An Interloper

Frances Mary PeardProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.1

Word count: 583K words
Chapters: 59

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 Interloper by Frances Mary PeardAuthor: Peard, Frances Mary, 1835-1923,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Jul 8, 2013

Editor's review

An Interloper is likewise by the Victorian writer Frances Mary Peard, an English-literature public-domain work released free by Project Gutenberg. The title's "interloper" signals the novel's core themes of intrusion and boundaries; Peard often placed outsiders in everyday domestic settings to disrupt the existing order and observe human relations, class, and moral judgment. The book is similar in length to Donna Teresa and works well as a comparative text in author studies: read together, the two make clearer how she handles similar character predicaments differently. As a public-domain ebook, it suits readers with a clear purpose—course supplement, author study, or English extensive reading—rather than those seeking entertainment. Familiarity with nineteenth-century British narrative conventions beforehand will reduce resistance to the text.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literature students specializing in Victorian fiction
Researchers doing comparative reading of Peard's works
Advanced English learners needing public-domain English novels for extensive reading
Readers interested in the interloper motif and domestic-ethics narrative

Not a good fit for

Thriller readers expecting a modern suspense-style interloper plot
Beginner readers who can only manage heavily annotated or adapted versions
Casual readers with limited patience for nineteenth-century long-form narrative

Reading tips

Read alongside Donna Teresa to compare how the author handles similar character predicaments.
Note how attitudes change each time the interloper intervenes in family relationships.
Read the ending first, then return to the earlier text to see how motives and misunderstandings are set up.
Pair with a short background essay on nineteenth-century British social class to lower the barrier to understanding.

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 An Interloper related to Donna Teresa?

Both are different works by the same author, Frances Mary Peard, and both are public-domain English-literature ebooks released by Project Gutenberg, but the materials show no direct plot or character connection, so they are best read as independent works.

What does Interloper in the title mean?

Interloper means "intruder, one who comes uninvited." Given Peard's usual domestic-ethics subject matter, the title generally points to an outsider who disrupts the existing order, but the specific referent must be determined from the character relationships in the text; the materials provide no plot details.

Is this book suitable for classroom use?

It can serve as supplementary reading for courses on the Victorian novel or women's writing, but Project Gutenberg editions usually lack scholarly annotations and introductions, so teachers should prepare background materials and discussion questions themselves.

Comments

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About the author

Frances Mary Peard Author · English · 1835–1923

Frances Mary Peard (1835–1923) was a British writer and traveler, born in Exminster, Devon, into a family of naval officers. Between 1867 and 1909 she wrote more than forty novels for children and adults, many drawing on her travels abroad and often set in France and India. Her representative works include Cartouche, Unawares: A Story of an Old French Town, Donna Teresa, The Swing of the Pendulum, The Career of Claudia, Thorpe Regis, An Interloper, and Two Studios; the library holds nine of her works. She never married and spent her later years in Torquay. Public information about her life and writing is limited, and existing accounts focus mainly on the subjects and period of her works, making a more detailed assessment of her literary style and influence difficult.