Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Virago UK (2012), Edition: Reprint, Hardcover, 272 pages
Description
The magnetic Evelyn Gresham, fifty-two, is a KC of considerable distinction. He has everything life could offer - a gracious riverside house in Berkshire, a beautiful grey-eyed wife Imogen, devoted to him and to their eleven-year-old son, a replica of his father. Their nearest neighbour is Blanche Silcox, a plain, tweed-wearing woman of fifty who rides, shoots, fishes, and drives a Rolls Royce - in every way the opposite of the domestic, loving Imogen. Their world is conventional country life at its most idyllic: how can its gentle surfaces be disturbed?
User reviews
LibraryThing member Kasthu
Imogen Gresham is 37, married to a very successful barrister. They have an eleven-year-old son, a rather beastly boy named Gavin. Imogen’s husband, Evelyn, develops a friendship with their neighbor, a wealthy fifty-something-year-old spinster named Blanche Silcox. She and Imogen are completely
Imogen is a domestic, preferring home over hunting or any of the other country pursuits that her husband engages in. It’s partly due to this as well that their relationship becomes fraught with tension. They have nothing in common, so it’s really no wonder that Evelyn turns to an older woman (one much closer in age to him than Imogen is) for, at the very least, friendship. It’s an odd affair; usually the femme fatale is a younger, not some staid, aging spinster. So the whole dynamic of the novel shifts. It’s perfectly natural that Evelyn and Blanche should become friends; but their relationship isn’t wholly natural. I still can’t quite figure things out.
What I loved about this book was Imogen’s reaction to the whole affair; it’s because of it, and her discovery of what’s going on, that she grows and matures as a person. When I began to read this novel, Imogen more or less faded into the background; she really wasn’t compelling enough as a main character, and so I really didn’t become attached to her right away. But the more I read, the more I liked her. She displays a quiet strength as she faces Evelyn and Blache’s affair hat I found quite admirable. I don’t think that a lot of people in her situation, with her kind of personality, would have the strength to do what she does in the end. And she gets major points for putting up with Evelyn for all those years! Elizabeth Jenkins has been compared to Jane Austen and Barbara Pym; there’s less humor in The Tortoise and the Hare, but it’s still a wonderful novel.
Elizabeth Jenkins was a biographer who was best known for her biographies of Elizabeth I and Jane Austen. She passed away last month, aged 105.
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opposite; and it’s Evelyn’s relationship with Blanche that colors the whole tone of his relationship with his wife.Imogen is a domestic, preferring home over hunting or any of the other country pursuits that her husband engages in. It’s partly due to this as well that their relationship becomes fraught with tension. They have nothing in common, so it’s really no wonder that Evelyn turns to an older woman (one much closer in age to him than Imogen is) for, at the very least, friendship. It’s an odd affair; usually the femme fatale is a younger, not some staid, aging spinster. So the whole dynamic of the novel shifts. It’s perfectly natural that Evelyn and Blanche should become friends; but their relationship isn’t wholly natural. I still can’t quite figure things out.
What I loved about this book was Imogen’s reaction to the whole affair; it’s because of it, and her discovery of what’s going on, that she grows and matures as a person. When I began to read this novel, Imogen more or less faded into the background; she really wasn’t compelling enough as a main character, and so I really didn’t become attached to her right away. But the more I read, the more I liked her. She displays a quiet strength as she faces Evelyn and Blache’s affair hat I found quite admirable. I don’t think that a lot of people in her situation, with her kind of personality, would have the strength to do what she does in the end. And she gets major points for putting up with Evelyn for all those years! Elizabeth Jenkins has been compared to Jane Austen and Barbara Pym; there’s less humor in The Tortoise and the Hare, but it’s still a wonderful novel.
Elizabeth Jenkins was a biographer who was best known for her biographies of Elizabeth I and Jane Austen. She passed away last month, aged 105.
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LibraryThing member LyzzyBee
(21 January 2012 – from Ali for my birthday)
This is a gorgeous Virago hardback edition (you can see it on the photo, second from the left on the front row. SO pretty. Imogen is married to Eveylyn Gresham, a barrister a good few years older than her who is Not Particularly Nice, but exerts a
The psychological suspense is almost unbearable – you want to probe the situation like you would a slightly sore tooth or a mild bruise. Redemption comes through the most unlikely of sources, and only once you’ve been put through the wringer. It is rather Elizabeth Taylorian (even being set near Reading) and, to put it mildly, exquisite.
This is a gorgeous Virago hardback edition (you can see it on the photo, second from the left on the front row. SO pretty. Imogen is married to Eveylyn Gresham, a barrister a good few years older than her who is Not Particularly Nice, but exerts a
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traditional patriarchal and also sexual hold over her. She keeps up her end of the marital bargain by being decorative (which she was obviously raised to be) and trying to run the house and family smoothly (not so successfully), buoyed up only by her flirtatious relationship with old friend, Paul, and her sustaining friendship with Cecil (who is a lady with a man’s name, contrasting nicely with Evelyn’s bi-gendered name). Enter Blanche Silcox, bluff and gruff in her ill-fitting tweeds, and elderly at 50, who is, it seems, determined to prise Evelyn away from Imogen. The women thus far mentioned are contrasted with a terrifying poetess who operates entirely through her physicality, a brittle wife and a neglectful mother: no one comes out of this particularly well.The psychological suspense is almost unbearable – you want to probe the situation like you would a slightly sore tooth or a mild bruise. Redemption comes through the most unlikely of sources, and only once you’ve been put through the wringer. It is rather Elizabeth Taylorian (even being set near Reading) and, to put it mildly, exquisite.
