The Silver Devil
Show Notes
The Silver Devil was published by Jacqui Bianchi, under the pen name of Teresa Denys, in 1978. We’ve talked before about bodice rippers with a cult reputation, and The Silver Devil, set in the “opulence and intrigue” of Renaissance Italy, is perhaps the moodiest, bloodiest, most devilish bodice ripper of them all. Denys only published two books: 1978’s The Silver Devil, and 1980’s The Flesh and the Devil, before her death in the late 1980s. While most out of print books fade into obscurity, both Denys’s books remain cult classics to this day.
Books Referenced
The Flesh and the Devil by Teresa Denys
Stormfire by Christine Monson
Gaywyck by Vincent Virga
The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole
Shadowheart by Laura Kinsale
Works Cited:
The Cambridge Companion to American Gothic edited by Jeffrey Weinstock
Transcript
Chels
Welcome to Reformed Rakes, a historical romance podcast that will kill your lover if you step out of line. My name is Chels. I'm the writer of the romance substack, the Loose Cravat, a romance book collector and booktoker under the username chels_eBooks.
Beth
I'm Beth, and I'm on booktok under the name BethHaymondReads.
Emma
I'm Emma, a law librarian writing about justice and romance at the Substack restorative romance.
Chels
The Silver Devil was published by Jackie Bianchi under the pen name of teresa Denys in 1978 on reformed rakes. We've talked before about bodice rippers with a cult reputation, and The Silver Devil set in the, quote, opulence and intrigue of Renaissance Italy, is perhaps the moodiest, bloodiest, most devilish bodice ripper of them all. Jackie Bianchi was a major Mills and Boon editor, discovering category romance superstars like husband and wife duo Wendy and Frank Brennan, who sold millions of books under the pen name Emma Darcy.
Chels
Interestingly, category romance is famous for sticking within certain bounds to complement the other books in the series. This is the appeal and why many unknown authors get their start writing category. By day, Bianchi edited these books, and by night she wrote masterpieces that pushed the boundaries of what gothic romance can be. The modern Gothic the woman fleeing a mansion. Books popularized in the 1960s and 70s reigned supreme, but Denys took these books out of Victorian England, increased the threat level, and made her readers grapple with moral quandaries. Denys only published two books, 1970 eight's The Silver Devil and 1980s the Flesh and the Devil before her death in the late 1980s. While most out of print books fade into obscurity, both Denys's books remain cult classics to this day.
Chels
As a reminder, bodice rippers contained rape and sometimes graphic violence. The Silver Devil is far from an exception. So please skip this episode if you need to, we will see you next time.
Chels
Okay, so I feel like I've been talking about The Silver Devil for probably.
Chels
As long as I've known y'all. So I guess now we can talk about first thoughts. And then of course we could compare it to Stormfire, which is another very violent bodice ripper that we read for this podcast.
Beth
I'm glad I read Stormfire before this one, but maybe I'd feel the same way if I read The Silver Devil first, where I felt like kind of prepared for this. I don't know, just the kind of style that Denys employs.
Emma
Yeah, I guess I'm thinking about it in terms of Stormfire because I think maybe two people would list those two. And maybe The Flame and the Flower, though, that's in print, so it's a little bit more accessible as maybe what you think of when you think of a bodice trooper. Just because of the sort of notoriety of The Silver Devil and Stormfire, though, maybe I'm realizing the notoriety of The Silver Devil may be coming from Chels talking about it so much, I feel like that's where people maybe know it from. But I think I'm really glad that we read Gaywyck before this one, because I think it reminded me more of Gaywyck.
Emma
I think the gothic and the Mistress of Melyn, and seeing what a bodice stripper does when it's more like a gothic, because I would not like Stormfire is not a gothic, and it has the violence and there's some overlap, like the importance of location. And obviously there's a Venn diagram of gothic tropes and Stormfire, but I think you could do that with most romance novels. But I think seeing these sort of two extremes of the bodice ripper genre being written so differently, having different interest within their characters, sort of puts into focus the subgenre that people kind of collapse and sort of talk about in broad strokes, can have a lot of variety amongst it. Even with these two sort of big examples that are often characterized as, like, the extreme of the genre. They're extreme in different ways.
Chels
Yeah. I think I do kind of feel like this book is more in conversation with Gaywick than it is like, I think particularly like Robbie and Felicia. What decisions would those two make together that would be fun to know.
Emma
They would get up to nothing good, opening doors. They shouldn't. Yeah. Revealing information that will become important later.
Chels
Before we continue our discussion of The Silver Devil, I'm going to give you a plot summary. I can't promise it'll be quick, but it'll be thorough.
Chels
The book begins with a brief prologue, as an unnamed narrator lies still on a bed. She’s pregnant, confined to a room that is stiflingly hot, surrounded by whispering voices she longs to block from her mind. A sense of foreboding looms. 1605, on the East coast of Italy, just north of the Kingdom of Naples. Felicia lives with her half-brother Antonio and his wife Celia.They both strongly loathe and mistreat Felicia, who they see as worthless for being born a bastard. Her mother never revealed who fathered her, and when Felicia’s mother died, her lot in life took a turn for the worse. Without a single protector or friend in life, Felicia is forced to do unpaid grunt work at her brother’s in, with Celia constantly belittling and berating her. They force her away from the public eye, warning her of the predatory men of the outside and implying she would find a way into sex work soon enough. Celia tells her she would have paid nuns to take her, if she could have spared the money. Because she’s so isolated, Felcicia begins to notice the changes in Fidena gradually. It seemed to become what she called a city in terror, crowded by soldiers and condottieri. War was coming. One night Felicia overhears Beniamino, a captain in the duke’s army, describe the situation. Duke Carlo, the Duke of Cabria who rules Fidena, married a Spanish woman named Madam Gratiana, who’s unfaithfulness spurred him to rebuke her in public. Enraged, Gratiana sent her kinsmen to Naples to start a war. The duke enlisted his two sons to drive out the invaders - Sandro, his eldest, who is illegitimate but an experienced soldier, and Domenico, the heir. Beniamino criticizes Domenico harshly, saying that he is a coward who only joined in on the conflict to be around handsome soldiers. A week later, a courier delivers the news of Duke Carlo’s victory: the enemy soldiers were driven back to Naples. Sandro, the duke’s dark-haired child, revered as the Flower of Fidena, initially led his troops to slaughter, only to be rescued by his younger brother Domenico, The Silver Devil. When the troops parade through the city in triumph, Felicia is left alone at the inn. She is able to pry open an old window upstairs to watch the procession in fascination, noting that most of them had dyed their hair white. “Here and there, someone’s natural coloring escaped the fashionable leprosy – a woman’s high-piled hair gleaming like a helmet of bronze, a man’s soot-black curls– but all the rest looked like living corpses bedecked for a macabre dance of death, their lizard eyes blinking gummily in the sunshine. Felicia is surprised to discover that Duke Carlo is so old, with gold powder dusting his white hair to give him the illusion of youth. She notes that dark-haired Sandro is short and handsome. When she peers out of the window to get a closer look at a third rider, her life changes forever. “He sat on his horse unmoving, a somber black figure in startling contrast to the vivid colors about him, the sun dazzling on his white gold hair. Unlike the duke and his bastard, there was no laughter in his face, and his eyes were not searching the house fronts for diversion–instead, he was staring intently straight up at my window.” Felicia notes that he was looking at her as a cat in front of a mousehole. Troubled and afraid, she closes the window. Late that night, she hears voices outside of the inn. Feeling sure that the riders have come for her, she tries to hide, only to encounter the rider from earlier in the taproom. He calls her “little crow,” and asks her if Antonio is her husband or lover. When she tells him that Antonio is her kinsman, the rider moved to touch her, backing her into a corner. Antonio comes charging in, and the rider tells him that he has come to purchase a rare wine. A flustered Antonio, who has no such wares, is confused, telling Felicia to leave. Later, Antonio brings a wine to Felicia, telling her that the rider that visited was noble. He bids her to drink the cordial for it will help her sleep, and Felicia doesn’t want to, but kindness from Antonio is so rare that she does anyway. An indeterminate amount of time later, she wakes up in a dungeon. Disoriented, she hears voices speaking of her, how the Duke wants her, and that she almost died in his attempt to take her from the inn. When she wakes in full, a kindly Jesuit priest named Father Vincenzo tells her that she drank something that gave her a fever. A small man, with unnaturally bleached hair named Piero della Quercia is sent to fetch Felicia for the duke. Knowing she’s to be his unwilling mistress, Felicia asks why he would bother to take her by force. “Because he soon tires of those who are too willing.” There was an oddly brittle note in Piero’s