The Good Soldier (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
At a glance:
- Author: Ford Madox Hueffer
- First Published: 1915
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Psychological realism
- Time of Work: The 1890’s through 1913
- Setting: England, Germany, and the United States
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction
- Subjects: United States or Americans, Love or romance, Sex or sexuality, Suicide, Twentieth century, Nineteenth century, Marriage, England or English people, Adultery, Ethics, Truthfulness and falsehood, Health, Soldiers, Germany or German people, Heart attack or disease
- Locales: France, Connecticut, Philadelphia, PA, England, Germany
Characters Discussed
John Dowell, an independently wealthy American who has spent most of his adult life in Europe taking his weak wife from spa to spa. Dowell is so intellectually confused and morally obtuse that for nine years he has been unaware of the duplicity of his closest friends, the Ashburnhams, and his wife. Without passion himself, he fails to realize its power in the lives of others. Dowell assumes surface manners to be the defining characteristics of people; whenever anybody behaves erratically, Dowell is mystified. Not until after the deaths of his wife and...
[The entire page is 694 words long]
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