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The Sweet Dove Died
A chance encounter over a Victorian flower book brings together Humphrey, an antiques dealer, his nephew James, and Leonora. Although she is considerably older, Leonora becomes a little too fond of James. Leonora is determined to keep James to herself but realizes that her rival is the bookish Phoebe. Then along comes Ned, a saucy young American, and Leonora's problems boil over.
168 pages, Paperback
First published April 10, 1979
121 people are currently reading
1644 people want to read
About the author
Barbara Pym
40 books988 followersPeople know British writer Barbara Pym for her comic novels, such as
Excellent Women
(1952), of English life.
After studying English at St Hilda's College, Oxford, Barbara Pym served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. From 1950 to 1961, she published six novels, but her 7th was declined by the publisher due to a change in the reading public's tastes.
The turning point for Pym came with a famous article in the 1975 Times Literary Supplement in which two prominent names, Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin, nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century. Pym and Larkin had kept up a private correspondence over a period of many years. Her comeback novel, Quartet in Autumn, was nominated for the Booker Prize. Another novel, The Sweet Dove Died, previously rejected by many publishers, was subsequently published to critical acclaim, and several of her previously unpublished novels were published after her death.
Pym worked at the International African Institute in London for some years, and played a large part in the editing of its scholarly journal, Africa, hence the frequency with which anthropologists crop up in her novels. She never married, despite several close relationships with men, notably Henry Harvey, a fellow Oxford student, and the future politician, Julian Amery. After her retirement, she moved into Barn Cottage at Finstock in Oxfordshire with her younger sister, Hilary, who continued to live there until her death in February 2005. A blue plaque was placed on the cottage in 2006. The sisters played an active role in the social life of the village.
Several strong themes link the works in the Pym "canon", which are more notable for their style and characterisation than for their plots. A superficial reading gives the impression that they are sketches of village or suburban life, with excessive significance being attached to social activities connected with the Anglican church (in particular its Anglo-Catholic incarnation). However, the dialogue is often deeply ironic, and a tragic undercurrent runs through some of the later novels, especially Quartet in Autumn and The Sweet Dove Died.
After studying English at St Hilda's College, Oxford, Barbara Pym served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. From 1950 to 1961, she published six novels, but her 7th was declined by the publisher due to a change in the reading public's tastes.
The turning point for Pym came with a famous article in the 1975 Times Literary Supplement in which two prominent names, Lord David Cecil and Philip Larkin, nominated her as the most underrated writer of the century. Pym and Larkin had kept up a private correspondence over a period of many years. Her comeback novel, Quartet in Autumn, was nominated for the Booker Prize. Another novel, The Sweet Dove Died, previously rejected by many publishers, was subsequently published to critical acclaim, and several of her previously unpublished novels were published after her death.
Pym worked at the International African Institute in London for some years, and played a large part in the editing of its scholarly journal, Africa, hence the frequency with which anthropologists crop up in her novels. She never married, despite several close relationships with men, notably Henry Harvey, a fellow Oxford student, and the future politician, Julian Amery. After her retirement, she moved into Barn Cottage at Finstock in Oxfordshire with her younger sister, Hilary, who continued to live there until her death in February 2005. A blue plaque was placed on the cottage in 2006. The sisters played an active role in the social life of the village.
Several strong themes link the works in the Pym "canon", which are more notable for their style and characterisation than for their plots. A superficial reading gives the impression that they are sketches of village or suburban life, with excessive significance being attached to social activities connected with the Anglican church (in particular its Anglo-Catholic incarnation). However, the dialogue is often deeply ironic, and a tragic undercurrent runs through some of the later novels, especially Quartet in Autumn and The Sweet Dove Died.
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July 8, 2016
”Life is cruel and we do terrible things to each other.”
Humphrey, a widowed antiques dealer, and his nephew James, who he is attempting to teach about the antiques trade, meet this elegant, aging beauty named Leonora Eyre at a book sale. Meeting such a woman at such a place filled Humphrey with horror.
”A book sale was certainly no place for a woman; had it been a sale of pictures or porcelain, fetching the sort of inflated prices that made headline news, or an evening sale--perhaps being televised--to which a woman could be escorted after being suitably wined and dined--that might have been another matter altogether.”
Humphrey is really a perfect match for Leonora because they both appreciate the finer things in life, objects are in many ways more important to them and certainly more reliable than people. They both understand the same rules of engagement and enjoy the simple, but luxurious aspects of society. Fulfillment comes from having things...just so.
James sees the situation a different way from his Uncle.
”James thought his uncle was making rather a fool of himself. Miss Eyre was certainly of a suitable age for Humphrey to marry, if that was what he wanted. though he had been a widower for so long now that it seemed unlikely he would wish to improve on the convenient arrangements he already had and take such a drastic step as marriage.”
The fool...marriage...at his age. Still, on paper, this potential relationship looks like an alliance that could garner that elusive trinity of a sustainable relationship: security, common interest, and mutual attraction.
Except that Miss Eyre likes James better.
Is it so crazy? She is older, granted, but she has taken care of herself, men of all ages still notice her. And James, well he is as malleable as Binx Bolling, remember him from The Moviegoer. With just the right amount of maneuvering James will do what she wants him to do.
Leonora would have made a brilliant Roman Field Commander. Her grasp of battlefield tactics are put on display as she eviscerates her rivals with cool precision; and yet, with her ultimate designs artfully concealed. Phoebe, the English Literature major, who seduced James on an excursion to the country was one such victim. James was rather confused about how a drink led to such a vigorous romp in bed, part of his Binx like behavior of just accepting what others want. I rather liked awkward Phoebe with her baggy clothes making her the spoil to Leonora’s stellar elegance. There is this scene I just have to share.
”One of the village cats had come into the room and jumped up on top of the big old-fashioned radio set which Phoebe turned on, making music for herself and warmth for the animal. A symphony was being played and as Phoebe lay watching the cat she had the fancy that its spreading body was like a great empty wineskin or bladder being filled with Mendelssohn. She began to think of a poem she would write for James.”
It seems whenever James leaves Leonora’s sight he falls in bed with someone. He takes a jaunt through Europe to look at antique shops as part of his training and meets a young, well lets look a little closer, maybe not so young American named Ned. He like Phoebe is an English Literature major studying the minor poems of Keats. When he meets Leonora he is better prepared for her tactics as he is a veteran of many doomed love affairs, bedroom dramas, and the lies and manipulations that it takes to have cake and eat it too.
Ned quotes a bit of poetry to Leonora over tea.
”I had a dove and the sweet dove died;
and I have thought it died of grieving
O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied
With a single thread of my own hand’s weaving.”
What a civilized world these people live in threatening each other with poetry. The rest of us are such Neanderthal’s with our guns, knives, clubs, and fists.
Human behavior is explored and exposed with a grace that cloaks the wicked stab of wit and the pain of those charmed, but left in the wake of cooling desires. No one escapes without at least a few twinges of remorse, even Ned, the shallow pool swimmer, doesn’t take his final leave of Leonora (over tea of course) without a feeling of being something less than he should be. What makes this book a small masterpiece is Barbara Pym’s ability to use humor, style, and her perceptive writer’s eye to blunt the very worst of emotional circumstances. I also thought how refreshing to read a book that accepts homosexual relationships without a hint of homophobia. In 1977 Pym was named the most underrated writer of the century. I think we can change that, don’t you think, at least in the Goodreads universe.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
Humphrey, a widowed antiques dealer, and his nephew James, who he is attempting to teach about the antiques trade, meet this elegant, aging beauty named Leonora Eyre at a book sale. Meeting such a woman at such a place filled Humphrey with horror.
”A book sale was certainly no place for a woman; had it been a sale of pictures or porcelain, fetching the sort of inflated prices that made headline news, or an evening sale--perhaps being televised--to which a woman could be escorted after being suitably wined and dined--that might have been another matter altogether.”
Humphrey is really a perfect match for Leonora because they both appreciate the finer things in life, objects are in many ways more important to them and certainly more reliable than people. They both understand the same rules of engagement and enjoy the simple, but luxurious aspects of society. Fulfillment comes from having things...just so.
James sees the situation a different way from his Uncle.
”James thought his uncle was making rather a fool of himself. Miss Eyre was certainly of a suitable age for Humphrey to marry, if that was what he wanted. though he had been a widower for so long now that it seemed unlikely he would wish to improve on the convenient arrangements he already had and take such a drastic step as marriage.”
The fool...marriage...at his age. Still, on paper, this potential relationship looks like an alliance that could garner that elusive trinity of a sustainable relationship: security, common interest, and mutual attraction.
Except that Miss Eyre likes James better.
Is it so crazy? She is older, granted, but she has taken care of herself, men of all ages still notice her. And James, well he is as malleable as Binx Bolling, remember him from The Moviegoer. With just the right amount of maneuvering James will do what she wants him to do.
Leonora would have made a brilliant Roman Field Commander. Her grasp of battlefield tactics are put on display as she eviscerates her rivals with cool precision; and yet, with her ultimate designs artfully concealed. Phoebe, the English Literature major, who seduced James on an excursion to the country was one such victim. James was rather confused about how a drink led to such a vigorous romp in bed, part of his Binx like behavior of just accepting what others want. I rather liked awkward Phoebe with her baggy clothes making her the spoil to Leonora’s stellar elegance. There is this scene I just have to share.
