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Conversation Piece
When Oliver visits lovely ramshackle Pullinstown, he gets swept up in wild days of fox hunting, fishing, and racing by his fearless young cousins Willow and Dick, whose profound closeness is matched only by their passion for horses and trickery. Their elegant, crafty father, Sir Richard, jousts with them both and with the redoubtable, sprightly Lady Honour, his old adversary and love. In this early novel by Molly Keane, the high romance and disarray of the vanished Anglo-Irish world is evoked with humor, nostalgia, and undercurrents of powerful feeling.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1932
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About the author
M.J. Farrell
17 books7 followersM.J. Farrell is a pseudonym used by
Molly Keane
for her earlier published novels and plays.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
October 7, 2016
Another wonderful book that takes you back to a bygone age of fox hunting,horse racing and fishing.
Told with humour and lovely descriptions of the countryside!
Told with humour and lovely descriptions of the countryside!
March 25, 2017
Then writing as M J Farrell, Conversation Piece was Molly Keane’s fourth novel. Like many of her novels – it’s very horsey – if you hate all things fox hunting then it is probably not for you. Oddly enough (and I think I have said this before) although I detest the very thought of fox hunting I don’t mind reading about it when it’s written by Molly Keane. I can’t help but think that the kind of eccentricity one finds among Keane’s characters can’t possibly exist anymore – although I really hope it does. It is these eccentric characters that I read Molly Keane novels for – it is all a world away from twenty first century Birmingham that’s for sure.
Conversation Piece – is perhaps not a very well-known Molly Keane novel, it is also not going to be my favourite – although I certainly enjoyed it. There isn’t a huge amount of plot – not something that ever bothers me – it is much more an evocation of a time, a way of life – and the people who lived it. It is the world that Molly Keane herself grew up in – the sporting calendar running to the seasons of the year with people’s lives completely tied up in it.
Set among the impoverished gentry of rural Ireland, Conversation Piece is narrated by Oliver who – throughout the unspecified time period of the novel – makes regular lengthy visits to his uncle and cousins at Pullinstown. His Uncle is Sir Richard Pulleyns, his cousins Dick and Willow, a little younger than Oliver, they are extremely close – each of them madly passionate about horses. They are also masters of trickery – loving nothing more than to completely outsmart their latest adversary. Gradually Oliver is accepted by them, and drawn into their world – their pranks, their hunts and horse races. Sir Richard is getting on – but he is no push over – quite a match for his difficult children, who generally call him (with affectionate mockery) Sir Richard or the Sir. The house is a shabby riot of confusion, containing almost as many animals as people.
“ ‘ Oh God help me!’ Sir Richard rose to his feet in a sudden helpless early morning spasm of complete and unavailing fury. ‘Put that dog down, sir; do you hear me, put it down. I’ll not have it. Do you know where your nasty ass was this morning, Willow? In the hot-air press! Yes in my own bottom shelf lying on my own bath-towel. What between dogs and donkeys, I can’t call my house my own; I can’t eat my breakfast without being disgusted by you children and your antics…”
The other – important member of the Pullinstown household is James, the butler. An old family retainer – who is very much a part of the family – the house is likely to go ‘all to blazes’ without his competent management. So when, James is laid up ill, a highly irritated Sir Richard – sends his children upstairs to minister to their butler. While James is out of action, the housemaids run amok, and all Sir Richard wants is for things to be back to normal. Willow is followed up the stairs by her baby donkey – who when not munching on James’s discarded poultices is generally found lying by the fire. In their absence one day, James has been ministered to by the slightly disreputable Pheelan, whose remedies consist of smouldering rags, and threaten to set James and the whole house alight. It is in these scenes of absurd comedy that Molly Keane so excels.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
Conversation Piece – is perhaps not a very well-known Molly Keane novel, it is also not going to be my favourite – although I certainly enjoyed it. There isn’t a huge amount of plot – not something that ever bothers me – it is much more an evocation of a time, a way of life – and the people who lived it. It is the world that Molly Keane herself grew up in – the sporting calendar running to the seasons of the year with people’s lives completely tied up in it.
Set among the impoverished gentry of rural Ireland, Conversation Piece is narrated by Oliver who – throughout the unspecified time period of the novel – makes regular lengthy visits to his uncle and cousins at Pullinstown. His Uncle is Sir Richard Pulleyns, his cousins Dick and Willow, a little younger than Oliver, they are extremely close – each of them madly passionate about horses. They are also masters of trickery – loving nothing more than to completely outsmart their latest adversary. Gradually Oliver is accepted by them, and drawn into their world – their pranks, their hunts and horse races. Sir Richard is getting on – but he is no push over – quite a match for his difficult children, who generally call him (with affectionate mockery) Sir Richard or the Sir. The house is a shabby riot of confusion, containing almost as many animals as people.
