Da Vinci's Tiger by L.M. Elliott

It is January, 1475. Sixteen-year-old Ginevra de' Benci Niccolini is seated in the front row with her friend Simonetta Cattaneo Vespucci at a joust being held in the Piazza di Santa Croce."The Medici had organized this joust to celebrate Florence's new diplomatic alliance with Venice and Milan." Simonetta, "the publicly celebrated Platonic love" of Guiliano Medici, the younger brother of Lorenzo the Magnificent, has been honoured as the joust's "Queen of Beauty". Prior to the joust there had been a parade through Florence to Santa Croce, led by Guiliano, nine trumpeteers and two men-at-arms carrying pennants of the Medici coat of arms. Guiliano himself carried an enormous banner with Simonetta depicted as Pallas, the Greek goddess of wisdom and war. Considering all of this makes Ginevra jealous of Simonetta's appeal, but her friend informs her that the new Venetian ambassador, Bernardo Bembo has shown an interest in her.

After having unseated one opponent already, Guiliano's next opponent in the joust is Signor Morelli. When it appears the two combatants are tied, Signor Morelli graciously concedes the round, and offers his exquisitely painted banner of a reclining nymph to the Queen of Beauty. Ginevra believes the banner to be better than the one Botticelli painted for Guiliano. Simonetta tells Ginevra that Maestro Verrocchio painted the banner with the help of one of his apprentices named Leonardo from Vinci.

The rounds continue until well into the evening. Guiliano's opponent is Renato de Pazzi who enters the lists on a large black horse belonging to Guiliano's godfather who refused the horse to his godson. Simonetta explains the political power play that exists in Florence, how the Pazzi, who are nobles, continually attempt to undermine the powerful influence of the Medici. The challenge is made "a la guerre", meaning "Unhorsing a rider would be the aim and the only honorable way to win." The joust between Pazzi and Medici is violent but Guiliano unseats Renato and is declared the champion of the joust.

As she is leaving, Ginevra is introduced to the Venetian ambassador, Bernardo Bembo by Lorenzo de Medici. Lorenzo tells Ginevra that Bembo is interested in meeting citizens of Florence who love poetry. Lorenzo invites Ginevra to a dinner in his honour and to share one of her poems at the function. Ginevra's Uncle Bartolomoeo accepts the invitation on her and her husband Luigi Niccolini's behalf.

The next morning Ginevra greets her husband, Luigi and briefly discusses the joust with him. He is a member of the cloth merchant guild, the Arte di Calimala.  Ginevra wears a scarlet soft wool cape with a gold border and a dress "embroidered with intricate flower blossoms of red and emerald threads".  Although Ginevra and Luigi have consummated their marriage, she sleeps alone. Ginevra's marriage to Luigi Niccolini had been arranged on the previous January, against her will. Ginevra's father died in 1468, after which her Uncle Bartolomoeo had sent her away to Le Murate's convent school. She left the convent permanently, her uncle was now head of the family and in exchange for a position on one of Venice's eight priori, Ginevra was sold in marriage to the Niccolini family.

Ginevra does receive an invitation to the Medici dinner which is held in early March. When she and Luigi attend the function, they meet Verrocchio and his former apprentice Leonardo da Vinci. The latter believes Ginevra would make a "excellent subject". At the Medici dinner, Ginevra is enthralled by the naked bronze statue of David, the courtyard centerpiece done by Donatello. A discussion with Bernardo Bembo makes Ginevra blush. Bernardo's advances become more prominent and more transparent leading Ginevra to experience deep inner conflict.

As Ginevra is drawn further into the world of Florence's cultural elite, she finds herself drawn into a Platonic relationship with Bernardo Bembo. It is a relationship that pulls her into the Medici circle and into Florence's rich artisan culture, leading to a portrait that immortalizes her for posterity.

Discussion

Elliott has crafted an impressive fictional account of the life of sixteen-year-old Ginevra de' Benci's life and the painting of her portrait by Renaissance master, Leonardo da Vinci. Set in the High Renaissance, the mid-15th century in Florence, Italy, Elliott weaves a masterful story that incorporates many details of life during this era including cultural and religious practices, political intrigue in the Italian city states, and detailed descriptions of a working art studio. Elliott undertook significant research so that she could give her readers an encompassing view of life in the city-state of Florence in 1475.

