Red Pottage
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Product Description
Product Description
"I will break it off," says Hugh Scarlett to himself. "Thank Heaven, not a soul has ever guessed it."
He thinks of the day he first met her, when he looked upon her as merely a pretty woman. He recalls their other days together, and the gradual building up between them of a fairy palace. He added a stone here, she a stone there -- until suddenly it became a prison. Had he been tempter, or tempted? He cannot say. He wants only to be out of it. His infatuation has run its course. His judgment has been whirled -- he tells himself it had been whirled, but had it really only been tweaked? -- from its center. It performed its giddy orbit, and now the check-string has brought it back to the point from whence it had set out -- namely, that she is merely a pretty woman.
Yet nothing in life is simple. Lord Newhaven suspects -- or more than suspects: for he introduces the modern equivalent of the duel! And Hugh has had a vision of hope for the future, in a sympathetic soul -- in the eyes of Rachel West.
Novelist Mary Cholmondeley (1859-1925) was author of such satiric novels of middle-class life as Moth and Rust and Diana Tempest.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is by the little-known (today at any rate) Mary Cholmondely and often regarded as an autobiographical novel. It is metafictional in that it is a story about a writer creating a story. In 1899 it was a best-seller.
Hester is regarded as a spinster at the age of 27 and enjoys a "romantic friendship" with her friend Rachel (they are very close friends but no more than friends). Hester is writing a second novel after being successfully received with her first offering.Hester's book is so important to her that she regards it more as her child then simply a novel, and is totally consumed by it. She lives in an enclosed world of her brother's vicarage with his family, and her brother cannot believe that Hester's work is of any use partly because she is a woman and partly because he himself is a much superior author. (In fact he is boring and repetitive - Vineta Colby writes that Hester is "as sensitive, intelligent, witty and gifted as her brother is callow, bigoted,
humourless, and stupid.")
Her family cannot understand why she is so tired all the time, and regard her as lazy but in fact she is working all the hours of the night to write her novel, as she gets no peace from her brother's family during the day. She is extremely fond of her nephew Regie but nothing compares to her work. Cholmondely herself was a passionate writer who suffered all her life from debilitating illness. Hester is frustrated by the society around her which dictates social calls as the domain of the woman, a reflection of Cholmondely's bitterness at her own lack of education perhaps. Hester's writing is of no importance to her family who believe she should do more for them, their children. Her sister-in-law Minna thinks that Hester goes out of her way to vex her, and is a little envious of Hester's grace, superior social standing and intelligence.
Within the story there is also an intriguing plotline of a bet between two men who love the same woman - whoever loses the bet must die.
An important book in the world of New Woman fiction, Hester's story is one which will capture your heart. I loved not only the story but also the setting of the Vicarage in the village of Warpington. I really recommend this book, a great read!
Hester is regarded as a spinster at the age of 27 and enjoys a "romantic friendship" with her friend Rachel (they are very close friends but no more than friends). Hester is writing a second novel after being successfully received with her first offering.Hester's book is so important to her that she regards it more as her child then simply a novel, and is totally consumed by it. She lives in an enclosed world of her brother's vicarage with his family, and her brother cannot believe that Hester's work is of any use partly because she is a woman and partly because he himself is a much superior author. (In fact he is boring and repetitive - Vineta Colby writes that Hester is "as sensitive, intelligent, witty and gifted as her brother is callow, bigoted,
humourless, and stupid.")
Her family cannot understand why she is so tired all the time, and regard her as lazy but in fact she is working all the hours of the night to write her novel, as she gets no peace from her brother's family during the day. She is extremely fond of her nephew Regie but nothing compares to her work. Cholmondely herself was a passionate writer who suffered all her life from debilitating illness. Hester is frustrated by the society around her which dictates social calls as the domain of the woman, a reflection of Cholmondely's bitterness at her own lack of education perhaps. Hester's writing is of no importance to her family who believe she should do more for them, their children. Her sister-in-law Minna thinks that Hester goes out of her way to vex her, and is a little envious of Hester's grace, superior social standing and intelligence.
Within the story there is also an intriguing plotline of a bet between two men who love the same woman - whoever loses the bet must die.
An important book in the world of New Woman fiction, Hester's story is one which will capture your heart. I loved not only the story but also the setting of the Vicarage in the village of Warpington. I really recommend this book, a great read!
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