The Old Wives' Tale - Softcover

Bennett, Arnold

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1438279841 ISBN 13: 9781438279848

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2009

Synopsis

The Old Wives' Tale deals with the lives of two very different sisters, Constance and Sophia Baines, following their stories from their youth, working in their mother's draper's shop, into old age. It is generally regarded as one of Bennett's finest works.

Bennett claimed he was inspired to write the novel upon seeing a particular older woman: "This woman was once young, slim, perhaps beautiful; certainly free from ridiculous mannerisms. Very probably she is unconscious of her singularities. Her case is a tragedy. One ought to be able to make a heartrending novel out of the history of a woman such as she. Every stout, ageing woman is not grotesque--far from it!--but there is an extreme pathos in the mere fact that every stout ageing woman was once a young girl with the unique charm of youth in her form and movements and in her mind."

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

With a New Introduction by Francine Prose
Commentary by Rebecca West, W. Somerset Maugham,
Virginia Woolf, H. G. Wells, Henry James, and J. B. Priestley

" [Arnold Bennett's] superb Old Wives' Tale, wandering from person to person and from scene to scene, is by far the finest 'long novel' that has been written in English and in the English fashion, in this generation."
--H. G. Wells

First published in 1908, The Old Wives' Tale affirms the integrity of ordinary lives as it tells the story of the Baines sisters--shy, retiring Constance and defiant, romantic Sophia--over the course of nearly half a century. Bennett traces the sisters' lives from childhood in their father's drapery shop in provincial Bursley, England, during the mid-Victorian era, through their married lives, to the modern industrial age, when they are reunited as old women. The setting moves from the Five Towns of Staffordshire to exotic and cosmopolitan Paris, while the action moves from the subdued domestic routine of the Baines household to the siege of Paris during the Franco-Prussian War.

"Like Wordsworth, [Arnold Bennett] has triumphed over the habitual; he has not let it disguise the particle of beauty from him."--Rebecca West

ARNOLD BENNETT (1867-1931) looked to Flaubert, Maupassant, and Balzac for inspiration in the fashioning of his own acutely realistic novels, including his masterpiece, The Old Wives' Tale (1908). His first novel was A Man from the North (1898), and he is also known for his Clayhanger trilogy (1910-16).

The author of thirteen books of fiction, FRANCINE PROSE is a
fellow of the New York Institute for the Humanities and the New York Public Library's Center for Scholars and Writers.

About the Author:

ARNOLD BENNETT was born in Staffordshire on May 27, 1867, the son of a solictor. Rather than following his father into the law, Bennett moved to London at the age of twenty-one and began a career in writing . His first novel, "The Man from the North," was published in 1898 during a spell as editor of a periodical -- throughout his life journalism supplemented his writing career. In 1902 Bennett moved to Paris, married, and published some of his best known novels, most of which were set in The Potteries district where he grew up: "Anna of the Five Towns "(1902), "The Old Wives Tale" (1908), and the "Clayhanger" series (1910-1918). These works, as well as several successful plays, established him both in Europe and America as one of the most popular and acclaimed writers of his era. Bennett returned to England in 1912, and during the First World War worked for Lord Beaverbrook in the Ministry of Information. In 1921, separated from his first wife, he fell in love with an actress, Dorothy Cheston, with whom he had a child. He received the James Tait Black Award for his novel "Riceyman Steps" in 1923. Arnold Bennett died of typhoid in London on March 27, 1931.

About this edition

• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1438279841
• ISBN 13: 9781438279848
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 378