”One of the village cats had come into the room and jumped up on top of the big old-fashioned radio set which Phoebe turned on, making music for herself and warmth for the animal. A symphony was being played and as Phoebe lay watching the cat she had the fancy that its spreading body was like a great empty wineskin or bladder being filled with Mendelssohn. She began to think of a poem she would write for James.”
It seems whenever James leaves Leonora’s sight he falls in bed with someone. He takes a jaunt through Europe to look at antique shops as part of his training and meets a young, well lets look a little closer, maybe not so young American named Ned. He like Phoebe is an English Literature major studying the minor poems of Keats. When he meets Leonora he is better prepared for her tactics as he is a veteran of many doomed love affairs, bedroom dramas, and the lies and manipulations that it takes to have cake and eat it too.
Ned quotes a bit of poetry to Leonora over tea.
”I had a dove and the sweet dove died;
and I have thought it died of grieving
O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied
With a single thread of my own hand’s weaving.”
What a civilized world these people live in threatening each other with poetry. The rest of us are such Neanderthal’s with our guns, knives, clubs, and fists.
Human behavior is explored and exposed with a grace that cloaks the wicked stab of wit and the pain of those charmed, but left in the wake of cooling desires. No one escapes without at least a few twinges of remorse, even Ned, the shallow pool swimmer, doesn’t take his final leave of Leonora (over tea of course) without a feeling of being something less than he should be. What makes this book a small masterpiece is Barbara Pym’s ability to use humor, style, and her perceptive writer’s eye to blunt the very worst of emotional circumstances. I also thought how refreshing to read a book that accepts homosexual relationships without a hint of homophobia. In 1977 Pym was named the most underrated writer of the century. I think we can change that, don’t you think, at least in the Goodreads universe.
If you wish to see more of my most recent book and movie reviews, visit http://www.jeffreykeeten.com
I also have a Facebook blogger page at:https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeeten
March 11, 2019
Pym has surprised me in ways I didn’t expect to.
This is a dark comedy rather than the restrained drama drawn in British finesse I was eager to immerse into. The reference to the famous poem by Keats in the title holds a sarcastic undertone I didn’t perceive until I reached the last line of the novel, something that diminished the much awaited pleasure of a gratifying reencounter with the Romantic poet.
“The sweet dove died”.
It turns out the dove wasn’t as sweet as it seemed and that it died fighting instead of placidly. And what an ugly fight.
The central character of this novel is a sophisticated middle-aged woman with a taste for refinement who falls in love with a much younger man while befriending his older uncle. An expected triangle of unrequited love ensues and when a third party disrupts the harmonious play-acting of the three wooers, a tale spinning jealousy, pretense and revenge takes the central stage, leaving aside the exploration of idealized love, the process of ageing and the harsh reality of facing a solitary life, which, in my opinion, were the main attractions of the novel.
Even though the story didn’t develop as I anticipated, Pym’s ability to create iconic characters with conflicting desires is indisputable. Her themes are equally thought-provoking. Questions as homosexuality or subrogated love are presented with unusual openness. The unequal equation between ideal love, reality and hurt pride is carefully dissected and presented with a directness that is uncharacteristic of the British poise, a trait that provided a rare freshness to the crisp prose.
Pym doesn’t lose time giving voice to her characters, and instead of using inner monologue, she presents action at relentless speed, juggling done facts without much preamble, forcing the reader to fill in the gaps of the missed narrative.
In a way, her novel echoes the little control we have over our lives and how we often grope in the dark trying to make the good choice.
Dark comedy was never my taste, but Pym has demonstrated that the hurt dove can have the last laugh as long as it is ready to lose a few of its soft feathers on the way. Poetry and romance can’t always win!
This is a dark comedy rather than the restrained drama drawn in British finesse I was eager to immerse into. The reference to the famous poem by Keats in the title holds a sarcastic undertone I didn’t perceive until I reached the last line of the novel, something that diminished the much awaited pleasure of a gratifying reencounter with the Romantic poet.
“The sweet dove died”.
It turns out the dove wasn’t as sweet as it seemed and that it died fighting instead of placidly. And what an ugly fight.
The central character of this novel is a sophisticated middle-aged woman with a taste for refinement who falls in love with a much younger man while befriending his older uncle. An expected triangle of unrequited love ensues and when a third party disrupts the harmonious play-acting of the three wooers, a tale spinning jealousy, pretense and revenge takes the central stage, leaving aside the exploration of idealized love, the process of ageing and the harsh reality of facing a solitary life, which, in my opinion, were the main attractions of the novel.
Even though the story didn’t develop as I anticipated, Pym’s ability to create iconic characters with conflicting desires is indisputable. Her themes are equally thought-provoking. Questions as homosexuality or subrogated love are presented with unusual openness. The unequal equation between ideal love, reality and hurt pride is carefully dissected and presented with a directness that is uncharacteristic of the British poise, a trait that provided a rare freshness to the crisp prose.
Pym doesn’t lose time giving voice to her characters, and instead of using inner monologue, she presents action at relentless speed, juggling done facts without much preamble, forcing the reader to fill in the gaps of the missed narrative.
In a way, her novel echoes the little control we have over our lives and how we often grope in the dark trying to make the good choice.
Dark comedy was never my taste, but Pym has demonstrated that the hurt dove can have the last laugh as long as it is ready to lose a few of its soft feathers on the way. Poetry and romance can’t always win!
June 24, 2025
You mustn’t expect things to be perfect, Leonora, they never are.
But Leonora does expect things to be perfect, picture perfect. It’s why she can’t handle a mess, can’t handle a child or a marriage and certainly can’t even begin to contemplate sex.
She is, in fact, another asexual character, a motif that the intriguing Barbara Pym just can’t seem to resist. What was it with Ms. Pym and her asexual protagonists?
This is only my second novel of Barbara Pym’s (I could actually describe myself as loathing the first one, Quartet in Autumn), and I can’t declare that I know much about her, but I do suspect, based on what little I’ve read, that our heroine here, Miss Leonora Eyre, is dangerously close to being autobiographical.
My main issue with the other novel, QUARTET, was that all of the characters were asexual and it just felt incredibly implausible to me. Here, in THE SWEET DOVE DIED, Pym’s secondary characters actually present the reader with a shocking (for the times) sexual fluidity. This distinction and diversity freed my mind from its previous agitation and allowed me to sit back and enjoy the show.
This was a fabulous character study for me, with fantastic “B list” characters, too. I wish I had read this book with others; it demanded discussion.
This short novel manages to be so very British, and so shockingly modern, particularly for its publication date of 1978.
But Leonora does expect things to be perfect, picture perfect. It’s why she can’t handle a mess, can’t handle a child or a marriage and certainly can’t even begin to contemplate sex.
She is, in fact, another asexual character, a motif that the intriguing Barbara Pym just can’t seem to resist. What was it with Ms. Pym and her asexual protagonists?
This is only my second novel of Barbara Pym’s (I could actually describe myself as loathing the first one, Quartet in Autumn), and I can’t declare that I know much about her, but I do suspect, based on what little I’ve read, that our heroine here, Miss Leonora Eyre, is dangerously close to being autobiographical.
My main issue with the other novel, QUARTET, was that all of the characters were asexual and it just felt incredibly implausible to me. Here, in THE SWEET DOVE DIED, Pym’s secondary characters actually present the reader with a shocking (for the times) sexual fluidity. This distinction and diversity freed my mind from its previous agitation and allowed me to sit back and enjoy the show.
This was a fabulous character study for me, with fantastic “B list” characters, too. I wish I had read this book with others; it demanded discussion.
This short novel manages to be so very British, and so shockingly modern, particularly for its publication date of 1978.
April 4, 2015
A dazzling Mozartian chamber piece. The mood seems light, the manner
civilized but the upshot is a jolt: perfectly chiseled words express profound insight into human nature. An unmarried near-50 London lady attends an auction where she meets a widowed antique dealer and his ambiguous nephew. The gent falls for her, but she only has eyes for chappy. 'One needed the company of young people...' The object of her hapless pash has an occasional girlfriend whose presence must be discouraged, then the odd couple can flirt over dinner. 'He could not tell her quite everything, and she liked to tease him about the parties he went to--.'
Warning - danger ahead: he meets an experienced American lit teach whose handsome face 'revealed that life had left its mark.' Control, jealousy and gay promiscuity are tweaked with ironic understanding. 'The sherry they were drinking seemed actively hostile in its dryness, inhibiting speech, even feeling.' This subtle writer of posthumous US fame shows that people who need people are the unluckiest people in the world.
civilized but the upshot is a jolt: perfectly chiseled words express profound insight into human nature. An unmarried near-50 London lady attends an auction where she meets a widowed antique dealer and his ambiguous nephew. The gent falls for her, but she only has eyes for chappy. 'One needed the company of young people...' The object of her hapless pash has an occasional girlfriend whose presence must be discouraged, then the odd couple can flirt over dinner. 'He could not tell her quite everything, and she liked to tease him about the parties he went to--.'
Warning - danger ahead: he meets an experienced American lit teach whose handsome face 'revealed that life had left its mark.' Control, jealousy and gay promiscuity are tweaked with ironic understanding. 'The sherry they were drinking seemed actively hostile in its dryness, inhibiting speech, even feeling.' This subtle writer of posthumous US fame shows that people who need people are the unluckiest people in the world.
