SOURCE: Clark, Ross. “A Tale of One Village.” Spectator 268, no. 8549 (16 May 1992): 28.

In the following review, Clark argues that certain sections of Ulverton are more successful than others, lamenting the novel's lack of historical verisimilitude and authorial explanation.

Adam Thorpe belongs firmly to the ‘selection box’ school of literature: he presents us not with a single narrative [in Ulverton] but with a dozen pieces of loosely associated writing, varying from a farmer's journal to a series of love letters to a script for a television documentary. Together they tell half the story of Ulverton, a fictitious Wessex village, from the year 1650 to the year 1988.

As with all selection boxes, one craves more of certain items but has no appetite for some of the others. By far the best piece is a journal of the year 1712 kept by a poor farmer with literary pretensions. In rude and hearty style he...