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Letter
Autumn, and soon it will be dark when we shut the shop. It’s the time
of year when people who live in cities forget about the countryside for six
months and rediscover winter evenings reading, listening to music and toasting
teacakes in front of the fire; thoughts of gardens vanish for another year
and houses become more important. In fact those Persephone readers who have
bought Gardener’s Nightcap will
be following Muriel Stuart’s advice: ‘The tidy gardener who reduces
his garden to a tidy level every autumn is dallying with many lives. In Nature
the dried stems and withered leaves stand above the plant, protecting it from
frost, and from the winds that dry the roots.’ In other words, Muriel
Stuart believes, leave well alone - the dead foliage should remain as protection
for what is about to grow.
Sadly, many houses close for the winter but we recommend a visit before the end
of October to a wonderful trio: Charleston, Mr
Straw’s House, and Carlyle’s
House. (Even if you cannot get to the latter before November, you will still
enjoy The Carlyles at Home.)
Do look at the EDGE reviews of The
Runaway and Someone
at a Distance. We love Jason Salzenstein’s opening remark to his
review of the latter: ‘I don’t know if I’m a complete feminist
(or was in a former life) or what, but there isn’t a book in Persephone’s
collection that I haven’t liked.’ And he concludes, ‘True,
all of the books in the Persephone collection are interesting, engaging, and
well-written - Someone at
a Distance however has that special something extra that sets it apart.
It’s a rare find.’
A rare find for us is one of our books being subjected to the rigorous analysis
of a literary critic. In the chapter on the 1930s in the Cambridge History
of Twentieth Century English Literature Rod Mengham writes: ‘In Julia
Strachey’s vivacious satire on the English, Cheerful
Weather for the Wedding, it is in the home that the most exotic discoveries
are to be made [and] an alarming accumulation of “home truths” about
the Thatchams renders their facade of gentility completely unsustainable.’ Dolly
spilling the black ink, and the rust spots on the mirror, apparently symbolise ‘the
family’s disgrace [seeming] to be lurking in their very attempts to secure
respectability.’ Even while laughing at the Thatchams’ house Julia
Strachey describes its every detail. Reading Cheerful
Weather for the Wedding and going to see Charleston or Carlyle’s
House would be an interesting counterpoint.
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Carlyle's House
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Two other October treats: A Rambling Fancy: in the footsteps of Jane Austen by
Caroline Sanderson, an excellent book by a great Persephone fan; and an exhibition
at the St Barbe Gallery in Lymington, Hampshire, ‘Evelyn Dunbar: War
and Country’ - if you like Persephone books you will like the work of Evelyn
Dunbar. Less of a treat but an essential read: ‘March of the Clone
Towns’, an incisive article by Mark Lynas in the New
Statesman.
Nicola Beauman
30 September 2006
59 Lamb’s Conduit Street | 
