A New Name

The last couple of weeks have been interesting for me. A lot of high points, but some not good very things happened too. Let’s get the bad things out of the way first. 

On 6 August Meta decided that the link to carosbookcase.blogspot.com was spam. I suspect it happened when a link to a review on my blog was shared on one of the Meta owned sited, but I have no way of knowing how or why it happened. It may be that AI is to blame, or it could be due to human error. I hate to think that anyone reported the link as spam, but I supposed that too is a possibility. Regardless of how it happened, the result was that I could no longer share the link to my blog in my bio on Instagram, or anywhere else on Meta's platforms, and neither could anyone else. I have filed a complaint through Instagram. However, I did this in the past for another issue and never heard a word from them.

The experience has been upsetting. Embarrassing, too. Unless you or someone close to you has had a similar issue, it's easy to assume that Meta is in the right when they say someone has gone against their ‘Community Guidelines’. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. But what can you expect from a social media conglomerate that sounds like it is straight out of a George Orwell novel? I spent a lot of time trying to come up with a solution to the problem. I considered creating a new blog, changing the domain name. The more research I did, the more daunting it felt, especially when the same thing could easily happen again with a new website. Then all of that work (and expense) would have been for nothing. 

For now I have opted to shell out for a custom domain, removing “blogspot” from the web address. Now you can find me at carosbookcase.com. If you happen to type the old address, carosbookcase.blogspot.com, into your web browser, it should reroute to the new address automatically.

Needless to say, this issue has greatly diminished my interest in creating content for a company that has no interest in its content creators or its users. When I joined Instagram I wanted to create something beautiful. I wanted to bring joy to others, but also to myself. And I have to tell you, this incident has left me searching for the joy. 

Here's where we get to the good things...

This incident has also reminded me of all of the kind people I have met since I started posting about books online. I just wanted to say that I appreciate all of you who reached out to me with offerings of kindness, commiseration, and brainstorming, when I shared the issue in my Instagram stories. The flood of messages I got was overwhelming.

I also want to thank you—the person reading this right now—for finding your way here. There are a lot of other ways you could be spending your time. It’s a blessing and a privilege to get to spend some of that time with you.

More good things

Two of which are featured in the photos accompanying this blog post. The bookcase was designed and built by my talented husband. The inspiration for the design comes from Michael Rothenstein’s 1933 painting of Eric Ravilious and Edward Bawden. You can view that painting on the National Portrait Gallery website. It turned out a bit larger than I had expected, so at some point I hope my husband will make a smaller version. That is, once his memory of what a hassle it was to make this one has somewhat dimmed! 

That second good thing I mentioned is Clark, of course. I am so thankful to have this little man in my life. He has always been a big supporter of spending hours in our armchair reading. Somehow, I'm the one who has to encourage him to get off the couch and take a walk!

I hope you have a lovely weekend in store. Can you believe it’s the last full weekend in August already? I’d like to know how summers seemed to last an eternity when I was a child and now they seem to be over in a blink. Whatever you are up to this weekend, I hope you have time to put your feet up and enjoy a good book while sipping on a comforting cuppa. 

Wishing you all the good things this weekend, and beyond!

The Jasmine Farm by Elizabeth von Arnim

At Shillerton that week-end, the week-end before Whitsuntide, they had gooseberry tart—or is it pie? Daisy Midhurst, in whose house it was eaten, never quite knew, but anyhow it was the thing with pastry on its top instead of its bottom,—for luncheon on Sunday; and it was a hot gooseberry tart, because pastry is better hot, though gooseberries are worse; and the guests, having eaten it were hot too, and not only hot but uncomfortable; for the gooseberries, on whose sourness no amount of sugar flung and cream emptied had the least effect, almost immediately, on getting inside them, began to ferment. 

 
Daisy Midhurst, normally known to be an impeccable host, serves her guests underripe gooseberries. Serving them once is a mistake any hostess could make. Perhaps not someone of Lady Midhurst’s standards, though one might take comfort in the fact that even she makes mistakes now and again. But when the gooseberries appear at each successive meal, the guests start to wonder, and talk among themselves… 

This novel isn’t just about what happens over the course of the weekend, which is what I had been expecting going in. The story really starts at the tail end of the weekend when Daisy’s daughter, Terry, makes a fateful slip of the tongue about her mother’s secretary, Andrew, to old Mr. Topham, endearingly referred to as Topsy, and known to be “the chief of the London leakers”.

