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The small widow
Harold s death leaves Julia a widow, alone and struggling with grief as well as with her new life. How can she begin to build new relationships with her friends, what does she now owe to her children, or they to her For the first time Julia has to learn independence, she needs to discover who she is when she is no longer a wife and is now a mother to children who do not need her. Can Julia find a freedom, an identity, which has never existed in her life before Janet McNeill is one of the great writers of the disillusions of middle age, her wry humour and compassion builds a spare and moving world, while her perceptive and intelligent writing is honest and unflinching in its understanding of the emotional conflicts of family life and the ironies of ordinary life.
221 pages, Unknown Binding
First published January 1, 1967
40 people want to read
About the author
Janet McNeill
71 books9 followersJanet McNeill was born in Dublin in 1907 and spent many years in Northern Ireland. Author of more than 20 children's books, as well as adult novels, plays, and two opera libretti, she was best known for her children's comic fantasy series My Friend Specs McCann.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
December 19, 2018
“‘I don’t feel anything,’ she said, ‘not anything at all. It isn’t that I’m trying not to. I want to feel something, even though Harold mightn’t have wished me to. But I just go on in an empty muddled kind of way, getting impatient because I’m always waiting for some piercing grief that doesn’t come.’”
Harold, Julia Stevens’s husband of 33 years, dies suddenly at the age of 60. An academic, a veteran of World War II, and a POW, he and his cousin, Madge, were among a group to be honoured at the Royal Albert Hall for their wartime efforts. Harold supposedly collapsed, perhaps from a heart attack, at some point during the ceremony. Julia was supposed to be watching the televised event; so were her four children and Madge’s brother, but all were too busy, each in his or her own way, to tune in. There is a certain mystery around Harold’s death, and Julia will later try to get Madge (a witness) to tell her about it.
I don’t want to give the wrong impression here: This book is NOT a mystery, though secrets do surface by the end. I do want to say that the book is a study of “bereavement”, but I’m afraid that also gives the wrong impression, for this is not a story about intense mourning. Julia does not feel loss so much as lost or unmoored. She not saddened but cynical, too often hearing the uncharitable, petty—“small”—voice within that criticizes others quite mercilessly. (Some of it makes for delicious reading.) Her husband’s death provokes not grief (which everyone seems to expect) so much as a dramatic role change. No longer is Julia the little woman to Harold’s big man. Her relationships with her four adult children will undergo adjustments.
Initially, Julia is prescribed tranquillizers to help her sleep. She also contracts influenza from a couple of door-to-door Jehovah Witness types. The flu will lay her up over Christmas—“good tidings of great joy” to family members, who all actually prefer to make their own Christmas anyway. When Julia is finally feeling better, she goes on a mad shopping spree, her mood becoming almost manic as the purchases add up. At the last minute, however, she collapses in a flood of tears, and a taxi has to be engaged to send her home. Because she’s losing control of herself, “the small widow” is required to spend time at the homes of her two eldest children and their families. (Her younger son and daughter, who have flats in the family home, seem to feel they’ve already done their bit.) Harold’s cousins, Lionel and Madge, also have important parts to play in the story. Unkempt Madge, always an odd duck, runs her own gardening business and seems to be closer to her dogs than to humans. She will become increasingly “drunk and disorderly” as the novel unfolds, showing up at Julia’s home at all hours. There is something very important she needs to communicate . . .
The first two-thirds of The Small Widow is brilliantly written and often very funny. It is full of Julia’s sharp, unvarnished observations about marriage, motherhood, ageing, the sublimation of one person—a wife— into the world of a larger-than-life husband. Her unsettled state after Harold’s death is, for the most part, compellingly and convincingly portrayed. However, the final third of the novel feels rushed and rather weak. Coming too hard and too fast, the denouement feels unnecessarily melodramatic. Nevertheless, I still found this a stimulating, insightful, and enjoyable novel.
