The Way of All Flesh (1903)
Butler drafted his semi-autobiographical novel between 1873 and 1884, but refused to publish it during his lifetime. The narrative charts the development of Ernest Pontifex, a weak boy starved of familial affection, who grows up to reject the tenets of his formal education and his father’s authoritarian brand of Christianity. As Ernest struggles to make his own way in the world he learns to recognise the foibles in human nature, eventually becoming an author of controversial literature aimed at correcting a flawed society.
Following its publication in 1903, the novel was swiftly acknowledged as one of the most important critiques of Victorianism of its time. It is now seen as a precursor to early 20th-century modernist fiction, with many established and emerging writers, such as Virginia Woolf and E.M. Forster, admitting to being affected by the book.