DIY History | Transcribe | Scholarship at Iowa | The Ethical Tendency of the English Novel by Helen M. Harney, 1897 | The Ethical Tendency of the English Novel by Helen M. Harney, 1897, Page 22

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The Ethical Tendency of the English Novel by Helen M. Harney, 1897

The Ethical Tendency of the English Novel by Helen M. Harney, 1897, Page 22

will change a principle in accord with which the race has acted for ten centuries.
The last decade or two, in particular, has given us an increasing proof of the growth in popularity of the novel with a purpose. The appearance in a single year of three novels of such power and charm as "Marcella," "Trilby," and "The Manxman" would go a long way toward settling the question of purpose. For they have the reach, the force and the vitality of great novel writing; and they have the contact with life, the varied skill and ease and fullness of genuine art: they are works of power and purpose. Whatever we may think of "Marcella," we get a sense of the range and volume of the mystery we call life from the spectacle of a native so capacious passing through experience so various and so rich in emotional and moral quality. "Trilby"
19.

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will change a principle in accord with which the race has acted for ten centuries. The last decade or two, in particular, has given us an increasing proof of the growth in popularity of the novel with a purpose. The appearance in a single year of three novels of such power and charm as "Marcella," "Trilby," and "The Manxman" would go a long way toward settling the question of purpose. For they have the reach, the force and the vitality of great novel writing; and they have the contact with life, the varied skill and ease and fullness of genuine art: they are works of power and purpose. Whatever we may think of "Marcella," we get a sense of the range and volume of the mystery we call life from the spectacle of a native so capacious passing through experience so various and so rich in emotional and moral quality. "Trilby" 19.