The Adventures of Harry Richmond — Volume 6
Harry Richmond has spent his life in the shadow of his father's magnificent delusions. Now, in this sixth volume, he watches Roy Richmond hold court at the Opera, a figure of cultivated respectability among London's gentlemen, all built on elaborate pretense. But the polished surface cracks under the weight of rumor: whispers of a German princess, Ottilia, and a betrothal Harry never agreed to. As Harry moves through encounters with Lady Edbury and the steadfast Anna Penrhys, he confronts the unbearable distance between his father's grand narrative and his own fractured identity. The social world that adores Roy offers Harry only scrutiny and suspicion. What begins as comedy of manners curdles into something darker: a son watching his father perform legitimacy while the foundations tremble, caught between defending a lie and claiming a self that society refuses to see clearly. Meredith's psychological acuity pierces Victorian pomposity with devastating precision.
