Homework

       "The telephone called Rose from the bathroom where she was meeting her Waterloo with a tin of Vim." The war made unlooked-for demands on many people, not least housewives who were forced to do without the domestic help they'd considered indispensable. So in Winifred Peck's novel House-Bound, Rose Fairlaw takes to the job of looking after her own large home with the aforesaid Vim, vigour and enthusiasm, albeit without a jot of experience or knowledge of the art.

      Set against the backdrop of Rose's growing acquaintance with sheer drudgery, where she comes to view her home as a master to be appeased at all costs, this intriguing book examines more crucially another interpretation of the term 'house-bound': emotionally constrained. Rose sees herself and her family as "tethered inexorably to a collection of all the extinct memories and .... inhibitions with which they had grown up, bits of mental furniture which they dusted and inspected daily."

      It is in the melting-pot of wartime, where attitudes and standards are broken down and re-formed, that events occur which force Rose and her family to break free of their emotional ligatures. While years before, Rose's mother had been "...exquisitely secure over her petit-point in a world that was made for her...", her daughter is part of a changing order, forced to wonder "how are we all to get out?" when she recognises the extent of her predicament, and then, through processes both intensely painful and uplifting, to find the answer to her question.

      Set in Edinburgh, or "Castleburgh" as it's called, and first published in 1942, this edition comes with an Afterword written by Penelope Fitzgerald, Winifred Peck's niece. While being sharp and funny, particularly on social observation, it's a book full of thought, insight and understanding - as are so many fellow Persephone titles - of the sensibilities of women.

Comments

[a simple yarn]

So Karen, are you going to start a lending library for all these wonderful books you've been reviewing of late? I'm not sure my household budget can stand the strain of all these titles I should be getting!

[Simon]

Ok, you've twisted my arm. My next Persephone order will be going in within the next few days. Probably including Miss Peck - I have another of hers on my shelf at home, 'A Clear Dawn', but I've not read it. I bought it simply because I thought, after Winifred Watson, anyone with the name Winifred must be a good writer.

[tara]

Karen, thank you for giving such a clear picture of the endpapers. I do love them and they seem to perfectly compliment this book - Persephone pays such close attention to every detail, don't they. This one is on my shortlist; I'm hoping some arrive here for Mother's day. Or should I say, some had better arrive here for Mother's day!

[Peg]

I learned something today - end papers. They are beautiful and I love the fact that women seem to show their better side when pushed to the wall!