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The Valley of Song ... With illustrations by Steven Spurrier
In a 19th century English ship-building village, a beautiful ship, due to lack of funds, is slated to be destroyed. A local girl, Tabitha, rallies her community in obtaining materials to finish ship's construction. She visits The Workshop, a magical place where all things are made.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1951
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About the author
Elizabeth Goudge
78 books890 followersElizabeth Goudge was an English author of novels, short stories and children's books.
Elizabeth de Beauchamp Goudge was born on 24 April 1900 in Wells, Somerset, in Tower House close by the cathedral in an area known as The Liberty, Her father, the Reverend Henry Leighton Goudge, taught in the cathedral school. Her mother was Miss Ida Collenette from the Channel Isles. Elizabeth was an only child. The family moved to Ely for a Canonry as Principal of the theological college. Later, when her father was made Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, they moved to Christ Church, Oxford.
She went to boarding school during WWI and later to Arts College, presumably at Reading College. She made a small living as teacher, and continued to live with her parents. During this time, she wrote a few plays, and was encouraged to write novels by a publisher. As her writing career took off, she began to travel to other nations. Unfortunately, she suffered from depression for much of her life. She had great empathy for people and a talent for finding the comic side of things, displayed to great effect in her writing.
Goudge's first book, The Fairies' Baby and Other Stories (1919), was a failure and it was several years before she authored Island Magic (1934), which is based on Channel Island stories, many of which she had learned from her mother, who was from Guernsey. After the death of her father, Goudge and her mother went to Devon, and eventually wound up living there in a small cottage. There, she wrote prolifically and was happy.
After the death of her mother, and at the wishes of Goudge's family who wished her to live closer to them, she found a companion who moved with her to Rose Cottage in Reading. She lived out her life there, and had many dogs in her life. Goudge loved dogs, and much preferred their company to that of humans. She continued to write until shortly before her death, when ill health, successive falls, and cataracts hindered her ability to write. She was much loved.
Goudge was awarded the Carnegie Medal for The Little White Horse (1946), the book which J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter stories, has said was her favorite as a child. The television mini-series Moonacre was based on The Little White Horse. Her Green Dolphin Country (1944) was made into a film (under its American title, Green Dolphin Street) which won the Academy Award for Special Effects in 1948.
A Diary of Prayer (1966) was one of Goudge's last works. She spent her last years in her cottage on Peppard Common, just outside Henley-on-Thames, where a blue plaque was unveiled in 2008.
Elizabeth de Beauchamp Goudge was born on 24 April 1900 in Wells, Somerset, in Tower House close by the cathedral in an area known as The Liberty, Her father, the Reverend Henry Leighton Goudge, taught in the cathedral school. Her mother was Miss Ida Collenette from the Channel Isles. Elizabeth was an only child. The family moved to Ely for a Canonry as Principal of the theological college. Later, when her father was made Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, they moved to Christ Church, Oxford.
She went to boarding school during WWI and later to Arts College, presumably at Reading College. She made a small living as teacher, and continued to live with her parents. During this time, she wrote a few plays, and was encouraged to write novels by a publisher. As her writing career took off, she began to travel to other nations. Unfortunately, she suffered from depression for much of her life. She had great empathy for people and a talent for finding the comic side of things, displayed to great effect in her writing.
Goudge's first book, The Fairies' Baby and Other Stories (1919), was a failure and it was several years before she authored Island Magic (1934), which is based on Channel Island stories, many of which she had learned from her mother, who was from Guernsey. After the death of her father, Goudge and her mother went to Devon, and eventually wound up living there in a small cottage. There, she wrote prolifically and was happy.
After the death of her mother, and at the wishes of Goudge's family who wished her to live closer to them, she found a companion who moved with her to Rose Cottage in Reading. She lived out her life there, and had many dogs in her life. Goudge loved dogs, and much preferred their company to that of humans. She continued to write until shortly before her death, when ill health, successive falls, and cataracts hindered her ability to write. She was much loved.
