Items related to The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion

The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion - Softcover

  • 3.68 out of 5 stars
    27,765 ratings by Goodreads
 
9781456456351: The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion

Synopsis

I call this the Saddest Story, rather than “The Ashburnham Tragedy”, just because it is so sad, just because there was no current to draw things along to a swift and inevitable end. There is about it none of the elevation that accompanies tragedy; there is about it no nemesis, no destiny. Here were two noble people—for I am convinced that both Edward and Leonora had noble natures—here, then, were two noble natures, drifting down life, like fireships afloat on a lagoon and causing miseries, heart-aches, agony of the mind and death. And they themselves steadily deteriorated. And why? For what purpose? The Dowells and the Ashburnhams, two seemingly perfect couples, are not at all what they seem. Ford Madox Ford’s groundbreaking novel of marriage, infidelity, madness and death explores the nature of truth and the human understanding of reality. Ford tells his story—and it is loosely based on his own messy personal life—through non-chronological flashbacks, a literary technique pioneered by the author. To complicate matters, the narrator is quite unreliable, gradually revealing a version of events that is startling different from what the reader is originally led to believe.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Review

First published in 1915, Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier begins, famously and ominously, "This is the saddest story I have ever heard." The book then proceeds to confute this pronouncement at every turn, exposing a world less sad than pathetic, and more shot through with hypocrisy and deceit than its incredulous narrator, John Dowell, cares to imagine. Somewhat forgotten as a classic, The Good Soldier has been called everything from the consummate novelist's novel to one of the greatest English works of the century. And although its narrative hook--the philandering of an otherwise noble man--no longer shocks, its unerring cadences and doleful inevitabilities proclaim an enduring appeal.

Ford's novel revolves around two couples: Edward Ashburnham--the title's soldier--and his capable if off-putting wife, Leonora; and long-transplanted Americans John and Florence Dowell. The foursome's ostensible amiability, on display as they pass parts of a dozen pre-World War I summers together in Germany, conceals the fissures in each marriage. John is miserably mismatched with the garrulous, cuckolding Florence; and Edward, dashing and sentimental, can't refrain from falling in love with women whose charms exceed Leonora's. Predictably, Edward and Florence conduct their affair, an indiscretion only John seems not to notice. After the deaths of the two lovers, and after Leonora explains much of the truth to John, he recounts the events of their four lives with an extended inflection of outrage. From his retrospective perch, his recollections simmer with a bitter skepticism even as he expresses amazement at how much he overlooked.

Dowell's resigned narration is flawlessly conversational--haphazard, sprawling, lusting for sympathy. He exudes self-preservation even as he alternately condemns and lionizes Edward: "If I had had the courage and the virility and possibly also the physique of Edward Ashburnham I should, I fancy, have done much what he did." Stunningly, Edward's adultery comes to seem not merely excusable, but almost sublime. "Perhaps he could not bear to see a woman and not give her the comfort of his physical attractions," John surmises. Ford's novel deserves its reputation if for no other reason than the elegance with which it divulges hidden lives. --Ben Guterson

From the Inside Flap

Ford Madox Ford wrote The Good Soldier, the book on which his reputation most surely rests, in deliberate emulation of the nineteenth-century French novels he so admired. In this way he was able to explore the theme of sexual betrayal and its poisonous after-effects with a psychological intimacy as yet unknown in the English novel.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Buy New

View this item

Shipping: US$ 13.01
From United Kingdom to U.S.A.

Destination, rates & speeds

Add to basket

Search results for The Good Soldier: A Tale of Passion

Stock Image

Ford Madox Ford
Published by CreateSpace, 2010
ISBN 10: 1456456350 ISBN 13: 9781456456351
New Paperback
Print on Demand

Seller: Revaluation Books, Exeter, United Kingdom

Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars 5-star rating, Learn more about seller ratings

Paperback. Condition: Brand New. 194 pages. 9.00x6.00x0.44 inches. In Stock. This item is printed on demand. Seller Inventory # 1456456350

Contact seller

Buy New

US$ 29.68
Convert currency
Shipping: US$ 13.01
From United Kingdom to U.S.A.
Destination, rates & speeds

Quantity: 1 available

Add to basket