Romola · Chapter
LXIX: Homeward explained
Romola, having rested from her weariness, reflects on her recent experiences and undergoes a profound internal transformation.
What happens
Romola, having rested from her weariness, reflects on her recent experiences and undergoes a profound internal transformation. She feels a renewed sense of purpose, rejecting her earlier desire for death and embracing a life of service to others. Her thoughts turn back to Florence, and she begins to question her past judgments and actions, particularly her flight from her husband Tito and her godfather. She feels a renewed sense of gratitude and debt to Savonarola, despite his errors. Driven by a longing to be near Florence and learn of its fate, she departs the valley where she has been staying, accompanied by Jacopo and the Padre, with the villagers mourning her departure.
Themes in this chapter
Redemption and Moral Choice
Romola undergoes a moral reckoning, questioning her past choices and seeking a new path of purpose and service. She rejects her earlier despair and embraces a life of helping others, seeing her previous flight as potentially cowardly.
Duty vs. Personal Desire
Romola is torn between her desire to be free from her marriage to Tito and her sense of duty and connection to Florence and its people. She feels a 'thread of pain' testifying that she could not cease to be a wife, and her feelings are drawn back to familiar things.
Characters to notice
- Romola de' Bardi
Experiences a 'new baptism' of purpose, rejecting her earlier desire for death and feeling a renewed call to help the suffering. She undergoes deep self-judgment, questioning her past actions and her flight from Florence, while feeling a growing pull to return.
- Tito Melema
Romola's memory of her life with him and the impossibility of their union is a central source of her internal conflict. She feels dread at the thought of seeing him again but also unease at not knowing his fate.
- Girolamo Savonarola
Romola's sense of debt to him is recovering predominance. She remembers the great inspiration he gave her, which waked a new life in her, and she begins to question her own judgment of him.
- Bardo de' Bardi
Romola's indignant grief for her godfather no longer has complete possession of her, as she begins to question the justness of her own conclusions and deeds.
Key passages
“The experience was like a new baptism to Romola.”
This experience felt like a profound spiritual renewal for Romola.
Highlights Romola's transformative experience and renewed sense of purpose.
“It was mere baseness in me to desire death.”
Wanting to die was a cowardly and lowly thought.
Shows Romola's rejection of her earlier despair and her new commitment to life.
“Florence, and all her life there, had come back to her like hunger”
She felt a deep, consuming longing for Florence and her former life.
Illustrates the strength of Romola's pull back to her home and past.