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A Drama In Muslin
Always an ambitious novelist, George Moore realized early in the composition of his third novel, A Drama in Muslin , how his chosen subject – the sentimental education of five girls born into the gentry of the West of Ireland – could be extended to encompass a study of the prevailing social conditions of the Irish people, who were desperate for political change and growth. Written in the mid 1880s, the novel reflects the unease of the times when the activities of the Land League began increasingly to jeopardize the security of the landlords and expose the artificiality and moral inadequacies of their way of life, centered on the annual Dublin seasons and receptions at the Castle. Fresh from their convent school, Alice and Olive Barton, with the aid of their mother (one of Moore’s most brilliant portraits), are set in quest of their identities and in pursuit of a husband, for as Mrs Barton asserts 'Marriage gives a girl liberty, gives her admiration, gives her success, a woman’s whole position depends upon it’. Alice, the more observant and intelligent of the two, quickly appreciates how completely their choices in life are conditioned by the social tensions of the age, which render words like ‘liberty’ and ‘success’ meaningless.
330 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1886
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About the author
George Moore
531 books89 followersGeorge Augustus Moore was an Irish novelist, short-story writer, poet, art critic, memoirist and dramatist. Moore came from a Roman Catholic landed family who lived at Moore Hall in Carra, County Mayo. He originally wanted to be a painter, and studied art in Paris during the 1870s. There, he befriended many of the leading French artists and writers of the day.
As a naturalistic writer, he was amongst the first English-language authors to absorb the lessons of the French realists, and was particularly influenced by the works of Émile Zola. His writings influenced James Joyce, according to the literary critic and biographer Richard Ellmann, and, although Moore's work is sometimes seen as outside the mainstream of both Irish and British literature, he is as often regarded as the first great modern Irish novelist.
As a naturalistic writer, he was amongst the first English-language authors to absorb the lessons of the French realists, and was particularly influenced by the works of Émile Zola. His writings influenced James Joyce, according to the literary critic and biographer Richard Ellmann, and, although Moore's work is sometimes seen as outside the mainstream of both Irish and British literature, he is as often regarded as the first great modern Irish novelist.
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September 9, 2025It might have been a truth generally acknowledged within the world of Drama in Muslin that any single woman not possessed of a large fortune must be in want of a husband.
The resemblances to Jane Austen's famous novel Pride & Predjudice don't stop at that paraphrase of its first sentence. There's a mother in this book who, in search of spouses for her daughters, leaves no stone unturned—she'd take a woodlouse or a beetle as long as he is rich and has a title. But unlike Austen's Mrs Bennett, Moore's Mrs Barton has only two daughters, a blessing for which the reader thanks the author.
The mother and daughters live in a manor house somewhere in Ireland in the early 1880s. There's a Mr Barton in the story too but similarly to Mr Bennett, he tends to hide away in his library—where he doesn't attend to the management of his estate.
The daughters might easily be named Sense andSensibility Nonsense. The reader is grateful to George Moore for creating Sense but thinks he went too far with the Nonsense character. And he made her the beautiful one while Sense is described as plain.
The two girls are close in age and are about to be presented at court. Well, not quite at court since this is Ireland not England, so instead of being presented to Queen Victoria in London, they will be presented to her representative in Dublin, the Lord Lieutenant, in a ceremony called the Drawing Room which took place every year in Dublin Castle (this is all happening towards the end of the period when Ireland was a colony of England and therefore still governed by the Lord Lieutenant).
So the novel spends a lot of pages discussing the many dresses the young girls will need for their presentation and the various balls that were held during the presentation season. That accounts for the word 'Muslin' in the title.
I might have ended the review here as I became tired of writing about these privileged people. But the thing is, George Moore seems to grow tired of writing about these people and their frippery too. Little by little, he introduces notes of discord: tenants' refusals to pay rent, attacks on landlord's bailiffs, threats to burn property. Insurgency in other words.
But the insurgency isn't confined to the impoverished tenants. One of the daughters in the story begins her own rebellion against the status quo. She refuses to engage with the ever more slimy and aging suitors her mother chooses for her, and turns instead to writing little caustic pieces about the very marriage market in which all the pliable young women in her circle are being displayed.
