The Enchanted April

I recently read the book 'The Enchanted April' by Elizabeth Von Arnim, and also watched the movie starring Polly Walker and Miranda Richardson. Although the movie was well made, I think the book is an even greater delight to read.

The plot is centered on four women who rent a medeival castle in Italy for the month of April in the 1920s. Each woman, initially, wishes to be alone to contemplate, for each has her own story. There's Lotty Wilkins, who is married to a mercenary solicitor called Mellersh Wilkins; Rose Arbuthnot seeks comfort in religion after a failed marriage to Frederick Arbuthnot, an author of salacious memoirs that she is embarassed to read; young Lady Caroline Dester wants to escape high society and its adoration of her; and old Mrs. Fisher wishes to think back to her childhood in the nineteenth-century when things were more refined and proper. Through the course of the month, the women open up, learn a little bit more about each other, and grow a little closer.

While I was initially attracted to this book because of the spine of the plot: four women stranded in one place, I wasn't entirely happy with the book.

My main problem with this book is the crux of the story. While the women do change, I feel that they do so primarily because of men. Though they go to the Castle to get away from men, it seemed to me that they needed the men to put their lives back in order. Hence, this is the main reason it loses its feminist stance. True, it is probably feminist for its time, considering it was written in the 1920, but as a 21st century reader, I find the book a little problematic.

Lotty and Rose make up with their husbands. Lady Caroline probably marries Mr. Briggs, and Mrs. Fisher is too old to get a man herself, and there's no hint that she will end up with one. Ironically, perhaps this is the book's message: get back with your menfolk and change them by taking them to an 'enchanted' castle, and you may only remain single and retain your independence if you are old like Mrs. Fisher. Perhaps that is the time to be really happy: Mrs. Fisher is the only one who is not attached to a man. And so, the transformation that she undergoes will have a greater efffect on her and for a longer period.

The ending isn't conclusive. Lotty and Mellersh get togther and the latter pays his wife more attention, certainly, but his motivation is entirely different: He only praises her because she got him close to a rich client, Lady Caroline. So though Lotty thinks he is in love with her, his motivations are different. So we do not know how they will live once they get back to their home in England, whether they will maintain a good relationship or whether Mellersh will go back to his old self.

Rose and Frederick make up at the Castle, but Rose has no idea that Frederick was besotted with Lady Caroline and was probably in love with her. What will happen if Rose finds out? Will she have the same feelings for him? Will she be friends with Lady Caroline? Does Frederick have more feelings for Lady Caroline?

Lady Caroline and Mr. Briggs form a pair. However, what becomes of all that thinking that she did in the Castle? She had asked difficult questions of herself and tried to figure out her place in the world. What happens when she marries Mr. Briggs? Would she lose her independence of thought and instead succumb to being a frumpy housewife?

What is interesting is that it is the entrance of Mellersh, Frederick, and Mr. Briggs that catalyses the change in the women. The women, without the men, have been distant from each other, and have not attempted to grow close to each other. They probably have not even desired it. But the sudden arrival of the men changes that. I definitely wanted to see more of what would have happened without any men in the castle. In short, I wanted to see more of women's relationships with each other in the absence of men.

Nevertheless, I maintain that 'The Enchanted April' is a good read, and certainly better than many books in this genre. It's thought provoking in its own way, and its a gem for its humor.

The Fate of Lady's Maids

I've spent the past two weeks with the Brownings while reading Margaret Foster's Lady's Maid and now that I've finished the book, I feel the pangs of withdrawal. I keep waiting to traverse the rooms of Case Guidi, or learn of Mrs. Browning's disposition, or see Pen's frolics, and then it takes a while before I register that it is "all over."

Though I flipped the last page of this book only this morning, I still feel like there is more I'll come home to. The book was long, but I never found it tedious, which surprises me. It was an easy read, and nothing too convoluted or dense like other novels in the same genre that I've read recently. Forster centers the story around Lily Wilson, Mrs. Browning's maid, and so most of the story is told from her perspective. Not being an inquiring sort, or an intellectual, Lily Wilson's life revolves around caring for her own family and her mistress. Thus, the book chiefly, and rightly, deals with the concerns of a servant: we are given insight into the Barrett household, Mrs. Browning's illness and medications, the landscape of different places in England and Italy, and the carnal desires that drive all people, both the learned and the uneducated. In many ways this novel is a study of the 19th century, with a focus on class, especially with regard to that of the working poor.

