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Selected Stories
In the selection of her stories from 1932 to 1977, the author casts a kind but piercing eye on human quirks and passions, as well as chronicling the events of Elfland. A brother and sister, shattered by the horrors of war, find solace in a tender, incestuous 'marriage'. A wife, bored and rancorous, stitches a widow's quilt. An old level-crossing keeper watches over his speechless, disfigured niece. In this magnificent selection of her stories, ranging from 1932 to 1977, Sylvia Townsend Warner casts a compassionate but piercing eye on the oddities of love. There's the joyously farcical story of the mouse and the four-poster bed, the strange fugue of a sad woman and her doppelganger cat, the composer unexpectedly spending an afternoon 'living for others'. And finally, there's the skein of stories reporting on the events of Elfland, precise, witty and strange. Readers who know this author's work will be delighted, while newcomers will find the perfect introduction to a writer of incomparable style and substance.
440 pages, Paperback
First published October 27, 1988
9 people are currently reading
169 people want to read
About the author
Sylvia Townsend Warner
94 books440 followersSylvia Townsend Warner was born at Harrow on the Hill, the only child of George Townsend Warner and his wife Eleanora (Nora) Hudleston. Her father was a house-master at Harrow School and was, for many years, associated with the prestigious Harrow History Prize which was renamed the Townsend Warner History Prize in his honor, after his death in 1916. As a child, Sylvia seemingly enjoyed an idyllic childhood in rural Devonshire, but was strongly affected by her father's death.
She moved to London and worked in a munitions factory at the outbreak of World War I. She was friendly with a number of the "Bright Young Things" of the 1920s. Her first major success was the novel Lolly Willowes. In 1923 Warner met T. F. Powys whose writing influenced her own and whose work she in turn encouraged. It was at T.F. Powys' house in 1930 that Warner first met Valentine Ackland, a young poet. The two women fell in love and settled at Frome Vauchurch in Dorset. Alarmed by the growing threat of fascism, they were active in the Communist Party of Great Britain, and visited Spain on behalf of the Red Cross during the Civil War. They lived together from 1930 until Ackland's death in 1969. Warner's political engagement continued for the rest of her life, even after her disillusionment with communism. She died on 1 May 1978.
She moved to London and worked in a munitions factory at the outbreak of World War I. She was friendly with a number of the "Bright Young Things" of the 1920s. Her first major success was the novel Lolly Willowes. In 1923 Warner met T. F. Powys whose writing influenced her own and whose work she in turn encouraged. It was at T.F. Powys' house in 1930 that Warner first met Valentine Ackland, a young poet. The two women fell in love and settled at Frome Vauchurch in Dorset. Alarmed by the growing threat of fascism, they were active in the Communist Party of Great Britain, and visited Spain on behalf of the Red Cross during the Civil War. They lived together from 1930 until Ackland's death in 1969. Warner's political engagement continued for the rest of her life, even after her disillusionment with communism. She died on 1 May 1978.
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
August 22, 2017
Aside from the elfin stories, which I must admit that I wasn't a great fan of, this is a treasure trove of tiny masterpieces.
September 5, 2010
As with any short-story collection, my reactions to individual tales differed though none here merited less than 3 stars - I liked them all.
This volume is a compilation of Warner's best (as determined by her literary executors) and covers her 40+ years as an active writer.
Some of the more arresting included:
"A Love Match" - This is the first story in the collection (from 1961's Warner S a Stranger with a Bag) and it begins things with a "bang." It's the story of the incestuous love of a brother and sister.
"Idenborough" - I liked this one because it shows that even two people in love can't be totally honest with each other.
"Apprentice" - This is a disturbing story from 1943's A garland of straw;: Twenty-eight stories) about a young German girl in occupied Poland (her family is one of the colonists shipped in by the Nazis). It's an illustration of how easy it is to dehumanize the other.
From the same collection there's "A Red Carnation," which seemed particularly topical considering the US occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. It's the story about a German soldier shipped off to aid the Francoists in Spain's Civil War and his disillusionment when he arrives to find the natives aren't the appreciative well wishers he expected.
