- Paperback: 256 pages
- Publisher: Harper Row (1987)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 006097074X
- ISBN-13: 978-0060970741
- Product Dimensions: 20.1 x 13.5 x 1.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 3,518,607 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
A Glass of Blessings (Virago Modern Classics)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
32 of 32 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
We are in 1950s London with an excellent cast of characters. The pathalogically domesticated Keith, forever washing down paintwork and boiling discloths in Tide; Father Thames, the gourmet priest with a penchant for Lapsang Souchong which can never be satisfied at parish get-togethers; and the kleptomaniac Wilf Bason, housekeeper at the clergy house, whose idea of a suitable meal for Lent is fried octopus; these are among the best.
Wilmet, the heroine, self-absorbed but aware to some extent of her failings, skims the surface of life without engaging with it. She is shocked out of her complacency by a series of events relating mainly to the novel's gay couple, Keith and Piers. When it was published, homosexuality was against the law, so it was a subversive element. However, it is handled with matter-of-factness, and there is very little Angst, except that Piers drinks more than is good for him, which could happen to any one.
Wilmet avoids being totally unsympathetic by the tone of her interior monologues, which have a lot in common with those of Miss Pym's spinster heroines - these include the references to Victorian literature and the interest in the details of other peoples' lives (as long as they are "people like us").
A top class Pym.
Wilmet, the heroine, self-absorbed but aware to some extent of her failings, skims the surface of life without engaging with it. She is shocked out of her complacency by a series of events relating mainly to the novel's gay couple, Keith and Piers. When it was published, homosexuality was against the law, so it was a subversive element. However, it is handled with matter-of-factness, and there is very little Angst, except that Piers drinks more than is good for him, which could happen to any one.
Wilmet avoids being totally unsympathetic by the tone of her interior monologues, which have a lot in common with those of Miss Pym's spinster heroines - these include the references to Victorian literature and the interest in the details of other peoples' lives (as long as they are "people like us").
A top class Pym.
9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I read an extract from "A Glass of Blessings" in "The Penguin Book of Gay Short Stories" where Barbara Pym is credited as being "one of the first English writers to include homosexual characters in her work without sensationalising or condemning them." What's equally remarkable is that when Pym wrote this novel,where a gay couple is presented in an entirely matter-of-fact manner, homosexuality was still a crime. Reading the whole book I was enchanted by the heroine, Wilmet Forsyth, 30-something, fashion-conscious, idle, bored, with an affluent and hard-working husband, an intellectual, do-gooding mother-in-law, and no less than three High Anglican priests to interest herself in! I can just picture Wilmet, in a classic 50s couture suit, fur stole, and high heels,taking a taxi to a ladies' lunch, and then going on to buy an elegant hat. But what makes her so appealing are her doubts, humour, self-awareness, and her recognition of her mistakes. She makes a cameo appearance too in "No Fond Return of Love", still secure and cherished, with her husband Rodney and the gay couple, Piers and Keith, all in attendance.
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Narrated by the shallow Wilmet, Glass of Blessings showcases Pym's wonderfully observant characterizations and contradictory impulses. Wilmet herself observes and comments but the reader soon learns that this self-absorbed woman is a narrator flawfully unself-aware. Pym includes deliciously witty commentary on class, church, and love through Wilmet's first person narration. No plot to speak of, naturally, but the question of Wilmet's realizing some understanding of love, of herself moves the reader through this sly wonderful novel, full of the blessings of Pym's irony.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
wonderfully comic - and wonderfully sad
Barbara Pym's novels gradually become closer to the bone - and much much sadder, while retaining a wonderful comic verve in terms of narrative and characterisation. Read more
Published 1 month ago by William Jordan
"The rarest of treasures ..."
Anne Tyler's observation that "Barbara Pym is the rarest of treasures; she reminds us of the heartbreaking silliness of everyday life' is wonderfully apposite. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Eric TM
Just wonderful
I have not yet finished the Pym collection, but I think that this is my favourite so far. Even better than Some Tame Gazelle!
Why have these books been forgotten?
Why have these books been forgotten?
Published 13 months ago by E. Watson
More than just funny
I've just come back to Barbara Pym after reading her with great pleasure about 20 years ago.
The thing that now strikes me is the underlying melancholy of this book. Read more
The thing that now strikes me is the underlying melancholy of this book. Read more
Published 22 months ago by M. READ
Overflowing Plesure
This is some of the very best of Barbara Pym: gently satiric or openly ironic, the range of characters often gives rise to humorous encounters in which the humour is apparent only... Read more
Published on 27 May 2010 by LFJ Hardwick
fall back in time
Our heroine this time surprises us with daring and foolhardy actions - all tempered with the standards she strives to keep up. Read more
Published on 16 Feb 2010 by Eleanor Cambridge
A glass of praise
A Glass of Blessings (along with Excellent Women) is one of my favourite Pym novels and certainly the funniest. Read more
Published on 26 Sep 2008 by T. Bently
Wilmet's blessings
Wilmet Forsyrh is an attractive woman in her 30's with not enough to do. She lives with her husband, Rodney, in her mother-in-law Sybil's house in London, and fills up her days... Read more
Published on 7 Oct 2000 by Lynette Baines
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