St. Augustine's Press
Savrola is Winston Churchill’s first major literary effort and his only full-length work of
fiction. Published in 1900, the novel’s subtitle, A Tale of the Revolution in Laurania, reflects
the story’s modern political focus. Laurania, a long-established republic, is subjected to
the autocratic rule of President Antonio Molara, a former general who has become
known as the Dictator. Savrola, the man of the multitude, leads the democratic effort to
restore the political liberties of the people. When the register of eligible electors is
mutilated and the popular franchise compromised, a riot breaks out and the stage is set
for a fight to the death between Molara and Savrola over who will rule Laurania.
General Molara enlists the assistance of his beautiful wife, Lucille, to undermine
Savrola’s influence with the people. But Lucille falls in love with Savrola, who is equally
moved by the beauty and charm of the First Lady. As is indicated by the last chapter’s
title, “Life’s Compensations,” all ends well in Laurania. After the violent troubles of the
revolution, Molara is dead, Lucille and Savrola are united, and the Mediterranean
republic returns to peace and prosperity.
Savrola contains the seeds of Churchill’s exceptional talents as a statesman, a
political philosopher, and a man of literature. The ambition of Savrola to rule
foreshadows Churchill’s own life-long career as the greatest democratic leader of the
past century. In the novel, Churchill the thinker explores the challenges of securing
democratic order and avoiding mob rule. He sketches a model of the education needed
for modern statesmanship and describes the kind of rhetoric that appeals to a modern
democratic people. Elements of Churchill’s literary style in the novel anticipate the
greatness of his later prose works that would merit him the Nobel Prize for Literature.
This edition of Savrola contains extensive introductory materials, notes, an appendix,
and is lavishly illustrated with reproductions of the André Collot woodcuts made for a
limited French edition of the work.
Patrick Powers is a tutor and academic dean at Magdalen College in Warner N.H. He is
Director of the Fides et Ratio Colloquium, a gathering of Catholic liberal-arts colleges,
under the auspices of the Faith and Reason Institute in Washington D.C.
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Savrola
A Tale of the Revolution in Laurania
A definitive new edition, edited and with an introduction by Patrick Powers
Preface by James W. Muller
Reproductions of woodcuts by André Collot
Published in association with the Churchill Centre
336 pages, 6” x 9”, jacketed clothbound,
preface, introduction, illustrations, footnotes,
bibliography, appendix, index
world rights in English
ISBN: 1-58731-754-0
$30.00 (£17.00)