February 26, 2022
I did not like Leonora Eyre, the 50-year-old central character, at all. She was unmarried.... probably good reason for that. She didn’t care for babies, handicapped children, her neighbors, her so-called friends, etc. Oh, and cats.
She was in love with a younger man, James who was 24. Talking about robbing the cradle, eh? Something that men her age rarely did, eh? Eh?
I don’t know what floated James’s boat. He was educated at Oxford and had no inclinations to do diddly-squat in life. Has sex with a woman that is his age and that he is dating and as far as I can tell does not enjoy it. Has sex with a man his age, Ned, who has no interest in James.
I have a number of her other books...many are about clergy...maybe I will try one of those one of these days. I read many of her books over 20 years ago, and I know I liked her in general, and I don’t recall her having the central antagonist(s) as being nasty. I guess I just picked the wrong book of hers to read. 🙁
Reviews:
• https://www.stuckinabook.com/the-swee...
• https://bookaroundthecorner.com/2020/...
She was in love with a younger man, James who was 24. Talking about robbing the cradle, eh? Something that men her age rarely did, eh? Eh?
I don’t know what floated James’s boat. He was educated at Oxford and had no inclinations to do diddly-squat in life. Has sex with a woman that is his age and that he is dating and as far as I can tell does not enjoy it. Has sex with a man his age, Ned, who has no interest in James.
I have a number of her other books...many are about clergy...maybe I will try one of those one of these days. I read many of her books over 20 years ago, and I know I liked her in general, and I don’t recall her having the central antagonist(s) as being nasty. I guess I just picked the wrong book of hers to read. 🙁
Reviews:
• https://www.stuckinabook.com/the-swee...
• https://bookaroundthecorner.com/2020/...
August 21, 2023
This is my least favourite Pym to date (apart from Quartet in Autumn which I abandoned after a handful of pages) - it lacks all the delicious sunshiny liveliness and humour of the early books and characters who we might laugh at but usually in a fond kind of way.
In this book, I struggled to find the point especially as all the characters are not ones I could get interested in or involved with: James is a naive fool and a bit of an enigma, Humphrey is a creep (that scene which keeps reverberating in Leonora's mind where he 'looms' over her...), Ned is a showy philanderer (but he's not making promises to anyone so why shouldn't he be?) and Leonora herself is cold, aloof and self-centred. She has an affection for James but she neither loves him nor desires him - she's essentially asexual and almost completely hollow as she loves her objet d'art more than any person. Which is fine - but it does mean there are no emotional stakes in the book.
Flashes of Pym's waspish observations are some compensation but the minor side characters of Phoebe and Meg are more interesting than any of the main actors. I did enjoy the setting of London in the seventies, albeit following a rarefied group of people who go shopping in Fortnums and don't know how to use public transport (that's only for the common people, obvs!)
Ned at the end says, 'Life is cruel and we do terrible things to each other' - but actually that's not what this book illustrates. No-one does do anything cruel or terrible and no-one really suffers, or, at least, not for long: Phoebe takes herself off and will grow into young womanhood, better off without drippy James, and James himself will either settle into being mothered at arms length by unmaternal Leonora, or 'discover' himself. The one takeaway I got was the generation gap between Humphrey and Leonora on one side, and Phoebe and James on the other.
My understanding is that after having a line of rejections from her publishers for being old-fashioned, this was Pym trying to write in a contemporary style - all I can say is it didn't work overly well for me. It's youthful, sunshiny and smart Pym that I adore.
In this book, I struggled to find the point especially as all the characters are not ones I could get interested in or involved with: James is a naive fool and a bit of an enigma, Humphrey is a creep (that scene which keeps reverberating in Leonora's mind where he 'looms' over her...), Ned is a showy philanderer (but he's not making promises to anyone so why shouldn't he be?) and Leonora herself is cold, aloof and self-centred. She has an affection for James but she neither loves him nor desires him - she's essentially asexual and almost completely hollow as she loves her objet d'art more than any person. Which is fine - but it does mean there are no emotional stakes in the book.
Flashes of Pym's waspish observations are some compensation but the minor side characters of Phoebe and Meg are more interesting than any of the main actors. I did enjoy the setting of London in the seventies, albeit following a rarefied group of people who go shopping in Fortnums and don't know how to use public transport (that's only for the common people, obvs!)
Ned at the end says, 'Life is cruel and we do terrible things to each other' - but actually that's not what this book illustrates. No-one does do anything cruel or terrible and no-one really suffers, or, at least, not for long: Phoebe takes herself off and will grow into young womanhood, better off without drippy James, and James himself will either settle into being mothered at arms length by unmaternal Leonora, or 'discover' himself. The one takeaway I got was the generation gap between Humphrey and Leonora on one side, and Phoebe and James on the other.
My understanding is that after having a line of rejections from her publishers for being old-fashioned, this was Pym trying to write in a contemporary style - all I can say is it didn't work overly well for me. It's youthful, sunshiny and smart Pym that I adore.
July 30, 2019
"Yes, I suppose one feels that life is only tolerable if one takes a romantic view of it."
I really enjoyed this. It has all the benchmark Barbara Pym ingredients - unrequited love, slightly snobby characters and wonderful descriptions of going out for afternoon tea.
Middle aged and extremely elegant Leonora becomes friendly with Humphrey, an antiques dealer, and his nephew James who also works for him. As Leonora begins to feel more and more for James, Humphrey begins to feel more and more for Leonora, whilst James is also starting a relationship with a woman named Phoebe, and soon after an American man named Ned threatens to spoil everything. It was funny, but also a tad dark, which I feel all Barbara Pym's writing is. I loved it. I feel sometimes like I am inside Pym's head, exposed to all her brilliance.
I really enjoyed this. It has all the benchmark Barbara Pym ingredients - unrequited love, slightly snobby characters and wonderful descriptions of going out for afternoon tea.
Middle aged and extremely elegant Leonora becomes friendly with Humphrey, an antiques dealer, and his nephew James who also works for him. As Leonora begins to feel more and more for James, Humphrey begins to feel more and more for Leonora, whilst James is also starting a relationship with a woman named Phoebe, and soon after an American man named Ned threatens to spoil everything. It was funny, but also a tad dark, which I feel all Barbara Pym's writing is. I loved it. I feel sometimes like I am inside Pym's head, exposed to all her brilliance.
October 6, 2016
While sharply written, this Pym did not appeal to me as much as the only other I’ve read, Jane and Prudence. Its biting (and ultimately sad) cynicism was a bit more reminiscent of Muriel Spark than Jane Austen (whom Pym has been compared): that's not a complaint, as I enjoy both authors.
Besides the Keats poem referenced in the title, Henry James’ Washington Square is also used as an overt allusion. The two polar-opposite rivals of the “elegant” (and very selfish) rival for the affections of a pliable young man work in the field of English literature, yet the young man is oblivious at any of these references, as he is of many other things—until it is too late.
Besides the Keats poem referenced in the title, Henry James’ Washington Square is also used as an overt allusion. The two polar-opposite rivals of the “elegant” (and very selfish) rival for the affections of a pliable young man work in the field of English literature, yet the young man is oblivious at any of these references, as he is of many other things—until it is too late.
August 22, 2023
The Sweet Dove Died (1978) is another latter day Barbara Pym novel that diverges from her earlier, lighter books. One thing all the novels I have read by her share is that they are beautifully written. The economy here creates a brisk style. From the early 1960s Barbara Pym's work was out of fashion and she was unable to get new work published. In response she took to rewriting and revising, hence her pared down, polished later works. I'm pleased to report her reputation enjoyed a renaissance in the 1970s and publishers once again beat a path to her door.
The Sweet Dove Died (along with Quartet in Autumn (1977)) is brief, accomplished, memorable and powerful. The more maudlin mood of both books reflects the era in which they were written.
In contrast with her early work, many of her characters during this era were unsympathetic and hard to like. To varying degrees the characters in this novel are self serving, vain, manipulative and pleasure seeking. Despite this Barbara Pym is so skilful that she made me care about them all and become invested in their outcomes.
One character, Leonora, must surely be the most complex female character in Barbara Pym's work. She embodies negative female characteristics to an extraordinary extent. I struggle to find any redeeming features in her personality or behaviour. She also lacks the internal resourcefulness of many of Pym's earlier unmarried "excellent women" who often exhibit an understated assurance that makes them quietly but strongly independent. Leonora relies on her declining looks, indeed clings to her appearance and obsesses over ageing. She seems to rely on male validation and not revealing any of her true thoughts or feelings to her female friends. Indeed she seems to view these "friends" as competitors or a way to make herself feel better in comparison to their appearance or any travails they may be suffering. She enlists weak men to flatter her and pay her tribute with attention, meals, flowers etc.
The less you know about the plot the better, suffice to say this is a deft, mature work by a brilliant writer that is so readable it's easy to overlook the artistry and plotting.
4/5
A chance encounter over a Victorian flower book brings together Humphrey, an antiques dealer, his nephew James, and Leonora. Although she is considerably older, Leonora becomes a little too fond of James. Leonora is determined to keep James to herself but realizes that her rival is the bookish Phoebe. Then along comes Ned, a saucy young American, and Leonora's problems boil over.