Rating: 3.5
Harold, Julia Stevens’s husband of 33 years, dies suddenly at the age of 60. An academic, a veteran of World War II, and a POW, he and his cousin, Madge, were among a group to be honoured at the Royal Albert Hall for their wartime efforts. Harold supposedly collapsed, perhaps from a heart attack, at some point during the ceremony. Julia was supposed to be watching the televised event; so were her four children and Madge’s brother, but all were too busy, each in his or her own way, to tune in. There is a certain mystery around Harold’s death, and Julia will later try to get Madge (a witness) to tell her about it.
I don’t want to give the wrong impression here: This book is NOT a mystery, though secrets do surface by the end. I do want to say that the book is a study of “bereavement”, but I’m afraid that also gives the wrong impression, for this is not a story about intense mourning. Julia does not feel loss so much as lost or unmoored. She not saddened but cynical, too often hearing the uncharitable, petty—“small”—voice within that criticizes others quite mercilessly. (Some of it makes for delicious reading.) Her husband’s death provokes not grief (which everyone seems to expect) so much as a dramatic role change. No longer is Julia the little woman to Harold’s big man. Her relationships with her four adult children will undergo adjustments.
Initially, Julia is prescribed tranquillizers to help her sleep. She also contracts influenza from a couple of door-to-door Jehovah Witness types. The flu will lay her up over Christmas—“good tidings of great joy” to family members, who all actually prefer to make their own Christmas anyway. When Julia is finally feeling better, she goes on a mad shopping spree, her mood becoming almost manic as the purchases add up. At the last minute, however, she collapses in a flood of tears, and a taxi has to be engaged to send her home. Because she’s losing control of herself, “the small widow” is required to spend time at the homes of her two eldest children and their families. (Her younger son and daughter, who have flats in the family home, seem to feel they’ve already done their bit.) Harold’s cousins, Lionel and Madge, also have important parts to play in the story. Unkempt Madge, always an odd duck, runs her own gardening business and seems to be closer to her dogs than to humans. She will become increasingly “drunk and disorderly” as the novel unfolds, showing up at Julia’s home at all hours. There is something very important she needs to communicate . . .
The first two-thirds of The Small Widow is brilliantly written and often very funny. It is full of Julia’s sharp, unvarnished observations about marriage, motherhood, ageing, the sublimation of one person—a wife— into the world of a larger-than-life husband. Her unsettled state after Harold’s death is, for the most part, compellingly and convincingly portrayed. However, the final third of the novel feels rushed and rather weak. Coming too hard and too fast, the denouement feels unnecessarily melodramatic. Nevertheless, I still found this a stimulating, insightful, and enjoyable novel.
Rating: 3.5
January 3, 2019
Irish writer Janet McNeill seems to be unjustly underappreciated. Whilst a prolific author, publishing ten novels for adults and penning a whole host of radio plays, it is her children's books for which she is most well known - and for those, she seems to be barely remembered. She has intrigued me ever since I saw her single title, Tea at Four o' Clock, represented on the Virago Modern Classics list. Whilst I was unable to find a copy of the aforementioned in time for my book club's monthly author selection, I got my hands on a copy of The Small Widow, and am so pleased that I did.
Fortnight writes of McNeill's work favourably, and draws parallels between her and 'English novelists such as Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor. What their writing shares... is a subtlety which makes demands of its readers.' These three are all novelists whom I very much enjoy reading, and I have adored everything of Taylor's which I have read to date. I was therefore most excited to begin The Small Widow.
The novel's protagonist is a middle-aged woman named Julia, who has been left a widow after the death of her husband Harold. She is 'alone and struggling with grief as well as her new life.' She is a mother to four children, none of whom she feels overly comfortable in interacting with, as their relationships have shifted so much since their childhoods. For the first time, she 'has to learn independence, she needs to discover who she is when she is no longer a wife and is now a mother to children who do not need her.' The central question which the novel asks is this: 'As a widow can Julia find a freedom, an identity, which has never existed in her life before?'
