Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present
Arnold Bennett
-
Standard Name: Bennett, Arnold
Birth Name: Enoch Arnold Bennett
Used Form: E. A. Bennett
An extraordinarily prolific English writer of both literary-realist and mass-interest novels, short stories, pocket philosophy self-help manuals, plays, journal articles and book reviews, AB
was acclaimed as an artist in his own time and was also politically and culturally influential. He served as director of the Ministry of Propaganda under Lord Beaverbrook
in the first world war. He estimated his own output in 1930 as seventy or eighty books written, of which only a handful were well-known.
Staley, Thomas F., editor. Dictionary of Literary Biography 34. Gale Research.
26
His wealth and influence, as well as his painstaking realism, earned him the scorn of the modernist writers of the next generation.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland.
9
Arnold Bennett
gave it very high praise. Of the passage in which Lucy Audley decides to try to murder Robert, he...
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
By 1901 MEB
was so firmly established in the literary scene that Arnold Bennett
commented: She is a part of England . . . she has woven herself into it.
Wolff, Robert Lee. Sensational Victorian. Garland.
2
She declined this year...
Literary responses
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
By the time of her death, MEB
's novels had received praise from many great writers of her day, including George Moore
, Arnold Bennett
, Robert Louis Stevenson
and Thomas Hardy
. Her astonishingly...
Reception
Rhoda Broughton
This novel deals with miseries arising from domestic misunderstanding, in this case between Lettice Trent, who keeps house for her brother, and his new wife, Marie. While he was disconcerted by the subject-matter (Conceive...
Literary responses
Rhoda Broughton
An article by Eliza Lynn Linton
written in June 1887 (well after the ebbing of RB
's early, scandalous reputation) judged that her books were always essentially love-stories, and nothing else,
Linton, Eliza Lynn. “Miss Broughton’s Novels”. Temple Bar, Vol.
80
, pp. 196-09.
203
but that without...
politics
Dora Carrington
The club met for discussion and entertainments every Thursday night in Fitzroy Square, where guests and performers included Winifred Gill
, Shaw
, Yeats
, and Arnold Bennett
. The subscription fee was 5s...
Literary responses
Catherine Carswell
Reaction to this book was fiercely negative among traditional Burnsites, especially in Scotland. CC
received threats to her well-being, including one letter signed Holy Willy (after a character satirised by Burns) and containing a...
Textual Features
Willa Cather
Here she complains that the modern novel has been taken over by [t]he property-man, by an obsession with the vivid presentation of material objects.
Cather, Willa. On Writing. Editor Tennant, Stephen, Alfred A. Knopf.
Praised in the Daily Mail and Times Literary Supplement (where the anonymous reviewer was Walter de la Mare
), Dolores was compared to its advantage with works by Ada Leverson
and Arnold Bennett
. ICB
Literary responses
Ivy Compton-Burnett
Leonard Woolf's decision proved a mistake. The book was not only praised to the skies by young, advanced reviewers, but also made the secondary Book of the Month for May by the newly-formed Book Society
Friends, Associates
Ella D'Arcy
Lane
and Harland
were centres of literary social life in London. EDA
had many friends among writers, many of them New Women. They included Evelyn Sharp
, and Constance Smedley
(who found her entirely sincere...
Publishing
Ella D'Arcy
After The Bishop's Dilemma D'Arcy apparently worked on other novels, including one on the Shelley circle. She showed the manuscript of one to Arnold Bennett
, who liked it. However, it was not published and...
Reception
Ella D'Arcy
EDA
's slim output has made it easier for posterity to ignore her. But both Arnold Bennett
and Ford Madox Ford
thought highly of her.
Fisher, Benjamin Franklin. “Ella D’Arcy: A Commentary with a Primary and Annotated Secondary Bibliography”. English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920, Vol.
35
, No. 2, pp. 179-11.
204
Mix, Katherine Lyon. A Study in Yellow: <span data-tei-ns-tag="tei_title" data-tei-title-lvl="j">The Yellow Book</span> and Its Contributors. Greenwood Press.
She contributed fiction, essays, and travel articles to many other journals, including the New York Independent, the Westminster Gazette, Arnold Bennett
's Woman, and the Sketch, writing for the last-named on...
Timeline
2 September 1914: The British War Propaganda Bureau (newly...
Writing climate item
2 September 1914
The British War Propaganda Bureau
(newly formed along the lines of a similar body in Germany) summoned twenty-five writers to discuss the production of texts that would boost national feeling and the war effort.
By April 1929: The Book Society (first conceived of by Arnold...
Writing climate item
By April 1929
The Book Society
(first conceived of by Arnold Bennett
) was launched by Hugh Walpole
with himself as chairman; it was the first such society in Britain.
Texts
Bennett, Arnold. Anna of the Five Towns. Chatto and Windus, 1902.
Bennett, Arnold. Fame and Fiction. Books for Libraries Press, 1975.
Bennett, Arnold. Imperial Palace. Cassell, 1930.
Bennett, Arnold. “Journalism for Women. A Practical Guide”. Project Gutenberg.
Bennett, Arnold. Journalism for Women. A Practical Guide. John Lane, 1898.
Bennett, Arnold. Lord Raingo. Cassell, 1926.
Bennett, Arnold. The Old Wives’ Tale. Nelson and Sons, 1908.
