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Towers in the Mist
Christ Church, Oxford is the location of this tale of the Leigh family, set in the days of Queen Elizabeth I.
In her notes about the origin of the book Elizabeth Goudge writes: "It is impossible to live in an old city and not ask oneself continually, what was it like in ages gone by? Who were the men, women and children who lived in my home centuries ago, and what were their thoughts and actions as they lived out their lives day by day in the place where I now live mine?"
In her notes about the origin of the book Elizabeth Goudge writes: "It is impossible to live in an old city and not ask oneself continually, what was it like in ages gone by? Who were the men, women and children who lived in my home centuries ago, and what were their thoughts and actions as they lived out their lives day by day in the place where I now live mine?"
384 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 1937
78 people are currently reading
939 people want to read
About the author
Elizabeth Goudge
64 books895 followersElizabeth Goudge was an English author of novels, short stories and children's books.
Elizabeth de Beauchamp Goudge was born on 24 April 1900 in Wells, Somerset, in Tower House close by the cathedral in an area known as The Liberty, Her father, the Reverend Henry Leighton Goudge, taught in the cathedral school. Her mother was Miss Ida Collenette from the Channel Isles. Elizabeth was an only child. The family moved to Ely for a Canonry as Principal of the theological college. Later, when her father was made Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, they moved to Christ Church, Oxford.
She went to boarding school during WWI and later to Arts College, presumably at Reading College. She made a small living as teacher, and continued to live with her parents. During this time, she wrote a few plays, and was encouraged to write novels by a publisher. As her writing career took off, she began to travel to other nations. Unfortunately, she suffered from depression for much of her life. She had great empathy for people and a talent for finding the comic side of things, displayed to great effect in her writing.
Goudge's first book, The Fairies' Baby and Other Stories (1919), was a failure and it was several years before she authored Island Magic (1934), which is based on Channel Island stories, many of which she had learned from her mother, who was from Guernsey. After the death of her father, Goudge and her mother went to Devon, and eventually wound up living there in a small cottage. There, she wrote prolifically and was happy.
After the death of her mother, and at the wishes of Goudge's family who wished her to live closer to them, she found a companion who moved with her to Rose Cottage in Reading. She lived out her life there, and had many dogs in her life. Goudge loved dogs, and much preferred their company to that of humans. She continued to write until shortly before her death, when ill health, successive falls, and cataracts hindered her ability to write. She was much loved.
Goudge was awarded the Carnegie Medal for The Little White Horse (1946), the book which J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter stories, has said was her favorite as a child. The television mini-series Moonacre was based on The Little White Horse. Her Green Dolphin Country (1944) was made into a film (under its American title, Green Dolphin Street) which won the Academy Award for Special Effects in 1948.
A Diary of Prayer (1966) was one of Goudge's last works. She spent her last years in her cottage on Peppard Common, just outside Henley-on-Thames, where a blue plaque was unveiled in 2008.
Elizabeth de Beauchamp Goudge was born on 24 April 1900 in Wells, Somerset, in Tower House close by the cathedral in an area known as The Liberty, Her father, the Reverend Henry Leighton Goudge, taught in the cathedral school. Her mother was Miss Ida Collenette from the Channel Isles. Elizabeth was an only child. The family moved to Ely for a Canonry as Principal of the theological college. Later, when her father was made Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford, they moved to Christ Church, Oxford.
She went to boarding school during WWI and later to Arts College, presumably at Reading College. She made a small living as teacher, and continued to live with her parents. During this time, she wrote a few plays, and was encouraged to write novels by a publisher. As her writing career took off, she began to travel to other nations. Unfortunately, she suffered from depression for much of her life. She had great empathy for people and a talent for finding the comic side of things, displayed to great effect in her writing.
Goudge's first book, The Fairies' Baby and Other Stories (1919), was a failure and it was several years before she authored Island Magic (1934), which is based on Channel Island stories, many of which she had learned from her mother, who was from Guernsey. After the death of her father, Goudge and her mother went to Devon, and eventually wound up living there in a small cottage. There, she wrote prolifically and was happy.
After the death of her mother, and at the wishes of Goudge's family who wished her to live closer to them, she found a companion who moved with her to Rose Cottage in Reading. She lived out her life there, and had many dogs in her life. Goudge loved dogs, and much preferred their company to that of humans. She continued to write until shortly before her death, when ill health, successive falls, and cataracts hindered her ability to write. She was much loved.
Goudge was awarded the Carnegie Medal for The Little White Horse (1946), the book which J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter stories, has said was her favorite as a child. The television mini-series Moonacre was based on The Little White Horse. Her Green Dolphin Country (1944) was made into a film (under its American title, Green Dolphin Street) which won the Academy Award for Special Effects in 1948.
