George Gissing 
Our Friend the Charlatan 

The storyline of Our Friend the Charlatan is set in the countryside of England and its main character is a man in his late 20’s, Dyce Lashmar. Dyce is described in this book as ‘the coming man’ and throughout the book he tries to find a perfect woman for himself – a ‘new woman’. Even though he is Oxford educated and portrayed as an intellectual, is his search of a perfect woman, no one is more sexist than him. This book depicts his story – his downfall.