The Major

The Major is a novel published in 1917 by the Canadian writer Ralph Connor (born Charles William Gordon, 1860–1937), and one of the more representative works in his series of Canadian novels. Set in the western Canadian plains and the Rocky Mountain region, the novel centers on its protagonist, David Bent. After many years of service in the British Army, Bent is known to those around him as "The Major" on account of his rank and temperament; upon leaving the army he travels to western Canada, where he rebuilds his life through homesteading and enterprise. The first half of the novel follows his struggles and personal entanglements in country life, including tests of love, faith, and morality; the second half places his individual fate within a larger historical vortex: as war approaches in Europe, the shadow of war in Canada, questions of ethnic identity, and the stance of a "neutral nation" rise one by one, and Bent must choose between duty, loyalty, and family. The book continues Connor's characteristic approach: expansive natural description, vivid characterization, and a narrative mode that blends adventure, romance, and moral reflection. It is at once a literary portrait of western Canadian society in the early twentieth century and an accessible popular reader for understanding the shift in mentality across the British Commonwealth world around the First World War. The English original corresponding to this Chinese entry is commonly found in public-domain classics collections.