Edith Wharton tutorials

Edith Wharton was a best-selling novelist, a Pulitzer prizewinner, and a close friend of Henry James. She also wrote a prodigious number of short stories and novellas - and the range of topics she covers is quite amazing. Her tales range from grim naturalistic depictions of lower-class life in New York, as in Bunner Sisters, via social satires such as The Other Two (a woman juggling two ex-husbands) and her best-known work Roman Fever, to ghost stories such as Afterward and The Triumph of Night. Even an early work such as Sanctuary shows amazing control of dramatic effects and her feeling for the shapliness of a form which is half way between a long story and a short novel. Full plot synopses and critical commentaries on all our new tutorials on these works - plus a nice documentary video showing the forty-two room house she designed and furnished herself.

Joseph Conrad and the novella

Joseph Conrad explored just about every genre of prose fiction. He wrote novels, long and short stories, travel books, memoirs, essays, and even experimented with collaborative writing. But the genre in which he seems to be most comfortable and in which he created some of his most carefully crafted works is the novella. This is a work which is longer than a story but shorter than a novel. But it's not just a matter of length. The novella usually has very few characters, the events of the narrative are concentrated on a single issue, and that issue itself is usually of universal rather than just local or temporary significance.

A short story may be based on no more than an anecdote, whereas a novella deals with large scale general themes. A novel can have a cast of dozens and feature multiple locations, whereas a novella can have just two or even one main character, and the setting is likely to remain focussed in one place.

We've just posted study guides to two of Conrad's best novellas, both of them based on his own experiences as a young sea captain. The Shadow-Line deals with the character-building drama of a ship which is becalmed with a sick crew, and The Secret Sharer explores notions of 'the double' and 'alternative selves' when a young captain allows a murderer to hide on board his ship.

More on the novella here