Book 1, Chapter 02

Literary Fiction

The Romantic

by May SINCLAIR (1863 - 1946)

As a simple story told, "The Romantic" is one of Sinclair’s tightest and most compelling. Charlotte Redhead, a young British secretary, finds herself in a degrading extra-marital affair with her boss. In reaction, she renounces Sex and links herself platonically to a handsome young Bohemian (John Conway) she meets by chance, tramping in the fields. Together, under a powerful romantic excitement, the two rush off to Belgium in the early weeks of World War I, having organized their own little volunteer ambulance corps. The romance of the adventure begins to break down when the various ambulance corps start to back-stab each other, each selfishly seeking to one-up the others for glory. The real crisis comes when the central characters begin to reveal the true human characters behind their romantic delusions, in the end turning the attention back to the genuine human suffering that was the real story of the hideous Great War. An indictment of the author’s own thrill-seeking past, as revealed in her "Journal of Impressions in Belgium," and showing some of the concerns of the so-called Lost Generation that included Hemingway and Dos Passos and Woolf, "The Romantic" weaves together a number of fascinating themes, re-interpreting with Sinclair’s inimitable frankness post-war attitudes about sex, war, patriotism, and even the new psychology. (Summary by Expatriate)

Listen next episodes of The Romantic:
Book 1, Chapter 03 , Book 1, Chapter 04 , Book 1, Chapter 05 , Book 2, Chapter 06 , Book 2, Chapter 07 , Book 2, Chapter 08 , Book 2, Chapter 09 , Book 2, Chapter 10 , Book 2, Chapter 11 , Book 2, Chapter 12 , Book 2, Chapter 13 , Book 2, Chapter 14 , Book 2, Chapter 15 , Book 2, Chapter 16 , Book 2, Chapter 17