Esther Waters (Everyman's Library #933) [Hardcover] George. Moore and Walter Allen

George Moore wrote Esther Waters at a time of high prosperity in the English novel - the end of the nineteenth century. Moore's French influences, particularly Zola and Flaubert, are apparent, but nevertheless Esther Waters was a solid achievement in its own right. Like Tess Of The d'Urbervilles, Esther is not a tragic heroine. She is, as Walter Allen says 'sullen, stubborn, independent, proud - the incarnation both of instinctive love - the love of a mother for her child - and of wifely duty, and everything in the novel is subordinated to her.