George Moore develops the very sensible Alice Barton into a memorable character in the last third of the book and it becomes a lot more interesting than its title, Drama in Muslin, might convey.
But in case you're wondering about the word 'Drama' in the title, be assured that there are some minor ones: an attempted elopement with a military man, and a fruitless engagement to a Lord, both of which happen to the daughter I named Nonsense at the beginning of the review. Her name was actually Olive—I had to check—but I don't think I'll remember her or her name for very long.
Her mother, Mrs Barton, will be more memorable I think. She was an interesting creation because of her scheming nature. And when all her scheming comes to nothing, she still manages to hold her head high—no question of taking to the bed with a case of nerves like Mrs Bennett. Instead, she continues to host gatherings, and just as she easily ignores the worsening plight of her husband's tenants, she neatly side-steps her neighbors' questions about what has become of her daughters. There's no hint of pliable muslin in her character. She is starched linen through and through.
This was one of George Moore's early works, written years before Esther Waters, The Untilled Field, and The Lake, all of which I read recently. This book may be weaker than those others but I'm still glad I read it because it's about a period of Ireland's history I know very little about. For that reason alone it was a worthwhile read.
The resemblances to Jane Austen's famous novel Pride & Predjudice don't stop at that paraphrase of its first sentence. There's a mother in this book who, in search of spouses for her daughters, leaves no stone unturned—she'd take a woodlouse or a beetle as long as he is rich and has a title. But unlike Austen's Mrs Bennett, Moore's Mrs Barton has only two daughters, a blessing for which the reader thanks the author.
The mother and daughters live in a manor house somewhere in Ireland in the early 1880s. There's a Mr Barton in the story too but similarly to Mr Bennett, he tends to hide away in his library—where he doesn't attend to the management of his estate.
The daughters might easily be named Sense and
The two girls are close in age and are about to be presented at court. Well, not quite at court since this is Ireland not England, so instead of being presented to Queen Victoria in London, they will be presented to her representative in Dublin, the Lord Lieutenant, in a ceremony called the Drawing Room which took place every year in Dublin Castle (this is all happening towards the end of the period when Ireland was a colony of England and therefore still governed by the Lord Lieutenant).
So the novel spends a lot of pages discussing the many dresses the young girls will need for their presentation and the various balls that were held during the presentation season. That accounts for the word 'Muslin' in the title.
I might have ended the review here as I became tired of writing about these privileged people. But the thing is, George Moore seems to grow tired of writing about these people and their frippery too. Little by little, he introduces notes of discord: tenants' refusals to pay rent, attacks on landlord's bailiffs, threats to burn property. Insurgency in other words.
But the insurgency isn't confined to the impoverished tenants. One of the daughters in the story begins her own rebellion against the status quo. She refuses to engage with the ever more slimy and aging suitors her mother chooses for her, and turns instead to writing little caustic pieces about the very marriage market in which all the pliable young women in her circle are being displayed.
George Moore develops the very sensible Alice Barton into a memorable character in the last third of the book and it becomes a lot more interesting than its title, Drama in Muslin, might convey.
But in case you're wondering about the word 'Drama' in the title, be assured that there are some minor ones: an attempted elopement with a military man, and a fruitless engagement to a Lord, both of which happen to the daughter I named Nonsense at the beginning of the review. Her name was actually Olive—I had to check—but I don't think I'll remember her or her name for very long.
Her mother, Mrs Barton, will be more memorable I think. She was an interesting creation because of her scheming nature. And when all her scheming comes to nothing, she still manages to hold her head high—no question of taking to the bed with a case of nerves like Mrs Bennett. Instead, she continues to host gatherings, and just as she easily ignores the worsening plight of her husband's tenants, she neatly side-steps her neighbors' questions about what has become of her daughters. There's no hint of pliable muslin in her character. She is starched linen through and through.
This was one of George Moore's early works, written years before Esther Waters, The Untilled Field, and The Lake, all of which I read recently. This book may be weaker than those others but I'm still glad I read it because it's about a period of Ireland's history I know very little about. For that reason alone it was a worthwhile read.
