Review: Anderby Wold, by Winifred Holtby

Pages: 310

Original date of publication: 1923

My edition: 1981 (Virago)

Why I decided to read: Winifred Holtby is one of my favorite authors

How I acquired my copy: Ebay, February 2011

Winifred Holtby quickly became one of my favorite authors when I read The Crowded Street early last year. Although Anderby Wold was Holbty’s first published novel, it ranks up there as one of my favorites. The novel is set in a familiar Holtby milieu—agricultural and rural Yorkshire. Mary Robson is a young housewife married to a man much older than she. Her marriage is pleasant, but lacking in passion. Although she has lived in Anderby all her life, she is somewhat of an outsider. Nonetheless, she’s a kind of social queen. One day, in the most dramatic fashion possible, she meets David Rossitur, a socialist writer who really shakes things up, so to speak, both in Anderby and with Mary herself.

Anderby Wold suffers a little bit from first-time writer’s syndrome; Winifred Holtby uses a few writers’ clichés here and there (witness the scene where Mary and David meet. The introduction of David into Mary’s life certainly isn’t subtle, and David is mentioned by name even before Mary knows who he is). But you can definitely see where Winifred Holtby’s career is going. The hallmarks of her books are there: a provincial Yorkshire town; an opinionated, outsider main character. South Riding, in my opinion, is one of her best books, but Anderby Wold comes a close second.

This is a novel that is heavy on character development; this is also a novel where the place in which it’s set also becomes a character. Winifred Holtby’s love for Yorkshire is very clear in this book. The author tends to hit her reader over the head with her political themes, but she’s not partial to one side or the other.

Winifred Holtby was born into a farming family in Yorkshire; for many years, she was a friend of the writer Vera Brittain (who wrote about her in Testament of Friendship, a copy of which I intend to track down immediately). She published six novels and several collections of short stories. Tragically, Holtby died of kidney disease at the age of 37. If not for that, Winifred Holtby could easily have been one of the 20^th century’s greatest female writers. As it is, it’s a shame that her books are nearly out of print (although Virago is doing another revival of five of them this spring) and that she isn’t better known.

Review: Mrs. Miniver, by Jan Struther

Pages: 145

Original date of publication: 1939

My edition: 1993 (Virago)

Why I decided to read: It’s one of the books featured in Ruth Adam’s A Woman’s Place

How I acquired my copy: Online, March 2011

Mrs. Miniver is a novel and collection of essays that focuses on the day-to-day life of a 1930s housewife. The “chapters” are more vignettes that focus on the trivial events of Mrs. Miniver’s life: visits to the dentist’s, the changing of the seasons, holidays with her husband, an architect, and their three children, and Christmas shopping.

All of this sounds, boring, but it’s not. Jan Struther describes Mrs. Miniver’s life poetically, with emphasis on the little details. The essays are a reflective look into the thoughts and feelings of one inter-war housewife (although the story is told in the third person). There’s no plot or character development, but Mrs. Miniver describes her lifelife exquisitely. There’s also a subtle undercurrent of humor to this book, although it’s not quite as laugh-out-loud as DE Stevenson’s Mrs. Tim books or Henrietta’s War, by Joyce Dennys. On the other hand, though, Mrs. Miniver makes some really insightful comments on a wide variety of topics—everything from the impending war to her love of engagement books. There’s not much in the way of plot to this book, but nonetheless, it’s quite wonderful.

Review: Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte

Pages: 624

Original date of publication: 1847

My edition: 2010 (Vintage)

Why I decided to re-read: the film adaptation inspired me to re-read this book

How I acquired my copy: Borders, Mach 2011

Oh, Jane Eyre, how do I love thee? The first time I read this book was in middle school; then I read it twice in high school and once in college. The recent movie adaptation inspired me to re-read this book after an eight-year gap since my last reading.

