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Some Tame Gazelle
Both middle-aged spinsters in a provincial English village, flirtatious Harriet turns down periodic proposals, while shy sister Belinda has been unable to express her longstanding love for the vicar
252 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1950
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About the author
Barbara Pym
41 books996 followersPeople know British writer Barbara Pym for her comic novels, such as
Excellent Women
(1952), of English life.
After studying English at St Hilda's College, Oxford, Barbara Pym served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. From 1950 to 1961, she published six novels, but her 7th was declined by the publisher due to a change in the reading public's tastes.
The turning point for Pym came with a famous article in the 1975 Times Literary Supplement in which two prominent names, Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin, nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century. Pym and Larkin had kept up a private correspondence over a period of many years. Her comeback novel, Quartet in Autumn, was nominated for the Booker Prize. Another novel, The Sweet Dove Died, previously rejected by many publishers, was subsequently published to critical acclaim, and several of her previously unpublished novels were published after her death.
Pym worked at the International African Institute in London for some years, and played a large part in the editing of its scholarly journal, Africa, hence the frequency with which anthropologists crop up in her novels. She never married, despite several close relationships with men, notably Henry Harvey, a fellow Oxford student, and the future politician, Julian Amery. After her retirement, she moved into Barn Cottage at Finstock in Oxfordshire with her younger sister, Hilary, who continued to live there until her death in February 2005. A blue plaque was placed on the cottage in 2006. The sisters played an active role in the social life of the village.
Several strong themes link the works in the Pym "canon", which are more notable for their style and characterisation than for their plots. A superficial reading gives the impression that they are sketches of village or suburban life, with excessive significance being attached to social activities connected with the Anglican church (in particular its Anglo-Catholic incarnation). However, the dialogue is often deeply ironic, and a tragic undercurrent runs through some of the later novels, especially Quartet in Autumn and The Sweet Dove Died.
After studying English at St Hilda's College, Oxford, Barbara Pym served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. From 1950 to 1961, she published six novels, but her 7th was declined by the publisher due to a change in the reading public's tastes.
The turning point for Pym came with a famous article in the 1975 Times Literary Supplement in which two prominent names, Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin, nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century. Pym and Larkin had kept up a private correspondence over a period of many years. Her comeback novel, Quartet in Autumn, was nominated for the Booker Prize. Another novel, The Sweet Dove Died, previously rejected by many publishers, was subsequently published to critical acclaim, and several of her previously unpublished novels were published after her death.
Pym worked at the International African Institute in London for some years, and played a large part in the editing of its scholarly journal, Africa, hence the frequency with which anthropologists crop up in her novels. She never married, despite several close relationships with men, notably Henry Harvey, a fellow Oxford student, and the future politician, Julian Amery. After her retirement, she moved into Barn Cottage at Finstock in Oxfordshire with her younger sister, Hilary, who continued to live there until her death in February 2005. A blue plaque was placed on the cottage in 2006. The sisters played an active role in the social life of the village.
Several strong themes link the works in the Pym "canon", which are more notable for their style and characterisation than for their plots. A superficial reading gives the impression that they are sketches of village or suburban life, with excessive significance being attached to social activities connected with the Anglican church (in particular its Anglo-Catholic incarnation). However, the dialogue is often deeply ironic, and a tragic undercurrent runs through some of the later novels, especially Quartet in Autumn and The Sweet Dove Died.
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May 14, 2015
The older I get, the more seriously I take Barbara Pym. Reading this book it strikes me that what she writes is very funny, and also very sad. Reading this after Cranford brings out parallels as well, and some anger -- anger about how we treat Barbara Pym and her sort of book, anger than no one in her books would ever express.
The women in these books are so easy to dismiss as trivial, and obsessed with trivialities: is the local church service too high, will I be disgraced at the jumble sale, is my crush on the vicar too embarrassingly obvious? But are these not genuine concerns for the people that live them? Why is it lyrical and lovely to contemplate (once again) one's New York neighborhood, and yet ridiculous to be, literally, parochial in small town England? Why is a man's terrible loneliness, depicted with muscular internal dialog, a moving account of the human struggle and a spinster's timid expressions of the smallness of her life a boring second-rate life of no account whatsoever?
It is precisely the timidity, the modesty, the dismissability of Pym's characters that makes them so specifically what they are, and a casual reader may find them as easy to miss as Pym's engagement with the men of the EETS in this book.* Yes, all she has to look forward to is a boiled egg alone. Yes, she may perhaps find herself on the outskirts of the intellectual sphere as she types the manuscripts of her boorish husband. Yes, she will have more knowledge of poetry and get less credit for it than her sister, who wears fashionable clothes, because she is not so pretty. And yes, she will never complain, because timid spinsters don't complain.
This is perhaps one of the saddest things I have ever read:
After all, she might make a jumper for herself, now that she came to think of it she was certain that she would, either that or something else equally safe and dull. When we grow older we lack the fine courage of youth, and even an ordinary task like making a pullover for somebody we love or used to love seems to dangerous to be undertaken. Then Agatha might get to hear of it; that was something else to be considered. Her long thin fingers might pick at it critically and detect a mistake in the ribbing at the Vee neck; there was often some difficulty there. Agatha was not much of a knitter herself, but she would have an unfailing eye for Belinda's little mistakes. And then the pullover might be too small, or the neck opening too tight, so that he wouldn't be able to get his head through it. Belinda went hot and cold, imagining her humiliation. She would have to practice on Harriet, whose head was fully as big as the Archdeacon's. And yet, in a way, it would be better if Harriet didn't know about it, she might so easily blurt out something.... Obviously the enterprise was too fraught with dangers to be attempted and Belinda determined to think no more about it.
Is it not at least as tragic as those sparklier, wittier, more properly intellectual women (and men) that we read with such gusto, thinking them properly serious writers? Who among us has not had such silly thoughts, and yet experienced exactly this pain? Going through an entire life in this mode is painful indeed, a small, quiet tragedy, one of millions of small quiet tragedies, funny when they are noticed at all, and more likely invisible. Pym's depictions of them likewise ignored or dismissed; if she were capable of expressing the problem more stridently, more confidently, more in terms we would want to hold up as great literary success, if she or her characters were capable of a screaming fit, a nervous breakdown, or even a carefully argued work of literary theory, well, then the problem that they have wouldn't be this problem any more. A person who can ask for what she wants without apology is no longer a character in a Barbara Pym novel. And so, like the spinsters she has such genuine affection for, her books are set aside into the stream of minor women's domestic literature**, even by those most vocal in their defense of women's art.
Perhaps especially by them.
I feel like poor Pym and her ladies are caught between the backwards glamor of truly spectacular victimhood (none are living through a war, or locked in a room as a sex slave) and the showiness and frontwards glamor that could make her a flavor of the week. And so, quietly, people assume books like this will always be here, ready to lend a helping hand, not asking for much in return, never complaining, keeping their small-scale joys and sorrows to themselves. Yet not every worthy contribution is dressed up in her high heels for the garden party. Some of us are in sensible shoes.
*Those of us who have at one point subscribed to the publications of the Early English Text Society deserve a laugh, too. In my meaner moments, I can't help but think that if this joke had run through a book written by a man, he would rewarded with a line by line gloss constructed by an earnest graduate student somewhere, and faithfully consulted by the book's cult of future readers. Looking Hoccleve up is well worth it, as he too has slipped into the lower and forgotten tiers of the canon, but does not deserve to be there. Lydgate, well, he may deserve his reputation as a bore. Plowman and Bede are in there too.
**Oh, is this book written by a woman about women's concerns ALSO like Jane Austen? IS IT? Because my list of books written by women about women's concerns which are all in theory exactly like Jane Austen and which are, none of them, even a tiny little bit like Jane Austen except insofar as they books written by women about women's concerns is now huge. I will be requiring some sort of secondary criterion to subdivide it. I know that it cannot be easy to tell such small literary efforts apart from one another.
The women in these books are so easy to dismiss as trivial, and obsessed with trivialities: is the local church service too high, will I be disgraced at the jumble sale, is my crush on the vicar too embarrassingly obvious? But are these not genuine concerns for the people that live them? Why is it lyrical and lovely to contemplate (once again) one's New York neighborhood, and yet ridiculous to be, literally, parochial in small town England? Why is a man's terrible loneliness, depicted with muscular internal dialog, a moving account of the human struggle and a spinster's timid expressions of the smallness of her life a boring second-rate life of no account whatsoever?
