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The book consists of four volumes containing coming of age novels set in the Midlands of Victorian England. The story follows Edwin Clayhanger as he leaves school, takes over the family business, and falls in love. The second novel Hilda Lessways tells the story from her coming of age, her working experiences as a shorthand clerk and keeper of a lodging house in London and Brighton. These Twain, the third in the Clayhanger series, chronicles the married life of Edwin and Hilda. The fourth show more book, The Roll-Call, concerns the young life of Clayhanger's stepson, George. show lessTags
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I think that Arnold Bennett has been most unfairly overlooked by history. This is a fine, "coming of age" novel, set in the latter half of Queen Victoria's reign in the "five Towns" of Staffordshire, which would gradually merge into the present-day city of Stoke On Trent. (Of course, in real life there were six towns, but Bennett chose not to have a cognate for Fenton, "the forgotten town".)
The central theme of the novel is the development from recently-released schoolboy Edwin Clayhanger, who temporarily dreams of becoming an architect) into an eminent local businessman and free thinker.
His father, Darius, has laboured long and hard to create a successful business, on the back of which Edwin and his sisters are born into relative show more affluence. However, unknown to them, their father had a deep dread of poverty after having worked long shifts in the pottery works as a very young boy, and even spending one night with his parents in the workhouse, whence they were rescued by the good offices of Sunday School teacher Mr Shushions, simply because he had spotted potential in the young Darius and his early eagerness to learn to read.
On the day on which Darius attends the funeral of his old patron he suffer a stroke-like episode and sinks into a protracted mental and physical deterioration.
Meanwhile Edwin takes control of the business which he runs without Darius's all-pervading ruthlessness, giving way, instead, to his Liberal leanings in the matter of fair wages and working conditions for his staff.
However, Edwin's life is not one of unsullied success. Early in life he falls headlong in love with Hilda Lessways, but is sundered from her before they can marry. Memories of Hilda stay with him all his life, and her gentle yet assured radical ideology steers Edwin's own mental, cultural and political development.
This all sounds very dry, but the novel is actually wholly engaging. Bennett writes with a deft, light touch, and offers a scintillating insight into the later Victorian period from the perspective of a swelling industrial provincial town.
I was also intrigued, in a novel published in 1910, to see the use of the phrase, "Bugger the lot of you!" That must have seemed very risque at the time.
I had owned a copy of this book for years but, for reasons I can't adequately disinter, had been reluctant to pick it up and read it. That was definitely a mistake - I rather feel I have now been bitten by the Bennett bug! show less
The central theme of the novel is the development from recently-released schoolboy Edwin Clayhanger, who temporarily dreams of becoming an architect) into an eminent local businessman and free thinker.
His father, Darius, has laboured long and hard to create a successful business, on the back of which Edwin and his sisters are born into relative show more affluence. However, unknown to them, their father had a deep dread of poverty after having worked long shifts in the pottery works as a very young boy, and even spending one night with his parents in the workhouse, whence they were rescued by the good offices of Sunday School teacher Mr Shushions, simply because he had spotted potential in the young Darius and his early eagerness to learn to read.
On the day on which Darius attends the funeral of his old patron he suffer a stroke-like episode and sinks into a protracted mental and physical deterioration.
Meanwhile Edwin takes control of the business which he runs without Darius's all-pervading ruthlessness, giving way, instead, to his Liberal leanings in the matter of fair wages and working conditions for his staff.
However, Edwin's life is not one of unsullied success. Early in life he falls headlong in love with Hilda Lessways, but is sundered from her before they can marry. Memories of Hilda stay with him all his life, and her gentle yet assured radical ideology steers Edwin's own mental, cultural and political development.
This all sounds very dry, but the novel is actually wholly engaging. Bennett writes with a deft, light touch, and offers a scintillating insight into the later Victorian period from the perspective of a swelling industrial provincial town.
I was also intrigued, in a novel published in 1910, to see the use of the phrase, "Bugger the lot of you!" That must have seemed very risque at the time.