voice. “He is surfeited with brood mares and must mount the unicorn.” Piero taunts Felicia, warning her that the duke will tire of her shortly, as he does with all women. Once this inevitably occurs, she will be left at Piero’s mercy. Felicia is dressed in finery by a servant named Madonna Niccolosa. A beautiful younger woman named Maddelena watched Felicia’s preparation and spitefully remarks that she’s common and will not interest the duke. When Felicia is brought to the feast, she’s surprised to note that the duke is not there. Instead, the silver-haired rider who accosted her at the inn is seated at the place of honor. The rider is none other than Domenico, whose father, Duke Carlo, died the night Felicia was kidnapped, making Domenico the new Duke of Cabria. During the feast, Sandro turns to his brother Domenico and asks him for a gift from his former mistress, Maddelena. Felicia watches in horror as Piero’s warning comes to life in front of her: Domenico summons Maddelena and unceremoniously says she will serve his brother now, and an enraged Maddelena is dragged from the feast by Sandro. That night, Domenico rapes Felicia, then asks her to come to him gently instead of resisting. “Is it so hard to love me, Felicia?” he asks. “This is not love.” she responds. He tells her that she will soften to him, and Felicia worries that affection for her captor will only make her fate more difficult to bear. The next day, Domenico warns Felicia of his jealousy. If she can’t love him he tells her to “Take heed you love no one else, then, or the man you choose shall pay for it – his hand if it touches you, his eyes if he looks too long– or if his speech charms you, I shall take his tongue. There are other forfeits.” He demonstrates this early on: when a young courtier helps Felicia into her saddle when she goes riding the next day, Domenico whips the man on the cheek. Felicia learns from Domencio’s secretary, Ippolito, that Gratiana, the Spanish third wife of the deceased duke Carlo, was removed from court by Domenico because he suspected her of killing the former duke. The famously unfaithful Gratiana was also Sandro’s lover, which is why Domenico made a gift of Maddelena, to make up for his brother’s lost mistress. The Archbishop Francesco della Rafelle, who is Domenico’s great-uncle, is an important figure in the state of Cabria. Fifty years prior, the pope found himself in great debt to Duke Riccardo, who demanded that his brother, a bishop at the time, be elected to take the place of the former legate. The pope refused, and Riccardo rebelled and took power by force, declaring himself and his brother, the current Archbishop as joint rulers. The pope’s successor was willing to accept this new reality in exchange for a cancellation of his debt, but it’s widely believed that when the Archbishop dies, the pope will excommunicate the entire state of Cabria. Father Vincenzo tells Felicia that the Archbishop fears her power over the famously fickle Domenico, as she’s been his mistress for an unheard of four days. Felicia rejects this notion: she believes Domenico sees her as a plaything, and that he will grow bored of her. She’s distraught to further realize tha t she has come to love Domenico, and decides never to reveal her feelings. Piero continues to taunt Felicia, cornering her in her bedchamber and telling her that the duke is rumored to take a wife soon. “Where is your power now?” he asks her. She responds with “I had none to lose.” As Piero leaves, he drops a note. Felcia intends to return it to him, but Sandro intercepts her, telling her that she’s discovered a cipher, and that Piero could potentially be a spy. This is confirmed later – a horrified Piero wanders around the castle waiting for his comeuppance. Felicia calls him a “walking wraith.” One day, Maddelena, Domenico’s former mistress, tells Felicia that Domenico, in searching for the truth of Felicia’s parentage, discovered that Duke Carlo was her father, making her and Domenico half-siblings. Disgusted, Felicia begins to withdraw from Domenico, telling him she can’t lie with him because she got her period. Domenico grows suspicious, and he assumes that Felicia has taken a lover. He brings her down to a torture chamber to reveal Bernardo, the courtier who was kind to Felicia, stretched to the the fullest on the rack. Domenico pushes Felicia to reveal her perfidy, and Felicia tells him what Maddelena revealed to her about her parentage. Domenico summons Maddelena, who confesses that she lied out of jealousy to create a wedge between them. Domenico banishes Maddelena from court and tells her she will have to nurse men with leprosy, something Felicia describes as a “living death.” Domenico shares his suspicions with Felicia that this is the work of the Archbishop, who is sowing discord in order to get rid of Felicia. The next day, Domenico and the rest of his court, including Felicia, leave for Diurno for Domenico’s coronation as the new Duke of Cabria. Once there, Domenico shows Felicia a set of portraits of potential wives, not caring how much this distresses her. The Archbishop approaches Felicia when she is alone, telling her that he will help her escape to a nunnery, but that she has to do it quickly. Felicia, who cannot return to her former home at the inn because she will be seen as a ruined woman, has nowhere else to go once Domenico takes a wife and loses interest in her. She thinks she will be better off at a nunnery than to be passed on to another nobleman, watching Domenico and his new wife at a distance. She agrees to leave, and the Archbishop enlists a group of men to pay off her guards and escort her away. She doesn’t make it far before she’s intercepted by a furious Domenico, who had been informed of the plot by none other than Piero. In a nightmarish scene, Domenico lines up the seven people involved – to varying degrees – in facilitating Felicia’s escape, and sentences them all to hang. Felicia is weeping and devastated, hoping that Domenico will kill her too so that she no longer has to live with the memory of this night. Instead, Domenico orders Felicia to attend his coronation the next day pretending to be the woman he has chosen as his future wife, the illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Savoy. Felicia is baffled by this, and is embarrassed by the ruse, but nobody is the wiser that she is not of noble birth. Now that Domenico is crowned, they will all return to Fidena, but not before Domenico takes care of one final matter: Piero. Domenico organizes a hunting trip with Sandro, Piero, Felicia, and a handful of other men. Piero, who was previously cautious around the castle after losing his cipher, has been lulled into a sense of safety. Domenico seeks out Piero, seemingly confirming their connection is strong. Felicia is troubled by thinking, “I could hardly bear to see how flattery had swelled the man. All his caution had been swallowed up in conceit, and his voice, high and overexcited, was the only one uplifted in the whole party…. I felt sick. Domenico’s cruelty did not stop at keeping Piero ignorant of his doom; first he was letting him make a fool of himself.” Finally, a group of the hunting party leave, circling Piero. Domenico calls out to him softly: “You lost this writing the other day. Take it.” Piero’s realization that he’s not just been caught, but trapped, is devastating. At first he denies his treachery, then he swells with rage, accusing Domenico of dangling him on a string, turning away from his love and devotion. “I have never known whether I loved you more than I hated you.” he said almost conversationally. “God and the devil will have to winnow it out between them. But I fancy the devil will win; God may dislike my making you His rival and tip the scales so that I shall burn. And yet you never loved me, nor anyone.” Domenico gives the orders for Piero to be killed, then the three wolflike hunting dogs circle him, then attack. Felicia watches in horror as Piero, Domenico’s friend and confidante of thirteen years, is eaten alive. Back in Fidena, Domenico learns that his stepmother, Gratiana, enraged at being banished from court, is preparing to have Spanish forces invade Cabria. With little time to prepare, the city is under siege. Domenico orders Felicia to hide, but she decides that she would rather keep an eye on Domenico instead, paying off a servant boy for a pair of clothes so she can dress as a man and keep in Domenico’s proximity. The siege turns dire – they are outmatched and the Spanish have infiltrated the city, beginning to slaughter the people inside. Domenico’s courtiers beg him to escape and regroup, but he staunchly refuses. He only agrees when Ippolito, his secretary, promises to carry out an unnamed task. Domenico and some of his men escape down the castle walls on a rope, and it’s then that Ippolito finds Felicia and recognizes her disguise. He convinces her to follow Domenico and his men. Felicia makes it to safety, but Ippolito is hit by an arrow and killed. When Felicia delivers this news to Domenico, he is distraught over Ippolito’s death, giving Felicia little notice. Felicia is humiliated that Domenico should care so little for her, and decides that since she does not have the duke’s protection or favor, she must continue with her ruse as a young man. With the help of another servant, Santi, who recognizes her disguise, she cuts her long hair, knowing that she can’t wear her cap throughout the night. Felicia watches from afar as Domenico continues to act erratically, which she chalks up to his grief over Ippolito. They pass each other a few times, but he doesn’t speak to her and barely looks her way. As they make their way to an unknown destination, Domenico’s party comes across Sandro, who reveals that he is working with Gratiana. With Domenico’s death, Gratiana, Sandro’s former mistress, has promised to rule with Sandro. Domenico challenges Sandro to a fight, which Sandro, as an experienced soldier, believes he will easily win. It’s a long and vicious battle, but