It is precisely the timidity, the modesty, the dismissability of Pym's characters that makes them so specifically what they are, and a casual reader may find them as easy to miss as Pym's engagement with the men of the EETS in this book.* Yes, all she has to look forward to is a boiled egg alone. Yes, she may perhaps find herself on the outskirts of the intellectual sphere as she types the manuscripts of her boorish husband. Yes, she will have more knowledge of poetry and get less credit for it than her sister, who wears fashionable clothes, because she is not so pretty. And yes, she will never complain, because timid spinsters don't complain.
This is perhaps one of the saddest things I have ever read:
After all, she might make a jumper for herself, now that she came to think of it she was certain that she would, either that or something else equally safe and dull. When we grow older we lack the fine courage of youth, and even an ordinary task like making a pullover for somebody we love or used to love seems to dangerous to be undertaken. Then Agatha might get to hear of it; that was something else to be considered. Her long thin fingers might pick at it critically and detect a mistake in the ribbing at the Vee neck; there was often some difficulty there. Agatha was not much of a knitter herself, but she would have an unfailing eye for Belinda's little mistakes. And then the pullover might be too small, or the neck opening too tight, so that he wouldn't be able to get his head through it. Belinda went hot and cold, imagining her humiliation. She would have to practice on Harriet, whose head was fully as big as the Archdeacon's. And yet, in a way, it would be better if Harriet didn't know about it, she might so easily blurt out something.... Obviously the enterprise was too fraught with dangers to be attempted and Belinda determined to think no more about it.
Is it not at least as tragic as those sparklier, wittier, more properly intellectual women (and men) that we read with such gusto, thinking them properly serious writers? Who among us has not had such silly thoughts, and yet experienced exactly this pain? Going through an entire life in this mode is painful indeed, a small, quiet tragedy, one of millions of small quiet tragedies, funny when they are noticed at all, and more likely invisible. Pym's depictions of them likewise ignored or dismissed; if she were capable of expressing the problem more stridently, more confidently, more in terms we would want to hold up as great literary success, if she or her characters were capable of a screaming fit, a nervous breakdown, or even a carefully argued work of literary theory, well, then the problem that they have wouldn't be this problem any more. A person who can ask for what she wants without apology is no longer a character in a Barbara Pym novel. And so, like the spinsters she has such genuine affection for, her books are set aside into the stream of minor women's domestic literature**, even by those most vocal in their defense of women's art.
Perhaps especially by them.
I feel like poor Pym and her ladies are caught between the backwards glamor of truly spectacular victimhood (none are living through a war, or locked in a room as a sex slave) and the showiness and frontwards glamor that could make her a flavor of the week. And so, quietly, people assume books like this will always be here, ready to lend a helping hand, not asking for much in return, never complaining, keeping their small-scale joys and sorrows to themselves. Yet not every worthy contribution is dressed up in her high heels for the garden party. Some of us are in sensible shoes.
*Those of us who have at one point subscribed to the publications of the Early English Text Society deserve a laugh, too. In my meaner moments, I can't help but think that if this joke had run through a book written by a man, he would rewarded with a line by line gloss constructed by an earnest graduate student somewhere, and faithfully consulted by the book's cult of future readers. Looking Hoccleve up is well worth it, as he too has slipped into the lower and forgotten tiers of the canon, but does not deserve to be there. Lydgate, well, he may deserve his reputation as a bore. Plowman and Bede are in there too.
**Oh, is this book written by a woman about women's concerns ALSO like Jane Austen? IS IT? Because my list of books written by women about women's concerns which are all in theory exactly like Jane Austen and which are, none of them, even a tiny little bit like Jane Austen except insofar as they books written by women about women's concerns is now huge. I will be requiring some sort of secondary criterion to subdivide it. I know that it cannot be easy to tell such small literary efforts apart from one another.
July 1, 2017
3.5 stars
My first novel by Barbara Pym and this is her first novel, published in 1950, but started before the war and the setting feels pre-war as well. The title comes from a poem by Thomas Haynes Bayly:
“Some Tame Gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh something to love”
The premise is a simple one and the novel is based on Pym and her sister. Pym started it in her 20s and imagined herself and her sister in their 50s, unmarried and living together. Belinda and Harriet Bede are sisters in their early 50s living together in an English village. It is worth noting that this novel is very English, centering on the Church of England in a rural village and nothing much happens. There is plenty of irony and satire and Pym is a very astute observer.
Both sisters are very much preoccupied with the local Church of England clergy. Belinda has loved Archdeacon Hoccleve for many years, since they were at college;
“Belinda, having loved the Archdeacon when she was twenty and not having found anyone to replace him since, had naturally got into the habit of loving him, though with the years her passion had mellowed into a comfortable feeling, more like the cosiness of a winter evening by the fire than the uncertain rapture of a spring morning.”
He married a rather more ambitious wife; Belinda doesn’t really like her. Harriet is much more occupied with the younger clergy who pass through the parish in the role of curate and live in lodgings. She cooks and knits for them and invites them for dinner and afternoon tea. When the Archdeacon’s wife goes on holiday, other visitors including a librarian and an overseas bishop come to visit and provide some minor disruption to the smooth running of village life. Both sisters get proposals of marriage during the book. Harriet receives an annual proposal from an Italian Count who lives in the village.
Pym has a way of showing the reader what is going on under the surface at times as with this conversation with the Count after another proposal is turned down, when Belinda says:
'' 'mustn't lose hope. ... I know she is fond of you and even if she will not love you, always remember' - her eyes lighted on the works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson - 'that it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. I always think those lines are such a great comfort; so many of us have loved and lost.' She frowned: nobody wanted to be one of many, and she did not like this picture of herself, only one of a great crowd of dreary women. Perhaps Tennyson was rather hackneyed after all.''
There is no action, but a great deal of observation; it feels a bit like Miss Marple without the murders!
Poverty and the working classes make no real appearance and the servants are fairly anonymous. The bishop who visits has a diocese in Africa and Pym dissects the Church’s attitudes to mission and the inherent racism masquerading as charitable concern. It must also be said that the male characters are also pretty grim and it is no surprise that there are so many unmarried women
As a comedy of manners and a satire on middle class English village life in the early twentieth century it works quite well.
My first novel by Barbara Pym and this is her first novel, published in 1950, but started before the war and the setting feels pre-war as well. The title comes from a poem by Thomas Haynes Bayly:
“Some Tame Gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh something to love”
The premise is a simple one and the novel is based on Pym and her sister. Pym started it in her 20s and imagined herself and her sister in their 50s, unmarried and living together. Belinda and Harriet Bede are sisters in their early 50s living together in an English village. It is worth noting that this novel is very English, centering on the Church of England in a rural village and nothing much happens. There is plenty of irony and satire and Pym is a very astute observer.
Both sisters are very much preoccupied with the local Church of England clergy. Belinda has loved Archdeacon Hoccleve for many years, since they were at college;
“Belinda, having loved the Archdeacon when she was twenty and not having found anyone to replace him since, had naturally got into the habit of loving him, though with the years her passion had mellowed into a comfortable feeling, more like the cosiness of a winter evening by the fire than the uncertain rapture of a spring morning.”
He married a rather more ambitious wife; Belinda doesn’t really like her. Harriet is much more occupied with the younger clergy who pass through the parish in the role of curate and live in lodgings. She cooks and knits for them and invites them for dinner and afternoon tea. When the Archdeacon’s wife goes on holiday, other visitors including a librarian and an overseas bishop come to visit and provide some minor disruption to the smooth running of village life. Both sisters get proposals of marriage during the book. Harriet receives an annual proposal from an Italian Count who lives in the village.
Pym has a way of showing the reader what is going on under the surface at times as with this conversation with the Count after another proposal is turned down, when Belinda says:
'' 'mustn't lose hope. ... I know she is fond of you and even if she will not love you, always remember' - her eyes lighted on the works of Alfred, Lord Tennyson - 'that it is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. I always think those lines are such a great comfort; so many of us have loved and lost.' She frowned: nobody wanted to be one of many, and she did not like this picture of herself, only one of a great crowd of dreary women. Perhaps Tennyson was rather hackneyed after all.''