I won’t go into the plot since it’s one of those plots that most people in the English-speaking world seem to know (even if they haven’t read the book), and one of those plots that resonates throughout English literature. Suffice it to say that Jane Eyre is one of those books that stands up to the test of time well—not just historically but personally as well. It captured my imagination as a teenager; and, as I’ve been dealing with some recent emotional disappointment, there are some quotes in Jane Eyre that really seemed to reflect my mood—especially when the house party is held at Thornfield and Jane reflects on her new-found feelings for Mr. Rochester—that she believes are unreturned:

It does good to no woman to be flattered by her superior, who cannot possibly intend to marry her; and it is madness in all women to let a secret love kindle within them, which, if unreturned and unknown, must devour the life that feeds it; and, if discovered and responded to, must lead, ignis-fatuus-like, into miry wilds whence there is no extrication (Ch. 16)

Or how about:

I had not intended to love him: the reader knows I had wrought hard to extirpate from my soul the germ of love there detected; and now, at the first renewed view of him, they spontaneously revived, green and strong! He made me love him without looking at me. (Ch. 17)

Or one of my favorites:

It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it. Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot....Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts, as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings….knitting stockings….playing on the piano….It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.- (Ch. 12)

How can you not love a book that speaks to your mood, no matter what it is? I think also the appeal to this book for me lies in the fact that I identify so much with Jane herself; I see a lot of myself in her personality. She’s such an introspective person, someone who experiences emotion strongly; but it’s very quietly experienced, which is probably why that emotion is so strongly felt in the first place. There’s so little opportunity for Jane to emote that when she experiences feelings for Mr. Rochester, she doesn’t expect it. Jane's feelings of being a social outsider is very familiar, to me, too. I love a novel that, even after reading it five times, causes me to see the book anew each time I read it.

Review: Alas, Poor Lady, by Rachel Ferguson

Pages: 463

Original date of publication: 1937

My edition: 2006 (Persephone)

Why I decided to read:

How I acquired my copy: Persephone catalogue, January 2011

Born in 1870, Grace Scrimgeour is the youngest daughter in a large, not-wealthy Victorian family. In an age and society where women were defined by their marital status, the Scrimgeours fail to make any provision for marriage for their younger daughters—Grace, Queenie, and Mary. One of the sisters becomes a nun; the others marry; but the focus is on the spinsters who remain at home with their mother, a selfish woman who fritters away money in their large house in Kensington.

The book chronicles Grace’s life from birth, through her abortive attempts to find a husband because she’s not attractive enough, through the family’s poverty and Grace’s attempts to earn money as a governess, work that she’s completely unsuited for. It’s a desperately sad novel about what happened to unmarried women—the book opens with Grace’s end in the 1930s, living in distressed circumstances and having to depend on the charity of others. On one hand, the reader feels sorry for Grace and her circumstances; on the other, Grace does nothing to alleviate them.

I read this novel at a time when my own success or lack thereof in the dating department isn’t optimal; so maybe it wasn’t the best book for my present state of mind. It’s a very sad book about the differences between men and women in Victorian England; how women spend their lives waiting, while men go out and actually live their lives. Because the novel covers such a large chunk of time, the story jumps around at times and seems sketchy in places. Nonetheless, I thought that this was a stunning read. It’s interesting to reflect on what would have happened to women like me (the “superfluous women” that Ruth Adam described so well in A Woman’s Place) a hundred years ago.

This is Persephone no. 65. Endpaper below:

The Sunday Salon

Another week, come and gone! I spent today in New York City; Friday was my sister’s birthday, and my dad and I drove up to have brunch with her and her boyfriend at one of my favorite restaurants, located near Union Square. A trip to New York couldn’t be complete without sojourns to the enormous Barnes and Noble at Union Square, and the Strand, a few blocks away. I’m newly-obsessed with the reprints put out by New York Review Books Classics, and Barnes and Noble has many, many of them in stock. So I came away with: Cassandra at the Wedding, by Dorothy Baker; The Long Ships, by Frans G. Bengtsson; A House and its Head, by Ivy Compton Burnett; The Vet’s Daughter, by Barbara Comyns; The Towers of Trebizond, by Rose MacAulay; Summer Will Show, by Sylvia Townsend Warner.