The novel pays little attention to Mrs. Browning's poetry, or her role as an artist of her time. All we are told is that she is famous, and it ends there. Mrs. Browning also does not discuss her poems with Wilson, and I suppose this is expected as the latter was quite a simpleton compared to the former. But was this so? The novel does not offer easy answers. Lily Wilson, though uneducated, feels a lot more than she is given credit for. She is attuned to the suffering of others, especially that of her mistress, whom she adores. She is not immune to needing companionship and makes a few lasting friendships. She does have maternal feelings and does what is best, in her eyes, for her children. But above all else, she is loyal, and never wavers in her loyalty, even when she is no longer hired by the Brownings.

The fate of Lily speaks to the fate of all women of her class: where does the lady's maid stand in the social ladder? How intimate are her relationship with her employers? How can she continue to be loyal at the price of her family's suffering? Who is to provide for her if she became ill, and more importantly, if she had children?

All these questions point to the "woman question" that was vital to 19th century discourse: What are women to do when they have lost all? How could a single woman surivive if she is barred from advancing professionally like her male counterparts? To what extents would women be driven to stay out of the workhouse and what impact does this have on the rest of the society, let alone the women themselves?

Hortense, Lady Dedlocks's maid in Bleak House, is publicly dimissed by her mistress and struggles to find another suitable position. Unlike Rosa, her submissive rival maid, Hortense is aggressive and unabashed. She is loquacious about her position in life, stressing that she would have no where to go if she were unemployed. This aggression of hers, motivated by the depravity of her situation, does not win her any friends, unfortunately. Everyone rejects her, including Lady Dedlock, who hides behind the veil of her iciness. When Hortense' faith in Mr. Tulkinghorn fails, she takes matters into her own hands. While patience and righteousness might have saved her, or at least prolonged her life, her drastic action, committed out of despair, speeds her downfall.

But I ask: Is the judgement on Hortense fair?

Can a woman, who has lost her employment and is denied help, who is on the verge of entering the poorhouse, only to possibly starve or be exploited there, be expected to make sane decisions? Would it have been far better for Hortense to die than for Tulkinghorn, whose evil deeds wreck havoc on the lives of many more innocent people?

And more importantly, while we cannot esteem Hortense' temper, can we do the opposite for mute submission? Does Lily Wilson's endless sacrifice to her mistress trump over Hortense's efforts to escape poverty?

Who is the better woman?

The Persistence of Memories

In a mini-reading excursion I undertook on my own, I read Kim Edwards' The Memory Keeper's Daughter, and Susan Minot's Evening. Both books deal with the role of memories and how they continue to exert their effects long after the events have taken place. I compared these two novels to Penelope Lively's The Photograph, which I had read not too long ago.


In Evening, 65 year-old Ann Lord, the protagonist, is dying of cancer, and in her deathbed, remembers events that happened over forty years ago. That summer weekend long ago, Ann had traveled to Maine to attend her friend Lila's wedding. That meeting was pivotal in her life, for it was there that she met her true love, a man she loved and lost. Realizing the futility of their relationship, Ann later marries three different men and bears five children. But none of them knows the story of their mother: the passion she harbored, the guilt she has bottled, and her courage in striving to lead a happier life for her children's sake.

As Ann starts hallucinating, she recalls vividly the summer of her youth, and it is at this point that her children begin to understand her. As she lay dying, it is Harris' face that she remembers the most, it is the memory of their time together, however brief, that she clings to. However, in learning to deal with her imminent death, she must learn to see her relationship with Harris as more than what she romanticized it to be. She must see the effects of that relationship: the tragedy that befell the Wintennborn that mirrors her inner turmoil, her misjudgement of love, her hard, practical exterior which masked her inner, more sensitive nature that she concealed. As a result, her children were deprived of knowing their mother for the woman she used to be, which increased the distance between all of them.

