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ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN, or
THE MAIDEN OF THE MIST (1829)
by Sir Walter Scott Reviewed by Patrick Killough I. Review for barnesandnoble.com RATING: * * * * * (FIVE STARS) TITLE OF THIS REVIEW: A Novel Influencing the Ku Klux Klan and THE DA VINCI CODE. There are many ways to read and enjoy Sir Walter Scott's rich, brilliant ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN: OR THE MAIDEN OF THE MIST (1829). Think of the novel as Scott's view of Europe a few years before the discovery of the New World and the Reformation. Realize how little most of us know of the 1470s and early 1480s and why we should want to learn more. Read ANNE as well for its romance, the intrigue, the battles, the chivalry, the treachery. More up-to-date assessments include that ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN helps understand post-Civil War America and also the novel, THE DA VINCI CODE. ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN takes place on the eastern periphery of the end phase of the Wars of the Roses (1455 - 1485) when rival lines of the Plantagenet family -- House of Lancaster (Red Rose) and House of York (White Rose) -- fought for the throne of England. Disguised as merchants named Philipson, the exiled Lancastrian Earl of Oxford and his son Arthur attempt to rally support for their cause in northern Italy, then pass through Switzerland en route to Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy. In Switzerland they are befriended by a mountain notable and his beautiful daughter Anne of Geierstein. The merchants then travel with the Swiss, who are part of a peace delegation, towards the court of Burgundy. En route the father has a frightening encounter with the hooded judges of a Secret Court which will ultimately condemn Charles the Bold to death. Charles promises his old comrade in arms Philipson that he will help the Lancastrians regain the throne of England if they and their deposed Queen Margaret of Anjou persuade her weak, art-loving 80-year old father René of Anjou to cede his realm of Provence to the greedy Duke Charles. But plans go astray when, in a series of three campaigns against the militarily underestimated, fiercely independent Swiss foot soldiers, Charles the Bold, Europe's richest ruler, is defeated and killed. Young Arthur Philipson is, as we slowly learn, of the noble de Vere family. So he is eligible to wed the equally noble Anne of Geierstein (whose wizardly grandmother may not have been human!). They settle with Arthur's parents in Switzerland but return in triumph to England after King Henry VII wins the throne of England and ends the Wars of the Roses. Scholars cite Walter Scott's Secret Tribunals (vehme-gerichte) as a source inspiring in December 1865 the handful of Scots-Americans who founded the Ku Klux Clan in Pulaski, Tennessee. And King René of Anjou is one of the string of Masters of the Priory of Sion discussed in HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL. The Priory of Sion is an institution also important in THE DA VINCI CODE. -OOO- Also recommended: Wm. Shakespeare, KING HENRY VI. Michael Baigent et al., HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL. Dan Brown, THE DA VINCI CODE. Sir Walter Scott, QUENTIN DURWARD. Black Mountain, 01/11/2007 ==-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= II. Review for amazon.com Here is your review the way it will appear: REVIEWER'S RATING: * * * * * (FIVE STARS) TITLE OF THIS REVIEW: Walter Scott's Final Masterpiece. Forerunner of the Detective Novel. January 11, 2007 In 1832, three years after writing ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN, Sir Walter Scott died, broken in health, having written more than one frenzied pot-boiler to stave off financial ruin. ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN OR THE MAIDEN OF THE MIST is a late flowering: one of Scott's five or six master works. It foreshadows the clue-strewing, puzzle unraveling later genre of the detective story. Who are these English traders, father and son Philipson? Who is the Black Priest of St Paul's? Was Anne of Geierstein's magician grandmother really non-human? ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN is also a novel about real history. The main action takes place in 1474 and 1475 and moves from Northern Italy through the Swiss Alps into southern and eastern France. The theme is the end of the English Civil Wars (Wars of the Roses) as played out by a few apparently definitively defeated Lancastrians (Red Rose) loyal to England's former Queen, Margaret of Anjou. She had kept Red Rose hopes high after the capture of her feckless but saintly husband King Henry VI. In ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN, a simple minded but admiring young Swiss mountaineer who sees the old lady at her father's court in Aix en Provence compares her to something he knows better from his Alpine meadows: But the Queen is a stately creature. The
