Novel 145: Eleanor Frances Poynter, My Little Lady (1870)

 
Sir Edward John Poynter, In a Garden

Sir Edward John Poynter, In a Garden

 

An impulsive French girl, raised by a gambler, is aided by an English doctor.

Eleanor Frances Poynter (1840-1929), the sister of the painter Sir Edward John Poynter and of the translator Clara Bell, wrote some seven novels between 1870 and 1892, of which the first is this poignant story of vulnerable innocence in a hard and confusing world.

“It is an agreeable task to record a book which can be read with genuine pleasure. My Little Lady’s history” is “written in a simple graceful style.” Athenaeum, December 17, 1870

“The whole book is charming; quietly told, quietly thought, without glare or flutter, and interesting in both character and story.” Saturday Review, December 17, 1870

“It is really pleasant to read a novel like ‘My Little Lady’—a simple story, so vividly potraying a few characters that we can imagine we have known them, felt all their troubles, and rejoiced in their happiness.” Examiner, January 7, 1871

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v.1 http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_00000004766A#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=6&xywh=-629%2C0%2C3742%2C1962

v.2 http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_00000003F32A#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=6&xywh=-652%2C0%2C3781%2C1982

v.3 http://access.bl.uk/item/viewer/ark:/81055/vdc_00000003F330#?c=0&m=0&s=0&cv=0&xywh=-1679%2C-126%2C4802%2C2518

Novel 144, Ellen Wallace, Margaret Capel (1846)

 
Sir Luke Fildes, Carina

Sir Luke Fildes, Carina

 

An innocent and virtuous young lady falls in love with her uncle's ward.

Here is another novel by Wallace (see Novel 074), with the same merits (quiet, vivid characterization, a good style) and the same defect (a painfully hard-to-swallow lovers’ misunderstanding).

“This is one of the best kind of ‘fashionable novels’: it is not only free from the vulgar impertinences of the ‘silver-fork school,’ but has the tone of good society, and, better still, a vein of pure and healthful sentiment.  It gives an animated picture of country life among the upper class of gentry at the present day, sketched with the skill and tact of a nice observer; who possesses the art of indicating scenes and persons with a few graphic touches, and the power of making characters act and talk naturally.” Spectator, January 17, 1846

“It is a very fairly drawn picture from the life.  It deals with the men and manners of our own time, and the author has been content to take the world as he finds it, without attempting to create imaginary persons or impossible events. . . .  Altogether this is one of the best fictions the season has produced.” Critic, January 24, 1846

“Here is the best novel of the Austen school we have ever seen, with real men and women, natural situations, brilliant dialogue; but there are no stage tricks in it, no startling effects, no murders, adulteries, or seductions, and only one death of any sort—consequently it has received very moderate praise in England, and no one in America seems aware of its existence. . . .  There have been very very few better novels written for the last six years.” Literary World, March 27, 1847

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v. 1 https://archive.org/details/margaretcapelnov01wall

v. 2 https://archive.org/details/margaretcapelnov02wall

v. 3 https://archive.org/details/margaretcapelnov03wall

Novel 143: Francis E. Paget, Lucretia; or, The Heroine of the Nineteenth Century (1868)

 
John Henry Henshall, Thoughts

John Henry Henshall, Thoughts

 

A young lady tries to live like the heroine of a novel.

Francis Edward Paget (1806-1882), rector of Elford, wrote half a dozen novels promoting his High Church views, beginning in 1833.  This, a satire on the novels of M.E. Braddon and her kind (though it alludes also to Scott and Bronte), features an intriguing narrator, foolishly credulous and at the same time cleverly self-aware.

“This satire is quite just, because it exactly hits the great artistic fault of the sensational novel, the use of illegitimate means to produce an effect upon the reader.” Spectator, August 8, 1868

“A happier thought than the combination of a ludicrously sensational plot with a ludicrously sentimental heroine . . . could not have been devised.” Athenaeum, October 17, 1868

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http://explore.bl.uk/BLVU1:LSCOP-ALL:BLL01016843384

Novel 137: Beatrice May Butt, Delicia (1879)

 
Evelyn de Morgan, The Soul's Prison House

Evelyn de Morgan, The Soul's Prison House

 

A quiet young woman introduces her best friends to one another, with unexpected consequences.