There is no action, but a great deal of observation; it feels a bit like Miss Marple without the murders!
Poverty and the working classes make no real appearance and the servants are fairly anonymous. The bishop who visits has a diocese in Africa and Pym dissects the Church’s attitudes to mission and the inherent racism masquerading as charitable concern. It must also be said that the male characters are also pretty grim and it is no surprise that there are so many unmarried women
As a comedy of manners and a satire on middle class English village life in the early twentieth century it works quite well.
May 13, 2024
“At tea they were all very gay, in the way that happy, unmarried ladies of middle-age often are.”
I so enjoy Barbara Pym. This first novel may not be as good as her subsequent ones, but each has their charms--Pym’s charm--which comes through in everything she writes.
Belinda and Harriet Bede are unmarried sisters in their fifties. They live comfortably together, primarily focused on their roles as supporters of their parish church. Belinda studied English literature with their married Archdeacon in college, and still carries a torch for him. Harriet has a habit of tending to every curate that comes along and then turning down marriage proposals. They spend their time gardening, socializing with their neighbors, giving luncheon parties, and knitting useful items for the poor and for needy curates.
Pym modeled the characters on a future version of herself and her sister, with each of the other characters based on one of their close friends. Read with that knowledge, it’s very playful and fun, though I have to wonder what some of the real-life friends thought of her barbs.
“… unfashionable narrow shoulders combined with Edith’s broad hips made her look rather like a lighthouse.”
The story explores the question of whether marriage is preferable to staying single, and Pym begins with lines from a poem by Thomas Haynes Bayly:
“Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove: something to love, oh, something to love!”
The longing that comes across in those lines changes shape as the novel goes on, and I found the end surprisingly satisfying.
I so enjoy Barbara Pym. This first novel may not be as good as her subsequent ones, but each has their charms--Pym’s charm--which comes through in everything she writes.
Belinda and Harriet Bede are unmarried sisters in their fifties. They live comfortably together, primarily focused on their roles as supporters of their parish church. Belinda studied English literature with their married Archdeacon in college, and still carries a torch for him. Harriet has a habit of tending to every curate that comes along and then turning down marriage proposals. They spend their time gardening, socializing with their neighbors, giving luncheon parties, and knitting useful items for the poor and for needy curates.
Pym modeled the characters on a future version of herself and her sister, with each of the other characters based on one of their close friends. Read with that knowledge, it’s very playful and fun, though I have to wonder what some of the real-life friends thought of her barbs.
“… unfashionable narrow shoulders combined with Edith’s broad hips made her look rather like a lighthouse.”
The story explores the question of whether marriage is preferable to staying single, and Pym begins with lines from a poem by Thomas Haynes Bayly:
“Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove: something to love, oh, something to love!”
The longing that comes across in those lines changes shape as the novel goes on, and I found the end surprisingly satisfying.
March 30, 2011
Rereading Barbara Pym periodically is enlightening. When I first encountered her books I thought they were somewhat amusing but not in the least profound. As I grow older I recognize how perceptive her depiction is of unmarried middle aged women whose lives have constricted to the daily round and the common task with its small pleasures and pains.
Pym was born in 1913 and was 37 when Some Tame Gazelle was published in 1950, but she showed a remarkable sensitivity to women in their 50s, spinsters, “old maids” and in this as in many of her books, the “odd women,” those whose men, the men they would have married, were killed in the First World War. Later in her life Pym and her sister lived together in a cottage in a small village as the sisters Belinda and Harriet Bede do in this novel.
The title comes from an obscure early 19th century poet, Thomas Haynes Bayly,
Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh, something to love.
Belinda, through whose eyes we see most of the story, quotes this couplet, understanding that her sister’s doting on a series of young curates and her own holding fast for 25 years to her love of Archdeacon Hoccleve demonstrate this need to love someone, something.
The plot is simple. The archdeacon’s wife, Agatha, goes on vacation to a German spa without her husband in what is clearly an attempt to get away from the self-centered, lazy, and uncaring cleric. He uses this time to remind Belinda that they were once in love and that perhaps he made the wrong choice in marrying Agatha, something that is on Belinda’s mind at all times and which, coming from the archdeacon, pleases her but makes her uncomfortable.
Some old friends visit the archdeacon and one of them proposes to Harriet but is spurned. Then Agatha returns bringing with her the Bishop of Mbawawa who in his youth was one of the first of Harriet’s coddled curates. Belinda expects him, too, to propose to Harriet and fears that Harriet will accept. But Belinda is in for a surprise. Though the book ends with two marriages they are presented with humor and not a little irony rather than satisfaction. Pym does not provide traditionally happy endings.
2011 No 55 Coming soon: Lady’s Maid, by Margaret Forster
Pym was born in 1913 and was 37 when Some Tame Gazelle was published in 1950, but she showed a remarkable sensitivity to women in their 50s, spinsters, “old maids” and in this as in many of her books, the “odd women,” those whose men, the men they would have married, were killed in the First World War. Later in her life Pym and her sister lived together in a cottage in a small village as the sisters Belinda and Harriet Bede do in this novel.
The title comes from an obscure early 19th century poet, Thomas Haynes Bayly,
Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh, something to love.
Belinda, through whose eyes we see most of the story, quotes this couplet, understanding that her sister’s doting on a series of young curates and her own holding fast for 25 years to her love of Archdeacon Hoccleve demonstrate this need to love someone, something.
The plot is simple. The archdeacon’s wife, Agatha, goes on vacation to a German spa without her husband in what is clearly an attempt to get away from the self-centered, lazy, and uncaring cleric. He uses this time to remind Belinda that they were once in love and that perhaps he made the wrong choice in marrying Agatha, something that is on Belinda’s mind at all times and which, coming from the archdeacon, pleases her but makes her uncomfortable.
Some old friends visit the archdeacon and one of them proposes to Harriet but is spurned. Then Agatha returns bringing with her the Bishop of Mbawawa who in his youth was one of the first of Harriet’s coddled curates. Belinda expects him, too, to propose to Harriet and fears that Harriet will accept. But Belinda is in for a surprise. Though the book ends with two marriages they are presented with humor and not a little irony rather than satisfaction. Pym does not provide traditionally happy endings.
2011 No 55 Coming soon: Lady’s Maid, by Margaret Forster
September 6, 2023
My first Pym; her 1950 debut. A quiet yet hilarious novel about two 50-something unmarried sisters in a small British town: Harriet dotes on each successive young curate and Belinda still carries a torch for her college beau, who's long since been the married archdeacon across the street. I especially loved how Pym softened my laughter at Harriet and Belinda's foibles by making me recognize their yearnings as my--as our--very own.
July 19, 2022
3.5
Pym’s first published novel is not my first by her, and it’s interesting to see the elements she’ll continue to use: two sisters in their fifties living in the same house, unmarried for different reasons; their days revolving around village church life; their deep interest in the neighborhood’s anodyne aspects; the realization that they cherish the single life and wouldn’t have it any other way; as well as the many allusions to poetry and Pym’s pointed, yet somehow not mean-spirited, humor.
Pym’s first published novel is not my first by her, and it’s interesting to see the elements she’ll continue to use: two sisters in their fifties living in the same house, unmarried for different reasons; their days revolving around village church life; their deep interest in the neighborhood’s anodyne aspects; the realization that they cherish the single life and wouldn’t have it any other way; as well as the many allusions to poetry and Pym’s pointed, yet somehow not mean-spirited, humor.
May 29, 2023
The trivial round, the common task - did it furnish quite all we needed to ask? Had Keble really understood? Sometimes one almost doubted it. Belinda imagined him writing the lines in a Gothic study, panelled in pitch-pine and well dusted that morning by an efficient servant. Not at all the same thing as standing at the sink with aching back and hands plunged into the washing-up water.
This is my second Pym (after Excellent Women) and I've come to appreciate her under-the-radar form of gendered subversion. Yes, this is very funny: from the curate's combinations to the caterpillar in the cauliflower cheese (eek!), but where Pym really scores, and what makes her quite different from Jane Austen with whom she is compared ad nauseam, is that she peoples her world with women who are surrounded by hopeless men. Women may be briskly efficient, they may run the parish while all the kudos goes to the men, they may be more intellectual and scholarly as is the case here with Agatha and her niece Olivia - while the men are pompous, hapless, arrogant and self-regarding. Even nice Mr Donne, the young if bloodless curate, is only going to get on in his career because his fiancée has the sense and drive that he himself lacks.