chief cow of the herd, who carries the bouquets and garlands, and leads
the rest to the chalet, has not a statelier pace. (Ch. 32)
There is also the complex King René of Provence, last of the minstrel kings, fun-loving octogenarian, described by Shakespeare and later listed by Pierre Plantard and in HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL as one of the Grand Masters of THE DA VINCI CODE's Priory of Sion. Queen Margaret of Anjou is his daughter. The son of another daughter is a bitter foe of Duke Charles of Burgundy who lusts for King René's land and titles. Duke Charles is Brother in Law of the Yorkist King of England, Edward IV. Walter Scott moves these famous people like sinfning but powerful giants across his exciting stage. As in Scott's novels THE MONASTERY and THE ABBOT, two brothers go their separate ways -- one holding on to the dying old, the other moving decisively into future mega-trends. In ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN, Anne's father insists on his noble prerogatives and holds fast to the worst features of the rapidly fading Age of Knighthood as a Robber Baron in the Holy Roman Empire during the declining middle ages of Europe. His brother becomes a humble Swiss farmer and leader of the new Alpine democracy. Anne's father stands and fights in solidarity with the heavily armored mounted knights who go down in the end before Anne's uncle and the citizen foot soldiers of the Swiss mountains. Along the borders of the German Empire and a weak Kingdom of France, justice is rendered by a Ku Klux Klan-like shadow government of Secret Tribunals enjoying some support from bishops and even a Pope. The disguised Earl of Oxford is tried on charges of slandering this brotherhood but is acquitted in a below ground chamber full of his hooded judges. Walter Scott comments: Such an
institution could only prevail at a time when ordinary means of justice
were excluded by the hand of power, and when in order to bring the
guilty to punishment, it required all the influence and authority of
such a confederacy.
(Ch. 20) In addition to the political themes, Scott rehearses another favorite of his: the virtual impossibility of married love between persons of different social ranks: noble and commoner. Fortunately for the noble but simply reared (by her uncle) Anne of Geierstein, her lover, the ostensibly commoner merchant Arthur Philipson, turns out to be Arthur de Vere, son of the Earl of Oxford. Another facet of the late 15th Century: superstition, alchemy, foretelling the future. Anne's maternal grandfather was a great student of Zoroastrian and Muslim wisdom. He married a Persian sage's daughter, Hermione, who bore Anne of Geierstein's mother, the Baroness Sybilla. All these women appear possessed of preternatural powers. Some of ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN's historically true characters first appeared in Scott's 1823 novel QUENTIN DURWARD. These include most notably Louis XI, wily King of France, his trusted barber and his two hangmen and also Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy, Louis's most dangerous foe. You can read and enjoy ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN without knowing much European history. But you may not finish the book without hungering for much more and even deeper real history. -OOO- =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= III. Review for epinions.com TITLE OF THIS REVIEW: A Literary Ancestor of THE KU KLUX KLAN and THE DA VINCI CODE by aohcapablanca, Jan 11 '07 Set almost entirely in 1474 - 1475, ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN or THE MAIDEN OF THE MIST is a late (1829) master work by Sir Walter Scott, father of both the historical novel and the political novel. A lovingly, slowly and lavishly developed plot gallops through its final three chapters to the seemingly inevitable fall and death of Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy, Europe's richest monarch. The haughty, impetuous Charles is done in by opponents whom he despises as plebeian rebels against their Austrian overlords: the democratic, hard-working future-shaping mountain men of Switzerland. Their decentralized, libertarian, democratic, face-to-face cantonal politics points to the United States and Federalism. Swiss infantry tactics, for their part, lay low and make obsolete the previously invincible armored horsemen of the High Middle Ages. It is hard for readers of Michael Baigent (et al) (HOLD BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL) and of the closely related Dan Brown (THE DA VINCI CODE) not to notice premonitions of these contemporary works in Sir Walter Scott's ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN. First, there is Scott's whimsical portrayal of King (of Jerusalem!) René of Anjou and his mini-court at Aix en Provence. René is 80 years old, in his youth an ally of Joan of Arc, but in old age given over wholly and impractically to minstrelsy and the arts. His tough daughter, Margaret of Anjou, had been Henry VI's Queen of England and also had held high the Red Rose and Lancastrian banners during the closing years of the Wars of the Roses. Queen Margaret's son Prince Edward of Westminster, long since fallen, had been born the same day as Arthur de Vere, son of Margaret's (fictional) friend the Countess of Oxford. Young Arthur now accompanies his disguised father, the banished Count of Oxford, on a mission in Italy, Switzerland and Burgundy, to rally support to oust the Yorkist King Edward IV and restore the Lancastrians to the throne. Disguised as two merchants named Philipson, the Count and his son are befriended in the Swiss Alps by Anne of Geierstein, her uncle Arnold Biederman and his huge sons. All are of noble birth but have opted for mere citizenship of the Canton of Unterwalden. The Philipsons, for security in troubled times, accompany the Biedermans and a Swiss Peace Delegation into Burgundy. The disguised Count of Oxford, scion of the ancient house of de Vere, is an old comrade in arms of the hot-headed Duke of Burgundy. The elder De Vere tries but fails to mediate peace with the Swiss. Having met Queen Margaret in Strasburg, young Arthur de Vere is sent to "Good King René" in Provence, bearing a proposal that René give up his land to Burgundy and his many titles if Charles the Bold will help restore the Lancastrians in England. All falls apart when Charles needlessly attacks the Swiss and is first routed in two major battles and then slain in a third. Arthur de Vere marries Anne and with his parents initially settles in Swiss Unterwalden. When the Lancastrian Henry Tudor takes the throne as Henry VII, Countess Anne and Arthur go to England and adorn the Court at London. Scholars have noted that certain eerie scenes from ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN inspired or influenced the Scotch-American founders of the Ku Klux Klan to wear hoods and call themselves Knights. They note a parallel between the historical Secret Tribunals which Scott prominently describes and the troubled times of the Lost Cause in the American South after the Civil War. Good King René of Anjou figures in HOLY BLOOD, HOLY GRAIL and the 1950s impostures of Pierre Plantard as one of the alleged Grand Masters of the Priory of Sion. Much is made by Michael Baigent and his co-authors of the Good King's historical tie with Joan of Arc and his European-acknowledged but otherwise obsolete title of King of Jerusalem, which ties René back to the first Christian King of Jerusalem, Godfrey of Bouillon. And Rene recreated in Provence that Arcadia later celebrated by the painter Nicolas Poussin. All of this pre-shadows certain claims of THE DA VINCI CODE. Walter Scott was a skeptical student of witchcraft, alchemy and related black arts. He knew that these arts were taken seriously in the Middle Ages and he is not shy about raising readers' hackles through tales of creatures with preternatural powers, such as Anne of Geierstein's learned Persian Zoroastrian maternal grandmother. Some of this sense of invisible powers behind earthly powers spills over into Scott's descriptions of the illegal Secret Tribunals, which, historically, did not lack a certain amount of ecclesiastical approval. ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN is also a tale of troubadours, trade, corruption of the simple manners of the Swiss by booty won in their increasingly successful wars, of international politics, the decline of knighthood and of treachery. All this takes place on the eve of the Renaissance, the discovery of America and the Reformation. Scott is a master of human motivation. Scott's characters live and breathe and make the reader want to know more of the complex dynastic histories behind this very great historical novel. ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN also prefigures the genre of the detective novel, with many hints strewn as to the true identity of the several disguised principal characters. -OOO- Pros: This is very close to being the perfect historical novel. Period. Cons: Before or after reading ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN, we must learn a lot of European history. The Bottom Line: Read ANNE OF GEIERSTEIN as a pleasant introduction to late 15th Century English and French history. Read it also for story, romance, atmosphere, change of pace and unforgettable characters. Overall Product Rating: * * * * * (FIVE STARS) Excellent Recommended: Yes =-=-=-=-=-=-=- Black Mountain. 01/11/2007 |
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