Domenico eventually kills Sandro, ordering his men to leave his body unburied on the road, as flies overtake him. One night, the duke catches Felicia in the dark, and as he accosts her it’s revealed that he is just now recognizing her. He thought she died in the castle, and it was her assumed death, not Ippolito's, that had caused him to grieve. Domenico orders Felicia, still disguised as a boy, to his side, and the rest of the party assume that Domenico has taken a new young lover. Their destination is to the Duke of Ferenza, also known as Amerighi, a man who is rumored to be mad but has created a large army that Domenico hopes to utilize. Amerighi is one of Domenico’s allies and, interestingly enough, the person Piero was trying to spy for. Domenico saw this as stupidity on Piero’s part, but its soon revealed that Amerighi is no ally. Before he was married to Gratiana, Domenico’s father, Duke Carlo had two other wives. The first was Domenico’s mother, and the second, Isabella, was said to have been murdered. Isabella was Amerighi’s sister, and her death was not murder, but suicide. Amerighi’s love for his sister was not brotherly but incestuous, and he blames Domenico for her death. Instead of giving him use of his army without strings attached, Amerighi challenges Domenico to a game of chess. If Domenico wins, he gets the soldiers to win back Fidena. If he loses, Amerighi gets to keep Felicia. Domenico agrees to play, and loses the game of chess. Felicia thinks, once again, that Domenico cares little for her since he bartered her so easily, but the truth is he never intended to keep his word. When Amerighi moves to claim Felicia, Domenico kills his guards and moves to fight the other duke. Amerighi then seems to lose touch with reality, confusing Felicia for his long-dead sister. When a captain arrives to question what happened, Domenico lies and tells him that he and Amerighi were sparring, and that the dead guards are a result of their overzealous defense of the man. The captain does not seem to believe Domenico, but because he is tired of being a part of an army that sees no action, goes along with it. Domenico means to leave Amerighi while taking his army to Fidena, but Felicia tells him she will not go with him. To her surprise, Domenico breaks down and confesses that he has loved her since he saw her and he wants her for a wife. He thought that if he kept her around long enough by force she would come to love him in return, as all women do. There was never another woman: he was going to pass her off as the Duke of Savoy’s illegitimate daughter, knowing the man would not protest his lie, in order to give her ties to the nobility. He showed her pictures of potential brides to make her jealous, but Felicia never gave him the reaction he desired. Felicia finally tells Domenico she loves him. They return with the army and take back the city of Fidena, and then they wed. The epilogue mirrors the prologue: Felicia is about to give birth to Domenico’s heir, and his reign of terror will continue.
Chels
All right, so now that we've talked about literally everything that happens in this book, now we can chat about it. So, gothic heroines are often heavily criticized for being spineless or too stupid to live. And I can see people say that Felicia is more of a passive heroine. What do you think of this critique and how Felicia's decisions compare to other main characters in Gothics?
Beth
I focused more on the critique of too stupid to live because it enraged me so much, because, first off, she's 18 or 19. She doesn't even know her own age, because her brother and sister in law don't tell her anything about herself or the family. And they restrict her socializing even with other servants. Like the other servants learn fairly quickly extending kindness to Felicia will get them in trouble. So we have this very sheltered girl thrust into the political world with no experience or knowledge of that world. So how would you expect someone like this to react? She watches, she observes. We get all the statecraft as she listens in rooms or listens to other people. And she does start to pick up on it near the end. Domenico is asking her questions near the end of the book, and she just kind of gets to the heart of what he's asking. So she says, "I know it does not matter to you whether the duke is mad or sane, so long as you get what you want from him. He looked at me sharply. You are growing politic. Soon I shall have to consider the things I say to you before I speak aloud."
Beth
And then another thing that annoys me about this critique is, to me, Teresa Denys is pulling from the Anne Radcliffe gothic tradition. So Anne Radcliffe, she's very popular in the 1780s, she really popularized the gothic tradition and the genre and the convention of the virtuous heroine and the overbearing aristocrat who preys on her and then the man she actually ends up marrying at the end of the book. So I guess I see this influence with the setting in historical Italy. But also I feel like Denys is asking the question, what if the heroine succumbed to the aristocrat?
Emma
Yeah, I think too stupid to live categorically...Don't say it. It's a bad critique. It's a lazy critique. If a heroine is making such incomprehensible decisions, just call the book bad. Don't call the character stupid. I think that's the line that I have. I hate that phrase. I do like Beth's point about the relationship with the Gothic and falling in love with the aristocrat instead of the sort of maybe nobler.
Beth
Right. Like the virtuous man,
Emma
the virtuous brother. Because that relationship between Sandro and Domenico. We'll talk about this later and what Sandro's plot ends up being. But the idea that Domenico the sort of heir who is not doing things right or has machinations or is trying to get away with things. If this was a regency, if this was a ballroom set book, that guy would get a comeuppance. He would look like a fool at the end of the book. But it's like Domenico is not going to ever look like a fool. Like he's always going to be in charge. So Felicia doesn't. There's no route for her to actually have that direction. So it's like she's actually smarter by saying, I'm going to go with the way the wind blows and the power, because that's a decision that's keeping her alive. She's not dying. Like, sort of famously, she is avoiding the violence from Domenico directly.
Chels
I know we're always talking about people, not thinking about how in first person Gothics, we're still dealing with the main character's lack of information. But the interesting thing about The Silver Devil is that even though Felicia is ignorant of court, she's able to tell right away that these people mean her harm because she's not stupid.
Chels
It's just like, what does she know about this world? What does she know about these people? And what can she do, though, to retaliate? She can't leave. As we find out later, Domenico would punish her, and now that she's lived as a man's mistress, she wouldn't be welcomed back at The Eagle, which is a life that was already almost unbearable for her when she was still seen as. So, like, what are the choices that people think that Felicia has to make her be smart. She's really kind of, like, backed into a corner here. And I liked that conversation so much about what you were saying, Beth, about the heroines. Like, I think that's what makes The Silver Devil so unique is that the fact that we fully buy into Felicia's innocence until she gets what she wants, which is Domenico's love. So this is kind of the point where we have to ask, what is it to want Domenico's love? What do you have to ignore and endure for the HEA? And that makes it such a spooky and kind of depressing, but also very metal ending.
Beth
I feel like she's good at surviving, too. When you were talking about that, she's good at kind of like, seeing who might be hopeful to her or what can she get from that person? I think she's always kind of done that in her life. Like, what can I do to survive this?
Emma
Like, she doesn't know a lot about the court, but she's also more successful at the court than other players like Piero and Madeleina, because her priority is survival rather than power. And I think that comes from her background with Antonio and Celia, that it's like that is frankly like a more tenuous situation for her livelihood. If she gets kicked out of that house, where is she going to when the implication in the court is when Domenico is done with her, she'll go to a nunnery or be passed off, and she'll have this emotional anguish. But there'll be like a place for her. And so it's like, as bad as the abuses and violence of Dominico's court are, she acknowledges it's like a higher world for her. And she has more places to fall than Antonio and Celia. And I don't think Madeleina and Piero understand that as a power that she has that ultimately leads to her quote unquote, success at the court. But I think it's also one of the things that makes her attractive to Domenico. He likes that aspect of her. He first becomes attracted to her in the inn. I think that's important why he's so drawn to her.
Chels
It was so crass, but like, he's surfed of brood mares. Now he wants to mouth the unicorn. Piero.
Emma
That's how people talk to strangers.
Chels
He just came right out the gate with that, too. That was like, I think the first time we meet him also, that's one.
Emma
Of those things when you were first reading it, you're like, oh, Domenico's like, this is what Domenico's like. And you're like, once you learn about Piero and Domenico's relationship, you're like, oh, Piero is saying that out of jealousy. He's like, he's discarded me. He will discard you as well. And so rather than this surface level, like, this is just the way Domenico is with everyone. It's like you can kind of read it as like, oh, Piero has to tell that to himself to justify his own disposal. And that's one of those things that changes once you have all the information, post revelations that Felicia has.
