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Barsetshire #29
Three Score and Ten
Thirkell’s last, unfinished novel, completed by her close friend C. A. Lejeune, features a host of new and old friends from the author’s beloved Barsetshire. This time out, a little boy appears to save Wiple Terrace, home of Miss Hampton and Miss Bent, from destruction. The budding romance between Lord Mellings and Lavinia Merton flowers, a past love finds Dr. Ford, and the Old Bank House provides the setting for the final scene, an all-Barsetshire party to celebrate the 70th birthday of Mrs. Morland, the popular novelist.
318 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1961
8 people are currently reading
148 people want to read
About the author
Angela Thirkell
58 books258 followers Angela Margaret Mackail was born on January 30, 1890 at 27 Young Street, Kensington Square, London. Her grandfather was Sir Edward Burne-Jones the pre-Raphaelite painter and partner in the design firm of Morris and Company for whom he designed many stained glass windows - seven of which are in St Margaret's Church in Rottingdean, West Sussex. Her grandmother was Georgiana Macdonald, one of a precocious family which included among others, Stanley Baldwin, the Prime Minister, and Rudyard Kipling. Angela's brother, Denis Mackail, was also a prolific and successful novelist. Angela's mother, Margaret Burne-Jones, married John Mackail - an administrator at the Ministry of Education and Professor of Poetry at Oxford University.
Angela married James Campbell McInnes in 1911. James was a professional Baritone and performed at concert halls throughout the UK. In 1912 their first son Graham was born and in 1914 a second son, Colin. A daughter was born in 1917 at the same time her marriage was breaking up. In November 1917 a divorce was granted and Angela and the children went to live with her parents in Pembroke Gardens in London. The child, Mary, died the next year.
Angela then met and married George Lancelot Thirkell in 1918 and in 1920 they traveled on a troop ship to George's hometown in Australia. Their adventures on the "Friedricksruh" are recounted in her Trooper to the Southern Cross published in 1934. In 1921, in Melbourne Australia, her youngest son Lancelot George was born. Angela left Australia in 1929 with 8 year old Lance and never returned. Although living with her parents in London she badly needed to earn a living so she set forth on the difficult road of the professional writer. Her first book, Three Houses, a memoir of her happy childhood was published in 1931 and was an immediate success. The first of her novels set in Trollope's mythical county of Barsetshire was Demon in the House, followed by 28 others, one each year.
Angela also wrote a book of children's stories entitled The Grateful Sparrow using Ludwig Richter's illustrations; a biography of Harriette Wilson, The Fortunes of Harriette; an historical novel, Coronation Summer, an account of the events in London during Queen Victoria's Coronation in 1838; and three semi-autobiographical novels, Ankle Deep and Oh, These Men, These Men and Trooper to the Southern Cross. When Angela died on the 29th of January 1961 she left unfinished the last of her books, Three Score and Ten which was completed by her friend, Caroline LeJeune. Angela is buried in Rottingdean alongside her daughter Mary and her Burne-Jones grandparents.
Angela married James Campbell McInnes in 1911. James was a professional Baritone and performed at concert halls throughout the UK. In 1912 their first son Graham was born and in 1914 a second son, Colin. A daughter was born in 1917 at the same time her marriage was breaking up. In November 1917 a divorce was granted and Angela and the children went to live with her parents in Pembroke Gardens in London. The child, Mary, died the next year.
Angela then met and married George Lancelot Thirkell in 1918 and in 1920 they traveled on a troop ship to George's hometown in Australia. Their adventures on the "Friedricksruh" are recounted in her Trooper to the Southern Cross published in 1934. In 1921, in Melbourne Australia, her youngest son Lancelot George was born. Angela left Australia in 1929 with 8 year old Lance and never returned. Although living with her parents in London she badly needed to earn a living so she set forth on the difficult road of the professional writer. Her first book, Three Houses, a memoir of her happy childhood was published in 1931 and was an immediate success. The first of her novels set in Trollope's mythical county of Barsetshire was Demon in the House, followed by 28 others, one each year.