May 5, 2021
mmokay - i put up the publisher's description, and now i write a review so jen can use this in her book club. i read this in college so my details are not perfect, but i remember loving it. it's about mothers trying to get their daughters married, and the lengths they will go to to accomplish this. it's like an old time-y version of cheerleader or beauty pageant moms. there is a lot of scheming and betrayals and backstabbing, but under the guise of these sweet convent girls and their pretty dresses and balls. what i remember so strongly were all the comparisons to battle - the dresses and hair and makeup were like armour to conquer the enemy, or prospective husband. i also remember it being compared to chess. i would like to reread this, when i am finished reading all the baby books i have to read for my summer class. but - yes - book club this and let me know if you like it.
come to my blog!
come to my blog! 
October 6, 2017
I really enjoyed this - an underrated and interesting book, both in its examination of gender roles and the position of women in late Victorian Irish society and in its presentation of Irish politics and issues at the time. It reminds me in tone of Austen, and while I didn't always find the characterisation that in depth, the issues it explores and the conclusions it draws, as well as the unusual and very original aspects of this book in comparison to other Victorian literature, makes it a thoroughly interesting read.
July 21, 2009
Let us now praise karen, for she recommended this book. Realistic Jane Austen was a perfect description. Delightfully surprised by the book. Folded more than my fair share of page corners.
My middle sister was excused from this month's selection because
1. tiny print
2. French phrases
3. no smut
4. she had a baby
My youngest sister liked the book, but not as much as Jane Austen. "Jane Austen is more polite and has more dialogue"
And, as for me, I liked the book-liked that Alice was plain, smart, and logical. She didn't believe in God, she managed to make a living from writing, and she knew how to keep a secret when one of her friends took off one too many petticoats, or wrappers, or liners, or whatever the heck it was under there. And, big one, she didn't happen to end up with the richest man that every gal wanted. Take that, Jane!
"Alice watched the ceremony of Mass, and the falseness of it jarred upon her terribly. The mumbled Latin, the by-play with the wine and water, the mumming of the uplifted hands...passing by, without scorn, the belief that the white wafer the priest held above his head, in this lonely Irish chapel, was the Creator of the twenty millions of suns in the Milky Way....then Alice felt, more calmly than she had ever done before, that what she was now witnessing was but the dust of an old-world faith, the sweeping away of which had only been delayed because a man is idle, and 'loves to lie abed in the unclean straw of his intellectual habits.'"
"Alice! How can you talk so? Are you not afraid that something awful might happen to you for talking of the Creator of all things in that way?"
"Why should I be afraid, and why should that Being, if he exists, be angry with me for my sincerity? If he is all-powerful, it rests with Himself to make me believe."
This book had the dresses, the balls, but also included the descriptions of the small, dirty, and bedraggled unfortunates who could only press their faces against the thin panes of glass that divided them from the privileged world alight with satin and candlelight.
"I do not know that I found the world so very different from what I expected to find it. Of course there is evil- and a great deal of evil; and if you will fix your eyes upon it, and brood over it, of course life seems to you only a black and hideous thing; but there is much good-yes, there is good even in things evil; and if we only think of the goodness we become happier even if we do not become better; and I cannot but think that the best and the most feasible mode of life is to try to live up to the ordinary and simple laws of nature of which we are but a part."
Well said, Alice. And Mr. Darcy has nothing on your sensible, kind, and hard working man.
My middle sister was excused from this month's selection because
1. tiny print
2. French phrases
3. no smut
4. she had a baby
My youngest sister liked the book, but not as much as Jane Austen. "Jane Austen is more polite and has more dialogue"
And, as for me, I liked the book-liked that Alice was plain, smart, and logical. She didn't believe in God, she managed to make a living from writing, and she knew how to keep a secret when one of her friends took off one too many petticoats, or wrappers, or liners, or whatever the heck it was under there. And, big one, she didn't happen to end up with the richest man that every gal wanted. Take that, Jane!
"Alice watched the ceremony of Mass, and the falseness of it jarred upon her terribly. The mumbled Latin, the by-play with the wine and water, the mumming of the uplifted hands...passing by, without scorn, the belief that the white wafer the priest held above his head, in this lonely Irish chapel, was the Creator of the twenty millions of suns in the Milky Way....then Alice felt, more calmly than she had ever done before, that what she was now witnessing was but the dust of an old-world faith, the sweeping away of which had only been delayed because a man is idle, and 'loves to lie abed in the unclean straw of his intellectual habits.'"