The Sweet Dove Died (along with Quartet in Autumn (1977)) is brief, accomplished, memorable and powerful. The more maudlin mood of both books reflects the era in which they were written.
In contrast with her early work, many of her characters during this era were unsympathetic and hard to like. To varying degrees the characters in this novel are self serving, vain, manipulative and pleasure seeking. Despite this Barbara Pym is so skilful that she made me care about them all and become invested in their outcomes.
One character, Leonora, must surely be the most complex female character in Barbara Pym's work. She embodies negative female characteristics to an extraordinary extent. I struggle to find any redeeming features in her personality or behaviour. She also lacks the internal resourcefulness of many of Pym's earlier unmarried "excellent women" who often exhibit an understated assurance that makes them quietly but strongly independent. Leonora relies on her declining looks, indeed clings to her appearance and obsesses over ageing. She seems to rely on male validation and not revealing any of her true thoughts or feelings to her female friends. Indeed she seems to view these "friends" as competitors or a way to make herself feel better in comparison to their appearance or any travails they may be suffering. She enlists weak men to flatter her and pay her tribute with attention, meals, flowers etc.
The less you know about the plot the better, suffice to say this is a deft, mature work by a brilliant writer that is so readable it's easy to overlook the artistry and plotting.
4/5
A chance encounter over a Victorian flower book brings together Humphrey, an antiques dealer, his nephew James, and Leonora. Although she is considerably older, Leonora becomes a little too fond of James. Leonora is determined to keep James to herself but realizes that her rival is the bookish Phoebe. Then along comes Ned, a saucy young American, and Leonora's problems boil over.
September 24, 2021
Detestei este livro. Pronto, já disse!
September 19, 2022
Sadly, I have no more Barbara Pym novels left to read, but I'm now looking forward to re-reading them all.
Leanora Eyre certainly isn't one of Pym's 'excellent women', but I did enjoy reading about her.
Leanora Eyre certainly isn't one of Pym's 'excellent women', but I did enjoy reading about her.
Read
December 11, 2022Se os livros fossem bolachas este não chegava à categoria de água e sal.
Os temas de Pym, que, pela sua mão, frequentes vezes roçam o aborrecimento, até têm a capacidade de ser interessantes, mas a execução raramente cumpre. Desta vez, de novo, acho que o problema está não tanto na escolha de tema - os efeitos da prepotência nas relações amorosas -, mas na distância com que o/a narrador/a aborda os personagens e na não concretizaçao dessa mesma premissa.
Entre os três principais personagens, Leonora, Humphrey e James tece-se um triângulo amoroso sem grande desenvolvimento, feito de não ditos, de meias vontades, de um arrastar sem fim de um conformismo que deveria ser bravata para que o tema estivesse devidamente trabalhado e levasse a algum desenrolar lógico (o poema donde Pym retira o título promete isso mesmo, mas acho que a autora não soube bem como lá chegar, novamente).
O retrato de Leonora, único minimamente curioso, começa por ser um fator de interesse: uma mulher de meia idade, independente, ousada, sem grandes pruridos é atraente para os leitores de hoje - para mim é:
"A cama larga, com cabeceira de latão neo-vitoriana, convidava a pensamentos agradáveis e Leonora arranjou-se para ir dormir. Não havia Bíblia, livro de devoção ou despertador a limitar o encanto mundano da sua mesinha de cabeceira. Browning e Mathew Arnold - os seus poetas favoritos tinham o seu lugar junto
à água de colónia da Guerlain, a uma garrafa de sais, a suaves lenços de papel verde-água, a um frasco de cápsulas de cores vivas para o alívio do stress e da tensão; a tudo isso presidiam as fotografias descoloridas de um homem bem posto e de uma mulher de rosto doce num vestido do fim da época vitoriana. Há já muito tempo que Leonora decidira que seus avós tinham um aspecto muito mais distinto que os seus pais, cujas fotografias haviam sido escondidas numa gaveta."
... Mas as coisas ficam-se por aí. Perdida no seu triângulo amoroso, Leonora perde qualquer sintoma de originalidade, qualquer pedaço de interesse, torna-se baça, opaca e francamente irritante. Já os restantes personagens nunca foram nem ligeiramente capazes de me suscitar curiosidade - têm comportamentos nada incomuns: são movidos pelo desejo ou pela vaidade, os seus sentimentos são vulgares, e tanto lhes dá ter vinte como sessenta anos são igualmente imaturos, despreocupados e entretêm-se a correr atrás de ligações passageiras mais pelo espetáculo do que qualquer outra coisa.
"Então era isso, pensou Humphrey. Agora podia admitir para si próprio que sempre tivera algumas dúvidas quanto ao sexo dos namorados de James. Talvez que, como tio e sobrinho, tivessem tido uma relação demasiado próxima para que James confiasse nele. Ou talvez não tivessem tido inmidade suficiente. E isto era muito claramente uma rapariga. Tinha posto os óculos para ter a certeza, pois que, hoje em dia, não era sempre fácil descortinar."
Esta preocupação de um tio com as preferências sexuais de um sobrinho que é seu concorrente na conquista de uma mulher mais velha é só incoerente, em nada enriquecendo a trama... E estas situações repetem-se: Leonora deveria ser uma mulher atormentada por uma ligação ligeiramente incestuosa, mas não passa de uma burguesa afetada com tanto mãos medo das opiniões dos outros do que empenho em conseguir a sua felicidade, etc etc.
É pena porque Leonora tem potencial para ser uma personagem inesquecível - não necessariamente boa ou má, mas delineada com um certo interesse psicológico que, a julgar por algumas passagens iniciais, não a deveria ter arrastado para a espiral sentimental em que acabou:
"Enquanto passeavam, com Leonora a produzir uma torrente de comentários maravilhados sobre o cenário, chegaram a um enorme totem, quebrando a pacífica beleza da paisagem.
Que repugnante símbolo fálico, pensou Leonora, mas é claro que não o iria mencionar; limitar-se-ia a passar rapidamente desviando a cara."
Acho que a inconsistência e desinteresse na caracterização dos personagens - para não falar no desenrolar da ação sem pingo de AÇÃO - é um problema relativamente comum na escrita de Pym (só li três obras suas) e que não tem grande remédio: ou nos subjugamos ao desinteresse ou nem sequer dá para terminar.
Os temas de Pym, que, pela sua mão, frequentes vezes roçam o aborrecimento, até têm a capacidade de ser interessantes, mas a execução raramente cumpre. Desta vez, de novo, acho que o problema está não tanto na escolha de tema - os efeitos da prepotência nas relações amorosas -, mas na distância com que o/a narrador/a aborda os personagens e na não concretizaçao dessa mesma premissa.
Entre os três principais personagens, Leonora, Humphrey e James tece-se um triângulo amoroso sem grande desenvolvimento, feito de não ditos, de meias vontades, de um arrastar sem fim de um conformismo que deveria ser bravata para que o tema estivesse devidamente trabalhado e levasse a algum desenrolar lógico (o poema donde Pym retira o título promete isso mesmo, mas acho que a autora não soube bem como lá chegar, novamente).
O retrato de Leonora, único minimamente curioso, começa por ser um fator de interesse: uma mulher de meia idade, independente, ousada, sem grandes pruridos é atraente para os leitores de hoje - para mim é:
"A cama larga, com cabeceira de latão neo-vitoriana, convidava a pensamentos agradáveis e Leonora arranjou-se para ir dormir. Não havia Bíblia, livro de devoção ou despertador a limitar o encanto mundano da sua mesinha de cabeceira. Browning e Mathew Arnold - os seus poetas favoritos tinham o seu lugar junto
à água de colónia da Guerlain, a uma garrafa de sais, a suaves lenços de papel verde-água, a um frasco de cápsulas de cores vivas para o alívio do stress e da tensão; a tudo isso presidiam as fotografias descoloridas de um homem bem posto e de uma mulher de rosto doce num vestido do fim da época vitoriana. Há já muito tempo que Leonora decidira que seus avós tinham um aspecto muito mais distinto que os seus pais, cujas fotografias haviam sido escondidas numa gaveta."
... Mas as coisas ficam-se por aí. Perdida no seu triângulo amoroso, Leonora perde qualquer sintoma de originalidade, qualquer pedaço de interesse, torna-se baça, opaca e francamente irritante. Já os restantes personagens nunca foram nem ligeiramente capazes de me suscitar curiosidade - têm comportamentos nada incomuns: são movidos pelo desejo ou pela vaidade, os seus sentimentos são vulgares, e tanto lhes dá ter vinte como sessenta anos são igualmente imaturos, despreocupados e entretêm-se a correr atrás de ligações passageiras mais pelo espetáculo do que qualquer outra coisa.
"Então era isso, pensou Humphrey. Agora podia admitir para si próprio que sempre tivera algumas dúvidas quanto ao sexo dos namorados de James. Talvez que, como tio e sobrinho, tivessem tido uma relação demasiado próxima para que James confiasse nele. Ou talvez não tivessem tido inmidade suficiente. E isto era muito claramente uma rapariga. Tinha posto os óculos para ter a certeza, pois que, hoje em dia, não era sempre fácil descortinar."