Goudge was awarded the Carnegie Medal for The Little White Horse (1946), the book which J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter stories, has said was her favorite as a child. The television mini-series Moonacre was based on The Little White Horse. Her Green Dolphin Country (1944) was made into a film (under its American title, Green Dolphin Street) which won the Academy Award for Special Effects in 1948.
A Diary of Prayer (1966) was one of Goudge's last works. She spent her last years in her cottage on Peppard Common, just outside Henley-on-Thames, where a blue plaque was unveiled in 2008.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
February 1, 2020
This is one of my favorite childhood books, hence the five stars.
The Valley of Song takes place in a little shipbuilding village in England, maybe 200 years ago. In this village lives Tabitha, daughter of the blacksmith, who would much rather explore the beautiful meadows and woods than stay confined in the village school. One day her wanderings take her down a new path, and at its end, she finds the gateway into a magical place, the Valley of Song. For Tabitha, the Valley is a place of trees and flowers--a perfect place where a child can play and be at peace. And one day, Tabitha takes with her her dear friend, old Job, the carpenter--and to the wonder of both of them, when he passes through the door, he too becomes a child, delighting along with her in the beauty and wonder that they have found. There they meet Silkin, a fairy person, small and furry, one of those charged with the making of trees.
When Job sees the trees being made, with those that are to grow in our world disappearing in a flash of light, and those that do not being cast aside, to be used again, he knows he wants some of that ungrowing wood to take back with him. For in Job and Tabitha's village, a new ship is being built--the most ambitious that they were to attempt. But is dying almost before it is begun--the owner cannot pay for it. So Job, despite Silkin's reservations, ascends the stairway in the great tree that leads to Heaven itself, to ask for wood for the ship. And being a humble man, his prayers are answered, and the next morning, the wood has appeared in the village.
But a ship needs more than wood--metal, paint, ropes, and sails are also necessary. And each of these comes from the Valley of Song too, as Tabitha brings others into this paradise--Anthony, the master builder, Julie, his French wife, Andrew, the bitter and lonely man who was to be the ship's captain, and even her own father. Each of these has their own aspect of the Valley, waiting for them on the other side of the door when the past through and become young again--formal garden, pastoral meadow, Mediterranean coast, and high mountains--and each finds new and wondrous fairy folk, and living signs of the Zodiac, and each of these will also send their own prayers to Heaven, for the ship they love....
It is Andrew's journey that most impressed me--his path to the door of Heaven leads down into the dark waters. Capricorn is there to guide him, but Andrew is afraid. "No child of mine, born to the hardness of the cold nights and the lashings of the winter winds, was ever a coward." says Capricorn (page 140), and Andrew goes down into the dark, to free himself of the ropes with which his spirit is bound...I'm a Capricorn too, and I say this to myself when I have to go to the dentist....And then, after saying good-bye to Andrew, Tabitha has a lovely little journey with a merchild fairy.
At last, after many such magical adventures, the ship is built, but one thing is missing. The village priest takes Tabitha to the church, and there she finds that the church itself is another way into the Valley of Song...and God's own blessing flies like a flag from the beautiful ship as Tabitha christens it and sends it on its way.
I'm a little shy about recommending this one, because I'm not sure how a grown-up (or even "the modern child") might react to the dizzying pastiche of mythology, folklore, and Christianity. But it is a book I will always love. Such beautiful pictures in my mind, so many hours daydreaming about what my own Valley of Song would be...so much wonder and delight. And there's humor, too, in the dialogue, to keep it from being cloying. But you'll probably have to take my word for it. It is out of print, and very expensive now, unless you visit one of the few libraries that still has a copy...
The Valley of Song takes place in a little shipbuilding village in England, maybe 200 years ago. In this village lives Tabitha, daughter of the blacksmith, who would much rather explore the beautiful meadows and woods than stay confined in the village school. One day her wanderings take her down a new path, and at its end, she finds the gateway into a magical place, the Valley of Song. For Tabitha, the Valley is a place of trees and flowers--a perfect place where a child can play and be at peace. And one day, Tabitha takes with her her dear friend, old Job, the carpenter--and to the wonder of both of them, when he passes through the door, he too becomes a child, delighting along with her in the beauty and wonder that they have found. There they meet Silkin, a fairy person, small and furry, one of those charged with the making of trees.