“Any other of her men friends would have died sooner than tell on her. Theoretically Mr. Topham, too, would have died. He couldn’t, however, help himself. He was made that way. Leak he must, and leak he did” (104).

Just like that, the secret is out, and while no one can quite believe it of the girl, they can’t entirely dismiss the rumour about Terry and Andrew as untrue, either.

From an English country house to the south of France, this story covers such unexpected topics for a book published in 1934, as extramarital affairs and blackmail, and, perhaps more anticipated, love, forgiveness, and the complexities of marriage. As usual Elizabeth von Arnim does a number on the married state, but with a lightness and humour that is all her own. 

Daisy’s husband is dead, but we get a glimpse of the couple on their honeymoon, and the first time they came across the jasmine farm that Midhurst would buy for his wife.

A reserved girl, his Daisy, and becoming, it seemed to him, every minute more reserved. Bad, that was, in a bride. Brides, in his opinion, if there was to be any real fun, should be headlong. He had never had one before, but in spite of his youth was experienced in that which, if legalized, would have been brides, and knew what he was talking about. Waste of time, held Midhurst, to be ladylike in bed; keep that for interviewing the housekeeper. Till the day the Napier broke down in the lane that ran through what they afterwards learned was a jasmine farm, Daisy had been very ladylike in bed, giving him to understand by her recoils and her silences, that he was no gentleman. (168)

In the present, Daisy has run away from London, and the scandal around her daughter, to the jasmine farm they owned, but had never been to since. The farm has been cared for by a man named, Adolphe, and the house remains just as they left it more than twenty years ago, right down to Midhurst’s yellow pyjama’s which are still lying folded on his pillow.

All these years they had been utterly forgotten, but now with what vividness she remembered him in them, coming out of the little dressing room opposite, his fair hair, so like Terry’s tousled, and taking a flying leap on to the bed—a boy the same age as herself, but versed in many things of which she hadn’t an inkling.

Wasn’t this horrible? Could she sleep, side by side with Tom’s empty pyjamas? And he dead. Poor Tom dead. So long dead, poor little Tommy, while his pyjamas went on being as fresh and yellow as ever. (185)

This passage and the one previous, highlight the complexities of marriage at a time when men had more experience, or at least had access to knowledge of sex and all that marriage would entail, while women, especially in the upper classes, were sheltered and kept ignorant. Note how Daisy is both repulsed by the pyjamas and feels almost a tenderness towards them, as, in the same sentence, she refers to her husband as “a boy the same age as herself” behaving like a child and “his fair hair” recalling their daughter’s, and contrasting this childlike appearance with his knowledge “in many things of which she hadn’t an inkling”. Then her next feeling is tenderness towards “little Tommy”, while still wanting the physical reminder of him, the pyjamas, to be taken out of her sight and in fact the next thing she does is calls for the servant to remove them.

We see this abhorrence and horror at the physical side of marriage again and again in Elizabeth von Arnim’s novels. There is often a comedic bent to the telling, but the feeling of discomfort is no less potent. This dislike of marriage is present in a number of women in this novel. See the thoughts on love by Mumsie, the mother of Rosie, who is Andrew’s wife.

Love, too, that such a fuss was made over. Nothing in that, either. She supposed she had had as much of it as most women, first and last, yet she wouldn’t be surprised if she hadn’t really had any. Not love. Not what you’d call love. However pleased one was each time at the beginning, fancying one had got hold of the real thing at last, it always turned out to be nothing but just another husband. If you married him or didn’t marry him, it made no difference. She had tried it all ways. Lovers didn’t exist, only husbands. By the third morning, when the bickering began, the man didn’t live who wasn’t indistinguishable from a husband. (233)

I love that line, “it always turned out to be nothing but just another husband”. Elizabeth von Arnim is so good at these humorous turns of phrase. Initially, it isn’t clear if Mumsie is talking about sex or something more innocent, until the end of this passage where she refers to “the third morning” when talking about men all being like husbands even when they aren’t husbands in the traditional sense. While we get the sense that Mumsie may enjoy sex to the extent that she is willing to welcome a man into her bed without being bound to him by marriage, we can see that men have been a disappointment to her, as they have for Daisy.

