In Our Convent Days

Repplier, Agnes, 1855-1950Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.8

Word count: 215K words
Chapters: 22

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.In Our Convent Days by Agnes RepplierAuthor: Repplier, Agnes, 1855-1950,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Oct 8, 2017

Editor's review

This is a collection of essays in which the American essayist Agnes Repplier recalls her years at a convent school, recreating with delicate, humorous strokes the life of a Catholic girls' boarding school in the late nineteenth century. The author has a gift for capturing character and the tensions of the age in everyday detail; she offers both a gentle observation of discipline and faith and a keen portrayal of adolescent psychology, in prose that is elegant yet light. As a public-domain ebook, it is moderate in length with self-contained chapters, making it a good introduction to American women's coming-of-age writing and the Catholic educational tradition. Read it as a nostalgic cultural essay rather than strict historical record; savoring one piece at a time on a commute or before bed best reveals its linguistic wit and subtle irony. Readers studying nineteenth-century American social customs or women's education will also find firsthand, evocative material here.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy English essays and memoirs and want to experience an elegant, humorous style
Readers interested in nineteenth-century American women's education and convent life
Students and teachers studying American literature and social customs who need evocative primary material
Intermediate to advanced English learners looking for short pieces to practice reading

Not a good fit for

Readers of fiction expecting a continuous plot or strong dramatic conflict
Researchers needing systematic data on educational history and rigorous documentation
Beginners in English reading who are unfamiliar with religious and cultural background

Reading tips

Read chapter by chapter; after each piece, note how the author observes character and uses humor.
Read the preface or opening chapters first to grasp the historical background, then return to specific scenes.
Look up religious terms and details of school rules as you go, using notes or background sources.
Read alongside other coming-of-age works by women of the same period to appreciate differences in the writing tradition.

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 memoir?

According to the available information, it consists of essayistic recollections drawn from Repplier's convent-school years, with a clear personal, retrospective character; it is not a work of fiction. Read it as a cultural essay rather than a strict autobiography.

How difficult is the English, and what level of learner is it for?

The prose is elegant with fairly long sentences and the rhetorical habits of nineteenth-century essays; the vocabulary is advanced but not obscure. It suits intermediate-to-advanced readers who can use a dictionary for culturally specific terms; beginners might start with a translation or an introduction.

Do I need religious background knowledge to understand it?

You don't need systematic theology, but some familiarity with the basic rules, rituals, and daily norms of a Catholic girls' boarding school will make the scenes and characters' reactions easier to understand. Look up unfamiliar terms as needed; it won't hinder overall reading.

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About the author

Repplier, Agnes, 1855-1950 Author

Agnes Repplier (1855–1950) was an American essayist known for light, witty prose. Five of her works are held in this collection: In Our Convent Days, Americans and Others, Points of View, Essays in Idleness, and In the Dozy Hours, and Other Papers. These titles show that she drew on everyday life, reading, and travel for her material, writing in a relaxed style tinged with gentle irony and nostalgia, and with a keen eye for human manners. Active in American letters from the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century, her essays had a certain influence among magazines and readers of her time. Public information is limited, so details of her life and the critical reception of her work cannot be given in full; yet these works alone show her to be a writer of short essays, elegant in style and distinctive in personal voice.