Chels
Right? And it's also too, Piero seems like he's the only one. And we're going to talk about Piero a lot today because Piero is the best character. But Piero, he has this 13 year long relationship with Domenico. And so what Felicia is being told about Domenico's other mistresses is that they will last. Like, like even his relationship with, like Maddalena it wasn't like a sustained relationship. Like he would have an affair with her and she would do something else. So the one big relationship in his life outside of Felicia was only Piero. So it does make sense. Even though he does have all these mistresses and he does quickly lose interest and discard people, it does make sense that Piero is way more threatened by Felicia than he would be anyone else because there was never anyone who came close to him until this point. The Silver Devil stands out among spotta strippers for the really unique way that violence is enacted in this case, it's punishment by proxy. So there are two really gruesome instances that stand out. The uncoordier, who Domenico suspects as being Felicia's lover, who is put to the rack, and the seven people Domenico sentences to hang after Felicia's escape attempt.
Beth
I don't want to derail the conversation, but I think The Silver Devil is, like, a pretty good exploration of proximity to violence because of Felicia's position. So as I was reading this, I'm like, I think a lot of people now might associate this with mafia romance. I don't love Mafia romance. I feel like sometimes authors will stop short of truly examining the violent characters that they have created. Like Teresa Denys clearly has no qualms that way. But I kind of read mafia romances as kind of a spiritual successor to gothics in that way, that proximity to violence, where you have this violent man at the head of a violent organization. And most authors construct their worlds as very patriarchal. So arranged marriages are a feature, and most women in these stories have to grapple with their complicity. And honestly, the standard is embracing the darkness. At the end of the book, they kind of are okay with, I was born in the darkness, raised in the darkness. I'm going to be part of this violent world. So, yeah, I don't know. That was just something I thought about when I was reading this book.
Chels
It's so funny because the way know because of, we talk about reputations all the, like, silver Devil has this reputation, but it is kind of like the same thing you have happen in some mafia romances where I think it's a Danielle Lori book. And I know she sucks, right? Like, she sucks,
Beth
She's like a trump supporter or.
Chels
Yeah, yeah. I haven't read this book, but this scene became like a meme. A meme. It became a thing on TikTok where it's like someone touched his girl and then he blew up a gas station.
Beth
Yeah, they weren't even dating yet.
Chels
I think he, like, oh, my goodness.
Beth
Tries to grab her butt, and he's like, what's wrong? And then she tells him, he goes inside and he sets the gas station on fire. And everyone's like, oh, my goodness. He set the gas station on fire for her.
Emma
Setting the gas station on fire. Not that hard. Famously flammable.
Chels
Step it up.
Chels
Did you put a man to the rack? Right?
Emma
I think gas stations catch on fire accidentally all the time.
Chels
Yeah, well, I guess just kind of like taking it back to the punishment by think. I think Denys is cutting off any like, well, why doesn't she just leave criticisms off at the knees? So there's a lot more at stake than Felicia's virtue or her pride. There's like these actual human casualties. The Domenico lays at her feet for her, quote unquote, bad behavior. So I keep thinking of that moment where Domenico sentences all of those people who helped her escape to death. And then Felicia thinks that the memory of the stay will be unbearable if she goes on living. She's just like, the worst thing that could happen to me is me knowing that this happened. So it's just kind of like this other. It's not just Felicia's life. It's not just like her choices have this very obvious cause and effect because of the way that he chooses to keep her in line. But she does go on living, and I think thematically, like gothic romance. As you were talking about, Beth, it's like, what if I wasn't dragged into darkness? What if I was born there? So if Felicia is to love Domenico, to truly love him, and to stay with him of her own volition, she's staying with the man that did these things.
Chels
It's a sort of tacit endorsement that brings her close to his level because most of the people he killed were entirely innocent or minimally involved in the escape, there's no plausible deniability for Felicia. She knows Domenico is violent and erratic and evil, but in the end, she still chooses to marry him.
Emma
I think the sort of arc of the violence, again, like going back to Stormfire. I struggled to read this book like it was hard to read. There were scenes that were hard to read. It was not to the level of anguish for me, as Stormfire. And I think part of that goes to. I don't think Denys is super interested, at least in this book, in the cycles of abuse, that's not really the arc of the violence that she's dealing with. It's more like the descent into violence. Domenico is constantly upping what he's willing to do, but in Stormfire, there's this cycle of abuse of Catherine and then emotional connection and then a revelation and then more abuse of Catherine. And so it gets to that sort of domestic violence, sort of, how do we move on? How can we ever be together? Because this is how our relationship is defined. Felicia's never really worried that she's going to die at Domenico's hand. It's like, what is he going to do to other people? And so, again, it's that these books that are sort of put together because of their extreme violence just deal with such different things.
Emma
And it's like, yeah, violence. Like romance has lots of different ways that it manifests in relationships. And the reading experience is very different. And also the narrative structure of how the violence intersects with the romance is very different.
Chels
Like, having the reveal that Domenico has loved her the whole time. That's a very gothic thing. Like, the thing, like the question of am I bad for loving? Like, is this. This, which is not even something that she really even thinks. She doesn't think it's possible. And I think kind of like having it works so well as a gothic. But I can see why you wouldn't experience that emotional anguish because you don't have that emotional connection between Felicia and Domenico, because you have to keep up the mystery of what are Domenico's true feelings about Felicia. What is Domenico going to like? In order for the story to work, Domenico has to be very erratic and impenetrable. If it was so obvious that he was going to marry her and that he loved her the whole time, I feel like it would feel maybe a little bit goofy, but because of that, it just functions so much differently. So it's kind of like, yeah, I see sometimes these books on lists together of similar books, and I'm like, they're not, not really.
Emma
And like, Sean and Catherine both have a moment in Stormfire where they're like, oh, no, I love this person. And Felicia kind of has that, but she doesn't really feel. I didn't get the sense that she was upset about loving Domenico. It was just of course, of course. That's what happens when you're with Domenico, is that you become fascinated by him, you become interested in him. And it's like the oh, no is more like, I've set myself up for pain, not, I'm surprised by my own feelings. So, yeah, the arc is totally different. It's wild.
Chels
Yeah, I think it's like that first.
Chels
Night that they are together.
Chels
She's like, oh, it would be so easy to love him. I can't let this happen. So she's kind of like, already braced for it. It's not a surprise for her. And I was surprised, too, because I.
Chels
Remember this line, because I love this line.
Chels
But it's when Felicia realizes that she's in love with Domenico. He's going through the potentials of the pictures of his future brides, and he summons her over.
Chels
And then she thinks he held his hand out to me without speaking. And it was then as I went.
Chels
To him like a falcon flying to his fist. I realized I loved him, and that was, like, maybe a couple of chapters into the book that was not very far. And I was just kind of, like, surprised the second time around that it's so never. The tension isn't really so much about how she feels about Domenico. It's how Domenico feels about her is a lot more attention.
Beth
I was honestly surprised when she was like, I think I love this guy. I was like, I understand why you would be fascinated by someone, by him. But, yeah, it is very early on that she's like, yeah, I love him. But I guess I kind of just chalked it up to, like, this is literally the first person she's ever been with, and he is kind of interested in her. I could see why she might feel that early on
Emma
And going from a place where Antonio and Celia were saying her entire life, nobody is interested in you. We're only keeping track of you because it would cost us money to get rid of you. Yeah, I think if people talk about the abuse and violence in this book and focus on Domenico, and it's like you're not acknowledging that Felicia's coming from an abusive starting place that she has less power in, at least at court, she has some power over Domenico, even if she's in the process of learning it. As we're reading her plot, she has no power at inn. She has no ability to fight back or to gain anything. So, yeah, when she moves up, even if she has no knowledge of what exactly is going on politically, she knows that she has some stakes and some power at her disposal, and that power seems to be part of the attraction that the proximity to him gives her.
Chels
Speaking of proximity, I want to talk about Piero, Domenico's childhood friend who loved him and one of the main antagonists of the book. So I think he's the most compelling character in the entire story. So we're going to talk about his death a little bit later. But first, what do you think of his role as Felicia's tormentor and his betrayal of Domenico?
Beth
All I put is I honestly could read a story where Domenico and Piero live up their story. Like, maybe there's a version of The Silver Devil where it's like Piero and Domenico's book. Yeah, that was what I had, like.
Chels
A prequel or even just like an alternate version.
Beth
I feel like. I don't know.
