Books with author E. F. Benson

This volume was published in 1916.In a series of hilariously dry fictional sketches, E F Benson introduces us to some of the more bizarre inhabitants of Mayfair's Edwardian high society - a world he knew intinately. Each is a distinct representative of an anthropological 'type': Sir Louis and Lady Mary Marigold turn snobbery into an art form; 'Aunt' George is a bachelor with a passion for embroidery; Mrs Weston, a devotee of every new health-cult and spiritual fad; Horace Campbell, the jealous and poisonous society gossip; the socalled 'grizzly kittens' Babs Begum and Charlie Gordon, refuse to grow old gracefully; Mrs Sarah Whitehand is thesocial-climbing wife of an American toilet-bowl magnate; and Mr Sandow, the socialite vicar who seems interested in everything but real spirituality. These and a number of other intriguing specimens, all greedily jockeying for social standing in this most exclusive of societies, are impaled, Iabelled and preserved for our entertainment on the razor-sharp scalpel of Benson's savage wit. (*)(*)....summary from fantasticfiction.co.uk

This book was inspired by Wagner's "The Valkyries" which is an operatic drama in the Ring Cycle. Many have heard Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” a wonderful piece of classical music so often used in film to underscore dramatic action scenes. However, not many know, who or what the Valkyries were or how they came to be. This volume seeks to translate Wagner’s operatic prose into a novel, and does remarkably well.The works are based loosely on characters from the Norse sagas, the Volsungs and the Nibelungenlied and is quite often referred to as the Ring Cycle.In the Rheingold the stage is set. In Heaven above, around the rainbow-girt of Valhalla, and in the dark, stir the forces beneath the earth. Alberich and the Niebelungs, enter the arena waiting for the sons of men to assert their rightful lordship over the earth.This drama was originally titled "Siegfried and Sieglinde: The Valkyrie Punished" but was later renamed “The Valkyries.” It is the most performed of all books of the Cycle. It starts with a storm, during which Sieglinde gives shelter to a wounded stranger. They find themselves drawn to each other. He is Siegmund, the twin from whom Sieglinde was separated in childhood. Unknown to them, their father is Wotan, the most powerful of the gods. Through Siegmund, Wotan hopes to retrieve a gold ring of ultimate power that he cannot take himself (sound familiar?)Brother and sister fall in love and flee, taking with them Nothung, a sword destined for a hero. As goddess of marriage, Wotan’s wife Fricka angrily demands Wotan must not protect his incestuous children to serve his own ends. Wotan bitterly concedes. However, Wotan’s daughter Brünnhilde, a Valkyrie, takes it on herself to save Siegmund. Wotan stops her, and Siegmund is killed in battle, his sword shattered. Brünnhilde rescues Sieglinde, whom she knows is pregnant with Siegmund’s son, who is destined to become the hero Wotan desires. Brünnhilde pleads with her sister Valkyries to help save Sieglinde. They try to hide Siegmund but flee at Wotan’s wrath. As punishment for defying him, Wotan incarcerates Brünnhilde in a deep sleep on a mountaintop, protected by magic fire provided by Loge, the demigod of fire. There, on the mountain-top Brunnhilde sleeps, waiting for the coming of he, who she is destined for, to be awakened to the joy of human life. And there, till Siegfried leaps the barrier of flame, we leave her.What happens next? Well you’ll have to keep a lookout for the other books in the Ring Cycle published by Abela Publishing.===============KEYWORDS/TAGS: Valkyries, Ring Cycle, Norse, Viking, Norse Mythology, legends, Norse Saga, House Of Hunding, The Stranger, Story Of The Stranger, Recognition, Strife, Wotan, Fricka, Siegmund, Lot Cast, cast a lot, Fight, Flight, Brunnhilde, Sentence, Sleep Of Brunnhilde, coming, cry, day, death, earth, eyes, face, father, forest, gods, heart, house, light, love, might, night, shield, Sieglinde, sisters, soul, spring, stood, stranger, sword, voice, Walhalla, Valhalla, wife, woman, wrath, Wagner, Opera, soul, spear, anger, incest, maid, rose, Volsung, Wolsung, sorrow, sweet, hero, heroes, vengeance, shelter, storm, bosom, breast, disobey, sword-hilt, Victory, overcome, shameful, chariot, Grane, Alberich, deliverance, tempest, lovers, Nuthung, destiny,

