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Category Archives: Unforgettable older novels

Shepherdess of Elk River Valley

22 Monday Jul 2019

Posted by Sara M. Barnacle in American History, Memoir/Letters, Unforgettable older novels, Women's History

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sheep ranching, women ranchers

This book is hard to categorize. It is a memoir by Margaret Duncan Brown, and was published in 1982 by Golden Bell Press of Denver, Colorado.

I will quote from the preface.

During the 47 years that Margaret Duncan Brown lived alone on her Colorado sheep ranch, she kept a diary of her thoughts and exceptional life. She had never submitted anything for publication, except a short piece to The Reader’s digest, that received the First Person Award, September, q958, entitled, “A Little Bunch of Sheep.”

Mrs. Brown died Julyl 30, 1965. As attorney for her estate, my wife being her niece and Executrix of her will, I found her writings stored around the ranch house, mostly on small tablets that she carried in her pockets while tending sheep. I had the enriching experience of organizing the writings into the form here presented.

The writings trace margaret Duncan, an extremely attractive but pensive young girl, of gentle Southern parentage, to marriage, at age of 18 , in 1900 to Thornton Brown, then a mining clerk in Cripple Creek, Colorado. By 1915, her husband had become cashier and resident manager of a bank in Cripple Creek, and the couple were quite active in business and social circles. They decided to become ranchers, and in late 1915, they made a small down payment and moved on 160 acres on Elk River, Routt County, in northwestern Colorado. In 1918 her husband died. She stayed on, and after the hardest of struggles, solely on her own, she paid out the ranch and expanded. When she died, she had a beautiful, improved ranch of 713 acres, debt free. The richest heritage is, of course, her indomitable spirit, her great sensitiveness, perception and philosophy of life, which live in these writings.

Signed, Paul E. Daugherty

I obtained my copy of this unforgettable book through the Bas Bleu Society, in fact, it is “A Bas Bleu Edition.” Whatever it takes to get a copy, read it!

The Country of the Pointed Firs

06 Sunday Nov 2016

Posted by Sara M. Barnacle in American classics, Unforgettable older novels

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Country of the Pointed Firs, Maine coast, regional writers, Sarah Orne Jewett, women writers

This American classic, by Sarah Orne Jewett, is one of those rare books which sports a readable and useful introduction. Willa Cather wrote the preface — empathetic, intuitive, respectful.

As Ms. Jewett herself said, “The thing that teases the mind over and over for years, and at last gets itself put down rightly on paper — whether little or great, it belongs to Literature.” Cather wrote that every great story “must leave in the mind of the sensitive reader an intangible residuum of pleasure; a cadence, a quality of voice that is exclusively the writer’s own, individual, unique. A quality that one can remember without the volume at hand, can experience over and over again in the mind but can never absolutely define, as one can experience in memory a melody, or the summer perfume of a garden.” The great writer must give herself totally to her material, must “fade away into the land and people of [her] heart” — “must die of love only to be born again.”

Cather concludes, in her 1925 evaluation of this 1896 work: “If I were asked to name three American books which have the possibility of a long, long life, I would say at once, The Scarlet Letter, Huckleberry Finn, and The Country of the Pointed Firs. I can think of no others that confront time and change so serenely.” And of our present interest: “It will be a message to the future, a message in a universal language.”

I don’t know about all that, but I do know this book has brought increasing pleasure over years of re-readings to first my mother, and now me. I just finished my umpteenth reading, finding greater depth and artistry than ever before. How did I miss this? Oh, the perfection of that!

The setting of the story is a small, Maine fishing village on a deep water harbor which opens into an ocean bay dotted with islands. The plot is minimal. A city-bred writer discovers life anew during a summer spent among the citizens of this hamlet. Her empathy and insight into character, rather than plot, are what draw the reader deeper and deeper into the story. The natural setting, of fishermen’s and sea captains’ homes, the tides and winds, the upland fields and pastures, the flowers, tress, shrubs, and weeds — the “pointed firs” — all become shapers of the story.

I used to read this for pleasure — which I still do — but now I read it for the tears that come from Jewett’s unsentimentally poignant literary skill.

You don’t have to be from Maine to enjoy this, but if you are in Maine you will come away understanding better your home’s place in the universe.

Cranford, by Elizabeth Gaskell

23 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by Sara M. Barnacle in Unforgettable older novels

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Cranford, Elizabeth Gaskell, English literature, women's literature

I have just laid down one of the most delightful books in the English language. This was my third pass through it, chuckling, sighing in satisfaction over a perfect turn of phrase, exclaiming, or weeping all the way. It’s a lot more than antique chick lit. Beneath the surface of financially strained female gentility is a strong current of ardent feminism, a sharp critique of early Industrial Revolution big business, and another critique of the British class and education systems. Its upper layers give us characters warmly portrayed who would under many another author’s quill pen have been laughed at, sneered at, or simply passed over in favor of exaggeration or titillation.