"But at the Stroke of Midnight," from The Innocent and the Guilty. This is a good example of Warner's theme in many of her stories and novels - breaking free from convention. One day Lucy Ridpath becomes her cousin Aurelia and escapes the stifling domesticity of her home.
"Happiness" - I think this story is about the ephemerality of the emotion; at least that's what I got from it. In general, I found that, in this collection at any rate, Warner's tone is darker, less optimistic than in the novels I've read, and this tale is a good example of that view.
"Total Loss" was a wrencher for me. It's about a girl and her parent's well meaning - though fruitless - attempt to shield her from reality. In this case, the need to put her cat to sleep.
"One Thing Leading to Another," from a collection by the same name, is Warner in a playful mood. Like "But at the Stroke of Midnight," it's about someone breaking free from convention but the motivations and consequences are not so marked by despair.
The last seven stories in the collection are taken from Warner's foray into fantasy, Kingdoms of Elfin, which I reviewed previously here. The only comment I'll make in this review is that, even moreso than Tad Williams, Warner captures the alienness of fairies better than any author I've read.
I'm a hopeless devotee of Sylvia Townsend Warner so I can't help but recommend this book (if you can find it).
This volume is a compilation of Warner's best (as determined by her literary executors) and covers her 40+ years as an active writer.
Some of the more arresting included:
"A Love Match" - This is the first story in the collection (from 1961's Warner S a Stranger with a Bag) and it begins things with a "bang." It's the story of the incestuous love of a brother and sister.
"Idenborough" - I liked this one because it shows that even two people in love can't be totally honest with each other.
"Apprentice" - This is a disturbing story from 1943's A garland of straw;: Twenty-eight stories) about a young German girl in occupied Poland (her family is one of the colonists shipped in by the Nazis). It's an illustration of how easy it is to dehumanize the other.
From the same collection there's "A Red Carnation," which seemed particularly topical considering the US occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. It's the story about a German soldier shipped off to aid the Francoists in Spain's Civil War and his disillusionment when he arrives to find the natives aren't the appreciative well wishers he expected.
"But at the Stroke of Midnight," from The Innocent and the Guilty. This is a good example of Warner's theme in many of her stories and novels - breaking free from convention. One day Lucy Ridpath becomes her cousin Aurelia and escapes the stifling domesticity of her home.
"Happiness" - I think this story is about the ephemerality of the emotion; at least that's what I got from it. In general, I found that, in this collection at any rate, Warner's tone is darker, less optimistic than in the novels I've read, and this tale is a good example of that view.
"Total Loss" was a wrencher for me. It's about a girl and her parent's well meaning - though fruitless - attempt to shield her from reality. In this case, the need to put her cat to sleep.
"One Thing Leading to Another," from a collection by the same name, is Warner in a playful mood. Like "But at the Stroke of Midnight," it's about someone breaking free from convention but the motivations and consequences are not so marked by despair.
The last seven stories in the collection are taken from Warner's foray into fantasy, Kingdoms of Elfin, which I reviewed previously here. The only comment I'll make in this review is that, even moreso than Tad Williams, Warner captures the alienness of fairies better than any author I've read.
I'm a hopeless devotee of Sylvia Townsend Warner so I can't help but recommend this book (if you can find it).
December 23, 2017
Whether she is telling the story of a newly married couple, a level crossing keeper and his badly disfigured niece, incestuous siblings or the oddly magical world of elves and fairies, Sylvia Townsend Warner is a consummate storyteller. Her writing is beautiful, sometimes surprising, frequently rooted in an England long vanished from view – she is both witty and perceptive. She explores with great tenderness, the passions, oddities and quirks of all sorts of people, and there is sometimes a suggestion of delicious irreverence.
“She planted a high Spanish comb in her pubic hair and resumed her horn-rimmed spectacles.
‘There! That’s as much as I shall dress’
‘You look very improper.’
‘I am improper.’ Her young voice was quelling.
Love warmed her. It did not warm him. He moved nearer the gas fire and repelled the thought of his overcoat. He would soon be in it and on his way home. But politeness requires that after making love one must make a little conversation.”