Esta preocupação de um tio com as preferências sexuais de um sobrinho que é seu concorrente na conquista de uma mulher mais velha é só incoerente, em nada enriquecendo a trama... E estas situações repetem-se: Leonora deveria ser uma mulher atormentada por uma ligação ligeiramente incestuosa, mas não passa de uma burguesa afetada com tanto mãos medo das opiniões dos outros do que empenho em conseguir a sua felicidade, etc etc.
É pena porque Leonora tem potencial para ser uma personagem inesquecível - não necessariamente boa ou má, mas delineada com um certo interesse psicológico que, a julgar por algumas passagens iniciais, não a deveria ter arrastado para a espiral sentimental em que acabou:
"Enquanto passeavam, com Leonora a produzir uma torrente de comentários maravilhados sobre o cenário, chegaram a um enorme totem, quebrando a pacífica beleza da paisagem.
Que repugnante símbolo fálico, pensou Leonora, mas é claro que não o iria mencionar; limitar-se-ia a passar rapidamente desviando a cara."
Acho que a inconsistência e desinteresse na caracterização dos personagens - para não falar no desenrolar da ação sem pingo de AÇÃO - é um problema relativamente comum na escrita de Pym (só li três obras suas) e que não tem grande remédio: ou nos subjugamos ao desinteresse ou nem sequer dá para terminar.
April 22, 2015
I have long been a fan of Barbara Pym's superficially gentle (but actually quite robust) novels of English life in the post-Second World War years. Her body of work is not large - Pym wrote fewer than fifteen novels - and is noteworthy for its delicate, amusing and restrained examination of the life of a certain type of middle-class person who is searching for love. The world of the Anglo-Catholic church and its somewhat dreary social life of the time, of curates, of minor intellectuals and of unattached men and women forms the backdrop to Pym's beautifully observed stories. As poet and critic Anthony Thwaite put it: "Her characters are specimens in a lepidopterist's cabinet: some rare and exotic, some dim and dowdy, but all meticulously impaled on the delicate pins of a wit that is as scrupulous as it is deadly".
'The Sweet Dove Died' is one of Pym's later works. It is perhaps darker than some of her earlier novels. And it is not preoccupied with the clergy or with members of the Anglo-Catholic church. Indeed, church attendance and anything to do with it is wholly absent from the story. Instead, we have antiques dealer Humphrey Boyce and his young nephew James, both of whom work in Humphrey's shop in London's fashionable Sloane Square. The story opens as they are having lunch with Leonora Eyre, whom they have just met at a Bond Street auction room. Leonora is cool, poised, elegant and fastidious. Humphrey becomes very fond of her. But Leonora develops feelings for James. James, however, seems to be confused about his sexuality. He has a brief liaison with a young woman called Phoebe before meeting and falling for a young American man named Ned.
That simple story is the plot in full. Leonora's love for James, who is less than half her age and who, because of his homosexuality, is unlikely to be able to return it, is the basis of a harrowing tale of unrequited passion. The underlying theme of 'The Sweet Dove Died' is the anxiety (and the desperation, even) that many of us experience as we get older about the increasingly limited opportunities available to us to find love.
As always, Pym's characterisation is superb. Her prose is unfussy and supremely readable. And this wonderful writer brings her usual qualities of control and restraint to a world that she most definitely made her own in the field of English novels of the 20th century - that of the personal feelings, the emotions, the thwarted passions and the sadness that inhabit the lives of ordinary people. 'The Sweet Dove Died' may bring you to tears. Yet it is also curiously uplifting in the way that it so accurately recognizes and portrays the snobbery, the comedy and the pathos of the unremarkable lives that most of us lead. It's an excellent novel. 10/10.
'The Sweet Dove Died' is one of Pym's later works. It is perhaps darker than some of her earlier novels. And it is not preoccupied with the clergy or with members of the Anglo-Catholic church. Indeed, church attendance and anything to do with it is wholly absent from the story. Instead, we have antiques dealer Humphrey Boyce and his young nephew James, both of whom work in Humphrey's shop in London's fashionable Sloane Square. The story opens as they are having lunch with Leonora Eyre, whom they have just met at a Bond Street auction room. Leonora is cool, poised, elegant and fastidious. Humphrey becomes very fond of her. But Leonora develops feelings for James. James, however, seems to be confused about his sexuality. He has a brief liaison with a young woman called Phoebe before meeting and falling for a young American man named Ned.
That simple story is the plot in full. Leonora's love for James, who is less than half her age and who, because of his homosexuality, is unlikely to be able to return it, is the basis of a harrowing tale of unrequited passion. The underlying theme of 'The Sweet Dove Died' is the anxiety (and the desperation, even) that many of us experience as we get older about the increasingly limited opportunities available to us to find love.
As always, Pym's characterisation is superb. Her prose is unfussy and supremely readable. And this wonderful writer brings her usual qualities of control and restraint to a world that she most definitely made her own in the field of English novels of the 20th century - that of the personal feelings, the emotions, the thwarted passions and the sadness that inhabit the lives of ordinary people. 'The Sweet Dove Died' may bring you to tears. Yet it is also curiously uplifting in the way that it so accurately recognizes and portrays the snobbery, the comedy and the pathos of the unremarkable lives that most of us lead. It's an excellent novel. 10/10.
September 28, 2016
Not the usual spinsters and vicars. A bit darker, still a wonderful read.
December 27, 2017
I reread this book a few years back but did not recod it on Goodreads. Probably because I first read it way back before then and was not recording anything but new reads. So thus may have been my fourth read and one I undertook in preparation for the Barbara Pym conference this coming March 2018. I know a little of the history of this book and read more about it. Yes, Leonora Eyre is not a Pym excellent woman or a doer of good deeds. She is a middle-aged calculating narcisstic diminishing beauty who requires adoration from men to feed her insatiable need to be worshipped. The adoration must be from arm's length and any trespass across her physical and emotional boundaries is scorned and rejected. As in other Pym novels, the theme of a loveless woman of a certain age becoming entwined with a young man of unspecified sexual orientaion is one of the central motifs around which the story spins. Unlike her other books, The Sweet Dove Died omits church life. No vicars. No worrying about Roman inclinations. London and city life replaces English village life. Despite Leonora's urban sophistication, she remains anachronistic in the way she dresses and speaks, but especially in her expectations that men should "keep" her in her skewed state of superiority and expect nothing in return. She is a tragic figure unprepared to age.
December 15, 2021
As I understand it, the overall theme of this book has to do with attempts to fill a void of loneliness. Here, however, I found the main characters unlikeable, and the secondary ones sad. There's no love or affection among Humphrey, Leonora, nor Ned - just a need for acquisition. James seemed that way as well initially, but I came to realize he needed relationships more for a sense of validation. Don't want to go into more details at the risk of spoilers.
Do not, under any circumstances, read this one if you're relatively new to Pym! Stick with her earlier titles instead.
Do not, under any circumstances, read this one if you're relatively new to Pym! Stick with her earlier titles instead.
August 15, 2023
I liked this novel somewhat less than Quartet and Excellent Women, although I still enjoyed the humour in the language, the waspish observations of the characters and the narrator, and the wry descriptions about the sexes and their clumsy, frustrated affairs. Even the "old", the poorly dressed, the moderately sexed and only mildly attractive are entitled to their (slight) passions, and Pym gives them their deserved time and attention.
I did particularly like the discussion of James as a not-exactly male thing in Chapter 8.
I did particularly like the discussion of James as a not-exactly male thing in Chapter 8.
August 16, 2017
"Eu tinha uma pomba e a doce pomba morreu;
E pensava eu que morrera de mágoa;
Oh, que podia magoá-la? As suas patas presas
Por um fio de seda que eu próprio teci..."
John Keats
Este poema é o melhor do livro...
James tem 25 anos; duas namoradas e um namorado. Uma das namoradas tem cerca de 20 anos a outra mais de 50. Enfim, nada de especial...
A premissa é muito interessante mas o seu desenvolvimento nem por isso...
E pensava eu que morrera de mágoa;
Oh, que podia magoá-la? As suas patas presas
Por um fio de seda que eu próprio teci..."
John Keats
Este poema é o melhor do livro...
James tem 25 anos; duas namoradas e um namorado. Uma das namoradas tem cerca de 20 anos a outra mais de 50. Enfim, nada de especial...
A premissa é muito interessante mas o seu desenvolvimento nem por isso...
October 14, 2025
3.5
Whoa! Pym being cold and dark and acidic is such a jolt. The Sweet Dove Died reminded me so much of Elizabeth Taylor, the other mid-twentieth century giant of domestic dramas and the complexities of everyday life.
Though both writers inhabit the same spaces and are very incisive about the inner lives of characters juxtaposed with their social interactions, the dichotomy is usually pretty clear in their tones and styles: Pym is warmer, melancholy — her humour is bittersweet but has lightness in it — whereas Taylor’s humour is dark, her jabs sharper and more relentless, and the sadness of her characters can be desolating.
In this novel Pym is closer to Taylor’s work than she is to much of her own. It was great. It’s because of her characters. The characters here are different. They’re like many of Taylor’s characters. They’re all assholes — they all serve their own interests, and they’re all snobbish and judgmental in silly ways. They’re all supremely unlikable.
I wouldn’t number this novel among my favourites by Pym, but it was delicious in its own way.