“ ‘ Oh God help me!’ Sir Richard rose to his feet in a sudden helpless early morning spasm of complete and unavailing fury. ‘Put that dog down, sir; do you hear me, put it down. I’ll not have it. Do you know where your nasty ass was this morning, Willow? In the hot-air press! Yes in my own bottom shelf lying on my own bath-towel. What between dogs and donkeys, I can’t call my house my own; I can’t eat my breakfast without being disgusted by you children and your antics…”
The other – important member of the Pullinstown household is James, the butler. An old family retainer – who is very much a part of the family – the house is likely to go ‘all to blazes’ without his competent management. So when, James is laid up ill, a highly irritated Sir Richard – sends his children upstairs to minister to their butler. While James is out of action, the housemaids run amok, and all Sir Richard wants is for things to be back to normal. Willow is followed up the stairs by her baby donkey – who when not munching on James’s discarded poultices is generally found lying by the fire. In their absence one day, James has been ministered to by the slightly disreputable Pheelan, whose remedies consist of smouldering rags, and threaten to set James and the whole house alight. It is in these scenes of absurd comedy that Molly Keane so excels.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
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August 18, 2020I don't have a "horse trading" shelf nor a "fishing-fly-theft" shelf so I think this one will remain unshelved. I really felt I must read one early Keane "horse-and-hound" novel, and this seemed like a good candidate given that it's the last one before the decisive break that was Devoted Ladies. For many, many pages, I thought, ok. So this is not for me. That's fine. I don't want to listen to a bunch of Anglo-Irish richo's and their servants do horse-talk for an entire novel, and that's what this seems like it's going to be. But then suddenly three quarters of the way through, it acquires this shimmery quality--and strange to say--there are subtleties I'm missing because, again, horses--but I think it becomes quite sophisticated? There's a point where the episodic horse-adventures quality falls away and the nostalgic first-person narrator (an English cousin) steps forward and that strange out-of-time feeling Keane is so capable of creating drops over the writing. And then a vaguely Christlike madman digs a badger out of a sandy embankment during a fox hunt and holds this living, biting badger in his bare hands while thirty dogs basically swarm him until he should be dead, but he isn't. And then the madman walks away, a young girl is scolded for flirting with an inappropriate lover, and the book is over? And I liked it? Ugh I don't know, am I going to have to read all the early Keanes now?
October 14, 2025
Some of the plotting around buying horses was very confusing. But somehow the way of life, sense of time and place, passion for the countryside and fox hunting and horse racing, and the people come through in a very interesting way.
January 22, 2014
Although it is in print, as a Virago Modern Classic, ‘Conversation Piece’ almost seems to be Molly Keane’s forgotten novel. I can only find aa passing mention in her biographical details, searching online I found only a handful of very brief reviews, and even the author interview that takes the place of an introduction in the copy I have just read only mentions it in passing.
I can almost understand the lack of attention. This is an early work – but not so early as to be interesting on that account – and it lacks some of the qualities that made many of her thirteen novels so special. But it paints a wonderful picture of life in an Irish country house at the start of the twentieth century – the world that Molly Keane grew up in – and it tells a simple story well.
That story is told by Oliver, the son of a younger son, who comes to visit his uncle and his cousins at the family home, a grand if rather shabby country house, known as Pullinstown.
“To be with these Irish cousins, their kindness mine and the quick fire of their interest changes me strangely, I think, so that all safe known values are gone for me and I am theirs.”
He is enchanted by the house, and by the cousins, and he describes them simply and beautifully. I really did feel that he was telling his story, speaking or writing, and he brought a house, a family, and a way of living to life on the page.
I was as taken as he was with his cousins, Dick and Willow. They were close, they were completely caught up with life and their shared interests, but as soon as they realised he was one of them, and not quite one of the grown-ups, they warmed to him and drew him into their circle. I liked their father, Sir Richard, who knew that he was growing old but wasn’t quite ready to be bested by his offspring. And I loved James, the unflappable butler who could turn his hand to almost everything.
When James fell ill it was Dick and Willow who cared for him, while the housemaids ran riot.
Times were changing, and Pullinstown was a country house in decline …
‘Conversation Piece’ isn’t so much a story as a telling of how life was, and of particular times that would always be remembered. That’s where the story almost fall down, because the family’s lives were centred around hunting, shooting, fishing and other country pursuits. The stories were well told, but there were too many of them, and they didn’t hold my interest.
There was an underlying story, of young and old, of how they, sometimes knowingly and sometimes unknowingly affect each others lives. That was engaging, and I wish it had been developed a little more, given a little more room to breathe.
