Evening Dress

Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.0

Word count: 43K words
Chapters: 5

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. Evening Dress by William Dean Howells. Author: Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920. Language: English. Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature. Release Date: Jan 24, 2009.

Editor's review

Howells was a key driver of American literary realism, and Evening Dress, though brief, typifies his fine observation of daily life and gentle irony. The story revolves around dress and status in social settings, using an evening dress to draw out subtle relations among characters; the language is restrained and the dialogue natural, without exaggerated dramatic conflict, presenting social manners and human nature through detail. For readers curious about late-19th-century American middle-class social etiquette and literary taste, this is a light entry point. As you read, note how the author uses clothing, conversation, and scene arrangement to hint at characters' social positions—a method more flavorful than direct commentary. As a public-domain ebook, it suits分段 reading on a commute or before bed, and works as a sample for analyzing short fiction.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy 19th-century American realist short stories
Literature enthusiasts studying Howells's narrative style and social themes
Advanced learners who want to practice close reading with an English original short story

Not a good fit for

Readers who prefer strong plots and fast-paced stories
Readers uninterested in social etiquette themes
Beginner English readers who need Chinese notes or introductions

Reading tips

Read through once for plot, then revisit details of dress and dialogue to grasp the author's social hints.
Read alongside other Howells short stories to observe how he handles conflict in everyday scenes.
After finishing, summarize the character relationships in a few sentences to check whether you've grasped the subtext.

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 work suitable for English learners?

It suits English readers with some foundation. The text is an English original; the language is plain but contains period terms and social-scene descriptions, so beginners may need a dictionary, while intermediate and advanced learners can use it to practice close reading and character analysis.

What is the story mainly about?

According to the materials, the work is titled Evening Dress and is a social-themed novel by Howells. The story uses an evening dress in social settings as a thread to present character relationships and status differences; for specific plot details, refer to the original text.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

This edition is a free ebook released by Project Gutenberg and is a public-domain resource, easy to obtain on a computer or e-reader. It contains no modern introduction or notes, so readers need to supply background knowledge themselves.

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About the author

Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920 Author

William Dean Howells (1837–1920) was an American author and literary editor, with 107 works held in the collection. His writing spans novels, travel books, memoirs, and literary essays, and his representative works include My Mark Twain, Indian Summer, A Boy's Town, A Modern Instance, and A Hazard of New Fortunes. Howells drew on close observation of everyday life, writing in a plain style with gentle irony and attending to moral questions and human situations amid social change; his travel book Venetian Life and his memoir Literary Friends and Acquaintance record his journeys and personal recollections of American literary figures. Public information is limited, so biographical details are not elaborated here; readers may turn to the works above to learn about his subjects and style.