
I did, but I know nothing about it, so I'm not sure I'm getting the connection, except I see it was published in the late 1500s. Is that the origin of saying his piece?
Off topic, but it’s the source for Handel’s opera Rinaldo. (One of my favorites.)
Interesting how Fra Cristofero is a listener, not a talker, like toadies at Rodrigo's table. And how both of them say little, but observe much, and the power they hold because of this.