(The Forgone Conclusion – 1961)
During her writing life Sylvia Townsend Warner produced an incredible number of short stories – they appear to run to something like eighteen volumes – though some stories may appear in more than one volume. This selected Stories collection first published in 1989 contain forty stories from across those collections dating from between 1932 and 1977. Through them one can see the author’s own slightly shifting perspectives as the world around her changed – culminating, at the end of the collection with her foray into fantasy with some of the stories from her world of fairies. As probably happens with all large collections of stories there were a very small number that didn’t quite hit the spot – though only four or five in the entire collection – overall this is a superb collection, and could be for some a brilliant introduction to the work of Sylvia Townsend Warner.
I have always found it very difficult to write reviews of story collections, but this one is particularly difficult. Firstly, I read it over a two-week period, setting it to one side for my book group read of Warner’s Lolly Willowes – (I know you wait ages for a Sylvia Townsend Warner review and…) and then Another Little Christmas Murder. Secondly of course, forty stories are far, far too many to write about in detail. As ever all I can hope to do is give a very slight flavour, helped along by a few quotes from Sylvia Townsend Warner’s delightful prose.
The collection opens with A Love Match, the story of a brother and sister, so damaged by the horrors of that war to end all wars, that they turn to one another for comfort, companionship and love. It’s a union which lasts years. Incest – the great taboo – it’s really quite the opener.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
“She planted a high Spanish comb in her pubic hair and resumed her horn-rimmed spectacles.
‘There! That’s as much as I shall dress’
‘You look very improper.’
‘I am improper.’ Her young voice was quelling.
Love warmed her. It did not warm him. He moved nearer the gas fire and repelled the thought of his overcoat. He would soon be in it and on his way home. But politeness requires that after making love one must make a little conversation.”
(The Forgone Conclusion – 1961)
During her writing life Sylvia Townsend Warner produced an incredible number of short stories – they appear to run to something like eighteen volumes – though some stories may appear in more than one volume. This selected Stories collection first published in 1989 contain forty stories from across those collections dating from between 1932 and 1977. Through them one can see the author’s own slightly shifting perspectives as the world around her changed – culminating, at the end of the collection with her foray into fantasy with some of the stories from her world of fairies. As probably happens with all large collections of stories there were a very small number that didn’t quite hit the spot – though only four or five in the entire collection – overall this is a superb collection, and could be for some a brilliant introduction to the work of Sylvia Townsend Warner.
I have always found it very difficult to write reviews of story collections, but this one is particularly difficult. Firstly, I read it over a two-week period, setting it to one side for my book group read of Warner’s Lolly Willowes – (I know you wait ages for a Sylvia Townsend Warner review and…) and then Another Little Christmas Murder. Secondly of course, forty stories are far, far too many to write about in detail. As ever all I can hope to do is give a very slight flavour, helped along by a few quotes from Sylvia Townsend Warner’s delightful prose.
The collection opens with A Love Match, the story of a brother and sister, so damaged by the horrors of that war to end all wars, that they turn to one another for comfort, companionship and love. It’s a union which lasts years. Incest – the great taboo – it’s really quite the opener.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
June 12, 2013
I picked this up mostly because I was curious about Townsend Warner's (fiction) writing after I read the lovely collection of letters she and her wife sent to each other. I would've preferred one of her novels because I don't read short stories that often, but this is what the library had.
Stories I've liked:
1. 'An Act of Reparation' - there are a lot of stories about unhappily married middle aged women in this book, but this is just whimsical and almost sweet, in any case more touching than stories using the same unhappy wife tropes
2. 'But At The Stroke of Midnight' - the ending of this is more than a bit disappointing, but I love the whimsical women in Townsend Warner's stories - and the cat (although the cat dies and that's very disappointing as well)
3. 'The Reredos' - the main character in this is the same kind of sweet whimsical middle aged woman - she's a painter and she decides to renovate the parish church, but because she can only paint from life, she turns portraits of her two sons and two sons-in-law into the four evangelists
4. The Elfin stories in the last part of the book, although they're a bit of a mixed bag, they're refreshing and a bit startling after the very not fantastic stories of the first 4/5 of the book.
