George Alfred Henty: The Story of an Active Life

Fenn, George Manville, 1831-1909Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.5
Word count
569K words
Chapters
57

Tags

English Originals Literary Figures English Literary HistoryWriter's CareerWriting LifeHistorical NovelistProlific WriterLiterary GiantsInspirational LifeSocial ObservationVictorian EraYouth Reading

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.George Alfred Henty: The Story of an Active Life by George Manville FennAuthor: Fenn, George Manville, 1831-1909,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Jul 29, 2011

Editor's review

This is a biographical work by George Manville Fenn on his contemporary George Alfred Henty, issued as a free public-domain eBook by Project Gutenberg. Its value lies not in offering a critical biography in the modern academic sense, but in presenting a close contemporary account of Henty's "active life" by a fellow writer, providing first-hand or near-first-hand material for the study of Henty and his works and of the production context of nineteenth-century British historical adventure fiction for young readers. Readers can glimpse the period's literary sociability, writing, and publishing ecology. As a public-domain electronic text, it generally lacks a modern editorial introduction, notes, and index; readers must judge its narrative stance and period limitations for themselves, and the English original demands a certain reading proficiency. It is better suited to reference reading or as supporting material for specialized research than to light entertainment.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Not a good fit for

Reading tips

  1. First outline a chronology of Henty's major works, then read the relevant chapters of the biography alongside it.
  2. Note contemporary evaluations as you read, and distinguish the author's stance from historical fact.
  3. Pair the reading with prefaces or scholarly studies of Henty's representative works for intertextual reference.
  4. Use the electronic text's search function for names and titles to map personal relationships and work线索.

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.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50
  51. 51
  52. 52
  53. 53
  54. 54
  55. 55
  56. 56
  57. 57

FAQ

Is this book an autobiography written by Henty himself? No. According to the material, the author is George Manville Fenn (1831–1909) and the subject is George Alfred Henty; it is a biographical work written by another person, not Henty's autobiography.
Do I need to read Henty's novels before reading this biography? You need not read all the novels first, but familiarity with Henty's representative works and themes helps. The biography deals with writing and publishing background, and basic prior knowledge of the works improves comprehension.
Does this eBook have notes and an index? The material indicates it is a public-domain eBook released by Project Gutenberg and generally does not include modern notes, an introduction, or a complete index. Readers who need to verify historical facts should consult scholarly editions or authoritative reference works.

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

Fenn, George Manville, 1831-1909 Author

George Manville Fenn (1831–1909) was a British author whose biographical details remain limited in publicly available sources. The library holds 127 of his works, including The Little Skipper: A Son of a Sailor, The Silver Canyon: A Tale of the Western Plains, and Sappers and Miners: The Flood beneath the Sea. Most center on youthful growth and adventure, often set at sea, in mining districts, or on the western plains. He also wrote such biographical work as George Alfred Henty: The Story of an Active Life. His writing emphasizes plot momentum and the shaping of character in young readers, and is commonly classified as inspirational coming-of-age fiction, holding a place in the tradition of juvenile adventure novels.