The Coward
This third of Robert Hugh Benson's "mainstream" novels, The Coward,
first published in 1912, may have been the most shocking to the upper
class sensibilities of Benson's day. A young man is faced with
challenges and manages to fail at every step. He becomes convinced he is
an irredeemable coward — and only then begins to find courage. In a
damning indictment of close-minded Edwardian society, a supreme act of
courage on the young man's part is mistaken for yet one more craven act.
The Coward takes on the soul-destroying tendency to adhere unthinkingly to social conventions. (ISBN 978-1-60210-007-7, 312 pp., $20.00.)
