Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Riceyman Steps

Riceyman Steps

Bennett, Arnold

Paperback

Classic FictionGeneral FictionLiterary Fiction

ISBN13: 9791043136191
Publisher: Les Prairies Numeriques
Published: Feb 27 2026
Pages: 366
Weight: 1.08
Height: 0.82 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English

Riceyman Steps, by Arnold Bennett, first published in 1923, is set in dingy and sordid Clerkenwell, in central London, where existence was a dangerous and difficult adventure in almost frantic quest of food, drink and shelter. It's there that Henry Earlforward runs a gloomy, dusty store full of secondhand books. He eats less and less with every day, keeps his young servant Elsie working long hours for minimal pay, and never lights a candle when darkness will do. One day he takes notice of Violet, a middle-aged widow who owns a confectionary shop nearby, and they become husband and wife soon after.It quickly becomes clear that his miserliness, his grand passion and vice, has rubbed off on Violet, threatening her chances at happiness just as much as his. His obsession also imperils Elsie's ability to help her lover Joe, who returned from World War I with shell shock, and who desperately needs her.The year it was published Riceyman Steps won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction. Its tragic tone represents a departure from many of the novels and stories Arnold Bennett set in the Five Towns, the fictional location inspired by his Staffordshire childhood. Instead, it reflects the pain and disappointment of the years immediately following the Great War. As Earlforward tells a customer early on, We're not quite straight here yet. The truth is, we haven't been straight since 1914.Riceyman Steps, by Arnold Bennett, first published in 1923, is set in dingy and sordid Clerkenwell, in central London, where existence was a dangerous and difficult adventure in almost frantic quest of food, drink and shelter. It's there that Henry Earlforward runs a gloomy, dusty store full of secondhand books. He eats less and less with every day, keeps his young servant Elsie working long hours for minimal pay, and never lights a candle when darkness will do. One day he takes notice of Violet, a middle-aged widow who owns a confectionary shop nearby, and they become husband and wife soon after.It quickly becomes clear that his miserliness, his grand passion and vice, has rubbed off on Violet, threatening her chances at happiness just as much as his. His obsession also imperils Elsie's ability to help her lover Joe, who returned from World War I with shell shock, and who desperately needs her.The year it was published Riceyman Steps won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction. Its tragic tone represents a departure from many of the novels and stories Arnold Bennett set in the Five Towns, the fictional location inspired by his Staffordshire childhood. Instead, it reflects the pain and disappointment of the years immediately following the Great War. As Earlforward tells a customer early on, We're not quite straight here yet. The truth is, we haven't been straight since 1914.

19 different editions

Also available

Also from

Bennett, Arnold

View All

Also in

Literary Fiction

View All