Dame Judi Dench played the lead role, Miss Matty, in a TV production of Cranford — I think it was a BBC mini-series — some years back. Even she was not able to give us the depths of this seemingly weak, slightly endowed spinster sister, who is nevertheless a sterling leader by example.

Mrs. Gaskell (Elizabeth Gaskell, 1810 – 1865) published the novel Mary Barton in 1848, which won her a nationwide audience through Charles Dickens’ new periodical, Household Words, where Cranford was first published in serial form. She also wrote Wives & Daughters, North & South, Sylvia’s Lovers, and the acclaimed Life of Charlotte Bronte. Gaskell’s insight and writing skill are often compared favorably to the otherwise incomparable Jane Austen.

My copy is a sadly decaying Oxford Paperbacks 1972 edition, which I (wisely, as it turns out) covered in sticky-backed plastic. Get a better copy, and be ready to enjoy life for a good read.

My Grandmother’s Novels

13 Saturday Feb 2016

Posted by Sara M. Barnacle in Memoir/Letters, Unforgettable older novels

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Hiram, Maine, Maine literature, Margaret Flint, regional novels, Sebago, West Baldwin, Women's Army Corps, World War II

My mother left me her most prized possession — a collection of her mother’s novels. Mother, Eleanor Jacobs Mitchell, read them through once a year. I had read one or two, or maybe a few chapters in another, during visits to my parents in East Parsonsfield, Maine. Due to a series of changes in my life, the books have been in storage for several years. This fall I decided it was time I made their full acquaintance. I set them in chronological order of publication on the top shelf of my bedroom bookcase, supported on either end by my Noah and the Ark bookends, then took down the first volume and commenced to read.

The Old Ashburn Place was Margaret Flint Jacobs’ first novel, hammered out on a manual typewriter during sweltering southern nights after her children were in bed. It was published in 1935. The action is set, however, in the beauty and coolness of the Flint family’s ancestral stomping ground, West Baldwin, Maine — pre-World War I.

Margaret Flint (her pen name) was no ordinary lady author, and she did not, I find, write “lady author” books. The conflict in the story is a man’s impossible-therefore-unrequited love in a tug of war with his unsought-but-inevitable adultery. The graphic detail of such scenes, which would be written out at length in a modern novel, is abbreviated here; but the emotional impact is almost hard core. The book won the First Novel of the Year prize, run by Dodd, Mead Publishers, in 1936. This housewife and mother, who had been pounding that typewriter for many years, was swept into a round of book signings and speeches.

Reading The Old Ashburn Place was a re-read, and I found it to be as much an encyclopedia of farm life in Maine, as a memorable story. Also, it is the only Flint novel currently available — new, on Amazon and from the publisher, Istoria Books. (IB publishes ebooks and print on demand paperbacks. Fiction: romance, mystery, and literary women’s fiction. See http://www.istoriabooks.com/IstoriaAuthors.html for more background on both the book and its author.)

Since the first novel is the only one to have received much notice, I’ll make this a long post and briefly cover them all, in an amalgamated review.

The second novel, Valley of Decision, — written after my grandfather’s passing and after my grandmother had moved the family back to Maine — surprised me by being set in the deep South, on the Gulf coast. My grandmother’s habit of close observation of nature, along with her curiosity about what makes humans tick, comes through almost as well in the Southern as in the Northern context. Evidently, her sojourn in the south with husband and six children had not been all perspiration and diapers to change. Yet I found this book less appealing than The Old Ashburn Place, partly because she was delving into some rather deep psychology, into the area of mental manipulation. Character and plot development get downright creepy. And, I was beginning to wonder, small-mindedly, if ALL her heroines were going to be petite, with small hands and smaller perception of the havoc they raise in the hearts and innards of her heroes? In fact, not one of her characters is perfectly beautiful or handsome, completely good or wicked. One feels that the author yearned over all of them.

Deacon’s Road (1938) introduces Ephraim Squire, the young, farm-inclined hero, who yearns to revive the ancient family farmstead. The ups and downs of his possibly achieving that hope form the framework for the story. And with this novel, the heroines become more realistic.

As the plot unfolds, the reader is introduced to old-time town meeting politics and to the caste system among the ancient families, newcomer wannabes, and the poor. Serious news for today’s reader is how hard thrifty farm women worked. Eph’s aunt, Hetty Hicks, what we today might call a swinging single, is also found crocheting a bedspread, “all in one piece” to sell in exchange for paint to redecorate the bathroom on her father’s farm, buy the material for her spring clothes, and “have some money to tuck away in the bank besides. Yes, along with her spring cleaning, she would do that bathroom over. . . . nobody could say she slighted her regular housekeeping in favor of these extras. She . . . [kept] things immaculate from attic to cellar . . . had a flower garden in summer and potted plants in winter . . . had shelves of home-canned food. . . literally hundreds of jars.” Whew.