A Diary of Prayer (1966) was one of Goudge's last works. She spent her last years in her cottage on Peppard Common, just outside Henley-on-Thames, where a blue plaque was unveiled in 2008.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
January 25, 2021
This book is in a class all by itself. It is a story of a family who lives in the rectory of Christ Church Oxford, a home Elizabeth Goudge once lived in with her family. It is a story haunted by the history of Oxford both backwards and forwards in time. It captures so much of the beauty of the landscape, the architecture, and the ideals of Oxford too. The story itself is engulfed in the ‘place.’ I could see that it might not be for everyone but if you love Goudge and love English history and love Oxford, you will love this book. And it is sprinkled throughout with Elizabethan poetry.
If it were an easier book to read I would give it five stars for majesty and beauty.
If it were an easier book to read I would give it five stars for majesty and beauty.
February 23, 2023
This is a quiet story about family life, about Oxford life as it began to change and be influenced by the academic life of the time, starting to grow roots and expand. There is also good deal of Elizabethan poetry, history, Oxford, mischief with Tom Brown's schooldays' vibes, spiritual insights, romance (innocent and sweet), humor, grief, death, quite an array of adventures which make this book so enjoyable. Loved it even more on a second read.
January 22, 2023
Elizabeth Goudge has never disappointed me before but she did with this book. I wouldn’t have finished it if I hadn’t been reading it for a challenge. And it felt like a marathon because it is long, meandering, sentimental, and romantic in the cloying sense. I might add jingoistic.
The story opens with a waif, Faithful Crocker, sleeping rough with Gypsies, who has set his sights on becoming a scholar at Oxford. This being more of a fable than a novel, he soon succeeds: a master of Christ Church is taken with him and helps him to find a place there. It is, we learn, the sixteenth century, and soon Faithful is mingling with the likes of Philip Sidney and Walter Raleigh; there are other historical and fictional characters scattered in, and even Queen Elizabeth appears.
Scattered in is an apt term because this is a book that can’t find its center. The story leaves Faithful in the background for long stretches to dwell on other characters, male and female, none of whom comes fully to life or inspires attachment. It dwells on scholarship and creativity and young love in turn, alternating with rollicking scenes of Renaissance city life, but none of its concerns feels like a shaping idea. The pace is wildly uneven. There are scenes full of suspense and dramatic opportunity, but they invariably come to nothing, leaving the story to wind on like a summer brook, slow-moving and a bit turgid. Goudge seems to be wanting to evoke the beauty and ugliness of a bygone era, but that should have been the background to a plot and she never achieves plot.
Goudge is well known for the beauty of her descriptions, but here that strength topples over into excess, with interminable similes (I came to dread the appearance of the word like) and sentences that meandered into incoherence, losing track of their syntax. It’s a bit like someone telling you at interminable length about a dream she had.
Towers in the Mist is dedicated to her father, and although it’s not the first book she published, I’m left wondering whether she didn’t write it in her teens only to set it aside, later on giving it to a publisher when unable to meet a deadline on one of her adult books. This is one of a trio of books she wrote about cathedral towns and the first one, City of Bells, is (so far) my favorite of her novels. This one was a big letdown.
The story opens with a waif, Faithful Crocker, sleeping rough with Gypsies, who has set his sights on becoming a scholar at Oxford. This being more of a fable than a novel, he soon succeeds: a master of Christ Church is taken with him and helps him to find a place there. It is, we learn, the sixteenth century, and soon Faithful is mingling with the likes of Philip Sidney and Walter Raleigh; there are other historical and fictional characters scattered in, and even Queen Elizabeth appears.
Scattered in is an apt term because this is a book that can’t find its center. The story leaves Faithful in the background for long stretches to dwell on other characters, male and female, none of whom comes fully to life or inspires attachment. It dwells on scholarship and creativity and young love in turn, alternating with rollicking scenes of Renaissance city life, but none of its concerns feels like a shaping idea. The pace is wildly uneven. There are scenes full of suspense and dramatic opportunity, but they invariably come to nothing, leaving the story to wind on like a summer brook, slow-moving and a bit turgid. Goudge seems to be wanting to evoke the beauty and ugliness of a bygone era, but that should have been the background to a plot and she never achieves plot.
Goudge is well known for the beauty of her descriptions, but here that strength topples over into excess, with interminable similes (I came to dread the appearance of the word like) and sentences that meandered into incoherence, losing track of their syntax. It’s a bit like someone telling you at interminable length about a dream she had.
Towers in the Mist is dedicated to her father, and although it’s not the first book she published, I’m left wondering whether she didn’t write it in her teens only to set it aside, later on giving it to a publisher when unable to meet a deadline on one of her adult books. This is one of a trio of books she wrote about cathedral towns and the first one, City of Bells, is (so far) my favorite of her novels. This one was a big letdown.