All of the characters in the novel were real people who lived at the time Ginevra's portrait was painted except for Sancha, her maid. The basic details of Ginevra's life are incorporated into the story: she was born into a family of Florentine notaries who were connected to the wealthy and powerful Medici family and educated at Le Murate, a convent run by Abbess Scolastica Rondinelli and patronized by Ginevra's family. Ginevra was known in Florence as a poet. In 1474, she was married to  Luigi de Bernardo Niccolini, a widower and wool merchant, who was much older than Ginevra  The marriage was likely arranged by Ginevra's Uncle Bartolomeo who may have known Niccolini.

Many aspects of life in the High Renaissance are portrayed in Da Vinci's Tiger.  In the fifteenth century, Italy was comprised of a series of city states. The main republics were Florence, Milan, Genoa, Pisa and Venice. Unfortunately these city states were often at war with each other and at various times with the Pope. Eventually a peace was negotiated between Venice, Florence, Milan, Naples and the Papal States (areas controlled by the pope).

This period of peace and its recovery from the devastation wrought by the Black Death, allowed Florence to flourish as a center of business and trade. It soon became the cradle of the Renaissance, a movement that saw the rediscovery of classical Greek and Roman art and a focus on understanding the natural world through direct observation. Florence gradually came under the influence and control of the Medici family whose bank, became increasingly important. They were the leading family in Florence, their influence beginning with Cosimo di Giovanni de' Medici who was involved in negotiating peace with Milan. His grandson, Lorenzo (the Magnificent) de' Medici received a humanist education and became a significant patron of the arts. Great families like the Medicis began to build beautiful estates, forgoing the austere homes of the Middle Ages. They began to build churches, convents, hospitals and held special feasts and entertainment. 

In Da Vinci's Tiger, the importance of the Medici family is explained by Ginevra, who states that they exerted their influence in subtle ways, through the patronage of the arts and festivals, "granting favors and loans", brokering "advantageous marriages and business partnerships." Lorenzo Medici was seen as especially as a patron of literature, inviting "artists, writers, and scholars to his country villas at Fiesole and Careggi to listen to music and poetry read aloud. They discussed the nature of man's supreme good, his summum bonum, as explored within classical texts. He also sponsored a Platonic Academy within the city, led by the great philosopher Marsilio Ficino..."

In Da Vinci's Tiger, Elliott portrays the sumptuous pageantry and the ongoing political intrigue and rivalries that marked life in 15th century Florence. For example, in June 1475, Ginevra like most other Florentines attends the Festival of John the Baptist. Elliott describes it for her readers through the eyes of Ginevra. "Florence had nearly a hundred public holidays during the year, but St. John's Feast was its grandest -- a two-day extravaganza celebrating both our material successes and our earnest piety." The festival begins with a "government-ordered mostra -- a lavish display of the city's riches as homage to the blessings out patron saint bestowed upon us...Festooning their shops with colorful banners, merchants put out their best merchandise --gold cloth, silver plates, painted panels, tapestry, jewelry, carved wood, embroidered leather...Florence's clergy donned elaborately embroidered vestments and processed through the streets with Florence's holy relics -- a thorn of the Holy Crown, a nail of the cross, a finger bone of John the Baptist. Following them came the city's secular dignitaries dressed as angels and biblical figures, with musicians of all sorts playing and singing."  On the morning of the second day of the festival "The city's guildsmen circled the Duomo cathedral to approach the ancient, octagonal Baptistery and its gates of paradise -- huge bronze doors decorated with scenes of St. John's life. Carrying painted candles, they slowly marched under blue canopies painted with stars and lilies that were stretched across the streets to replicate the night sky."  The palio, the horse race that caps the festival is a vibrant, heart-pounding event that Ginevra finds thrilling. "Now I could see the leading horses, legs flying, dirt churned up and sprayed, jockeys hunched and clinging to handfuls of mane. They had little hope now of steering their mounts, frenzied by the competition, frantic at the mass of humanity and their guttural shouts of encouragement.""