I had owned a copy of this book for years but, for reasons I can't adequately disinter, had been reluctant to pick it up and read it. That was definitely a mistake - I rather feel I have now been bitten by the Bennett bug! show less
Arnold Bennett - [Clayhanger]
Published in 1910 Clayhanger belongs to the previous century in in its themes and subject matter. One could trace its development from the novels of Jane Austen through the Bronte sisters and Thomas Hardy. Published just three years before D. H Lawrence's Sons and Lovers it seems to have little connection to the modernist themes found in Lawrence's work. The influence of Sigmund Freud was not felt by Bennett: his characters do not have sex they get married and have children. Bennett's Clayhanger is set in the Victorian era and has Victorian values: the story starts with Edwin Clayhanger's last day at school in 1872 and finishes some twenty five tears later, as he approaches forty, but the modernist literary show more period is not even on the horizon. Perhaps this is why Arnold Bennett has been largely overlooked and is missing from many timelines showing the development of British Literature. However Bennett at his best is a very fine writer indeed and his novels get right down amongst the vagaries of the human condition, certainly as it applied to the late Victorians with their traditions, conventions and phobias.
Many of Bennetts novels are set in what has become known as the five towns, the five towns where pottery was king. Bursley the hometown of Edwin Clayhanger is modern day Burslem. It was a hard working industrial town and against the odds Darius Clayhanger; Edwins father had hauled himself up by his bootstraps, to become one of the leading printers in Bursley and a proud owner of a steam printing machine. He ensured his son Edwin had a decent education, but when he left school he expected him to work in the printing shop and learn the business. The novel is told through Edwin's point of view as he struggles against his autocratic father and with his own diffidence. Darius keeps Edwin poor, hardly allowing him any money and Edwin although resentful comes to accept his position. He is a man who lives very much in his own head with few if any contemporary friends, things happen to him rather than him making things happen, but there are rare occasions when he takes command and surprises his family. He realises that he will one day own the business and trains himself in the aspects of the work in which he feels comfortable, and being comfortable rules Edwins existence and it is only when he shakes himself out of the rut that he feels truly alive. The novel follows Edwin's progress; he becomes master of the printing shop when his father succumbs to Alzheimer's disease and inherits it on his death, He falls in love with the mysterious Hilda Lessways, but is jilted, meanwhile the eldest daughter: Janet Orgreave, of his neighbour; a wealthy solicitor waits for Edwin to make a move.
Edwin's character is a very fine creation; he strives to better himself through his reading and his association with the better educated Orgreave family. He has a good heart and is contemptuous of men in his own society, that do not try and better themselves. He is naive and clumsy around women, but is not unattractive, he becomes comfortable with his position as one of the leading business men in Bursley and takes an interest in politics; voting socialist in the National elections more to spite his conservative colleagues as much as his own views on a more equitable society. Arnold Bennett shows his readers the industrial town of Bursley, through Edwin's eyes: the eyes of the son of a self made man, who will never know poverty, but will see it all around him and will be sympathetic when his own life style is not threatened.
Bennetts descriptions of printing works and the tawdry central square of the town is drawn down, as though from a still life. He peoples his tableau with convincing characters and some brilliant scenarios. At the age of 16 Edwin is taken to the large central Hotel and public house by big James his fathers master printer. He hears big James sing as part of a four man choir and sees a female clog dancer, an image that stays with him all his life. He looks after his father unselfishly in his final illness and does not shy away from his duties, witnessing the horror of his death. Edwin's brief romance with Hilda is pent with possibilities and his relationship with Janet is full of warmth and diffidence. The celebrations in the town of a century of chapel going is vividly portrayed as is the sorry state of the striking pottery workers. Bennett captures the atmosphere of a dirty industrial town either celebrating or carrying out the daily grind. Edwin's exertions to create his own little world in his families house, and the characters around him that pull him out of his easy lifestyle are a feature of the novel.
