Robert Elsmere
A Victorian Crisis of Faith, Historical Biblical Criticism, and the Search for Ethical ChristianityBy Humphry Mrs. Ward
Length26h 48m
About this audiobook
Published in 1888, Robert Elsmere is a searching Victorian novel about the collision between inherited Christian belief and modern historical criticism. Its protagonist, an idealistic Anglican clergyman, gradually loses confidence in orthodox doctrine as scholarship, moral doubt, and contact with social suffering compel him to reconsider the foundations of faith. Combining psychological realism, theological debate, and the expansive social panorama of the nineteenth-century novel, Mrs. Ward's work dramatizes the period's crisis of belief without reducing it to mere polemic. Its measured prose, earnest dialogue, and intellectual architecture place it within the tradition of the problem novel, while its concern with ethical action anticipates later fiction of religious and social reform. Mary Augusta Ward, who published under the name Mrs. Humphry Ward, was formed by a profoundly literary and religious family: she was the granddaughter of Thomas Arnold and the niece of Matthew Arnold, and she knew the intellectual tensions of Victorian Anglicanism from within. Her engagement with contemporary biblical scholarship, theological liberalism, and debates over agnosticism gave the novel its unusual authority. Ward's own movement toward a more intellectually flexible Christianity informs Robert Elsmere's central conflict, even as the book preserves sympathy for traditional devotion and communal faith. Robert Elsmere is especially rewarding for readers interested in Victorian culture, the history of religious thought, and the relationship between literature and intellectual controversy. Though its discussions are demanding, its emotional seriousness and humane depiction of conscience give them dramatic force. It remains a valuable, challenging book for anyone wishing to understand how nineteenth-century fiction confronted modernity, doubt, and the possibility of an ethical life beyond dogma.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 3.7 (1.8K)
Includes Goodreads, LibraryThing, StoryGraph, Amazon
GenreGeneral Fiction
Length26 hrs 48 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateDec 12, 2023
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1CHAPTER I
26CHAPTER XXIV
2CHAPTER II
27CHAPTER XXV
3CHAPTER III
28BOOK IV CRISIS
4CHAPTER IV
29CHAPTER XXVI
5CHAPTER V
30CHAPTER XXVII
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6CHAPTER VI
31CHAPTER XXVIII
7CHAPTER VII
32CHAPTER XXIX
8CHAPTER VIII
33CHAPTER XXX
9CHAPTER IX
34BOOK V ROSE
10CHAPTER X
35CHAPTER XXXI
11BOOK II SURREY
36CHAPTER XXXII
12CHAPTER XI
37CHAPTER XXXIII
13CHAPTER XII
38CHAPTER XXXIV
14CHAPTER XIII
39CHAPTER XXXV
15CHAPTER XIV
40CHAPTER XXXVI
16CHAPTER XV
41BOOK VI NEW OPENINGS
17CHAPTER XVI
42CHAPTER XXXVII
18CHAPTER XVII
43CHAPTER XXXVIII
19CHAPTER XVIII
44CHAPTER XXXIX
20BOOK III THE SQUIRE
45CHAPTER XL
21CHAPTER XIX
46CHAPTER XLI
22CHAPTER XX
47CHAPTER XLII
23CHAPTER XXI
48CHAPTER XLIII
24CHAPTER XXII
49CHAPTER XLIV
25CHAPTER XXIII
50CHAPTER XLV
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