"Alice! How can you talk so? Are you not afraid that something awful might happen to you for talking of the Creator of all things in that way?"
"Why should I be afraid, and why should that Being, if he exists, be angry with me for my sincerity? If he is all-powerful, it rests with Himself to make me believe."
This book had the dresses, the balls, but also included the descriptions of the small, dirty, and bedraggled unfortunates who could only press their faces against the thin panes of glass that divided them from the privileged world alight with satin and candlelight.
"I do not know that I found the world so very different from what I expected to find it. Of course there is evil- and a great deal of evil; and if you will fix your eyes upon it, and brood over it, of course life seems to you only a black and hideous thing; but there is much good-yes, there is good even in things evil; and if we only think of the goodness we become happier even if we do not become better; and I cannot but think that the best and the most feasible mode of life is to try to live up to the ordinary and simple laws of nature of which we are but a part."
Well said, Alice. And Mr. Darcy has nothing on your sensible, kind, and hard working man.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 31, 2016
A fascinating novel about the twilight years of the Catholic and Protestant aristocracy in Ireland in the late 1800s. Growing up in Ireland I was used to seeing the ruins of grand houses scattered throughout the countryside and I often wondered what life was led in the latter years of their existence. A Drama in Muslin is an illuminating glimpse into that claustrophobic landed society that grew increasingly insular as their rent paying tenants got more organized and assertive.
With the twin threats of bankruptcy and murder by peasant revolt always looming, the story concerns the procurement of marriages suitable to postpone as long as possible the inevitable decline of the aristocratic lifestyle. The competitive chase of elusive bachelors by marriage driven debutants is amusing as it is desperate. With economic advantage being with the industrialized cities of Britain and the opportunities of opening global markets, the old privileged world of the Irish landlord seeped away as its occupants waltzed around the edge of the sinkhole.
With the twin threats of bankruptcy and murder by peasant revolt always looming, the story concerns the procurement of marriages suitable to postpone as long as possible the inevitable decline of the aristocratic lifestyle. The competitive chase of elusive bachelors by marriage driven debutants is amusing as it is desperate. With economic advantage being with the industrialized cities of Britain and the opportunities of opening global markets, the old privileged world of the Irish landlord seeped away as its occupants waltzed around the edge of the sinkhole.
September 8, 2018
not really fair to say i read this, all i read was the back cover and part of the introduction
then i got really tired of reading a classic so i stopped
then i got really tired of reading a classic so i stopped
October 3, 2018
One has to read this as a near perfect novel of its era. The descriptions of mothers armed as if for battle in attempting to marry off their daughters to the best title run to extended metaphors that I found both humorous and tragic. What else could women in the 1880’s aspire to but marriage? More disturbing is the backdrop of the tragedy being played out between tenants and landlords. This is a critical period of transition in Irish history, described by one who lived through it. Deserves to be read by anyone interested in Irish history and literature.
December 7, 2020
Can't remember how I ended up with this book on my Google books shelf but glad I did. It was probably some passing reference in another review I read. What is it? The first couple of years of five girls (Alice, Olive, Violet, May and Cecilia) after they finished school and especially the trials of a very pushy wealthy ambious mother to find a "titled" husband for her favourite daughter (Olive). This all against the back-drop of the land wars in Ireland in the 1880s.
In P&P Mr Darcy was a very wealthy land owner with tenants that, according to his house keeper, "loved him". This book could not be more different. This era was the beginnng of the end of landed gentry in Ireland. The land war side of the story faded later in the book but it was a war that was lost by the gentry. From Wikepedia - in 1870, only 3% of Irish farmers owned their own land while 97% were tenants. By 1929, this ratio had been reversed with 97.4% of farmers holding their farms in freehold. The gentry and peasants lived side by side, with the difference emphasied by the ball in the school, and the peasant delegation walking up to the front to the house to argue about the rents.
So many of the these families were in dier financial situations so there was a cronic shortage of "eligible" men, which was at the core of the story. I have read so many nineteen century books during the 2020 lockdown but this was very different from the rest. There were things in this book that I could not imagine being written 80 years earlier. Comments about womens' ankles & legs and the slope of her shoulders! Then extramarital sex as one reviewer below hilariously put it as "lifted one petticoat too many".
