George Eliot and G. H. Lewes were anxious authors and preferred to be out of the country while their latest books were being published, so May of 1860 duly found them on a Continental tour. Happily it soon transpired they had little cause for anxiety as back home her novel Silas Marner was selling well and so was his Physiology of Common Life. Buoyed up by this news and inspired by the artistic beauty and historical heritage of their Florentine surroundings, Lewes, ever the astute literary agent, suggested that Eliot write something in the very marketable historical novel genre. Eliot was so enthusiastic about the idea that she set to work straight away. Instead of sticking with Eliot's usual publisher, the Blackwood brothe

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Published 30 June 2002

Citation: Uglow, Nathan. "Romola". The Literary Encyclopedia. 30 June 2002.
[http://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=2324, accessed 9 February 2010.]