My spending at the Strand was slightly less expensive: I picked up The Bookshop, by Penelope Fitzgerald; The Vera Wright Trilogy, by Elizabeth Jolley; and Chronicles of Fairacre, by Miss Read. Then I also found a VMC edition of The Well of Loneliness, and a pristine green (and I do mean pristine, it smells like dust and the pages are tanned a bit, but its obviously never been read) copy of Miss Mole, by EH Young—easily my most exciting find of the day!

I realized recently that, because I was working out first thing in the morning, I wasn’t getting to read as much as I want to (when I get home from work, all I want to do is watch TV, which can’t be good for me!). Now, by going to the gym in the afternoon (ie, when most normal people work out), and getting up early, I’ve found myself getting more reading in. This week alone I finished The Mirage, by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles, The Age of Innocence, by Edith Wharton (why oh why haven’t I read this before now?), and a review copy of In the Garden of Beasts, by Erik Larson, popular history about the American Ambassador to Germany in the 1930s, and his daughter. It’s interesting, but a departure from Larson’s other books. So far this month I’ve read more than I read in February and March!

What have you been reading lately?

Review: The Glass-Blowers, by Daphne Du Maurier

Pages: 368
Original date of publication: 1963
My edition: 2004 (Virago)
Why I decided to read: it’s been on my TBR list forever
How I acquired my copy: Online, February 2011

The Glass-Blowers is the story of the Bussons, a family of glassblowers in the late 18th century (and ancestors to Daphne Du Murier). The story is told through the eyes of their sister, Sophie Duval, married to a master glassblower. The novel takes the family. Daphne Du Maurier wrote frequently about various members of her ancestors and family members, and this is a fantastic fictional account of the French Revolution and the effects it had on one family.

Daphne Du Maurier is one of my favorite authors, but sadly, this to me wasn’t one of her better books. There’s not much about the glassblowing trade in this novel, and the details the reader gets on the events of the period are sketchy. Granted, Sophie Duval spends most of her time out in the countryside, but maybe the story could have been told from the point of view of a different member of the family? There were stretches in this novel where not much happens, which was a bit of a disappointment. But when there was action, such as the scene when the Vendeans come into their village, that are truly harrowing. I’m continually amazed, through reading fiction and nonfiction about the French Revolution, by how brutal people were.

The author’s strengths, however, lie in characterization. Robert Busson, with his pretensions to grandeur, has the most heartbreaking story of them all—but in a way, he brings all of what happens to him on himself. I also enjoyed reading about how the Du Maurier family got their name—a bit of self-invention at its finest! I’m a little bit partial towards Daphne Du Maurier’s books, and so I’m rating this higher than I normally would, but I don’t think it’s one of her best.

Review: The Outcast, by Cynthia Harrod-Eagles

Pages: 594

Original date of publication: 1998

My edition: 2007 (Sphere)

Why I decided to read: I’m trying to read through the Morland Dynasty series

How I acquired my copy: book Depository, April 2010

#21: 1857-1865; covers the American Civil War

This installment of the Morland series takes the family from England to South Carolina—just as war is about to tear apart the United States. A foundling shows up at Benedict Morland’s door, and he takes the child to South Carolina, where his daughter Mary is a wife and mother on a large plantation. Back in England, Charlotte’s marriage to Oliver Fleetwood slowly crumbles over her friendship with a doctor, even as she becomes involved in the divorce reform bill.

This book takes a break from England, and I thought it was a welcome change from the usual. As the books in this series usually are, the events described are well-researched and give the reader a glimpse into what life was like in the 1850s and ‘60s. Mary’s marriage to Fenwick isn’t exactly a bed of roses, and it’s interesting to watch her friendship with Martial develop (though you can pretty much predict where it’s going to go!).