There is also a very funny exchange between two women near the end of the novel. I will resist the urge to share it here, but it makes the point quite clearly that life without a husband is preferable to life with one.

From what we find out about Rosie, she isn’t a fan of the physical aspect of marriage either. Both Rosie and her mother seem to be solely interested in Rosie’s marriage for what they can get out of it without having to put much in. Rosie, in fact, seems to prefer being left out of it. It’s Mumsie who acts the part of puppet master, keeping things running smoothly between the couple, especially once Andrew’s affair comes to light.

“And if, said Mumsie, Andrew as a husband was a wash-out, and didn’t do any of the things he ought to have done for a wife like Rosie—dress her, pet her, flaunt her,—the way of peace lay in laughing and forgetting it” (47).

Meanwhile Daisy is “sprawling on the sofa” (201), “bored dead” (202) at being stuck in the flat in the days following the affair coming out. “Why should she, Rosie, have to spend a whole summer day cooped up in doors, waiting for these developments?” (202).

While I have focused on the representations of marriage in this novel, there is an interesting dynamic between mothers and daughters. It cannot be an accident that we have two sets on either side of this affair, Terry and her mother, Daisy, and Rosie and her mother, Mumsie. Both mothers are widows, which Elizabeth von Arnim uses to both humours and potent effect. This book might not put marriage in a positive light, but in contrast it does emphasize the care and investment that mothers make in their daughters’ lives. 

Daisy’s husband died in the First World War, so he doesn’t feature in the present drama with Terry, but he does indirectly effect Daisy’s reaction to the news that her daughter is having an affair with a married man. Daisy is horrified, and quickly flees London for France. It seems like an overreaction from a spoiled, sheltered woman who cares more about appearances than she cares about her only child with whom she is supposed to have a close relationship. That is until you consider that Daisy's husband was known for his affairs. He would flaunt his relationships in public, not even bothering to hide his mistresses from his wife. In addition to knowing her husband had started cheating on her not long after they returned from their honeymoon, she had the additional upset of having all of London privy to their marital discord. After Midhurst’s death, Daisy and her daughter drew closer, making Terry’s actions all the more hurtful to her mother. Not only because Terry kept this huge secret from Daisy, but because Terry would be both acting as Midhurst did in disrespecting the married state, as well as causing discord in a marriage. Aligning her daughter with Midhurst's mistresses, must have done Daisy's head in.

I read this book along with my friend, Gina. In fact, she sent me this book so we could read it together. She is @babsbelovedbooks on Instagram and blogs over at ‘Babs' Beloved Books’. We have read a number of Elizabeth von Arnim’s books together and it’s always a pleasure to have someone with whom to share ideas about her writing. And thank you for being here, too. It's a joy and a privilege to have so many fellow book lovers to talk with about books.

It would be remiss of me if I didn't share any of Elizabeth von Arnim’s delightful descriptions of nature in this review, so I'll close with this short passage I marked. 

It was very quiet; a hot summer afternoon, hardly stirring in its sleep. Over the hills lay blandness. The single cypress might have been carved in black stone, it stood so motionless. The grass in the olive-grove below the wall was patched with lovely lights, and all the fields were spread with jasmine. (177) 

Miss Granby's Secret by Eleanor Farjeon

“An Advanced Woman: that is how Aunt Addie would have described herself. It is a pity she couldn’t write her own obituary (16)." 

Eleanor Farjeon’s book Miss Granby’s Secret or the Bastard of Pinsk is full of funny lines, like the one above. Originally published in 1940, it is about Adelaide Granby, a prolific author of Victorian romances, who dies, leaving her great-niece Pamela with a house, Pelham Place, a stack of papers, and an unpublished manuscript. Amongst the flowers and condolence cards is an impressive arrangement with a card signed, “From Stanislaw,” alerting Pamela to the fact that along with material possessions, her Aunt Addie has left her with a mystery to uncover. Who was this “grande passion” of her Aunt Addie’s? And was her aunt really as naïve as she seemed? 

Addie left a big impression on Pamela. Knowing how her aunt would have responded on a given occasion, Pamela often hears Addie’s voice in her head. On one occasion, Pamela, who is a suffragette and prides herself on her knowledge, remembers the time she offered to tell her aunt the facts of life, and how Addie declined (18). 

