TEHRAN-The book “The Realists: Portraits of Eight Novelists” written by C. P. Snow has been released in the book market across the country.

Translated by Akram Rezaei, the book has been published in 383 pages by Now Publication, Mehr reported.

In the book, originally published in 1978, Snow assesses the influences of personality and experiences on the choice of subjects and literary style of Stendhal, Honoré de Balzac, Charles Dickens, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Leo Tolstoy, Benito Pérez Galdós, Henry James and Marcel Proust. Snow makes a robust defense of the realistic novel in the book.

The realistic novel was quite different than what has been seen in earlier literature. The most popular form of literature had always been poetry. The realistic novel changed that. This form of literature used journalistic techniques to make the literature something closer to real life with facts and general stereotypes of human nature. The attention to detail was made to just report the facts, not commenting or judging on the scene or character.

Charles Percy Snow (1905-1980) was an English novelist and physical chemist who also served in several important positions in the British Civil Service and briefly in the UK government. He is best known for his series of novels known collectively as “Strangers and Brothers,” and for “The Two Cultures,” a 1959 lecture in which he laments the gulf between scientists and literary intellectuals.

SS/SAB