It's to Pym's credit that her book is still so good-natured despite this inherently critical eye. We laugh at her creations, but we don't sneer at them. We are, though, very glad that both Belinda and Harriet steer clear of marriage despite the proposals they both receive. And, even if she tries to bury her thirty year old love for the married Archdeacon Hoccleve, Belinda can't help, at times, recognising how irritating, lazy, affected, self-important and egotistical he is. Even his wife comes back renewed and revitalised after some time away from him.
There is then, unlike Austen, no romance to be found here. In fact, the Bede sisters pretty much know that they're happier living together in independence than either would be married - a pretty radical stance for the book to take.
Alongside the critique of gender and social roles, Pym also does a rather wonderful take-down of the way poetic tropes are used to create mythologies of life: from the centrality of orthodox love to the kind of aphorisms quoted at the head of this review which Belinda deconstructs in her gentle way.
It's striking that the most fun is had when Belinda and Harriet have two women over for tea and the four of them have a hilarious time dancing and listening to Harriet re-enact the last marriage proposal she declined. Women without men, in this world, are not merely self-sufficient but freer and funnier when men are the butt of their jokes rather than the centre of their anxious attention.
From what I know of Pym (The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym) Belinda and Harriet are a composite of her own characteristics: Belinda shares her unrequited love for a man who simply didn't appreciate her (this is, in a way, a revenge novel!), while Harriet voices her more outspoken, witty, outrageous side.
For me, what makes Pym so delicious is this combination of observation and waspish reflections with a skill in the exact placement of words: Harriet's hat which is at too 'rakish' an angle for church, the way Miss Jenner 'almost shrieks' when Miss Aspinall gets engaged to Theodore Grote, Miss Prior who 'wasn't entirely the meek person one expected a little sewing woman to be'.
This may be light on plot but in her quiet, polite way Pym upends many of the 'rules' upon which English society is built.
July 26, 2021
I'm quite incapable of writing a review on this remarkable book by Barbara Pym.
It's basically what on the surface appears to be a simple story of two sisters in their fifties, Belinda and Harriet Bede, who live in the countryside with an involvement in parish life. The sisters are just so opposite. Hilary, plump, loves good clothes, looking glamorous with a penchant for young curates. They are often invited “chez” the Bede sisters and invariably fed boiled chicken with the added bonus of a present of a pair of knitted socks. Belinda on the other hand wears sensible clothes, is relatively quiet, but thinks a lot and dotes on Archdeacon Henry Hochleve, even after twenty or so years. People were led to believe that he would marry her but it was not to be and Agatha was to be his final choice.
The Archdeacon is in fact based on Henry Harvey, a man Pym truly loved whilst at St Hilda’s college in Oxford. Like the Archbishop, Henry Harvey also married when he went to work in Finland, after having a relationship with Pym. What is remarkable is that she continued to love Harvey even after he left her and also wrote to his wife, whom she had never met. Henry would prove to be part of her life until her death in 1980.
In the book it is soon apparent that the Archbishop Hochleve is rather a boring man, who drones on and is always complaining how busy he is. He is also extremely tactless as he tends to criticize his wife Agatha and bring up the days when he was with Belinda and is indeed very kind and gentle about her. Belinda finds this upsetting as was the case with Harvey.
Briefly, this is a very witty and skilfully written book with some extraordinary characters such as Nathaniel Mold, a rather vulgar librarian and the most unusual bishop Africa, Theodore Grote who likes proposing to women. Now does he strike lucky? That is the question! The character that I truly loved was the self-effacing Count Ricardo Bianco, who regularly proposes to Harriet without success. She was fond of him but not enough to marry him. Why she would then not be able to see her young curates!
I am indeed looking forward to reading another book by this author.
It's basically what on the surface appears to be a simple story of two sisters in their fifties, Belinda and Harriet Bede, who live in the countryside with an involvement in parish life. The sisters are just so opposite. Hilary, plump, loves good clothes, looking glamorous with a penchant for young curates. They are often invited “chez” the Bede sisters and invariably fed boiled chicken with the added bonus of a present of a pair of knitted socks. Belinda on the other hand wears sensible clothes, is relatively quiet, but thinks a lot and dotes on Archdeacon Henry Hochleve, even after twenty or so years. People were led to believe that he would marry her but it was not to be and Agatha was to be his final choice.
The Archdeacon is in fact based on Henry Harvey, a man Pym truly loved whilst at St Hilda’s college in Oxford. Like the Archbishop, Henry Harvey also married when he went to work in Finland, after having a relationship with Pym. What is remarkable is that she continued to love Harvey even after he left her and also wrote to his wife, whom she had never met. Henry would prove to be part of her life until her death in 1980.
In the book it is soon apparent that the Archbishop Hochleve is rather a boring man, who drones on and is always complaining how busy he is. He is also extremely tactless as he tends to criticize his wife Agatha and bring up the days when he was with Belinda and is indeed very kind and gentle about her. Belinda finds this upsetting as was the case with Harvey.
Briefly, this is a very witty and skilfully written book with some extraordinary characters such as Nathaniel Mold, a rather vulgar librarian and the most unusual bishop Africa, Theodore Grote who likes proposing to women. Now does he strike lucky? That is the question! The character that I truly loved was the self-effacing Count Ricardo Bianco, who regularly proposes to Harriet without success. She was fond of him but not enough to marry him. Why she would then not be able to see her young curates!
I am indeed looking forward to reading another book by this author.
February 1, 2013
In the middle of the 1930s, not long after she came down from Oxford, the young Barbara Pym wrote her first novel. She borrowed a title from Thomas Haynes Bayley.
"Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh, something to love!"
Its significance wasn’t clear to me at first, but as I read understood.
And then Barbara Pym imagined how she and her sister might be, thirty years in the future. She creates that world, perfect in every detail, a future built on the world she knew that would never come because war changed everything.
Harriet and Belinda Bede lived together in a village in the English countryside. they living quietly, serving their church, knitting industriously, reading studiously, and making sure that they got the small details of life right. Questions of how one should dress, of what should be served at dinner, of how guests should be entertained.
Small things, but important things, that fill up lives. Barbara Pym understood that and she painted the picture beautifully, taking it seriously but still able to smile at sillinesses.
Some Tame GazelleHarriet and Belinda were quite different, living overlapping rather than united lives. Harriet was plump and sociable, fussing over young curates, planning supper parties, and fending off marriage proposals from neighbour Ricardo Bianco. Belinda was softer and meeker, more involved with her friends and neighbours, and quietly, wordlessly, loving the married archdeacon.
It was lovely just to watch their world, so beautifully observed, and to realise that the sisters Bede were not unhappy with their lives.
They were women of independent means who had lived, loved, and had chosen to remain independent.
Though, of course, it’s not quite that simple. There are lost dreams, faded hopes, loneliness …. and sometimes it is easier to love from a distance, to play a role, than to make a real commitment.
I was so happy just watching everyday life that I was a little disappointed when the main plot arrived and the focus shifted slightly.
The archdeacon’s wife was called away and first a visiting librarian and then a visiting bishop upset the balance of village life, with some very interesting consequences.
There were some wonderful moments, there was just a hint of contrivance, of a cast having been assembled.
Each sister received an unexpected marriage proposal, and each sister turned it down. They knew that those offers came not from love or desire, but from a wish to be looked after and supported. And they preferred to support each other, to live together, to continue the life they knew.
The right end to a wonderful debut. I can’t say it’s her finest work, but to do so much so well at such a young age is remarkable. And now I have great expectations of the other books I have lined up to read and re-read in Barbara Pym’s centenary year.
"Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh, something to love!"
Its significance wasn’t clear to me at first, but as I read understood.
And then Barbara Pym imagined how she and her sister might be, thirty years in the future. She creates that world, perfect in every detail, a future built on the world she knew that would never come because war changed everything.