June 26, 2011
I might have been introduced to Elizabeth Goudge by falling in love with the Little White Horse but Towers in the Mist is my absolute favourite of her books. Oxford's early days as England's great university are brought vividly to life in a golden, magic book teeming with wonderful characters and Goudge's trademark enchanted touch. On the eve of the visit of Elizabeth 1, one family's life is touched in so many different ways; there is romance, transformation and mischief. I must have read it a gazillion times, I will continue to do so!
April 14, 2025
A story of Oxford, home-coming, and transcendent beauty, finished off with Goudge's characteristic mercy for the outcast.
"It is always love of something, he thought, that brings joy; love of some human being, of beauty or of learning. Love is the unchanging landscape, he though, at which among the changes and chances of this mortal life, we sometimes look through the peep-hole of joy; the love of God of which human love is a tiny echo. To be lost in it will be to have eternal life. One can know no more than that."
"It is always love of something, he thought, that brings joy; love of some human being, of beauty or of learning. Love is the unchanging landscape, he though, at which among the changes and chances of this mortal life, we sometimes look through the peep-hole of joy; the love of God of which human love is a tiny echo. To be lost in it will be to have eternal life. One can know no more than that."
April 27, 2012
One of Goudge's wordier books, not my top favorite, but with a fun sketch of Oxford history and a lovely tour of the town as part of the story. (Having just been there, I felt it quite good.) I liked her capture of the spirit of the Elizabethan age in the way she brought a young Sidney and Raleigh to life and evoked some of the golden possibility of the time. I think book's like this add flavor to my perception of history.
February 20, 2014
I adore Elizabeth Goudge and everything she has written! A few of my favorite quotes:
p. 141 "They had more star-shine in their souls than most men. It shone out of them like light of another country."
p. 157 "Somehow it did not occur to her than he might not love her; she took for granted that what she gave to him he would be able to give to her; she did not know yet that out of the depth of her own nature she made demands upon others that could not be satisfied unless their depth equaled her own...To be happy. To be satisfied. To be fulfilled."
p. 163 "If love for the one person in the world could be like this, a cool fragrant hiding place built round the well of life into which one could creep and be refreshed when the storms of this word became more than one could put up with..."
p. 166 "Her capacity for love was large."
p. 175 "...to keep in her sight the portals of those gates that led into the country for which she longed."
p. 247 "For herself Joyeuce had not dread of death, for she was one of those anxious pilgrims who look towards it as to a resting place where there is no more need for endurance."
p. 249 "She had discovered that in the long run we bear our own burdens. Others, as they pass us, can put a hand beneath them for a moment only, but they do not stop for long, and at the turn of the road the whole weight is back on our shoulders again."
p. 254 "News of a far country."
p. 255 "You must not grieve. There is another country."
p. 260 "It's not as bad as you think. The deeper you go into pain the more certain are you that all that happens to you has an explanation and purpose. You don't know what they are but you know they are there. You don't suffer any less because of the certainty but you would rather suffer and have it than just enjoy yourself and not have it."
p. 268 "It seemed that suffering of any sort made one lonely."
p. 269 "As the body turns always homeward at evening when the crowds are gone, so perhaps there is a country of the spirit to which the spirit turns in desolation. Perhaps one needed to be desolate to find that country, for if one were always happy one would not bother to look for it...what was that country?...Heaven. Fairyland. The land beyond the sunset. The land above the stars where the great multitude which no man can number stand before the throne, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands. The land behind the tree trunks where Queen Mab and her fairies leave the track of their passing in flowers upon the grass. Raleigh's land where birds of white and carnation perch in tall cedar trees, where the stones are of gold and silver and rivers fall down crystal mountains with the noise of a thousand bells clanging together...They gave it so many different names, but he supposed it was the same place and that the spirits of some lucky people, saints and little children and dreamers like Raleigh, could follow the road of loneliness until they reached their home...
He opened his eyes and found himself gazing straight at a blazing star. His blood tingled through his veins and he felt himself gripped by a strange excitement. Was this his star, whose face he had thought was turned away from him? Was it at last pointing upon him graciously? It shone so brightly straight into his eyes that for a moment, he put up his hand to cover them. It was surely speaking to him. It said, "come."
The young man who stepped out of the porch...was no longer lonely and unhappy. HE was Saint Nicholas, the Christmas saint, come down from heaven, or Oberon kind of the fays, or a sailor sailing towards the sunset. He was caught in a fairy tale and the glory of it swept him along as though his feet were winged.
p. 272 "The love of God is with man...That, Nicholas knew suddenly, is the news of the far country, the mystery like a nugget of gold that men travel so far to seek, the fact that is stated but not explained by all the pictures that have been painted and by all the music and the poetry that has been written since the dawn of the world. It was as easy as that, and as difficult."
p. 285 "Grace, the boys, and the twins stared sadly and a little sullenly into the fire, for they felt that happiness was their right at this season and they could not but feel bitter against the fate that had snatched it away from them."