Stories I've liked:
1. 'An Act of Reparation' - there are a lot of stories about unhappily married middle aged women in this book, but this is just whimsical and almost sweet, in any case more touching than stories using the same unhappy wife tropes
2. 'But At The Stroke of Midnight' - the ending of this is more than a bit disappointing, but I love the whimsical women in Townsend Warner's stories - and the cat (although the cat dies and that's very disappointing as well)
3. 'The Reredos' - the main character in this is the same kind of sweet whimsical middle aged woman - she's a painter and she decides to renovate the parish church, but because she can only paint from life, she turns portraits of her two sons and two sons-in-law into the four evangelists
4. The Elfin stories in the last part of the book, although they're a bit of a mixed bag, they're refreshing and a bit startling after the very not fantastic stories of the first 4/5 of the book.
October 18, 2021
Even though I was surprised that the Elfin tales did not thrill me (normally I love fairy tales and most versions thereof), the other stories - almost without a single exception - moved me, touched me, and awed me with their deft and economical power. If five stars means "amazing," then, yeah, five stars.
I will go on record right now to say that "Oxenhope" is one of the most beautiful (if not the most beautiful) stories I have ever read. "Total Loss" broke my heart (what's left of it, anyway, after 60+ years of animals in my life); "At the Stroke of Midnight" is sharp, tragic, desperate, and a dark reprise of Lolly Willowes, a novel I cherish. A single half-sentence in "The Red Carnation" made me gasp.
The stories are small in scale, sparely written, often about people (especially women) trapped by their lives and circumstances and their attempts to free themselves. Yet there is a wry, sympathetic narrative tone that keeps them from being merely grim, but instead poignant.
On my shelf of lifetime treasures.
I will go on record right now to say that "Oxenhope" is one of the most beautiful (if not the most beautiful) stories I have ever read. "Total Loss" broke my heart (what's left of it, anyway, after 60+ years of animals in my life); "At the Stroke of Midnight" is sharp, tragic, desperate, and a dark reprise of Lolly Willowes, a novel I cherish. A single half-sentence in "The Red Carnation" made me gasp.
The stories are small in scale, sparely written, often about people (especially women) trapped by their lives and circumstances and their attempts to free themselves. Yet there is a wry, sympathetic narrative tone that keeps them from being merely grim, but instead poignant.
On my shelf of lifetime treasures.
Read
September 30, 2018This thing sat on my night table for like two straight months before I could bring myself to finish it. Part of that is just that I find this format – very long short story collections – particularly difficult to push through. There’s certainly nothing wrong with it, Townsend is a talented writer, but except for the last five stories or so, which are about fairies, they did tend all to be rather exhaustingly English, tiny and over refined, and there was an awful lot of It was a terrible amount of trouble to bring our wretched grandmother these scones but at least she’s happy cut to Grandma thinking God I hate these scones.
physical-tbr
December 25, 2024"A Love Match"
rating: tbd/5
"Winter in the Air"
rating: tbd/5
"Idenborough"
rating: tbd/5
"The Foregone Conclusion"
rating: tbd/5
"An Act of Reparation"
rating: tbd/5
"Lay a Garland on my Hearse"
rating: tbd/5
"Their Quiet Lives"
rating: tbd/5
"A Spirit Rises"
rating: tbd/5
"The Level-Crossing"
rating: tbd/5
"A Speaker from London"
rating: tbd/5
"The Fifth of November"
rating: tbd/5
"Apprentice"
rating: tbd/5
"A Red Carnation"
rating: tbd/5
"Over the Hill"
rating: tbd/5
"A Widow's Quilt"
rating: tbd/5
"But at the Stroke of Midnight"
rating: tbd/5
"Absalom, my Som"
rating: tbd/5
