Charles Merry is the senior schoolmaster at a small prep school for boys. He masks his shortcomings, and those of his staff and students, with bluster and bravado. The book explores themes of authenticity, loyalty, love, death, and friendship through dense passages that are often exclusively spoken dialog with minimal supporting text—a style that came to define the author’s future works.

Rich with intriguing characters and cleverly constructed conversations, Pastors and Masters was published in 1925 and became the first breakthrough success for its author, Ivy Compton-Burnett . The book was critically acclaimed upon its release and hailed by the New Statesman as “like nothing else in the world” and “a work of genius.”