p. 291 A love poem
p. 295 "...he realized that in spite of all assertions to the contrary, it is in this world the old who must serve the young; they are wasted by them, despoiled of their riches and wisdom by them, grateful if they can win their liking and allegiance, thankful at the end to be given, as reward for their sacrifice and labors, a small portion of a warm chimney to end their days in."
p. 299 "I think my love permeates her life, and hers mine. It is to me what light is to the sun and perfume to the rose; I am valueless without it."
p. 300 "I think that she is not happy in a humdrum life...She wants unordinary experiences and it is not good for her that she should have them only in her spirit. She needs to laugh and sing and dance. She needs to wear a new dress every day and have all the men at Court writing verses to her eyebrows. She needs to be so very happy for a short while that the whole of the rest of her life will glow with it."
p. 358 "And then she died; died as a wild bird will die who is shut in too small a cage."
p. 376 "It is always love of something that brings joy; love of some human being, of beauty or love or of learning. Love is the unchanging landscape at which, among the changes and chances of this mortal life, we sometimes look through the peephole of joy; the love of God of which human love is a tiny echo. To be lost in it will be to have eternal life. One can know no more than that."
p. 386 "...years of unceasing work and anxiety that would never break her spirit but would strip of her beauty and make of her a weary old woman."
p. 141 "They had more star-shine in their souls than most men. It shone out of them like light of another country."
p. 157 "Somehow it did not occur to her than he might not love her; she took for granted that what she gave to him he would be able to give to her; she did not know yet that out of the depth of her own nature she made demands upon others that could not be satisfied unless their depth equaled her own...To be happy. To be satisfied. To be fulfilled."
p. 163 "If love for the one person in the world could be like this, a cool fragrant hiding place built round the well of life into which one could creep and be refreshed when the storms of this word became more than one could put up with..."
p. 166 "Her capacity for love was large."
p. 175 "...to keep in her sight the portals of those gates that led into the country for which she longed."
p. 247 "For herself Joyeuce had not dread of death, for she was one of those anxious pilgrims who look towards it as to a resting place where there is no more need for endurance."
p. 249 "She had discovered that in the long run we bear our own burdens. Others, as they pass us, can put a hand beneath them for a moment only, but they do not stop for long, and at the turn of the road the whole weight is back on our shoulders again."
p. 254 "News of a far country."
p. 255 "You must not grieve. There is another country."
p. 260 "It's not as bad as you think. The deeper you go into pain the more certain are you that all that happens to you has an explanation and purpose. You don't know what they are but you know they are there. You don't suffer any less because of the certainty but you would rather suffer and have it than just enjoy yourself and not have it."
p. 268 "It seemed that suffering of any sort made one lonely."
p. 269 "As the body turns always homeward at evening when the crowds are gone, so perhaps there is a country of the spirit to which the spirit turns in desolation. Perhaps one needed to be desolate to find that country, for if one were always happy one would not bother to look for it...what was that country?...Heaven. Fairyland. The land beyond the sunset. The land above the stars where the great multitude which no man can number stand before the throne, clothed with white robes and palms in their hands. The land behind the tree trunks where Queen Mab and her fairies leave the track of their passing in flowers upon the grass. Raleigh's land where birds of white and carnation perch in tall cedar trees, where the stones are of gold and silver and rivers fall down crystal mountains with the noise of a thousand bells clanging together...They gave it so many different names, but he supposed it was the same place and that the spirits of some lucky people, saints and little children and dreamers like Raleigh, could follow the road of loneliness until they reached their home...
He opened his eyes and found himself gazing straight at a blazing star. His blood tingled through his veins and he felt himself gripped by a strange excitement. Was this his star, whose face he had thought was turned away from him? Was it at last pointing upon him graciously? It shone so brightly straight into his eyes that for a moment, he put up his hand to cover them. It was surely speaking to him. It said, "come."
The young man who stepped out of the porch...was no longer lonely and unhappy. HE was Saint Nicholas, the Christmas saint, come down from heaven, or Oberon kind of the fays, or a sailor sailing towards the sunset. He was caught in a fairy tale and the glory of it swept him along as though his feet were winged.
p. 272 "The love of God is with man...That, Nicholas knew suddenly, is the news of the far country, the mystery like a nugget of gold that men travel so far to seek, the fact that is stated but not explained by all the pictures that have been painted and by all the music and the poetry that has been written since the dawn of the world. It was as easy as that, and as difficult."
p. 285 "Grace, the boys, and the twins stared sadly and a little sullenly into the fire, for they felt that happiness was their right at this season and they could not but feel bitter against the fate that had snatched it away from them."
p. 291 A love poem
p. 295 "...he realized that in spite of all assertions to the contrary, it is in this world the old who must serve the young; they are wasted by them, despoiled of their riches and wisdom by them, grateful if they can win their liking and allegiance, thankful at the end to be given, as reward for their sacrifice and labors, a small portion of a warm chimney to end their days in."
p. 299 "I think my love permeates her life, and hers mine. It is to me what light is to the sun and perfume to the rose; I am valueless without it."
