The Ordeal of Richard Feverel

After his wife's desertion, Sir Austin wants to bring up his son according to a strict educational system governing every aspect of his life. However Richard has to make his own mistakes, fall in love, and generally live his own life. This book tells about the clashes between Richard's wish to govern his own life to his father's constant interference. This book was very influential. The leading libraries of the day considered it too frank and sexually explicit and refused to buy it. Later authors including E. M. Forster, Oscar Wilde and Virginia Woolf admired and respected it.


By : George Meredith (1828 - 1909)

01 - The Inmates of Raynham Abbey



02 - Showing How the Fates Selected the Fourteenth Birthday to Try the Strength of the System



03 - The Magian Conflict



04 - Arson



05 - Adrian Plies His Hook



06 - Juvenile Stratagems



07 - Daphne’s Bower



08 - The Bitter Cup



09 - A Fine Distinction



10 - Richard Passes Through His Preliminary Ordeal, and is the Occasion of an Aphorism



11 - In which the Last Act of the Bakewell Comedy is Closed in a Letter



12 - The Blossoming Season



13 - The Magnetic Age



14 - An Attraction



15 - Ferdinand and Miranda



16 - Unmasking of Master Ripton Thompson



17 - Good Wine and Good Blood



18 - The System Encounters the Wild Oats Special Plea



19 - A Diversion Played on a Penny-Whistle



20 - Celebrates the Time-Honoured Treatment of a Dragon by the Hero



21 - Richard is Summoned to Town to Hear a Sermon



22 - Indicates the Approaches of Fever



23 - Crisis in the Apple-Disease



24 - Of the Spring Primrose and the Autumnal



25 - In which the Hero Takes a Step



26 - Records the Rapid Development of the Hero



27 - Contains an Intercession for the Heroine



28 - Relates How Preparations for Action Were Conducted Under the April of Lovers



29 - In which the Last Act of a Comedy Takes the Place of the First



30 - Celebrates the Breakfast



31 - The Philosopher Appears in Person



32 - Procession of the Cake



33 - Norsing The Devil



34 - Conquest of an Epicure



35 - Clare’s Marriage



36 - A Dinner-Party at Richmond



37 - Mrs. Berry on Matrimony



38 - An Enchantress



39 - The Little Bird and the Falcon; a Berry to the Rescue!



40 - Clare’s Diary



41 - Austin Returns



42 - Nature Speaks



43 - Again the Magian Conflict



44 - The Last Scene



45 - Lady Blandish to Austin Wentworth


Sir Austin Feverel's wife deserts him to run away with a poet, leaving her husband to bring up their boy Richard. Believing schools to be corrupt, Sir Austin, a scientific humanist, educates the boy at home with a plan of his own devising known as "the System". This involves strict authoritarian supervision of every aspect of the boy's life, and in particular the prevention of any meeting between Richard and girls of his own age. Richard nevertheless meets and falls in love with Lucy Desborough, the niece of a neighboring farmer. Sir Austin finds out and, disapproving of her humble birth, forbids them to meet again, but they secretly marry. Sir Austin now tries to retrieve the situation by sending Richard to London. Here, however, Sir Austin's friend Lord Mountfalcon successfully sets a courtesan to seduce Richard, hoping that this will leave Lucy open to seduction by himself. Ashamed of his own conduct, Richard flees abroad where he at length hears that Lucy has given birth to a baby and has been reconciled to Sir Austin. He returns to England and, hearing about Lord Mountfalcon's villainy, challenges him to a duel. But this goes badly: Richard is seriously wounded. Lucy is so overcome by this turn of events that she loses her mind and dies.

Comments

Random Post