The novel opens with Harold's funeral: 'The car slowed, they were approaching the gates. Julia's throat tightened, the impossible thing is happening now... She ached to escape from the pressure of her daughters' hips, the inevitability of shared warmth and the threat of shared emotion.' The funeral scene is vivid: 'The mourners formed into an untidy procession and started in the direction of the grave, trying to find a pace between a stroll and a trot. The raw wind robbed them of any attempt at dignity. It plucked their hair and their clothes, snatched the breath out of their mouths and ruffled the tufts of frozen grass. Only the humped shapes of the dead were undisturbed.' McNeill goes on to probe Julia's conflicting emotions about her sudden loss. At this point in time, when everything is raw and new, she sees her children as '... four relentless and dedicated orphans, demanding a formal come-back from her, the Mother Figure, whom they had discarded years ago. It wasn't fair. Julia felt that she needed protection from them.'
The Small Widow is told using the third person omniscient perspective, which has been interspersed with Julia's opinions and concerns. In this way, McNeill makes us party to Julia's innermost thoughts, and the secretive, one-sided conversations which she imagines with her husband: 'I'll do my mourning for you later, Harold. Just now I am getting through this the best way I can. You could have coped magnificently with my funeral, Harold. I don't know how to cope with yours.' These asides continue throughout the book, and are particularly poignant when Julia considers her children. Of her son, Johnnie, who lives in an outbuilding on her property, and runs a small bookshop, she thinks: 'To him I'm not a person in the ordinary sense of the word. I was typecast the minute the cord was cut. I have been drained and diminished by motherhood. I am a collection of attitudes, a pocket-sized matriarch whom it is traditional to have around... It doesn't help these self-made creatures to remember they are the children of my body. I have done my job. I am allowed, expected, to love them still, but at a decent distance.'
Julia's concerns do not just affect her family. Some of them are deeply personal, and seem trivial at first to outsiders. She therefore keeps her grievances private, sometimes excruciatingly so. She is forced to make all sorts of adjustments, and get used to the absence of things which she has grown so accustomed to throughout her long marriage. For instance, 'During the day the uninhabited area of the bed made her embarrassed. One didn't think of bereavement as posing problems like this. One expected anguish, not embarrassment. (I shall feel anguish in a week or two, Harold, just now there isn't anything much that I feel. It was puzzling to know what to do about the space here and all through the house that Harold used to occupy. Presumably time would spill over and close the gaps, like the bark of a tree when it has been cut.' She develops coping mechanisms; if she does not move from her place on the sofa or in bed for the entirety of the day, for example, 'she wouldn't notice that she was by herself.'
The Small Widow was first published in 1967, and was the only book which McNeill wrote whilst living outside Northern Ireland. In the novel, she 'anticipates many of the concerns of the 1970's women's movement in its awareness of the restricted role of women in the traditional family and marriage.' I liked the way in which McNeill pushed against these limitations, giving Julia a voice and authority of her own, which built as the novel went on. I found myself rooting for our central character, who rises above the opinions which others around her hold of women in her particular position, and the demands which they often make upon her. The Small Widow feels far more modern, in many ways, than it is; Julia's concerns are still prevalent in today's society, particularly with regard to loneliness, and the shifting relationships between parents and their grown children. The familial relationships here are revealing, and have a complexity to them; they shift both with time, and as a consequence of Julia finding her voice.
As a character portrait, The Small Widow is striking. Throughout, Julia has a great deal of depth to her, and I found her surprising rather than predictable. Her character arc alters believably due to her circumstances. On the basis of this well-sculpted novel, it is evident why one of her books has been published by Virago; it is just a shame that more haven't followed suit.
Fortnight writes of McNeill's work favourably, and draws parallels between her and 'English novelists such as Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor. What their writing shares... is a subtlety which makes demands of its readers.' These three are all novelists whom I very much enjoy reading, and I have adored everything of Taylor's which I have read to date. I was therefore most excited to begin The Small Widow.
The novel's protagonist is a middle-aged woman named Julia, who has been left a widow after the death of her husband Harold. She is 'alone and struggling with grief as well as her new life.' She is a mother to four children, none of whom she feels overly comfortable in interacting with, as their relationships have shifted so much since their childhoods. For the first time, she 'has to learn independence, she needs to discover who she is when she is no longer a wife and is now a mother to children who do not need her.' The central question which the novel asks is this: 'As a widow can Julia find a freedom, an identity, which has never existed in her life before?'