But there are also troubling aspects to life in Florence. For example the tamburi, "locked wooden boxes placed near major churches by the Ufficiali di Notte, the Officers of the Night. In those boxes, Florentines could denounce their neighbors for vice by leaving secret accusations of crimes against decency that brought arrest and trial in front of a tribunal of old men." Early in the novel, Ginevra and her maid Sancha witness Leonardo da Vinci attempting to break into a tamburi. It is a foreshadowing of an accusation made against him later on in the novel.

A significant portion of the novel revolves around Ginevra's relationship with a young Leonardo da Vinci. Elliott provides readers with much detail involving Leonardo, his physical appearance, his thoughts, his relationship with master Andrea del Verrocchio as well as his artistic endeavours in this early period. In her detailed Afterword, Elliott writes that "Much of Leonardo's dialogue comes from his own writings..." The reader learns much about Leonardo through the character himself as his friendship with Ginevra develops and he tells her about himself.

Leonardo da Vinci was the illegitimate son of Ser Piero, a notary in the village of Vinci and Caterina, a peasant girl who worked for the family. Leonardo lived with his mother when he was very young but eventually went to live with his father and grandfather. He spent much of his time with his tutor and uncle, Francesco who instilled in him  a curiosity about the natural world. At age fifteen, he was apprenticed to Andrea del Verrocchio of Florence. Leonardo was a polymath, having substantial gifts in many areas of science, art, architecture, music and engineering.  His paintings, sculptures, and many scientific discoveries continue to amaze today.

Ginevra de Benci by Leonardo da Vinci

The novel highlights the significant contributions Leonardo was beginning to make in the art world. While Verrocchio and Leonardo were adept at using egg tempera to paint, Elliott, through the character of Ginevra states, "But Leonardo was one of the first in Florence to attempt using the oils preferred by the northern painters in Flanders. Oil paints did provide subtler, more varied, and translucent tones but were difficult to mix evenly and to spread with the brush."

His portrait of Ginevra marked an innovative change in how portraits were painted, in that her portrait was painted in the three quarter pose. Elliott suggests in her novel that this was the (unlikely and feminist) idea of Ginevra who saw this as "the chance to make men listen -- and see -- what women had in their hearts and minds."  Ginevra wanted a "larger metaphor" for herself. In the novel she states, "My eyes would gaze unblinking to allow people to look into them and wonder about me. I, a mountain tiger, like the one that showed no fear when hunted, whose fierce dignity prompted imaginings about her soul and her courage -- a creature with her own past and own story."  However, it was Leonardo's decision to paint her in this way, to show her as a real person.

Da Vinci's Tiger deals with some mature themes including the attempted seduction of Ginevra by her Platonic love, Ambassador Bernardo Bembo. The concept of platonic love is explored throughout this novel. During the Renaissance, the renewed interest in Greek and Roman thought led to the practice of choosing a platonic love. This questionable practice, is explained by Ginevra as such, "According to Ficino's Neoplatonic philosophy, if a man could keep his ardor for a woman to a Platonic friendship -- in a look-but-do-not-touch idolization -- and only contemplate her physical loveliness as being manifestation of her virtuous spirit and absolute beauty, then his soul was purified. His love would, in essence, replicate the selfless love of Christ for us and bring the man closer to God." As Scholastica warned, Ginevra discovers this is often not what happens. Instead such relationships were often used to hide sinful behaviours and sometimes  led to the birth of illegitimate children.

Elliott also incorporates Leonardo's arrest for sodomy after someone denounces him and three other men. The accusations are serious because as Sancha indicates, the punishment can be severe especially for homosexual men. At dinner, Luigi tells Ginevra that he obtained Leonardo's freedom as a favour to the Medici family. But he also intimates indirectly to Ginevra that he too is a homosexual, thus explaining his lack of romantic interest in her. Whether Luigi Niccolini's homosexuality is fact or fiction is not addressed in Elliott's Afterword.

There are plenty of interesting historical aspects to investigate in this novel and Elliott has done a good job portraying the era and giving readers a sense of the genius of Leonardo da Vinci and the background behind the painting of one of his more famous works. Ellitott's characterization of Ginevra de Benci Niccolini is inspiring and realistic, that of a young woman of conviction, strength, intelligence and compassion, who wrote poetry and inspired one of the most famous artists of all time. One only needs to gaze at her portrait to see that Leonardo da Vinci succeeded in portraying  her as a real person, whose "motions of the mind" can be entertained simply by the pose portrayed.

