An Ambitious Man

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 1850-1919Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.8

Word count: 236K words
Chapters: 24

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.An Ambitious Man by Ella Wheeler WilcoxAuthor: Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 1850-1919,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Apr 1, 2005

Editor's review

An Ambitious Man is a novel by late nineteenth-century American author Ella Wheeler Wilcox, offered here as a free eBook by Project Gutenberg. Wilcox was known for her poetry and popular fiction, and her work often centers on the tension between social norms and personal desire. The book follows an ambitious man, combining the plot appeal and moral inquiry characteristic of late Victorian popular fiction; it will suit readers curious about the landscape of American popular literature at the end of the nineteenth century. As a public-domain eBook, it is easy to read on electronic devices and works well as supplementary material for English literature courses or as a textual sample for literary-historical research. While reading, note how the author handles ambition, gender roles, and social judgment, and understand the characters' choices in light of the period. Note that this is a Project Gutenberg digital edition: the text is in English and includes no modern introduction or notes, so readers will need some English reading ability.

Who it's for

A good fit for

English-language readers curious about late nineteenth-century American popular fiction
Scholars and students studying Wilcox's work or American literary history
Readers who enjoy late Victorian plot-driven fiction and moral questions
Teachers who need public-domain English texts as course supplements

Not a good fit for

Readers hoping for a Chinese translation or a bilingual edition
Beginners who need modern notes, introductions, and detailed background analysis
Readers who prefer fast-paced contemporary fiction and have limited patience for classic narrative

Reading tips

Start with the bibliographic information on the Project Gutenberg page to confirm the edition and chapter structure before beginning the text.
Prepare a brief character list and update it as you read to help clarify plot and motives.
Read with the social context of late nineteenth-century America in mind, noting how ambition relates to moral judgment.
If used for a course, compare it with other American novels of the same period to discuss gender narrative in popular fiction.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book in Chinese? What language level is needed to read it?

No. This is a public-domain English eBook from Project Gutenberg; the text is in English and there is no Chinese translation. A reading level of CET-4 or above is recommended, or use a dictionary and translation tools as support.

Does this edition have notes or an introduction?

According to the available information, this is a Project Gutenberg digital edition that mainly provides the English text and basic bibliographic information; no modern notes or introduction are mentioned. For background analysis, consult separate references on Wilcox's life and late nineteenth-century American literary history.

Is it suitable as a reading for an English literature course?

It can serve as a supplementary text. Its length and subject matter suit discussion of ambition, gender, and social norms in popular fiction, but it lacks modern notes, so teachers will need to prepare background materials and discussion questions themselves and confirm that students' English reading level is appropriate.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Wilcox, Ella Wheeler, 1850-1919 Author

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850–1919) was an American poet known for her lyric verse and short philosophical poems. The collection holds 23 of her works, spanning poetry, prose, and aphoristic essays, including Poems of Passion, Maurine and Other Poems, The Heart of the New Thought, Poems of Sentiment, Poems of Purpose, and The Kingdom of Love. Her poems often center on love, emotion, life's aims, and spiritual reflection; their plain, direct language and smooth rhythm carry an encouraging, inspirational tone that makes them easy for ordinary readers to remember and quote. Beyond poetry, she also wrote prose and maxim-like pieces, such as A Woman of the World: Her Counsel to Other People's Sons and Daughters and Hello, Boys!, addressing young readers on conduct and feeling from an experienced woman's perspective. Public information is limited, so biographical details are hard to set out; the surviving works show her attention to everyday emotion and moral counsel, in a gentle, approachable style that gave her some influence among popular poetry readers of her time.