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daja57's review against another edition
4.0
My heart sank when I approached this book. It's big, it's about local government in Yorkshire in the 1930s, and it has a cast list stretching to five pages.
But I enjoyed it.
It's an ensemble novel with several protagonists whose stories, told from their perspective by an omniscient narrator in the past tense (so stylistically a very conventional 'Victorian English' novel) interweave. There is Sarah Burton, the new headmistress of the local girls' school, who is determined to shake things up. There is Alderman Mrs Beddows the wise old woman who has seen it all before and who sympathises with the plights of her fellow humans. There is Councillor Carne, a conservative farmer, who married the daughter of a Lord and whose punishment is impending bankruptcy. There is Lydia, a clever girl who dreams of university but who is doomed to look after her little brothers and sisters in the railway carriage in a field in which they squat. There is Alderman Snaith, the lonely rich man who plots and schemes and pulls the strings. There is Huggins the councillor and Methodist minister whose sexual adventures leave him open to blackmail and whose money-making schemes make him corruptible. There is Lily Sawdon, dying of cancer, unable to tell her husband. These are the flawed materials through which, somehow, the county must find a way out of the harsh economic depression towards a promising future.
It has been called a 'blatant socialist tract' and some characters, especially at the end, are given speeches which call for progress, for change, even for revolution. But the minutely detailed descriptions of some of the poverty endured by the poor members of this society, some of whom have been disabled through their service in the trenches during the First World War, put these things in context. This is the England of the essays of Orwell, of The Road to Wigan Pier, an England of deprivation and social injustice. This is the world of Love on the Dole, and of The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, an England of cocktails for some and misery for many. Furthermore, the arguments are balanced. Carne, the face of the old Squirearchy, is a hugely sympathetic character. The new housing estate is built through the machinations of Snaith whose intentions are a fine blend of self-interest and altruism. Huggins, forever preaching of God, is hugely flawed. There is, at the end, a final showdown between Sarah Burton and Mrs Beddows in which the idealistic headteacher, in despair and racked with guilt, has things put in perspective by the old lady: none of us are perfect but we all have a part to play, but remember to cherish not just the glittering successes but also those who will always fail in the race of life. This is a superbly balanced novel, full of empathy. But yes. It breaks with what it calls "The Shakespearean tradition of finding the lower classes funny, whatever tragedy touched the kings and nobles, outraged his humanity." (5.6) And thank goodness. There aren't enough stories written from the perspective of a working man.
There are a number of characters who embody alternative positions. For example:
Snaith is depicted as sterile and rational and calculating, a sort of Apollonian Satan; he is the chief adversary of Huggins the womaniser. Huggins himself is the man of god who is at war with his own earthy lusts. Modernisers such as Sarah Burton are against the forces of conservatism such as Carne and Mrs Beddows. The generosity of Mrs Beddows conflicts with the parsimony of her husband
Snaith wants to build: he is the force of the town against Carne the traditional famer, the voice of the country.
Is this a feminist book? In many ways it is anti-male. Male characters are either evil or feckless. Thus, Snaith is a manipulator, Huggins is a hypocrite whose one attempt to make money by fraud is a failure, moreover he can't keep his trousers on, nor can the virtually unemployable Mr Holly who literally kills his wife by foisting yet another pregnancy on her, Carne is sliding into bankruptcy, as is his extravagant younger brother, Mr Mitchell can't make any money from his job. Mr Beddows is a skinflint, and Tom Sawdon drinks heavily as his wife wastes away from cancer and his pub heads for failure. On the other hand, the female characters are either talented (Sarah and Lydia) or long-suffering (Mrs Beddows, Lily Sawdon, Mrs Holly). Madame Hubbard's dancing school keeps the Hubbards afloat as her husband's drapery shop fails. The only negative female characters are Agnes Sigglesthwaite, the keen scientist who can't hack it as a teacher, and Mrs Carne, the flighty wife who goes mad.
But is it feminist? Although, in the final pages, it imagines a world in which married women won't have to give up their jobs, it has spent most of the novel is apparently passive acceptance of this fact. When Mrs Holly dies there is no suggestion that Mr Holly might care for his children: the caregiver must be Lydia, in the first instance, and then the widowed Mrs Brimsley. Mrs Beddows can carve a joint better than her husband and she knows it but she lets him carve because, as she says' "I prefer to see a cock crow on his own dunghill." (5.2)
Furthermore, Holtby is very prepared to emphasise the physical beauty or otherwise of her female characters (although you could argue that she is seeing them through the eyes of male characters, and that she also emphasises the physical beauty of Mr Carne).