Image credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginevra_de%27_Benci#/media/File:Leonardo_da_Vinci_-_Ginevra_de'_Benci_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

Book Details:

Da Vinci's Tiger by L.M. Elliott
New York: Katherine Tegen Books      2015
287 pp.

Across A War-Tossed Sea by L.M. Elliott

Fourteen-year-old Charles Bishop and his ten-year-old brother Wesley are celebrating Labor Day 1943 with their American host family, the Ratcliffs at a pond that feeds Four Mile Creek. Charles and Wesley have been sent overseas to America to escape Hitler's bombing of London. The Radcliff family has taken in Charles and Wesley because their father saved Mr. Ratcliff's life during World War I. Now they are living in Tidewater, Virginia with a family that includes seven-year-old twins Johnny and Jamie, two older boys Bobby and twelve-year-old Ron and their older sister, sixteen-year-old Patsy.

Tidewater, is located near Richmond, Virginia, an area heavily involved in the war effort, with factories at Richmond producing parachutes and other war materials, while east along the James River, the U.S. Navy has a base at Norfolk.  From Norfolk, the U.S. military deploys servicemen out of Hampton Roads to the war in Europe and North Africa.

Even though they are thousands of miles away from the war, Wesley continues to have nightmares about the bombing and the treacherous Atlantic crossing. One such nightmare occurs during their Labor Day outing after Wesley falls asleep because of the oppressive heat. Charles is embarrassed by Wesley's struggles but Patsy tries to comfort him. This leads Wesley to tell her about being attacked in the Atlantic and how their ship was not allowed to stop and save those whose ships had been torpedoed. But Ron ridicules Wesley whom he bullies constantly, which makes Charles angry. Patsy intervenes to prevent a fight. 

In September of 1943, Charles begins high school. He's on the football team as a tight end, while Bobby is the quarterback. As some of his school chums are now nighttime air raid wardens, Charles worries that he will be considered a coward. So when he writes home he tells his parents he wants to return to help the fire brigade in extinguishing the incendiary bombs in London.

Meanwhile Wesley finds himself "skipped ahead" to grade seven, the same grade as Ron. While Charles has a best friend in Bobby, Ron is not interested in being Wesley's friend. Instead Ron resents the presence of the Bishop brothers and bullies Wesley constantly. Ron accuses Wesley of cheating on a test but their teacher, Miss Darling discovers the paper he was holding was a telegram from his parents. Charles tries to encourage Wesley to stand up to Ron, telling him to ignore him and to work at being really good at something that Ron isn't so he will look foolish when he bullies him. Wesley decides on working at the spelling bee but although he makes it to the county championships he loses when he spells a word in the British way.

With the approach of Halloween, Charles and Bobby are busy preparing for the football championships, so when Mr. Radcliff asks the boys to help out with harvesting of pumpkins and the mowing and bringing in the hay, Bobby tries to decline. This leads his father to suggest that because help is hard to find he might have to hire the German POWs. Charles becomes so upset he leaves the dinner table and Mr. and Mrs. Ratcliff instead decide they will hire the sons of a local man, Ed. Wesley is sent to tell Charles so the two of them can visit Ed to ask him, but he's unable to find Charles. Instead he decides to visit Ed's house alone and while there he meets Ed and Alma and their son Freddy. Wesley leaves that evening believing he may have found a friend.

Soon everyone is working hard to bring in the harvest; Mr. Ratcliff and Ed and shredding cornstalks, Ed's sons and two friends are raking the hay into a tractor baler and Bobby, Ron and Charles and the twins are plowing the cornfield and planting winter wheat. When the mules bolt, dragging Charles it is Freddy who saves him. Although Wesley and Charles are grateful, Ron is angry that his brother Bobby is more concerned with Charles.

Charles and Wesley have many good and bad experiences; a haunted house for Halloween, a hunting trip that Wesley almost doesn't make because he shoots off a rifle in the Ratcliff home, Wesley's unexpected meeting of a Chickahominy Indian man and Charles joining Patsy whom he is crushing on, to plane-watch. But it is a series of events in the new year of 1944 that change many things for both the Ratcliffs and the Bishop brothers. Wesley gets into a brawl with Ron and his friends but tells Mr. Radcliff only part of the story to make Ron look good. This changes how Ron is viewed by his family and makes he and Wesley friends. Patsy learns that her beau, Henry Forester is missing in action over Europe. And Charles learns from a letter from a school chum that their school has been bombed. Feeling ashamed that he's not at home to help, Charles decides to attempt to canoe down the river to the Newport News-Hampton Roads docks where he hopes to stowaway on a cargo ship for Britain. This almost costs him his life.