Characters
Alice Barton - a great character.
Cecilia - Disabled and very bitter young person who was probably in love with with Alice.
Lord Dungory so many French quotes by him got annoying. With google books it is easy to translate them but they were all nonsense so I just stopped in the end.
Mr. Barton - what a waste of space that man is. Makes Mr Bennet look like the best dad in the world
Mrs Barton - Mrs Bennet is not remotly in her league.
Can't understand why in later editions he dropped the "A Drama in" from the title. That exact phrase "A Drama in Muslin" appears to describe the cattle mart in Dublin that passes as "finding a husband" Excellent book strongly recommend it.
The Absentee by Maria Edgeworth, published in 1812 covers many of the same topics about the plight of the Irish tenant farmers seventy years earlier. Another one for you if you enjoyed this one.
In P&P Mr Darcy was a very wealthy land owner with tenants that, according to his house keeper, "loved him". This book could not be more different. This era was the beginnng of the end of landed gentry in Ireland. The land war side of the story faded later in the book but it was a war that was lost by the gentry. From Wikepedia - in 1870, only 3% of Irish farmers owned their own land while 97% were tenants. By 1929, this ratio had been reversed with 97.4% of farmers holding their farms in freehold. The gentry and peasants lived side by side, with the difference emphasied by the ball in the school, and the peasant delegation walking up to the front to the house to argue about the rents.
So many of the these families were in dier financial situations so there was a cronic shortage of "eligible" men, which was at the core of the story. I have read so many nineteen century books during the 2020 lockdown but this was very different from the rest. There were things in this book that I could not imagine being written 80 years earlier. Comments about womens' ankles & legs and the slope of her shoulders! Then extramarital sex as one reviewer below hilariously put it as "lifted one petticoat too many".
Characters
Alice Barton - a great character.
Cecilia - Disabled and very bitter young person who was probably in love with with Alice.
Lord Dungory so many French quotes by him got annoying. With google books it is easy to translate them but they were all nonsense so I just stopped in the end.
Mr. Barton - what a waste of space that man is. Makes Mr Bennet look like the best dad in the world
Mrs Barton - Mrs Bennet is not remotly in her league.
Can't understand why in later editions he dropped the "A Drama in" from the title. That exact phrase "A Drama in Muslin" appears to describe the cattle mart in Dublin that passes as "finding a husband" Excellent book strongly recommend it.
The Absentee by Maria Edgeworth, published in 1812 covers many of the same topics about the plight of the Irish tenant farmers seventy years earlier. Another one for you if you enjoyed this one.
June 20, 2021
I came across this 1886 novel by George Moore by chance and really enjoyed it overall. It's Austenesque in theme (scheming mother trying to get her daughters married) and also in its sometimes scathing presentation of society and its foibles. But the prose is a lot clunkier and there's a bleakness and harsh cynicism that you don't really find in Austen.
There's some really interesting stuff about the societal hierarchy in Ireland at the time, and a lot of the machinations of the various characters are well observed. But the one disabled character, Cecilia, is disparaged by both other characters and the authorial voice, and the suggestion that she is actually in love with her best friend, Alice, is presented as making her deranged and unstable.
There's a very in-depth and realistically harsh portrayal of pregnancy and childbirth out of wedlock, which I didn't expect to find in a book of this era, but the story tips over into melodrama in places, which undermined its credibility a bit.
Generally, though, I enjoyed this portrait of a very specific part of society at a particular time in history, and may well look out for more works by Moore in the future.
There's some really interesting stuff about the societal hierarchy in Ireland at the time, and a lot of the machinations of the various characters are well observed. But the one disabled character, Cecilia, is disparaged by both other characters and the authorial voice, and the suggestion that she is actually in love with her best friend, Alice, is presented as making her deranged and unstable.
There's a very in-depth and realistically harsh portrayal of pregnancy and childbirth out of wedlock, which I didn't expect to find in a book of this era, but the story tips over into melodrama in places, which undermined its credibility a bit.
Generally, though, I enjoyed this portrait of a very specific part of society at a particular time in history, and may well look out for more works by Moore in the future.
