The Sword of Damocles: A Story of New York Life

What It's About

Bertram Mandeville is a talented young pianist whose devotion to music sets him at odds with the fortune-driven world of Gilded Age New York. When he falls for Paula, the daughter of a wealthy man with no patience for musicians, Bertram must decide whether to set aside his art in pursuit of the wealth and status needed to win her hand. Around this central romance, Green weaves in family secrets, watchful relatives, and the quiet influence of characters like Mrs. Sylvester and the redoubtable Miss Belinda. Detective Ebenezer Gryce — the character who would make Green's reputation — appears only briefly, a hint of the mystery elements simmering beneath the novel's romantic surface.

Key Concepts

The novel takes its title from the ancient story of the sword suspended by a single hair over Damocles' head, using that image to explore how easily a life of apparent good fortune can be shadowed by anxiety and risk. It weighs artistic vocation against material ambition, and examines the narrow choices available to a young woman whose marriage prospects are largely controlled by her father's wishes.

About the Author

Anna Katharine Green (1846–1935) was an American novelist and poet, born in Brooklyn, New York. She is widely regarded as one of the first American writers of detective fiction and has been called "the mother of the detective novel" for her carefully plotted, legally precise mysteries. Her patient, methodical detective Ebenezer Gryce helped define the genre in the United States well before it flourished in the twentieth century.