Mary is your typical Morland family woman (uncannily ahead of her time with regards to her education and opinions on the issue of slavery), but I enjoyed the interplay she has with Martial. I also enjoyed meeting members of the American branch of the Morlands, although they’re almost an exact copy of the English branch and the similarities are a bit too much at times. I would have also liked to have seen more of Charlotte in this story, and I was a little frustrated by how quickly her relationship with her husband deteriorated. After all, they had a seemingly happy marriage beforehand! I’m looking forward to seeing what happens to the family in the next book in the series as the series returns to England.

The Sunday Salon

It’s Sunday again! In September 2009, when I went on vacation to London by my lonesome, I got hooked on a British show called Who Do You Think You Are, a BBC show focusing on celebrities who explore their family history. Today I discovered that there’s an American version that recently aired its second season on NBC—so I’ve spent my day glued to my computer screen watching past episodes on hulu. I think the American version is much more interesting—first because I’ve actually heard of the celebrities featured (eg, Vanessa Williams, Tim McGraw), second because these celebrities’ stories are a reflection of larger, American history; and third because they travel to more exotic places. The first season is available on DVD and it’s at the top of my Netflix queue as we speak! I’d love to watch the episodes of the British version I haven’t seen…

Otherwise, it’s been a quiet kind of Sunday—went to the gym, grocery store, the usual Sunday afternoon of a spinster maid! I’m still trying to deal with a recent disappointment, but I’m doing better—until I was faced with it on Thursday. I went out to lunch with my coworker on Thursday and talked about it, so I ended up feeling better about it. I’m the kind of person who internalizes everything and makes mountains out of molehills, so it’s good to talk things out. At the time, though, I just felt as though I’d been punched in the stomach!

How was your week?

Review: Unbeaten Tracks in Japan, by Isabella Bird

Pages: 333

Original date of publication: 1880

My edition: 1984 (Virago)

Why I decided to read: recommended to me through LibraryThing

How I acquired my copy: Amazon UK seller, January 2011

Unbeaten Tracks in Japan is composed of a series of letters that Isabella Bird wrote home to her sister and friends during the summer of 1878. She set out from Tokyo, eager to explore the “unbeaten tracks” of the northern part of Honshu (the largest island of Japan) and Hokkaido. The letters are a combination of travelogue, anthropological study, and cultural study. I was especially eager to grab this book off my TBR shelf after what’s recently happened in Japan, and I enjoyed reading about Isabella Bird’s adventures there 130 years ago—a very different experience from when my family lived in Tokyo in the 1980s and ‘90s!

Isabella Bird inserts very little of her own thoughts and feelings into the narrative of her letters, but at times her very subtle sense of humor comes through, especially with regards to her interpreter, Ito, towards whom she has a kind of maternal disapproval at times. Bird was the first Western woman to travel in some of the remoter parts of Japan; in fact, she was the first Western person to travel in those areas, period, so caused quite a stir there when she arrived! Through her letters, Bird comes across as a very courageous woman, despite the fact that she suffered from back pain during her travels.

Some of the details she recounts are a bit boring (she even lists temperatures at certain points), but her views on the natives of Japan are fascinating, albeit from a modern prospective sometimes a bit disturbing. But I think Bird went to Japan with preconceived ideas of the Japanese. It’s interesting, therefore, to see how her opinions changed and improved over the course of her journey. Bird’s writing style itself is almost poetic at times, especially when she’s describing the scenery she passes through. I loved, for example her description of Mount Fuji when first arriving!

Teaser Tuesdays

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

--Grab your current read

--Open to a random page

--share two “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page

Be sure NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (Make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)

--Share the title and author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR lists if they like your teasers!

“We went to our ball last night—it was pretty; the room was hung round with such profusion of garlands and a sort of stage, on which there were green arches decked out with flowers; but what particularly took my fancy was a set of European soldiers dressed up for the night as footmen, real red plush trousers, with blue coats and red collars, and white cotton stockings, and powdered heads, and they carried about trays of tea and ices. After the turbaned heads and ‘the trash and tiffany,’ as Hook says, with which we are surrounded, you cannot conceive what a pleasant English look this gave to the room.”

--From Up the Country: Letters from India, by Emily Eden