Evan Harrington — Complete
Evan Harrington has a problem no one wants: his father was a tailor. Not just any tailor, but Mr. Melchisedec Harrington, who spent his life crafting fine clothes for the nobility while dreaming of becoming a gentleman himself. Now that he's dead, Evan must sort through the wreckage of his father's ambitions, and his own complicated inheritance. Should he embrace the family trade, or run from it? The answer, like everything in Victorian England, depends on class, money, and what people think they know about you. George Meredith's semi-autobiographical novel is sharp, satirical, and surprisingly modern. It's about the lie of social mobility, the masks we wear, and the clothes that make the man, or destroy him. Evan himself is caught between worlds: too educated for the shop, too 'trade-born' for proper society. His journey through the snobberies and pretensions of mid-Victorian England is both painful and darkly funny.
