The Lake (1905) is George Moore’s eleventh novel. Published more than two years after The Untilled Field, it is set in the West of Ireland, possibly in the environs of Lough Carra, County Mayo, where the author was born and raised, and where he situated “Resurgam” in Memoirs of My Dead Life (1906).
The Lake traces the gradual awakening of Oliver Gogarty, a parish priest who admires, then jealously condemns, then falls in love with local schoolteacher Rose Leicester.
Rose is a remote presence for most of this epistolary novel. Early on she moves to England in order to give birth to a daughter out of wedlock; then becomes a traveling scholar of Christian antiquity.
Unlike Esther Waters ten years earlier, Rose does not devote her life to the well-being of her child or marry the child’s father. We never learn the child’s name or what becomes of her. Instead Rose pivots to work as a music teacher and becomes the secretary of a literary English gentleman.
Oliver’s unrequited yearning for Rose gradually turns into a longing for what she represents to him: freedom, passion, curiosity, adventure, a life of joy and cultural enrichment.
The Lake is not a story that ends “happily ever after.” The dénouement of the novel augurs the fresh start of troubled Irish lives, now reborn and full of brave but undefined potential.
Chapters
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Dedicatory Letter
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 1
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 2
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 3
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 4
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 5
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 6
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 7
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 8
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 9
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 10
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 11
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 12
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 13
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 14
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 15
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 16
1905-11-10 — The Lake — Chapter 17
Letters
The Lake is an epistolary novel. Over a timeline of three years, 25 letters between the characters Oliver Gogarty, Rose Leicester, Eliza Gogarty, and Father O’Grady (no first name given) are interspersed with third-person narrative. The place names are fictional.
Here is a list of the letters in chronological order.
First Year
Chapter 3. From Father O’Grady to Father Oliver Gogarty. [no address], June 1, 19 — .
Chapter 4. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Father O’Grady. Garranard, Bohola, June 2, 19 — .
Chapter 4. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, June 2, 19 — .
Chapter 4. From Father Oliver Gogarty to the Mother Abbess, Tinnick Convent. Garranard, Bohola, June 3, 19 — .
Chapter 6. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Tinnick Convent, June 4, 19 — .
Chapter 7. From Miss Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. 4, Wilson Street, Dorset Square, London. [no date]
Chapter 7. From Father O’Grady to Father Oliver Gogarty. [no address], June 8, 19 — .
Chapter 7. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, June 27, 19 — .
Chapter 7. From Miss Rose Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. 5, Cumberland Place, London, June 27, 19 — .
Chapter 7. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, June 29, 19 — .
Chapter 8. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, July 7. 19 — .
Chapter 8. From Miss Rose Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. Ethelstone Manor, Yarksdale, July 26, 19 — .
Chapter 8. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, July 29, 19 — .
Chapter 8. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, August 16, 19 — .
Chapter 9. From Miss Rose Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. Hotel Belvidere, Munich, September 2, 19 — .
Chapter 10. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, September 6, 19 — .
Chapter 11. From Father Oliver Gogariy to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, October 10 and 12, 19 — .
Chapter 11. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, October 20, 19 — .
Chapter 11. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, November 3, 19 — .
Chapter 13. From Miss Rose Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. Rapallo, Italy, December 12, 19 — .
Second Year
Chapter 13. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester, Garranard, Bohola, November 8, 19 — .
Third Year
Chapter 14. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, March 12, 19 — .
Chapter 14. From Miss Rose Leicester to Father Oliver Gogarty. Imperial Hotel, Cairo, Egypt, May 5, 19 — .
Chapter 15. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, May 18, 19 — .
Chapter 17. From Father Oliver Gogarty to Miss Rose Leicester. Garranard, Bohola, July 25, 19 — .
The Lake (AI)
The Lake (AI) is a PDF of the first edition that may be uploaded to AI applications such as Notebook LM for guided analysis and interpretation.
Leave a comment