When the story ended I wished that I could have spent a little more time with Oliver, Dick and Willow, and know a little more of what their futures held.
What I found most interesting about ‘Conversation Piece’ was that, although the style was recognisably Molly Keane’, although there were so many things – the country house, the lifestyle, the period – that can be found in her other novels, this book was different. The style was straightforward, the tone was often elegiac, and it was so clearly written with love.
I’m inclined to think that it has elements of autobiography, or that maybe it was inspired by friends and family.
I think that I need to read more of her work, so that I can really put it into context. I love her writing, and I am struck by the variation in the stories she has spun around Irish country houses.
I can understand now why ‘Conversation Piece’ is nearly forgotten, but I am glad that is not completely forgotten. For its own sake, and for the sake of understanding the writing life of an intriguing author …..
I can almost understand the lack of attention. This is an early work – but not so early as to be interesting on that account – and it lacks some of the qualities that made many of her thirteen novels so special. But it paints a wonderful picture of life in an Irish country house at the start of the twentieth century – the world that Molly Keane grew up in – and it tells a simple story well.
That story is told by Oliver, the son of a younger son, who comes to visit his uncle and his cousins at the family home, a grand if rather shabby country house, known as Pullinstown.
“To be with these Irish cousins, their kindness mine and the quick fire of their interest changes me strangely, I think, so that all safe known values are gone for me and I am theirs.”
He is enchanted by the house, and by the cousins, and he describes them simply and beautifully. I really did feel that he was telling his story, speaking or writing, and he brought a house, a family, and a way of living to life on the page.
I was as taken as he was with his cousins, Dick and Willow. They were close, they were completely caught up with life and their shared interests, but as soon as they realised he was one of them, and not quite one of the grown-ups, they warmed to him and drew him into their circle. I liked their father, Sir Richard, who knew that he was growing old but wasn’t quite ready to be bested by his offspring. And I loved James, the unflappable butler who could turn his hand to almost everything.
When James fell ill it was Dick and Willow who cared for him, while the housemaids ran riot.
Times were changing, and Pullinstown was a country house in decline …
‘Conversation Piece’ isn’t so much a story as a telling of how life was, and of particular times that would always be remembered. That’s where the story almost fall down, because the family’s lives were centred around hunting, shooting, fishing and other country pursuits. The stories were well told, but there were too many of them, and they didn’t hold my interest.
There was an underlying story, of young and old, of how they, sometimes knowingly and sometimes unknowingly affect each others lives. That was engaging, and I wish it had been developed a little more, given a little more room to breathe.
When the story ended I wished that I could have spent a little more time with Oliver, Dick and Willow, and know a little more of what their futures held.
What I found most interesting about ‘Conversation Piece’ was that, although the style was recognisably Molly Keane’, although there were so many things – the country house, the lifestyle, the period – that can be found in her other novels, this book was different. The style was straightforward, the tone was often elegiac, and it was so clearly written with love.
I’m inclined to think that it has elements of autobiography, or that maybe it was inspired by friends and family.
I think that I need to read more of her work, so that I can really put it into context. I love her writing, and I am struck by the variation in the stories she has spun around Irish country houses.
I can understand now why ‘Conversation Piece’ is nearly forgotten, but I am glad that is not completely forgotten. For its own sake, and for the sake of understanding the writing life of an intriguing author …..
May 7, 2012
Too many descriptions of hunts and races for me. All the other parts of the book are marvelous. It is much horsier than any of her other books I think.
April 20, 2021
I have no idea why Virago had a cover with three people around a piano on the cover nor why this title was chosen. This is not an inside book, but one full of description of the Irish countryside. It is a series of sketches from the point of view of a young Englishman visiting his Anglo-Irish uncle and his brother and sister cousins--all mad about horse racing and fox hunting. He finds them charming, even his cousin's practice of keeping a baby donkey in her bedroom. The run-down estate is full of 18th century antiques that no one cares about. This is a bewildering society where even the local minister is involved in horse trading and racing. I'm left a bit mystified by the appeal of the blood sports and there are places where I'm not sure what is going on.
October 1, 2020
I hate foxhunting and horse racing, not a book for me.
January 22, 2021
I go back to this book time after time - the amazing writing, the atmosphere and the wonderful characters.
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August 15, 2021MArvellous story, well written and engaging. Always recommend it to friends, and have re-read twice.
October 26, 2012
nope nope nope. this book is too boring to be able to resist tana french's faithful place any longer. i don't care about the hunt, i don't want to hear anymore about it, i feel the same way about willow, dick, and oliver, and i'm making up a hot bath and cup of coffee to celebrate the start of faithful place next.
January 21, 2014
Not for me---way too horsey. An early novel, this one lacks the weirdness and darkness I love in every other novel I've read by her.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews