Classics · Thoughtful

Ernest Pontifex grows up in an oppressive Victorian home, in a book left unpublished until Butler's death

The Way of All Flesh

by Samuel Butler

A young man's oppressive upbringing, written as an attack on Victorian morality

Ernest Pontifex is the protagonist of this semi-autobiographical novel, which chronicles the oppressive home environment of Butler's own upbringing and satirically attacks Victorian morality. Butler began it in 1870 and worked on it until 1885. He thought its satirical tone too controversial during his lifetime and wished to protect his family, so it was published only in 1903, a year after he died, in an edition by his literary executor, R. A. Streatfeild, who altered the text. The original manuscript, titled Ernest Pontifex or The Way of All Flesh, was published in 1964.

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