Small but Perfect - a Gem of a Book

At some point, I don’t know where or when, I read a favourable review of JL Carr’s A Month in the Country, and it obviously made an impression on me, because I remembered it when I came across a copy while I was sorting through donations in the charity shop, so I had to buy it, and I’m very glad I did, because it’s an absolute gem.

This is a very slender novel – just 111 pages in my 1982 Penguin edition – but every word really counts: it’s a beautifully crafted little masterpiece, which should appeal to anyone who loves those understated, between-the-wars, English novels, where the focus is on thoughts and feelings rather than action. In fact, if the words ‘Winner of the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1980’ hadn’t been printed on the front cover, I would have assumed it was from that earlier period but, surprisingly, it was written in 1980.

But it’s set in 1920 as Tom Birkin, his marriage on the rocks and his nerves shot to pieces by the war, arrives in the Yorkshire village of Oxgodby to uncover and restore a long-lost medieval wall painting in the small, unassuming church. He sleeps and cooks in the historic building, while in the field next door Charles Moon, another scarred survivor of the conflict, has set up camp while he searches for a long-lost medieval grave. Both men are damaged, not just by their experiences in the war, but by life and love, and they seek healing from the horrors of the past.

They are being paid thanks to bequest left by a local spinster – though the Vicar, the chilliest clergyman I’ve encountered outside the pages of ‘Middlemarch’, is less than enthusiastic about the projects, believing the money could be better spent. And, just like George Eliot’s narrow-minded, mean-spirited Casaubon, this cleric also has a beautiful, young wife who is warm and caring, full of life and laughter, who befriends and beguiles Tom.

Gradually he makes friends and gets sucked into village life when the stationmaster (a leading light in the local chapel), his wife and their young daughter take him under their wing. But he becomes more and more obsessed with painting, which turns out to be a huge mural of the Day of Judgement, and is of the very highest quality. As he uncovers the picture, the vision of hell reflects the horrors and carnage he saw on the battlefields of Flanders, and more mysteries are revealed, for it was painted over within a few years of its creation (long before the Reformation) and one figure – a man with a crescent scar falling into hell – was covered earlier than the rest.

The painting inside the church becomes more real to him than life outside, and there is a link between the mural and the skeleton found by Moon, but when his quest ends Tom must move on – and, as you might guess from the title of the mural, there can be no happy ending, although he dreams of reaching an understanding with Alice.

He never returns to Oxgodby, never knows what happens to the friends he made while he was there, but many years later he looks back on the long, hot, golden summer, recalling the heat and the haze, the lazy days, the sights, sounds and smells of the English countryside. It was perfect, a rural idyll, and Tom remembers this period in his life as something whole and good, when he was happy and at peace with himself, while the village remains unchanging.

But there is nostalgia and regret for missed opportunities and a life that might have been different. In the end he makes to move to move his relationship with Alice beyond normal friendship – due, perhaps, to a kind of inertia or fear rather than any conscious desire to ‘do the right thing’.  And if things had been different, would he have been happy? That we will never know, but there is also the possibility that Tom has misread the situation, so by not acting or expressing his emotions he cannot be rejected.

In some ways ‘A Month in the Country’ reminded me of LP Hartley’s ‘The Go-Between’. There’s the obvious parallel of an older man looking back on his younger self, but I think it’s more to do with the feeling of nostalgia that suffuses the novel, and the sense of loss - loss of a place, and a time, loss of a more innocent past, and a future that never was. We never really learn what Tom makes of his life after Oxgodby, but you get the impression he is not happy, and that he never fulfils his potential.

A Mad Mother and a 'Well Hidden' Family

Queen Victoria was on the throne of England when William Peacock married Miranda Mirova. The couple are very young, barely out of childhood, but he is the precociously talented editor of a literary magazine and she is the most famous ballet dancer of generation. All goes well until baby Clare is born, when Miranda no longer wishes to dance, and develops an aversion to noise and crowds. As she becomes more and more isolated her behaviour becomes more and more strange. “We are not well hidden,” she tells her husband. She hears 'them' following her (though who 'they' are we never discover) and wanders the house at night to check all is safe.