p. 300 "I think that she is not happy in a humdrum life...She wants unordinary experiences and it is not good for her that she should have them only in her spirit. She needs to laugh and sing and dance. She needs to wear a new dress every day and have all the men at Court writing verses to her eyebrows. She needs to be so very happy for a short while that the whole of the rest of her life will glow with it."
p. 358 "And then she died; died as a wild bird will die who is shut in too small a cage."
p. 376 "It is always love of something that brings joy; love of some human being, of beauty or love or of learning. Love is the unchanging landscape at which, among the changes and chances of this mortal life, we sometimes look through the peephole of joy; the love of God of which human love is a tiny echo. To be lost in it will be to have eternal life. One can know no more than that."
p. 386 "...years of unceasing work and anxiety that would never break her spirit but would strip of her beauty and make of her a weary old woman."
August 27, 2018
I am sad to see that I have now read every Elizabeth Goudge novel. This one is, I believe, her first, written when she was in her 30s. I feel like she needed an editor to slash some of the wordiness and descriptions. The nuggets of wisdom that appear in her books appeared primarily in the last third of the book. Being a modern day reader, I might have given up before her jewels appeared, but because she is an absolute favorite author, I kept on reading. For being "an old maid" spinster in rural England, coming of age at the end of WWI, with a father who was an Anglican minister, her insight into humanity is incredible. Like the Bronte sisters and Jane Austen, she reflected on humanity in an age we cannot conceive of, with our stimuli. I will always seek her nuggets of wisdom, as a respite from the busy life I live. Even though this isn't my favorite book, she will always be my favorite author!
March 5, 2014
Delightful! A good book for a rainy afternoon with cup of tea. I loved the character development, the lyrical, poetic writing style, and the frequent rabbit trails that are complete stories in themselves, though still linked to the main story and adding depth and richness.
May 27, 2021
I enjoyed all the English History woven into it but that may not be for everyone. I thought I was one of the better Goudge books I’ve read, but maybe I was in the mood for a history lesson.
January 29, 2021
This was a lovely book! The beginning was a bit slow, but about 1/3 of the way through it started to pick up, and I really did enjoy it. I gave it four stars because it is still not as wonderful and dear to me as The Dean's Watch.
October 31, 2024
I mean, I can see why not everyone would like this book. It’s long. Not much happens. I was still enjoying the setting and the family and the pace, preparing to bestow a solid four Anjie-Stars…until the last four chapters about the Queen’s visit.
🥱 🥱 😒 🥱
🥱 🥱 😒 🥱
August 13, 2025
Another charming book by Goudge -- often I feel I read a book at just the right time, but with this one I wish I had read it when I was fourteen or fifteen, because I would have related to the character so much then -- the older sister who thought she must martyr her poet's heart in order to raise her six younger and orphaned siblings, and how she mothered them and loved them as she would her own children. It was a sweet depiction.
The setting was very unique: the Catholic church is underground, and the common faith is Anglican. Elizabeth is queen, and although she is well loved, the author subtly points out that there it is a fear-based worship. Veneration of the Mother Mary must be kept secret -- and so must mysteries of God's church. However, nobody is really evil. Each is walking in their own faith or convictions, and living out the consequences of their joys and sorrows as peasants and scholars are determined to do.
There is an interesting anecdote on whipping children and how a young child, no matter how stubborn he may be, knows well the different between anger and abuse, and when he deserves a proper spanking, and how harmful and unsettling the first can be, and how comforting and sheltering the second is.
The main characters are many -- Faithful, who leaves the gypsies and finds a home with a priest and his many children, the scholars (real and fictional), the priests, and the children, themselves from the eldest to youngest. They each feel as real and prominent as the story unfolds.
The setting was very unique: the Catholic church is underground, and the common faith is Anglican. Elizabeth is queen, and although she is well loved, the author subtly points out that there it is a fear-based worship. Veneration of the Mother Mary must be kept secret -- and so must mysteries of God's church. However, nobody is really evil. Each is walking in their own faith or convictions, and living out the consequences of their joys and sorrows as peasants and scholars are determined to do.
There is an interesting anecdote on whipping children and how a young child, no matter how stubborn he may be, knows well the different between anger and abuse, and when he deserves a proper spanking, and how harmful and unsettling the first can be, and how comforting and sheltering the second is.
The main characters are many -- Faithful, who leaves the gypsies and finds a home with a priest and his many children, the scholars (real and fictional), the priests, and the children, themselves from the eldest to youngest. They each feel as real and prominent as the story unfolds.
June 7, 2017
Although this was written in the 1930's, I wanted to read this because 1) It's about Oxford & my husband & daughter & I have all had many happy days there; 2) I read 'Green Dolphin Street' as a HS'er on a recommendation from my mother(!) & enjoyed it.
