The Spinners

Phillpotts, Eden, 1862-1960Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.4

Word count: 823K words
Chapters: 83

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 Spinners by Eden PhillpottsAuthor: Phillpotts, Eden, 1862-1960,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Mar 20, 2005

Editor's review

The Spinners is a novel by the English writer Eden Phillpotts, a work of English literature, released here as a free eBook by Project Gutenberg. Phillpotts was known for his prolific output and his skill at weaving narratives of rural life and family, and the title suggests either a textile-industry setting or a metaphor for the interweaving of human relationships. For readers familiar with late Victorian and Edwardian English fiction, the book offers a window onto social structures, working life and individual destinies. As a public-domain eBook, its value lies not only in the text itself but in its accessibility as a digital humanities resource. Readers are advised to attend to the unfolding of relationships and the local colour, and to read it in fairly unbroken stretches in order to appreciate the pacing of a long narrative. As an early electronic edition, the formatting and notes may be plain, and readers should be prepared for a plain-text reading environment.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who love classic English fiction and want to broaden their list of late 19th- and early 20th-century authors
Literature students studying Phillpotts or English regional fiction
Readers used to public-domain English eBooks who can accept plain-text formatting
General readers interested in a textile-industry setting or rural social narratives

Not a good fit for

Readers who prefer fast-paced contemporary fiction and lack patience for long classic narratives
Beginners who need detailed notes, introductions or scholarly editions
Readers unaccustomed to reading English originals and dependent on Chinese translations

Reading tips

Read the opening chapters first to sort out the main characters and the setting before getting into the main plot.
Read alongside material on British industrial history or the textile industry to deepen your sense of the period.
Adjust font size and line spacing on your e-reader to reduce fatigue over a long plain-text read.
After finishing, jot down briefly how the characters' fates unfold, to help you review the structure of a long narrative.

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?

This is an English original, released as an eBook by Project Gutenberg. The metadata lists the language as English and the class as English literature. Chinese readers will need some ability to read English, or a dictionary and other aids.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

Project Gutenberg was the first project to offer free eBooks, and this book is its public-domain electronic text. The edition is mainly plain text with simple formatting and usually has no modern introduction or detailed notes, suiting readers who can handle the original on their own.

I haven't read any of the author's other works; can I start with this one?

Yes. This is a stand-alone novel and does not require prior reading of the author's other works. Readers need only be prepared for the pacing of classic English fiction, and can begin here to get to know Phillpotts's style.

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About the author

Phillpotts, Eden, 1862-1960 Author

Eden Phillpotts (1862-1960) was a prolific English author whose works span novels and short stories. Sixteen of his books are included here, among them Children of the Mist, The Red Redmaynes, The Grey Room, The Spinners, The Torch and Other Tales, The Human Boy, The Human Boy and the War, and The Poacher's Wife. These works show him building suspenseful and emotionally charged narratives around rural settings and family relationships, with a style that combines realism and romance. Some of his books centre on boyhood and growth, and are therefore classed as inspirational coming-of-age reading. Public information about the details of his life is limited, yet his works hold a modest place in English and American popular fiction, offering readers a glimpse of the variety of early twentieth-century British storytelling.