In Evening, Susan Minot shows that in the last days of a woman's life, what matters most to her are the few moments of bliss that she tasted in her youth. These memories comfort her towards the end of her life, and paradoxically, help her to 'live' at the same time. Ann does not die grieving, but instead, lives her past, a past she has blotted out of her memories while saddled with responsibilities that come from being a wife and mother. Only by re-living her past, and by coming to terms with its effects, could she finally lay herself to rest: only in living could she die.

In contrast to Evening, The Memory Keeper's Daughter, shows that it is not possible to blot out memories of our past, even for an instant, because the past follows us wherever we go. While Ann Lord manges to blot out her memories until the end of her life, the Henrys face dire consequence throughout Memory Keeper, as a result of a single act committed by David Henry.

In Memory Keeper, David Henry is consistantly haunted by his past and never escapes it: his experiences of living in poverty and watching his sister die tragically propels him to try and fix everyone's problem. He becomes a doctor so that she can cure people of disease. But more importantly, he is concerned with eliminating pain and heartache: he could not endure his loved ones facing pain the way he did when he was growing up.

Thus, when his wife gives birth to twins, he sends away his disabled baby daughter, who is born with Down's syndrome, and orders his nurse to put her in a home. He tells his wife later, as she regains consciousness after her birth, that one of their twins has died. When his wife Norah, stricken with grief, plans a memorial services to bring some kind of closure, David Henry retaliates: in a strained manner, he reproaches his wife for having a memorial service so soon, while his wife accuses him of not feeling enough pain for the loss of their daughter. And so begins their path of misunderstanding, that will eventually lead to the family's downfall. Norah, unable to understand her husband's secrecy and emotional distace, copes in her own way by succumbing to different affairs with other men to find relief. David, ever guilty, permits her to do so, even though he is hurt in the process. And their son Paul, the living twin, is also eager to learn more about his father, and feels the void in the family as he watches his parents drift apart.

Norah remembers her daughter at every instant and she at first cannot see Paul without pain, although she learns to support him for what he wants to do, that is become a musician. David expects more from Paul because he feels guilty for giving up his daughter and robbing her of opportunities that his son, born more perfect than his daughter, is given. And while the Henry family breaks down, Pheobe, the discarded daughter, thrives with her surrogate mother, the nurse Carolyn Gill. Though disabled, she learns to surivive on her own, by getting a good education and then a job, all with the help of Carolyn, who fights for Pheobe's rights to a better life.

David's memories of his childhood, watching his sickly sister June die of a heart condition, haunts him all his life, as do his actions of the day that his twins were born. Phoebe is like a physical representation of memory: as the Henry family cannot let go of its memories, Phoebe continues to exist. She shows that memory will live and flourish, and haunt. Her existence causes both pain and joy, just as memories do, as Ann Lord would find at the end of her life. Knowing that Pheobe is doing well does make her father David Henry proud, but the same time, grossly ashamed for what he has done to give her up and conceal that from his wife.

Kim Edward shows us that memory cannot be defined and it will surprise us. Phoebe trancends classification: she has Down' syndrome, but she is also more self-sufficient that what one would expect of her. She does have feelings like a normal person, and more importantly she has enormous capacity for forgiveness and love. She bridges the gap between the two families: she shows Norah that David isn't the epitome of evil when he gave her away, and she shows Paul that there are things he must understand about his father. By leading her life as brightly as she could every day, Phoebe shows everyone that you cannot take life for granted: it is precious, though conflicted. You have to take it day by day, with both its joys and pains, while cherishing it for what it is.

Similar themes are evoked in Lively's The Photograph. Once again, memory re-enters people's lives and changes it in a manner they did not expect. Here, a single photograph is shown to create chaos in the lives of many people. At the same time, we see that the photograph can bring them together. The photograph, in essence, is the representation for memory, just as Phoebe is in Memory Keeper.