One of the main themes of this novel is the love that Sarah Burton feels for Mr Carne. This seems to come straight from the pages of Jane Eyre. Sarah is, like Jane, a strong-minded (some might say stubborn) intelligent woman whose profession is education; she teaches Carne's wayward daughter. Carne is a local landowner of great physical beauty, just like Mr Rochester, with a mad wife who has been locked away (though in a nursing home rather than the attic). In their second (though effectively the first) encounter he is on a horse and Sarah explicitly thinks of "the memory of Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester". The climax of the affair is an aborted night of passion, resembling the aborted wedding in the Bronte novel. It is only the ending of the two stories that differs.
A Spanish proverb is much quoted, in the dedication and several times throughout the book. "'Take what you want,' said God. 'Take it - and pay for it'." This is what Sarah says to the senior girls at her school (3.6) But when Sarah quotes this to Mrs Beddows (4.2) this lady's response is "But who pays?" This is repeated again at the end of chapter 4.2 (more or less exactly half way through the book) with the subtle change that instead of God saying 'take and pay. this is now Sarah saying it (and Mrs Beddows asking, again, 'who pays?'. And, in the Epilogue, Sarah remembers what Mrs Beddows asked and realises: "And suddenly she felt that she had found the answer. We all pay, she thought; we all take; we are members one of another. We cannot escape this partnership. This is what it means — to belong to a community; this is what it means, to be a people."
I think that what lifts this novel above others is the compassion and empathy shown by the author to all her characters, even when they are improvident or foolish or downright wicked. This feeling permeates the text. She knows knows the lives of her characters from the inside.
But I enjoyed it.
It's an ensemble novel with several protagonists whose stories, told from their perspective by an omniscient narrator in the past tense (so stylistically a very conventional 'Victorian English' novel) interweave. There is Sarah Burton, the new headmistress of the local girls' school, who is determined to shake things up. There is Alderman Mrs Beddows the wise old woman who has seen it all before and who sympathises with the plights of her fellow humans. There is Councillor Carne, a conservative farmer, who married the daughter of a Lord and whose punishment is impending bankruptcy. There is Lydia, a clever girl who dreams of university but who is doomed to look after her little brothers and sisters in the railway carriage in a field in which they squat. There is Alderman Snaith, the lonely rich man who plots and schemes and pulls the strings. There is Huggins the councillor and Methodist minister whose sexual adventures leave him open to blackmail and whose money-making schemes make him corruptible. There is Lily Sawdon, dying of cancer, unable to tell her husband. These are the flawed materials through which, somehow, the county must find a way out of the harsh economic depression towards a promising future.
It has been called a 'blatant socialist tract' and some characters, especially at the end, are given speeches which call for progress, for change, even for revolution. But the minutely detailed descriptions of some of the poverty endured by the poor members of this society, some of whom have been disabled through their service in the trenches during the First World War, put these things in context. This is the England of the essays of Orwell, of The Road to Wigan Pier, an England of deprivation and social injustice. This is the world of Love on the Dole, and of The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists, an England of cocktails for some and misery for many. Furthermore, the arguments are balanced. Carne, the face of the old Squirearchy, is a hugely sympathetic character. The new housing estate is built through the machinations of Snaith whose intentions are a fine blend of self-interest and altruism. Huggins, forever preaching of God, is hugely flawed. There is, at the end, a final showdown between Sarah Burton and Mrs Beddows in which the idealistic headteacher, in despair and racked with guilt, has things put in perspective by the old lady: none of us are perfect but we all have a part to play, but remember to cherish not just the glittering successes but also those who will always fail in the race of life. This is a superbly balanced novel, full of empathy. But yes. It breaks with what it calls "The Shakespearean tradition of finding the lower classes funny, whatever tragedy touched the kings and nobles, outraged his humanity." (5.6) And thank goodness. There aren't enough stories written from the perspective of a working man.
There are a number of characters who embody alternative positions. For example:
Snaith is depicted as sterile and rational and calculating, a sort of Apollonian Satan; he is the chief adversary of Huggins the womaniser. Huggins himself is the man of god who is at war with his own earthy lusts. Modernisers such as Sarah Burton are against the forces of conservatism such as Carne and Mrs Beddows. The generosity of Mrs Beddows conflicts with the parsimony of her husband
Snaith wants to build: he is the force of the town against Carne the traditional famer, the voice of the country.
