| Title | : | Ormond (Penguin Classics) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0140436448 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780140436440 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 313 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1817 |
Ormond (Penguin Classics) Reviews
-
I have always said there are many authors whose main novels I am very interested in reading, and I’m trying to find among those books a possible all-time favorite of mine. Unfortunately, my reading experience with my first Maria Edgeworth has not been what I was expecting beforehand. Basically my first and wrong assumption was that Ormond would be similar in style to a Jane Austen novel; actually, the first chapter seemed to be like a very typical Austen chapter: people in a ball, talking and pretending to enjoy the gathering, and in the meantime, our 'main character' is introduced to the reader. Again, I was mistaken, and it was until I read the second chapter that I realized this wouldn't have anything to do with Jane Austen and her marvelous novels. That being said, I must confess I really enjoyed both Edgeworth's writing style and Ormond's main plot, though there were some minor stories and some aspects of the book that didn't live up to my expectations.
Ormond is a coming-of-age novel—this is probably what made me enjoy this book, despite my previous expectations—that somehow reminded me of Candide (Voltaire) and whose protagonist, Harry Ormond, is living quite a few experiences throughout the book. These life experiences are helping him to shape the man he will become at the end of the book, however, the whole journey won't be that easy. Ormond is going to fall in love, but at the same time, he'll have to cope with the loss of a loved one; besides, he'll have to deal with some difficulties and enjoy some happy moments in life while he is going from place A to place B.
Unlike Candide, who is constantly traveling to many countries and even continents, Ormond only visits three countries(?) in the entire book, and those places are nevertheless enough for the author to depict the society at that period of time, their people and some differences between them. For instance, my favorite part was definitely when Ormond is in France and we can see very well portrayed that society living in Paris some years before the French Revolution started. Finally, though I didn't like the ending very much, I found it acceptable and somehow realistic; it was nonetheless rather abrupt, as if the author was tired of keeping writing her book at this point. Probably this is just my view after all, since I was indeed truly tired of the story at that precise moment, yet mainly because of the subplots.
Ormond overall is an enjoyable book; if, for instance, you pick this up and you also love reading early nineteenth century novels, you'll probably find yourself gravitating towards its characters and the writing style. On the other hand, you can't expect to find a masterpiece here; it is by no means a better style of writing than Jane Austen's, and even I can see why Maria Edgeworth is not well known outside English-speaking countries (her works definitely should be better known and translated, for sure).
In a nutshell, and even though this novel was not completely for me, I'd recommend it to anyone who is into Regency literature; as for me, I'm going to pick up another novel by Edgeworth in the future, just to see if I can enjoy her other works much more than this one. For the record, there is another book that is constantly mentioned in the story, a novel that Ormond is reading every now and then, that—as far as I am aware—might have been like an inspiration for the author to write Ormond: I'm referring to Tom Jones (Henry Fielding), an eighteenth century classic I'm also eager to read. We'll see if we can give it a go sooner rather than later.
“It is the triumph of religion and of its ministers to be able to support the human heart, when all other resources are of little avail. Time, it is true, at length effaces the recollection of misfortune, and age deadens the sense of sorrow. But that power to console is surely far superior in its effect, more worthy of a rational and a social being, which operates—not by contracting or benumbing our feelings and faculties, but by expanding and ennobling them—inspiring us, not with stoic indifference to the pains and pleasures of humanity, but with pious submission to the will of Heaven—to the order and orderer of the universe." -
A pleasant, charming, enjoyable reading experience about the coming of age of Harry Ormond. Harry’s mother dies when Harry is a baby and his father, an army captain, marries an Indian woman and resides in India. At the age of four Harry is lucky to have a guardian, an Irishman named Sir Ulick O’Shane. Living in Ireland, Harry is cared for but not educated. He is not expected to have property or the need of an education. As a youngster, Harry is intemperate and nearly kills a friend. Harry learns about the value of money and about different types of young women. Harry has a good heart, good morals and a strong will.
This book was first published in 1817. -
A great early nineteenth-century episodic novel of an orphan boy's rise to the upper classes, in the tradition of Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews et al. The eponymous Harry Ormand is raised side-by-side with the son of the local lord, Sir Ulick O'Shane; his low-birth, however, keeps him from developing the haughty, dismissive manner of the natural son of O'Shane, Marcus. Harry also spends extended periods of time with O'Shane's somewhat feral first cousin, the self-style King of the Black Islands, Cornelius, whose demense is something akin to an ancient, pre-Christian Irish fiefdom. "King Corny" rules as a benificent despot, quick to action (right or wrong), but equally fast in apologising and making ammends for his errors.