P.S. Props to Pym for writing queer men in the ‘50s through to the ‘70s, and for having a bisexual man (James) as one of the main characters in this novel. And with zero judgment, too — in fact, with zero comment at all on James’s sexuality. He goes from a relationship with a woman to a relationship with a man. And literally no one says anything about it. It’s not part of the story at all. It’s actually really striking... If only contemporary novels could do the same…
Whoa! Pym being cold and dark and acidic is such a jolt. The Sweet Dove Died reminded me so much of Elizabeth Taylor, the other mid-twentieth century giant of domestic dramas and the complexities of everyday life.
Though both writers inhabit the same spaces and are very incisive about the inner lives of characters juxtaposed with their social interactions, the dichotomy is usually pretty clear in their tones and styles: Pym is warmer, melancholy — her humour is bittersweet but has lightness in it — whereas Taylor’s humour is dark, her jabs sharper and more relentless, and the sadness of her characters can be desolating.
In this novel Pym is closer to Taylor’s work than she is to much of her own. It was great. It’s because of her characters. The characters here are different. They’re like many of Taylor’s characters. They’re all assholes — they all serve their own interests, and they’re all snobbish and judgmental in silly ways. They’re all supremely unlikable.
I wouldn’t number this novel among my favourites by Pym, but it was delicious in its own way.
P.S. Props to Pym for writing queer men in the ‘50s through to the ‘70s, and for having a bisexual man (James) as one of the main characters in this novel. And with zero judgment, too — in fact, with zero comment at all on James’s sexuality. He goes from a relationship with a woman to a relationship with a man. And literally no one says anything about it. It’s not part of the story at all. It’s actually really striking... If only contemporary novels could do the same…
January 26, 2022
Este é o segundo livro dela que li. O primeiro (O Quarteto de Outono) era uma história de quatro colegas de trabalho (dois homens e duas mulheres) e laços que entre eles se forjavam. Apesar da aparente singeleza do tema, a capacidade de observação de Pym e o seu modo de escrever, cativaram-me e fizeram com que hoje, vários anos depois, ainda me recorde do prazer com que li a obra.
Por isso, quando vi este outro livro de Pym não hesitei na compra e na imediata leitura. A protagonista é uma mulher de meia idade, ainda bela, que vive uma existência centrada em si própria e no seu prazer estético, traduzido num gosto acentuado por objectos vitorianos. Leonora é filha única e os seus pais deixaram-na com rendimentos suficientes para viver sem precisar de trabalhar. Mora num apartamento confortável e apesar de ter algumas relações pessoais, cedo percebemos que se trata de uma superficial que pretende ver-se a si própria como uma pessoa original. Mais ainda, alguém que resiste a criar relações afectivas significativas, mantendo as mulher como "conhecidas" e os homens como "antigos admiradores", ao invés de procurar a construção de relações profundas, lidando com a inevitável imperfeição da natureza humana.
Leonora Eyre conhece num leilão Humphrey e James, tio e sobrinho que trabalham como antiquários. Apesar do primeiro lhe ser mais adequado aos olhos convencionais é por James que a nossa protagonista se interessa. Cria-se um triângulo amoroso que serve de pano de fundo ao livro. É através dele que quem lê consegue apreciar o conhecimento da natureza humana que Barbara Pym tinha e o modo como deslindou emoções, segundas intenções e caprichos no pequeno mundo da burguesia, onde ninguém diz o que pensa e o que sente. O final é consentâneo com o carácter que a protagonista vai mostrando ao longo desta novela e, embora suave, deixa-nos um amargo de boca.
Por isso, quando vi este outro livro de Pym não hesitei na compra e na imediata leitura. A protagonista é uma mulher de meia idade, ainda bela, que vive uma existência centrada em si própria e no seu prazer estético, traduzido num gosto acentuado por objectos vitorianos. Leonora é filha única e os seus pais deixaram-na com rendimentos suficientes para viver sem precisar de trabalhar. Mora num apartamento confortável e apesar de ter algumas relações pessoais, cedo percebemos que se trata de uma superficial que pretende ver-se a si própria como uma pessoa original. Mais ainda, alguém que resiste a criar relações afectivas significativas, mantendo as mulher como "conhecidas" e os homens como "antigos admiradores", ao invés de procurar a construção de relações profundas, lidando com a inevitável imperfeição da natureza humana.
Leonora Eyre conhece num leilão Humphrey e James, tio e sobrinho que trabalham como antiquários. Apesar do primeiro lhe ser mais adequado aos olhos convencionais é por James que a nossa protagonista se interessa. Cria-se um triângulo amoroso que serve de pano de fundo ao livro. É através dele que quem lê consegue apreciar o conhecimento da natureza humana que Barbara Pym tinha e o modo como deslindou emoções, segundas intenções e caprichos no pequeno mundo da burguesia, onde ninguém diz o que pensa e o que sente. O final é consentâneo com o carácter que a protagonista vai mostrando ao longo desta novela e, embora suave, deixa-nos um amargo de boca.
August 9, 2017
This is one of the more poignant Pym novels that is just as good as her others but tinged with a melancholy. I find her portrayal of Leonora fascinating and these spinster women attaching themselves to gay men and playing second fiddle to their love affairs makes for great reading. Leonora is one of the few Pym characters that I do not like. Her very regimented, pampered lifestyle coupled with her selfish personality really got to me. The dismissing of her elderly tenant to make room for James was so illustrative that I could hardly take it. It didn't make it any better that the old lady was going to leave anyway.
As always, fantastic reading.
As always, fantastic reading.
March 7, 2025
The characters (types) were fascinatingly portrayed, their world, perspective, and relationships. A delightful short look at a piece of their lives.
[4-4.5 stars]
[4-4.5 stars]
Read
October 27, 2025I raced to finish this before leaving for a work trip because travel tends to pull me out of a certain headspace.
This might be my favorite Pym although I say that of every Pym I just finish reading. Haha. With what little I know of Pym, I can't help but draw parallels between her and her women. In The Sweet Dove Died, her Leonora Eyre is a sophisticated middle-aged socialite who once did some exciting mysterious work for British intelligence, has had her fair share of glamorous love affairs, and falls for a man who is essentially unattainable. In a recent biography by Paula Byrne, it's revealed that Pym does engage in some kind of spy work and tends to love men who can't love her back (at least in the way she desires).
I haven't read enough of early Pym to compare, but The Sweet Dove Died is the accomplished, measured work of a writer who has Been Through It. (It was published more than a decade after the publishing scene decided her work was outdated.) The writing is tight and engaging, the insights are blunt and cutting yet genuine and not unkind. In A Glass of Blessings, there is a similar situation between main character Wilmet and a young man, but the treatment is more comedic. Here, it's more tragic, underscored with compounding feelings of loneliness, pride, and despair. In this later work, Pym is interested in probing the realities that may hinder us from making meaningful connections. Amazingly, just as we're beginning to question what it's all for, she still manages to end on a hopeful note. We're sad, but it's going to be okay.
This might be my favorite Pym although I say that of every Pym I just finish reading. Haha. With what little I know of Pym, I can't help but draw parallels between her and her women. In The Sweet Dove Died, her Leonora Eyre is a sophisticated middle-aged socialite who once did some exciting mysterious work for British intelligence, has had her fair share of glamorous love affairs, and falls for a man who is essentially unattainable. In a recent biography by Paula Byrne, it's revealed that Pym does engage in some kind of spy work and tends to love men who can't love her back (at least in the way she desires).
I haven't read enough of early Pym to compare, but The Sweet Dove Died is the accomplished, measured work of a writer who has Been Through It. (It was published more than a decade after the publishing scene decided her work was outdated.) The writing is tight and engaging, the insights are blunt and cutting yet genuine and not unkind. In A Glass of Blessings, there is a similar situation between main character Wilmet and a young man, but the treatment is more comedic. Here, it's more tragic, underscored with compounding feelings of loneliness, pride, and despair. In this later work, Pym is interested in probing the realities that may hinder us from making meaningful connections. Amazingly, just as we're beginning to question what it's all for, she still manages to end on a hopeful note. We're sad, but it's going to be okay.
November 6, 2025
Barbara Pym writes well of people who live with so much restraint that they're barely alive except in the tiny rut that constitutes a world. The lead characters are intensely self-centered with some unpleasant tendencies, but still readable as with those narcissists whose total self-focus becomes almost mesmerizing. I appreciate Pym's close and sharp observation of sensitive people and small calamities, but don't know enough about England to understand their place in the class system. I would've liked to've read more about poor Phoebe, potentially the most interesting character in the book who ended up a kind of throwaway.
September 5, 2016
In the last chapter of this novel, Pym writes '...but in the end parting had come with the inevitability of the last scene of a well-constructed play'. Replace 'play' with 'novel', and you have my initial response to this late book by Pym who's a novelist a friend put me onto a couple of years ago.
I think the thing I most respected in this tale of unfulfilled urbanite lives was the ending. Apart from Ned going back to America, no other ends are tied up. No wonder Larkin liked Pym: this novel ends with the same sort of effect as 'Mr Bleaney', what might be described as a kind of bewildered disturbance about the vanity of existence. James has been abandoned by both his male and female lover and, tacitly, by his older female admirer, Leonora (who has, I think, only ever kept him around as a trophy toyboy over who she can exercise the power she doesn't have over her own emotional life and as a way of staving off the reality of her own loneliness). Leonora herself who has been deserted by James in response both to Ned's expertise in heartless manipulation and pleasurable self-dramatisation, and to his own anxiety about being trapped by Leonora, continues her non-committal to a relationship of sorts with Humphrey which seems to exist as far as she can manage it in elegant dinners and excursions to showrooms and flower shows. Phoebe's existence, we are left to imagine as one that is as undriven and indecisive as the chaos of her cottage suggests, and she, I thought with remarkable daring on Pym's part, simply disappears from the story. Miss Caton will continue to go cheerfully on holiday by coach; Meg will desperately cultivate gay Colin's continuing allegiance, and Liz will have her cats.
