Svengali pronunciation

Fictional character from the novel Trilby by George du Maurier

This article is about the fictional character. For other uses, see Svengali (disambiguation).

Svengali () is a character in the novel Trilby which was first published in by George du Maurier.

Svengali is a Jewish man who seduces, dominates and exploits Trilby, a young half-Irish girl, and makes her into a famous singer.^[1]

Definition

After the book's publication in , the word "svengali" has come to refer to a person who, with evil intent, dominates, manipulates and controls another.

In court, the "Svengali defence" is a legal tactic that portrays the defendant as a pawn in the scheme of a greater, and more influential, criminal mastermind.^[2]

Novel

Svengali is a stereotypical antisemitic portrayal of an Ashkenazic (Eastern European) Jew, complete with "bold, black, beady Jew's eyes" and a "hoarse, rasping, nasal, throaty rook's caw, his big yellow teeth baring themselve