It's written in a different style than what I regularly read now--more flowery & poetic than modern murder mysteries (imagine that!) so it took me a little while to slow down my reading rate. After I had adjusted my reading, it grew on me.
Her story consists of a "snippet" of Oxford's history while Queen Elizabeth I had just recently been made Queen. [I was really glad that I had recently seen 'Wolf Hall' on PBS so that I was able to follow some of the historical details she brings up.] She follows (mainly) a rector's family who are part of Christ College, & yet are typical Oxford townspeople of the time. The children are very lovable as the oldest sister steps in for her dead mother to raise the youngers & run the household. Great descriptions of family life @ that time.
I love that she included youthful portraits of (Sir) Walter Raleigh, Philip Sidney, & other Oxford students @ the time, plus the Duke of Essex, all of whom would go on to play major parts in QE1's reign. She also begins her chapters with examples of actual poetry written @ that time by Raleigh, Sidney, & others within her story. What a treat!
I found it well worth the time I invested.
It's written in a different style than what I regularly read now--more flowery & poetic than modern murder mysteries (imagine that!) so it took me a little while to slow down my reading rate. After I had adjusted my reading, it grew on me.
Her story consists of a "snippet" of Oxford's history while Queen Elizabeth I had just recently been made Queen. [I was really glad that I had recently seen 'Wolf Hall' on PBS so that I was able to follow some of the historical details she brings up.] She follows (mainly) a rector's family who are part of Christ College, & yet are typical Oxford townspeople of the time. The children are very lovable as the oldest sister steps in for her dead mother to raise the youngers & run the household. Great descriptions of family life @ that time.
I love that she included youthful portraits of (Sir) Walter Raleigh, Philip Sidney, & other Oxford students @ the time, plus the Duke of Essex, all of whom would go on to play major parts in QE1's reign. She also begins her chapters with examples of actual poetry written @ that time by Raleigh, Sidney, & others within her story. What a treat!
I found it well worth the time I invested.
September 30, 2022
It took me until about half-way through this book to really get into it. Centered in Oxford, it’s mainly a story of one family and the various people their lives intersect with.
Instead of small happenings supporting one theme or plot, there were at lot of small happening strung together into the story of a town and family. I felt like maybe I missed a vital over-arching theme that glued everything together. It felt really scattered to me and a bit hard to know just what she was trying to tell her audience.
Instead of small happenings supporting one theme or plot, there were at lot of small happening strung together into the story of a town and family. I felt like maybe I missed a vital over-arching theme that glued everything together. It felt really scattered to me and a bit hard to know just what she was trying to tell her audience.
February 7, 2024
A wonderful book of Oxford early in the reign of Elizabeth 1; when student Walter Raleigh was dreaming of going to sea for her, and could still attend lectures taught by Edmund Campion. The story centers around a Canon of Christ College and his children. Through them over the course of a year, you see Oxford in all its seasons and all moods. Some romance, some adventure, and a lot of inspiration.
April 20, 2020
Review to come.
February 24, 2023
The writing in this book was beautifully lyrical. That was about the only thing that I really liked about it.
It's not that I particularly disliked it, I just felt like it never actually … told me a story. There seemed to be no actual main characters- they all felt like side characters. One would be introduced, you'd start to get to know them, and then they'd be put to the side and you never really got to know them. More time was spent describing the histories of the place instead of the characters and what was going on with them, and what was happening now. Which, for some people that might be a preferable thing. However, for me it left the story feeling disjointed and I didn't really know what I was supposed to be following. If felt like listening to someone who is dreamy and can't follow a train of thought and just keeps going off on different topics, occasionally circling back around to things they've been talking about, but then going off the tracks again.
This would probably be a great summertime read, for those lazy summer days on the beach where your attention wanders with your own dreams. It's saving grace for me was her beautiful writing. If it had been my own book vs a library book it would have had multiple pages marked with quotes and passages I found poignant.
It's not that I particularly disliked it, I just felt like it never actually … told me a story. There seemed to be no actual main characters- they all felt like side characters. One would be introduced, you'd start to get to know them, and then they'd be put to the side and you never really got to know them. More time was spent describing the histories of the place instead of the characters and what was going on with them, and what was happening now. Which, for some people that might be a preferable thing. However, for me it left the story feeling disjointed and I didn't really know what I was supposed to be following. If felt like listening to someone who is dreamy and can't follow a train of thought and just keeps going off on different topics, occasionally circling back around to things they've been talking about, but then going off the tracks again.
This would probably be a great summertime read, for those lazy summer days on the beach where your attention wanders with your own dreams. It's saving grace for me was her beautiful writing. If it had been my own book vs a library book it would have had multiple pages marked with quotes and passages I found poignant.
June 19, 2025
First off, what a wonderful heartwarming story: so many “coincidences” and happy endings! Every Goudge book I’ve read so far is immensely satisfying and encouraging. Of course there is sadness and grief but not without hope of “that other country” for those who know Christ.