This Pegnuin Classics edition illustrated isn't the one I picked up one Sunday a few months ago from the two-dollar carts outside a Fourth Avenue shop. I found a 1903 Macmillian edition that was illustrated. Already almost a hundred-years old when this edition was published, it's my first Edgeworth. I must admit, I bought it for sentimental reasons, as she lived most of her life just a few miles from the town where I was born in the Irish Midlands. Maria Edgeworth was a heroine to and contemporary of Jane Austen; need I say more? -
Free download available at
eBooks@Adelaide.
Opening lines:
“What! no music, no dancing at Castle Hermitage to-night; and all the ladies sitting in a formal circle, petrifying into perfect statues?” cried Sir Ulick O’Shane as he entered the drawing-room, between ten and eleven o’clock at night, accompanied by what he called his rear-guard, veterans of the old school of good fellows, who at those times in Ireland — times long since past — deemed it essential to health, happiness, and manly character, to swallow, and show themselves able to stand after swallowing, a certain number of bottles of claret per day or night.
This is the story of the Irish hero and his political ideologies paths between Ireland and France. -
Orphaned Ormond is a high-spirited youngster who is engineered away from the protection of Sir Ulick O'Shane over a mild shooting incident, but mainly because he outshines O'Shane's son. Our hero stays with the rough and ready self-styled King of The Black Isles and furthers his moral education before slipping away from Ireland to become a sensation at the perfumed court of French nobility. A Romantic romp with a strong core of pure goodness, it feels very much like a cocktail of Robert Louis Stevenson and Jane Austen.
-
Originally published with Harrington in 1817, Ormond tells of an orphaned English gentleman who is raised in Ireland and spends some of his young adulthood in France in the 18th C. It is a coming of age story with a moralizing bent (though not too hamfisted) and a backdrop of political discourse, as English Harry Ormond reacts to the socio-political worlds of the Irish and French that he moves among.
-
"Florence Annaly was beautiful, but not one of those beauties who strike at first sight. Hers was a face which neither challenged nor sued for admiration."
Ormond may be one of the most confusing and complex novels that I have ever read. I want a Baedeker through this fever-dream-like land, and possibly teach an entire module on the novel. It is weirdly beautiful, which is not something I would say about most novel of the 1810s! I had worried from its beginning that Ormond would fall into the pattern of his literary hero, Tom Jones, and I would be forced to despise him, but he remains if not inoffensive, at the very least not insufferable.
Ormond is in a grey sea between having no personality and having a static personality, an issue that is often tackled in the novel of this period; Ormond's saving grace is that he is innately likeable, though I could not in good conscience call him charismatic, we are told on numerous occasions how likeable Ormond is. In most narratives this would quickly devolve into a telling-not-showing problem. No so with Edgeworth! Much like her late contemporary, Jane Austen, Edgeworth deftly uses a series of literary techniques which are enthralling. She will state a truism and in the same sentence refute it. She will state that Ormond is not a vain man, then say that a woman has flattered his vanity. Everything is contradictory, woven together in such a manner as to not give you rhetoric-whiplash, but give texture and play to this beautiful novel.
If we're all done with me waxing poetic about genre studies and you're looking for the entertaining soul of the novel: Ormond has a series of homes - Castle Hermitage and Irish society, the private nature kingdom of the Black Islands, a number of estates across England and Ireland, as well as a place at the heart of Paris. In the course of the novel their are sudden twists of fate: letters, deaths, schemes, escapes - not only for Ormond, again he is no Tom Jones, but of all of the characters, giving this novel a clarity and depth that is engaging and frustrating.
Indeed, it's not one of those beauties who strike at first sight. It is a novel which neither challenges nor sues for admiration. -
I was between three and four stars, would have went for 3.5 if I could. Intersting opening chapters, where every character we we introduced to were horrible. But then we come to realize that it was more a case of Marcus having a bad influence on Ormond, and when seperated we start to see Ormond develop. Like The Absentee, this had a bit of Irish history, in this case, the opposition to education for Catholics. This would have reference to the illegal Hedge Schools for catholic children, in 18th & and 19th century Ireland (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedge_s...).