“I always shocked my public. That’s how I made my name. If I had known the facts of life, I couldn’t have done it. I should have been much too coy. But fortunately, I had only my inklings, so I have been able to run on to my forty-ninth novel unimpeded (23)."

Written when she was 16 years old, the unpublished manuscript that Addie leaves behind, entitled “The Bastard of Pinsk”, was her first attempt at a novel. As Pamela reads it, we are privy to the full text. In it we discover just how innocent young Addie was, as evidenced by her belief that a bastard is “A very noble Hero of Royal Blood”. On one occasion a woman in Addie’s novel confessed that she had given a man “her all”. Next to it, Addie has written herself a note “Mem: What is it? Find out.—A.G." (115).

At first I thought Miss Granby’s Secret was simply a book within a book, but after some reflection it seems to be more like three books, the present, Addie’s manuscript, and excerpts from Addie’s diary, all woven together. You cannot appreciate one without the other and I think this bears keeping in mind. About halfway through the manuscript portion I found myself tiring of the joke, despite how humorous it was. It took until I was two-thirds of the way through the manuscript before I felt like I understood why it needed to be there in its entirety. On top of that there are notes, letters, funeral announcements, etc… all adding to a collage of texts, conversations, and interviews that not only relate the fictitious writer, Adelaide Granby, to the novel she has written, but providing similarities between the character and her creator, Eleanor Farjeon. 

Admittedly, I could have approached this book with more knowledge if I had first read the wonderfully insightful introduction by Elizabeth Crawford provided in the Dean Street Press edition, or perhaps if I had read the blurb all the way through. What can I say? I like to approach most books with minimal knowledge, leaving me free to form my own opinions and stumble where I may, allowing the text to reveal itself to due time. This one revealed itself to be a work of genius, it just took me a while to realize it.

As Elizabeth Crawford writes in her introduction, Eleanor Farjeon herself retained an innocent understanding of sex well into adulthood as recounted by her niece Annabel, though at 18 years old Eleanor Farjeon’s verse was so knowing that it was wondered where she got her knowledge from (11). There are other similarities between Eleanor and Adelaide, but I will leave you to read the introduction for yourself to discover those. 

One of the things that stood out to me about this book is the built up to Pamela finally visiting Pelham Place, the home Addie grew up in. It isn’t until late in the novel that Pamela visits and her impressions took me by surprise, though it probably should not have.

“About an acre and a half of shrubs, flowers, vegetables, and weeds. Only near the house were the weeds not dominant. It was a two-storied grey stone house, neither large nor small, attractive nor unattractive. Nondescript. Perhaps the back had more to offer (274)."

“I went though the other rooms, all much of a character, characterless.” (277)

I found myself on the top of a circular spur enclosed by a castellated battlement, and crowned with a dilapidated erection which I recognised at once as the "Gothic Temple." Seated within it, one looked down on the cedar and the roof of the house, across to the ravine where the river flowed. It was damp, and smelled dismally of decay. It would have enchanted Caroline Tarletan [a character in Addie’s manuscript], but not me. That was all the grounds could offer me. A constricted little effort at romance. (279)

The disconnect between the dramatic and romantic setting as depicted in Addie’s novel and Pelham Place as see through Pamela’s eyes made me wonder if it was solely the romanic notions of a young girl in love that gave a rose-colored tint to the place, or if Eleanor Farjeon was commenting on the inability of a person to return to the past. After the breakup of Addie’s relationship that wasn’t to be, she never returns to Pelham Place.

Mrs. Chester, the housekeeper remembers Addie, describing her at 15 as “pretty as a picture” (276) and that’s how she would remain in that woman’s memory. By not returning to Pelham Place, Addie would never have to see it diminished to the “characterless” surroundings that Pamela sees. Perhaps, the contrast would have been all the more stark for Addie had she visited years later.

Eleanor Farjeon is best known for her children’s books, though this is the first book of hers I have read. I would love to learn more about the author’s life and then come back and read this one again in hopes of discovering more of the Easter eggs hidden secreted away by Miss Granby and her author.

This book was fun, joyful, ridiculous, surprisingly poignant, and a little like falling down a rabbit hole at times. I loved it!

Miss Granby’s Secret comes out on 5 August and is the first Furrowed Middlebrow release as Dean Street Press Ltd. transitions from Dean Street Press. I actually squealed with joy when I opened the email from the DSP that said they would be continuing to release new titles. Thank you to the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for a review.