Emma
Yeah, he was my favorite character. I was really interested in him and his motivations more than Domenico. I think probably because he's just like, there's so much mystery to Domenico and what is he doing? And the politics. Piero is constantly telling us why he's doing things, and it's because he's obsessed with Domenico. And it's like, okay, I'm on board with that. He's in love with Domenico and all the violence and all the power, and he has the power to externalize these thoughts. So Felicia is in this quandary where she feels like she can't say anything to Dominico. Piero is, like, talking a lot, which I liked. And so I feel like we also get a lot of understanding of why Felicia is falling in love with Domenico through Piero. Like, when Beth was saying that, she was surprised of when Felicia says, I think I'm in love with Domenico and you're okay. Like, why? I think the answer doesn't come from Felicia being able to articulate it. I think it comes from Piero's sort of obsession with him. So we're, like, watching someone else fall in love with, like, I feel like, again, if this was, like, a more standard genre fiction setup, it's like, I would be eagerly anticipating Piero's book.
Emma
But, R I P, he dies. I just want him to. If it was slightly less violent and he didn't die, I would be like, oh, I want his sequel so bad. But he does get eaten by dogs.
Beth
Yes.
Chels
The way you just said, he does get eaten by dogs.
Beth
Bummer!
Emma
No HEA For our boy Piero.
Chels
No. Oh, my gosh. So, yeah, of course. So Piero is my favorite character. And it's kind of astounding to me that Denys can make me have sympathy for such a little worm of a man.
Chels
So Piero is the one who is constantly telling Felicia that her days are numbered and that Domenico is only interested in her because she's new.
Chels
So he tells her, quote, he is a sort of child in that he wants nothing so much as the thing that is withheld. And once he has it, he breaks.
Chels
It, like is not or tosses it away, unvalued. And this is something that he brings up repeatedly. Like, every time Felicia is, like, doing something, he pops up out of a corner.
Chels
He whispers something a little nasty in her ear. He's like, domenico's gonna get tired of you. I heard he's looking for wives. Better wait until you're my mistress. So there's this really weird situation where Piero is rooting for Felicia's downfall for two reasons. He's jealous of her. He's jealous of the way that she has Domenico's affection. But he also wants Felicia. He wants her to be his mistress afterwards. And this is something that eventually makes Domenico mad. He's like, I can see you panting after, like, don't think I don't see that. Just, like, thinking about why Piero wants Felicia, that it. Is it because it's something. Because Felicia is a person that Domenico loves. And so once he has Felicia, he's that much closer to that. Is that what it is?
Chels
His motivations are a little complex. Even though he's always talking.
Emma
It feels like the song Girl Crush, where it's like the woman singer is singing to the woman, and it's like, I want you because you smell like him. And it's like, what is happening? Like, he doesn't have the gay language to explain why he wants Felicia because of her proximity to Domenico. Also, I just feel like I always picture Piero, like, leaning up against a door jamb.
Chels
Hi.
Emma
I have something to say. I have something to make you doubt everything that you know up until this point, right? He's fun.
Beth
I don't want to be simplistic, but I feel like that quote you read, Chels, where Pierre was like, he's kind of a child. He only wants something that's withheld. I'm like, is that why he loves. She's like, won't break. He's trying to make her jealous. And she's like, yep, that's a nice picture of a potential bride.
Chels
I mean, that is kind of a question, right?
Chels
Because the only thing we know about Domenico's feelings for Felicia comes at the end where he's like, I've always loved you. I loved you since I saw you. But it's like, what did he like? What was that conversation like? So if you'll remember, he sees her in the window. Felicia is like, oh, no. I should not have looked at this man which is correct.
Chels
She's very correct. You should not have looked at him. He comes for her later, and she doesn't know who he is. And he kind of, like, corners her in the tap room. And the conversation that they have there is very simple and straightforward. It's basically he's just like, are you Antonio's lover? And she's like, no, we're kin. And then he calls her little crow. And then he kind of goes to move to touch her, and she's kind of, like, jerking away from him. I don't think that just because Domenico is.
Chels
Domenico is a rapist. Domenico and his friends are rapists. These are things that it makes it kind of clear that they have done and do before. So I don't think it's, like, necessarily Felicia resisted in that moment, and that's why he wants her. It's kind of like a big fog, and I think you can say many different things to it. Like, maybe she is really different. Maybe he does really love her, or maybe it's because she doesn't tell him she loves him until the very, very end. And that's what he wanted so badly. So that is the thing withheld.
Chels
What's going to happen now? How does their reign of terror continue.
Chels
Back to Piero again!
Chels
So the standout scene of the book for me is Piero's death. So even though we are told explicitly that it's coming and we've seen Domenico kill and torture other people by this point, it still manages to be very shocking.
Chels
Why do you think that is?
Beth
I think why it's so shocking is because it does end up to be very violent. And like Emma said, some dogs rip him apart. But also, I think, and this is so amazing that Denys does this, where it's like, I feel like your dread about something that's about to happen makes the thing worse. And so she kind of does that to the reader where she's like, Domenico's like, yeah, I'm going to do this to Piero. So the whole time you're like, is he going to follow through? When is it going to happen? How is it going to, like, yeah, I feel like the whole time you're kind of, like, all tensed up inside, and then when it actually. Sorry, go ahead.
Chels
No, go ahead.
Beth
I was just saying, when it actually happens, it's so much worse than you actually imagined.
Chels
Yeah. A lot of plot happens between Felicia.
Chels
Discovering Piero's cipher and his eventual punishment. So I think the reader goes on a similar journey as. So, like, first we're waiting for the other shoe to drop. We've already witnessed Domenico's cruelty, so we're bracing ourselves for something, like, almost unendurable. Then when it doesn't come, we let.
Chels
Our guard down and we start to think of other matters. So, like, when he first lost the note, Pierre was really jumpy and quiet, like, way more cautious than he normally is. And then with time, he resumes tormenting Felicia, and he's lulled into this sense of security by Domenico's renewed interest in him.
Chels
Then the hunting scene occurs.
Chels
So that moment when Piero realizes he's been cornered is really devastating because he.
Chels
Finally has nowhere to go. He has no more courtly lies at his disposal. And he spews all of this pent up vitriol at Domenico, like, abrading him for not loving him properly, for not seeing how good of a friend he. Could be, for ensorceling him for 13 years of his life. So when Domenico yells back at him, he has one of his fits where. He almost falls unconscious and Piero catches him. And they are kind of like locked in this near embrace. And then when Domenico comes to, he immediately orders Piero's death. So this detail, to me reveals that there was a little bit of truth.
Chels
To what Piero was saying. So while they're fighting, Piero says, Domenico made himself my food, then stinted me. I tried to rule him. And so I did for a little. Then he grew older and too proud to bear with me. And then Domenico responds, should the son of a duke be ruled by his lackey?
Chels
So I think there was true affection between them. But now Domenico is hardened and embarrassed by it.
Emma
Yeah, I thought about this with the switch from embarrassment from a place of affection. It seems like this is like the longest relationship that Domenico had of whatever the relationship was, Piero has stuck around. But that switch with that laying on top of the power plays in court with the queer relationship, because both participants of Piero and Domenico, and I think Piero references this, or Domenico references it when he said, should a duke be ruled by his lackey? Piero has the potential to have power in court. Felicia as a woman can only secure power and safety through Domenico. But Piero can sort of wrest some for himself. And so before Domenico is actually like an adult and a duke has the chance to have power over him, not just affectionately, but politically, Felicia can't ever really hope for the latter. But that means that her relationship with Domenico has the staying power because he gets to be sort of singular in his duke. And this is ironic because this is the one thing that Peiro is telling her she doesn't have. She does not have lasting power. She is not going to stick around. And he's like projecting his reality onto their relationship between Piero and Domenico.
Emma
One of them has to be destroyed because their power plays are always going to exist in a zero sum game of this patriarchal power that exists in the court, where Piero, even if he's in a relationship with Domenico, can turncoat and go look for another duke to have an allyship with. They're just always going to be these power players. They can't be compatible in this way, in the system that is built around them. And that's like the thing that I guess Piero doesn't understand about Felicia's relationship. I guess he reads her as passive and less skilled at dealing with Domenico's power. But actually her passivity and lack of political power makes her more powerful in her relationship with Domenico than Piero was.
Chels
So the two main queer characters in the story, Domenico and Piero, are both pretty horrible. So we spoke about this in our Gaywyckepisode. The idea of having queer characters be lecherous or villainous kind of automatically slots them into bad queer representation criticism.