This novel took me back to the summer of 2001 that I spent in Oxford at St John’s College. Being familiar with some of the 21st century streets and colleges that have changed little since this book’s setting made in infinitely more enjoyable, but even if I wasn’t familiar with Oxford, the way she imagines famous Elizabethan people intertwining with the characters she created fits so well together you would think it might just be true. I enjoyed even the asides about Oxford history and how things came to be, like the Bodleian library and the rough history of Christ Church where Goudge also once lived. What a lovely summer read! I highly recommend for fans of romance and British history alike, and the descriptions of the landscape and the town may be wordy for some but I felt they added to the sense of place and permanence that Oxford holds in so many minds.
This novel took me back to the summer of 2001 that I spent in Oxford at St John’s College. Being familiar with some of the 21st century streets and colleges that have changed little since this book’s setting made in infinitely more enjoyable, but even if I wasn’t familiar with Oxford, the way she imagines famous Elizabethan people intertwining with the characters she created fits so well together you would think it might just be true. I enjoyed even the asides about Oxford history and how things came to be, like the Bodleian library and the rough history of Christ Church where Goudge also once lived. What a lovely summer read! I highly recommend for fans of romance and British history alike, and the descriptions of the landscape and the town may be wordy for some but I felt they added to the sense of place and permanence that Oxford holds in so many minds.
May 21, 2020
I finally finished this book! It says a lot about this incredible author that she can hold my attention and cause me to persevere in a book set in a time and place I know little about and am not very interested in. I don’t think I got half out of this book of what I should have. I felt quite ignorant of her references of people and places in a way that I didn’t feel in reading The Green Dolphin Country, Which was set in the Channel Islands which I knew even less about.
The pilgrims Inn series and The Green Dolphin Country AKA Green Dolphin Street have been my favorites so far.
The pilgrims Inn series and The Green Dolphin Country AKA Green Dolphin Street have been my favorites so far.
June 20, 2018
Not my favorite of her books. It felt like the main character was actually the city of Oxford. Lots of detail about life in the Elizabethan era-- but the entire book felt like more of a snapshot than a story.
Also needed to read extra info about pretty much everyone in the book as they were historical figures.
Also needed to read extra info about pretty much everyone in the book as they were historical figures.
October 15, 2016
This paean to Elizabethan Oxford is an early work of Goudge's -- all her usual good stuff is there in embryo form, but it never really comes together into a satisfying narrative. Still, enjoyable to fans of Elizabethiana (if that's a word).
January 10, 2020
A lovely portrait of Oxford in 1645. Romance, history, and adventures are recreated with a painter's eye, as Goudge fills her tale with opulent descriptions of nature. Appearances by Philip Sydney, Walter Raleigh and good Queen Bess piqued my interest and the poetic quotes from the time are an extra treat. The plot won't find you tearing ahead but will lead you along to nibble leisurely at the bounty. A convincing time machine with well-drawn characters.. Delightful.
May 21, 2021
I believe this was Elizabeth's third published novel. I've now read three-fourths of her novels, so I do feel like I have more perspective on the progression of her work. I could definitely tell that Elizabeth's craft in this novel was still developing. It weighs heavy on the history of Oxford. I did find it absolutely fascinating, but I started to grow impatient with the wealth of historical detail towards last fourth of the novel. Perhaps because it's simply so different from more modern history that I have a hard time comprehending it. When the story was focused on the Leigh family, I enjoyed the story much more. The last fourth of the novel focuses on Queen Elizabeth's visit to Oxford, which could work as a plot device, but it actually just overwhelmed the story.
I think her novel The White Witch, published in 1952, is a more successful historical novel (set in the English Civil War). The history in it is more subtle and has a more powerful effect in the story through imagery rather than simply retelling it as she does in Towers in the Mist. I actually have found that I prefer Elizabeth's "modern day" (modern to her) novels, like The Rosemary Tree, The Scent of Water, and the Damerosehay trilogy. I think The City of Bells is my favorite of her historical novels, but that may be because it's set around 1900 instead of 1560 or 1640. That being said, I am certainly looking forward to expanding my knowledge of English history pre-1800!
Nearly all the hallmarks of Elizabeth's prose are here in Towers in the Mist. She absolutely glories in the magnificent sense of place and history in Oxford. Her dad held a position at Oxford for about 15 years before her death, so I can see why she was compelled to write a novel like this, and she did bring Oxford of the 1560s alive so well. I will never, ever say I'm sorry to have read an Elizabeth Goudge novel because there is something so soul-enriching about each one.
I would have liked to have had more of the story from Canon Leigh's perspective since he was persecuted under Bloody Mary and fled to France for a time and someone, even as a bit of a dodderer, managed to father eight children and keep them all in a semblance of order. I liked Joyeuce, Grace, Faithful, Philip Sidney, and even the irascible Great-Aunt!
