The Dragon Painter

Fenollosa, Mary McNeil, -1954Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.2

Word count: 242K words
Chapters: 25

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.The Dragon Painter by Mary McNeil FenollosaAuthor: Fenollosa, Mary McNeil, -1954,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Oct 4, 2007

Editor's review

This novel centers on a painter obsessed with dragon motifs, rendering artistic obsession and emotional entanglement with a pronounced Oriental flavor. The author, Mary McNeil Fenollosa, had a deep knowledge of Japanese culture, so the descriptions of craft and the imagery feel credible and finely observed. The pace is slow, and psychological portraiture matters more than plot; it suits quiet afternoons and leisurely reading. As a public-domain e-book, it preserves the distinctive perspective of an early twentieth-century Western writer imagining the East, and is useful to readers studying cross-cultural writing. Watch how the painter's obsession with the dragon gradually changes his relations with those around him; this is the most thought-provoking part of the book.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers of English fiction who like Oriental subjects and artist protagonists
Literary scholars interested in early twentieth-century cross-cultural writing
Readers who prefer slow-paced psychological description to strong plot
Learners who want a public-domain e-book for English extensive reading

Not a good fit for

Readers seeking fast-paced suspense or strong conflict
Young readers impatient with slow narrative
Readers expecting rigorous scholarship on Japanese culture

Reading tips

Read the first two chapters to sense the narrative pace before deciding whether to continue.
Jot down dragon- and painting-related images as you read to help trace the themes.
Compare with Fenollosa's other works or with Oriental-themed novels of the same period.

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 or English?

The original is in English; it is a Project Gutenberg public-domain e-book classified as American and Canadian literature. Chinese readers can use a dictionary or a parallel translation.

What is the story about?

The novel centers on a painter obsessed with dragon motifs and describes the changes in his artistic obsession and emotional relationships; it has a strong Oriental imaginative coloring, a slow plot, and emphasizes psychological portrayal.

Is it suitable as English extensive reading material?

It is not long, and its language is early twentieth-century English fiction, with somewhat literary sentence patterns. Readers with a basic command of English can use it for extensive reading; beginners are advised to use an annotated edition.

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

Fenollosa, Mary McNeil, -1954 Author · American · 1865–1954

Mary McNeil Fenollosa (1865–1954) was an American novelist and poet, and the wife of Ernest Fenollosa. Public information about her life is limited, and the details currently available center mainly on her literary work and her marriage. She wrote novels set in the American South, often using the region as a backdrop and focusing on its local customs and the fates of its characters. Her representative work, The Dragon Painter, is a novel that unfolds around art and emotion, reflecting her interest in exotic subjects and in the inner lives of her characters. Her writing spans both fiction and poetry, with delicate language and attention to atmosphere. Overall, she holds a place in American Southern literature and in cross-cultural writing, though the scattered nature of the sources means her full profile remains to be further clarified.