Publisher's Synopsis
The Man of Property (1906)[edit] In this first novel of the Forsyte Saga, after introducing us to the impressive array of Forsytes headed by the formidable Aunt Ann, Galsworthy moves into the main action of the saga by detailing Soames Forsyte's desire to own things, including his beautiful wife, Irene Forsyte (née Heron). He is jealous of her friendships and wants her to be his alone. He concocts a plan to move her to the country, to Robin Hill and a house he is having built, away from everyone she knows and cares about. She resists his grasping intentions, falls in love with the architect Philip Bosinney who has been engaged by Soames to build the house and has an affair with him. However, Bosinney is the fiancé of her friend June Forsyte, the daughter of Soames's cousin 'Young' Jolyon. There is no happy ending: Irene leaves Soames after he asserts what he perceives to be his ultimate right on his property - he rapes Irene (as a husband was entitled to do under English Law until 1991), and Bosinney dies under the wheels of an omnibus after being driven frantic by the news of Irene's rape by Soames.... The Forsyte Saga, first published under that title in 1922, is a series of three novels and two interludes published between 1906 and 1921 by Nobel Prize-winning English author John Galsworthy. They chronicle the vicissitudes of the leading members of a large commercial upper-middle-class English family, similar to Galsworthy's own.[1] Only a few generations removed from their farmer ancestors, the family members are keenly aware of their status as "new money". The main character, Soames Forsyte, sees himself as a "man of property" by virtue of his ability to accumulate material possessions-but this does not succeed in bringing him pleasure. Separate sections of the saga, as well as the lengthy story in its entirety, have been adapted for cinema and television. The first book, The Man of Property, was adapted in 1949 by Hollywood as That Forsyte Woman, starring Errol Flynn, Greer Garson, Walter Pidgeon, and Robert Young. The BBC produced a popular 26-part serial in 1967, that also dramatised a subsequent trilogy concerning the Forsytes, A Modern Comedy. In 2002, Granada Television produced two series for the ITV network called The Forsyte Saga and The Forsyte Saga: To Let, and the two Granada series made their runs in the US as part of Masterpiece Theatre. In 2003, The Forsyte Saga was listed as #123 on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's "best-loved novel". Following The Forsyte Saga, Galsworthy would go on to write two more trilogies and several more interludes also based around the titular family; the resulting series is collectively called The Forsyte Chronicles.... John Galsworthy OM (14 August 1867 - 31 January 1933) was an English novelist and playwright. Notable works include The Forsyte Saga (1906-1921) and its sequels, A Modern Comedy and End of the Chapter. He won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.... Edward William Garnett (1868-1937) was an English writer, critic and literary editor, who was instrumental in getting D. H. Lawrence's Sons and Lovers published.