In this book, Lively shows the persistence of memory by weaving this story around the absent Kath. From the opening pages, Kath is always there in the lives of everyone who knew her, though we, the readers, never see her. Unlike Phoebe, who is alive, Kath is dead. While Edwards is of the belief that memory will always exist, and take a physical form, even if it is damaged, Lively believes that memory does not need merely a physical form to represent it: it can exist in a metaphysical manner. Even if the matter of the photograph was never brought up, Kath would still continue to fill the minds of all who knew her. Thus, in The Photograph, memory is shown to be even more abstract, but also very tangible, by its abstractness. Memories of Kath fill others' minds in such a vivid manner that it seems like Kath is alive in the flesh; we sense her just as we sense anything else. It almost feels to the reader as if Kath is not dead after all. Lively creates this effect by the title of her chapters: we find chapters with titles of Glyn and Elaine just as we find chapters with Kath and Elaine.

Just as the birth of the twins catalyses the events to follow in Memory Keeper, Glyn's finding the photograph of his wife catalyses the events in this book. The photograph is crucial for Elaine to understand her sister, just as it is important for David Henry, through his journey in the book, to understand his love for his sister and his parents. The photograph leads Elaine to seek Mary Packard, Kath's friend, and to learn another side of Kath that she kept hidden from the rest of the world. It is in understanding Kath for who she was, instead of re-living the memories of who she was perceived to be, that Elaine finally comes to terms with Kath as a person. Kath is given form, to the rest of the characters who aren't given the same insight as us, the readers, when she is perceived as someone real: when she is seen as someone who has known both joy and sorrow.

Like in Evening, The Photograph shows us that memories are strongly tied around death. All three novels force us to question what makes death such a powerful motive for making us confront our deepest desires and our darkest secrets. While death, either our own, or a loved one's, makes us re-live our past through our memories, such a second 'living' is different for each of us: it can either be transient, or it can have lasting effects. While Ann Lord dies after the powerful surge of her memories, Phoebe lives on, and Elaine mends her relationship with her sister and her family.

Do memories cause death or are they an effect? Are memories the means to escape death, or do they allow us to embrace it, unafraid, unprejudiced, and willing?

Child of Rage

Diane Setterfield's debut novel The Thirteenth Tale is a study of the female experience, especially with regard to childhood. She explores the concept of childhood and transition through the prism of twin-ship.

In The Thirteenth Tale, Margaret Lea, an amateur biographer, is invited to write a biography of the famous writer Vida Winters. Through the course of her stay at Ms. Winters' residence, Margart learns the power of Ms. Winters' story-telling, and to distinguish between fact and fiction. Most importantly, she learns to read between the lines, to pay just as much attention to a subplot, as the story being narrated. As Vida and Margaret embark on a journey together, secrets about their pasts are revealed, secrets that connect the two women. Both women come to terms with the ghosts that haunt them, and learn what it is to suffer, cherish, and endure.

As the title of this post suggests, the novel makes references to children, and how they are dealt with in other works of literature. The two most important books alluded to are Brontë's Jane Eyre, and James' The Turn of the Screw. Wuthering Heights also assumes a degree of importance. These novels are seamlessly embedded throught Setterfield's mastery of intertextuality.

The Angelfield family's isolation and lack of parental figures is reminiscent of the Earnshaws in Wuthering Heights and the inhabitants of Bly in James' novel. While the two children, Isabelle and Charlie engage in a disturbing relationship, Miles and Flora's behavior toward each other also raises similar questions. Setterfield's Hester Burrow is the counterpart to the governess in James' story. Both Hester and James' governess view ghosts. Hester, like the governess, is eager to solve the mystery of the children's behavior. Like the governess, she becomes increasingly sexually aware. We learn that Hester and the married doctor, who is a guardian figure for the twins, entertain a scandalous relationship. Children are used as a vehicle to project adult relationships. Setterfield's twins, Adeline and Emmeline, have already had a tainted birth, and now help to bring Hester and the doctor together. Similarly, Miles and Flora are responsible for the governess' awakening sense of sexuality, as shown through Quint and Miss Jessel's relationship. Both novels question the children's innocence: can children be 'tainted'? Can children feel just as adults feel? Are children capable of doing harm? Are children sexually aware?