Summer brings with it new challenges especially as the German POWs begin to work on the Ratcliff farm. For Charles and Wesley this means confronting their own prejudices and fears.

Discussion

Across A War-Tossed Sea is the third book in a trilogy that includes Under A War-Torn Sky and A Troubled Peace. This book is set in Virginia and tells the adventures of two English boys sent to the safety of America during World War II.

Although safe from incendiary bombs and the threat of invasion, Charles and Wesley Bishop must cope with homesickness, the trauma of their war experiences in London as well as living in America with its very different culture from that in their home country of England. Charles finds the American practice of talking about feelings annoying, especially when it comes to their war experiences in London. "Did they really think that talking or hugging or those molasses cookies and lemonade they endlessly offered could wash away the memories or houses shattering, friends trapped under rubble, or ships exploding and burning while survivors clung to wreckage in ten-foot-high waves?"

Charles' major struggle centers around the shame he feels at not being back in London to help with the war effort. At fourteen, he believes he can contribute and, to his school mates, it looks like he ran away. "Even though he and Bobby were good mates and he was enjoying high school, Charles was antsy to return to England and do his part. Several of his old school chums had become nighttime air raid wardens. Charles feared some of them called him a coward for evacuating to the U.S."  It is this shame after receiving a letter from England from a school chum, that leads him to run away from the Radcliff farm and attempt to canoe down the river to the sea. "More to the point, it felt to Charles as if he school chum's letter had implied that he was a coward for not being in London when the city desperately needed every able hand - a sense of guilt that had dogged Charles ever since he had walked up the gangplank of the ship evacuating him to America."  Charles' attempt to canoe to the Newport News-Hampton Roads docks almost ends in disaster. He does realize the serious repercussions his actions have for both himself (he develops pneumonia) the Ratcliff family (who use their savings to buy medication to save his life) and works to make amends. Eventually Charles is allowed to come home when his father is seriously injured in a bombing.

Charles tries to take the place of their father for his younger brother Wesley,  imagining how he might help Wesley deal with the bullying while coping with his own problems.  "Since crossing three thousand miles of ocean and settling in on the Ratcliff farm, Charles had had to play dad, mum, and big brother all to Wesley. No one comforted him when he was racked with similar nightmares!"

Meanwhile, Wesley struggles to overcome what is clearly post traumatic stress disorder due to the bombing in London and the attack on the ships during their Atlantic crossing. He experiences nightmares and is triggered by loud noises. The novel opens with Wesley experiencing one of his nightmares, much to Charles' annoyance. When Wesley accompanies Freddy and his family to London to see the launch of a aircraft carrier Freddy's father has been working on, he experiences a flashback of a air raid in London. "Abruptly, the five o'clock siren sounded, signaling the end of the work day for some, the beginning of it for others. Most didn't react to the blaring sound. But Wesley flinched and stiffened. Being around big ships all day had brought back a lot of very bad memories. Now the siren's wail sounded like the alarm he'd heard over and over again back home when the Luftwaffe was coming loaded with hellfire. The truck backfired again...He looked nervously to the sky, waiting for the first whistling scream of a bomb falling through the air. He backed away from Freddy, not seeing him, only the rush of hurrying people...He needed to find the nearest shelter, quick!"  Freddy's father and mother help Wesley calm down. However, with time and living in a safer environment, Wesley finds he has fewer

Wesley also has to deal with bullying by Ron Ratcliff. Although his older brother Charles tries to encourage Wesley to ignore Ron, Wesley decides a different way to deal with him. Recognizing that Ron needs affirmation, Wesley points out the good act Ron did when he is attacked by Ron's friends. Although Ron pushed Wesley first, in the end he saves him from a serious beating and Wesley helps him fight when they turn on him too. Affirmed by both his father and his older brother Bobby, both of whom are shocked at Ron's good behaviour, Ron becomes friendlier and stops picking on Wesley.