Harriet and Belinda Bede lived together in a village in the English countryside. they living quietly, serving their church, knitting industriously, reading studiously, and making sure that they got the small details of life right. Questions of how one should dress, of what should be served at dinner, of how guests should be entertained.
Small things, but important things, that fill up lives. Barbara Pym understood that and she painted the picture beautifully, taking it seriously but still able to smile at sillinesses.
Some Tame GazelleHarriet and Belinda were quite different, living overlapping rather than united lives. Harriet was plump and sociable, fussing over young curates, planning supper parties, and fending off marriage proposals from neighbour Ricardo Bianco. Belinda was softer and meeker, more involved with her friends and neighbours, and quietly, wordlessly, loving the married archdeacon.
It was lovely just to watch their world, so beautifully observed, and to realise that the sisters Bede were not unhappy with their lives.
They were women of independent means who had lived, loved, and had chosen to remain independent.
Though, of course, it’s not quite that simple. There are lost dreams, faded hopes, loneliness …. and sometimes it is easier to love from a distance, to play a role, than to make a real commitment.
I was so happy just watching everyday life that I was a little disappointed when the main plot arrived and the focus shifted slightly.
The archdeacon’s wife was called away and first a visiting librarian and then a visiting bishop upset the balance of village life, with some very interesting consequences.
There were some wonderful moments, there was just a hint of contrivance, of a cast having been assembled.
Each sister received an unexpected marriage proposal, and each sister turned it down. They knew that those offers came not from love or desire, but from a wish to be looked after and supported. And they preferred to support each other, to live together, to continue the life they knew.
The right end to a wonderful debut. I can’t say it’s her finest work, but to do so much so well at such a young age is remarkable. And now I have great expectations of the other books I have lined up to read and re-read in Barbara Pym’s centenary year.
April 8, 2021
“But surely liking the same things for dinner is one of the deepest and most lasting things you could possibly have in common with anyone,' argued Dr. Parnell. 'After all, the emotions of the heart are very transitory, or so I believe; I should think it makes one much happier to be well-fed than well-loved.”
Bumping up my rating to 5 stars after re-reading this delightful book, which is like a soothing balm especially after this nasty covid-induced illness left my nerves in tatters.
There's nothing like reading about sweet and melancholy parochial nothings by Barbara Pym.
Bumping up my rating to 5 stars after re-reading this delightful book, which is like a soothing balm especially after this nasty covid-induced illness left my nerves in tatters.
There's nothing like reading about sweet and melancholy parochial nothings by Barbara Pym.
December 30, 2023
I was recently moved to revisit Barbara Pym, as an antidote, I think, to the chaos of our world and the intensity of many of the books I'd been reading. Pym's novels, of which this, written in 1950, is the first, typically focus on the quiet lives of unmarried women living in villages in rural or suburban England.
Not a lot happens in these books; the characters tend not to have exotic temperaments. Their social interactions often involve local clergymen - in a most proper way, of course.
So what is the attraction? The subdued but always graceful prose is filled with ironic observations on the relationships among the residents of the women's villages, and most acutely, the relationships between men and women. Although the protagonists often struggle with feelings of unrequited love, as in this book, they also realize that life without a husband is quite comfortable and acceptable. The men so often have clay feet to accompany their large egos. Pym isn't a feminist, but her female characters do have a decided (though unremarkable) strength.
Both of the middle-aged sisters in this book receive sometimes surprising offers of marriage, all of which are rejected. They don't need marriage just to say they have a husband. It is interesting to contrast the circumstances of Pym's women, who all seem to have "independent means", as compare with women of today, who may not need a man, but do need a job.
I came away from Some Tame Gazelle soothed, and I will need to remember the "Pym solution" when my soul again needs a balm.
Not a lot happens in these books; the characters tend not to have exotic temperaments. Their social interactions often involve local clergymen - in a most proper way, of course.
So what is the attraction? The subdued but always graceful prose is filled with ironic observations on the relationships among the residents of the women's villages, and most acutely, the relationships between men and women. Although the protagonists often struggle with feelings of unrequited love, as in this book, they also realize that life without a husband is quite comfortable and acceptable. The men so often have clay feet to accompany their large egos. Pym isn't a feminist, but her female characters do have a decided (though unremarkable) strength.
Both of the middle-aged sisters in this book receive sometimes surprising offers of marriage, all of which are rejected. They don't need marriage just to say they have a husband. It is interesting to contrast the circumstances of Pym's women, who all seem to have "independent means", as compare with women of today, who may not need a man, but do need a job.
I came away from Some Tame Gazelle soothed, and I will need to remember the "Pym solution" when my soul again needs a balm.
October 1, 2024
Oh I love the Bede sisters!! I want the book to keep going, I still need more quality time with these beloved ladies!
This is the first Barbabra Pym I finished. I just randomly picked this up and BAM my reading slump is history. I hardly ever hear Some Tame Gazelle mentioned when people talk about her work. It's confounding to me. I started her Excellent Woman last year because that's the one everyone raves about. And yeah it was good but I got distracted half way through. It just didn't particularly grab me.
This, on the other hand!
I finished this in one day. That is an impressive feat for any novel to pull off already. But factor in my months long reading slump that I was in at the time, it's truly a miracle ✨️
This is the first Barbabra Pym I finished. I just randomly picked this up and BAM my reading slump is history. I hardly ever hear Some Tame Gazelle mentioned when people talk about her work. It's confounding to me. I started her Excellent Woman last year because that's the one everyone raves about. And yeah it was good but I got distracted half way through. It just didn't particularly grab me.
This, on the other hand!
I finished this in one day. That is an impressive feat for any novel to pull off already. But factor in my months long reading slump that I was in at the time, it's truly a miracle ✨️
January 11, 2020
Charming, with a delightful ‘bite’.
August 30, 2017
I first read Barbara Pym 30 years ago. I devoured all her works. But over time, I'd forgotten exactly how much and why I loved her.
The phrase "some tame gazelle" is quoted at the beginning of the book. It refers to having some, any in fact, object for one's love. We all need something or someone to love. It's a deep part of being human.
Belinda and Harriet Bede are two middle-aged "spinsters" (not a word one hears much anymore!) who live in a small English village. They are active in the local church. Since her college years, Belinda has been in love with the man who is now the archdeacon of her church. Harriet has an Italian suitor who proposes marriage to her every few months. Both women are happy in their lives, despite occasional bouts of wistfulness. Harriet occupies herself with caring for the new curates that come to their church and Belinda gardens.
The book is not just a gentle bucolic tale. The story is told through Belinda's perspective (although in the third person) and the village is revealed to consist of people as full of their dreams and hopes and bitternesses as people are any and everywhere. Beneath their churchy exteriors, there is much commentary passed on the lives of those around them.
And the commentary is often hilarious and biting.
I find Pym excruciatingly funny. The gentle barbs that spring to Belinda's mind are rendered even more amusing by her self-deprecating style. She is meek but she is not mild. Even the man she loves is not spared her judgments.
Pym is one of the funniest writers I've read. I now want to read her entire work.
The phrase "some tame gazelle" is quoted at the beginning of the book. It refers to having some, any in fact, object for one's love. We all need something or someone to love. It's a deep part of being human.
Belinda and Harriet Bede are two middle-aged "spinsters" (not a word one hears much anymore!) who live in a small English village. They are active in the local church. Since her college years, Belinda has been in love with the man who is now the archdeacon of her church. Harriet has an Italian suitor who proposes marriage to her every few months. Both women are happy in their lives, despite occasional bouts of wistfulness. Harriet occupies herself with caring for the new curates that come to their church and Belinda gardens.
The book is not just a gentle bucolic tale. The story is told through Belinda's perspective (although in the third person) and the village is revealed to consist of people as full of their dreams and hopes and bitternesses as people are any and everywhere. Beneath their churchy exteriors, there is much commentary passed on the lives of those around them.
And the commentary is often hilarious and biting.
I find Pym excruciatingly funny. The gentle barbs that spring to Belinda's mind are rendered even more amusing by her self-deprecating style. She is meek but she is not mild. Even the man she loves is not spared her judgments.
Pym is one of the funniest writers I've read. I now want to read her entire work.