Here is another novel by Butt (see Novel 045).  It has several vivid characters, and three plots, of which the most prominent is also the best. 

“Delicia is one of those womanly portraits that can be drawn only by a high-minded writer. . . .  On the whole, the story will repay the reader’s trouble.” Athenaeum, July 5, 1879

“That ‘Delicia’ is a good novel nobody who has read it can have the slightest doubt.” It is good because of “the strength, the delicacy, and the freshness of the character-drawing, and . . . the interest of the story. . . .  The Stevens family . . . is really a triumph in its way.  It has all the truth to English domestic life. . . . We have not read so good a novel as ‘Delicia’ this year.” Examiner, July 19, 1879

“Without aspiring to the highest place, it is none the less one of the few books where there is nothing we could wish added or taken away.  This calm sufficiency and graceful tact in proportioning ambition to resources, if not exactly genius, is near akin to it.” Academy, August 30, 1879

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https://archive.org/details/deliciabyauthor00buttgoog/

Novel 136: Margaret Agnes Paul, De Cressy (1856)

 
Evelyn de Morgan, Cadmus and Harmonia

Evelyn de Morgan, Cadmus and Harmonia

 

An impoverished but virtuous young lady attracts the love of a lord.

Here is another novel by Paul (see Novel 025):  ambivalent characters find themselves entangled in a subtle and apparently intractable conflict—until the author, out of time, or patience, or paper, suddenly resolves it by sending two characters to heaven and a third to South America.

“The persons have much consistency and reality about them; spirit is equable and well sustained throughout.” Spectator, June 28, 1856

It is “written in an unpretending, pleasing style.” Saturday Review, July 26, 1856

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Novel 135: William Gilbert, De Profundis (1864)

 
Evelyn De Morgan, Hope in the Prison of Despair

Evelyn De Morgan, Hope in the Prison of Despair

 

An honest couple do the best they can amid the squalor and vice of the slums.

William Gilbert (1804-1890), father of W.S. Gilbert (of Gilbert & Sullivan), wrote some twelve novels, many, like this one, about the London poor, whose miseries are narrated in a breezy, unsentimental tone, with much wry humor.

“In this story Mr. Gilbert never introduces ‘high life,’ nor people of the better class.  He reveals the mysteries of ‘London labour and the London poor’ in a low metropolitan neighbourhood, and all through the book we get no distinct peeps at any higher social condition.  To interest the general reader in such revelations requires great skill, pathos, and power.  Mr. Gilbert commands them all, and combines with them, in his writing, a deep, true knowledge of human motive and action. . . .  That Mr. Gilbert is a true artist we cannot but admit, for out of the simplest details of low life he produces characters whose very vividness enchains the attention.  He is amongst novelists a realist.  Neither imagination nor caricature influences his portraiture.  Men, women, and children are precisely what he sees them to be, and his vision is correct, his judgment true.” Manchester Guardian, February 28, 1865

“‘De Profundis’ is an excellently written, unvarnished narrative. . . .  The style well becomes the subject—plain, earnest, unaffected, and with an admirable quaint simplicity of language in relating the most heart-rending details, which is more effective than the most studied artificial effects, as it is perhaps more rarely attained to. . . . We have never read a story of humble life so well and unaffectedly told as this, and we recommend it as a wholesome contrast to the pictures of vulgar splendour and luxury under which our tables groan.” Westminster Review, April, 1865

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http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/f/89vilt/oxfaleph014418947

Novel 134: Eliza Lynn Linton, My Love! (1881)

 
Henry Nelson O’Neil, Painting con Amore

Henry Nelson O’Neil, Painting con Amore

 

A vain amateur artist-poet and an ill-tempered old lady oppress their young adult children.

Here is another novel by Linton (see Novel 044), with some especially entertaining minor characters, such as the thoroughly modern girl twins Gip and Pip.