Edwin is surrounded by strong female characters, who are not able to break free from their traditional roles, although Hilda might be the exception. There is nothing in Bennett's writing that hints at social change, but his observations enable the reader to feel the difficulties under which the women must labour to carve out a worthwhile life in the patriarchal society. The grime, the labour, the struggle to keep ones position are all part and parcel of this novel but its central character lends it a warm heart, which never approaches being over sentimental or kitsch. At the end of the novel Edwin is nearly forty, unmarried, comfortable, but still wondering how he can improve himself and perhaps seize upon that one chance that would make him feel more happy and more alive (there are two sequels). This is an excellent novel and one that I thoroughly enjoyed - a five star read. show less
Published in 1910 Clayhanger belongs to the previous century in in its themes and subject matter. One could trace its development from the novels of Jane Austen through the Bronte sisters and Thomas Hardy. Published just three years before D. H Lawrence's Sons and Lovers it seems to have little connection to the modernist themes found in Lawrence's work. The influence of Sigmund Freud was not felt by Bennett: his characters do not have sex they get married and have children. Bennett's Clayhanger is set in the Victorian era and has Victorian values: the story starts with Edwin Clayhanger's last day at school in 1872 and finishes some twenty five tears later, as he approaches forty, but the modernist literary show more period is not even on the horizon. Perhaps this is why Arnold Bennett has been largely overlooked and is missing from many timelines showing the development of British Literature. However Bennett at his best is a very fine writer indeed and his novels get right down amongst the vagaries of the human condition, certainly as it applied to the late Victorians with their traditions, conventions and phobias.
Many of Bennetts novels are set in what has become known as the five towns, the five towns where pottery was king. Bursley the hometown of Edwin Clayhanger is modern day Burslem. It was a hard working industrial town and against the odds Darius Clayhanger; Edwins father had hauled himself up by his bootstraps, to become one of the leading printers in Bursley and a proud owner of a steam printing machine. He ensured his son Edwin had a decent education, but when he left school he expected him to work in the printing shop and learn the business. The novel is told through Edwin's point of view as he struggles against his autocratic father and with his own diffidence. Darius keeps Edwin poor, hardly allowing him any money and Edwin although resentful comes to accept his position. He is a man who lives very much in his own head with few if any contemporary friends, things happen to him rather than him making things happen, but there are rare occasions when he takes command and surprises his family. He realises that he will one day own the business and trains himself in the aspects of the work in which he feels comfortable, and being comfortable rules Edwins existence and it is only when he shakes himself out of the rut that he feels truly alive. The novel follows Edwin's progress; he becomes master of the printing shop when his father succumbs to Alzheimer's disease and inherits it on his death, He falls in love with the mysterious Hilda Lessways, but is jilted, meanwhile the eldest daughter: Janet Orgreave, of his neighbour; a wealthy solicitor waits for Edwin to make a move.
Edwin's character is a very fine creation; he strives to better himself through his reading and his association with the better educated Orgreave family. He has a good heart and is contemptuous of men in his own society, that do not try and better themselves. He is naive and clumsy around women, but is not unattractive, he becomes comfortable with his position as one of the leading business men in Bursley and takes an interest in politics; voting socialist in the National elections more to spite his conservative colleagues as much as his own views on a more equitable society. Arnold Bennett shows his readers the industrial town of Bursley, through Edwin's eyes: the eyes of the son of a self made man, who will never know poverty, but will see it all around him and will be sympathetic when his own life style is not threatened.
Bennetts descriptions of printing works and the tawdry central square of the town is drawn down, as though from a still life. He peoples his tableau with convincing characters and some brilliant scenarios. At the age of 16 Edwin is taken to the large central Hotel and public house by big James his fathers master printer. He hears big James sing as part of a four man choir and sees a female clog dancer, an image that stays with him all his life. He looks after his father unselfishly in his final illness and does not shy away from his duties, witnessing the horror of his death. Edwin's brief romance with Hilda is pent with possibilities and his relationship with Janet is full of warmth and diffidence. The celebrations in the town of a century of chapel going is vividly portrayed as is the sorry state of the striking pottery workers. Bennett captures the atmosphere of a dirty industrial town either celebrating or carrying out the daily grind. Edwin's exertions to create his own little world in his families house, and the characters around him that pull him out of his easy lifestyle are a feature of the novel.
Edwin is surrounded by strong female characters, who are not able to break free from their traditional roles, although Hilda might be the exception. There is nothing in Bennett's writing that hints at social change, but his observations enable the reader to feel the difficulties under which the women must labour to carve out a worthwhile life in the patriarchal society. The grime, the labour, the struggle to keep ones position are all part and parcel of this novel but its central character lends it a warm heart, which never approaches being over sentimental or kitsch. At the end of the novel Edwin is nearly forty, unmarried, comfortable, but still wondering how he can improve himself and perhaps seize upon that one chance that would make him feel more happy and more alive (there are two sequels). This is an excellent novel and one that I thoroughly enjoyed - a five star read. show less
Increasingly compulsive read: Edwin Clayhanger is the put-upon son of a rather dictatorial printer father, in Victorian Staffordshire. With never-to-be fulfiled aspirations of avoiding the family business to study architecture, Edwin is ground down.
