Bøger af Ford Madox Ford

This 900-page survey of world literature, "e;From Confucius' Day to Our Own"e; (as the subtitle reads), was the last book written by Ford Madox Ford, one of the seminal figures of the modernist period. Written for general readers rather than scholars and first published in 1938, The March of Literature is a working novelist's view of what is valuable in literature, and why. Convinced that scholars and teachers give a false sense of literature, Ford brings alive the pleasures of reading by writing about books he is passionate about. Beginning at the beginning - with ancient Egyptian and Chinese literature and the Bible - Ford works his way through classical literature, the writings of the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, continuing up to the major writers of his own day like Ezra Pound, Henry James, and Joseph Conrad. With his encyclopedic reading and expertise in the techniques of writing, Ford is a reliable and entertaining guide. Ford also includes a chapter on publishers and booksellers, noting the key roles they play in literature's existence. Novelist Alexander Theroux (Darconville's Cat, An Adultery) has written an insightful introduction for this reissue, the first time this monumental book has been made available in paperback.

The Good Soldier is set just before World War I and chronicles the tragedy of Edward Ashburnham, the soldier to whom the title refers, and his own seemingly perfect marriage and that of two American friends. The story is narrated by the character John Dowell, half of one of the couples whose dissolving relationships form the subject of the novel. Dowell tells the story of those dissolutions and the deaths of three characters and the madness of a fourth, in a rambling, non-chronological fashion.

"Some Do Not ..." chronicles the life of Christopher Tietjens, "the last Tory", a brilliant government statistician from a wealthy landowning family, who serves in the British Army during the First World War. The novel is the first part of the famous "Parade''s End" tetralogy by Ford Madox Ford. The setting is mainly England and the Western Front of the First World War, in which Ford had served as an officer in the Welch Regiment, a life he vividly depicts.

The Fifth Queen trilogy consists of three historical novels, The Fifth Queen, Privy Seal and The Fifth Queen Crowned. The trilogy presents a fictionalized account of Katharine Howard''s arrival at the Court of Henry VIII, her eventual marriage to the king, and her death. Katharine Howard is introduced as a devout Roman Catholic, impoverished, young noblewoman escorted by her fiery cousin Thomas Culpeper. By accident, she comes to the attention of the king, in a minor way at first, is helped to a position as a lady in waiting for the then bastard Lady Mary, Henry''s eldest daughter, by her old Latin tutor Nicholas Udal. Udal is a spy for Thomas Cromwell, the Lord Privy Seal. As Katharine becomes involved with the many calculating, competing, and spying members of Henry VIII''s Court, she gradually rises, almost against her will, in Court. She is brought more to the attention of the King, becomes involved with him, gets used by Cromwell, Bishop Gardiner and Thomas Cranmer as well as the less powerful though more personally attached Nicholas Throckmorton. Her connection to the latter puts her in some peril, as in January 1554 he is suspected of complicity in Wyatt''s Rebellion and arrested, during which time Katherine is also briefly implicated. Katharine''s forthrightness, devotion to the Old Faith and learning are what make her attractive to the King, along with her youth and physical beauty.

Heralded by Graham Greene as "one of the finest novels of our century," Ford Madox Ford's 1915 modernist masterpiece of passion and deceit is now available in a revised and expanded Norton Critical Edition.

This tetralogy, widely regarded as one of the best novels in English, celebrates the end of an era, the irrevocable destruction of the comfortable, predictable society that vanished during World War I. "There are not many English novels which deserve to be called great: 'Parade's End' is one of them." -W. H. Auden.

First published in 1915, "The Good Soldier" is Ford Madox Ford's tragic tale of the relationship between two couples. The first couple is English, Captain Edward Ashburnham, the good soldier referenced in the title, and his wife Leonora. The two at first have a seemingly perfect marriage but over the course of the novel is revealed that a constant series of infidelities by Edward has driven Leonora to attempt to exert increasing control over Edward's affairs, placing great strain on their relationship. The second couple is American, John and Florence Dowell, who have been living abroad in Europe for quite some time. John, a wealthy American Quaker, is held romantically at a distance from his wife Florence, who feigns a heart condition so that she may carry on an affairs of her own. What ensues is a tragic series of events which is described by John as the "saddest story ever told". Often cited as one of the greatest novels ever written, "The Good Soldier" presents the epitome of the unreliable narrator in John Dowell, leaving the reader wondering whether or not he is an innocent victim or a master of manipulation seeking to evoke the sympathy of his audience. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper.

Tracing the psychological damage inflicted by battle, the collapse of England's secure Edwardian values - embodied in Christopher's wife, the beautiful, cruel socialite Sylvia - and the beginning of a new age, epitomized by the suffragette Valentine Wannop, this title is an elegy for both the war dead and the passing of a way of life.

A fascinating new stage adaptation from an award winning writer.