Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance

Merchant, EllaProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.7

Word count: 270K words
Chapters: 28

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.Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance by Alice Ilgenfritz Jones and Ella MerchantAuthor: Merchant, Ella,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: May 26, 2013

Editor's review

This work uses the guise of a romance to deliver social observation and commentary on gender, telling of a narrator from an outside world who enters a parallel society with a different social order and, in the process, reexamines institutions and assumptions he has taken for granted. Its strength lies in using the premise of "another society" to create distance, allowing readers to see, through contrast, arrangements in their own culture that are treated as a matter of course, especially the relation between gender roles, marriage, and public life. As a speculative novel in late nineteenth-century American literature, it is closer to a social allegory than a pure adventure story; narrative pacing and characterization serve the play of ideas. While reading, note how the narrator's perspective is framed as that of an outsider, and how the author presents institutional differences through everyday details rather than grand argument. For readers studying utopian literature, women's writing, and traditions of social imagination in American literature, this book offers a text worth close reading.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Literary scholars studying utopian and speculative fiction traditions
Readers interested in late nineteenth-century American women's writing and gender issues
Readers who enjoy reflecting on real institutions through contrast with an alternative society
Teachers and students seeking supplementary materials for American literature courses

Not a good fit for

Readers of genre fiction expecting fast-paced plots and strong dramatic conflict
Readers seeking direct contemporary argument on gender issues rather than literary metaphor
Readers with little patience for late nineteenth-century English narrative style

Reading tips

First grasp the narrator's observational position as an outsider, then map the institutional arrangements and everyday details of the society he enters.
While reading, list the differences between the two societies in gender roles, marriage, and division of labor as clues to the author's intent.
Read it alongside utopian literature and American women's writing to see its mode of speculation more clearly.
Do not rush to judge whether the premise is realistic; focus first on how the author uses contrast to create reflective distance from reality.

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 purely a romance novel?

No. Although the title contains the word "romance," the work is closer to a social allegory and speculative fiction. The romance and narrative thread serve the comparative observation of institutions, gender roles, and social arrangements, so readers should not approach it with the expectations of a genre romance.

Do I need to know the utopian literary tradition to read this book?

Prior expertise is not necessary, but familiarity with the basic utopian device of using an "alternative society" to mirror reality will make the author's design easier to grasp. If this is your first encounter with such a work, focus first on the narrator's perspective as an outsider, then gradually work toward the issues behind the institutional differences.

Is this book suitable for discussions of contemporary gender issues?

It can be used as a historical text, but note that it is a literary imagination from the late nineteenth century, not contemporary theoretical argument. It offers a narrative way of reflecting on gender roles through contrast, suitable for discussion within the framework of literary and social intellectual history, but it should not be treated directly as conclusive material on contemporary issues.

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About the author

Merchant, Ella Author

Ella Merchant is an author about whom very little public information is available. She is known as the author of Unveiling a Parallel: A Romance, the only work by her held in this collection. Subtitled "A Romance," the book is generally treated as fictional narrative, built around a "parallel" situation set beside a familiar world and colored by romance and imagination. Because her biography, nationality, and period of writing are not clearly recorded, a full picture of the author is difficult to sketch, and readers' knowledge of her still depends mainly on this single work. On the available evidence, Merchant's writing centers on using fictional settings to carry emotion and imagination, and the word "unveiling" in the title suggests a spirit of exploration in the narrative. For readers studying early utopian or parallel-world fiction, the work may serve as a reference text, while more background on the author remains to be verified.