His one romantic interlude with the strange and unknowable Hilda Lessways comes to nought.
But as the years roll by, some things change...
The second volume in series- Hilda Lessways- will, I hope, clarify that lady's mysterious history. All set to start reading.
Recommended.
His one romantic interlude with the strange and unknowable Hilda Lessways comes to nought.
But as the years roll by, some things change...
The second volume in series- Hilda Lessways- will, I hope, clarify that lady's mysterious history. All set to start reading.
Recommended.
This took me a while to get going with and was a bit slow in places, but is a nicely detailed book evoking a time and place very well. By the end I was quite hooked and am definitely planning to read the others in the series. I think it's a little uneven - some events (not always particularly exciting ones, though most are pivotal to the characters development) are told in great detail, but then years are skipped over entirely.
While I found this book easy to read, Edwin was an unsatisfactory 'hero' to me. I know that I am being too hard on him (especially as I agreed with many of his sentiments) but despite his inner life, he struck me as bland and too often pompous. I might end up changing my rating as time passes as I find that in the few days that have already passed since I finished this book my irritation at Edwin has diminished.
A thoroughly good read. I've enjoyed Bennett in the past and this one lived up to expectations. I don't feel it has as good a structure as "Anna of the Five Towns" but I felt very much part of the world of the Five Towns again. As a study of the sociology of the rising middle-class it was superb and gave a real feel for the pressures of Methodist religion and social expectation against glimpses of a newer more liberal world.
This was a strange one, mostly that it really seemed to have no discernible through line. Edwin Clayhanger goes from a young man leaving school to enter his father's business and live through various events in his life. He is not a particularly likable person (nor is his father) and there are large digressions into politics of the time that I mostly don't understand. And yet there are three more in a collection called The Clayhanger Family. Hmmm, I'll see how much patience I have for the next one.
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Author Information
193+ Works 6,838 Members
Arnold Bennett was born on May 27, 1867 in Hanley, Staffordshire, England. He began his working career as a law clerk and later he left the legal field and became an editor for the magazine Woman. His first novel was "A Man from the North." He wrote several novels set in Hanley, the town where he was born. These are known as the Five Town novels. show more Other titles include "The Babylon Hotel," "The Truth about an Author," and "How to Live on 24 Hours a Day." Bennett won the 1923 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel "Riceyman Steps." "The Journal of Arnold Bennett" was published posthumously in three volumes. Bennett was also the author of "Hugo" which was made into a major motion picture in 2011 starring Jude law and Ben Kingsley, directed by Martin Scorsese. During WWI, Bennett was Director of Propaganda for France at the Ministry of Information. (At that time "propaganda" did not have the negative connotations it would have later in the twentieth century.) This appointment was based on the recommendation of Lord Beaverbrook, who also recommended him as Deputy Minister of that department at the end of the war. Bennett refused a knighthood in 1918. He died in London of typhoid fever on March 27, 1931. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Awards and Honors
Series
Belongs to Publisher Series
Work Relationships
Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1910; 1954 (first Penguin ed.) (first Penguin ed.)
- People/Characters
- Edwin Clayhanger; Darius Clayhanger; Hilda Lessways
- Important places
- Five Towns, Staffordshire, England, UK (fictional); Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England, UK; Bursley, England, UK
- First words
- Edwin Clayhanger stood on the steep-sloping, red-bricked canal bridge, in the valley between Bursley and its suburb Hillport.
- Quotations
- Once Edwin had looked forward to a moment when he might have his father at his mercy, when he might revenge himself for the insults and the bullying that had been his. Once he had clenched his fist and his teeth, and had said... (show all), ‘When you’re old, and I’ve got you, and you can’t help yourself ...!’ That moment had come ... As he looked at the poor figure fumbling towards the door, he knew the humiliating paltriness of revenge.
- Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)He thought of the younger Edwin whom she had kissed into rapture, as of a boy too inexperienced in sorrow to appreciate this Hilda. He braced himself to the exquisite burden of life.
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- Reviews
- 9
- Rating
- (3.99)
- Languages
- Czech, English, Spanish
- Media
- Paper, Audiobook, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 62
- ASINs
- 19