A must read for any fan of Benson's hugely popular 'Mapp and Lucia' series. Here we find ourselves in the small village of Riseholme, where all the rich have to do is gossip and vie for the position of supreme hostess. This is classic E. F. Benson dealing with the petty concerns of petty people, using his natural wit and humour. This novel, originally published in 1912, is being republished here together with a new introductory biography of the author.

The story of Princess Sophia, a world class gambler and hostess.Princess Sophia’s father, the reigning Prince Leonard’s grandfather, was a man extraordinarily truculent in disposition, with a hand of iron under no velvet glove, and a temper frankly diabolical. His wife, the Grand Duchess Fedora, had died in giving birth to his only child, the Princess Sophia; and so long as the girl grew up strong and healthy, he had no thoughts of attempting to take to himself another partner. In this he acted contrarily to the bias of mankind, who would see in the education of a daughter the need of a mother’s hand. Not so thought Prince Demetrius. Had Sophia died, there would then be an undeniable necessity for marrying again, and so continuing his line, and disappointing the hopes of the cousin who stood next the throne, a man abhorrent to him; but as long as she lived, such a course appeared to him to be altogether outside the region of the vaguest consideration. Indeed, his first venture—though the word is scarcely apt for so chill a piece of business—had not been altogether fortunate. The Princess Fedora had been a mild and ailing woman, with weak and swimming blue eyes, of an uncertain manner, and of notable mediocrity, and the secret satisfaction which her husband at first used to feel in making her jump soon lost its edge when he saw how easily, how unintentionally even, the thing could be done. A voice raised ever so little, one raucous and guttural exclamation, though half stifled, was enough to make that poor lady skip or swoon. In fine, he got tired of her swoonings, and was in danger, when she died, of losing the keenness of his overbearing and furious temper from mere contact with one so grossly meek and of so contemptible a spirit, even as a sword that has often to cut cotton-wool is soon blunted.

"Mrs. Ames" by E. F. Benson. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

"Mrs. Ames" by E. F. Benson. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.

Mrs Ames. is a novel written by E. F. Benson, published in 1912.Edward Frederic Benson (24 July 1867 - 29 February 1940) was an English novelist, biographer, memoirist, archaeologist and short story writer, known professionally as E. F. Benson.Benson's first book was Sketches from Marlborough. He started his novel writing career with the (then) fashionably controversial Dodo (1893), which was an instant success, and followed it with a variety of satire and romantic and supernatural melodrama.A prolific writer, Benson created the famous Mapp and Lucia series, which satirized upper-middle class British life in the 1920s and 30s. He also developed a reputation for writing macabre ghost stories and other stories of the supernatural, which have been adapted for film and television.This e-Book features a linked table of contents. Enjoy reading Mrs Ames.