Tale is similar to Wuthering Heights in its exploration of brother-sister relationships. Furthermore, there are vivid discriptions of violence, much like that found in Wuthering Heights. Just as Catherine and Heathcliff have a relationship that could potentially be called incestous, Isabelle and Charlie's relationship is anything but virtuous. Adeline and Emmeline's relationship is akin to that of soulmates, thus resembling Catherine and Heathcliff's. Hindley's ability to inflict pain is similar to Charlie's. Linton is an absent, but doting father, just as George is to Isabelle. While the Heights has Nelly and Joseph for servants, Angelfield has the Missus and John as its caretakers. The most important point that links Tales to Wuthering Heights is the foundling-child: Heathcliff, when Mr. Earnshaw finds him, is initially dirty and malnourished. Ms. Winter, like Heathcliff, is an orphan and in a similar state when the servants find her, and is brought up in Angelfield as if she was one of the family, while all the time aware of the fact that she will always be an outsider, a charity's child.

Setterfield's novel is densely filled with references to Jane Eyre. Angelfield shares a suffix with Thornfield. The secret is revealed through its connection to Jane Eyre. Just as Jane is an outsider, Ms. Winter represents the rejected relative. Both Jane and Ms. Winter are fond of reading and often steal to the library with caution. Jane is close to Bessy just as Ms. Winter is close to the Missus. The Missus and John have a platonic relationship while Bessy and her John marry while at Gateshead. Aurelius inherits his true 'family' just as Jane finds hers at the end. Both Angelfield and Thornfield burn down, as a result of the "other" women, women who show a split in identity.

This split of identity is shown by the existance of the twins: Adeline and Emmilne are shown to be polar opposites. Emmilines overflows with kindness while Adeline is filled with rage. Adeline is possessive while Emmeline is passive. Emmeline is naive, and albeit, rather dimwitted, while Adeline is more manipulative. In Brontë's novel, Bertha is akin to Adeline and Emmeline, in some sense, is akin to Jane. Emmeline is innocense while Adeline is passion, and its extreme, violence. Tales suggests that these two disparate natures can in fact be united. More imporantly, that they are two parts of a coin, yin and yang; that one will not surivive without the other, just as the twins pine for each other when they are seperated. There is an intangible cord of sympathy that connects Adeline and Emmline just as there is a 'cord of communion' that links Jane and Bertha. It is Adeline's possessiveness of her sister that brings her to destroy the "innocent", the baby, just like it is Bertha's possessiveness that tempts her to destory Jane, and later, Thornfield.

By offering us Ms. Winter, Setterfield suggests that the extremes of the likes of Adeline and Emmeline, Jane and Bertha, can in fact coexist within a single individual. But at the same time, Setterfield also points us that this third person, who outwardly resembles the twins, is merely a ghost. Like a ghost she can exert her influence but also disappear at ease. But I wonder what implications this can have in terms of freedom. While it allows Ms. Winter to gain access to worlds that she would otherwise have been shunned from, she is also not noticed, and has to live in stealth. Her freedom, while immense, is also fragile.

The Scarlet Letter and the Elf-Child

As one of the most fascinating characters I've ever come across in Literature, Pearl stands as a symbol of great Art, both through Hawthorne's characterization of her, and her actions through the course of the novel.

We are introduced to Pearl at the very beginning and it could be argued that if it wasn't for her, the novel The Scarlet Letter would not exist. The novel opens with a community of puritans surrounding a scaffold on which stands a young woman, Hester Prynne, Pearl's mother, holding her infant. Hester had been convicted of adultery and had just borne a bastard child. Indeed, Pearl enters the world aware of the scarlet letter A attached to her mother's bosom. When the magistrates of the town demand that she reveal the father of the child so that he too can share the burden, Hester does not comply, but accedes to face the humiliation alone. Later, after her hour of ignominy, Hester takes residence at an isolated cottage, away from the rest of the village, striving to earn a living for her and her child through her handiwork. Thus, from an early age, Hester adorns Pearl in beautiful garments while she remains modestly dressed, her hair covered and the letter A, albeit finely decorated, permanent attached to her bosom.

Removed from the rest of civilization, except on occasional trips to the town with her mother, Pearl is essentialy a child of the forest, for she belongs to Nature. She is allowed to roam freely, make up her own games and playmates, and learn the world anew, a world in which the Nature within is given full rein.

