Resumen
Resumen de El Goldsmith ilustrado de los Dalziel
Para quién es
For readers who enjoy eighteenth century comedy, gentle satire and plain, musical verse, and for anyone who wants to explore one writer’s range through a novel, a play, poems and essays.
De qué trata este libro
Oliver Goldsmith was an Irish writer who made his living in London in the middle of the 1700s. He wrote almost everything: a novel, comedies, long poems, newspaper essays, histories and light verse. This collection gathers his work around its best-known pieces. They are The Vicar of Wakefield, the play She Stoops to Conquer, and the poem The Deserted Village. Goldsmith wrote to earn a living and to please a wide public, and he did it with a warm and gently teasing voice.
In this summary you meet a country clergyman whose family is tested by money troubles and by a charming neighbour. You meet a young gentleman who takes a private house for an inn and makes a fool of himself. You meet a village poet who mourns a lost countryside, and a visitor from China who looks at English manners with fresh eyes. Behind them all stands one writer who believed that kindness and simple living matter more than rank. Let us begin with the vicar and his household.
En este resumen
- 1A country vicar with a loving householdFree
- 2Misfortunes arrive with a charming neighbour
- 3A fall in fortune tests his patience
- 4A mistaken inn and a pretended barmaid
- 5A village emptied and a world observed
- 6Kindness, folly and a gentle voice
Idea clave 1 de 6
A country vicar with a loving household
The Vicar of Wakefield opens with its narrator, Dr Charles Primrose, a clergyman who describes himself and his family with open pride. He has a wife, Deborah, who is proud of her housekeeping, and six children. The ones who matter most to the story are his daughters Olivia and Sophia and his sons George and Moses. Primrose is learned, kind and a little vain about his opinions, and he cheerfully admits he writes on church matters with great energy.
The family is comfortable at the start. They live in a pleasant parish, and the vicar's eldest son is engaged to a neighbour's daughter. Goldsmith spends time on small domestic scenes, such as the family's evenings, their games and their small quarrels. These scenes set up the world that is about to be shaken, and they make the reader fond of people who are not perfect.
Then the family's wealth is lost when a merchant who held their money fails. The vicar takes the news with patience, which is easier for him to preach than to practise. He decides the household must leave and take a smaller living in another part of the country. His wife and daughters feel the drop in rank more sharply than he does.
The first lesson of the book is already clear here. Primrose believes that a good heart and a clear conscience can carry a family through bad luck. The rest of the novel tests that belief again and again, sometimes at his own expense. As the family travels to its new home, a stranger enters their lives, and the story begins to turn.
That’s 1 of 6 key points.
The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Questions about El Goldsmith ilustrado de los Dalziel
What is The Vicar of Wakefield about?
It follows Dr Primrose, a kind and trusting country clergyman, and his large family. They lose their money and move to a new parish, where one misfortune after another tests his faith and his patience.
What does She Stoops to Conquer mean?
The title describes Kate Hardcastle, who pretends to be a lower-ranking barmaid so that a shy young man will speak openly to her. She lowers herself in order to win him.
What is The Deserted Village about?
It is a poem about Auburn, a village whose people have been driven away. Goldsmith blames wealthy landowners and a love of luxury, and he mourns the simple life that was lost.
Is The Deserted Village a true story?
Auburn is an imagined village, though the poem draws on real changes in the English and Irish countryside, such as land being enclosed and families leaving. It was published in 1770.
Is Goldsmith hard to read today?
No, he is one of the easier writers of the 1700s. His sentences are clear and his humour is mild.