January 13, 2026
Book 3 of the
2026 Read Your Hoard Challenge
I have enjoyed every Barbara Pym novel that I have read to date. This was her very first and already she demonstrates her sharp observations of people, especially relations between the sexes. Belinda Bede is Pym's alter-ego and Harriet is her sister's. I believe that the real life sister did get married and widowed, but this was written to imagine them as spinsters in their fifties.
Many of the characters in Some Tame Gazelle are based on Pym's friends and relatives. Archdeacon Hoccleve is the fictional representation of a former lover who was willing to sleep with Pym but married another woman. Pym managed to stay friendly with the couple, but Belinda's unrequited love for the Archdeacon comes into sharper focus with this knowledge. She uses her claws gently with his depiction. Apparently her circle of friends and acquaintances recognized him and themselves and were highly entertained.
Even in this very first book, there are some references to anthropology. Bishop Grote, who is home from the mission field, gives a lantern slide presentation about the African people among whom he works. Pym was an assistant editor of an anthropological journal and she incorporates this expertise neatly into her writing.
I enjoyed Excellent Women and Less Than Angels so much that I bought a stack of Barbara Pym novels during Covid, but I got distracted by other books and never read them. This is the year that I fix this omission and I am ever so glad that this was such an enjoyable start to the project.
I have enjoyed every Barbara Pym novel that I have read to date. This was her very first and already she demonstrates her sharp observations of people, especially relations between the sexes. Belinda Bede is Pym's alter-ego and Harriet is her sister's. I believe that the real life sister did get married and widowed, but this was written to imagine them as spinsters in their fifties.
Many of the characters in Some Tame Gazelle are based on Pym's friends and relatives. Archdeacon Hoccleve is the fictional representation of a former lover who was willing to sleep with Pym but married another woman. Pym managed to stay friendly with the couple, but Belinda's unrequited love for the Archdeacon comes into sharper focus with this knowledge. She uses her claws gently with his depiction. Apparently her circle of friends and acquaintances recognized him and themselves and were highly entertained.
Even in this very first book, there are some references to anthropology. Bishop Grote, who is home from the mission field, gives a lantern slide presentation about the African people among whom he works. Pym was an assistant editor of an anthropological journal and she incorporates this expertise neatly into her writing.
I enjoyed Excellent Women and Less Than Angels so much that I bought a stack of Barbara Pym novels during Covid, but I got distracted by other books and never read them. This is the year that I fix this omission and I am ever so glad that this was such an enjoyable start to the project.
July 7, 2022
I really enjoy Barbara Pym's quiet, peppery humor. I wish she were better known. I thoroughly approve of the way this book ends.
March 9, 2011
A Barbara Pym novel for me is the greatest of guilty pleasures. Though this is not my favorite of her novels, it was a wonderful reminder of all the reasons that I adore her.
The story of two spinster sisters in a tiny township in England, where the most exciting news is the arrival of a new curate for the church, should not be page turning reading. But, I will tell you that no one is better at developing the simple lives of wonderfully complex people like Barbara Pym. I hesitate to compare her to Jane Austen, as all critics do, but both of them have a way of making every day life seem so enthralling.
The lives of Harriet and Belinda may not excite many. Tea and Church tend to dictate almost all decisions. But I find that in this simple life, one can best see the complexity that surround each decision we make. Can a spinster every hope of getting married? Is a life wasted when pining for a man you could have had but didn't, and is now married and living next door? Is being a mother hen a good way for one to go through life, or just a waste of time?
I left this novel with a sadness as neither woman seems to get what I wanted for them. But also with a hope that there are many in the world that always desire change in their life, but can be actually very content with what they have -- even if it is not perfect.
The story of two spinster sisters in a tiny township in England, where the most exciting news is the arrival of a new curate for the church, should not be page turning reading. But, I will tell you that no one is better at developing the simple lives of wonderfully complex people like Barbara Pym. I hesitate to compare her to Jane Austen, as all critics do, but both of them have a way of making every day life seem so enthralling.
The lives of Harriet and Belinda may not excite many. Tea and Church tend to dictate almost all decisions. But I find that in this simple life, one can best see the complexity that surround each decision we make. Can a spinster every hope of getting married? Is a life wasted when pining for a man you could have had but didn't, and is now married and living next door? Is being a mother hen a good way for one to go through life, or just a waste of time?
I left this novel with a sadness as neither woman seems to get what I wanted for them. But also with a hope that there are many in the world that always desire change in their life, but can be actually very content with what they have -- even if it is not perfect.
September 6, 2023
Unmarried mid-aged sisters Belinda and Harriet Bede live together in a small English village. They center their lives around going to church and visiting with various clergymen. Belinda has carried a torch for the (now married) Archdeacon for decades. Harriet is involved in the close-knit community and regularly turns down marriage proposals from an Italian Count. If I had to describe this novel in one word, it would be “understated.” The narrative follows the daily lives of the characters. Very little happens. The main events are a church-related garden party and a wedding. The sisters host guests for tea and meals. They read books and sew. It is what I would call a “cozy” or “comfort” read. In addition, it makes the point that women can be completely happy while choosing to remain single, a view that would have been quite different from the norm for the time it was published (1950). The subtle humor made me smile. I enjoyed it as a nice change of pace.
March 23, 2024
This morning, I was listening while driving, and at a stop light I managed to scribble the following quote: "They fell on a plate of cakes and began to eat ravenously," it just struck me as funny, as in my mind's eye I imagined falling into a giant sponge cake with lots of frosting! The quote is from a scene where a middle-aged woman is having afternoon tea with an archdeacon.
What's interesting is that this book has a high potential to be annoying in the emphasis on the "unimportant trifles" of middle-aged women whose conversations run to social commentaries on their neighbors and belittling other women to elevate themselves, however because of the quality of the writing and the underlying themes/messages, it is actually quite intriguing.
During the time this novel is set women spent a considerable amount of time on creating garments through knitting or sewing. At one point, reference is made to a woman needing to know how to shape the toe of a sock they were knitting and I remembered that my mother-in-law knitted socks for her husband, my father-in-law. Nowadays, knitting socks seems rather less important to people, a hobby, rather than a necessity, and I wonder if in time this will become a lost art.
The following quote illustrates an undercurrent of nastiness of a woman finding fault in another woman that gives a spike of momentary pleasure, a feeling of superiority:
"When we grow older we lack the fine courage of youth and even in ordinary tasks like making a pullover for somebody we love, or used to love seems too dangerous to be undertaken. Then, Agatha might get to hear of it, that was something else to be considered. Her long thin fingers might pick at it critically and detecting a mistake in the ribbing at the V-neck."
This quote gave me pause to ponder on its truth:
"But surely, liking the same things for dinner is one of the deepest and most lasting things you could possibly have in common with anyone," argued Doctor Parnell, "After all, the emotions of the heart are very transitory, or so I believe, I should think it makes one much happier to be well fed than well loved."
Finally, a quote which points to the meaning of the book's title:
"The old song had come into her head and seemed appropriate. Some tame gazelle or some gentle dove or even a poodle dog - something to love, that was the point."
Narrated by Mary Sarah in a somewhat lilting voice that was interesting to listen to.
What's interesting is that this book has a high potential to be annoying in the emphasis on the "unimportant trifles" of middle-aged women whose conversations run to social commentaries on their neighbors and belittling other women to elevate themselves, however because of the quality of the writing and the underlying themes/messages, it is actually quite intriguing.
During the time this novel is set women spent a considerable amount of time on creating garments through knitting or sewing. At one point, reference is made to a woman needing to know how to shape the toe of a sock they were knitting and I remembered that my mother-in-law knitted socks for her husband, my father-in-law. Nowadays, knitting socks seems rather less important to people, a hobby, rather than a necessity, and I wonder if in time this will become a lost art.
The following quote illustrates an undercurrent of nastiness of a woman finding fault in another woman that gives a spike of momentary pleasure, a feeling of superiority:
"When we grow older we lack the fine courage of youth and even in ordinary tasks like making a pullover for somebody we love, or used to love seems too dangerous to be undertaken. Then, Agatha might get to hear of it, that was something else to be considered. Her long thin fingers might pick at it critically and detecting a mistake in the ribbing at the V-neck."
This quote gave me pause to ponder on its truth:
"But surely, liking the same things for dinner is one of the deepest and most lasting things you could possibly have in common with anyone," argued Doctor Parnell, "After all, the emotions of the heart are very transitory, or so I believe, I should think it makes one much happier to be well fed than well loved."
