The print-run of 20,000 for the first number proved to be too optimistic and was progressively reduced to 13,000 for the last seven. It was illustrated by the author himself. The Virginians was issued by Thackeray's publishers, Bradbury and Evans, in 24 monthly parts, the first one appearing on November 1, 1857. Rawlins wrote that ' The Virginians is a bad book - dissatisfying in the reading, acknowledged as dull and dried-up by Thackeray.' Publication history John Halperin called it 'the worst book ever produced by a great novelist.' Jack P. Sutherland agreed to a degree, calling it Thackeray's worst major novel. It's the worst novel anyone ever wrote.' In fact, Jerrold died before the first volume of The Virginians was published. An apocryphal story claims that Thackeray once confessed to Douglas William Jerrold that The Virginians was 'the worst novel he ever wrote,' while Jerrold replied, 'No. But he who takes it up to read as a whole, will find that it is the work of a desultory writer, to whom it is not infrequently difficult to remember the incidents of his own narrative. There is not a page of it vacant or dull. George, who also becomes a British officer, eventually resigns his commission rather than continuing in arms against his brother.Ĭritical reception of the book was on the whole favourable, and the novel has continued to be considered one of the standard works of 19th century fiction, though many critics have held that the novel's plotting was not of the tightest. On the outbreak of the American War of Independence he takes the revolutionary side.

Henry's romantic entanglement with an older woman leads to his volunteering in the British army and fighting under the command of General Wolfe at the 1759 capture of Quebec. The novel tells the story of Henry Esmond's twin grandsons, Virginia-born George and Henry Warrington. The Virginians: A Tale of the Last Century ( 1857– 59) is a historical novel by William Makepeace Thackeray which forms a sequel to his Henry Esmond and is also loosely linked to Pendennis.

Wm thackeray novels