Aldous Huxley’s 1922 collection consists of five pieces of short fiction that examine the friction between intellectual vanity and physical reality. In The Gioconda Smile, Henry Hutton navigates a murder accusation born from a web of social deception and unrequited obsession. Tillotson Banquet details the failure of a young aristocrat to revive the dignity of a forgotten, impoverished artist. Other stories, such as Nuns at Luncheon, parody the act of storytelling itself, while Green Tunnels depicts an adolescent girl’s romantic fantasies collapsing under the weight of her family’s mundane, middle-class existence.
Readers who value cynical wit and precise psychological observation will find this book useful for its dissection of early twentieth-century class structures. The text appeals to those interested in how internal ego clashes with external circumstances. A reader walks away with a clear understanding of the gap between a character’s perceived sophistication and their actual moral shortcomings. The collection provides a sharp look at human pretension and the frequent absurdity of social obligation.
Deep and thought-provoking; a moderate read.
Best for readers like The Wisdom Collector. Which reader are you?
- Published
- 1922
- Language
- EN