Finally, a quote which points to the meaning of the book's title:
"The old song had come into her head and seemed appropriate. Some tame gazelle or some gentle dove or even a poodle dog - something to love, that was the point."
Narrated by Mary Sarah in a somewhat lilting voice that was interesting to listen to.
May 10, 2025
Nothing better than discovering a new author that you really enjoy!
May 17, 2023
I had high hopes for Some Tame Gazelle (1950) having recently read and loved both Excellent Women (1952) and Quartet in Autumn (1977).
I quite enjoyed this, Pym's debut, but it lacked the more immediate charms of the previous two books and I was never really engaged.
I was concurrently reading The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym by Paula Byrne which helpfully explains all the real life inspirations for the characters and it was this aspect of the novel that I found most interesting.
At around the halfway point I decided to skim read it with the aid of the plot summary on the novel's Wikipedia page.
I still look forward to more Pym despite this disappointment which lacks the laughs and sly humour of Excellent Women and Quartet in Autumn.
3/5
I quite enjoyed this, Pym's debut, but it lacked the more immediate charms of the previous two books and I was never really engaged.
I was concurrently reading The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym by Paula Byrne which helpfully explains all the real life inspirations for the characters and it was this aspect of the novel that I found most interesting.
At around the halfway point I decided to skim read it with the aid of the plot summary on the novel's Wikipedia page.
I still look forward to more Pym despite this disappointment which lacks the laughs and sly humour of Excellent Women and Quartet in Autumn.
3/5
October 22, 2023
Barbara Pym started writing this, her first novel, in her twenties. Basing the characters on herself and her sister and friends, she placed them, middle-aged, in a parochial setting in the countryside.
Sisters Belinda (Pym) and Harriet (Pym's sister Hilary) are confirmed spinsters sharing a house and a life filled with gardening, church activities and endless speculation about other people's comings and goings. Belinda carries a torch for the Archdeacon, who is unhappily married to prickly Agatha, while Harriet regularly turns down proposals from a sweet Italian count. Agatha's departure to a German spa, and the arrival of a famous librarian (back then, famous librarians walked the earth) and a bishop from Africa shake things up. There is so much for Belinda to worry about: her inappropriate attachment to the Archdeacon (who is as arrogant as real-life Henry), the risk of Harriet being lured into marriage by one of the many suitors skulking about, the proper lunch for the visiting seamstress (lesson learnt: if the cauliflower served contains a huge caterpillar, the guest may be compensated with a boiled egg).
A delightful, funny, sharp and thoroughly entertaining comedy. I am in awe of this woman. She wrote most of this in her early twenties, and already possessed so much wit, smarts and knowledge of human nature. Her satirical eye gently observes the peculiarities of her fellow men. Here the bishop shares his African experience with the parishioners, singing and playing native instruments:
'Imagine yourselves taking part in a Mbawawa wedding'.
'I do not feel myself equal to that', whispered Edith to Belinda. 'Death would have been a better choice, or even birth'. The voice of the Bishop rang out through the hall in song. Many handkerchiefs were taken out hastily, especially among the younger members of the audience, for the noise which filled the hall was quite unexpected. Even Belinda, who had heard the Bishop sing as a curate, was a little unprepared. And yet perhaps the Mbawawa did have voices like that and it was wrong to feel one wanted to laugh.
After this ordeal , it is time for the next instrument, the characteristic Hmwoq:
Everyone looked with interest at the curiously shaped object which had had now appeared on the screen. It was certainly a very peculiar shape and there was more giggling from the back of the hall. It could hardly be what it seemed to be, thought Belinda doubtfully, though one knew that among primitive peoples one might find almost anything. The anthropologist who went among them must go with an open mind... The Bishop turned towards the screen and prodded it uncertainly. Then he advanced toward the edge of the platform and said in a loud clear voice, 'I think that slide is upside down'.
Ah, the British.
Sisters Belinda (Pym) and Harriet (Pym's sister Hilary) are confirmed spinsters sharing a house and a life filled with gardening, church activities and endless speculation about other people's comings and goings. Belinda carries a torch for the Archdeacon, who is unhappily married to prickly Agatha, while Harriet regularly turns down proposals from a sweet Italian count. Agatha's departure to a German spa, and the arrival of a famous librarian (back then, famous librarians walked the earth) and a bishop from Africa shake things up. There is so much for Belinda to worry about: her inappropriate attachment to the Archdeacon (who is as arrogant as real-life Henry), the risk of Harriet being lured into marriage by one of the many suitors skulking about, the proper lunch for the visiting seamstress (lesson learnt: if the cauliflower served contains a huge caterpillar, the guest may be compensated with a boiled egg).
A delightful, funny, sharp and thoroughly entertaining comedy. I am in awe of this woman. She wrote most of this in her early twenties, and already possessed so much wit, smarts and knowledge of human nature. Her satirical eye gently observes the peculiarities of her fellow men. Here the bishop shares his African experience with the parishioners, singing and playing native instruments:
'Imagine yourselves taking part in a Mbawawa wedding'.
'I do not feel myself equal to that', whispered Edith to Belinda. 'Death would have been a better choice, or even birth'. The voice of the Bishop rang out through the hall in song. Many handkerchiefs were taken out hastily, especially among the younger members of the audience, for the noise which filled the hall was quite unexpected. Even Belinda, who had heard the Bishop sing as a curate, was a little unprepared. And yet perhaps the Mbawawa did have voices like that and it was wrong to feel one wanted to laugh.
After this ordeal , it is time for the next instrument, the characteristic Hmwoq:
Everyone looked with interest at the curiously shaped object which had had now appeared on the screen. It was certainly a very peculiar shape and there was more giggling from the back of the hall. It could hardly be what it seemed to be, thought Belinda doubtfully, though one knew that among primitive peoples one might find almost anything. The anthropologist who went among them must go with an open mind... The Bishop turned towards the screen and prodded it uncertainly. Then he advanced toward the edge of the platform and said in a loud clear voice, 'I think that slide is upside down'.
Ah, the British.
December 22, 2024
This was my first Pym, although she was recommended to me years ago on Amazon; I picked up a few ancient paperback editions from my local used book store over the years and put them on the "to-read" shelf. I just finished "Some Tame Gazelle" last night, and I really enjoyed it. I know Pym's been compared to Austen, and I see that, but I also think, as a NYT reviewer says on the cover of my edition, ". . .Barbara Pym is funnier!" Reading her makes me feel like I do when I read Anthony Trollope: tickled by their shared gift for creating warm, cozy rural English villages peopled (mostly!) by genuinely good curates, archdeacons, and "excellent" churchwomen, but at the same time making very sharp, often hilarious observations poking gentle fun at their foibles. It's an amazing balancing act, and I find myself smiling and chuckling as I read - delicious! Some reviewers on Amazon say this book was nothing compared to her later works, which I look forward to tracking down and savoring.
December 15, 2016
Pym’s world is very gentle and shares with Wodehouse the fact that nothing really bad ever happens. Her humour too is quiet. Life isn’t quite uneventful—there are visits and little dinner and luncheon parties, and fairs and concerts—but in another sense, it isn’t all that eventful either. Romance or possibilities of it are a digression, a fluctuation in an otherwise smooth course. It may be a touch melancholy at times, there may be feelings of loneliness but does that mean that only love and/or marriage makes life full and complete? This book, as some of Pym’s others, shows that perhaps it isn’t so—life may not always need to be ‘complete’ in the popular sense to be happy or comfortable. There will always be hope and possibilities, things to add flavour. The question is not so much of what is, but of how one perceives it. A pleasant and lovely read, as always.
