Anna of the Five Towns

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Instead, it features a profoundly nasty man, who never lays a finger on anyone or commits any crime. I thought a lot about Anna’s inability to feel the sentiments of love and passion. I view this an important element of the story. Why is she this way? Why did she feel as she did about her suitor? Why was she drawn to both him and then Willie? Isn’t it understandable that she should first feel motherly love and that only later could this be transformed into passion toward a mate? Was she even able to recognize love growing up alongside her father? So yes, character portrayal is an essential part of the story. Few take conscious pride in the ancient art of the potter, steeped as it is within the weft of human life, yet Mynors's works were among the finest for those of modest means. "Thrift is a great virtue," he said to Anna. "That's why it is for Mr Price's good you must ensure he pays you what is owed." Bennett grew up in Staffordshire, but left it for London as a young man. Although no doubt he continued to visit, he never again lived there. However, we can see from this book that his childhood home left a deep impression on him. Bennett describes the Five Towns in loving detail. By day it might be a dirty townscape of pottery works and coal mines, but by night it is lit by distant fires which give it a fairyland glamour.

Anna's own attitude to money is very different: she makes all her own clothes, has no servant or carriage, and uses nothing on her hair. "The arrival of money out of space, unearned, unasked, was a disturbing experience." "She wanted to test the actuality of this apparent dream by handling a coin and causing it to vanish over counters." The trouble is, she's now too rich to ask her father for any of his money, but she can't use her own, as he's tied her into a business agreement with someone. On holiday with the Suttons, she is startled by their "amazing habit of always buying the best of everything." It becomes clear that Willie must declare himself bankrupt and the creditors (which include Anna) allow him enough money to emigrate to Australia. Mynors takes the large Price family residence for the marital home, even though it will need much refurbishment. He and Anna agree to marry as soon as possible and make a home for Agnes as well. In preparation, Anna visits the families of Sunday School children and "found joy in the uncongenial and ill-performed task", both as a penance and because Henry asked her to do it. Anna is dutiful, naive, lonely: "the peculiarity of her position... awe and pity were equally mingled" and unfamiliarity with social situations mean she is not "a facile talker". Proprio poco prima che lui parta, Anna capisce di provare per lui sentimenti molto forti che vanno oltre l’amicizia, ma è incapace di opporsi alla promessa di matrimonio fatta a Mynors. Il loro è un amore puro ma la loro relazione è impossibile nel ristretto mondo in cui vivono, perché appartenenti a due diverse classi sociali.

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How nice you can come with us to the Isle of Man now you are monied," cried Mrs Sutton. "I do also declare Mr Mynors is enamoured of you." Once Anna would have dreaded such a disclosure, but now she merely smiled as if to say, "Yes, I the shy, dreary one am beloved by the man desired of all." The book wonderfully describes the town “potteries”, the area, the era, the people and the pervading social climate. How people, women and men and individuals of different social standing, were expected to behave is made clearly evident. A plot summary would make this short, but perfectly formed novel sound parochial, unoriginal and maybe dull. It is not. Bennett is a wonderful observer and writer of the small-scale aspects that make life real and characters spring to life. He's also pretty good at writing female characters. In fact, by far the weakest character is male: the faultless Henry Mynors. La ambientación. Bursley, una de las cinco poblaciones que forman las Cinco Villas, famosas por la porcelana y la industria alfarera en torno a la que gira la vida de la zona. Describe maravillosamente la zona, las alfarerías de la ciudad, la sociedad de la época, la vida diaria, la familia, el trabajo, la educación de los niños o la religión de sus habitantes. Y también el comportamiento de las personas que era diferente según su posición social. Drabble, Margaret. Arnold Bennett. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974. The most readable of the biographies on Bennett. Helps relate the complicated nexus that held him to the Five Towns, even when physically and culturally far removed. Bibliography and index, including a full list of Bennett’s published works.

Anna lives in one of the "Five Towns" near Liverpool renowned for their pottery making and coal mining, and Bennett does not spare the cityscapes from caustic descriptions. Her father is a miser and a tyrant, having outlived both his daughters' mothers and now making his money through real estate and investments. If dinner is not served precisely, an explosion and a night of shunning ensues.Should one read this story for plot or for character portrayal? For both or for either. Each character is well drawn. This makes you need to know what will happen to them, making plot equally important! Thass settled thun. Na giv Mr Mynors anuther morsel of fat and thun go an lean on Mr Price for more brass." Henry corteggia Anna, con l’intenzione di sposarla, prestandogli attenzioni cui lei non è abituata. La ragazza è attratta da lui, e prova a raggiungere e ad unirsi al suo fervore religioso ma, essendo troppo insicura e non avendo fiducia in se stessa, non riesce a redimersi o accettare pubblicamente Dio nelle assemblee religiose metodiste.

a vacation, and Anna thinks there can never again be such luxurious living. It was necessary for her to take ten pounds of her own money to get clothes for the trip, but her father berated her violently when she told him what she did. Her time spent with Henry and the Suttons, however, helps her forget his anger. When the vacation is marred by Beatrice’s serious illness, Anna wins a permanent place in the Suttons’ affection by her unselfish and competent nursing. La historia. Anna Tellwright es una joven sencilla, que lleva una vida sencilla con su tiránico padre Ephraim y su media hermana menor Agnes. Cumple con sus deberes sin quejarse, sin expectativas ni grandes esperanzas en nada. The novel’s ending is, from the point of view of character, an anticlimax. Greater happiness could have been accorded to Anna, but Bennett is always a realist. Although she will have no great sorrows in her future life, she will have to rely on just those few memories of joy, epitomized in the Isle of Man holiday, to feed her spirit. Bennett is the sympathetic novelist of ordinary people, and Anna of the Five Towns a truly democratic novel.One must pay attention to every word. Each word is there for a reason; every word counts. Arnold Bennett’s writing is unsentimental. This makes what happens bearable. I like the sparsity of the prose. This forces you to pay attention and makes you think.