The Advance of the English Novel , by William Lyon Phelps, Lampson Professor of English Literature at Yale, should, therefore, meet with a ready welcome. The book is scholarly, but also popular in treatment. The very difficulties of the theme are turned to advantage. True it is that the attempt to deal with the whole history of the English novel from Defoe to Edith Wharton necessitates a very rapid treatment; but rapidity of treatment with Professor Phelps makes for interest and variety. Unquestionably the theory of the ...
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The Advance of the English Novel , by William Lyon Phelps, Lampson Professor of English Literature at Yale, should, therefore, meet with a ready welcome. The book is scholarly, but also popular in treatment. The very difficulties of the theme are turned to advantage. True it is that the attempt to deal with the whole history of the English novel from Defoe to Edith Wharton necessitates a very rapid treatment; but rapidity of treatment with Professor Phelps makes for interest and variety. Unquestionably the theory of the novel is a subject too deep and too complex to be dealt with satisfactorily in the space of three hundred-odd pages-if indeed it is at present susceptible of satisfactory treatment in any number of pages; but what the average reader, and often the scholar or teacher, wants most, is, after all, not a theory of criticism, but criticism. Professor Phelps's book is packed with the criticism of common sense and of genuine appreciation, steadied and clarified by the historic view. A feature of the book is its discussion of modern novelists and its incidental comparisons of the established classics with modern favorites. The author's taste is catholic, and while some modern reputations are placed less high in this volume than the popular estimate, and others higher, the general effect of the book is to sustain and interpret intelligent modern taste and not to discredit it. Professor Phelps's criticisms of the classic novelists are often delightfully frank and pungent-actually taking our part, for example, against those who insist that we should read and enjoy Johnson's Rasselas ; yet it is written in a spirit of real reverence for genius.
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Seller's Description:
Good. No Jacket. New York: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1919. 5th or later Edition. Hardcover. Good/No Jacket. 12mo-over 6¾-7¾" tall. 1919 reprint of 1917 fifth edition. How two centuries of literature have shaped the modern novel, with a particular focus on contemporary writers. All in Vg internal order, with just a little even toning. Blue boards rather dulled and a little marked. 12mo. 334pp.
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Seller's Description:
Very Good. Book Blue binding with gold-colored print on spine. Blind stamped edge lines and logo on cover. Tight, sound, gently used ex-library with usual markings.
