Not too long ago there was an uproar in Jane Austen circles at the discovery of a drawing that was labeled Jane Austen, depicting an
As a novel, The Castle of Otranto is downright risible, but as a period piece it’s fascinating. While it doesn’t have quite as much rape
Once you accept the lugubrious plot of the longest English novel (pure and innocent girl is Wronged, fades away into angelic death) Clarissa, by Samuel
Reading Pamela, by Samuel Richardson, is like watching the invention of literature before your eyes. Richardson began this as yet another work-for-hire series of “conduct
It’s actually winter in Southern California, closing us in for an entire week. Time to reread the great classics! And Wives and Daughters, by Elizabeth
The occasion of this recent reread was a discussion of George Eliot’s Middlemarch. At the end one of the groups said, “Why is this considered
It’s interesting to read an end-of-the-century novel from the opposite side of the intervening twentieth century, for though there is in Chopin’s novel no preoccupation
As I was growing up, I became aware of people talking about how witty this book was, or that movie, or a famous person sitting
It is scarcely the province of an author to refute the arguments of his censors and vindicate his own productions, but I may be allowed
Books! Books were the window from which I looked out of a rather meager and decidedly narrow room, onto a rich and wonderful universe. I
I was rereading Fanny Burney’s first novel, Evelina, recently. It had been a while; I’d retained a memory of a boring central romance surrounded by vivid
Interviewer’s Note: Laura Gayle is the pen name for Shannon Page and Karen G. Berry SHERWOOD: One of the pleasures of this series is the
