Mock's Curse: Nineteen Stories

by T.F. Powys

213 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Theodore Francis Powys, published as T. F. Powys, was born in Shirley, Derbyshire, the son of the Reverend Charles Francis Powys (1843–1923), vicar of Montacute, Somerset, for 32 years, and Mary Cowper Johnson, grand-daughter of Dr John Johnson, cousin and close friend of the poet William Cowper. He was one of eleven talented siblings, including the novelist John Cowper Powys (1872–1963) and the novelist and essayist Llewelyn Powys (1884–1939).
A sensitive child, Powys was not happy in school and left when he was 15 to become an apprentice on a farm in Suffolk. Later he had his own farm in Suffolk, but he was not successful and returned to Dorset in 1901 with plans to be a writer. Then, in 1905, he married Violet Dodd. They had two sons and later adopted a daughter. From 1904 until 1940 Theodore Powys lived in East Chaldon but then moved to Mappowder because of the war.
During the Spanish Civil War (1936–39), Powys was one of several UK writers who campaigned for aid to be sent to the Republican side.
Powys was deeply, if unconventionally, religious; the Bible was a major influence, and he had a special affinity with writers of the 17th and 18th centuries, including John Bunyan, Miguel de Cervantes, Jeremy Taylor, Jonathan Swift, and Henry Fielding. Among more recent writers, he admired Thomas Hardy, Sigmund Freud, and Friedrich Nietzsche.
He died on 27 November 1953 in Mappowder, Dorset, where he was buried. [from wikipedia, adapted]

Reviews

[Terence · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw an edition of this at a used bookstore for $40. A bit pricey for me at this time but I'll probably cave in eventually.
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I can't explain better why to read Powys than to quote from John Gray's essay on him in The New Statesman:

“In their different ways, all three Powys brothers deserve retrieving or a wider readership, but none more so than Theodore. He is by far the best writer among them, and the most original. The greatest value of his work, though, is in showing that it is still possible to write about the primordial human experiences to which religion is a response. Secular writers tend to steer clear of them, and end up stuck in the shallows of politics or fashion. On the other hand, Christian writers are mostly precious and unpersuasive, like T.S. Eliot, or else more or less openly fraudulent, like Graham Greene. Very few 20th-century authors have the knack of writing convincingly of first and last things. A religious writer without any vestige of belief, Theodore Powys is one of them.”

The 19 stories in this collection take place in the same milieu as many of Powys’ other books – the countryside of England and they’re populated by the same cast of characters. All the stories are good but my favorites in this collection were:

“Mr. Pompey Seeks Preferment” – When the Parish Clerk’s position falls open upon the incumbent’s death Mr. Pompey sets out to obtain it by acting like a lost soul needing redemption. It’s a good example of Powys’ gentle humor and satire.

“Thou Shalt Commit” – This is a hilarious story about a husband and wife who strive to obey all of God’s commandments. The trouble is that they are in possession of one of the notorious “Wicked Bibles” of 1631, wherein the word “not” was omitted in the seventh commandment – “Thou shalt commit adultery.”

As with all of Powys’ works I’ve read so far, I can’t recommend this enough.