Daniel R. Schwarz has studied and taught the modern British novel for decades and now brings his impressive erudition and critical acuity to this insightful study of the major authors and novels of the first half of the twentieth century. This book presents an insightful study of British fiction in the first half of the twentieth century. It draws on the author's decades of experience researching and teaching the modern British novel. It sets the modern British novel in its intellectual, cultural and literary contexts.This book features close readings of Hardy's Jude the Obscure, Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim, Lawrence's Sons and Lovers and The Rainbow, Joyce's Dubliners and Ulysses, Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse and Forster's A Passage to India. It shows how these novels are essential components in a modernist cultural tradition which includes the visual arts. It takes account of recent developments in theory and cultural studies. It is written in an engaging style, avoiding jargon.