A dyspeptic, unhappy shopkeeper burns down his shop and runs away to find contentment as a country innkeeper. Wells's warm comic novel of escape from a dreary life.
Books mentioned in The History of Mr Polly (13)
Tales of Old Japan by Algernon Bertram Freeman-Mitford: “But he read all sorts of things; a book of old Keltic stories collected by Joyce charmed him, and Mitford's Tales of Old Japan, and a number of paper-covered volumes, _Tales from Blackwood_, he had acquired at Easewood, remained a stand-by.”
Tom Cringle's Log by Michael Scott: “He read Fenimore Cooper and "Tom Cringle's Log" side by side with Joseph Conrad, and dreamt of the many-hued humanity of the East and West Indies until his heart ached to see those sun-soaked lands before he died.”
A Thousand and One Nights: “Mr. Polly bought a number of books, Rabelais for his own, and "The Arabian Nights," the works of Sterne”
Wanderings in South America by Charles Waterton: “A book he browsed over with a recurrent pleasure was Waterton's Wanderings in South America.”
A Sailor Tramp by Bart Kennedy: “He found too one day among a pile of soiled sixpenny books at Port Burdock, to which place he sometimes rode on his ageing bicycle, Bart Kennedy's "A Sailor Tramp," all written in livid jerks, and had forever after a kindlier and more understanding eye for every burly rough who slouched through Fishbourne High Street.”
Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare: “The Three Ps went to a performance of "Romeo and Juliet" at the Port Burdock Theatre Royal, and hung over the gallery fascinated.”
The Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: “With La Perouse he linked "The Island Nights Entertainments," and it never palled upon him that in the dusky stabbing of the "Island of Voices"”
The Path to Rome by Hilaire Belloc: “a second-hand copy of Belloc's "Road to Rome," an odd volume of "Purchas his Pilgrimes"”
Purchas his Pilgrimes by Samuel Purchas: “…from Blackwood," cheap in a second-hand bookshop, the plays of William Shakespeare, a second-hand copy of Belloc's "Road to Rome," an odd volume of "Purchas his Pilgrimes" and "The Life and Death of Jason."”
The Life and Death of Jason by William Morris: “…second-hand bookshop, the plays of William Shakespeare, a second-hand copy of Belloc's "Road to Rome," an odd volume of "Purchas his Pilgrimes" and "The Life and Death of Jason."”
The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer: “He was stirred to read the Canterbury Tales, but he could not get on with Chaucer's old-fashioned English; it fatigued his attention, and he would have given all the story telling very readily for a few adventures on the road.”
The Quest of the Golden Girl by Richard Le Gallienne: “Richard Le Gallienne's very detrimental book, _The Quest of the Golden Girl_, which he had read at Canterbury, but he had no confidence they would happen in England--to him.”
Travels in Tartary, Thibet, and China by Evariste Regis Huc and Joseph Gabet: “And another book which had no beginning for him was the second volume of the Travels of the _Abbés_ Hue and Gabet.”