Pearl's external beauty is a result of the innocence and freedom she has within her. She is her mother's companion as well as her savior; she's loving, curious, and brave; she plays with the animals and is one with the plants and flowers. Intrigued by the scarlet letter on her mother's breast, Pearl constantly questions Hester as to its meaning and at one point even tells her she wants to be like her mother. Most of all, Pearl asks for genuine love and affection from Hester and the minister, Arthur Dimmsdale. When the latter refuses to hold her hand in public in the daytime, Pearl is crushed and loses her faith in the minister. To Pearl, who lacks a strong father figure or a happy mother figure, the only symbol of constancy is the scarlet letter. She becomes almost as obsessed with it as the villagers who were responsible for making Hester wear it. She touches it, plays with it, and contructs and imitation of it on the grass during one of her games.

Although the scarlet letter is initially a symbol of punishment, it becomes a source of strength for Hester and Pearl. Hester is able to exert her independence and earn a living of her own because of it. As both Hester and Pearl are marginalized, they have freedom to do things the other townspeaople cannot. Though Hester lacks friends, she is able to form a closer bond with her daughter and learn something from her. Pearl thrives more while being marginalized, for she is able to be 'wild' to her heart's content, just like the reeds that grown on the river bank. Pearl does not govern by Puritan rules but rather, by the laws of Nature. Nature is indeed on her side, for Pearl's existance is a result of love, a feeling that cannot be governed by any law, but the divine. In this sense, Hawthorne equates the Divine with Nature, which translates to Pearl being a symbol of a divine Angel. Further, she is faithful to her feelings, unlike the adults around her, and that is itself admirable. She is passionate and speaks out even if her mother does not. She is protective of her mother and wards off other people who threaten to harm her or her mother.

In a scene riddled with symbolism, Pearl uses the scarlet letter to change her mother. Towards the end of the novel, Arthur and Hester reconcile and Hester convinces him to return to England so that they can live obscure but free lives. In one of the most moving passages of the novel, Hester strips herself of the scarlet letter and hurls it across the ground. She also releases her hair from its clasp so that her rich tresses tumble down in waves about her. She remarks to Arthur that in the forest, at this time, the scarlet letter will no longer burn her even if she wears it, because she is with none other than her companion in 'crime'. As she gets rid of the scarlet letter, she tastes a hint of freedom, even for a brief instance. When Hester calls Pearl, who was playing by herself on the opposite side of the stream, the child refuses to return to her mother's arms. Speechless, and stunned, Pearl points to her mother's chest, and with an understanding sigh, Hester retrieves the scarlet letter, hooks it back in its place and bundles her hair into its previous hairstyle. As she does so, Pearl happily skips over the stream and embraces her mother, for now she recognizes her. Thus, Pearl orders her mother into submission by using the scarlet letter. While it is posession and constancy on Pearl's side, her actions also suggest oedipal tensions, for the child, seeing her mother decked in natural beauty, winning the affection of a man, who is essentially Pearl's father, is roused with jealousy, and so attempts to strip her mother of charms that will win over her own. Hester thus resigns herself to the tribulations associated with wearing the letter A.

It is interesting to note that Pearl is a sparkling character when she is a child. She is repeatedly refered to as elfin, child of the forest, impish, and fairy-like. Through her bright, bubbly, passionate nature, Pearl wins the affections of the townspeople, the minister, and even Roger Chillingworth, the novels antagonist and Hester's legal husband. In the novel's conclusion, we learn that Hester and Pearl leave for England. Pearl is hightly sought-after for she inherits a large sum of money from Roger Chillingworth, upon his death. We are told that she later marries and possibly has a child of her own. Nothing else is mentioned about Pearl, and in fact, we are left to only infer certain facts about her, for she never appears on her own. Why is this so? Why does Pearl assume so little importance towards the end of the novel when she played a prominent role until that point? Does Pearl's transformation into a 'proper woman' in England, her marriage, and motherhood, signify that she is no longer worth talking about?

By taming the elf-child, does Hawthorne applaud Pearl for her sucess, or is he, like the readers, disappointed with her for succumbing to the pressures of a 'modern, rational, ordered' world?

[The insert is from "Pearl and the Scarlet Letter". Wood engraving by George M. Richards. From "The Scarlet Letter" (New York: Macmillan, 1927). ]