Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth

Artist's impression (from the NLS site)

Is not going to be making my list of favourite books this year. Not sure if I wasn’t concentrating on it enough, but I found it rather confusing and not all that interesting to be honest. Maybe if I was around at the time or had some interest in Anglo-Irish relations I’d be howling with laughter, but I was quite glad it was so short!

The massive introduction by Anne Thackeray Ritchie didn’t help either, especially as it was about a third of the book and I just wanted it to be over so I could get on with reading the rest. Nor did the glossary. As I had the free edition I got [glossary 1] or whichever number repeated multiple times with no linking so I only got the joke or the point she was trying to make at the end.  

It was only towards the end that it started to make sense and I started to see the humour in the novel, by which time it was almost over. I could go into more detail analysing it but I think I’d prefer to move on to the next book.

Anyway, I’m sure that the rest of Edgeworth’s novels will be better so I am not going to let it put me off reading more of her work, after all, it was Maria’s first novel and it was a little like Trollope’s The Kellys and the O’Kellys.