Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Valperga (1823), by Mary Shelley: Valperga; or, The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca (1823)

Valperga (1823), by Mary Shelley: Valperga; or, The Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca (1823)

Shelley, Mary

Paperback

General Fiction

ISBN10: 1532851499
ISBN13: 9781532851490
Publisher: Createspace
Published: Apr 21 2016
Pages: 78
Weight: 0.38
Height: 0.16 Width: 8.00 Depth: 10.00
Language: English
Valperga: or, the Life and Adventures of Castruccio, Prince of Lucca, is an 1823 historical novel by the Romantic novelist Mary Shelley, set amongst the wars of the Guelphs and Ghibellines (the latter of which she spelled Ghibeline.)Mary Shelley's original title is now the subtitle; Valperga was selected by her father, William Godwin, who edited the work for publication between 1821 and February 1823. His edits emphasised the female protagonist and shortened the novel.Valperga is a historical novel which relates the adventures of the early fourteenth-century despot Castruccio Castracani, a real historical figure who became the lord of Lucca and conquered Florence. In the novel, his armies threaten the fictional fortress of Valperga, governed by Countess Euthanasia, the woman he loves. He forces her to choose between her feelings for him and political liberty. She chooses the latter and sails off to her death.hrough the perspective of medieval history, Mary Shelley addresses a live issue in post-Napoleonic Europe, the right of autonomously governed communities to political liberty in the face of imperialistic encroachment. She opposes Castruccio's compulsive greed for conquest with an alternative, Euthanasia's government of Valperga on the principles of reason and sensibility. In the view of Valperga's recent editor Stuart Curran, the work represents a feminist version of Walter Scott's new and often masculine genre, historical novel.Modern critics draw attention to Mary Shelley's republicanism, and her interest in questions of political power and moral principles

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