Overall a very enjoyable read, he is a decent bloke, with his fair share of flaws, who undergoes many challanges, (gambling, rash incorrect conclusions, betrayal by so-called friends & guardians). Quickly paced final outcome, which relied on a few too many highly unlikely coincidences. How can a ship on its way from Ireland to the US end up shipwrecked off France, leading to an amazing meeting in Paris? -
This book is so meanderingly indecipherable, that it feels like a con job. This Edgeworth lady must've said to herself, "Hmmm, can I write a book, while actually just putting random pleasant words on pages, and having people believe it's coherent, that I can pass off as a classic? I believe I can!"
So she did.
There are conversations here, where you really don't know what people are saying. There are travels that happen, but you don't really know where people are going. There's stuff going on, but you can't really tell what's happening.
It's frustratingly readable, though, hence the successful con, but it's an incomprehensible mess, dressed up as a book, and I refuse to have the wool pulled over my eyes. -
This book is the story of a young orphan boy, Ormond and is the story of his coming of age. Written in 1817 by female author Maria Edgeworth this book has a bit of flavor of Austen only with a male hero instead of females and lots of comedy of manners, a bit of moralizing, and a romance. It was an easy read.
Set in Ireland, The Black Islands, England, Paris. The time period is set in the 1700's during Louis the Fifteenth and Madame du Barry, just before the reign of terror. Here we see the court behaviors and distaste for the common people. We also see the rent between Protestant and Catholic in Ireland with the debate of whether a Catholic boy can sit on the same school bench with a Protestant student. -
What I loved about Ormond is the light-hearted manner in which the moral education of the main character (through practice, because he received none through theory) is portrayed. In short, I liked the way the main character learns wise lessons from the experiences he has. The story was neither moralistic nor frivolous, it was well balanced although perhaps a little naive on some points.
-
This bildungsroman takes a while to get going and has some inconsistent characterisations. Through the example of Harry Ormond, the novel's hero, Edgeworth emphasises the importance of steadfastness of character and learning through experience.
-
An interesting enough read in terms of history and influence on other writers but will I remember it in a month? Probably not.
-
The thing is that Ormond is just so darned likeable as a character. You think at the very beginning that he's going to be this orphaned, aristocratic bad boy...but no. He's a stand up guy. So much so that the very guy he shoots and almost kills winds up in some ways being his Sancho Panza-like sidekick. The novel is episodic, and while not as good as "The Absentee," is still a enjoyable novel by Edgeworth. I felt that Edgeworth was playing with Candide, almost making an Irish version of that character, but with more realistic encounters with the world around him.
-
The travails for orphan Ormond. Enough action to keep my interest. I enjoyed this book.
-
Set in the late eighteenth century, Miss Edgeworth plants our hero, a young man, in Castle Hermitage, the country estate of which the squire, Sir Ulick O'Shane, has been his guardian since he was very young, Thence to an island estate 'ruled' by a maverick King, and then, following a broken heart, Miss Edgeworth whisks him off to the glittering Paris of Louis XV and Madame du Barry, a city where fidelity to one's spouse appears to be a rarity, and the Faro tables are busy every night. He visits an old love and her vain husband; will the sparks fly? The Parisians take to Monsieur Ormond; he is a great success. Indeed Harry Ormond is a very likeable young man, but not without fault, and his nature, sometimes trusting, and sometimes impulsive, can lead him toward danger of personal and financial nature.
This is a fast-paced novel for much of the time, and as implied above, Harry gets around quite a bit. He always seems to 'have a car waiting' and one time, he actually 'flew to Dublin.' which startled me a bit.
Maria Edgeworth is very much at home in the country estate, since she lived in one in County Longford. Though part of the English ruling class, she is sympathetic to the Irish and the Irish cause.
Hilarious at times! But the blood sports I do not like - the references to cock-fighting that country people were engaged in at the time. It seems very distasteful to us now. There is no actual cock-fight however in the novel. The shooting of birds was normal for the country squire. They always brought the game home to the kitchen anyway. So it wasn't just a thrill-kill.
There are also a few historical racist epithets - always uttered though, by bad or silly characters.