“In ‘My Love!’ Mrs. Lynn Linton has devoted herself with much success to the portraiture of some of the baser passions, such as selfishness, meanness, hypocrisy, and ill temper.”  She “is brilliantly clever from first to last, and . . . there is not a dull page in her novel, though there are many that are disagreeable.  She writes brightly, vigorously, and eloquently; she is uncommonly painstaking and earnest; her dialogue is always apt and pointed; and many of her personages . . . are of singular merit and interest.  ‘My Love!’ in fact, is an unusually able and impressive book, its unattractive purpose notwithstanding.” Athenaeum, July 9, 1881

“My Love is a readable and amusing love story. . . .  It is a tale of love, pure and simple, although the three or more love affairs which run parallel to each other are illustrated or encumbered by a multiplicity of episodes; while a great variety of characters, vigorously sketched, are brought together into active and energetic collaboration.  Mrs. Lynn Linton generally inclines to the grave; but in this novel she is often humorous, and sometimes sprightly, or even comic. . . . Altogether Mrs. Lynn Linton has written an agreeable story; and it is agreeable chiefly because . . . she has always taken some pains to show the more amiable side of her least amiable characters.” Saturday Review, August 13, 1881

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v.1 https://archive.org/details/mylove__01lint/

v.2 https://archive.org/details/mylove__02lint/

v.3 https://archive.org/details/mylove__03lint/

Novel 133: F.F. Montrésor, The Alien (1901)

 
John Atkinson Grimshaw, A Wet Road by Moonlight, Wharfedale

John Atkinson Grimshaw, A Wet Road by Moonlight, Wharfedale

 

A mysterious man is claimed by an old woman as the son and heir who died thirty years before.

Frances Frederica Montrésor (1862-1934) wrote a dozen or so novels between 1895 and 1907.  This one has interestingly conflicted characters and (except for an incongruous South American episode) a good plot.

“Cleverly thought out, and full of sympathy and observance, it is a book suited to all kinds and sorts of people. The interest . . . is never allowed to flag, while the quality of its character drawing gives it a delicate atmospheric beauty by no means common.” Academy, November 9, 1901

This “adds to the sincerity, simplicity, and insight marking her other stories a larger motive and a stronger grasp. . . . There is a touch of Mrs. Oliphant in the quiet humor, in the detached view and appraisement of ‘the human,’ and in the enduring consciousness of eternal goodness.” New York Times, December 7, 1901

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Novel 132: Alice Price, A Wilful Young Woman (1886)

 
George Elgar Hicks, Woman's Mission - Companion of Manhood

George Elgar Hicks, Woman’s Mission - Companion of Manhood

 

The virtuous daughter of a country lawyer is scorned by her selfish, worldly mother.

Here is another novel by Alice Price (see Novel 021), much like its predecessor in its engrossing but implausible plot and its well-defined characters.

“A very readable story. . . .  Mrs. Price has drawn her dramatis personae with some power and vigour, and nobody could possibly find this novel tedious.” Academy, November 20, 1886

“This is an excellent tale, and shows by a conspicuous example, which some of our lady-novelists might profitably note, that it is quite possible to rouse a strong interest in a love-story without even an allusion to unlawful passion. . . .  There are, we think, defects in the plot. . . .   But, on the whole, for sound sense, good feeling and taste, and a style which can be both pathetic and humorous on occasion, this is a book which cannot easily be surpassed.” Spectator, January 29, 1887

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v.1 https://archive.org/details/wilfulyoungwoman01pric/

v.2 https://archive.org/details/wilfulyoungwoman02pric/

v.3 https://archive.org/details/wilfulyoungwoman03pric/

Novel 131: Anonymous, Hanworth (1858)

 
Heywood Hardy, The Meeting in the Forest

Heywood Hardy, The Meeting in the Forest

 

A young lady loves a nobleman, whose interest in her friend she misinterprets.

The author of this forgotten novel is identified neither in Fraser’s Magazine, where it was serialized, nor in its separate publication as a book—a pity, because it’s a good one.

