The Ordeal of Richard Feverel: A History of a Father and Son

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Among the Victorian novelists, George Meredith occupies a place apart. Unlike Dickens, Thackeray, and Eliot, he appeals to a select few. Those who appreciate him are folk of his own temper—cultivated, intellectual, urbane. They are persons of taste and discernment. They are generally the middle-aged rather than the young. They are those who, aloof and contemplative, relish the comedy of life, rather than those who throw themselves whole-heartedly into the game. It is not to be marvelled at, therefore, that Meredith should have won his way slowly, or that recognition, when it came, should have rendered his position unique and secure.
Meredith's career as a writer of prose was opened, in 1856, with The Shaving of Shagpat , an experiment in fantastic Oriental romance. In the following year, he exploited German romance less successfully in Farina, a Legend of Cologne . Having thus trained his 'prentice hand, he passed to mastery of his craft in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel , published in 1859. This was his first modern novel, and probably his best. It showed him, not only expert in the use of language and original in literary technic, but distinguished, also, as an observer of the world and an analyst of character. The psychological novel of George Eliot, just emerging, found here a rival even more subtle. Adam Bede , a twin-birth with Feverel , although detailed in its exploration of motive and feeling, demanded less mental effort on the part of its readers; it accordingly attracted much greater attention. Whereas it was often reprinted, no second edition of Feverel came from the press for nearly two decades.