Heritage and proximity have destined Eph and a neighbor girl, Lois, for each other. But enter the glamorous city teenager, Shirley. It takes the rest of the book to get that tangle straightened out. Along the way, the reader is immersed in the beauty of changing seasons, the comforts and hardships of farm life, and the social ways of rural communities: “The [farm’s] livelihood . . . had come from the tilled land; the cash which made that life easier, which bought good clothes, and carriages, and machinery; which furnished the houses with solid and handsome mahogany, maple, and walnut; which sent the boys to Harvard or Bowdoin if they wished to go — that cash had come from timber. Towering pines, straight, bare of branches to their feathery tops, had been felled and reared again as the masts of ships. Virgin forests, booming markets, men of keen business sense and unbounded energy — the combination had built a prosperous rural community, and an aristocracy of trade and labor.”

History lessons mix in with funny, frustrating, or poignant human relations, as in all Flint novels. The backdrop is ever the rolling countryside of western Maine that hugs the foothills of New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

Breakneck Brook (1939) illustrates another Flint novel characteristic, for it is set on the banks of an actual brook in West Baldwin, Maine. I have splashed in that brook. My grandmother had a talent for combining the real and the fictional into a believable whole. The same goes for characters. Although she always claimed her characters were entirely fictional, friends and neighbors — and foes — were sure they saw themselves or someone they knew in the pages of one or more of the novels. And they probably did. My grandmother, for instance, would attend town meeting, reporter’s notebook in hand, to garner material for her stories. My mother shows up in this story, as the pretty, cheerful, stay-at-home Thurlow Parks. My Aunt Bunny appears as her sophisticated, city-acclimated, older sister Beth. My Dad has been said to furnish the model for the main character in October Fires — I sincerely hope not, as the man supports a mistress on the sly for years, then drops her.

Back to Breakneck Brook. The plot is not unusual, as it tracks the sorting out process of pairing up three women — after several false starts and twists — each with her right man. This book is special to me, though, partly because it describes in detail the climb up to the scenic ledge my mom, her siblings, and a horde of cousins used as a hangout on Saddleback Mountain across from my grandmother’s house. I’ve heard Mother’s stories and seen the family photos. I could just see that ledge from the bedroom in my grandmother’s house where I often slept as a child. The novel confirms and expands upon Mother’s stories.

Back O’ the Mountain (1940). The title, a colloquialism, brings up another characteristic of these novels. Maine accents are notoriously difficult to reproduce, even by professional actors. Yet Flint was able to hear acutely the colorful dialect of her neighborhood, and she devised an accurate system for writing it down. Unlike other lady authors of her day, she also included enough of the local profanity to faithfully fabricate authentic conversations.

This story is about Kate and Sam. Her struggle is to keep house and raise four children on the modest income from the farm that Sam works hard to maintain and improve. This is acceptable and even happy for them until they need to give a home to Sam’s truly “impossible” mother. It’s a wrenching situation on the wider family as well, and is only resolved just in time for the reader to finish the book in peace.

Down the Road a Piece (1941) also sports a colloquial title, which “has more than its obvious meaning. Neighbors may be separated by a mile or more, yet they are bound together by the road which is always open. Though they may know considerable about each other’s affairs, they do not interfere. There’s bound to be talk, of course, but they can live and let live,” according to the Prologue.

This novel lets us see the previous novel’s family situation from the perspective of Kate’s elegant and aspiring younger sister, Elinor, and Sam’s agribusiness-man brother, Clem. The strong bonds of love pull the family at cross purposes, at times, and create new tangles to be resolved. One highlight is, believe it or not, the week Clem and Elinor spend — in and out of each other’s company — at Maine’s annual Farm and Home Week at the flagship state university. This adventure shows us another common Flint theme: Women striving to better themselves and their families beyond their traditional roles without abandoning the home and garden. And the other side of the equation — men, also trying to adjust to the rapidly modernizing era.

October Fires (1941) doth stick in my craw, just a bit. Its theme is how Leroy Varney makes the best of a highly respectable, upwardly mobile, but mistaken marriage, all the while mismanaging relations with his faithful, backwoods mistress. Oh, and also while nursing a decades-long lust for the town beauty. My grandmother really knew how to get her characters into a fix! The protagonist’s strengths are commendable, but his weaknesses wear one down. I wouldn’t mind, except for the gossip connecting Varney with my father as mentioned above. No way.