April 16, 2013
Barbara Pym may not be the the very best novelist that has ever put pen to paper. But she is unquestionably my favourite. She has provided me with more hours of pure reading pleasure than any other writer I can think of (only Agatha Christie, whose detective stories I devoured when I was a teenager and who, with Enid Blyton, is primarily responsible for my love of reading, comes close). Yes, Ms Pym's stories are usually set in what now seems like an almost vanished world of genteel Anglo-Catholicism in middle class England of the 1950s that many readers will not be able to relate to. Yes, they are perhaps miniatures that are unlikely ever to be acclaimed as novels of earth-shattering relevance or importance. But in their own quiet way they are a very accurate representation of the seemingly insignificant moments of comedy, poignancy and pathos that make up most of our lives in the modern western world. And so, in that sense, they are major works of art. They are replete with gentle, subtle and pathetic moments of drama and amusement that may not ever produce an excited response or a guffaw from the reader but which are nonetheless likely to touch a nerve and perhaps to raise a quiet laugh in recognition of the uncannily deadly accuracy of the author's powers of observation.
"Some Tame Gazelle", which is Ms Pym's first published novel, bears all the author's trademark qualities of wit, of elegance and of gentle satire. It features two middle-aged spinster sisters, Belinda and Harriet Bede, who live relatively comfortable lower middle class lives, funded by unearned income. They are faithful churchgoers who are all too ready to involve themselves in the wider social life of the parish, largely prompted by their personal feelings towards the vicar and the curate. The precise details of the plot are not that important - so I'll say no more than that about the events that occur throughout the book's 250 or so pages. But as is always the case with Barbara Pym, the principal characters unwittingly reveal themselves in a series of acutely accurate vignettes that are redolent of the quietly desperate and pathetic nature of the foibles and eccentricities that constitute the major part of almost all of our lives. This is a quite brilliant novel. I urge you to read it (and Barbara Pym's other novels, most of which are as good as this one). 10/10.
"Some Tame Gazelle", which is Ms Pym's first published novel, bears all the author's trademark qualities of wit, of elegance and of gentle satire. It features two middle-aged spinster sisters, Belinda and Harriet Bede, who live relatively comfortable lower middle class lives, funded by unearned income. They are faithful churchgoers who are all too ready to involve themselves in the wider social life of the parish, largely prompted by their personal feelings towards the vicar and the curate. The precise details of the plot are not that important - so I'll say no more than that about the events that occur throughout the book's 250 or so pages. But as is always the case with Barbara Pym, the principal characters unwittingly reveal themselves in a series of acutely accurate vignettes that are redolent of the quietly desperate and pathetic nature of the foibles and eccentricities that constitute the major part of almost all of our lives. This is a quite brilliant novel. I urge you to read it (and Barbara Pym's other novels, most of which are as good as this one). 10/10.
December 18, 2021
This novel, Pym's first to be published (in 1950, begun while she was an undergraduate at Oxford), has cemented my belief that Pym was a proto-feminist and simply must be read through that lens.
I was immediately struck by how well it establishes her themes, tone, preferred setting and universe of characters. It's like a perfect little nugget of all that comes to be important in her oeuvre: the role of and constraints on women; the 'marriage plot' or, rather, the only path available to women to which end all of her novels seem to aim (but, importantly, almost none of her heroines ever achieve, at least during the course of a given novel); the close examination of post-war, English country village life revolving around the Church of England.
The irony and underhanded, almost coded, humour is absolutely delicious. I may be completely wrong about this, but I see Pym creating a literary optical illusion: one can obliviously read these books as comedies of manners, gentle examinations of English country life that ultimately accept and even reinforce the status quo.
Or, one can read them (as I do) as eviscerating satires that reveal the inequalities between the sexes and classes, and which point out that the constraints and lack of options (for women especially, but men too) ultimately doom an entire generation to quietly wither away, playing whist, consuming tea and attending evensong, as their increasingly irrelevant way of life meets its eventual end.
Hurrah!
I was immediately struck by how well it establishes her themes, tone, preferred setting and universe of characters. It's like a perfect little nugget of all that comes to be important in her oeuvre: the role of and constraints on women; the 'marriage plot' or, rather, the only path available to women to which end all of her novels seem to aim (but, importantly, almost none of her heroines ever achieve, at least during the course of a given novel); the close examination of post-war, English country village life revolving around the Church of England.
The irony and underhanded, almost coded, humour is absolutely delicious. I may be completely wrong about this, but I see Pym creating a literary optical illusion: one can obliviously read these books as comedies of manners, gentle examinations of English country life that ultimately accept and even reinforce the status quo.
Or, one can read them (as I do) as eviscerating satires that reveal the inequalities between the sexes and classes, and which point out that the constraints and lack of options (for women especially, but men too) ultimately doom an entire generation to quietly wither away, playing whist, consuming tea and attending evensong, as their increasingly irrelevant way of life meets its eventual end.
Hurrah!
September 15, 2022
It's been said that Pym is the Jane Austen of her era. I sort of saw the comparison in the previous two Pym books I read, No Fond Return of Love and Excellent Women, but in this one, her first novel, the comedy of manners in village life was much more pronounced. Pym loves to write about spinsters and clergy in a way that keeps this reader entertained!
Why I'm reading this: I'm on a bit of a Pym run lately after several articles on the publication of a new biography, The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym. In a long hold line at the library for that one!
Why I'm reading this: I'm on a bit of a Pym run lately after several articles on the publication of a new biography, The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym. In a long hold line at the library for that one!
May 20, 2025
I just love Barbara Pym! I can't say that this one was my favorite, but it was just what I have come to expect from her and, also -- what I want! :)
It is the story of the everyday lives of two middle-aged sisters who live in a small English village, where the social life seems to revolve around church activities, afternoon tea, and Sunday evening supper -- after Even Song. So, as in many of Pym's works, there are curates, vicars, archdeacons, bishops.... -- did I miss anyone? ;) Well, they are all there, along with the church ladies who organize the jumble sales and arrange the altar flowers. And I love it all!
I so enjoy Pym's sense of humor. I don't think she's making fun of her characters as much as she might be making fun of herself! Her writing style and sense of small village life is just so cute.
This the tenth book of hers that I have read, and I will keep reading her as long as I can find more of her books!
It is the story of the everyday lives of two middle-aged sisters who live in a small English village, where the social life seems to revolve around church activities, afternoon tea, and Sunday evening supper -- after Even Song. So, as in many of Pym's works, there are curates, vicars, archdeacons, bishops.... -- did I miss anyone? ;) Well, they are all there, along with the church ladies who organize the jumble sales and arrange the altar flowers. And I love it all!
I so enjoy Pym's sense of humor. I don't think she's making fun of her characters as much as she might be making fun of herself! Her writing style and sense of small village life is just so cute.
This the tenth book of hers that I have read, and I will keep reading her as long as I can find more of her books!
March 31, 2015
Some tame gazelle, or some gentle dove:
Something to love, oh, something to love! ---Thomas Haynes Bayly
Two reasonably content spinster sisters live together in a small town. Harriet "dotes" on young curates, having them over for meals and taking them presents, while our main character Belinda has spent thirty years gently nursing a flame for her college boyfriend, long since married and a clergyman in the same town.
Something to love, oh, something to love! ---Thomas Haynes Bayly
Two reasonably content spinster sisters live together in a small town. Harriet "dotes" on young curates, having them over for meals and taking them presents, while our main character Belinda has spent thirty years gently nursing a flame for her college boyfriend, long since married and a clergyman in the same town.
August 16, 2025
What would be the modern equivalent of Barbara Pym? A lyrical social comedy? I guess the times have changed. Is it even possible anymore? Such comfort comes from ignoring social tensions and political issues the modern novels cannot afford to not comment on.
A spinster lives in an English village in a quiet safe despair, and no revolution, failure or disintegration is coming for her at all. She takes no risks. What sustains her is the predictability: taking her egg with the tea, some cake, some knitting wool in the shop.
I love this world precisely because it is absolutely emotionally unreal in its safe longings, never to be satisfied. I guess that's the 25-year-old's inspired idea of a middle age. I would love to take a refuge in this kind of thing myself, except that I'm uncomfortably close to middle age in another century, where nothing is safe or quiet anymore.
A spinster lives in an English village in a quiet safe despair, and no revolution, failure or disintegration is coming for her at all. She takes no risks. What sustains her is the predictability: taking her egg with the tea, some cake, some knitting wool in the shop.
I love this world precisely because it is absolutely emotionally unreal in its safe longings, never to be satisfied. I guess that's the 25-year-old's inspired idea of a middle age. I would love to take a refuge in this kind of thing myself, except that I'm uncomfortably close to middle age in another century, where nothing is safe or quiet anymore.
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