The Duchess of Wrexe

Rising City series #1

by Hugh Walpole

Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole was an English novelist. He was the son of an Anglican clergyman, intended for a career in the church but drawn instead to writing. Among those who encouraged him were the authors Henry James and Arnold Bennett. His skill at scene-setting and vivid plots, as well as his high profile as a lecturer, brought him a large readership in the United Kingdom and North America. He was a best-selling author in the 1920s and 1930s but has been largely neglected since his death. After his first novel, The Wooden Horse, in 1909, Walpole wrote prolifically, producing at least one book every year. He was a spontaneous story-teller, writing quickly to get all his ideas on paper, seldom revising. His first novel to achieve major success was his third, Mr Perrin and Mr Traill, a tragicomic story of a fatal clash between two schoolmasters. During the First World War he served in the Red Cross on the Russian-Austrian front, and worked in British propaganda in Petrograd and London. In the 1920s and 1930s Walpole was much in demand not only as a novelist but also as a lecturer on literature, making four exceptionally well-paid tours of North America.

Genres: British Literature, Fiction

521 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1914

About the author

Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole was an English novelist. A prolific writer, he published thirty-six novels, five volumes of short stories, two plays and three volumes of memoirs. His skill at scene-setting, his vivid plots, his high profile as a lecturer and his driving ambition brought him a large readership in the United Kingdom and North America. A best-selling author in the 1920s and 1930s, his works have been neglected since his death.

Reviews

[Laura]

The first book in the Rising City series.

Free download available at Project Gutenberg.

[Bettie]

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/33086

[Lucy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unusually for this author, I didn't quite believe in any of the characters, so wasn't particularly invested in what happened to them. There's a great deal of tell not show here.

[Wealhtheow · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superficially, this book is very similar to others of its type and time--a spirited girl comes out into society and must choose between her rebellious and outcast cousin or a conventional young man. Rachel chooses the conventional young man, but as their marriage begins to degenerate, she comes into contact with her cousin once more. She falls in love with him--will she leave her husband and run off with her romantic but weak lover? And looming over all of this is the spectre of her grandmother, The Duchess, an old woman whose powers and health are waning but not yet gone.

The story of Rachel, Francis, Roddy and Lizzie's tangled love affair is merely the frontispiece of an examination of the end of the Victorian Age.

I especially loved the juxtaposition of each character's torrid thoughts and feelings with their banal conversations.

And yet, at the end, Walpole just couldn't resist having his characters moralize about coming generations and "this new Individualism". Quit while you're ahead!

[Kat · Rating 1 out of 5]

Boring boring boring but I stuck with it.