Is this a feminist book? In many ways it is anti-male. Male characters are either evil or feckless. Thus, Snaith is a manipulator, Huggins is a hypocrite whose one attempt to make money by fraud is a failure, moreover he can't keep his trousers on, nor can the virtually unemployable Mr Holly who literally kills his wife by foisting yet another pregnancy on her, Carne is sliding into bankruptcy, as is his extravagant younger brother, Mr Mitchell can't make any money from his job. Mr Beddows is a skinflint, and Tom Sawdon drinks heavily as his wife wastes away from cancer and his pub heads for failure. On the other hand, the female characters are either talented (Sarah and Lydia) or long-suffering (Mrs Beddows, Lily Sawdon, Mrs Holly). Madame Hubbard's dancing school keeps the Hubbards afloat as her husband's drapery shop fails. The only negative female characters are Agnes Sigglesthwaite, the keen scientist who can't hack it as a teacher, and Mrs Carne, the flighty wife who goes mad.
But is it feminist? Although, in the final pages, it imagines a world in which married women won't have to give up their jobs, it has spent most of the novel is apparently passive acceptance of this fact. When Mrs Holly dies there is no suggestion that Mr Holly might care for his children: the caregiver must be Lydia, in the first instance, and then the widowed Mrs Brimsley. Mrs Beddows can carve a joint better than her husband and she knows it but she lets him carve because, as she says' "I prefer to see a cock crow on his own dunghill." (5.2)
Furthermore, Holtby is very prepared to emphasise the physical beauty or otherwise of her female characters (although you could argue that she is seeing them through the eyes of male characters, and that she also emphasises the physical beauty of Mr Carne).
One of the main themes of this novel is the love that Sarah Burton feels for Mr Carne. This seems to come straight from the pages of Jane Eyre. Sarah is, like Jane, a strong-minded (some might say stubborn) intelligent woman whose profession is education; she teaches Carne's wayward daughter. Carne is a local landowner of great physical beauty, just like Mr Rochester, with a mad wife who has been locked away (though in a nursing home rather than the attic). In their second (though effectively the first) encounter he is on a horse and Sarah explicitly thinks of "the memory of Jane Eyre and Mr. Rochester". The climax of the affair is an aborted night of passion, resembling the aborted wedding in the Bronte novel. It is only the ending of the two stories that differs.
A Spanish proverb is much quoted, in the dedication and several times throughout the book. "'Take what you want,' said God. 'Take it - and pay for it'." This is what Sarah says to the senior girls at her school (3.6) But when Sarah quotes this to Mrs Beddows (4.2) this lady's response is "But who pays?" This is repeated again at the end of chapter 4.2 (more or less exactly half way through the book) with the subtle change that instead of God saying 'take and pay. this is now Sarah saying it (and Mrs Beddows asking, again, 'who pays?'. And, in the Epilogue, Sarah remembers what Mrs Beddows asked and realises: "And suddenly she felt that she had found the answer. We all pay, she thought; we all take; we are members one of another. We cannot escape this partnership. This is what it means — to belong to a community; this is what it means, to be a people."
I think that what lifts this novel above others is the compassion and empathy shown by the author to all her characters, even when they are improvident or foolish or downright wicked. This feeling permeates the text. She knows knows the lives of her characters from the inside.
emma_burke's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
siguirimama's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
krobart's review against another edition
4.0
Unlike the television series, the novel has a huge sweep and does not concentrate on Sarah, but presents the stories of about fifteen other major characters. It deals with issues like education, poverty, and governmental corruption as well as family relationships. The characters are all carefully delineated so that you feel that you know each one.
The novel is beautifully written, although it gets just a little preachy at the end. Some reviewers have compared Holtby to George Eliot because of her interest in local social issues and her breadth of scope.
See my complete review here:
http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/tag/south-riding/
The novel is beautifully written, although it gets just a little preachy at the end. Some reviewers have compared Holtby to George Eliot because of her interest in local social issues and her breadth of scope.
See my complete review here:
http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/tag/south-riding/
annieroff's review against another edition
funny
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
spauffwrites's review against another edition
3.0
I had never heard of this novel before the Masterpiece Theatre series, but I’m glad I picked it up. There are the obvious comparisons to Jane Eyre – a school teacher in love with a man beyond her reach, a mad wife locked away – but it has the quirkier characters of an Austen or Dickens novel. The parts about the workings of local government can get a bit confusing, but on the whole, I liked the book. It was funnier than I expected, but it also has a darker and sadder ending. There’s no “Reader, I married him,” and no one really lives happily ever after. They just live.