author
Jonathan Nield
b. 1863
A patient guide to the world of historical fiction, his work helped readers sort through centuries of novels and tales with a critic’s eye and a reader’s enthusiasm. Best known today for A Guide to the Best Historical Novels and Tales, he brought order and curiosity to a huge field of reading.
1 Audiobook
A Guide to the Best Historical Novels and Tales
by Jonathan Nield
About the author
Jonathan Nield was a writer and literary guide best known for A Guide to the Best Historical Novels and Tales, a reference work first published in the early 1900s and revised in later editions. Library and public-domain records consistently identify him as an author born in 1863.
His best-known book is a wide-ranging survey of historical fiction, organized to help readers, teachers, and students find novels set in different periods of the past. The book’s long life in later editions suggests it was valued as a practical companion for anyone exploring historical storytelling.
Records also show that Nield worked as a translator, including an English version of Émile Boutroux’s Science and Religion in Contemporary Philosophy. Clear biographical details beyond his publications are limited in the sources I could confirm, but his surviving work shows a strong interest in criticism, bibliography, and helping readers navigate large bodies of literature.