"Boors Carousing"
rating: tbd/5
"On Living for Others"
rating: tbd/5
"Plutarco Roo"
rating: tbd/5
"The House with the Lilacs"
rating: tbd/5
"A View of Exmoor"
rating: tbd/5
"The Reredos"
rating: tbd/5
"Happiness"
rating: tbd/5
"Total Loss"
rating: tbd/5
"Oxenhope"
rating: tbd/5
"A Long Night"
rating: tbd/5
"A Work of Art"
rating: tbd/5
"How to Succeed in Life"
rating: tbd/5
"The Nosegay"
rating: tbd/5
"In a Shaken House"
rating: tbd/5
"Shadwell"
rating: tbd/5
"The Property of a Lady"
rating: tbd/5
"One Thing Leading to Another"
rating: tbd/5
"My Father, my Mother, the Bentleys, the Poodle, Lord Kitchener and the Mouse"
rating: tbd/5
"Scenes of Childhood"
rating: tbd/5
"The Young Sailor"
rating: tbd/5
"The One and the Other"
rating: tbd/5
"The Five Black Swans"
rating: tbd/5
"Elphenor and Weasel"
rating: tbd/5
"The Revolt at Brocéliande"
rating: tbd/5
"Visitors to a Castle"
rating: tbd/5
"Winged Creatures"
rating: tbd/5
"The Duke of Orkney's Leonardo"
rating: tbd/5
rating: tbd/5
"Winter in the Air"
rating: tbd/5
"Idenborough"
rating: tbd/5
"The Foregone Conclusion"
rating: tbd/5
"An Act of Reparation"
rating: tbd/5
"Lay a Garland on my Hearse"
rating: tbd/5
"Their Quiet Lives"
rating: tbd/5
"A Spirit Rises"
rating: tbd/5
"The Level-Crossing"
rating: tbd/5
"A Speaker from London"
rating: tbd/5
"The Fifth of November"
rating: tbd/5
"Apprentice"
rating: tbd/5
"A Red Carnation"
rating: tbd/5
"Over the Hill"
rating: tbd/5
"A Widow's Quilt"
rating: tbd/5
"But at the Stroke of Midnight"
rating: tbd/5
"Absalom, my Som"
rating: tbd/5
"Boors Carousing"
rating: tbd/5
"On Living for Others"
rating: tbd/5
"Plutarco Roo"
rating: tbd/5
"The House with the Lilacs"
rating: tbd/5
"A View of Exmoor"
rating: tbd/5
"The Reredos"
rating: tbd/5
"Happiness"
rating: tbd/5
"Total Loss"
rating: tbd/5
"Oxenhope"
rating: tbd/5
"A Long Night"
rating: tbd/5
"A Work of Art"
rating: tbd/5
"How to Succeed in Life"
rating: tbd/5
"The Nosegay"
rating: tbd/5
"In a Shaken House"
rating: tbd/5
"Shadwell"
rating: tbd/5
"The Property of a Lady"
rating: tbd/5
"One Thing Leading to Another"
rating: tbd/5
"My Father, my Mother, the Bentleys, the Poodle, Lord Kitchener and the Mouse"
rating: tbd/5
"Scenes of Childhood"
rating: tbd/5
"The Young Sailor"
rating: tbd/5
"The One and the Other"
rating: tbd/5
"The Five Black Swans"
rating: tbd/5
"Elphenor and Weasel"
rating: tbd/5
"The Revolt at Brocéliande"
rating: tbd/5
"Visitors to a Castle"
rating: tbd/5
"Winged Creatures"
rating: tbd/5
"The Duke of Orkney's Leonardo"
rating: tbd/5
March 16, 2019
Sylvia Townsend Warner was a prolific writer of short stories. This excellent selection by William Maxwell (Townsend Warner's editor at The New Yorker, in which many of her stories first appeared) and Susanna Pinney showcases the enormous range and stylistic panache of her short fiction. There's everything here: domestic tragedy, high comedy, finely observed character studies and much more. I had my doubts about the final seven stories in the book; these are high fantasy set in the various 'kingdoms of Elfin' (fairy realms that exist in parallel with human kingdoms), but in fact these proved to be some of the best stories in the book. It wouldn't come as too much of a surprise if these were a significant influence on Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell; they have the same hard-edged attitude to the relationship between fairies and humans.
January 18, 2023
This book is not for everyone, but to me it showed STW as a master of the genre within 20th century British culture. These stories are mostly very short, and yet each one made me feel I got to know another person or two via her evocative use of language. The characters’ circumstances are not unusual yet STW chooses striking moments in their personal history. Several times I laughed out loud because of her ironic observational narrative. She is also masterful in describing natural scenes in very few words, which gave me keen aesthetic pleasure.