July 14, 2020
WOW. The title is extremely appropriate for this novel: DRAMA. I loved it! Another work to add to the PBS Masterpiece Classic wishlist.
This is mainly about how messed up the Irish gentry of the 1880-90s were and the horrific hurdles that the debutantes had to jump through just to survive. (By survive, I mean get married). There are scenes that depict the peasantry and the deplorable conditions they’ve been put into by their landlords, but that seemed to be a side story. I realize that George Moore came from the gentry class himself, so he probably knew that he couldn’t thoroughly portray the life of a poor person. He stayed in his lane.
If you’re in the mood for a highbrow novel that really just boils down to a girl-drama of a 2000s teen movie, this is it!
Warning: the kindle version I bought is essentially a huge PDF of a scan of a paper version, and you cannot highlight. Some of my classmates bought paper copies off of amazon, but they were rife with misprints and misspellings( result of illegal reprinting, no doubt). It’s probably best to order this from an actual book store or view it in person first.
This is mainly about how messed up the Irish gentry of the 1880-90s were and the horrific hurdles that the debutantes had to jump through just to survive. (By survive, I mean get married). There are scenes that depict the peasantry and the deplorable conditions they’ve been put into by their landlords, but that seemed to be a side story. I realize that George Moore came from the gentry class himself, so he probably knew that he couldn’t thoroughly portray the life of a poor person. He stayed in his lane.
If you’re in the mood for a highbrow novel that really just boils down to a girl-drama of a 2000s teen movie, this is it!
Warning: the kindle version I bought is essentially a huge PDF of a scan of a paper version, and you cannot highlight. Some of my classmates bought paper copies off of amazon, but they were rife with misprints and misspellings( result of illegal reprinting, no doubt). It’s probably best to order this from an actual book store or view it in person first.
July 2, 2022
Worth reading Moore’s 1915 preface (after) where he reviews the long elaborate passages—such as the descriptions of the dressmaking and the castle ball—as if they were written by a different person. Yet this is one of the real charms of the novel and although it is dense in parts this doesn’t detract the from the bold Ibsenian outspokenness against social conventions and conformities that were so restrictive at that time. Also worth reading for the rare portrayal of the West of Ireland with its indivisible colonial history at the time of the Land League.
March 15, 2019
I'm really surprised that this book isn't more widely known. It's like Jane Austen, but set in Ireland in the 1880s. And it's surprisingly pretty feminist- if I didn't know that a man wrote it, I never would have guessed.
August 10, 2021
Not his best work.
March 25, 2025
marriage obsessed mother archetype is strong in this one
September 8, 2010
This was an interesting book for a number of reasons. I like Irish history and the book takes place in the 1880's in western Ireland during the activities of the Land League, so there is the historical aspect to it. But the most interesting thing was the picture it painted of the lives of five girls born into the gentry of the West of Ireland. Read the rest of my review here: http://abookgeek-llm.blogspot.com/201...
February 20, 2013
I don't know that I would have picked this book up if it hadn't been assigned, but I really enjoyed this portrayal of female society in Ireland in the 1980s. Five friends return to Ireland from school in a convent only to be bombarded with their "coming out" for the Dublin season, pressure to marry advantageously, while Irish politics (the Land League) push in at edge.
It's a bit like a George Eliot/Jane Austen mash-up, if you'll forgive the awkward comparison.
It's a bit like a George Eliot/Jane Austen mash-up, if you'll forgive the awkward comparison.
maybe-to-read
August 11, 2018***WHO SUCKED ME IN***
Books and Things on YouTube in their Where to go after Jane Austen, or Jane Austen and the Victorians #janeaustenjuly video published on 25 july 2018
She compared it with Sense and Sensibility. I have not read that one but I really enjoyed the movie from 1995. I would compared that movie to the the Abduction Club, which is a lot more lighthearted (and unrealistic) but the relation between the sisters felt somewhat the same!
Books and Things on YouTube in their Where to go after Jane Austen, or Jane Austen and the Victorians #janeaustenjuly video published on 25 july 2018
She compared it with Sense and Sensibility. I have not read that one but I really enjoyed the movie from 1995. I would compared that movie to the the Abduction Club, which is a lot more lighthearted (and unrealistic) but the relation between the sisters felt somewhat the same!
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