📚 "Rather Dated" February: Dorothy Whipple, Someone at a Distance 📚

@TheGander

For me Rather Dated books are a great antidote to the preoccupations of modern life.

Agreed!

Rather dated!

Just coming in belatedly to say thanks for allowing me to discover Dorothy Whipple, I am reading Someone at a Distance and really enjoying it. While I was waiting for the library to get it, I read a book of her short stories which I really enjoyed too. For me Rather Dared books are a great antidote to the preoccupations of modern life.

I've finally got around to reading this, better late than never! I reserved it at the library and it took ages to come, and then languished on my TBR pile while I was reading other things.

Anyway, I really enjoyed the book, and have enjoyed reading everyone's comments. I found myself quite gripped by the plot. I agree with PP that the characters were a bit cliched but I think the quality of the author's emotional insights made up for that. I felt it was a very believable portrait of the different ways people respond to betrayal. Louise couldn't come to terms with Paul's betrayal so channelled her energies in a destructive direction, and although she succeeds in luring Avery away she doesn't love him and is incapable of making him love her back. Faced with a much worse betrayal, Ellen commits to moving on and building a new life for herself, and is ultimately rewarded with the return of Avery's affections.

I was ok with the ending as it resolved the misunderstanding between the two of them about Avery's feelings for Louise. I was a bit confused as to why it was so critical that they not reconcile until Anne left home. What were they going to do, meet in secret while she was at school? If she found out, wouldn't that be even worse?

Lovely idea, I read it years ago and remember noticing the anti semitism ( which was standard in those days). I’ll see if I can get hold of a copy and read along.

Just adding the link here to the March discussion of Miss Pettigrew, which I've just opened:

'Rather Dated' March: Winifred Watson's 'Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day' http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/whatweree_reading/4753690-rather-dated-march-winifred-watsons-miss-pettigrew-lives-for-a-day

I've not finished the book myself yet, so will post my thoughts when I have, but by all means start the conversation without me.

Agree largely with @LadyGardenersQuestionTime Comments, I found alot of the characters largely one dimensional but found the writing very compelling.

I also agree that the marriage has largely strayed into a brother/ sister relationship as Avery took Ellen very much for granted and had created a very Comfadable life for himself. I think he thought that this would always stay like this for him regardless on what he did.

It is beastly at present!

Off to the library tomorrow to look for anything by Dorothy Whipple, and another Barbara Pym. I’m taking refuge in the 1950s, from the beastliness of modern life.

It is, Terpsichore, and commiserations to you too if it's a regular* *thing. Yes, another reason to love having a Kindle:)

TheGander I haven't read her WW1 book so thank you, I will reserve at the library.

Oh no, Fuzzy, commiserations on the sleeplessness. It’s a pain, isn’t it? Though sometimes it's useful for whittling away at the reading pile 😂

Avery thought anything better than going into stockings...😄Luckily for him that he had stockings to fall back on!

Thanks Terpsichore! It came back to me. It sounds like Avery had it all sewn up until herself came along.

I read your post at 5am while having my own wakeful moment, by the way!

Sorry, @FuzzyCaoraDhubh, just noticed your post as I’m lying here sleepless so I went back to look!

Avery presented himself at the right time…he knew nothing about books and seemed to have no natural interest in them, but he had possibilities on the social side…and his father was ready to put up a good deal of money…Avery himself thought anything better than going into stockings. He liked the idea of working in London and coming back to the country every night.

So it may not have been his passion, exactly, to go into the publishing side of the family business but I think we're meant to think he enjoyed the glad-handing aspect of it enough to be happy with it as a career (and no stockings! Until they came to his rescue later).

And just to add to @frustratedacademic's post, our next book is Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, and I'll open the thread for that on 1 March.

Oops! Thanks 😄

“Well, there's plenty of money in tights!“

Stockings in those days!

Hmm, Terpsichore. I thought Avery had to go into publishing because it was expected of him and his partner was running the show because he was better at it. Yes, the family hosiery firm. Well, there's plenty of money in tights!

That's a really interesting point about how little the war impinged on the book, TheGander. I hadn't thought about it. They would really only have been picking up after it. As a previous poster mentioned, it would have had an impact on relations in a small town, if people had been in the resistance or not.

What a lovely idea for a thread - is it a series? As life these days can be so anxiety provoking, I find solace in books set in the 30s- 50s. Conscious of the irony of this, since life wasn’t exactly a bed of roses in the 30s, or during WW2. A PP commented on how little the war seems to impinge on the book. I have found this too in books set in the 50s, I think it was a reaction to all the misery and drudgery of war. Of course at a safe distance we find it all fascinating and want to safeguard all the detail, but they obviously felt differently at the time. Just finished Excellent Women by Barbara Pym, a nice bit of vintage escapism. Will order the Dorothy Whipple.Interesting about “ Perfect Wives” gailforce. V. Nicholson’s book on post WW1 spinsters was a tour de force.

I finished today and enjoyed it. All the views here have made me think about it in other ways - the serpent/garden of Eden analogy had passed me by.
It paves the way into my next book "Perfect Wives" the story of women in the 1950s by Virginia Nicholson

They Were Sisters is great and there’s also a film of it, which is well worth seeing if you spot it. Talking Pictures shows it occasionally. It’s got a splendid villain figure (a sort of male equivalent of Louise) played magnificently by James Mason.
I love this film (and James Mason!) It is also on Youtube but the quality is not great.

Avery does say at one point that he has co-ownership of the family hosiery firm, doesn’t he? And that he’s not worried about money because of that; it'll just keep coming in. Presumably the publishing firm was the job he chose to do but he had that private income in the background. Although yes, Louise would want to get her mitts on it!

They Were Sisters is great and there’s also a film of it, which is well worth seeing if you spot it. Talking Pictures shows it occasionally. It’s got a splendid villain figure (a sort of male equivalent of Louise) played magnificently by James Mason.

In fact Whipple did quite well with screen adaptations: there’s also a good film version of They Knew Mr Knight. I’m half-surprised there wasn’t any attempt to adapt SAAD but on reflection, I suppose it’s a bit on the frank side for its time and might have worried the censors.

I know, Sapatsea. Very frustrating. I like the sound of They Were Sisters. Another* *book to add to the list!

I agree - back to mummy, spent the kids inheritance, poorer but no wiser!