When Job sees the trees being made, with those that are to grow in our world disappearing in a flash of light, and those that do not being cast aside, to be used again, he knows he wants some of that ungrowing wood to take back with him. For in Job and Tabitha's village, a new ship is being built--the most ambitious that they were to attempt. But is dying almost before it is begun--the owner cannot pay for it. So Job, despite Silkin's reservations, ascends the stairway in the great tree that leads to Heaven itself, to ask for wood for the ship. And being a humble man, his prayers are answered, and the next morning, the wood has appeared in the village.
But a ship needs more than wood--metal, paint, ropes, and sails are also necessary. And each of these comes from the Valley of Song too, as Tabitha brings others into this paradise--Anthony, the master builder, Julie, his French wife, Andrew, the bitter and lonely man who was to be the ship's captain, and even her own father. Each of these has their own aspect of the Valley, waiting for them on the other side of the door when the past through and become young again--formal garden, pastoral meadow, Mediterranean coast, and high mountains--and each finds new and wondrous fairy folk, and living signs of the Zodiac, and each of these will also send their own prayers to Heaven, for the ship they love....
It is Andrew's journey that most impressed me--his path to the door of Heaven leads down into the dark waters. Capricorn is there to guide him, but Andrew is afraid. "No child of mine, born to the hardness of the cold nights and the lashings of the winter winds, was ever a coward." says Capricorn (page 140), and Andrew goes down into the dark, to free himself of the ropes with which his spirit is bound...I'm a Capricorn too, and I say this to myself when I have to go to the dentist....And then, after saying good-bye to Andrew, Tabitha has a lovely little journey with a merchild fairy.
At last, after many such magical adventures, the ship is built, but one thing is missing. The village priest takes Tabitha to the church, and there she finds that the church itself is another way into the Valley of Song...and God's own blessing flies like a flag from the beautiful ship as Tabitha christens it and sends it on its way.
I'm a little shy about recommending this one, because I'm not sure how a grown-up (or even "the modern child") might react to the dizzying pastiche of mythology, folklore, and Christianity. But it is a book I will always love. Such beautiful pictures in my mind, so many hours daydreaming about what my own Valley of Song would be...so much wonder and delight. And there's humor, too, in the dialogue, to keep it from being cloying. But you'll probably have to take my word for it. It is out of print, and very expensive now, unless you visit one of the few libraries that still has a copy...
May 13, 2021
glorious and beautiful, but I think I would've enjoyed it more if I understood what type of story it was. The description on the goodreads page is very misleading. :)
Second time: I enjoyed this even more, now that I knew what to expect. The writing gets a little tedious at times and the story is almost too sweet but I don't care. It fills me with all kinds of light.
Third time: I really stretched it out this time and only read a small portion each day-- which ended up being an utterly delightful way to truly savor the richness and beauty and magic. I love this story with all my heart.
Second time: I enjoyed this even more, now that I knew what to expect. The writing gets a little tedious at times and the story is almost too sweet but I don't care. It fills me with all kinds of light.
Third time: I really stretched it out this time and only read a small portion each day-- which ended up being an utterly delightful way to truly savor the richness and beauty and magic. I love this story with all my heart.
May 9, 2016
One of my all-time favorite books! It's got such wonderful descriptions of the beautiful spiritual world just beneath this visible one! I truly felt the joy God's loving Spirit as I read this and just rejoiced that He holds us all so tenderly and that behind the thin veil of this visible world is a perfect, lovely, enchanted world, more real, more beautiful, more joyful than we could ever imagine...and we are all so close to that world at all times, really IN it without being aware so many times...For in Him we live and move and have our being - we are upheld by that loving Presence that truly IS that place we are longing for, that world behind the world, that anchor that holds this world in place, holds our futures, holds our lives, holds our hearts forever safe in His loving fatherly Being!
January 3, 2013
Elizabeth Goudge told stories from inside her heart. Her writing is gentle and meditative, magical and clever -not I'm sure to everyone's taste nowadays. She is one of my favourite writers.
The Valley of Song, a children's book which is something like a fairytale really, reads like a private vision of heaven - without sanctimony. Very touching. Very special.
The Valley of Song, a children's book which is something like a fairytale really, reads like a private vision of heaven - without sanctimony. Very touching. Very special.
August 3, 2019
What a beautiful, magical story. She is such a gifted writer, a master of language. The way she paints with words, so lovely and poignant. There is so much to think about, and I hope I am young enough inside to go through the door.
July 23, 2022
This story is about a girl named Tabitha and her adult and animal friends who enter the Valley of Song from their home in Buckler's Hard, a ship-building community, and emerge from it with material to build a beautiful sailing ship that blesses and brings together the whole community of the Hard. The Valley of Song is the entryway to the Workshop, which is a creative and redemptive part of Heaven that is full of magical creatures who lovingly fashion creation and watch over humanity. I wonder if this was Elizabeth Goudge's way of exploring these verses from Matthew 18:2-4: "And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them 3 and said, 'Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.'" The adults literally become children when they enter the Valley of Song and the Kingdom of Heaven is as richly and vividly imagined as Goudge can make it. And Goudge has the most wonderful imagination of almost any writer I have ever encountered.
The wonder of this book is that it was originally published in 1951 when England (not to say much of the world!) was recovering from the devastation of WWII and in the grip of rationing still. I can imagine how writing this would have been an immense comfort to Goudge and reading it a deeply hopeful act for those who may have forgotten that "the world is charged with the grandeur of God" and "nature is never spent, there lives the dearest freshness deep down things" (Hopkins, God's Grandeur). Goudge's stories are always redemptive and this one deeply so through the realms of a giddy and grand imagined Heaven.
So why only three stars? I realized as I read this how much my fiction tends toward domestic realism and the savor of the "taste and see" realm of blessedness. I'm more at home in the descriptions of a laden tea tray than I am in the wild and abstract world of Goudge's imagined Heaven. Perhaps it means I'm not child enough yet to enter the Valley of Song. It's true that the wonder I had as a child is often replaced with a world weariness that seems to characterize being a feeling adult in the world. Wonder often has to be startled from me instead of being at home in me like it was for Goudge, for G.K. Chesterton, etc. But I think there's a place for adults like me in Goudge's story. As Pastor Redfern tells Tabitha in church, "If you were really worshipping, you were in the Workshop. You can be in it without being aware of the fact, you know...Through prayer...you go not only in but right deep in, and sometimes you are aware of where you are and dream dreams and see visions" (259).
Now that I think about it, this book has startled me to a vision of God's grandeur. Maybe it was a five-star read after all.
The wonder of this book is that it was originally published in 1951 when England (not to say much of the world!) was recovering from the devastation of WWII and in the grip of rationing still. I can imagine how writing this would have been an immense comfort to Goudge and reading it a deeply hopeful act for those who may have forgotten that "the world is charged with the grandeur of God" and "nature is never spent, there lives the dearest freshness deep down things" (Hopkins, God's Grandeur). Goudge's stories are always redemptive and this one deeply so through the realms of a giddy and grand imagined Heaven.
So why only three stars? I realized as I read this how much my fiction tends toward domestic realism and the savor of the "taste and see" realm of blessedness. I'm more at home in the descriptions of a laden tea tray than I am in the wild and abstract world of Goudge's imagined Heaven. Perhaps it means I'm not child enough yet to enter the Valley of Song. It's true that the wonder I had as a child is often replaced with a world weariness that seems to characterize being a feeling adult in the world. Wonder often has to be startled from me instead of being at home in me like it was for Goudge, for G.K. Chesterton, etc. But I think there's a place for adults like me in Goudge's story. As Pastor Redfern tells Tabitha in church, "If you were really worshipping, you were in the Workshop. You can be in it without being aware of the fact, you know...Through prayer...you go not only in but right deep in, and sometimes you are aware of where you are and dream dreams and see visions" (259).
Now that I think about it, this book has startled me to a vision of God's grandeur. Maybe it was a five-star read after all.
May 7, 2025
What a true gift of a book. A gift.
Goudge captures so well the pre-enlightenment imagination here and I loved it.
Goudge captures so well the pre-enlightenment imagination here and I loved it.
July 27, 2022
The Valley of Song is a place of wonder and imagination ~ and Goudge describes is beautifully.
It is a book that made me read it from a more reflective perspective, slowing my usual pace to better absorb the story and its theme.
It is a book that made me read it from a more reflective perspective, slowing my usual pace to better absorb the story and its theme.
July 31, 2022
Sadly, this is my least favorite of all of the 21 Elizabeth Goudge books I've read. It was very disappointing because I love her writing so much and there hasn't been a children's book of hers that I haven't really liked (or loved) so far.
Usually, her precise and detailed descriptions are a joy to me and I end up highlighting or saving at least 10 or more passages in her books because they are incredibly beautiful. In this book, I only saved one.
It may be that I lack the level of imagination that Elizabeth Goudge herself had because I found that I was struggling to picture everything that she was describing. My brain was reeling from trying to keep up with this world and how she was envisioning it.
I feel like this book would make a gorgeous movie or Studio Ghibli film. But, without illustrations (except one very small black and white one at the very end), this book was difficult for me to enjoy and very overwhelming for my brain.
I might give it another try at another time because Elizabeth Goudge is one of my favorite authors of all time, but I just could not love this book the way that I wanted to. Perhaps it would be more accessible to a child's mind?
Usually, her precise and detailed descriptions are a joy to me and I end up highlighting or saving at least 10 or more passages in her books because they are incredibly beautiful. In this book, I only saved one.
It may be that I lack the level of imagination that Elizabeth Goudge herself had because I found that I was struggling to picture everything that she was describing. My brain was reeling from trying to keep up with this world and how she was envisioning it.
I feel like this book would make a gorgeous movie or Studio Ghibli film. But, without illustrations (except one very small black and white one at the very end), this book was difficult for me to enjoy and very overwhelming for my brain.
I might give it another try at another time because Elizabeth Goudge is one of my favorite authors of all time, but I just could not love this book the way that I wanted to. Perhaps it would be more accessible to a child's mind?
June 2, 2016
Not as good as The Little White Horse or Linnets and Valerians. It went on for too long and there were too many characters. There were some good elements, but a lot of fuzzy theology too.
February 20, 2018
I wish I would have first read this as a child, I think coming to it as an adult made it lose some of its charm, as a child I would have relished the pages of descriptions but as an adult I found them at times to be sickeningly sweet and overdone. Yet I still liked this book. I would put it down only to come back a day or two later. Refreshed and ready to come back into its folds.
June 12, 2021
A pleasant children’s fantasy about a village the builds a sailing ship with materials that come from ‘the valley of song,’ a children’s paradise presided over by the signs of the Zodiac. It was just too pretty for me. I enjoy Goudge, but except for The Little White Horse I prefer her historical books without quite so much pastel magic. The sweetness of this book was almost sickly-sweet.
January 16, 2025
Something rich and strange
My wife is a great admirer of Elizabeth Goudge, and I bought this book for her a few Christmases ago. First published in 1951, it was apparently out of print until this edition was reprinted in 2019. Written for children, this was - according to her autobiography - one of the author's favourite books (the other two being "The Dean's Watch" and "The Child from the Sea"). Set in the early part of the nineteenth century, it opens in what looks like a conventional fashion, with a little girl (one of Goudge's favourite words is 'little') going down to the shipyard in her village (which is unnamed, but modelled on Buckler's Hard in Hampshire) to talk with her friend Job, an elderly shipwright. Job is working on a ship which, owing to a lack of funds, is slated to be destroyed.
The story is then about how the girl rallies the workers in the shipyard and other members of the village to finish building the ship, but the way she goes about this sees the story taking flight, visiting worlds and creatures which are - literally - fantastic. Along with the richness of the descriptions which evince the astonishing imagination of the author, there's an underlying theme of creation, beauty, love, eschatology and becoming child-like in order to understand and appreciate this world. Even if those themes only emerge towards the end of the book (as the reader begins to realise what the book was "really about"), there's still plenty to stimulate your attention - for example [p185]:
"And then, so far away that it might have been over the edge of the world, and so close that it might have been inside her own soul, she heard it. It was deep and thrilling like a roll of distant thunder and yet clear as the first cry of a robin in the dawn. She had never imagined that anything heard could be so lovely."
