BOOK REVIEW: The Greek Treasure by Irving Stone

Many years ago, my mom passed along to me a book she’d read by Irving Stone. I believe it was Those Who Love, about Abigail and John Adams. I devoured it, and then read several of his other novels. I became hooked not only on Irving Stone, but on biographical fiction in general.

Recently, I’ve been taking some online Great Books classes that have included The Iliad and The Odyssey, and it brought to mind one of the Irving Stone books that I loved, The Greek Treasure. This is a dual biographical novel of Sophia and Henry Schliemann, amateur archeologists who are known for tenacious excavations at Troy and Mycenae. And while most of Schliemann’s conclusions (many controversial at the time) subsequently proved false, he generated excitement about the rewards of archeology in the late 1800s, and reawakened debates about the historicity of Homer’s great epics. (Schliemann was pro-Homer as a factual historian.)

Irving Stone’s novel is seen through the eyes of Sophia, a Greek girl from a family facing impoverishment, who, at 17 or 18, was given in marriage to Henry, who was 47 at the time. Recently divorced, he wanted a Greek wife for inspiration as he embarked on his excavations at Hisarlik, his presumed site of Troy. Henry was a fabulously wealthy German, who had risen from poverty by shady means, and then devoted his life and fortune to his archeological pursuits.

I think when I first read this novel, I was more impressed with Schliemann and his findings, as well as Sophia’s growth and participation in the digs. However, reading it again, I am more appalled by Henry’s megalomania and his treatment of his wife. The author does an excellent job of showing the nuances of Sophia’s relationship to her husband. Her subjugation was typical of her culture and the times. In a way, she was given a good deal of freedom and her life was enriched by the education he afforded her and the opportunity to take part in the digs. But these were crumbs he threw her way, so long as she toed the line, lavished him with praise, and kept her doubts and disappointments to herself.

The novel is meticulously detailed. The excitement of discovery comes through, as does the difficulty of the process. But I confess that I was often driven to skimming over the laundry lists of the gold and bronze items pulled from the earth. And I found myself weighing in on the side of Henry’s antagonists. His justifications for stealing artifacts (LOTS of artifacts) rang hollow.

Irving Stone’s books are not as readily available as they used to be, especially the more obscure ones. I found The Greek Treasure in my local university library. And while the writing style is a tad ponderous, the novel is still a compelling read. I expect now that I know where to go to look for Stone’s novels, I’ll be re-reading more of them.