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LibraryThing member brenzi
Ohhhh my, this book may be the most devastating portrait of the unraveling of a marriage that I've ever read. Written in 1954, it's a slow burning look at the ways a man can belittle and abandon his wife without her even being aware of it, or at least not at first. Evelyn Gresham is a handsome 52
What I liked best was Jenkins way of slowly revealing the way this marriage was falling apart, and how Imogen seemed to operate with blinders on, continuing to cater to Evelyn's every wish and failing to realize what the reader can plainly see. The writing is both humorous and tragic in the way the plot is slowly developed. But this author can take down a character like nothing I've ever seen. Blanche's stepsister, Marcia for instance:
"Marcia Plender was short, plump and middle-aged. She was also excessively feminine, but so far from throwing her stepsister in the shade on this account whatever she might've done when both were girls, she now acted as a foil to her, though one would have been as far from suspecting it as the other. Marcia took great care of her person and appearance though she had allowed herself to get fat. As her constitution required her to rest in bed till half-past twelve and drink two double gins before lunch, it was difficult for her to avoid increasing weight....The assured, formidable appearance, combined with a sugary air, fluttering eyelids and die-away voice, made the beholder turn to Blanche with relief and even a sort of admiration. Blanche's abruptness and half-strangulated accents were not charming, but they were a great deal better than Marcia's efforts at charming" (Page75)
The minor characters are just as fully developed as the three protagonists and the ending knocked my socks off, but in a 2ay that made me think, "Oh, of course, all signs pointed to this. I should've known."
Just an absolutely brilliant book.
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year old lawyer who has everything he wants, including his doting wife Imogen and his 11 year old son. Their neighbor, near their large country estate, Blanche is everything Imogen isn't: unattractive and in her 50s, but athletic and interested in fishing, hunting, racing and other masculine things. What I liked best was Jenkins way of slowly revealing the way this marriage was falling apart, and how Imogen seemed to operate with blinders on, continuing to cater to Evelyn's every wish and failing to realize what the reader can plainly see. The writing is both humorous and tragic in the way the plot is slowly developed. But this author can take down a character like nothing I've ever seen. Blanche's stepsister, Marcia for instance:
"Marcia Plender was short, plump and middle-aged. She was also excessively feminine, but so far from throwing her stepsister in the shade on this account whatever she might've done when both were girls, she now acted as a foil to her, though one would have been as far from suspecting it as the other. Marcia took great care of her person and appearance though she had allowed herself to get fat. As her constitution required her to rest in bed till half-past twelve and drink two double gins before lunch, it was difficult for her to avoid increasing weight....The assured, formidable appearance, combined with a sugary air, fluttering eyelids and die-away voice, made the beholder turn to Blanche with relief and even a sort of admiration. Blanche's abruptness and half-strangulated accents were not charming, but they were a great deal better than Marcia's efforts at charming" (Page75)
The minor characters are just as fully developed as the three protagonists and the ending knocked my socks off, but in a 2ay that made me think, "Oh, of course, all signs pointed to this. I should've known."
Just an absolutely brilliant book.
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LibraryThing member mahallett
sad, very interesting.
i loved the red stockings on the cover.
i loved the red stockings on the cover.
LibraryThing member Crazymamie
This is a Virago edition. Love those. It's a slow starter, and I thought it might be a DNF for me because I was just not getting into the story - it really needs 50 or so pages and then it picks up. It's the unwinding of a marriage, and it is just so well done. I wanted to lecture the main
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character, Imogene, and explain that we teach people how to treat us. Don't put up with this. Speak up. Be brave. When push comes to shove, always shove! But alas, Imogene and I do not have the same temperaments or personalities. In frustration, I actually did something I never do - I turned to the final pages and read the ending before continuing. The ending saved it for me. Anyway, it's brilliant in how it shows us the marriage from different vantage points. This one is not about the plot; it's more of a character study, so you will need patience, but it is worthy. Show Less
LibraryThing member lauralkeet
Imogen is the young, attractive wife of Evelyn Gresham, a London barrister, and mother to their son Gavin. At 52, Evelyn is much older than Imogen, and his career success has made them comfortably well off. Imogen is devoted to Evelyn, keeping house and making sure his meals and other needs are
Reality dawns slowly, acceptance even more so. As her marriage unravels, Imogen must decide the shape of her future. Locked in the societal norms of the 1950s, she has options but saying and doing are two different things. Support from friends and an unlikely ally make for an unconventional outcome. Elizabeth Jenkins delivers a fairly balanced character study: Evelyn comes across as a fairly decent guy who cares about his family, even Blanche Silcox has her merits, and all three played a part in the ultimate fate of the marriage.
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attended to. But Evelyn has struck up a friendship with neighbor Blanche Silcox, who fills an emotional void in his life. Imogen is initially dismissive of Blanche; after all, she is older and plain in her appearance. But the reader sees what Imogen does not: Evelyn is finding reasons to spend time with Blanche, and to stay in London “for work” instead of coming home. Reality dawns slowly, acceptance even more so. As her marriage unravels, Imogen must decide the shape of her future. Locked in the societal norms of the 1950s, she has options but saying and doing are two different things. Support from friends and an unlikely ally make for an unconventional outcome. Elizabeth Jenkins delivers a fairly balanced character study: Evelyn comes across as a fairly decent guy who cares about his family, even Blanche Silcox has her merits, and all three played a part in the ultimate fate of the marriage.
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Language
Original publication date
1954
Physical description
272 p.; 5.12 inches
ISBN
1844087476 / 9781844087471