It is this stretch which provides what is perhaps the most staggering scenic prospect of all; the impression made on the mind by the overwhelming height of the Eiger, towering over the train, is almost impossible to describe.

A half brother or half sister

John is white, Della is Black, and any interracial relationship isn’t just a legal dead end, but a threat to their very lives from the disapproving world that surrounds them. It all sounds like a Hallmark weepie, but in Robinson’s hands, it becomes transcendent.

So ſpake th’ Archangel Michael, then paus’d, / As at the Worlds great period ; and our Sire / Replete with joy and wonder thus repli’d.