Aspects of the Novel - Paperback

by E. M. Forster (Author)

E. M. Forster's guide sparkles with wit and insight for contemporary writers and readers. With lively language and excerpts from well-known classics, Forster (author of A Passage to India, Howards End, and A Room With a View) takes on the seven elements vital to a novel: story, people, plot, fantasy, prophecy, pattern, and rhythm. He not only defines and explains such terms as "round" versus "flat" characters (and why both are needed for an effective novel), but also provides examples of writing from such literary greats as Dickens and Austen. Forster's original commentary illuminates and entertains without lapsing into complicated, scholarly rhetoric, coming together in a key volume on writing."Forster's casual and wittily acute guidance...transmutes the dull stuff of He-Said and She-Said into characters, stories, and intimations of truth."--Harper's

Back Jacket

The wit and lively, informed originality Forster employs in his study of the novel has made this book a classic. Deliberately avoiding the chronological development approach of what he classifies 'pseudosholarship, ' the author freely examines aspects all English-language novels have in common.