What one reviewer at amazon said about The Island Pharisees:
Richard Shelton returns to England following a round-the-world trip. He is betrothed to Antonia Dennent, but for some reason best known to her parents is not allowed to see her for a further three months. At Dover, Shelton meets a Fleming, Louis Ferrand. The meeting, coinciding with his return from overseas, causes Shelton to take a fresh look at his country and its inhabitants.
The novel is really Galsworthy embarking on a critique of late Victorian/early Edwardian English society, especially its hypocrisy. As Shelton travels around, different parts of society are examined, from the Church of England, the upper middle classes, imperialists, Oxford, London, and so on. Galsworthy criticises via the various dialogues between his characters, Shelton acting as the critic par excellence, the others as defenders of the status quo.
Galsworthy seemed to be saying that the hypocrisy of the people was a veneer for a deeper lack of confidence, or a mask for the serious divisions within society as a whole.
As a piece of literature, this book is very uneven - the plot seems a bolt-on, a mere hook upon which Galsworthy could hang his need to explore the issues that were interesting him. The way to approach it, I think, is not as a great story but as an interesting period piece.
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