The Parlor Car

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

3.0

Word count: 40K 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.The Parlor Car by William Dean HowellsAuthor: Howells, William Dean, 1837-1920,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Sep 1, 2002

Editor's review

The Parlor Car is a one-act play by William Dean Howells, set entirely in a parlor car and driven forward by dialogue, with a tight structure and a clear flavor of social comedy. Within its confined space it stages social misunderstandings and character, and its witty language makes it a useful text for observing staging and dialogue technique in nineteenth-century American drama. As a public-domain electronic text, it is short and easy to obtain, well suited to classroom read-aloud excerpts or textual analysis by drama enthusiasts. It is, after all, a playscript with many stage directions and notes, so readers used to novels may need time to adjust. Overall it is a light but flavorful work, a good introductory sample of Howells's dramatic writing.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in nineteenth-century American drama
Teachers and students needing a short play for classroom reading
Literature enthusiasts studying Howells's work across genres
Readers who enjoy dialogue-driven works with concentrated settings

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting long plots and complex character arcs
Readers unfamiliar with playscript format who dislike stage directions
Learners whose English reading is not yet fluent and who need translation notes

Reading tips

Read through once for the plot, then read aloud by role to feel the rhythm of the dialogue.
Pay attention to stage directions while reading and imagine the staging and movement within the car.
Compare with other works by Howells to see how his language differs between fiction and drama.
After reading, try mapping the characters' relationships to clarify how the misunderstandings and conflicts unfold.

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 a novel or a play?

It is a one-act play made up of dialogue and stage directions, set entirely in a parlor car. Read it as a playscript rather than expecting the full narrative and long descriptions of a novel.

Can I understand it without experience reading drama?

Yes. The play is short, the plot centers on social interaction in the car, and the relationships are not complicated. It helps to read the dialogue through first, ignoring the stage directions, then go back to the scene notes.

Is it suitable for classroom use?

It works well as short read-aloud or introductory drama material. The single setting and limited cast make role reading and discussion of tone easy. Teachers can explain the period background in advance to help students understand the social manners and humor.

Comments

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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.