Angela also wrote a book of children's stories entitled The Grateful Sparrow using Ludwig Richter's illustrations; a biography of Harriette Wilson, The Fortunes of Harriette; an historical novel, Coronation Summer, an account of the events in London during Queen Victoria's Coronation in 1838; and three semi-autobiographical novels, Ankle Deep and Oh, These Men, These Men and Trooper to the Southern Cross. When Angela died on the 29th of January 1961 she left unfinished the last of her books, Three Score and Ten which was completed by her friend, Caroline LeJeune. Angela is buried in Rottingdean alongside her daughter Mary and her Burne-Jones grandparents.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
January 13, 2013
Rating: 4.5* of five
The Book Description: Finished posthumously by her close friend, C. A. Lejeune, Three Score and Ten concludes the Barsetshire series with the birthday party of the heroine of the first novel, Laura Morland, now seventy years old, surrounded by her grown family, her literary legacy, and the same small-town drama that enchanted and amused readers thirty years previously. Thirkell's last, unfinished novel features a host of new and old friends from the author's beloved Barsetshire. This time out, a little boy appears to save Wiple Terrace, home of Miss Hampton and Miss Bent, from destruction. The budding romance between Lord Mellings and Lavinia Merton flowers, a past love finds Dr. Ford, and the Old Bank House provides the setting for the final scene, an all-Barsetshire party.
My Review: Of all the bittersweet pleasures I know, the completion of a dead author's beloved series stands alone at the top of my list. This, the twenty-ninth book in Thirkell's Barsetshire series, is never to have a companion added. It is a shame, on one level, and a relief on another.
I love the divagations and arabesques of illogic and whimsy that Thirkell specialized in. One's gently daft old Great-Aunt Maude, speaking from the edge of the grave to one's child-self, telling stories of the damnedest things...life before TV?! Horses as transportation instead of sport?! No showers?!...how extraordinary, how unimaginably primitive, how exciting! Laura Morland, introduced in the first book as the slightly harassed and mildly put-upon widowed mother of four wildly energetic, not terribly obedient sons, newly arrived in Barsetshire, is now turning seventy, which was quite a great age in 1959. She sits writing her Madame Koska thrillers, one after another, each just like the next and quite happily so; she has her youngest son's oldest son wished on her for the summer hols; she goes to parties, visits old friends for tea, takes pretty no-longer-young single women to the lairs of elderly single men and somehow makes it all come out right. Mrs. Morland is of the fabric of Barsetshire. She is the weft of the cloth, putting the picture into perspective, adding color and strength, and yet her lifetime habit of self-deprecation is ingrained and requires her to play down her milestone birthday and reject a party celebrating it in her honor.
And herein the relief of the series ending. The attitudes of fifty years ago can jar on modern sensibilities. The attitudes considered old-fashioned fifty years ago...! And of course, as anyone who has read the books before this one knows, there's the racism inherent in the time and place, most strongly evidenced by Thirkell's portraits of the Mixo-Lydian Ambassadress. Ye gods! The assumption that one must be married, must have a wife to care for one, a husband whose babies to have, isn't exactly in line with today's thinking and was slowly losing its hold on womanity even in 1959. The country-simple folks whose lives revolve around the rhythms of nature and the needs of their domestic cattle and crops, then a doomed lot of old-fashioned yokels, are now quite celebrated by the culture. Look at the Fabulous Beekman Boys! They're making a living out of promoting this very lifestyle, a gay couple riffing on Martha Stewart and (probably unknowingly) Thirkell. (Go read their blog. You'll see what I mean. Sharon Springs is like Barchester in a number of ways.)
But for all that, the sheer delight of sitting with Mrs. Morland, the authoress's well-known alter ego in the stories, as she contentedly runs out the sands in her life's hourglass, looking not ahead by much and back with a good deal of affection, is quite a pleasant experience. Mrs. Morland isn't dead yet, you see, she isn't just waiting for God, she is smiling and chatting and dispensing her inimitable style of wisdom to the young things quite without portentousness or even awareness of what she's doing. The Leslies, the Fosters (the Pomfrets, one supposes), the Thornes and Mertons and Keiths...of all generations...open their homes to Laura Morland, celebrated authoress, and old friend in this last installment. As Mrs. Thirkell herself died at seventy-one, it isn't a huge leap to imagine all these quiet teas and dull dinners (self-described!) and Agricultural Shows as Mrs. Morland's own last ones, and see them in this sweetly golden glow of times well and truly lost.
Being a Thirkell novel, well story since novel implies a plot of which this dear and lovely creation is void, there are engagements that will lead to the next generation's birth and upbringing, there are young people of every age busily engaged in the business of becoming themselves, there are so many many bustling scenes of no great moment but such deep pleasure...the knowledge that, despite the impending departure of the main character for good and all, there will be other lives and other worlds and new perspectives on it all. The sadness we feel at inevitable loss is tempered, as it always should be, by the eternal verity that Life, my dear, Life Goes On.
I love Barsetshire, and need its beautiful landscapes and wonderful people in my mental furniture. And sad as I am that I can't go there afresh in a new book, I'm so pleased to have had the chance to close the circle in finally reading this deeply autobiographical book. The door to Barsetshire, however, I refuse to close. The breeze from it is so beguilingly fresh.
