Three Things

Glyn, Elinor, 1864-1943Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.0

Word count: 137K words
Chapters: 14

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.Three Things by Elinor GlynAuthor: Glyn, Elinor, 1864-1943,Language: English, Class: HQ: Social sciences: The family, Marriage, Sex and Gender, Release Date: Apr 28, 2008

Editor's review

Three Things is a work by the British popular novelist Elinor Glyn, presented as a public-domain eBook in the original English and classified under social-science topics such as the family, marriage, and gender. Glyn was known for writing about emotional relationships and social manners, and this work continues her attention to sex and marriage, bearing clear marks of its time. For today's readers its value lies more in serving as a window on social history and the history of popular literature: one can see how the early twentieth-century English-speaking world talked about love, marriage, and gender roles, and how a popular writer packaged these topics into readable narrative. It should be read in its historical context, appreciating the popular appeal of its dialogue and scenes while noting gender attitudes that may now seem outdated. It is not suited to being cited as a serious sociological treatise but is better used as supplementary reading for understanding changes in popular emotional discourse. For readers studying popular fiction, women's writing, or the history of ideas about marriage, it is a light but useful text.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in early twentieth-century British popular fiction and women's writing
Cultural historians studying the social history of marriage and gender ideas
Readers who want light English public-domain fiction for reading practice
General readers interested in changing emotional discourse and popular culture

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting rigorous academic argument or systematic sociological research
Readers sensitive to gender attitudes limited by their era
Young readers who prefer contemporary pacing and contemporary values in narrative

Reading tips

Learn about the social customs of the author's time before reading, to avoid judging it simply by contemporary standards.
Use it as supplementary social-history material, noting typical statements about marriage and gender as you read.
English readers can read through the plot first, then return to key dialogues to appreciate the narrative rhythm of popular fiction.

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 a novel or a social-science work?

The listing classifies it under social-science categories such as the family, marriage, and gender, but the author, Elinor Glyn, was known for popular fiction. More accurately, it is a popular literary work with social themes, suited to being read as a text for observing the discourse on marriage and gender of its time rather than as a rigorous academic treatise.

Can I read this book if my English is average?

It is a public-domain English eBook whose diction and syntax carry early twentieth-century habits and are somewhat distant from modern English. Readers with intermediate English can get through it with a dictionary, focusing on dialogue and plot; those who only want to understand its social views may also read a translation or related introductions.

Will the ideas in the book seem outdated today?

As a popular work of the early twentieth century, its statements about marriage and gender roles are likely to carry clear limitations of their era. Readers are advised to read it in historical context, treating it as material for the history of ideas: understand the popular emotional discourse of the time while maintaining critical distance, rather than taking its views as a guide to contemporary behavior.

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

Glyn, Elinor, 1864-1943 Author

Elinor Glyn (1864–1943) was a British novelist known for popular fiction about love and marital entanglements in high society. The collection holds 18 of her works, including The Visits of Elizabeth, The Point of View, The Career of Katherine Bush, The Reflections of Ambrosine, The Vicissitudes of Evangeline, His Hour, Halcyone, and The Damsel and the Sage: A Woman's Whimsies. Her writing centres on romance, manners, and desire within aristocratic and social circles; her light touch and attention to women's psychology and social detail made her a representative figure in early twentieth-century popular reading. Public information is limited, so her biography is not elaborated here, but the titles and sheer number of works show a prolific author attentive to women's circumstances.