George Gissing
Author
Series
Language
English
Description
When their father's death leaves them with no money and a dim future, the Madden sisters, Alice, Virginia, and Monica, must negotiate the gender roles and class constraints of Victorian London in the 1890s. Virginia and Alice have aged out of the possibility of marriage and seemingly the idea of love itself and find themselves with few prospects and little hope. Remaindered in the marriage equation, these "odd women" face a great deal of scrutiny,...
Author
Language
English
Description
"New Grub Street" is George Gissing's 1891 novel set in the writing circles of London in the 1880s. A place that became synonymous with the writing of hack literature, Grub Street is a street in London, England and represents the setting of the novel. It is here that talented and cerebral novelist Edwin Reardon and the semi-scrupulous Jasper Milvain attempt to pursue success, love, and-often above all else-money. As a realistic picture of the literary...
Author
Language
English
Description
The Nether World is a novel written by the English author George Gissing. The plot concerns several poor families living in the slums of 19th century London. Rich in naturalistic detail, the novel concentrates on the individual problems and hardships which result from the typical shortages experienced by the lower classes — want of money, employment and decent living conditions.
Author
Language
English
Description
Godwin Peak is a star student at Whitelaw College. He wins many academic prizes and his future seems promising. Then his Cockney uncle arrives intending to open an eating-house adjacent to the college. Godwin is mortified of being associated with 'trade' and leaves the college rather than face the scorn he expects to receive from his upper-class fellow students.
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
First published in 1903 and hugely popular at the time, 'The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft' by George Gissing is structured as a series of diary entries. The diary keeper is the fictional former writer Henry Ryecroft, now in his fifties. An unexpected inheritance has allowed him to enjoy a slow, solitary life in Devon, where he muses about art, nature, and society through his diary. Although this is a work of fiction, there are clear parallels...
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Tomorrow I shall leave by the Messina boat, which calls at Paola. It is now more than a twelvemonth since I began to think of Paola, and an image of the place has grown in my mind. I picture a little marina; a yellowish little town just above; and behind, rising grandly, the long range of mountains which guard the shore of Calabria. Paola has no special interest that I know of, but it is the nearest point on the coast to Cosenza, which has interest...
Author
Pub. Date
2025
Language
English
Description
Charles Dickens: A Critical Study was written in Siena, Italy in 1897 and first published by Blackie in the Victorian Era Series in February 1898. Any doubts that readers and critics harboured over the choice of Gissing as author were swept aside on the book's publication. It was hailed as a triumphant feat of original and incisive criticism allied to level-headed conclusions. Literature, the forerunner of the Times Literary Supplement, described...
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
The Mumfords are a middle-class couple, living in suburban Sutton on the outskirts of London with their young son. Reading the newspaper, they become aware of a young woman seeking a place as a "paying guest," or lodger. To supplement their income they decide to take a tenant, named Louise Derrick, who is in need of a place to live due to disagreements with her immediate family. Louise, who is poorly educated and bad-tempered, is being romantically...
10) Thyrza
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Thyrza Trent, a young hat-trimmer, meets and falls in love with Walter Egremont, an Oxford-trained idealist who gives lectures on literature to workers. Trapped by birth and circumstance, Thyrza is attempting to escape her destiny in this tale of ambition, romance, betrayal and disillusionment.
11) A Life's Morning
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
A cultivated poor young woman, Emily Hood, from a small town in the north of England works as a governess in a wealthy country family. She falls in love with her employer's son, Wilfrid Athel, and the two are engaged. However, during a visit to her parents' home, she is confronted by her father's employer, Dagworthy, who threatens to expose her father as a thief unless Emily marries him.
12) The Emancipated
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Miriam Baske, a young widow, freed from the constraints of making a living, leaves behind the grey stone chapels and flinty hearts of Lancashire for the sun and artistic splendour of Italy. She meets a host of her countrymen vacationing and occupying themselves with travel, art, philosophy, romance, and improving their health.
13) Veranilda
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
The love story is not an unrequited romance - the two lovers are aware of their feelings for each other - as much as it is an unrewarded one, for the plot revolves around keeping the two from each other, as Veranilda becomes a pawn between the competing courts of Justinian and Totila. The story of Veranilda takes place during the time of the Gothic King Totila's advance on Naples and Rome.
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
The Town Traveller is one of Gissing's novels which earned him more income during his lifetime than most of his other novels. The story is full of life and descriptive detail. It revolves around life of town traveller Gammon, just the sort of quarter-educated that Gissing usually despises.
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
The story of the romantic and sexual initiation of a suburban heroine, Nancy Lord, which Gissing wrote after his return from Exeter. He took lodgings with his second wife at 76 Burton Road, Brixton, where South London provided new literary inspiration. He went for long walks through nearby Camberwell, soaking up impressions of the way of life he saw emerging there.
16) Eve's Ransom
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Eve's Ransom is the story of a mechanical draughtsman named Maurice Hilliard, who comes into some money, which enables him to live without working. As part of his resulting travels, he meets and falls in love with Eve Madeley, a book keeper.
17) The Whirlpool
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Alma's farther loses his fortune at his bank and commits suicide, forcing his 20 year old daughter to go abroad to make plans and pursue her career. Two admirers follow her: Cyrus Redgrave, a wealthy bachelor who makes an indecent proposal, and Harvey Rolfe, whom she ends up marrying.
18) The Unclassed
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Osmond Waymark, a struggling teacher answers a magazine advertisement, placed by Julian Casti, a half-Italian who had felt himself to be rejected by society. The two strike up a meaningful and deep friendship.
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
Gissing's own life takes a turn for the better and this novel reflects a more optimistic view of life with such prominent themes as spiritual life, importance of love in life, consideration for depth in relationships, criticism of stale Victorian norms of marriage.
Author
Publisher
Project Gutenberg
Language
English
Description
As he waited for his breakfast, never served to time, Mr. Lashmar drummed upon the window-pane, and seemed to watch a blackbird lunching with much gusto about the moist lawn of Alverholme Vicarage. But his gaze was absent and worried. The countenance of the reverend gentleman rarely wore any other expression, for he took to heart all human miseries and follies, and lived in a ceaseless mild indignation against the tenor of the age.

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