The Book Description: Finished posthumously by her close friend, C. A. Lejeune, Three Score and Ten concludes the Barsetshire series with the birthday party of the heroine of the first novel, Laura Morland, now seventy years old, surrounded by her grown family, her literary legacy, and the same small-town drama that enchanted and amused readers thirty years previously. Thirkell's last, unfinished novel features a host of new and old friends from the author's beloved Barsetshire. This time out, a little boy appears to save Wiple Terrace, home of Miss Hampton and Miss Bent, from destruction. The budding romance between Lord Mellings and Lavinia Merton flowers, a past love finds Dr. Ford, and the Old Bank House provides the setting for the final scene, an all-Barsetshire party.
My Review: Of all the bittersweet pleasures I know, the completion of a dead author's beloved series stands alone at the top of my list. This, the twenty-ninth book in Thirkell's Barsetshire series, is never to have a companion added. It is a shame, on one level, and a relief on another.
I love the divagations and arabesques of illogic and whimsy that Thirkell specialized in. One's gently daft old Great-Aunt Maude, speaking from the edge of the grave to one's child-self, telling stories of the damnedest things...life before TV?! Horses as transportation instead of sport?! No showers?!...how extraordinary, how unimaginably primitive, how exciting! Laura Morland, introduced in the first book as the slightly harassed and mildly put-upon widowed mother of four wildly energetic, not terribly obedient sons, newly arrived in Barsetshire, is now turning seventy, which was quite a great age in 1959. She sits writing her Madame Koska thrillers, one after another, each just like the next and quite happily so; she has her youngest son's oldest son wished on her for the summer hols; she goes to parties, visits old friends for tea, takes pretty no-longer-young single women to the lairs of elderly single men and somehow makes it all come out right. Mrs. Morland is of the fabric of Barsetshire. She is the weft of the cloth, putting the picture into perspective, adding color and strength, and yet her lifetime habit of self-deprecation is ingrained and requires her to play down her milestone birthday and reject a party celebrating it in her honor.
And herein the relief of the series ending. The attitudes of fifty years ago can jar on modern sensibilities. The attitudes considered old-fashioned fifty years ago...! And of course, as anyone who has read the books before this one knows, there's the racism inherent in the time and place, most strongly evidenced by Thirkell's portraits of the Mixo-Lydian Ambassadress. Ye gods! The assumption that one must be married, must have a wife to care for one, a husband whose babies to have, isn't exactly in line with today's thinking and was slowly losing its hold on womanity even in 1959. The country-simple folks whose lives revolve around the rhythms of nature and the needs of their domestic cattle and crops, then a doomed lot of old-fashioned yokels, are now quite celebrated by the culture. Look at the Fabulous Beekman Boys! They're making a living out of promoting this very lifestyle, a gay couple riffing on Martha Stewart and (probably unknowingly) Thirkell. (Go read their blog. You'll see what I mean. Sharon Springs is like Barchester in a number of ways.)
But for all that, the sheer delight of sitting with Mrs. Morland, the authoress's well-known alter ego in the stories, as she contentedly runs out the sands in her life's hourglass, looking not ahead by much and back with a good deal of affection, is quite a pleasant experience. Mrs. Morland isn't dead yet, you see, she isn't just waiting for God, she is smiling and chatting and dispensing her inimitable style of wisdom to the young things quite without portentousness or even awareness of what she's doing. The Leslies, the Fosters (the Pomfrets, one supposes), the Thornes and Mertons and Keiths...of all generations...open their homes to Laura Morland, celebrated authoress, and old friend in this last installment. As Mrs. Thirkell herself died at seventy-one, it isn't a huge leap to imagine all these quiet teas and dull dinners (self-described!) and Agricultural Shows as Mrs. Morland's own last ones, and see them in this sweetly golden glow of times well and truly lost.
Being a Thirkell novel, well story since novel implies a plot of which this dear and lovely creation is void, there are engagements that will lead to the next generation's birth and upbringing, there are young people of every age busily engaged in the business of becoming themselves, there are so many many bustling scenes of no great moment but such deep pleasure...the knowledge that, despite the impending departure of the main character for good and all, there will be other lives and other worlds and new perspectives on it all. The sadness we feel at inevitable loss is tempered, as it always should be, by the eternal verity that Life, my dear, Life Goes On.
I love Barsetshire, and need its beautiful landscapes and wonderful people in my mental furniture. And sad as I am that I can't go there afresh in a new book, I'm so pleased to have had the chance to close the circle in finally reading this deeply autobiographical book. The door to Barsetshire, however, I refuse to close. The breeze from it is so beguilingly fresh.