Chels
But The Silver Devil seems to be so matter of fact, almost unconcerned about anyone's sexuality, which I think is kind of a good counter to that criticism. I also kind of see Domenico as being kind of like interview with a vampire's Lestat. Like an obsessive, abusive, bisexual nightmare who is compelling because of how horrible he is.
Chels
Would you agree with me here?
Beth
I put, of course, four times. But you have to read that in Lestat's voice.
Chels
You also have to splice as long as you're coming home to.
Emma
Course, I did picture Lestat basically the whole time. I was like, this is. Yeah, like, I need like a fan edit of The Silver Devil of just that interview of the vampire. Yeah, the bad queer representation. But one thing I like as far as queer representation goes that I think actually was good in this book, not that we need that all the time, is I liked that the comments about the sexuality that were sort of derisive were limited to the lower classes. Domenico sort of suspect when he's introduced as like, oh, he only wanted to join the army because he wanted to sleep with the pretty soldiers. And then after that we sort of moved to the court. It's like nobody would say anything about Domenico's sexuality in court because he's the Duke. They get to do whatever they want. It's like, yeah, we talk about, I think, people conflate or collapse the way that queer relationships worked in history. They're like, oh, we do it right now and we're accepting of gay people now. But back then it was like this and you would have been punished in this one specific way that is very based on Victorian notions of sodomy.
Emma
It's like, yeah, an italian duke during the Renaissance can sleep with whoever he wants and nobody in court is going to think that he is going to be upset with him or try to rest power from him because of that reason. They're trying to wrest power from him for political reasons. They're just totally separate so I liked the matter of factness. I think that's actually an example of interesting and good queer representation, that it's more complicated than the projection of Victorian mores onto historical romance, which I think happens more often than it ought to.
Chels
Yeah, I think just kind of like the idea of representation entirely. We talked about this a lot in the Gaywyck episode, but it's basically because there are some people who write gay characters in a way that's just really derisive and derogatory. Everything else has to be laid out and explained and qualified in a way that makes it very clear that this is not being endorsed. And I think that's kind of the point that queer people are getting to right now, is where we're like, we cannot keep having this conversation. We cannot keep holding our media to this weird standard. Nobody is ever like, hey, that heterosexual relationship seemed a bit off. Well, actually, no, that's not true. All of romance fans do that for every single.
Beth
Right. Everything has to be, never mind a healthy portrayal of a relationship. You can't ever do anything wrong.
Chels
Think that, like, I think giving the big emotional heft of the story to Domenico and like, is kind of what and making that really interesting is if we were going to do good versus bad, making the really interesting in a book where every single person is bad, be between the two queer characters. Yeah, that's pretty cool. Piero's not getting a book.
Emma
I know Maybe it'll inspire me to write fan fiction where he gets away. Maybe he, like, goes torments another part of Italy. I want him to have a happily ever after because I think he deserves it. Even though he's terrible.
Chels
He's never done anything good. It's just like, there's nothing. Like, we don't witness him do anything good.
Emma
There's no redeeming qualities.
Chels
There's literally no. And then even the way that he's described. Because when they're marching through the city at the beginning, Felicia notices that everybody has white hair. They all dye their hair to match Domenico because that's like the fashion at court. But the only specific person that gets a call out for doing that is Piero. Like, no other character is just like, oh, this Domenico follower. It's only Piero. There's never anything flattering that we're giving, but it's just like, that's my baby.
Emma
Just on the topic of Domenico being a bisexual nightmare, I want to point out my favorite part of Domenico's personality, that happens at a very harrowing scene. Just in case someone doesn't read the book because fair if you don't want to. But my favorite Domenico part is when Felicia is attempting not to have sex with him because she thinks they're brother and sister. And it's like very fraught. It's like one of the moments where you really think like, oh, he might be very violent towards her, but then he couches it and he's like, oh, you're sick. You're on your period. I know women get sick on their periods. Of course, we don't have to have sex right now. And you're like, oh, this is kind of, she thinks she's gotten away with something. And then later, when he's revealing his torture of Bernardo, he says, I know how periods work. You've been on your period for, like a week. And it's, again, in this moment of total fraughtness where it's like this man is on the rack and Domenico has to make sure that it's like, yeah, I've had sex with people before. I know how periods work.
Emma
It sent me. I was like, oh, yeah, he is a nightmare.
Chels
I'm a cool duke. I know what periods are like.
Emma
Right, both of also Felicia, that maybe is one of her more naive moments. It's like, you think this is going to stop him from having sex with you. You're not stupid,
Chels
I feel he would almost be into that. Yeah, I feel like that would be more in character if you wouldn't be like, right on. That's kind of his thing, right? Which is another point for Domenico. Point for non canon Domenico, I guess, because Domenico I made up in my mind, because Domenico in the book was just like, oh, okay.
Chels
So, so much time in the book is dedicated to Piero's betrayal. But it's not until the third act that we find out that the biggest portrayal is by Sandro, Domenico's half brother with aspirations ruling. So did you see this coming?
Chels
And was he effective as a last minute villain?
Emma
I think so. Because, again, I was rooting for Piero to be saved the whole time. I was hoping that he would get away or something, because he's just always standing in doors being gay. But I think I expected Ippolito, because there's a comment early in the book where I think the priest tells Felicia, like, you could only trust Ippolito. And I was like, that's a little on the nose. I was like, maybe he's the person who will be betraying Domenico or something. And Felicia takes that to heart. And Ippolito actually is one of the only good people in the book. And then I think Sandro has sort of this reaction to Piero's cipher that I think could have been a hint that he would be more important later for the overall intrigue. But so much is happening with that cipher plot. I don't think I suspected Sandro specifically, but really, everyone in the book is so bad. You really do feel this power vacuum. It's like anyone, if they find a chance to take over, they would. And I feel like it wasn't a total surprise, but I wasn't, like, waiting for Sandro to turn coat.
Beth
Yeah, I didn't anticipate Sandro's betrayal, but it didn't surprise me. Like you said, Emma, these are all kind of, like, terrible, so. And I thought it was didn't just because I didn't anticipate it. I wasn't surprised that the illegitimate older brother would try and rest power from his younger brother. I think there's a version of this book where Domenico contrives to preemptively kill Sandro to prevent this from happening. I feel like that would be in character for him, but then we wouldn't have a third act, so obviously that's why that didn't happen. And then I think a lot of this book is about lineage and who is legitimate. Domenico legitimizes Felicia by concocting a story that she's the illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Savoy. He only needs her to have this connection to the aristocracy, kind of to satisfy his great uncle so they can get married.
Chels
Because everyone at court is a villain, say, for, like, Ippolito and Father Vincenzo, it's very easy to divide characters into, like, okay, these are Domenico's allies. These are Domenico's foes. Instead of take stock of their character, which is how I think Denys is able to surprise you with Sandro's portrayal, even though it's partially telegraphed. So Sandro is supposedly a charming man and is much better liked than Domenico, at least by the people. I don't know if it is like. At court, but we see him commit similar atrocities, namely the rape of an unwilling Maddelena and a married innkeeper that takes his fancy.
Chels
So when Felicia starts to fret about what will happen to Piero when it's discovered that he's a spy, Sandro tells her, stay a little longer at court, lady, and your tender conscience will cease to prick you. In a week or two, a month a man's life will be nothing to you if it stands in the way of your affairs. Why should you be so squeamish? The man is as good as dead.
Chels
So he's, like, literally telling her, when people get in your way, you're not going to care if they die. And it's hard to think of someone feeling that way about Domenico without it being like, at least it was hard to feel that Sandro felt that way about Domenico because he seemed so easy going. But this speech, plus his prior relationship with, like, she was his mistress, and she was also banished from court. So there's kind of, like, this bad blood there that Domenico wasn't really paying attention to because Domenico only really pays attention to Domenico. So I was definitely surprised by it. Even know Piero's dead. We've got this much of the book left. Something's got to happen, right?
Emma
I like the comment about everyone at court being a villain, because I think, for Denys, you cannot exist in this world and not be a villain. It is a corrupt system that they're in, and especially those chapters at the beginning and the end where they're talking. Felicia talks about how hard it is to live in the city, like, how smelly it is, how hard it is to make ends meet. The kingdom is not thriving. All the splendor of court comes at an expense that we see at the beginning of the book. And so it's like, if you're in this court, you're taking advantage of the world at large, and so you are a villain. Whether you're a person who is raping women that you want to rape or if you're killing people who are getting in your way. Those character traits are manifestations of the villainry that takes place at the court. It reminds me a lot of Roger Corman horror films, where Vincent Price plays like a duke or something, like the Edgar Allan Poe adaptations, like the mask of the morgue. And is that what it's called? The red mask of the red Death and the fall of the house of usher with Vincent Price, where it's like, Vincent Price would be.
Emma
I think he could be Domenico or Sandro. And a young woman comes and it's like he's very compelling and all the people are bad, and you're disgusted with his violence. But then also, what choice do you have? He's the devil manifest, and you're going to have great Roger Corman costumes and stuff. I feel like I would watch a Roger Corman adaptation of this book. That would be great.
Chels
So there's the incest fake out when Maddelena lies to Felicia about her being.
Chels
Related to Domenico, but there's reference to real incest later, between the Duke of forenza and his sister, Domenico's stepmother, Beth. You mentioned before that there's a reason that there are so many incest lines in gothic literature. I was hoping we could talk about that here.
Beth
Okay. So I think it's kind of important to note that at the heart of the Gothic is an examination of power and like, a transgression of boundaries. So this kind of toeing or crossing the line fascinates us. Authors can explore why those lines are there in the first place and where a specific culture draws the line. Quote. The gothic narratives give shape to culturally specific anxieties and tabooed desires, and that those anxieties and desires will always have to do with power and prohibition, what is forbidden to whom based on their subject positions within a particular social context. So I kind of see this exploration of power at the heart of The Silver Devil. Now, specifically about incest. We can trace its use to the very first Gothic, the Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole, published in 1764. So Manfred, whose only son, Conrad, the prince of Otranto, dies. Manfred obsesses over replacing his heir and decides to marry his son's fiance, Isabella. That might not seem like incest, but according to roman catholic law it was. And beyond that, Isabella views her mother in law as her mother. And the friar warns Manfred not to pursue the incestuous designs on thy contracted daughter.
Beth
And all the supernatural elements in the book are kind of, like, aimed at Manfred and side with Isabella. So I think what's interesting about incest is it seems like a hard and fast line, but it has changed over time. Like, do we consider Fannie's and Edmund's relationship from Mansfield park to be incestuous like their cousins? And I think most of us are like, well, that was 1814 and they didn't have genetic testing yet. And it wasn't like a social thing yet that you didn't marry your cousin, which is true. And then there's this episode of New Amsterdam, which is like this run of the mill medical show. But they had this storyline on that I thought was kind of interesting, where a couple comes to see this psychiatrist, Dr. From, after having discovered their half siblings a few days before their wedding. So if I remember correctly, they're both children of sperm donors and they decide to do, like, a 23 and me kit for fun before the wedding. And that's when they discover they're, like, half siblings and they've been a couple for at least nine years. Dr. Frims suggests that if they take surgical precautions to prevent having kids, what's really to stop them from being together?
Beth
I think this thought experiment challenges our cultural boundary by taking up the two obvious reasons why we have it in the first place. Future children. And like you, grew up together as a family. And The Silver Devil, the fake out between Domenico and Felicia feels. I don't know. For me, it feels kind of like a test of Felicia's devotion. After Maddelena lies to her, Felicia still finds herself attracted to Domenico. And this is her speaking. To my horror, my new knowledge made no difference to my inward response. When Domenico kissed me, I felt the same excitement, the same languor. I was so deep in iniquity that I could love my own brother as carnally as if he was no kin. And then after that, she kind of forces herself to be rigid and unresponsive. And she is really disturbed by this knowledge. But I think she's also disturbed that she doesn't really feel any differently about Domenico. And then, as Chels mentioned earlier, there is a real incestuous relationship, and that's between the Duke of Forenza and his sister Isabella. And I guess I kind of see this one as like an additional signifier of his madness.
Beth
And because there are multiple types of familiar relationships, I think the type employed is showing different power imbalances and functions differently in any plot. And overall, from the British gothic tradition, I see this anxiety about losing and gaining fortunes and consolidating family power as a consistent theme. Especially, like I mentioned before, legitimacy is such a big deal in the silver Devil . And you can really see Denys looking into that.
Emma
Yeah. For the theme of incest, I was thinking about two different sort of things, I think parallel to the book. So, like predating gothic novels, I was thinking about the theme of incest in fairy tales and how fairy tales are often, like, there's this anxiety about incest and anxiety about children leaving the home paralleled the two that I thought about with Stormfire were the fairy tale Donkey Skin and Beauty and the Beast. So Donkey Skin is more directly about incest, where it's similar to the plot of the gothic novel that Beth talked about, where the father's wife dies and he promises her, I'll only marry someone who's as beautiful and virginal and pure as you. The daughter grows up and then he feels like contractually fairytale, obligated to marry the daughter, who's the only one as beautiful as her mother. And the daughter does not want to. And so she requests increasingly expensive gifts of dresses from her father until she can get away by dressing up as his donkey. And that's why it's donkey skin. But it's about this anxiety about children leaving their kingdom, leaving their home. But also the anxiety about the extreme, which is like keeping them in in this incestuous relationship.
Emma
And then also the incest that's sort of prevalent in the parallel kingdoms to the kingdom of Cambria. The actual mean we have, like the Hapsburgs in the. Not the whole. I don't remember what they were in charge of. They were in Spain and also Holy Roman Empire. But there's like, the nobility and consolidation of power through incest, which was mostly like, I think uncles and nieces creates this consolidation of power that then also is the downfall of the family because of the genetic collapse of the family. So I think that anxiety of a family unit makes sense here again, because Felicia doesn't have that family unit with Antonio and Celia. And she even says when she discovers that she's potentially in an ancestral relationship with Domenico, she's like, it would be like if I was lying with Antonio. And so she connects it to what? Her sort of simulacrum of a family unit at The Eagle that never really served that purpose. That theme makes sense of why Denys it has sort of so many connections through the plots that she brings up.
Chels
Yeah. So what's very interesting to me is that you could have almost entirely the same story if the Duke of Forenza and Isabella didn't have an incestuous like, it's not difficult to believe that a brother would grieve the death of his sister and harbor a need for vengeance. In fact, I think that's a pretty common historical romance plot. But by making it incestuous, Denys kind of turns it into this rotten, doomed love. I didn't delve into this in the recap for time purposes, but Isabella dies by suicide because she's rejected by Domenico. So I think Denys is turning Isabella into an even more tragic figure here. So she's like a woman who's desperate for love and affection, no matter how inappropriate it is. And then even then, you can kind of contrast gratiana and Isabella. So Gratiana, the third wife, with Sandro's lover, and Sandro is her stepson. But Gratiana escapes this sort of tragic characterization by her lack of remorse and her scheming, which I know, like stepmother and son, there's no relationship there.
Beth
It's still crossing a line.
Chels
Yeah.
Chels
I think that the character work it does. There is. I feel like it made me kind of understand Isabella a little bit more because Isabella, she's referenced kind of obliquely throughout the book, and I didn't really get the significance of her. And then Domenico occasionally has these nightmares, right? Which I think is probably why Felicia thinks that Felicia starts to have an affection for him. She sees this very secret human moment and he even tells her the first time he has nightmares, he's like, don't tell anybody this. I don't want to have to kill you. But. So she has that insight into. And I think kind of the question is why Domenico feels that way about Isabella. I don't think that really made sense to me. But I feel like Isabella being an important part of the story like that through line of grief and anguish over Isabella and then having her brother be like the final boss of the book, I think that kind of stringed it together for me a little bit more like it made sense why I should be thinking about these characters and thinking about these things.
Emma
And Isabella's sort of like death, I think, makes it clear that Domenico has some well of...something. He will mourn someone. Whether he will mourn Felicia or not is not clear until the end of the book, but that's available to him both to the read that's clear to the reader and Felicia that he's not just so cruel and calculating that that's not even an option. But it's like, who does he provide it to? Is unclear.
Chels
So we love to talk about setting here, and Denys in particular, has really unique settings that place her books in the throes of violent, megalomaniacal rulers. So the flesh and the devil, her second book, is set during a time of upheaval in post inquisition Spain. And The Silver Devil is set in what the book cover called Renaissance Italy, but is like a time where there were papal states before the unification of Italy. So I thought we could talk about that here also. Did I characterize that correctly?
Emma
Yeah. So the papal states are one kingdom in the land mass of Italy that I think sort of start like in the nine hundreds, eight hundred s, and then continue with different power until the 1800s. So the papal states, you can think of them as akin to the Duchy of Siena or the kingdom of Naples. So they're all these little kingdoms with different power players on the mass of Italy. Like Tuscany is one, and they are always moving their lines about. The papal states are interesting and it comes up in the book because they have sort of two types of power. So normally a duke or a prince has the political power of the land that they occupy, and that's what they have. But the papal states have both the religious power, because the person who's in charge of them is the pope, but also what's called, like, temporal power or temporal power of the land. And so that comes up into the plot later. Cambria is a fictional sort of kingdom or duchy that is akin to Siena or Tuscany. And this version of Italy comes up in a few different romance novels.
Emma
I very recently read Shadowheart by Laura Kinsale, which is very firmly medieval, but has a similar sort of political issue of the multiple kingdoms of Italy, Duchies of Italy. And so the external plot is really focused on who's going to be in charge of this small kingdom, because Italy as a nation state doesn't exist yet. And also Italian identity is sort of in its nasancy, especially in the 1600s. When this book is set, one of the things that develops the identity during the Renaissance, like with Machiavelli's writing leading up to the Risorgimento or the unification of Italy in 1861, are the sort of persistent political conflicts that come from outside forces. So, like the threat of Spanish invasion in this book, that sort of becomes a rhetoric for people to say, we should work together and we should be concerned about Spanish invasion or French invasion. So, like, the invasion of Napoleon into Italy in the early 1800s is a big catalyst for Italian identity by the 1860s. But, yeah, that's Italy. It's hard to conceptualize because you think of Italy as, like, a very old country, but it has this sort of dual identity.
Emma
It's like a very old country, and then also a very young country because it wasn't Italy as we know it until the 1860s.
Beth
That was very good. Before we were recording this, I was like, I don't know anything about Italy. I'm going to need you guys to step up here for me.
Chels
Well, and this is kind of like, not Italy specific, but because I've read both of Teresa Denys's books. And so I was kind of thinking about how she continuously sets her books in places and times where we kind of bear witness to the removed violence of the Catholic Church, like the power of the catholic church. So we spoke about this in our taxonomy of rakes episode. But Felipe, the main character in The Flesh and the Devil, has firsthand knowledge of the violence of the inquisition. So he tells his love interest, your priests will torture any man or woman in the name of testing their faith.
Chels
But they will not kill. They are too merciful. They abandon their victims to the secular arm to met out death. But it is the church herself that swallows the lands and goods that come with them. So in The Silver Devil, the archbishop is, like, this very important figure in Cambria, because when he dies, the pope will likely excommunicate the entire state, like, damning thousands of souls. So he's the one man that Domenico can't really kill. So Domenico has to outmaneuver him in other ways. And the archbishop is also kind of like, he has a lot of power, and he also is very clearly not thinking of Felicia or thinking of Felicia as a problem to be solved. Like, there's one point where Madeleina tells Felicia, like, yeah, he's going to help you escape, but he doesn't care if you go to a nunnery or if you like. To him, this matters not. What matters is that you're gone. So it's kind of like this removed violence from him as well.
Beth
Yeah.
Emma
I liked the specificity of the way that religious sort of trauma and conflict came up in this book. I really like that when that happens in historicals, because I feel like, again, not unlike the queer question, I feel like there's often this collapse of people. We have this assumption that people are vaguely more religious, and so that they care about things like virginity or going to church or. It's not specific. So some of my favorite romance novels, I'm thinking, like, flowers from the storm, have very specific manifestations of how one person's relationship to their religion, rather than this vague 19th century British Protestantism. But I think the way that comes out is that Felicia takes the threat of excommunication really seriously. When I reading it as, like, a 21st century, vaguely protestant American, the threat of excommunication of an entire city seems so clearly strictly a political move. I think I would hear that and be like, that doesn't count. That's ridiculous. The idea that you can excommunicate an entire city from the church. It's this petty threat of men that seems silly to be anxious about. But Felicia has this terror and anxiety about the souls for the area, which she earnestly believes will not be saved if they're excommunicated.
Emma
It's really obvious that it's earnest and it's also sympathetic towards Felicia. I think Denys doesn't really pull any punches, sort of winking at this anxiety that Felicia feels about this political machination she's been thrust into.
Chels
How terrifying would that be to think, once this archbishop dies, we're all fucked? That's just kind of like what it seems, and
Emma
you can't do anything about it because of Catholicism. That's just the way that it works.
Chels
So, I guess kind of like wrapping up here. I want to talk about how the epilog and the prolog are the same scene, and they're almost equally sinister. But to me, the difference is that Felicia and the prolog seems like she's a victim, while Felicia in the epilog, is more complicit in Domenico's reign of terror. Why do you think Denys bookended The Silver Devil with these two versions of the same scene?
Emma
I've been thinking about this since I read the question.
Beth
I know.
Emma
And I was like, okay.
Chels
I can tell you what I think. Yeah, I have theory. So I loved this choice. I think it's hard to convey how sinister the prolog is without reading it in its entirety. It's only, like, four or five paragraphs, but you're left with this sinking feeling that, oh, this isn't going to end well, but it's also the happily ever after. So this is Denys's baby log. And that's what makes it such a genius choice, is that it really shows what she was going for. Like, the true slow burn of the Book is how you start to look at Felicia differently, where her passivity and victimhood kind of morph into something a bit more difficult to defend. So nothing has changed in either of these scenarios. The prolog, the epilog are the same scenes. What changes is how you feel about it.
Chels
So she kind of, like, ropes you in there?
Beth
Yes. I think I read what you wrote, and I was like, that seems accurate.
Chels
How did you feel about the fact that I called The Silver Devil having a baby logue?
Beth
But it is a baby log. Like, under the definition a baby log. It is. What? Well, I'm like, is she only pregnant in that, or she has the baby anyway.
Chels
I think she has the baby at the end.
Beth
It's a baby log. I think you can just be pregnant. It's a baby. Yeah.
Chels
What do you think Domenico is like as a father?
Emma
Maybe it's like a Cousin West situation where he really steps up to the task. He crushes it. He's amazing.
Chels
He's like, this is actually what needed to change him.
Beth
Well, I feel like I could see him being so obsessed about securing his legacy, especially if he has, like, a son first, that he'd be like, okay, this is how you read. Just those are the types of lessons he's giving his kids.
Emma
Or it could be, like, Dain and Lord of Scoundrels, where Felicia's like, now you get a taste of your own medicine. Your child is super charming. Everyone's obsessed with them. I guess it would be like a reverse Dane because Dane's a terror and so is his child. But it's like, oh, someone is now more charming than Domenico at court and he just has to put up with it. And Felicia is like, now you see what we all have been dealing with for 30 years.
Chels
Yeah. And because you don't really meet Duke Carlo at any point, Felicia gets a glimpse of him, but you never. And you're not really given that many clues to his personality except that he sleeps around a lot. That's kind of the only thing you know. So you don't really know how much of Domenico is like, purely Domenico and how much of that he's getting from Duke Carlo. But, yeah, I feel like Domenico has a child. That child is going to be Domenico to me. I think he's going to be exactly like Domenico, except he has black hair.
Chels
Oh, yeah, she does have the baby.
Chels
Because the baby has black hair.
Chels
She's black hair. He's not a silver devil.
Chels
Well, I guess on that note, do.
Chels
You guys have any final thoughts?
Chels
Anything else you wanted to say about this book?
Beth
I'm good.
Emma
Yeah, it's different. It's different that, I mean, for all the comparisons we made throughout the episode, I will say it's unlike anything we've read. I think our comparison, we made so many because you have to stretch what you're reaching for to try and comp this book.
Chels
Yeah, there really isn't any other gothic romance like it. It definitely is in kind of like a league of its own with stakes that are just like entirely different. It doesn't really work as it's not that similar to the other really big historical romances at the time. It's not that similar to the big gothics. It's just kind of like Teresa Denys just kind of did her own thing. So, yeah, it was very fun to.
Chels
Talk about this book with you both.
Chels
Thank you so much. And thank you so much for listening to reformed rakes.
Chels
If you enjoy this podcast, you can find bonus content on our patreon@patreon.com slash reformedrakes. Please rate and review us on Apple and Spotify helps a lot. You can also follow us on Twitter and Instagram for show updates. The username for both is at reformed rakes. Thank you again and we'll see you next time.
