A Visit from the Author of Ben Hur: Docent Material

Lew Wallace, Author of Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ

Maybe you’ve seen the 1959 version of the film Ben-Hur starring Charlton Heston – and marveled at the movie’s most famous scene, the chariot race. The movie is based on an 1880 novel by General Lew Wallace, and in December 1896, General Wallace came to visit St. Johnsbury and deliver a talk on “Turkey and the Turks, with glimpses of life in the palace and harem.” But the Caledonian-Record was clear about what really made this man famous: “Gen. Wallace will attract the attention of our people, who already know him as the author of Ben-Hur,” said the local newspaper.

Thank goodness for this authorship, which came along just in time to rescue Wallace from his depressing military reputation. During the Civil War, he led his division in a fiasco at the Battle of Shiloh – possibly because General Grant hadn’t been specific in his orders. Regardless of whether the division’s location was Wallace’s mistake or Grant’s, it meant that the reserves arrived too late to prevent horrible casualties that day. And when word of the disaster reached civilians, the Army chose to blame Wallace, calling him incompetent and removing his from his command.

In 1864, again commanding a large force of almost six thousand men, Wallace took part in delaying a Confederate advance on Washington, DC. Technically his forces were defeated, and again he was humiliated by being relieved of his command. But this time, he got it back again after Grant praised his work in delaying Confederate General Jubal Early, making it possible for Grant to pull together a defense for the capital city.

Later he became governor of New Mexico Territory from 1878 to 1881 and negotiated with the notorious outlaw Billy the Kid – and went on to be U.S. Minister to the Ottoman Empire (the Turks), for four years. Yet the blow of his war years still burned.

Writing Ben-Hur, which was the story of a young Jewish noble whose disastrous life is finally redeemed and set right through Jesus Christ, Wallace took the themes of friendship, betrayal, revenge, love, and redemption and, with passion doubtless from his own life, created a stirring novel that hasn’t ever gone out of print. It quickly became a play also, and then a short film, followed by an amazing Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film in 1925. The most exciting part of the film, the chariot race, was created by allowing stunt men to actually race chariots with horses in California – a Hollywood spectacle in the flesh. A cash prize was offered for the winning stunt driver. One chariot capsized, causing others to crash, and although no people were killed, seven horses had to be “put down” due to their injuries. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was outraged, but the reality of injuries and bloodshed helped make the film a blockbuster for its time, actually earning back the $4 million that M-G-M spent to make it.

Wallace died in 1905, so he never saw the film versions of his work. But when he arrived here in St. Johnsbury, the welcome he received as an author must have given some comfort to his shamed and wounded soul.

From Ben-Hur, chapter XIV, “The Race”:


WHEN the dash for position began, Ben-Hur, as we have seen, was on the extreme left of the six. For a moment, like the others, he was half-blinded by the light in the arena; yet he managed to catch sight of his antagonists and divine their purpose. At Messala, who was more than an antagonist to him, he gave one searching look. The air of passionless hauteur characteristic of the fine patrician face was there as of old, and so was the Italian beauty, which the helmet rather increased; but more-it may have been a jealous fancy, or the effect of the brassy shadow in which the features were at the moment cast, still the Israelite thought he saw the soul of the man as through a glass, darkly: cruel, cunning, desperate; not so excited as determined-a soul in a tension of watchfulness and fierce resolve.
    In a time not longer than was required to turn to his four again, Ben-Hur felt his own resolution harden to a like temper. At whatever cost, at all hazards, he would humble this enemy! Prize, friends, wagers, honour-everything that can be thought of as a possible interest in the race was lost in the one deliberate purpose. Regard for life even should not hold him back. Yet there was no passion on his part; no blinding rush of heated blood from heart to brain, and back again; no impulse to fling himself upon Fortune: he did not believe in Fortune; far otherwise. He had his plan, and, confiding in himself, he settled to the task never more observant, never more capable. The air about him seemed aglow with a renewed and perfect transparency.
    When not half-way across the arena, he saw that Messala's rush would, if there was no collision, and the rope fell, give him the wall; that the rope would fall, he ceased as soon to doubt; and, further, it came to him, a sudden flash-like insight, that Messala knew it was to be let drop at the last moment (pre-arrangement with the editor could safely reach that point in the contest); and it suggested, what more Roman-like than for the official to lend himself to a countryman who, besides being so popular, had also so much at stake? There could be no other accounting for the confidence with which Messala pushed his four forward the instant his competitors were prudentially checking their fours in front of the obstruction-no other except madness. …
     The rope fell, and all the four but his sprang into the course under urgency of voice and lash. He drew head to the right, and, with all the speed of his Arabs, darted across the trails of his opponents, the angle of movement being such as to lose the least time and gain the greatest possible advance. So, while the spectators were shivering at the Athenian's mishap, and the Sidonian, Byzantine, and Corinthian were striving, with such skill as they possessed, to avoid involvement in the ruin, Ben-Hur swept around and took the course neck and neck with Messala, though on the outside. The marvellous skill shown in making the change thus from the extreme left across to the right without appreciable loss did not fail the sharp eyes upon the benches: the Circus seemed to rock and rock again with prolonged applause. Then Esther clasped her hands in glad surprise; then Sanballat, smiling, offered his hundred sestertii a second time without a taker; and then the Romans began to doubt, thinking Messala might have found an equal, if not a master, and that in an Israelite! …
       "Down Eros, up Mars!" [Messala] shouted, whirling his lash with practised hand-"Down Eros, up Mars!" he repeated, and caught the well-doing Arabs of Ben-Hur a cut the like of which they had never known.
    The blow was seen in every quarter, and the amazement was universal. The silence deepened; up on the benches behind the consul the boldest held his breath, waiting for the outcome. Only a moment thus: then, involuntarily, down from the balcony, as thunder falls, burst the indignant cry of the people.
    The four sprang forward affrighted. No hand had ever been laid upon them except in love; they had been nurtured ever so tenderly; and as they grew, their confidence in man became a lesson to men beautiful to see. What should such dainty natures do under such indignity but leap as from death?