December 15, 2014
Farewell, Angela Thirkell.
This was her last book, and a friend had to finish it for her, but the transition appears seamless. This one brings in nearly ALL of her previous characters, if not in detail at least mentioned in passing. It is a very fitting send-off to a long series of books. The series began in "High Rising" with Laura Morland, harassed mother and authoress, and it concludes with her 70th birthday, an event which draws nearly all the inhabitants of the county together for old times' sake. There are still a few engagements to be arranged, as there are in every Thirkell book. There are village fetes, dinners, and tea parties. There are incorrigible but good-hearted children, comfortable friends, and desultory conversations. It's life with rose-coloured glasses.
I find it a little difficult to place this book, because it was published in 1961, which to me is an era that starts to scream "modern literature," but even though these characters are meant to be contemporary 1960-ish, they feel much more old-fashioned. I suppose that is because MOST of the focal characters are now middle-aged or elderly. By the time of her last book, Thirkell seemed to spare very little time for the 20-somethings... they only make the grade if they can follow in their parents' footsteps and stay a little old-fashioned themselves. Her characters are nostalgic.
The other thing that makes this book feel very "old" is the presence of the nobility... as an American who is only self-educated about Britain, I had the idea that by the 1960s the lords and ladies were getting more rare, but in this book the county is bursting with them, even though they're significantly reduced in their lifestyle. And they take a really active part in the doings of the county: everyone seems to be friends with them. And now I wonder, was that part of Angela Thirkell's personal nostalgia, or were there still lots of highly visible landed gentry in mid-20th century Britain?
Anyway, it has been a treat to read Angela Thirkell's funny, pensive books where sometimes the characters think just the way I would and where, by the end, all is contentment and peace.
This was her last book, and a friend had to finish it for her, but the transition appears seamless. This one brings in nearly ALL of her previous characters, if not in detail at least mentioned in passing. It is a very fitting send-off to a long series of books. The series began in "High Rising" with Laura Morland, harassed mother and authoress, and it concludes with her 70th birthday, an event which draws nearly all the inhabitants of the county together for old times' sake. There are still a few engagements to be arranged, as there are in every Thirkell book. There are village fetes, dinners, and tea parties. There are incorrigible but good-hearted children, comfortable friends, and desultory conversations. It's life with rose-coloured glasses.
I find it a little difficult to place this book, because it was published in 1961, which to me is an era that starts to scream "modern literature," but even though these characters are meant to be contemporary 1960-ish, they feel much more old-fashioned. I suppose that is because MOST of the focal characters are now middle-aged or elderly. By the time of her last book, Thirkell seemed to spare very little time for the 20-somethings... they only make the grade if they can follow in their parents' footsteps and stay a little old-fashioned themselves. Her characters are nostalgic.
The other thing that makes this book feel very "old" is the presence of the nobility... as an American who is only self-educated about Britain, I had the idea that by the 1960s the lords and ladies were getting more rare, but in this book the county is bursting with them, even though they're significantly reduced in their lifestyle. And they take a really active part in the doings of the county: everyone seems to be friends with them. And now I wonder, was that part of Angela Thirkell's personal nostalgia, or were there still lots of highly visible landed gentry in mid-20th century Britain?
Anyway, it has been a treat to read Angela Thirkell's funny, pensive books where sometimes the characters think just the way I would and where, by the end, all is contentment and peace.
May 30, 2013
And the very last word of the very last book is "England." Just right.
March 28, 2022
Ordinarily I'd summarize the plot, but there really didn't seem to be much of one. Someone is planning on knocking down some old buildings, a few are thinking about marriage, and Thirkell's stand in is having a birthday party. The book opens with an interminable and confusing dinner party, which goes on for far too many pages, but then improves somewhat. We get appearances from characters who appeared in previous of Thirkell's novels -- a nice touch, given that this is the very last of them -- but it does mean that I, who have only read four or five of the twenty-eight previous Barsetshire books, met people I didn't care particularly about. (Though I will admit I was very happy to see an old Mixo-Lydian friend, and to know she'd moved up in the world.)
There's humor, but not quite enough to carry the weight, given the plot's weaknesses, and one or two asides that made me curious as to whether they come from Thirkell's life, or were just there for effect. Angela Thirkell died before this book was complete, and it was finished by a friend. Had Thirkell lived a bit longer, maybe she would've been able to tighten up the prose a bit more.
A reviewer mentions that the 2005 edition is full of typos, and she is not kidding. This was surprisingly distracting, and I do recommend paying a couple dollars more for a less typo-ridden earlier edition.
