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Masterpieces of the English Short Novel
Includes works from Samuel Johnson's "Life of Richard Savage" to Joseph Conrad's "The Secret Sharer," including fiction by Maria Edgeworth, Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, Mrs. Gaskell, George Eliot, George Meredith, Thomas Love Peacock, and William Hazlitt
656 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1992
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 19, 2025
Overall, good writing but I was bored throughout most of the stories. The first story was a depressing trainwreck for the main character and the rest weren't that much better. As such this book was filled with run-on sentences, which is not my cup of tea. It was certainly very dated but as that's the time period, such can't be helped. 3.5 ⭐ rounded up generously.
March 2, 2021
Nine short novels. Novellas. My sentiments:
1. Life of Richard Savage by Samuel Johnson - The story about a born loser, and the most boring, depressing read in this collection. No stars.
2. Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth - Another story about an ineffectual man, actually generations of them. Two stars.
3. The Room in the Dragon Volant by Sheridan Joseph Le Fanu - Count on Le Fanu to give us his usual, predictable gothic yarn, engaging only because of his precise gift for atmosphere and setting--I'm bound to confuse this as a movie someday, with a strapping Stewart Granger in the lead role of yet another ineffectual man (surely I can't be the only reader who saw what was coming, early on!). Three stars.
4. Cousin Phillis by Mrs. Gaskell - A story that narrowly escaped being a tragedy. Reading it reminded me of Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd. All decent, sincere characters here, the only antagonist being great expectations (and I don't mean mine). Two and half stars.
5. The Lifted Veil by George Eliot - I detect none of the magic that endeared Middlemarch to me here. Depressing, certainly. Dispirited bildungsroman of a weakling. Two stars.
6. The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad - This started out slow, as benign as the windless bay where the narrative takes place. But what an exhilarating finish! I haven’t read much of Conrad's work, but the few I've read* I hold dear: Lord Jim, Typhoon, and now this. Onboard are the Joseph Conrad refrains I’ve come to recognize: second chances and ambiguous heroes. Anti-heroes. But—was this a ghost story? Of doppelgangers? And was there a tinge of what once was the love that dare not speak its name? Five stars.
7. The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper by George Meredith - Much ado over not much. And behold, surely, the most ineffectual general ever to grace the fiction section. One star.
8. Nightmare Abbey by Thomas Love Peacock - A very toned-down As You Like It, it might as well be sepia. I think my brain processed it as a comic book while I was reading this. No likeable characters here. Two stars.
9. Liber Amores by William Hazlitt - The Book of Love for losers and stalkers. Hazlitt's true tale of woeful, unrequited love for a servant girl. Of Human Bondage on steroids. Poor Hazlitt. Two and a half stars.
* Notable exception for Heart of Darkness. That seemed more like a Faulkner tale, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Although I loved the delightful A Rose for Emily. Which was so unFaulker-like! More Nathaniel Hawthorne...
1. Life of Richard Savage by Samuel Johnson - The story about a born loser, and the most boring, depressing read in this collection. No stars.
2. Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth - Another story about an ineffectual man, actually generations of them. Two stars.
3. The Room in the Dragon Volant by Sheridan Joseph Le Fanu - Count on Le Fanu to give us his usual, predictable gothic yarn, engaging only because of his precise gift for atmosphere and setting--I'm bound to confuse this as a movie someday, with a strapping Stewart Granger in the lead role of yet another ineffectual man (surely I can't be the only reader who saw what was coming, early on!). Three stars.
4. Cousin Phillis by Mrs. Gaskell - A story that narrowly escaped being a tragedy. Reading it reminded me of Thomas Hardy's Far from the Madding Crowd. All decent, sincere characters here, the only antagonist being great expectations (and I don't mean mine). Two and half stars.
5. The Lifted Veil by George Eliot - I detect none of the magic that endeared Middlemarch to me here. Depressing, certainly. Dispirited bildungsroman of a weakling. Two stars.
6. The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad - This started out slow, as benign as the windless bay where the narrative takes place. But what an exhilarating finish! I haven’t read much of Conrad's work, but the few I've read* I hold dear: Lord Jim, Typhoon, and now this. Onboard are the Joseph Conrad refrains I’ve come to recognize: second chances and ambiguous heroes. Anti-heroes. But—was this a ghost story? Of doppelgangers? And was there a tinge of what once was the love that dare not speak its name? Five stars.
7. The Case of General Ople and Lady Camper by George Meredith - Much ado over not much. And behold, surely, the most ineffectual general ever to grace the fiction section. One star.
8. Nightmare Abbey by Thomas Love Peacock - A very toned-down As You Like It, it might as well be sepia. I think my brain processed it as a comic book while I was reading this. No likeable characters here. Two stars.
9. Liber Amores by William Hazlitt - The Book of Love for losers and stalkers. Hazlitt's true tale of woeful, unrequited love for a servant girl. Of Human Bondage on steroids. Poor Hazlitt. Two and a half stars.
* Notable exception for Heart of Darkness. That seemed more like a Faulkner tale, and I don’t mean that as a compliment. Although I loved the delightful A Rose for Emily. Which was so unFaulker-like! More Nathaniel Hawthorne...
July 21, 2008
This is not the exact book I'm reading. I Am readin " The Narrows" by Kenneth H Brown, which is a novel abotu bay ridge in the 1970's and the children who live in the neighborhood. It must e out of print because I don't see it here and I finnaly foudn it on ebay after two years of looking!
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews