The Power of the Dead

A Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight #11

by Henry Williamson

Volume eleven of The Chronicle of Ancient Sunlight. Twelve hundred acres of downland valley with a trout stream await an heir and Sir Hilary Maddison wants his only nephew Phillip to learn farming the hard way, beginning as a labourer and rising to a tenancy-for-life. But Phillip has other ideas. Unable to forget the early death of his wife Barley as well as his friends who died in the Great War, he needs to recreate his past in his writing. Trying to combine both worlds Phillip is bound to fail in one of them; and literary success only intensifies the dilemma. 'The finest yet in Mr Williamson's long series' Kenneth Allsop

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1963

About the author

Henry William Williamson was an English soldier, naturalist, farmer and ruralist writer known for his natural history and social history novels, as well as for his fascist sympathies. He won the Hawthornden Prize for literature in 1928 with his book Tarka the Otter.

Henry Williamson is best known for a tetralogy of four novels which consists of The Beautiful Years (1921), Dandelion Days (1922), The Dream of Fair Women (1924) and The Pathway (1928). These novels are collectively known as The Flax of Dream and they follow the life of Willie Maddison from boyhood to adulthood in a rapidly changing world.

Reviews

[Paul Christensen · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this, the eleventh volume of the chronicle,
Phillip attains success; somewhat ironical,

As he’s trying his very best to live through farming.
But thanks to his book on an otter, he’s kept from starving.

‘The Power of the Dead’ is filled with wonders,
And an undercurrent like a distant thunder

That sanctifies the ghosts of British dead;
It will stay in your soul forever after it’s read.

[Trevor Harvey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This review contains spoilers.

The novel centres on Phillip Maddison and the conflicts he faces between his dual careers as a farmer and a writer.

At times the novel reads like an agricultural manual, such is the level of detail provided about farming matters. There are also passages from Maddison's (fictional) works which really don't add anything to the plot.

And then there is Maddison himself, a curiously passive character who allows things to happen to him. He does not stand up for himself and goes out of his way to accommodate people who take advantage of him.

The title of the novel is misleading, the assumption being that those who died in the First World War affect the lives of those that survived, but this point is only made occasionally and particularly in the character of Major Kidd, a lying conniving individual.

A curate's egg of a novel.

[PAUL DEWSON · Rating 5 out of 5]

The eleventh book in the series, finds Phillip Maddison and his second wife Lucy learning to farm in Wiltshire. But Phillip is torn between farming and his desire to be a successful writer. When success does finally come it brings matters to a head and he must decide whether to continue or revert back to the land. As always Williamson writes with a sharp eye for the foibles of human nature and the conflict between one's dreams and the harsh practicalities of life. Throw in his wonderful descriptions of the English countryside and you have a novel that is both charming and at the same time brutally honest.