Enduring Riches (1942) is the last of the series of novels set in the Baldwin/Hiram/Sebago area of Western Maine.

“Judith was the daughter of Joseph, who was the son of Eleazar, who was the son of Deacon Ephraim Squire. Then, if you must have it, the Deacon was the son of Eleazar, who was the son of Joseph, who was one of the proprietors of Squire Township. Later on, and for some unholy reason, the name of this township had been changed to Parkston.”

For “Squire” one could read “Flint” and see how my own ancestry is woven into these stories. I could take you, for instance, to the Deacon Ephraim Flint horse watering trough in West Baldwin, sadly neglected at present.

To continue: “On the distaff side, Judith’s heritage was no less impressive, and by some it was considered more so.”

“. . . very well indeed did Judith know the traditions and standards by which, supposedly, her thoughts and behavior were to be governed.” Yet, she finds herself voluntarily backed into a marriage that nearly wrecks her and her children’s lives. Can she solve this knotty problem without resorting to divorce? I’m not telling, but the title gives you a clue. I believe the title also sums up Margaret Flint’s real-life relationship with her land and her people.

My grandmother’s final published book was the novel Dress, Right Dress (1943), about life in the Women’s Army Corps during World War II. Her research material was primarily letters home from her two WAC daughters — only thinly disguised as friends in the story — who had differing ambitions and temperaments. My mother is “Sergeant Nell.” My Aunt Edith is “Corporal Bess.” I was startled and comforted at some of Nell’s advice in letters to her friend, for it could also have been meant for me.

Like all Flint’s novels, this is a penetrating commentary on the times, on social and economic matters, on education and opportunity. In addition, it touches on evolving race and gender relations, as well as the evolving nature of the U.S. military.

An unfinished novel, named (as I recall) Hard Cider, and all my grandmother’s papers, notebooks, clippings from her prize year and other publicity, and copies of her many newspaper and magazine articles are housed in the research library at Colby College in Maine. Most extant original copies of Margaret Flint’s books are in the hands of family, collectors, or in several Maine library special collections.

The Enchanted April

23 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by Sara M. Barnacle in Unforgettable older novels

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Elizabeth von Arnim, Italy, novels, Von Arnim

This novel about the search for happiness was first published in 1923. I have just re-read it from my mother’s worn but lovely copy. The book has been republished in recent years, but the older format speaks its own language. She had folded inside the front cover reviews, now faded and fragile, of the 1992 film made from the book. Let me assure you up front that I, too, enjoyed that film version thoroughly. This post is not a slam on movies made from books — at least not in this instance.  One might wonder, then, why I chose this book for my blog — whose purpose is to keep extraordinary books alive in our imaginations, not slipping out of sight over the cultural horizon — since the book has been made into a film twice (1935 as well as 1992), was early adapted as a stage play (1925) and has recently been adapted yet again, into a Broadway musical (2003). I have not seen any of these older and further adaptations, but their existence speaks of a work whose substance exceeds its original time and place.  At the very least, “Italy” still spells enchantment.

The prolific author, Elizabeth von Arnim, billed herself as simply “Elizabeth.” This copy says, “By the author of “Elizabeth and Her German Garden.” I want her book on my blog because her writing is so nearly perfect. She makes her penetrating observations of character and motive at once succinct, beautiful, and often funny. A book club I once belonged to dissolved in laughter over von Arnim’s novel Vera at the unexpected scene where the heroine looks up to see her husband falling helplessly past their living room window. Death funny? Yes, under von Arnim’s spell. The husband was a conventionally arrogant so and so, as I recall, and there’s an ironic rightness to his demise.  Von Arnim’s heroines are usually mildly trapped in the conventionally stifling marriages which their societies seem to accept as a woman’s rightful state. The Enchanted April takes us along with four English women who, under the sunny influence of a medieval Italian castle on the coast, find the inspiration and courage to reboot their relationships with husbands and other men.

It’s just possible that Elizabeth went on a bit too long detailing these transformations, but who cares? We are there, as a fifth woman with a deliciously long month in which to reinvent our lives inspired by the kaleidoscopic evolution of a fragrant Italian garden in April. Ellizabeth herself had visited the castle, giving her voice added authenticity.

Enchanted April fronticepieceThis faded fronticepiece from the 1923 novel conveys something of the atmosphere of the setting within which the four strangers forge, or otherwise form by quirk or default, new self-awareness and relationships with each other and with the men they invite or otherwise find inserted into their month of joint solitude.

The reason I wish the original 1923 story preserved is twofold: 1) Elizabeth’s exquisitely pungent writing, and 2) the wide and deep exploration of her characters possible to a thoughtful prose writer.

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