The novel opens with Harold's funeral: 'The car slowed, they were approaching the gates. Julia's throat tightened, the impossible thing is happening now... She ached to escape from the pressure of her daughters' hips, the inevitability of shared warmth and the threat of shared emotion.' The funeral scene is vivid: 'The mourners formed into an untidy procession and started in the direction of the grave, trying to find a pace between a stroll and a trot. The raw wind robbed them of any attempt at dignity. It plucked their hair and their clothes, snatched the breath out of their mouths and ruffled the tufts of frozen grass. Only the humped shapes of the dead were undisturbed.' McNeill goes on to probe Julia's conflicting emotions about her sudden loss. At this point in time, when everything is raw and new, she sees her children as '... four relentless and dedicated orphans, demanding a formal come-back from her, the Mother Figure, whom they had discarded years ago. It wasn't fair. Julia felt that she needed protection from them.'
The Small Widow is told using the third person omniscient perspective, which has been interspersed with Julia's opinions and concerns. In this way, McNeill makes us party to Julia's innermost thoughts, and the secretive, one-sided conversations which she imagines with her husband: 'I'll do my mourning for you later, Harold. Just now I am getting through this the best way I can. You could have coped magnificently with my funeral, Harold. I don't know how to cope with yours.' These asides continue throughout the book, and are particularly poignant when Julia considers her children. Of her son, Johnnie, who lives in an outbuilding on her property, and runs a small bookshop, she thinks: 'To him I'm not a person in the ordinary sense of the word. I was typecast the minute the cord was cut. I have been drained and diminished by motherhood. I am a collection of attitudes, a pocket-sized matriarch whom it is traditional to have around... It doesn't help these self-made creatures to remember they are the children of my body. I have done my job. I am allowed, expected, to love them still, but at a decent distance.'
Julia's concerns do not just affect her family. Some of them are deeply personal, and seem trivial at first to outsiders. She therefore keeps her grievances private, sometimes excruciatingly so. She is forced to make all sorts of adjustments, and get used to the absence of things which she has grown so accustomed to throughout her long marriage. For instance, 'During the day the uninhabited area of the bed made her embarrassed. One didn't think of bereavement as posing problems like this. One expected anguish, not embarrassment. (I shall feel anguish in a week or two, Harold, just now there isn't anything much that I feel. It was puzzling to know what to do about the space here and all through the house that Harold used to occupy. Presumably time would spill over and close the gaps, like the bark of a tree when it has been cut.' She develops coping mechanisms; if she does not move from her place on the sofa or in bed for the entirety of the day, for example, 'she wouldn't notice that she was by herself.'
The Small Widow was first published in 1967, and was the only book which McNeill wrote whilst living outside Northern Ireland. In the novel, she 'anticipates many of the concerns of the 1970's women's movement in its awareness of the restricted role of women in the traditional family and marriage.' I liked the way in which McNeill pushed against these limitations, giving Julia a voice and authority of her own, which built as the novel went on. I found myself rooting for our central character, who rises above the opinions which others around her hold of women in her particular position, and the demands which they often make upon her. The Small Widow feels far more modern, in many ways, than it is; Julia's concerns are still prevalent in today's society, particularly with regard to loneliness, and the shifting relationships between parents and their grown children. The familial relationships here are revealing, and have a complexity to them; they shift both with time, and as a consequence of Julia finding her voice.
As a character portrait, The Small Widow is striking. Throughout, Julia has a great deal of depth to her, and I found her surprising rather than predictable. Her character arc alters believably due to her circumstances. On the basis of this well-sculpted novel, it is evident why one of her books has been published by Virago; it is just a shame that more haven't followed suit.
February 9, 2016
There are a great many books sitting on my Virago bookcase, double-banked because shelf space is desperately lacking, and so it if horribly easy for ‘one Virago’ authors to get lost behind the authors who had a few or a great many titles reissued.
Janet McNeill is one such ‘one Virago’ author, and I always liked the look of ‘Tea at Four O’Clock, I always meant to read it, but I lost sight of it only to remember when I saw another book, reissued by another publishing house, sitting on a shelf in the library.
I picked it up.