Edward Frederic Benson (24 July 1867 – 29 February 1940) was an English novelist, biographer, memoirist, archaeologist and short story writer, known professionally as E.F. Benson. His friends called him Fred.E.F. Benson was born at Wellington College in Berkshire, the fifth child of the headmaster, Edward White Benson (later Chancellor of Lincoln Cathedral, Bishop of Truro and Archbishop of Canterbury), and Mary Sidgwick Benson ("Minnie").Benson was educated at Temple Grove School, then at Marlborough College, where he wrote some of his earliest works and upon which he based his novel David Blaize. He continued his education at King's College, Cambridge. At Cambridge, he was a member of the Pitt Club, and later in life he became an honorary fellow of Magdalene College.E.F. Benson was the younger brother of Arthur Christopher Benson, who wrote the words to "Land of Hope and Glory", Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson, author of several novels and Roman Catholic apologetic works, and Margaret Benson (Maggie), an amateur Egyptologist. Two other siblings died young. Benson's parents had six children and no grandchildren. E. F. Benson never married, and is likely to have been homosexual. Certainly this reveals itself through the camp humour of his novels, the implicit homoeroticism of his university works such as David Blaize (1916), his love of the company of handsome men, and his close friendships with known homosexuals such as John Ellingham Brooks with whom he shared a villa in Capri. Prior to the First World War the island was extremely popular with wealthy gay men.E. F. Benson was an excellent athlete, and represented England at figure skating. He was a precocious and prolific writer, publishing his first book while still a student. Nowadays he is principally known for his Mapp and Lucia series about Emmeline "Lucia" Lucas and Elizabeth Mapp.In London, Benson also lived at 395 Oxford Street, W1 (now the branch of Russell & Bromley just west of Bond Street Underground Station), 102 Oakley Street, SW3, and 25 Brompton Square, SW3, where much of the action of Lucia in London takes place and where English Heritage placed a Blue Plaque in 1994.Benson died in 1940 of throat cancer in University College Hospital, London.

One of E.F. Benson principal novel is Queen Lucia from his Mapp and Lucia series, which serialized by commercial television in the 1980s under the series title "Mapp and Lucia." The principal setting of which is a town called Tilling, which is recognizably based on Rye, East Sussex, where Benson lived for many years and served as Mayor. He also lived at 25 Brompton Square, London, where much of the action of Lucia in London takes place.

Though the sun was hot on this July morning Mrs Lucas preferred to cover the half-mile that lay between the station and her house on her own brisk feet, and sent on her maid and her luggage in the fly that her husband had ordered to meet her. After those four hours in the train a short walk would be pleasant, but, though she veiled it from her conscious mind, another motive, sub-consciously engineered, prompted her action. It would, of course, be universally known to all her friends in Riseholme that she was arriving today by the 12.26, and at that hour the village street would be sure to be full of them. They would see the fly with luggage draw up at the door of The Hurst, and nobody except her maid would get out.That would be an interesting thing for them: it would cause one of those little thrills of pleasant excitement and conjectural exercise which supplied Riseholme with its emotional daily bread. They would all wonder what had happened to her, whether she had been taken ill at the very last moment before leaving town and with her well-known fortitude and consideration for the feelings of others, had sent her maid on to assure her husband that he need not be anxious. That would clearly be Mrs Quantock's suggestion, for Mrs Quantock's mind, devoted as it was now to the study of Christian Science, and the determination to deny the existence of pain, disease and death as regards herself, was always full of the gloomiest views as regards her friends, and on the slightest excuse, pictured that they, poor blind things, were suffering from false claims. Indeed, given that the fly had already arrived at The Hurst, and that its arrival had at this moment been seen by or reported to Daisy Quantock, the chances were vastly in favour of that lady's having already started in to give Mrs Lucas absent treatment. Very likely Georgie Pillson had also seen the anticlimax of the fly's arrival, but he would hazard a much more probable though erroneous solution of her absence. He would certainly guess that she had sent on her maid with her luggage to the station in order to take a seat for her, while she herself, oblivious of the passage of time, was spending her last half hour in contemplation of the Italian masterpieces at the National Gallery, or the Greek bronzes at the British Museum. Certainly she would not be at the Royal Academy, for the culture of Riseholme, led by herself, rejected as valueless all artistic efforts later than the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and a great deal of what went before. Her husband with his firm grasp of the obvious, on the other hand, would be disappointingly capable even before her maid confirmed his conjecture, of concluding that she had merely walked from the station.- Taken from "Queen Lucia" written by E. F. (Edward Frederic) Benson