Authorpreneur Dashboard – Dr Harrison Solow
Felicity & Barbara Pym
Literature & Fiction
A splendid book! Original, controversial, academic, readable, serious, light-hearted, sensible, charming..." - Hazel Holt, Literary Executor of the Barbara Pym Estate, author of Barbara Pym’s biography, A Lot to Ask: A Life of Barbara Pym and editor (with Hilary Pym) of Barbara Pym’s unpublished work, Civil to Strangers and Other Writings; leading crime novelist. "It should be mandatory reading for all undergraduate students of English Literature; no American students of English Literature should be allowed to set foot upon campus without having proved that they have read it..." - Peter Miles, Emeritus Fellow of the English Association. "Dryden, a great writer as well as a great critic, created a work of art about works of art. Harrison Solow, in her incisive and delightful study of the novels of Barbara Pym has accomplished a similar feat." - Mayo Simon, New York playwright, writer of Academy Award winning film, Why Man Creates "Harrison Solow seamlessly weaves form and content to create an engrossing hybrid work: epistolary novel cum memoir cum literary critique cum advice column...Masterfully done." - Heather Hughes, Editor, Harvard University Press. “…A fantastic combination of solid scholarship and genuinely arresting narrative. It's a great book and is the heir to the best kind of scholarly writing, i.e. Trilling, that was once appreciated by a literate, general public, as opposed to the indecipherable, navel-gazing garbage that hack Ph.D.'s churn out by the ton these days.” Thomas Vinciguerra, Deputy Editor of The Week, New York; Contributing Writer, The New York Times.
Book Bubbles from Felicity & Barbara Pym
Clear-Sightedness
Learning literature - as opposed to learning about it, like the learning of any art, requires discernment. Without that crucial quality, a young and/or impressionable student might simply accept anything that any professor says about it. While I am not a believer in the democracy of all opinions, in which the views of the uninformed, ignorant and/or inexperienced hold as much weight (or even any weight at times) as someone who has studied, reflected, lived a great deal of life in the pursuit knowledge and in the company of other experts/authorities on this/her subject, it is patently clear that the sensibilities of many people are limited or obscured by self-interest and this includes those who teach literature. This is not to denigrate the profession - on the contrary - it is to elevate it. Mallory believes in Felicity's perceptiveness, and urges her to use it in choosing to whom to listen and from whom to take direction.
"O Tempora - O Mores!"
It is all very well to read a novel for entertainment, pleasure, even edification, but without substantial knowledge of the world from which it springs - the context, the culture, the everyday assumptions, the unspoken agreements, the societal expectations, the subtext of common language, the "tempora - the mores" - it would stretch the truth somewhat to say that one understands it. Here, Mallory, the tutor, tries to open the door into a lost world (and, to be sure, a privileged one - but a true world all the same) for her student, Felicity, believing that literature, not unlike life, if it is based on guesses and assumptions, projections and ignorance, isn't worth serious engagement.
