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#5 Platform - Linnets and Valerians
Dec. 10th, 2011 07:30 amA book that may have been self-consciously old-fashioned when it was first published a few decades ago.
Book: Linnets and Valerians
Author: Elizabeth Goudge
Provenance: Borrowed from Westmount Library
It's interesting to see what people thought made for a good children's book, oh, 50 something years ago. This isn't just in terms of the physical books - the copy I had was ridiculously solid by current standards, and had been read probably a hundred times, judging from the old card catalog card in the back, without even coming close to falling apart - but in terms of the content. This might be even more so for this story, which is set in a rural village in England pre-World War I, another 50 or so years before the book was written, and infused with a warm nostalgia for a simpler time.
The story follows the four Linnet children, Nan, Robert, Timothy, and Betsy, ranging from 12 to 6 years of age, whose father is off serving the Empire in India, and have been living with their tough, cold grandmother (drolly described as the sort of grandmother that doesn't exist anymore in the modern age). They escape from their house, commandeer a horse and carriage, and steal off to their uncle's house, where they are to be given an education and take it upon themselves to explore their new town, High Barton, and its secrets.
The story is pretty straightforward - the town has some sadnesses upon it that may be due to bad magic, and the children set out to discover how it's happened and why - and the characters are vividly and lucidly drawn. I found the story rather gentle and slow-paced, but it does move along; it's just that Goudge takes her time to describe the place and evoke the feel of her small English town and its inhabitants. The children, just by being good, energetic and inquisitive, are able to do quite a lot, with some assistance from the good adults of the village. How they change the town, and what the changes are, I won't say, although I did find it rather guessable. But then, it is a kid's book.
It's interesting as a time capsule, though. It's not just the characters: the friendly one-legged manservant of their uncle, the uncle with his large top hat and owl who just wants to spend his retirement writing and learning about ancient Greece, the lonely lady of the village in her mansion. Just the way the story's written, both in terms of word use (not to be puerile, but you really don't see people use ejaculate to mean exclaim anymore, or gay to mean happy) and the tone of the story, which is amiably suffused with magic, but does take its chances for straight-up moralizing directly at the reader, too.
I rather enjoyed the story, although it took a while to get through for the size of the book, but I think I enjoyed it more for the feel of it more than for the book itself. It's like getting into someone else's well-written nostalgia trip, and it's an queer feeling, to get another one of Goudge's phrases. If you do read it, or share it with your kids, just be prepared to explain how things have changed, and perhaps how they haven't.
Book: Linnets and Valerians
Author: Elizabeth Goudge
Provenance: Borrowed from Westmount Library
It's interesting to see what people thought made for a good children's book, oh, 50 something years ago. This isn't just in terms of the physical books - the copy I had was ridiculously solid by current standards, and had been read probably a hundred times, judging from the old card catalog card in the back, without even coming close to falling apart - but in terms of the content. This might be even more so for this story, which is set in a rural village in England pre-World War I, another 50 or so years before the book was written, and infused with a warm nostalgia for a simpler time.
The story follows the four Linnet children, Nan, Robert, Timothy, and Betsy, ranging from 12 to 6 years of age, whose father is off serving the Empire in India, and have been living with their tough, cold grandmother (drolly described as the sort of grandmother that doesn't exist anymore in the modern age). They escape from their house, commandeer a horse and carriage, and steal off to their uncle's house, where they are to be given an education and take it upon themselves to explore their new town, High Barton, and its secrets.
The story is pretty straightforward - the town has some sadnesses upon it that may be due to bad magic, and the children set out to discover how it's happened and why - and the characters are vividly and lucidly drawn. I found the story rather gentle and slow-paced, but it does move along; it's just that Goudge takes her time to describe the place and evoke the feel of her small English town and its inhabitants. The children, just by being good, energetic and inquisitive, are able to do quite a lot, with some assistance from the good adults of the village. How they change the town, and what the changes are, I won't say, although I did find it rather guessable. But then, it is a kid's book.
It's interesting as a time capsule, though. It's not just the characters: the friendly one-legged manservant of their uncle, the uncle with his large top hat and owl who just wants to spend his retirement writing and learning about ancient Greece, the lonely lady of the village in her mansion. Just the way the story's written, both in terms of word use (not to be puerile, but you really don't see people use ejaculate to mean exclaim anymore, or gay to mean happy) and the tone of the story, which is amiably suffused with magic, but does take its chances for straight-up moralizing directly at the reader, too.
I rather enjoyed the story, although it took a while to get through for the size of the book, but I think I enjoyed it more for the feel of it more than for the book itself. It's like getting into someone else's well-written nostalgia trip, and it's an queer feeling, to get another one of Goudge's phrases. If you do read it, or share it with your kids, just be prepared to explain how things have changed, and perhaps how they haven't.