Two other children, Hector and Viola, and William moves his family from London to the 'deserted decrepitude' of Prince's Acre, where Miranda is happy for a time. But there is a terrifying night when, because 'we are not well hidden', she takes the children outside and tries to cram Viola into a rabbit hole. After this Miranda is taken away and dies. William withdraws into himself and rarely leaves his study, so Clare, aided by faithful housekeeper Mrs Humble cares for her brother and sister, who are both disabled. Eventually, however, visitors from the outside world penetrate the family's enclosed life, and events take a tragic turn.

That's an over simplification of Rumour of Heaven, written by actress Beatrix Lehmann (the sister of novelist Rosamond) in 1934. It is, apparently, considered to be something of a curiosity rather than a great literary work, but I really enjoyed it, although it's a bit like the curate's egg – good in parts. But let us rejoin the family when Clare is 17, devoting her life to the well-being of her emotionally shattered father; Hector, who is what we would now call a person with learning difficulties; and Viola, who suffers from an unspecified debilitating disease.

Her own peace of mind is broken when she meets charismatic Max Ralston, who has written a book about a mysterious island paradise which may really exist, or may be a figment of his imagination. Then there is troubled Paul Millard, on the run from a failing marriage, fashionable Bohemian London, and his memories of WWI. He hopes to write a biography of his friend Roger, a poet, who once visited Prince's Acre. But he finds the real Roger slips away as he tries to record his own memories and talk to others about the Roger they knew.

Clare and her family seem to find reality just as hard to pin down: their house is like something in a fairy tale, dusty, overgrown, something out of time, yet perfect as it is, despite its faults. The two younger children live in a world of their own, unable to grasp the realities of everyday life, while Clare and her father seem to live in a dream, and you feel you could wake them, if only you could reach out and shake them.

Over it all lies the ghost of poor, mad Miranda (is one still allowed to call people mad I wonder, or is it politically incorrect, even when referring to a character in a novel written before the term was coined) whose presence can still be felt, although she is there for such a short time. Under the rafters of the barn is a 'ghost of a room' for Clare, where old ballet-shoes, made for feet half the size of her own, dangle on frayed ribbons.

The trunks in the corner had been dusted, and one, made of wicker, displayed the name 'Mirova' on its bursting side; and all were open and their maws foamed with overflowing treasures. Yellowed ruffles of tarlatan that time and repeated packing had not quelled. Miranda's ballet frocks sprang upwards like frosted cabbage leaves when the lid of the trunk had been lifted.

There are music scores, photographs, and books – gifts from long ago admirers – all ravaged by moths and mice, mementos of a make-believe world played out in the spotlight, but now hidden in the dark. But Miranda leaves a less tangible legacy, for her husband and children are still hidden away 'safe, all safe', unable to move forward and leave the world she created. And the emotional impact of her illness on those she loved is incalculable.

Her death is glossed over , so much so that I kept thinking she was still alive, incarcerated in an institution, and would re-appear at some stage, fully restored to her old self, but, of course, she never does. The cause of her condition is never explained. Is it a form of post-natal depression? Or is she bi-polar? Or schizophrenic? But her strange behaviour is described so touchingly, and quite sensitively, so I could feel her fear and desolation. Indeed, the relationships between the Peacock family were very tenderly portrayed.

I found Max and Paul less sympathetic, while Mrs Humble and the various rural yokels never came to life at all: they were caricatures, straight out of one of those pastoral novels that were once so popular (Mary Webb perhaps). And they speak in dialect, which is always difficult to handle well, although this may be done for comic effect.

Beatrix Lehmann as a young woman.

In fact nature has a role to play here, with weather and landscape echoing plot and feelings, and there are some excellent descriptive passages describing the sea and the scenery. However, there are other passages which are much more overblown (Mary Webb again I fear – I only mention her because Simon T at Stuck in Book recently wrote the most scathing and funny review of 'Gone to Earth'). And there are times when the plot itself seems akin to something Webb might have written – then, as it gets back on track, you start to wonder if it's parody, like 'Cold Comfort Farm', but somehow I don't think it is.

The tone of the novel is variable, and there are all sorts of themes to be unpicked, but overall, I think 'Rumour of Heaven' reads like a fairy tale, with a brief 'once upon a time' period when things are happy (or at least different), followed by a section that is part Cinderella, part Sleeping Beauty. But there is no real awakening for the Peacocks who survive tragedy, although there is a happy ending of sorts, even if you feel it is somewhat unreal.