There's humor, but not quite enough to carry the weight, given the plot's weaknesses, and one or two asides that made me curious as to whether they come from Thirkell's life, or were just there for effect. Angela Thirkell died before this book was complete, and it was finished by a friend. Had Thirkell lived a bit longer, maybe she would've been able to tighten up the prose a bit more.
A reviewer mentions that the 2005 edition is full of typos, and she is not kidding. This was surprisingly distracting, and I do recommend paying a couple dollars more for a less typo-ridden earlier edition.
January 29, 2023
What a nice book: not the strongest as far as plot (ahem) goes, and it certainly took some time to get going, but, as the last (posthumous, in fact) of Thirkell's books, it adds a lovely note to the conclusion. The last chapter about Mrs. Morland's party is priceless, and I was surprised to get a tad teary over the description of the Barshetshire book she's given, since it echoes so many memories I and many other readers, I'm sure, have of the pleasures of the series. Equally bittersweet is the fact that Thirkell herself died at 70. All in all, a suitable requiem!
**Reread in 2023: I reorganized our bookshelves and put all my Barsetshire books in order--and discovered this very last one, which I think I only read one time. It was a happy discovery! I stand by the review above, but will bump it up to four stars because it's truly one of the better ones in the series. Again, don't start with it, but if you're a fan of Thirkell, don't miss it!
**Reread in 2023: I reorganized our bookshelves and put all my Barsetshire books in order--and discovered this very last one, which I think I only read one time. It was a happy discovery! I stand by the review above, but will bump it up to four stars because it's truly one of the better ones in the series. Again, don't start with it, but if you're a fan of Thirkell, don't miss it!
February 11, 2023
For anyone who has read this entire series and become a Friend of Barsetshire, this was a very satisfying ending to a long, sprawling, funny, comforting series. I think every one of the hundreds of characters from the previous books made a cameo or was at least mentioned. I found this book much better than the last few near the end of the series, which were too repetitious, though I still enjoyed them. I have been grateful for the companionship of these happy books over the past two years. Nothing much occurs but it's written about with wit and dryest humor, the people are real and varied, and all things come to a good end in the most English county in England.
December 19, 2022
Angela Thirkell's last book. I judged that Thirkell died at the end of p. 116. If so, her last written words were, "Then their talk went back comfortably to old times." I decided to stop reading there. (After going to the end to see who married whom, according to the author who finished the book.)
. . . Nearly six years later, I finished the book. It's like a curtain call for all beloved characters (including the deceased, who are kept in memory) in their beloved settings, especially Mrs. Morland/Angela Thirkell who celebrates her 70th birthday.
. . . Nearly six years later, I finished the book. It's like a curtain call for all beloved characters (including the deceased, who are kept in memory) in their beloved settings, especially Mrs. Morland/Angela Thirkell who celebrates her 70th birthday.
July 9, 2012
This is NOT the pb Moyer Bell 2005 edition shown above, whick is RIDDLED with typos! Very aggravating!
Mine is the original Hamish Hamilton 1961 hardbound (with dust cover).
Sounds like AT to the end (she left it unfinished). Finished by C.A. Lejeune.
Ludo & Lavinia plan a wedding, Mrs. Morland is given a birthday party.
Mine is the original Hamish Hamilton 1961 hardbound (with dust cover).
Sounds like AT to the end (she left it unfinished). Finished by C.A. Lejeune.
Ludo & Lavinia plan a wedding, Mrs. Morland is given a birthday party.
Want to read
April 16, 2016This was published posthumously, and finished by someone else, based on Thirkell's manuscript and notes. It doesn't read quite like the other Thirkells, but it's close.
February 9, 2020
A more upbeat book that the last few Barsetshire books
Reminiscent of the pre war books
A nice way to finish the series
Reminiscent of the pre war books
A nice way to finish the series
March 25, 2019
I shed a tear or two after reading the last book in this series. Thirkell and the writer who finished the book after tHirkell's did a fantastic job of encapsulating the whole series in this final peek at Barteshire life. My favorite characters were included, Laura Moreland, and Heather Adams of "I tell you what" fame. We are also introduced to Robin Moreland, Laura's grandson, who says "I know" to the irritation of others just as his father Tony had done. The last scene of the books is particularly tender and reminds us that although time marches on, the Barteshire traditions will continue.
May 8, 2017
Excellent wrap-up to the series.
April 19, 2017
Her final and my final Barsetshire novel. Hard to say good-bye after 30 books, but she (and her co-author who completed it after her death) wrapped up the series beautifully, with everyone celebrating the 70th birthday of her surrogate novelist, Mrs. Morland. Lovely.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews