Castle Rackrent And Ennui

Castle Rackrent, a novel by Maria Edgeworth published in 1800, is often regarded as the first true historical novel and the first true regional novel in English. It is also widely regarded as the first family saga, and the first novel to use the device of a narrator who is both unreliable and an observer of, rather than a player in, the actions he chronicles.This volume also includes Ennui, the entertaining confessions' of the Earl of Glenthorn, a bored, spoiled aristocrat. Desperate to be free from the demon of ennui, Glenthorn's quest for happiness takes him through violence and revolution, and leads to intriguing twists of fate. Both novels offer a darkly comic and satirical expose of the Irish class system, and a portrait of a nation in turmoil.