Roland Yorke

Wood, Henry, Mrs., 1814-1887Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.3

Word count: 1.1M words
Chapters: 106

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.Roland Yorke by Mrs. Henry WoodAuthor: Wood, Henry, Mrs., 1814-1887,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Oct 12, 2018

Editor's review

Roland Yorke is a work by Mrs. Henry Wood, a prolific Victorian novelist, released as a free e-book by Project Gutenberg. Mrs. Wood was known for family novels with tangled plots and fluctuating fortunes, and this book continues her detailed portrayal of country and town life, family relations, and shifts in social class, with a steady narrative pace that suits readers who enjoy nineteenth-century English fiction. As a public-domain e-book, it is easy to read anytime on a phone, tablet, or computer, and it works as supplementary reading for the Victorian novel strand of an English literature course. While reading, watch how the author builds suspense through everyday scenes and how characters' moral dilemmas are presented. Note that the e-edition is the English original, and the Gutenberg version prioritizes readable text without modern notes or an introduction, so first-time readers may need a dictionary or background materials. Overall, it is a classic popular novel suited to slow, careful reading, valuable for its period atmosphere and narrative tradition.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy nineteenth-century British Victorian novels
English learners who want to approach classic English originals through public-domain e-books
Literature students studying Victorian popular fiction and domestic narrative
Readers used to reading long novels in fragments on electronic devices

Not a good fit for

Readers who prefer fast-paced contemporary suspense or short stories
Beginners who need modern notes, introductions, and detailed background
Readers whose English is not yet up to nineteenth-century long sentences and old-fashioned expressions

Reading tips

Read the opening chapters first to sort out characters and settings, then move into the main plot.
Keep a vocabulary notebook for recurring period expressions and forms of address.
Go chapter by chapter and summarize the events and character changes in one or two sentences after each.
If comparing with a print edition, choose one with an introduction to help with period background.

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 the English original, and how hard is it to read?

Project Gutenberg provides the English original as an e-book, in the style of a nineteenth-century British novel, with long sentences and older usage; a reading level of CET-4 or above makes it easier to get into. Beginners can use a dictionary and chapter summaries.

Does the Gutenberg edition have notes or an introduction?

Gutenberg mainly provides public-domain electronic texts and usually does not include modern scholarly notes, introductions, or background. For deeper understanding, look up Victorian social background yourself or compare with a print edition that has an introduction.

Is it suitable as English-learning material?

It can serve as extensive reading, but it is not recommended as an intensive textbook for beginners. It suits readers with some vocabulary who want to feel the language of classic fiction. Pair it with an audiobook or bilingual text to ease long sentences.

Do I need to know the author's other works before reading?

No. The book can be read on its own and does not depend on the plots of her other novels. To better grasp Mrs. Wood's narrative style, you can read her better-known works afterward, but that is not a prerequisite.

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

Wood, Henry, Mrs., 1814-1887 Author

Mrs. Henry Wood (1814–1887) was a British novelist of the Victorian era. Public information about her is limited, and few details of her life are known, yet the library holds 36 of her works, suggesting that she was widely read in her day. She is best known for the novel East Lynne, which deals with domestic upheaval, marital crisis and emotional entanglement; its intricate plot, strong sentiment and moral admonition made it a favourite on the stage as well. She also wrote the three-volume The Story of Charles Strange, the Johnny Ludlow series and The Channings, most of which are set against the daily life of country gentry and ordinary people and rely on serial-style suspense to drive the narrative.