THE GREAT WORLD AND TIMOTHY COLT

by Louis Auchincloss ‧ RELEASE DATE: N/A

A new novel is developed from an incident in last year's collection of short stories- The Romantic Egoists when Timothy Colt, a young lawyer, shy, sincere and assiduous, is gored by the client for whom he has won a six million dollar case. In this book, as in all of Auchincloss' books, the ""law of the lion"" is an operative and authoritative force- and with Colt's submission to it (his apology to crude George Emlen earns him a partnership in the law firm) Colt deserts his own standards and destroys himself. The new philistine world to which he gains admission costs him his wife, Ann, and his boys; under the tutelage of Sheridan Dale, senior member of the firm, he learns that the social game, the money game, is all part of the law; there is his attraction to Dale's stepdaughter- Eileen- a decorative divorce and finally his involvement in a questionable trust proceedings through which he gets his chance to turn back on ""the great world"" and redeem himself, and his wife, at the cost of his career. A biopsy of a class and a system, Louis Auchincloss is an expert diagnostician and a smooth raconteur- on a par and a parallel with J. P. Marquand. That will be the audience to secure- and it should be appreciative.

Pub Date: N/A

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Houghton, Mifflin

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1956

Categories: FICTION