Books with title The Good Soldier

At the fashionable German spa town Bad Nauheim, two wealthy, fin de siecle couples -- one British, the other American -- meet for their yearly assignation. As their story moves back and forth in time between 1902 and 1914, the fragile surface propriety of the pre -- World War I society in which these four characters live is ruptured -- revealing deceit, hatred, infidelity, and betrayal. "The Good Soldier" is Edward Ashburnham, who, as an adherent to the moral code of the English upper class, is nonetheless consumed by a passion for women younger than his wife -- a stoic but fallible figure in what his American friend, John Dowell, calls "the saddest story I ever heard."

In January 2007 the young and optimistic soldiers of the 2-16, the American infantry battalion known as the Rangers, were sent to Iraq as part of the surge. Their job would be to patrol one of the most dangerous areas of Baghdad. For 15 months, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter David Finkel was with them, following them almost every grueling step of the way. The resulting account of that time, The Good Soldiers, is a searing, shattering portrait of the face of modern war. In telling the story of these soldiers, both the heroes and the ruined, David Finkel has also written a classic work of war reporting.

First published in 1915, “The Good Soldier” is Ford Madox Ford’s tragic tale of the relationship between two couples. The first couple is English, Captain Edward Ashburnham, the good soldier referenced in the title, and his wife Leonora. The two at first have a seemingly perfect marriage but over the course of the novel is revealed that a constant series of infidelities by Edward has driven Leonora to attempt to exert increasing control over Edward’s affairs, placing great strain on their relationship. The second couple is American, John and Florence Dowell, who have been living abroad in Europe for quite some time. John, a wealthy American Quaker, is held romantically at a distance from his wife Florence, who feigns a heart condition so that she may carry on an affairs of her own. What ensues is a tragic series of events which is described by John as the “saddest story ever told”. Often cited as one of the greatest novels ever written, “The Good Soldier” presents the epitome of the unreliable narrator in John Dowell, leaving the reader wondering whether or not he is an innocent victim or a master of manipulation seeking to evoke the sympathy of his audience. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper.

Set just before World War I, The Good Soldier chronicles the tragedies of the lives of two seemingly perfect couples. The novel is told using a series of flashbacks, it also makes use of the device of the unreliable narrator as the main character gradually reveals a version of events that is quite different from what the introduction leads you to believe. The novel was loosely based on two incidents of adultery and on Ford's messy personal life.

"The Good Soldier" is the story of two couples. The first couple is English, Edward Ashburnham, the good soldier referenced in the title, and his wife Leonora. The second couple is American, John and Florence Dowell, who have been living abroad for quite some time. In a German spa prior to World War I the two couples meet and subsequently Edward and Florence become engaged in an affair. "The Good Soldier" is a tragic tale of passion. As John Dowell laments at the beginning of the book, it is "the saddest story I have ever heard."

With an Introduction by Sara Haslam. The Good Soldier is a masterpiece of twentieth-century fiction, an inspiration for many later, distinguished writers, including Graham Greene. Set before the First World War, it tells the tale of two wealthy and sophisticated couples, one English, one American, as they travel, socialise, and take the waters in the spa towns of Europe. They are playing the game in style. That game has begun to unravel, however, and with compelling attention to the comic, as well as the tragic, results the American narrator reveals his growing awareness of the sexual intrigues and emotional betrayals that lie behind its façade.

Events in The Good Soldier unfold just before World War I and chronicle the tragedy of Edward Ashburnham, the soldier to whom the title refers, and his own seemingly perfect marriage and that of two American friends. The novel opens with the famous line, “This is the saddest story I have ever heard.” The narrator explains that for nine years he, his wife Florence and their friends Ashburnham and his wife Leonora had an ostensibly normal friendship while Edward and Florence sought treatment for their heart ailments at a spa in Nauheim, Germany. As it turns out, nothing in the relationships or in the characters is as it first seems.In The Good Soldier, one of the biggest selling books in history, Ford Madox Ford paved the way for over a century of thriller writers and film-makers who would go on to use the idea of the unreliable narrator to create mystery and suspense. The Good Soldier is a masterpiece of early twentieth-century fiction.

This edition includes 10 illustrations. With his novel series Parade’s End recently adapted into a critically acclaimed miniseries, Ford Madox Ford’s The Good Soldier, considered his finest novel, tells an equally passionate and tragic tale of adultery, mental illness and suicide in the fashionable sites of Europe’s spas, among a pair of sophisticated couples involved in relationships whose gloss is starting to fade. Ford’s dark subject matter and frank depiction of situations normally considered too taboo for discussion in the polite society of the pre-World War I era may have been shocking, but they were an honest reflection of the author’s own turbulent life.

It was the last-chance moment of the war. In January 2007, President George W. Bush announced a new strategy for Iraq. He called it the surge. “Many listening tonight will ask why this effort will succeed when previous operations to secure Baghdad did not. Well, here are the differences,” he told a skeptical nation. Among those listening were the young, optimistic army infantry soldiers of the 2-16, the battalion nicknamed the Rangers. About to head to a vicious area of Baghdad, they decided the difference would be them.Fifteen months later, the soldiers returned home forever changed. Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington Post reporter David Finkel was with them in Bagdad, and almost every grueling step of the way. What was the true story of the surge? And was it really a success? Those are the questions he grapples with in his remarkable report from the front lines. Combining the action of Mark Bowden’s Black Hawk Down with the literary brio of Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, The Good Soldiers is an unforgettable work of reportage. And in telling the story of these good soldiers, the heroes and the ruined, David Finkel has also produced an eternal tale—not just of the Iraq War, but of all wars, for all time.

Leonora and Edward Ashburnham were "good people" from England, as John Dowell, the narrator of this tale, explains: and Dowell and his wife, Florence — leisured Americans of solid stock — were, like their English friends, a "model couple."For a dozen years, the foursome cultivated and maintained a friendship reinforced with yearly meetings at a fashionable German health resort, which Dowell visited with his "ailing" wife and the Asburnhams traveled to because of Edward's "heart problems." Their marriages seemed exemplary studies of permanence, stability, and tranquility. That is, until the day Dowell learned that for the previous nine years his wife had been the mistress of his friend Captain Ashburnham, the apparently honorable "good soldier."A provocative study of deception and betrayal and of convention and desire, The Good Soldier was also formally innovative. Along with Ford's Parade's End tetralogy, this powerful novel — first published in 1915 — has earned him a reputation as one of the major writers of the 20th century.

Taking place just before World War I, English novelist Ford Madox Ford’s 1915 publication "The Good Soldier" recounts the story of Edward Ashburnham and his seemingly idyllic life with his wife and another couple who are their friends. A series of flashbacks that are not presented in chronological order serve as the structure of the novel and serve, too, as an early example of literary impressionism. The narrator is considered unreliable as his telling of the events differs from what is suggested in the introduction. "The Good Soldier" is a novel about the differences between appearance and reality—and about human willingness to see events in a light that best suits the viewer, regardless of how accurate that vision may be.Incidents of adultery in Ford’s life are thought to have inspired the novel. The book was originally titled "The Saddest Story" but as World War I was underway by the time of its release, the publishers requested that Ford change the title. The text is highly respected on both sides of the Atlantic with Modern Library listing it as one of the best English language novels of the twentieth century and the BBC naming it number thirteen on its list of the one hundred greatest British novels.(Source: supersummary.com)