Literary Significance & Criticism
Romola is George Eliot's fourth published novel. Set in Renaissance Italy, it is isolated from her other novels, which were set in 19th-century England. Also for the first time, George Eliot published her story in serialised format and with a different publisher. Smith, Elder & Co. reportedly paid Eliot £7,000 for the novel, but was less than satisfied at the commercial outcome. Richard Hutton acknowledged that Romola would never be one of her most popular novels, and indeed it remains one of her most underrated works. Nevertheless, Hutton described the novel as "one of the greatest works of modern fiction … probably the author's greatest work".
George Eliot herself described her labour in writing the novel as one about which she could "swear by every sentence as having been written with my best blood, such as it is, and with the most ardent care for veracity of which my nature is capable". She reportedly spent eighteen months contemplating and researching the novel, including several excursions to Florence. The attention to detail exhibited in the novel was a focus of both praise and criticism. Anthony Trollope, having read the first instalment of Romola, expressed wonder at the toil Eliot must have "endured in getting up the work", but also cautioned her against excessive erudition, urging her not to "fire too much over the heads of her readers".
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