The story opens when Julia has just become a widow; at the funeral of Harold, her husband of thirty-two years. She is following the steps that she knows that she must follow, but she isn’t quite sure that she is acting as she should, feeling as she should.
12145597Julia had been happy to be cast as wife and mother, but suddenly she had to learn to play a new role that she hadn’t expected or wanted. Her husband was gone, her children were grown, and there was nothing to fill the space that was left.
Janet McNeill captures her situation beautifully, understanding the subtle changes in Julia’s different relationships with children, friends, and other family members; and appreciating that there would be missteps and frustrations as the new widow tried to come to terms with her new life.
She reminded me of something that my mother said to me not long after she was widowed. She said that many people were – or tried to be – kind – but that the only people who understood were those who were widows too.
Her writing has subtlety, clarity and just a little dry wit.
“Julia knew by this time that her conduct wouldn’t in any way measure the extent of her grief. She hadn’t been able to measure it herself. She had tried. She thought about death deliberately, trying to assess it. She thought about her own death. She thought about the new carpet in the dining-room; the salesman said it would give her fifteen years. It was disconcerting to compete with a carpet.”
A wealth of different characters around Julia help to illuminate her story: there is a daughter-in-law whose concern, whose anxiety to do the right thing, becomes cloying; there is a friend who is so grateful for help when she has to chose an outfit for a special occasion; there is a son who is nearby, whose new relationship Julia is pleased to see, though she cannot help but feel a little jealous of the closeness they have; and then there is Madge, the old family friend who was with Harold when he died and whose behaviour is a little strange ….
That creates a certain amount of drama, but ultimately the ‘The Small Widow’ is a quiet book, following Julia’s life though a momentous year and speaking profoundly of the changes and the realisations that year brought.
“I don’t feel anything,” she said, “not anything at all. It isn’t that I’m trying not to. I want to feel something, even though Harold mightn’t have wished me to. But I just go on in an empty muddled kind of way, getting impatient because I’m always waiting for some piercing grief that doesn’t come. I mean I don’t suppose this is all there is to it, it couldn’t be, could it?”
Its hold on me grew steadily as the story progressed.
The back cover of this novel suggests that Janet McNeill should be considered alongside “Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor.” I have to say that I’m not entirely convinced; and that there were times when the wring felt clumsy and the story felt rather mundane.
But I can say that she does what she does very well, and she does one thing better than any of them. She catches the difficult moments that Julia would rather forget and the emotions that she would rather not acknowledge. That makes her writing feel both honest and real.
She may never be a particular favourite but I’ll happily read Janet McNeill again.
And I must check my shelves for more of those ‘one Virago’ authors ….
Janet McNeill is one such ‘one Virago’ author, and I always liked the look of ‘Tea at Four O’Clock, I always meant to read it, but I lost sight of it only to remember when I saw another book, reissued by another publishing house, sitting on a shelf in the library.
I picked it up.
The story opens when Julia has just become a widow; at the funeral of Harold, her husband of thirty-two years. She is following the steps that she knows that she must follow, but she isn’t quite sure that she is acting as she should, feeling as she should.
12145597Julia had been happy to be cast as wife and mother, but suddenly she had to learn to play a new role that she hadn’t expected or wanted. Her husband was gone, her children were grown, and there was nothing to fill the space that was left.
Janet McNeill captures her situation beautifully, understanding the subtle changes in Julia’s different relationships with children, friends, and other family members; and appreciating that there would be missteps and frustrations as the new widow tried to come to terms with her new life.
She reminded me of something that my mother said to me not long after she was widowed. She said that many people were – or tried to be – kind – but that the only people who understood were those who were widows too.
Her writing has subtlety, clarity and just a little dry wit.
“Julia knew by this time that her conduct wouldn’t in any way measure the extent of her grief. She hadn’t been able to measure it herself. She had tried. She thought about death deliberately, trying to assess it. She thought about her own death. She thought about the new carpet in the dining-room; the salesman said it would give her fifteen years. It was disconcerting to compete with a carpet.”