I think her novel The White Witch, published in 1952, is a more successful historical novel (set in the English Civil War). The history in it is more subtle and has a more powerful effect in the story through imagery rather than simply retelling it as she does in Towers in the Mist. I actually have found that I prefer Elizabeth's "modern day" (modern to her) novels, like The Rosemary Tree, The Scent of Water, and the Damerosehay trilogy. I think The City of Bells is my favorite of her historical novels, but that may be because it's set around 1900 instead of 1560 or 1640. That being said, I am certainly looking forward to expanding my knowledge of English history pre-1800!
Nearly all the hallmarks of Elizabeth's prose are here in Towers in the Mist. She absolutely glories in the magnificent sense of place and history in Oxford. Her dad held a position at Oxford for about 15 years before her death, so I can see why she was compelled to write a novel like this, and she did bring Oxford of the 1560s alive so well. I will never, ever say I'm sorry to have read an Elizabeth Goudge novel because there is something so soul-enriching about each one.
I would have liked to have had more of the story from Canon Leigh's perspective since he was persecuted under Bloody Mary and fled to France for a time and someone, even as a bit of a dodderer, managed to father eight children and keep them all in a semblance of order. I liked Joyeuce, Grace, Faithful, Philip Sidney, and even the irascible Great-Aunt!
February 25, 2018
This is one of Goudge's adult novels; she wrote other books, for children, including Linnets and Valerians and The Little White Horse, both of which I loved as a kid. Towers in the Mist is set in Elizabethan Oxford and follows (more or less) a poor but very promising scholar called Faithful Crocker, who gets himself to Oxford in the hope of acquiring learning. He's quickly adopted by the family of Canon Leigh of Christ Church, and becomes the servitor of the eldest Leigh son, Giles, also studying at Christ Church. Over the course of a year, the fortunes of Faithful and the Leighs rise and fall. There is a love story (there are two, actually), but two things really make the book: its stunningly vivid, detailed, loving descriptions of Oxford city and the surrounding countryside, and its funny, chatty, interesting asides about the real-life historical figures that people its pages. (The book features not only a young Walter Raleigh but a clever, thoughtful Philip Sidney, and Elizabeth I, amongst many other characters whose lives are a matter of record.) Goudge, of course, propagates a mid-twentieth-century view of Tudor England, one that holds up Good Queen Bess and the return of religious moderatism and Raleigh's patriotic imperial yearnings as models of behaviour. But her characters are vivacious and irresistible, and the whole book comprises a love letter to Oxford that is more charming than I can say. She also handles religion rather well, I think; the practice and accoutrements of Christianity—prayers, relics and so on—are omnipresent in her characters' lives in a way that feels entirely faithful to the period, probably because they were very present in her own life, too.
April 18, 2019
What a beautiful tapestry Elizabeth Goudge has created with Towers in the Mist! From beggarly urchin to resplendent queen, to a full cast of life-sized characters in between...all against the backdrop of Oxford University in the mid-sixteenth century.
I love how Goudge has seamlessly meshed the plot line of the Leigh family with a richness of historical fact. Using that combination, she draws us right in to the realities of that era. We begin to feel what it would be like to live and love and strive and rejoice in that day.
Yes, there are frequent and full descriptions of the natural surroundings. Don't bother to pick up the book if you don't have the attention span for strongly descriptive passages. But if you can take such writing in, your mind's eye will reward you with a sensory-rich world that comes alive.
I've appreciated Goudge's writing for many years, and Towers in the Mist takes my appreciation to a whole new level. Highly recommended!
I love how Goudge has seamlessly meshed the plot line of the Leigh family with a richness of historical fact. Using that combination, she draws us right in to the realities of that era. We begin to feel what it would be like to live and love and strive and rejoice in that day.
Yes, there are frequent and full descriptions of the natural surroundings. Don't bother to pick up the book if you don't have the attention span for strongly descriptive passages. But if you can take such writing in, your mind's eye will reward you with a sensory-rich world that comes alive.
I've appreciated Goudge's writing for many years, and Towers in the Mist takes my appreciation to a whole new level. Highly recommended!
February 5, 2014
I love Elizabeth Goudge. I have read at least 5 other books by her and this one was a bit harder for me to "get into", but I am so glad I did. The last 3 chapters got so good and so rich that it made it worth the effort to read it. I blogged a short synopsis of what I got out of it and why I liked it here: http://settingsofgold.blogspot.com/20...
August 6, 2020
DNF. Sigh. I wanted to love this book. I have heard Elizabeth Goudge equated to Dickens and many people I admire are huge fans. I received the book as a gift in a secret elf exchange so that also gave me a reason to appreciate. I just could not get into this book and finally decided it was ok to let it go without finishing.
January 13, 2017
Not to my taste. Too sugary, idealistic, and long-winded.
January 27, 2019
This is a book that inspires you to be a better person. I love the historical figures that appear throughout the book and the stories/legends that are retold.
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