The History of Margaret Catchpole, a Suffolk Girl

Richard CobboldProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.5
Word count
827K words
Chapters
83

Tags

English Originals General Biography Crime and PunishmentCountry GirlLegendary LivesFate and FortuneUnderclass LifeTransportation to AustraliaCourageReal CasesRural MemoryFemale Perspective

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 History of Margaret Catchpole, a Suffolk Girl by Richard CobboldAuthor: Cobbold, Richard, 1797-1877,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Apr 1, 2012

Editor's review

The History of Margaret Catchpole, a Suffolk Girl is an English literary work by Richard Cobbold, classified under English language and literature. It centers on Margaret Catchpole, a Suffolk girl; the title labels it a "history," but readers will do better to approach it as narrative with a biographical cast: character, place, and a sense of fate are its core appeal. For Chinese readers, its value lies in offering a literary window onto English provincial society and women's experience. The language preserves an earlier English idiom, and its narrative pace differs from today's fiction, so it asks readers to settle into its context. It suits as supplementary reading for a course on English literature, and for readers who enjoy biography-like narrative and are happy to read slowly; those seeking strong plot and fast-paced modern fiction may find it distant.

Who it's for

A good fit for

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Reading tips

  1. Begin with the opening sections that establish the characters and local setting, fixing the coordinates of time and place.
  2. Read the "history" in the title as narrative biography, not by the standards of a historical monograph.
  3. Jot down character relationships and place names as you read, to keep up with the earlier English prose.
  4. Read in sections, and after each, summarize the events in a sentence or two so the threads don't slip away.

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
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  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
  58. 58
  59. 59
  60. 60
  61. 61
  62. 62
  63. 63
  64. 64
  65. 65
  66. 66
  67. 67
  68. 68
  69. 69
  70. 70
  71. 71
  72. 72
  73. 73
  74. 74
  75. 75
  76. 76
  77. 77
  78. 78
  79. 79
  80. 80
  81. 81
  82. 82
  83. 83

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a historical work? Sources classify it under English language and literature; the title says "history," but the narrative centers on a particular girl. The safer understanding is literary narrative with a biographical cast, not a strict historical monograph. Attending to character and local experience fits the text better than verifying historical facts.
Was Margaret Catchpole a real person? The sources provide only the title, author, and classification, without detailing the subject's life. Readers should not fill in historical details from this book alone. To confirm her historical identity, consult reliable biographies or local records; it is better to read this book as literary narrative.
What if the English original is hard going? First get a general sense of the story, then read in sections; with long sentences, grasp the characters and actions first. Keep paper and pen to record names and places and reduce flipping back. If it is still hard, seek reliable Chinese introductions for support, but don't measure this earlier English work by the pace of modern fiction.

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

Richard Cobbold Author · British · 1797–1877

Richard Cobbold (1797–1877) was an English clergyman and novelist known for his regional fiction. His better-known works include The History of Margaret Catchpole, a Suffolk Girl and Geoffery Gambado, both drawing on the local life and characters of Suffolk in a plain, narrative style. Public information about his life and writing is limited, and only two of his works are held in this collection. Judging from these works, his writing centers on rural life, local figures and folk stories, and has a distinct regional character, offering readable texts for later readers interested in nineteenth-century English country society and local narrative traditions.