A wealth of different characters around Julia help to illuminate her story: there is a daughter-in-law whose concern, whose anxiety to do the right thing, becomes cloying; there is a friend who is so grateful for help when she has to chose an outfit for a special occasion; there is a son who is nearby, whose new relationship Julia is pleased to see, though she cannot help but feel a little jealous of the closeness they have; and then there is Madge, the old family friend who was with Harold when he died and whose behaviour is a little strange ….
That creates a certain amount of drama, but ultimately the ‘The Small Widow’ is a quiet book, following Julia’s life though a momentous year and speaking profoundly of the changes and the realisations that year brought.
“I don’t feel anything,” she said, “not anything at all. It isn’t that I’m trying not to. I want to feel something, even though Harold mightn’t have wished me to. But I just go on in an empty muddled kind of way, getting impatient because I’m always waiting for some piercing grief that doesn’t come. I mean I don’t suppose this is all there is to it, it couldn’t be, could it?”
Its hold on me grew steadily as the story progressed.
The back cover of this novel suggests that Janet McNeill should be considered alongside “Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor.” I have to say that I’m not entirely convinced; and that there were times when the wring felt clumsy and the story felt rather mundane.
But I can say that she does what she does very well, and she does one thing better than any of them. She catches the difficult moments that Julia would rather forget and the emotions that she would rather not acknowledge. That makes her writing feel both honest and real.
She may never be a particular favourite but I’ll happily read Janet McNeill again.
And I must check my shelves for more of those ‘one Virago’ authors ….
January 30, 2016
A beautiful book which we see Julia come to terms with the sudden death of her Husband Harold.
Reminds me of Elizabeth Taylor and Barbara Pym for their observant eye for detail of relationships.
Julia has to come to term to life on her own and independence.
Wry humour and compassion weave a tale where there are hidden secrets!
A new author to me.
Will be looking out for more of her books.
Reminds me of Elizabeth Taylor and Barbara Pym for their observant eye for detail of relationships.
Julia has to come to term to life on her own and independence.
Wry humour and compassion weave a tale where there are hidden secrets!
A new author to me.
Will be looking out for more of her books.
May 19, 2025
I wholeheartedly agree with what is written on the cover of this novel: “Janet McNeill ought to be better appreciated”.
December 7, 2016
I hadn’t heard of Janet McNeill until recently but when she was compared with Elizabeth Taylor and Barbara Pym I immediately wanted to find out more.
The Small Widow was first published in 1967 and has been reissued by independent Turnpike Books. It tells the story of Julia Stevens who is suddenly widowed in her fifties. Julia’s whole identity is based on being a wife and mother. Now, her husband is dead and her relationships with her grown-up children and her social circle are in flux.
Julia is a shrewd woman who finds herself unable to grieve in the way those around her require. Much of the book’s drama and humour comes from the distance between what Julia feels and what she is able to convey. She is cool and arch which makes her occasional outbursts all the more shocking.
I particularly like the interplay between Julia and her four children, and the way she struggles with their expectations. She looks after her granddaughter, but finds herself unable to dote. Her son tries to shock her with his explicit language, but is embarrassed when she replies in kind. She is awash with ambivalence – she is resentful of their demands but consumed by love, has an unflinching eye for their failings but is swept away by occasional moments of perfection.
The Small Widow also gives an insight into a fast-changing world. Julia feels ridiculous in a café full of young people in her coat and matching hat, but is disappointed that the girls do nothing with their hair. She is aware of the greater sexual freedom of the younger generation, and experiences moments of jealousy that she can’t share in it. She misses her husband’s protective love, while knowing that he typecast her as dainty and dependent.
I’ve read a few blog posts recently on the merits of rereading. My own feeling is that a lot of contemporary novels aren’t built for it. They are written to be consumed rather than savoured, with high-concept plotting and low-density prose.
The Small Widow is different. It is intricately structured, and every minor character and sly observation play their part in drawing you into Julia’s shifting world. By the end of the novel your understanding of her family is transformed. A second reading would be a new experience, a chance to see what Julia (and I) missed.
This review first appeared on my blog https://katevane.wordpress.com/
The Small Widow was first published in 1967 and has been reissued by independent Turnpike Books. It tells the story of Julia Stevens who is suddenly widowed in her fifties. Julia’s whole identity is based on being a wife and mother. Now, her husband is dead and her relationships with her grown-up children and her social circle are in flux.