“One of the best photographs of English society as it now exists.” Illustrated Times, October 9, 1858

“It is a pleasant story of society, written with good taste and unquestionable skill.” Examiner, December 25, 1858

“Unobjectionable pleasantness is a quality which carries books, as it does human beings, quietly and happily through the world, but it does not give room for much discussion. . . .  The girls are like real girls, but there is nothing marked about them.  The nobleman, who is a high-minded love-creating coquet, is not an impossibility.  There is no clever writing, no description of scenery, no boring of any sort. . . .  From beginning to end the story goes on quietly, evenly, and agreeably, showing a considerable power of observing family life, a subdued sense of the ludicrous, and an unusual turn for writing intelligible and consecutive English.” Saturday Review, January 1, 1859

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https://archive.org/details/hanworthorigpub00hanwgoog/

Novel 130: Robert Buchanan, Foxglove Manor (1884)

 
John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, The Temptation of Eve

John Roddam Spencer Stanhope, The Temptation of Eve

 

A charismatic clergyman loves an agnostic squire’s wife.

Well known also as a poet, playwright, and critic, Robert Buchanan (1841-1901) published nearly 30 works of fiction, mostly in the last twenty years of the century. Despite some very silly plot twists at the end, this one provides a convincing portrait of self-deception and depravity.

“A very powerful study.  Mr. Buchanan has firmly grasped the character of a man of a sensuous and even refined imagination, but without moral fibre. . . . He has drawn the central figure with consummate skill, and told his story with great vigour, directness, and rapidity of narration.” Athenaeum, September 13, 1884

“As a study of morbid anatomy it reaches the highest level to which work of that kind can possibly attain.  From a dramatic point of view there is genius” in the handling of our reaction to the main character. Graphic, October 4, 1884

“It touches on that mysterious region in which the love of men to God is seen to have a deep and hidden connection with the mutual love of man and woman; and if we cannot pay it what would be the immense tribute of saying that it deals adequately with such a subject, we may at least declare that the attempt is marked by power and by a profound pathos, and associated with nothing unworthy.” Contemporary Review, 1884

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v.1 https://archive.org/details/foxglovemanornov01buchuoft/

v.2 https://archive.org/details/foxglovemanornov02buchuoft

v.3 https://archive.org/details/foxglovemanornov03buchuoft

Novel 126: Ellen Pickering, The Quiet Husband (1840)

 
Thomas Phillips, William Blathwayt IV and His Wife, Frances Scott

Thomas Phillips, William Blathwayt IV and His Wife, Frances Scott

 

A virtuous young lady, raised in luxury but suddenly orphaned and poor, is taken in by her mother’s former lover.

Ellen Pickering (1802-1843) wrote some sixteen novels before her early death.  If you don’t allow yourself to be annoyed by the plot here (especially the tediously mysterious lovers’ misunderstanding), you’ll enjoy the various carefully developed characters placed in striking situations.

“The quick eye and clear intellect to observe, and the ready pen to convey to others in a pleasant manner the impressions received, are the gifts of which Miss Pickering makes such good use.” Literary Gazette, June 6, 1840

“While we object to the story as being rather too improbable, to the dénouement as occurring merely at the author’s arbitrary pleasure, . . . we . . . pronounce the story . . . to be one that rivets the attention; serving also as the vehicle of numberless happy sketches as well as pointed and telling truths.  The lady has an admirable knack at dove-tailing just reflections in the progress of the narrative, and perhaps still more artlessly, to appearance, in the course of close and rapid dialogue.  With what a keen eye does she mark, if not a very wide world of life, at least distinct and important segments in its circle! with what a delicate hand does she delineate character!” Monthly Review, July, 1840

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http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/permalink/f/89vilt/oxfaleph014559115

Novel 125: Theo Gift, An Innocent Maiden (1883)

 
James Charles, Study of a Girl in White

James Charles, Study of a Girl in White

 

A murder places an innocent girl in a difficult dilemma.

For Theo Gift, see Novel 015.  In this brief novel, the characters, though mostly types, are compelling, and the plot is deftly handled.

Gift’s “idea of an innocent English girl is much more complex and natural than the mere selfish, silly chit who plays the ingénue in most novels. . . . Both the men are very well drawn. . . .  There is nothing depressing in this very pretty, refined, and carefully written book.” Academy, March 1, 1884

“Theo Gift’s last heroine is a very charming little maiden indeed, whose story may be recommended for its purity of tone and unaffected style.  Nor does it want a fairly constructed plot. . . .  Theo Gift always seems in kindly sympathy with the people of whom she writes.” Morning Post, March 13, 1884.


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https://archive.org/details/aninnocentmaide00boulgoog