MARIA'S ITALIAN SPRING

A reissue of The Italian Spring (NY, 1972), published in Britain in 1964. After the 1877 death of her scholarly guardian, who was teaching her Greek in Maria Escapes (1957; NY, 1992), Maria goes to an even more reclusive cousin in Italy. Her sojourn with him there—in Venice, where he instructs her on nearly invisible paintings in dark churches and she catches a shocking cold; in Florence, where she uses her invalid status to avoid his boring art lectures, or avoid being sent to another stultifying school—is an interesting contrast to the previous scenario: In care of Mr. Burghclere (substantially more oblivious and less amiable than her former guardian) and an Italian physician who's sure that education overtaxes the female brain, Maria is well on her way to becoming that staple of Victorian fiction—the lady invalid—when a lively young neighbor lures her forth. Another unusually rich picture of the period—especially for friends of book one and its likable, intelligent heroine. (Fiction. 9-12)