The tree

by Caroline Glyn

380 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 1969

Reviews

[Pollymoore3 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Here is Fullie again, now middle aged. Ah, so there is in fact a trilogy. I had mixed this one up with another of her books, "Heights and Depths"; I must have read them in quick succession years ago. But I had remembered the Traherne references (by Sally), just that they are here and not in "The Unicorn Girl". The only parts of "The Tree" I remembered were the kidnap or rescue of Dad, and the "happening", and of course the tree. Sadly, in a weird echo of the story, just as I was finishing it, I heard a whining and buzzing at the back of my garden. The three-trunked ash, which had been in the garden backing onto mine since before I moved in over 11 years ago, was being murdered. Never mind that the birds found shelter there before they ventured out to the bird feeders, never mind the shade and shelter it gave, or the carbon dioxide it recycled, or the fact that ash trees are in dire danger from infection now.... gone. I am far less resigned to it than Mrs Bott, as I think Caroline Glyn hadn't yet fully explored the implications of the "green" ideas in her books, and too much was still being accepted in a Sixties idea of progress. Trees are not just copies of Platonic heavenly trees, they have vital importance in their own right.