A Modern Chronicle

A Modern Chronicle is a 1910 best-selling novel by American writer Winston Churchill.[1]

A Modern Chronicle
AuthorWinston Churchill
IllustratorJ. H. Gardner Soper
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
PublisherMacmillan
Publication date
March 1910
Media typePrint (hardcover)
Pages524

The novel explores "the problem of the modern woman" and the effects of divorce, in a world driven by industrialization and business competition. Honora Leffingwell divorces her successful stockbroker husband to climb the social ladder, remarrying a man with ancestral wealth and status who turns out not to be all he seems.[2][3]

Reception

Churchill completed the manuscript of the novel in December 1909.[4] Released in March 1910, it was the second best-selling novel in the United States in 1910, and was the best-selling book in the country in the June and July 1910 issues of The Bookman.

In addition to positive reviews in mainstream papers,[5] Upton Sinclair's review of the novel for The New Age was critical, claiming that a "peculiar intellectual and spiritual immaturity" was becoming more apparent as Churchill's novels had progressed from historical romances to modern themes. Sinclair noted that he had read all of Churchill's works "not only because I like to pass a day of rest now and then, but because Mr. Churchill is our most prominent popular novelist and sells several hundred thousand copies of each of his books, and is therefore an important sign of the times." Sinclair thus noted that the novel shows "just exactly how far the mind of the American people has progressed on the subject" of divorce.[6]

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References
  1. (April 9, 1910). A Girl's Visions and Her Career: Winston Churchill Contributes A Fascinating Study of American Womanhood in the Making, The New York Times
  2. Walcutt, Charles Child. American Literary Naturalism, a Divided Stream, p. 161 (1956)
  3. Gilder, Jeanette L. Winston Churchill's "A Modern Chronicle", The Bookman (New York), Vol. 31, No. 3, May 1910, p. 305-08 (review)
  4. Schneider, Robert W. Novelist to a Generation: The Life and Thought of Winston Churchill, p. 164 (1976)
  5. Cool, Una H.H. (April 17, 1910) A Modern Chronicle, San Francisco Call
  6. A Modern Chronicle: By Winston Churchill (Reviewed by Upton Sinclair), The New Age, Vol. 7, No. 3, May 19, 1910, p. 62
  • A Modern Chronicle at Project Gutenberg
  • Winston Churchill (1910). A modern chronicle. The Macmillan Company.
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