It occurs to me that Gissing was exercising his rare sense of humour in this magnificent study of human folly and cupidity. Of all the people in this novel, there is something akin to sympathy for only two persons – the protagonist’s father, the Vicar, Mr Lashmar Senior, and the dreamy peer, Lord Dy

Even a lesser novel of George Gissing is better than most other Victorian fiction. Our Friend starts out slowly but builds into a compelling page-turner about a political and emotional fraud who tries to manipulate a series of women, who, it turns out, are all manipulating him! The women have contro

The Coming Man

It is becoming a rare treat to visit a walk-in used book store and find something wanted and unexpected. I recently had the opportunity to browse in an old used book store, stuffed with two floors of books, in the Capitol Hill section of Washington, D.C. I have the habit of looking for

“One can say of of “Our Friend the Charlatan” the trouble is that is nobody’s favourite”.G.W.Stonier.