SOURCE: Elgaard, Elin. Review of The Volcano Lover, by Susan Sontag. World Literature Today 67, no. 4 (autumn 1993): 825-26.

In the following review, Elgaard finds flaws in the narrative style in The Volcano Lover, yet compliments Sontag's characterizations, and especially the development of the protagonist, Emma.

Set in revolution-threatened, late-eighteenth-century Naples and subtitled “A Romance,” The Volcano Lover casts a net of passions: a British envoy's for Vesuvius, his first wife Catherine's for him, his own for second wife Emma, and finally hers, requited, for Admiral Nelson. Crisscrossing the net run other loves: the collecting envoy's for art; the starving mob's (as is the king's hunting lust) for butchery; that of the queen's confidant, Scarpia, for power. The storyteller (of ancient origin, now termed “postmodern”) freely manipulates and interrupts action—even letters!—in comments witty, scathing, and wistful, tightening the net till there is scarcely room for the reader. Deliberate...