May 17, 2022
There is an amazing array of characters in these short stories, and I felt I knew all of them just after reading a few pages. It is impossible to pick a favorite character or story. One of my favorite quotes comes from the story called The Fifth of November -- "...the scraps of knowledge she had accumulated lay like a heap of dead leaves, swept away into an unfrequented corner of her mind and only stirring now and then..." This rings an all too familiar bell for me!
April 29, 2019
Read for a seminar, confusing but interesting themes related to War Literature.
May 9, 2014
Sylvia Townshend Warner's best-known work is probably her novel "Lolly Willowes", about a single middle-aged woman who escapes from her humdrum life, and so this volume of Warner stories features a number of stories about middle-aged women who are or have been trapped in humdrum lives, in a sort of feminist-social-realist mode. Sometimes, as in "An Act of Reparation" (my second-favorite story in this collection, and easily the funniest of this group of stories), our heroine has escaped; sometimes, as in "But at the Stroke of Midnight", which is the easily the grimmest, the escape ends in failure. Of course, Lolly Willowes herself makes her escape by selling her soul to the Devil to become a witch, and the collection honors this side of Warner as well by including a number of her Elfin stories. Warner's elves are not Tolkien's: they are fay of the old school (most of the stories are set in the 18th century or earlier), and as such are entirely outside of any concept of human morality, making for an intriguing set of slightly off-skew stories. The rest of the stories are something of a hodgepodge. The collection starts off with "A Love Match", presumably in an effort to epater the bourgeoisie, since the story is about incest. If you are not too shocked, the rest of the collection is well worth reading. The three stories taken from "Scenes From Childhood" are all quite funny, with "My Father, My Mother, The Bentleys, The Poodle, Lord Kitchener, and The Mouse" (my favorite story here) in particular being hilarious, with something of a flavor of Gerald Durrell. Other stories remind me somewhat of Saki, though that may just be due to a shared quality of literary Britishness. Warner likes to switch abruptly between viewpoints, which can be done for comic effect as it is in "An Act of Reparation", or for a biting irony as in "Shadwell". Stories like "The Nosegay" go for more of an O. Henry kind of ironic sting, though with somewhat bitterer results. The only genuine misstep in the collection is "Apprentice", a WWII story that is pure propaganda: slightly surprisingly, the Spanish Civil War story, "A Red Carnation", is much better. All in all, an excellent introduction to Warner's oeuvre.
Want to read
December 6, 2025Read so far:
from The Salutation (1932):
How to Succeed in Life --
Over the Hill --
***
The Son --3
*The Best Bed --
from More Joy in Heaven and Other Stories (1935):
The Nosegay --
The Property of a Lady --
from The Cat's Cradle Book (1940):
***
The Phoenix --2
*Bluebeard's daughter --
from A Garland of Straw: 28 Stories (1943):
Lay a Garland on My Hearse --
Level Crossing --
Red Carnation --
Plutarco Roo --
Apprentice --
***
*The Trumpet Shall Sound --
from The Museum of Cheats (1947):
A Speaker from London --
The House with the Lilacs --
Boors Carousing --
***
*Poor Mary
from Winter in the Air and Other Stories (1955):
*Winter in the Air --
Shadwell --
Absalom, My Son --
Idenborough --
Reredos --
from A Spirit Rises (1962):
The Fifth of November --
In a Shaken House --
On Living for Others --
A Spirit Rises --
A Work of Art --
from A Stranger with a Bag and Other Stories (1966):
*A Love Match --
Happiness --
*An Act of Reparation
Their Quiet Lives --
*Total Loss --
A Long Night --
***
*Heathy Landscape with Dormouse
from The Innocent and the Guilty (1971):
*But at the Stroke of Midnight --
*Oxenhope --
from The Kingdoms of Elfin (1977):
The One and the Other --
The Five Black Swans --
*Elphenor and Weasel --
The Revolt at Brocéliande --
Visitors to a Castle --
Winged Creatures --
from Scenes of Childhood and Other Stories (1981):
My father, my mother, the Bentleys, the poodle, Lord Kitchener and the mouse --3
Scenes of Childhood --
The Young Sailor --
from One Thing Leading to Another and Other Stories (1984):