However, Maria's satire of social posturing as as good as Jane Austen's, in fact Jane was a fan of Maria, and it is quite possible she inspired her. Belles, coxcombs and snobs abound in the world of Harry Ormond as he endeavors to mature and make the right choices for himself!
Nothing to disappoint here. -
What possessed me to write it down, I do not know, but I have tacked upon my board a scrap of paper with this on it: "Ormod -- (Anglo-Saxon) Sad." It's written in my "in haste but still legible" handwriting.
So when I came across a list of books one "ought to read" and this was on it, I had to attain it, missing "n" or _ot. (Heh.)
I went into it with no expectations or ideas about its content. Somewhere in the first twenty pages I put the book down and said to the air (and then in an email to a friend), "I'd be surprised to find out that a spark of Harry Ormond didn't ignite the fire that one day became one Heathcliff Heathcliff."
I'm glad I had the thought, even if I know I wouldn't have had it if I hadn't paused. I wish I remember what exactly made me think it. Because I'm sure other readers could argue, and argue well, that I'm delusional.
Around there I found a description of what the book was "about," and it led me to expect a highly adventurous tale of travel and slapstick. Not so. And so what? What loved most about the novel was that the whole time---and most pointedly at times I was able to read without distraction---I felt like I'd tripped into some parlor in the past and found Ms. Edgeworth there. She sits in a chair and leans over as if simply accepting that some stranger has wandered in and should hear this story of a young man she knows.
You just can't pull off something like that these days. The telling and the addressing the reader and the failure to "put the reader in the story." Rather than feeling included within the story, it's a feeling of being trusted to hear a story.
It was delightful to me to hear about a man so full of naive goodness. You see a lot of naive evil. This is just refreshing.
Oh, and sure, I did laugh out loud a couple of times, but it was lighter, more feathery feeling of a laugh than I get from any modern literature, as it's half affection for the players and half for the authoress. -
First published in 1817, Ormond is set in the 1760s and'70s and filled with the melodramatic plotting necessary to shepherd the orphaned Harry Ormond safely to his happy ending. But even so, Edgeworth's novel isn't entirely predictable. It has an abundance of situations in which things could develop in various ways, and because it doesn't bother with extensive descriptions of irrelevant periods and incidents, there's a refreshing momentum that makes the 345 pages move swiftly. In the midst of issues of property and inheritance and courtship, Edgeworth creates space for some of the issues of the day, of injustice for the poor and anti-Catholic sentiment from the Anglo privileged classes. The book is considered an important title, and I took it up as a matter of duty, but I was very pleasantly surprised. It's a very readable book.
-
I started this after finishing Pride and Prejudice. It was like getting up from a tea room full of chintz and lace and soft murmurings and walking into a bar full of roaring singers where a huge-bosomed barmaid slams down foaming tankards of ale onto the table and where a poet is reciting in one corner while a fist fight is in progress in another...Give me Edgeworth over Austen any day...I only wish I'd read it twenty years ago, when I lived in rural Ireland, and where, remarkably, I found characters and scenes which Edgeworth would have recognised (baronets and cock-fights being two examples - I accepted invitations by the former, but declined them to the latter).
-
I read a reproduction produced for Kindle which had a number of errors which detracted from the reading experience. Nevertheless this was quite a romp and an enjoyable read. Although the author has been said to have influenced a great number of writers such as R.L. Stevenson and Dickens I had never heard of her. Much has been made of the Brontes and Jane Austen as forging a path for female writers but she predates them and was apparently very well known. I was delighted to make her acquaintance.
-
For a romance novel published in 1817, this is a remarkably clear-headed work. All the characters are completely believable, despite being wildly disparate and eccentric in nature. Even the villains have understandable motives! The concluding chapters seem a bit rushed, though, with cascading coincidences designed to produce an obligatory happy ending.
-
I didn't find anything particularly inspiring about this book. It was OK - nothing particularly bad about it nut just didn't spark any particular interest. Readable but also forgettable story of a young man's avrying fortunes in Ireland and Paris.
-
Excellent historical fiction setting forth the story of Harry Ormond and his upbringing in Irish/English society with even some French society thrown in. Lots of intrigue and romance and good people and evil people. True romance ultimately prevails.
-
It's only been a few years and I can't even remember what this book was about! Pretty sad.