Julia is a shrewd woman who finds herself unable to grieve in the way those around her require. Much of the book’s drama and humour comes from the distance between what Julia feels and what she is able to convey. She is cool and arch which makes her occasional outbursts all the more shocking.
I particularly like the interplay between Julia and her four children, and the way she struggles with their expectations. She looks after her granddaughter, but finds herself unable to dote. Her son tries to shock her with his explicit language, but is embarrassed when she replies in kind. She is awash with ambivalence – she is resentful of their demands but consumed by love, has an unflinching eye for their failings but is swept away by occasional moments of perfection.
The Small Widow also gives an insight into a fast-changing world. Julia feels ridiculous in a café full of young people in her coat and matching hat, but is disappointed that the girls do nothing with their hair. She is aware of the greater sexual freedom of the younger generation, and experiences moments of jealousy that she can’t share in it. She misses her husband’s protective love, while knowing that he typecast her as dainty and dependent.
I’ve read a few blog posts recently on the merits of rereading. My own feeling is that a lot of contemporary novels aren’t built for it. They are written to be consumed rather than savoured, with high-concept plotting and low-density prose.
The Small Widow is different. It is intricately structured, and every minor character and sly observation play their part in drawing you into Julia’s shifting world. By the end of the novel your understanding of her family is transformed. A second reading would be a new experience, a chance to see what Julia (and I) missed.
This review first appeared on my blog https://katevane.wordpress.com/
January 14, 2015
When I read Janet McNeill’s Tea at Four o’clock last year I knew I wanted to read more of her adult fiction (she was very well known for children’s fiction). Someone alerted me to the fact that Turnpike Books (a new name to me) were re-issuing her 1967 novel The Small Widow. It immediately went to the top of my wishlist, and so I was thrilled when Karen supplied me with this lovely new edition as part of the Librarything Virago group’s secret Santa swap.
The back cover declares:
“To find parallels with McNeill’s work one must look to English novelists such as Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor. What their writing shares… is a subtlety which makes demands of its readers”
(Fortnight)
Probably my perfect kind of book in that case? and yes I loved it. There is such delicacy and subtlety in the writing that I would certainly have been reminded of Elizabeth Taylor even had I not been prompted by the back cover.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2015/...
The back cover declares:
“To find parallels with McNeill’s work one must look to English novelists such as Barbara Pym, Anita Brookner and, more particularly, Elizabeth Taylor. What their writing shares… is a subtlety which makes demands of its readers”
(Fortnight)
Probably my perfect kind of book in that case? and yes I loved it. There is such delicacy and subtlety in the writing that I would certainly have been reminded of Elizabeth Taylor even had I not been prompted by the back cover.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2015/...
March 10, 2018
Good book. A woman’s journey coming to grips with adult children that don’t need her anymore and the loss of her husband. Somewhere along the line she lost who she was to the roles as mother, wife. Now she must find herself and her place in the world again. An every woman story.
August 3, 2021
2.5 stars
I overwhelmingly felt that if I had read this book closer to its publication date, 1967, I would have loved it more. However, the intervening years have brought many waves of books about middle aged, women amid the tide of feminism. From my standpoint it was a novel that felt dated and did not hold any kernel that gave, the period feel, substance.
There was some lovely writing, there were interesting observations and I did like this traditional woman pushing at the edges of expectation and finding the beginnings of a voice, albeit small woman, small widow, small voice.
I overwhelmingly felt that if I had read this book closer to its publication date, 1967, I would have loved it more. However, the intervening years have brought many waves of books about middle aged, women amid the tide of feminism. From my standpoint it was a novel that felt dated and did not hold any kernel that gave, the period feel, substance.
There was some lovely writing, there were interesting observations and I did like this traditional woman pushing at the edges of expectation and finding the beginnings of a voice, albeit small woman, small widow, small voice.
November 20, 2020
Janet McNeill is truly a hidden treasure.
Want to Read
May 9, 2019Not a review. I learned of this book via this review: https://theliterarysisters.wordpress....
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