The Napoleon of Notting Hill by G. K. Chesterton
"The Napoleon of Notting Hill" by G. K. Chesterton is a satirical novel written in the early 20th century. The story is set in a future London where the populace has seemingly lost faith in revolutions and upheaval, embracing a mundane and monotonous existence. The main character, Auberon Quin, is an eccentric government clerk who inadvertently becomes a king, sparking whimsical chaos with his grand (yet absurd) ideas about local governance andpatriotism. At the start of the book, the narrative delves into the ironic complacency of society in the early 20th century, where predictions from numerous "prophets" about the future are humorously disregarded by the ordinary people who simply maintain their daily routines. Auberon briefly disrupts this monotony when he chooses to take a stand in favor of local identities and medieval traditions, proposing extravagant systems such as city guards and proclamations for the boroughs of London. This sets off a series of comedic events that highlight the absurdity of his ideas while reflecting on the nature of governance and identity in a rapidly modernizing world. The opening establishes a sharp contrast between the absurdity of Quin's charismatic actions and the ordinary lives of those around him, laying the groundwork for an exploration of individualism against the backdrop of collective apathy. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
Read now or download (free!)
| Choose how to read this book | Url | Size | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Read online (web) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.html.images | 375 kB | ||||
| EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.epub3.images | 1.1 MB | ||||
| EPUB (older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.epub.images | 1.1 MB | ||||
| EPUB (no images, older E-readers) | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.epub.noimages | 207 kB | ||||
| Kindle | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.kf8.images | 1.2 MB | ||||
| older Kindles | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.kindle.images | 1.2 MB | ||||
| Plain Text UTF-8 | https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20058.txt.utf-8 | 330 kB | ||||
| Download HTML (zip) | https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/20058/pg20058-h.zip | 1019 kB | ||||
| There may bemore files related to this item. | ||||||
Similar Books
About this eBook
| Author | Chesterton, G. K. (Gilbert Keith), 1874-1936 |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Robertson, W. Graham (Walford Graham), 1866-1948 |
| Title | The Napoleon of Notting Hill |
| Note | Wikipedia page about this book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Napoleon_of_Notting_Hill |
| Note | Reading ease score: 80.3 (6th grade). Easy to read. |
| Credits | Produced by Jason Isbell, Diane Monico, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PR: Language and Literatures: English literature |
| Subject | Fantasy fiction |
| Subject | Political fiction |
| Subject | Notting Hill (London, England) -- Fiction |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 20058 |
| Release Date | Dec 8, 2006 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 641 downloads in the last 30 days. |
| Project Gutenberg eBooks are always free! | |