Charles and Wesley are unaware of  how different life in America is compared with England. Charles likes that Americans have "an ease with giving out compliments that, generally speaking, Brits didn't." Wesley discovers that in America, Negroes must sit at the back of the bus, segregated from white people and that some white Americans are very prejudiced against blacks. However, when a white bus driver helps Freddy and his family when they are threatened by white teens,  his actions demonstrate not all American's feel this way.

But both Charles and Wesley are forced to confront their own prejudices and hatred - against Germans when the German POWs come to work on the farm.  To Charles and Wesley, all Germans are Nazis but they soon discover that this is a very simplistic view when they meet Gunter, a young German soldier who doesn't believe in the Nazi ideology.

When Gunter expresses relief over the Allied invasion of Europe and the hope that the war will end soon, as so many Germans are dying, his strong emotions shock Wesley. "Were those tears in the Jerry's eyes? Wesley was amazed. He had to blink away the image Gunter painted, knowing well the type of horrifying scene he described. Wesley had never though much before about German families suffering the same kind of terror he and Charles had." Wesley and Gunter connect through their mutual interest in "Indians" and the Wild West and their love of reading.

For Charles, it is not so easy. When he learns that the German POWs who are sympathetic to the Americans are at risk of being murdered by other German POWs, Charles feels little sympathy. He is forced to confront his feelings of hate when Gunter is bitten by a deadly water moccasin and is in danger of dying. His moans bring back memories of a neighbour horribly injured in a German bombing but Charles also remembers how Gunter saved the Ratcliff twins from a crashing plane. Putting aside his feelings, Charles helps Gunter by sending Freddy for help and attempting to suck the poison out of the snake bite (a practice that does NOT work). Gunter, who believes he is dying from the snake bite, tells Charles, "...Kill if you must to serve your country. But revenge is a  poison. Like this snake. Fight to end hatred. Fight to bring peace. Yes?" Charles agrees and learns that he must forgive if he's going to do what Gunter asks. "For the first time in a long while, the Lord's Prayer filled Charles's mind and heart: 'Forgive us our trespasses as we...' -- he paused and emphasized the words to himself --'as we forgive those who trespass against us.' " When Charles does leave for England he knows he going "back into a war-tossed world. But he was ready to face it now, to fight, as Gunter had advised -- not for revenge -- but to stop those who brought war and delighted in it."

The novel ends on a positive, upbeat note, despite the fact that the war is still ongoing. Charles is returning to England but he feels differently about Americans than when he first arrived and is grateful to the Ratcliffs. "He'd learned so much from them -- about friendship, about generosity, about standing up to trouble." Wesley has overcome bullying and he tells Charles he's fine to stay behind; he hasn't had nightmares for some time and he's made two good friends in Freddy and Ron.

Elliott successfully recreates the 1940's war era in rural America through the experiences of two young British lads. This author is skilled at incorporating many details of life into the story; racial segregation that existed at this time, farming practices, the war effort in America, the dangers the merchant marine encountered bringing supplies to England and life in general for Americans at this time. Also incorporated seamlessly into the story are facts about the war, Hitler's soldiers and life in London during the war. For example, while Charles is fuming about the German POWs he notes that some are from Rommel's elite panzer divisions that served in Africa. Elliott uses this opportunity to inform readers how SS troops were branded- a practice implemented so they could be quickly identified. "They were tall, muscular, blond, haughty -- perfect Aryan specimens. They probably had the telltale 'SS' tattoo under their armpits, marking them as true believers, devotees of Hitler's racist beliefs." In this way, readers learn historical facts without really realizing it.E lliott has included an Afterword that provides further detailed information on life in wartime Britain, U-boats, segregation, V-1 rockets and German POWs in America.

Across A War-Tossed Sea suffers somewhat from uneven pacing; young readers may find the first hundred pages of the novel slow going. After the first hundred pages though, there are many exciting adventures and experiences which occur quickly, one after the other, engaging the reader to the very end of the novel.

Overall, Across A War-Tossed Sea is another well-written and appealing story by Elliott that explores the themes of tolerance, forgiveness and redemption.

Book Details:

Across A War-Tossed Sea by L. M. Elliott
New York: Disney-Hyperion Books      2014
247 pp.