It's a strange world. Although the novel is set in metropolitan and suburban London with some sallies out into the home counties (sometimes, when needs must - a measure of Leonora's desperation - by Green Line bus), we don't have a sense of Dickensian busyness. It seems a very small world in which isolated and lonely people lead small lives on the edge of pointlessness, spending a lot of time doing things that allow them to persuade themselves that daily life is not meaningless. The landscape feels as if it's one created by Stevie Smith.
I'm not sure what to make of Leonora. Although the novel was published in 1978 and if we assume it is set at that time as well, it nevertheless feels as if it's set in the early sixties or late fifties. But then if Humphrey and Leonora are people of a certain age, then they would have been born in the 1930s, and Leonora in particular may reflect the attitudes of an earlier time. Certainly, I was aware of how physically inhibited she is: she is beset, hampered, by a restraint that seems to be bred into her by the importance she attaches to elegance and aesthetics and form, the kind of externals that are accorded a worth that means that emotional intelligence is never allowed to blossom let alone bloom. This seems to me in keeping with the way a lot of upper-middle-class women may have been been brought up in the forties and fifties. Twice Pym shows her in tears when her carefully constructed world fails her. These were, however, for me rare moments when I found myself sympathising with a character I otherwise found wickedly manipulative, dishonest with herself, snobbish, uncharitable - to such an extent that even though I could see why she behaved like that, I could not find it in me to admit the pathos of it.
I did not exactly warm to James, either, because he was so limp. However, Pym presents him as a virtually unparented , sensitive boy, without much brain and looked after both indulgently and exploitatively by his uncle, Humphrey. He has little interest in antiques, has no business oomph, and lacks the zip to exercise any self-determination. Thus he is easily led by Leonora and the waspish Ned, a kind of malign imp, parasitising the emotional inadequacy of other people. (Ned is the only character who gets the better of Leonora.) James is simply too weak to chase after Phoebe who is herself finished off by her rival, Leonora. Yet James, by his very helplessness excites a little more sympathy.
The other aspect of the novel I liked was its understated style. So much is suggested by that which is unsaid. Leonora's knowing self-deceptions are perfectly evident to us, and it's pretty clear that they are to her as well, but she knows how to play them so that others will support her in them, and thus she can believe them to be true. Leonora's dialogue is crisply polite. It reminded me of Lawrence's rant against the Oxford voice - 'We wouldn't insist on it for a moment / but we are / we are / you admit we are / superior' - and it contrasted nicely with Meg and Liz and Ned and Mrs Culver. It's a form of cultivated politeness that allows anything that is 'unpleasant' to have no existence at all; and it's a way of asserting both social and personal worth, and quite plainly evidences the absence of both in the great scale of things. I find it very sad.
A lot of tea is offered, and a lot of 'drinks' (on trays, not at bars). 'George and Martha, sad, sad, sad.' The novel left me feeling both sad and exhilarated - sad by the lives that were depicted, exhilarated by the accomplishment with which they were presented.
I think the thing I most respected in this tale of unfulfilled urbanite lives was the ending. Apart from Ned going back to America, no other ends are tied up. No wonder Larkin liked Pym: this novel ends with the same sort of effect as 'Mr Bleaney', what might be described as a kind of bewildered disturbance about the vanity of existence. James has been abandoned by both his male and female lover and, tacitly, by his older female admirer, Leonora (who has, I think, only ever kept him around as a trophy toyboy over who she can exercise the power she doesn't have over her own emotional life and as a way of staving off the reality of her own loneliness). Leonora herself who has been deserted by James in response both to Ned's expertise in heartless manipulation and pleasurable self-dramatisation, and to his own anxiety about being trapped by Leonora, continues her non-committal to a relationship of sorts with Humphrey which seems to exist as far as she can manage it in elegant dinners and excursions to showrooms and flower shows. Phoebe's existence, we are left to imagine as one that is as undriven and indecisive as the chaos of her cottage suggests, and she, I thought with remarkable daring on Pym's part, simply disappears from the story. Miss Caton will continue to go cheerfully on holiday by coach; Meg will desperately cultivate gay Colin's continuing allegiance, and Liz will have her cats.
It's a strange world. Although the novel is set in metropolitan and suburban London with some sallies out into the home counties (sometimes, when needs must - a measure of Leonora's desperation - by Green Line bus), we don't have a sense of Dickensian busyness. It seems a very small world in which isolated and lonely people lead small lives on the edge of pointlessness, spending a lot of time doing things that allow them to persuade themselves that daily life is not meaningless. The landscape feels as if it's one created by Stevie Smith.
I'm not sure what to make of Leonora. Although the novel was published in 1978 and if we assume it is set at that time as well, it nevertheless feels as if it's set in the early sixties or late fifties. But then if Humphrey and Leonora are people of a certain age, then they would have been born in the 1930s, and Leonora in particular may reflect the attitudes of an earlier time. Certainly, I was aware of how physically inhibited she is: she is beset, hampered, by a restraint that seems to be bred into her by the importance she attaches to elegance and aesthetics and form, the kind of externals that are accorded a worth that means that emotional intelligence is never allowed to blossom let alone bloom. This seems to me in keeping with the way a lot of upper-middle-class women may have been been brought up in the forties and fifties. Twice Pym shows her in tears when her carefully constructed world fails her. These were, however, for me rare moments when I found myself sympathising with a character I otherwise found wickedly manipulative, dishonest with herself, snobbish, uncharitable - to such an extent that even though I could see why she behaved like that, I could not find it in me to admit the pathos of it.
I did not exactly warm to James, either, because he was so limp. However, Pym presents him as a virtually unparented , sensitive boy, without much brain and looked after both indulgently and exploitatively by his uncle, Humphrey. He has little interest in antiques, has no business oomph, and lacks the zip to exercise any self-determination. Thus he is easily led by Leonora and the waspish Ned, a kind of malign imp, parasitising the emotional inadequacy of other people. (Ned is the only character who gets the better of Leonora.) James is simply too weak to chase after Phoebe who is herself finished off by her rival, Leonora. Yet James, by his very helplessness excites a little more sympathy.
The other aspect of the novel I liked was its understated style. So much is suggested by that which is unsaid. Leonora's knowing self-deceptions are perfectly evident to us, and it's pretty clear that they are to her as well, but she knows how to play them so that others will support her in them, and thus she can believe them to be true. Leonora's dialogue is crisply polite. It reminded me of Lawrence's rant against the Oxford voice - 'We wouldn't insist on it for a moment / but we are / we are / you admit we are / superior' - and it contrasted nicely with Meg and Liz and Ned and Mrs Culver. It's a form of cultivated politeness that allows anything that is 'unpleasant' to have no existence at all; and it's a way of asserting both social and personal worth, and quite plainly evidences the absence of both in the great scale of things. I find it very sad.
A lot of tea is offered, and a lot of 'drinks' (on trays, not at bars). 'George and Martha, sad, sad, sad.' The novel left me feeling both sad and exhilarated - sad by the lives that were depicted, exhilarated by the accomplishment with which they were presented.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 17, 2013
“I had a dove, and the sweet dove died;
And I have thought it died of grieving;
O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied
With a single thread of my own hand’s weaving.. ”
(John Keats)
The Sweet Dove Died does feel quite different to other Pym novels I think; there are I felt, touches of Elizabeth Taylor at times. There is less cosiness and rather more sharpness to this novel -and although there is mention of a jumble sale there are not the usual collection of either clergymen or anthropologists.
At an antique fair the ageing elegantly dressed Leonora Eyre meets antique dealer Humphrey and his nephew James. Leonora is fragile and flirtatious with a love of Victoriana and beautiful things. Humphrey is instantly attracted to Leonora – while she is far more interested in James, despite the big age difference between them. Although Leonora’s intentions never progress beyond a small chaste kiss on the cheek – having done with “all that sort of thing” – she quickly places herself at the centre of James’s life.
“Leonora had had romantic experiences in practically all the famous gardens of Europe, beginning with the Grossner gardens in Dresden where, as a schoolgirl before the war, she had been picked up by a White Russian prince. And yet nothing had come of these pickings up; she had remained unmarried, one could almost say untouched. It was all a very far cry from the dusty little park where she and James now walked.”
Leonora takes it upon herself to help James manage the storing of his furniture, buys him expensive gifts – and contrives to evict her tenant so she can move James into the vacant flat above her, upon his return from Spain. However unknown to Leonora, just before James leaves on his Spanish trip, he meets the young and bookish Phoebe, young, badly dressed and sexually liberated, Phoebe is a very different kind of woman. When Leonora realises that in order to keep James under her spell she needs to dispense with young Phoebe, her critical eye appraises her as being no threat. However Leonora has not reckoned on wicked young American, Ned, who follows James back from Spain, and who is also quite adept at weaving a spell.
