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The Good Soldier (1915) is a novel by Ford Madox Ford. Set just before the First World War, the novel is superficially the story of Edward Asburnham, a man with a reputation for philandering. Considered an important proto-modernist novel, The Good Soldier employs a fragmented narrative told by an unreliable narrator who appears at times as distant, gossipy, voyeuristic, and even vindictive. Praised as one of the greatest English-language novels of the century, The Good Soldier remains Ford's most popular work. John Dowell has secrets. Married for nine years to a serially unfaithful woman, friends with a man who falls in love at first sight with every woman he meets, he lives an exciting life without ever doing much himself. As he sorts through his memories, revealing the sordid details of his loved ones' private lives, it becomes clear that Dowell is haunted by tragedy. His psychological state, shaped by years of jealousy and paranoia, reveals the soul of a man without faith, thrown from one betrayal to the next by his manipulative wife. But how could he fail to see what was right under his nose? Can a man truly be as innocent as Dowell claims to be? The Good Soldier is a masterpiece of English fiction that poses timeless questions regarding friendship, fidelity, and sexuality. This edition of Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier is a classic work of British literature reimagined for modern readers.
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About the author
Ford Madox Ford (1873-1939) was born Ford Hermann Hueffer in Kent, England. He was a prolific novelist, poet, critic, and editor whose influential journals The English Review and The Transatlantic Review promoted the work of such writers as Thomas Hardy, H. G. Wells, Joseph Conrad, James Joyce, William Butler Yeats, Gertrude Stein, and Ernest Hemingway, and debuted works of Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis, and D. H. Lawrence. The Good Soldier was published in 1915-the year Ford enlisted in the army where he served as an infantry officer during the Battle of the Somme and at the Ypres Salient. Ford is also known for Parade's End, a series of four novels about his experiences during the First World War. The Good Soldier is counted among the greatest works of literature of the twentieth century.
Summary
The Good Soldier (1915) is a novel by Ford Madox Ford. Set just before the First World War, the novel is superficially the story of Edward Asburnham, a man with a reputation for philandering. Considered an important proto-modernist novel, The Good Soldier employs a fragmented narrative told by an unreliable narrator who appears at times as distant, gossipy, voyeuristic, and even vindictive. Praised as one of the greatest English-language novels of the century, The Good Soldier remains Ford’s most popular work. John Dowell has secrets. Married for nine years to a serially unfaithful woman, friends with a man who falls in love at first sight with every woman he meets, he lives an exciting life without ever doing much himself. As he sorts through his memories, revealing the sordid details of his loved ones’ private lives, it becomes clear that Dowell is haunted by tragedy. His psychological state, shaped by years of jealousy and paranoia, reveals the soul of a man without faith, thrown from one betrayal to the next by his manipulative wife. But how could he fail to see what was right under his nose? Can a man truly be as innocent as Dowell claims to be? The Good Soldier is a masterpiece of English fiction that poses timeless questions regarding friendship, fidelity, and sexuality. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Ford Madox Ford’s The Good Soldier is a classic work of British literature reimagined for modern readers.
