Born in Exile

Godwin Peak will not stay where he was born. Gissing’s Born in Exile is brains against class: education as a ladder, love as a test, the lie that sometimes looks like a way through. Victorian England, sharp as a scholarship exam. Peak wants the inner circle and will wear a belief if it opens the door. The cost is a self split for promotion. Gissing on merit, snobbery, and the hunger to pass. Peak will wear a belief if it opens the drawing-room door.