Leonora is a wonderfully dreadful character, self-absorbed and blind to her own faults, she judges all other women against herself and under her gaze they just don’t measure up. Leonora is unaware how really quite like her friend Meg she is, Meg nursing an impossible affection for her friend Colin – who is gay. Old fashioned, slightly fussy Humphrey’s romantic intentions continue, although he is not unaware of Leonora’s preference for his nephew – and Leonora is quite happy to use Humphrey for a pleasant evening out.
I really enjoyed my re-reading of this Barbara Pym novel – I actually fairly gulped it down this time. Leonora is not totally unsympathetic – although there were moments when I wanted to slap her slightly – she is hard to like. Many of the characters in this novel are manipulative or deluded, and it is in this that we see Pym’s superb sharpness. Those lines of Keats – quoted at the start of the book and even referred to by Ned, give the story real poignancy.
And I have thought it died of grieving;
O, what could it grieve for? Its feet were tied
With a single thread of my own hand’s weaving.. ”
(John Keats)
The Sweet Dove Died does feel quite different to other Pym novels I think; there are I felt, touches of Elizabeth Taylor at times. There is less cosiness and rather more sharpness to this novel -and although there is mention of a jumble sale there are not the usual collection of either clergymen or anthropologists.
At an antique fair the ageing elegantly dressed Leonora Eyre meets antique dealer Humphrey and his nephew James. Leonora is fragile and flirtatious with a love of Victoriana and beautiful things. Humphrey is instantly attracted to Leonora – while she is far more interested in James, despite the big age difference between them. Although Leonora’s intentions never progress beyond a small chaste kiss on the cheek – having done with “all that sort of thing” – she quickly places herself at the centre of James’s life.
“Leonora had had romantic experiences in practically all the famous gardens of Europe, beginning with the Grossner gardens in Dresden where, as a schoolgirl before the war, she had been picked up by a White Russian prince. And yet nothing had come of these pickings up; she had remained unmarried, one could almost say untouched. It was all a very far cry from the dusty little park where she and James now walked.”
Leonora takes it upon herself to help James manage the storing of his furniture, buys him expensive gifts – and contrives to evict her tenant so she can move James into the vacant flat above her, upon his return from Spain. However unknown to Leonora, just before James leaves on his Spanish trip, he meets the young and bookish Phoebe, young, badly dressed and sexually liberated, Phoebe is a very different kind of woman. When Leonora realises that in order to keep James under her spell she needs to dispense with young Phoebe, her critical eye appraises her as being no threat. However Leonora has not reckoned on wicked young American, Ned, who follows James back from Spain, and who is also quite adept at weaving a spell.
Leonora is a wonderfully dreadful character, self-absorbed and blind to her own faults, she judges all other women against herself and under her gaze they just don’t measure up. Leonora is unaware how really quite like her friend Meg she is, Meg nursing an impossible affection for her friend Colin – who is gay. Old fashioned, slightly fussy Humphrey’s romantic intentions continue, although he is not unaware of Leonora’s preference for his nephew – and Leonora is quite happy to use Humphrey for a pleasant evening out.
I really enjoyed my re-reading of this Barbara Pym novel – I actually fairly gulped it down this time. Leonora is not totally unsympathetic – although there were moments when I wanted to slap her slightly – she is hard to like. Many of the characters in this novel are manipulative or deluded, and it is in this that we see Pym’s superb sharpness. Those lines of Keats – quoted at the start of the book and even referred to by Ned, give the story real poignancy.
February 27, 2022
Only three years before her death by cancer at age sixty-six Barbara Pym was rediscovered and achieved international fame. The loci of the rediscovery was a survey of famous British writers in the January 21, 1977 edition of the Times Literary Supplement, in which two of the famous writers asked to nominate the most underrated book of the previous seventy-five years picked novels by Pym. Philip Larkin, one of the surveyed writers, put Pym in Jane Austen’s league for her ability to keep her reader “always on the verge of smiling.” Recently Alexander McCall Smith echoed this comparison when he singled out Pym’s Excellent Women as “one of the most endearingly amusing English novels of the twentieth century.”
Among Pym's oeuvre The Sweet Dove Died is my personal favorite with its richly drawn characters including Leonora Eyre, an attractive and elegant, but essentially selfish, middle-aged woman. Leonora is very much the Victorian trying to live in a post-Victorian world. She surrounds herself with Victoriana, even to the point of replacing her parents’ picture with that of her grandparents because she thinks that they, in their late Victorian dress, are more distinguished looking. The plot involves her with an antique dealer, Humphrey Boyce, and his nephew James. Both men are attracted to Leonora, but Leonora prefers the young, good-looking James to the more "suitable" Humphrey. Who she will choose to be with and whether they will accept her becomes more and more complicated as the novel progresses. Pym's prose style is felicitous, while her story line is as classically sound as one out of Jane Austen. As with all Pym's fiction, the novel contains many literary references, notably to works by Keats, John Milton and Henry James. And all of her stories are a delight to read for any who enjoy a good English novel.
Among Pym's oeuvre The Sweet Dove Died is my personal favorite with its richly drawn characters including Leonora Eyre, an attractive and elegant, but essentially selfish, middle-aged woman. Leonora is very much the Victorian trying to live in a post-Victorian world. She surrounds herself with Victoriana, even to the point of replacing her parents’ picture with that of her grandparents because she thinks that they, in their late Victorian dress, are more distinguished looking. The plot involves her with an antique dealer, Humphrey Boyce, and his nephew James. Both men are attracted to Leonora, but Leonora prefers the young, good-looking James to the more "suitable" Humphrey. Who she will choose to be with and whether they will accept her becomes more and more complicated as the novel progresses. Pym's prose style is felicitous, while her story line is as classically sound as one out of Jane Austen. As with all Pym's fiction, the novel contains many literary references, notably to works by Keats, John Milton and Henry James. And all of her stories are a delight to read for any who enjoy a good English novel.
October 1, 2014
What hateful snobs abound in this book. Leonora, for whom everything has to be perfection, Humphrey who looks down on Miss Caton, Ned, who looks down on his lovers, James, who looks down on Phoebe and so on... It's a social heirachy of horrid snobs. Not one likeable character in the book apart from, say, Phoebe, who seems to be the most normal of them all.
Leonora, so wrapped up in her own beauty, elegance and grace that she hadn't noticed that she'd been left on the shelf until it was too late. She thought herself so above everyone that she was immune to such tawdry things as feelings. Leonora was like a Bensonite Lucia but with no wit or sparkle. I felt no sympathy for her, or James, or Humphrey and certainly not Ned.
Despite that I found this to be my favourite Pym so far. Much more observed and characterised. It felt more serious than the congregational books and seemed to be detailing a time of change from the old order, with its stifling unsaid rules and heirachy of Leonora, to the apparently less rigid times of which Phoebe was an example. A really enjoyable book.
Leonora, so wrapped up in her own beauty, elegance and grace that she hadn't noticed that she'd been left on the shelf until it was too late. She thought herself so above everyone that she was immune to such tawdry things as feelings. Leonora was like a Bensonite Lucia but with no wit or sparkle. I felt no sympathy for her, or James, or Humphrey and certainly not Ned.
Despite that I found this to be my favourite Pym so far. Much more observed and characterised. It felt more serious than the congregational books and seemed to be detailing a time of change from the old order, with its stifling unsaid rules and heirachy of Leonora, to the apparently less rigid times of which Phoebe was an example. A really enjoyable book.
March 29, 2022
Cool as a cucumber best describes Leonora Eyre, Pym's protagonist in this, her eighth novel (and the second to be published after her 'rediscovery' in 1977). A middle-aged spinster, Leonora is a beautiful and elegant woman who values her privacy and independence, her pretty possessions in her graceful home, but also enjoys the attentions of men. Unfortunately, she falls for James, a young homosexual, who breaks her heart while his uncle Humphrey tries to win her (sort of; he's mostly just looking for a companion I think).
I was ambivalent about Leonora, but I did pity her, in her lack of warmth and genuine friendships, as well as her judgments of others. As always, Pym manages to voice the quiet thoughts that rumble through our heads daily, sometimes keeping us stuck. Yet we forge ahead.
I was ambivalent about Leonora, but I did pity her, in her lack of warmth and genuine friendships, as well as her judgments of others. As always, Pym manages to voice the quiet thoughts that rumble through our heads daily, sometimes keeping us stuck. Yet we forge ahead.
June 13, 2010
Shallow, bigoted, manipulative, self-centered - all words that could describe the 50-something Leonora. But yet through Pym's understated character development, you also see her as lonely and vulnerable, a product of her times and social class.
Leonora meets Humphrey and James at an antique auction. Humphrey immediately falls for her, but it is Humphrey's much younger nephew James that Leonara is interested in. And she will do whatever she can to hold on to him.
"I had a dove, and the sweet dove died; And I have thought it died of grieving; O, what could it grieve for? its feet were tied With a single thread of my own hand's weaving.." - John Keats
Leonora meets Humphrey and James at an antique auction. Humphrey immediately falls for her, but it is Humphrey's much younger nephew James that Leonara is interested in. And she will do whatever she can to hold on to him.
"I had a dove, and the sweet dove died; And I have thought it died of grieving; O, what could it grieve for? its feet were tied With a single thread of my own hand's weaving.." - John Keats
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