I found this child's (not childish) vision of heaven to be richly startling in its depth and breadth, and enjoyed reading this book, despite its strangeness.
My wife is a great admirer of Elizabeth Goudge, and I bought this book for her a few Christmases ago. First published in 1951, it was apparently out of print until this edition was reprinted in 2019. Written for children, this was - according to her autobiography - one of the author's favourite books (the other two being "The Dean's Watch" and "The Child from the Sea"). Set in the early part of the nineteenth century, it opens in what looks like a conventional fashion, with a little girl (one of Goudge's favourite words is 'little') going down to the shipyard in her village (which is unnamed, but modelled on Buckler's Hard in Hampshire) to talk with her friend Job, an elderly shipwright. Job is working on a ship which, owing to a lack of funds, is slated to be destroyed.
The story is then about how the girl rallies the workers in the shipyard and other members of the village to finish building the ship, but the way she goes about this sees the story taking flight, visiting worlds and creatures which are - literally - fantastic. Along with the richness of the descriptions which evince the astonishing imagination of the author, there's an underlying theme of creation, beauty, love, eschatology and becoming child-like in order to understand and appreciate this world. Even if those themes only emerge towards the end of the book (as the reader begins to realise what the book was "really about"), there's still plenty to stimulate your attention - for example [p185]:
"And then, so far away that it might have been over the edge of the world, and so close that it might have been inside her own soul, she heard it. It was deep and thrilling like a roll of distant thunder and yet clear as the first cry of a robin in the dawn. She had never imagined that anything heard could be so lovely."
I found this child's (not childish) vision of heaven to be richly startling in its depth and breadth, and enjoyed reading this book, despite its strangeness.
July 17, 2025
Read for the Elizabeth Goudge book club, this is a children’s book which is really more fairy tale. While I thought it was mostly going to be about ship building, it was more about a child’s interaction with – or wish to interact with – fairy tale creatures. Having recently read her autobiography, where she does not mention him, it is in conversation with CS Lewis, nonetheless.
June 29, 2018
Old fashioned but magical allegorical tale of the power of love, imagination and forgiveness to heal hearts, build ships and rebuild a community. My mother read this book to us a children and we never forgot it. I read it to my children and I hope some day to read it to my grandchildren.
October 13, 2023
I have a high tolerance level for the twee and saccharine when it comes from my favourite children's authors, but the Christian proletysing here gets so cloying that I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who isn't already a big Goudge fan. It'll just make you roll your eyes.
January 27, 2024
While light on plot and character development, it has beautiful, descriptive language. The character of Julie, the Master Shipbuilder's wife moved me to tears. I know I will be looking for a door into the Workshop whenever I'm on a ramble.
July 11, 2022
What a delightful book!
March 15, 2024
Confused, reminiscent of parts of Mary Poppins: stars and zodiac and Roman myth and creation and and and. Took me about a third of the way to get into it. Definitely whimsical
July 14, 2025
This is a beautiful book , best read at a slow pace . It is one of my favorites of her books. I love how she used a wonderfully creative story to convey spiritual truth .
September 12, 2025
A lovely story with a mix of the enchanted.
August 3, 2015
This was recommended to me by a friend and it is an amazing read. There's this amazing cross over between the signs of the Zodiac and one of the Psalms all told in a child's parallel universe fantasy with the usual Elizabeth Goudge beautiful characters. Trippy, thought provoking, whimsical, lovely.
March 8, 2013
Loved so much of this book but it did seem to go on and on and on. Still, I am glad this is now a part of me.
July 14, 2015
une écriture merveilleusement poétique Une introduction à l'imaginaire que je recommande aux jeunes lecteurs (même si je n'adhère pas toujours au côté moralisateur et croyant)
January 3, 2017
The spiritual dimension in this book was amazing.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews