Italy and the English Novel, 1870–1917

The most significant English novelist to write on Italy in the 1870s was Ouida. After occasionally using purely conventional Italian scenery in a very minor way in some of her earlier novels (Chandos, 1866; Idalia, 1867; and Puck, 1870), she fell in love with the country on her first visit there in 1871, settled in Florence, and thereafter looked constantly to Italy for her literary material.