One Thing Leading to Another --
A View of Exmoor --3
*A Widow's Quilt --
The Duke of Orkney's Leonardo --
***
A Pair of Dueling Pistols --3
Uncollected Story:
Foregone conclusion --
from The Salutation (1932):
How to Succeed in Life --
Over the Hill --
***
The Son --3
*The Best Bed --
from More Joy in Heaven and Other Stories (1935):
The Nosegay --
The Property of a Lady --
from The Cat's Cradle Book (1940):
***
The Phoenix --2
*Bluebeard's daughter --
from A Garland of Straw: 28 Stories (1943):
Lay a Garland on My Hearse --
Level Crossing --
Red Carnation --
Plutarco Roo --
Apprentice --
***
*The Trumpet Shall Sound --
from The Museum of Cheats (1947):
A Speaker from London --
The House with the Lilacs --
Boors Carousing --
***
*Poor Mary
from Winter in the Air and Other Stories (1955):
*Winter in the Air --
Shadwell --
Absalom, My Son --
Idenborough --
Reredos --
from A Spirit Rises (1962):
The Fifth of November --
In a Shaken House --
On Living for Others --
A Spirit Rises --
A Work of Art --
from A Stranger with a Bag and Other Stories (1966):
*A Love Match --
Happiness --
*An Act of Reparation
Their Quiet Lives --
*Total Loss --
A Long Night --
***
*Heathy Landscape with Dormouse
from The Innocent and the Guilty (1971):
*But at the Stroke of Midnight --
*Oxenhope --
from The Kingdoms of Elfin (1977):
The One and the Other --
The Five Black Swans --
*Elphenor and Weasel --
The Revolt at Brocéliande --
Visitors to a Castle --
Winged Creatures --
from Scenes of Childhood and Other Stories (1981):
My father, my mother, the Bentleys, the poodle, Lord Kitchener and the mouse --3
Scenes of Childhood --
The Young Sailor --
from One Thing Leading to Another and Other Stories (1984):
One Thing Leading to Another --
A View of Exmoor --3
*A Widow's Quilt --
The Duke of Orkney's Leonardo --
***
A Pair of Dueling Pistols --3
Uncollected Story:
Foregone conclusion --
October 26, 2020
I can't really think of anyone I would rather spend my shielding time with than Sylvia Townsend Warner ,my dog and my cat.
Selected Tales is a world and a world of worlds within worlds.
STW had the most profound and extraordinary way of capturing characters,so that they aren't simply that ,but they are flesh and blood and very alive on the page. Such intricate nuanced details bring an entirely distinctive and palpable collection of people whose hearts beat so loudly on the page and ask us to listen in....
STW , writes women in a way that is original, exciting , enthralling ,magnetising and completely freeing. It comes to light ,that we all have secrets and within that realm the possibilities are almost endless.
My most favourite story was 'At The Stroke Of Midnight ' is curious and magical and explores human emotion in the most heart-wrenching and other-worldly way that I will never ever forget it. And Winged Creatures is beautifully sorrowful.
Her tales , whilst extraordinary and enigmatic are so addictive, haunting and relatable.
An absolute must have for STW fans and probably the best next-read if you've just read Lolly Willowes.
Tales about the strange the curious and the whimsical.
Absolutely perfection!
Selected Tales is a world and a world of worlds within worlds.
STW had the most profound and extraordinary way of capturing characters,so that they aren't simply that ,but they are flesh and blood and very alive on the page. Such intricate nuanced details bring an entirely distinctive and palpable collection of people whose hearts beat so loudly on the page and ask us to listen in....
STW , writes women in a way that is original, exciting , enthralling ,magnetising and completely freeing. It comes to light ,that we all have secrets and within that realm the possibilities are almost endless.
My most favourite story was 'At The Stroke Of Midnight ' is curious and magical and explores human emotion in the most heart-wrenching and other-worldly way that I will never ever forget it. And Winged Creatures is beautifully sorrowful.
Her tales , whilst extraordinary and enigmatic are so addictive, haunting and relatable.
An absolute must have for STW fans and probably the best next-read if you've just read Lolly Willowes.
Tales about the strange the curious and the whimsical.
Absolutely perfection!
November 15, 2009
Some entertaining short stories, but overall her writing isn't my cup of tea.
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