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Thank Heaven Fasting
"She could never, looking backwards, remember a time when she had not known that a woman's failure or success in life depended entirely upon whether or not she succeeded in getting a husband."
When in the company of a young man a dutiful daughter should immediately assume an air of fresh, sparkling enjoyment. She should not speak of "being friends" with him -- a young man is either eligible or he is not-and never, but never, should she get herself talked about, for a young girl who does so is doomed. "Men may dance with her, or flirt with her, but they don't propose."
It would be quite a coup for a girl to find a husband during her first season, but if, God forbid, three seasons pass without success, she must join the ranks of those sad women who are a great embarrassment to society and, above all, to their disappointed mothers . . . With such thoughts in mind, how can Monica fail to look forward to her first ball?
When in the company of a young man a dutiful daughter should immediately assume an air of fresh, sparkling enjoyment. She should not speak of "being friends" with him -- a young man is either eligible or he is not-and never, but never, should she get herself talked about, for a young girl who does so is doomed. "Men may dance with her, or flirt with her, but they don't propose."
It would be quite a coup for a girl to find a husband during her first season, but if, God forbid, three seasons pass without success, she must join the ranks of those sad women who are a great embarrassment to society and, above all, to their disappointed mothers . . . With such thoughts in mind, how can Monica fail to look forward to her first ball?
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1933
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316 people want to read
About the author
E.M. Delafield
135 books148 followersEdmée Elizabeth Monica Dashwood, née de la Pasture (9 June 1890 – 2 December 1943), commonly known as E. M. Delafield, was a prolific English author who is best-known for her largely autobiographical Diary of a Provincial Lady, which took the form of a journal of the life of an upper-middle class Englishwoman living mostly in a Devon village of the 1930s, and its sequels in which the Provincial Lady buys a flat in London and travels to America. Other sequels of note are her experiences looking for war-work during the Phoney War in 1939, and her experiences as a tourist in the Soviet Union.
Daughter of the novelist Mrs. Henry De La Pasture.
Daughter of the novelist Mrs. Henry De La Pasture.
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Displaying 1 - 25 of 25 reviews
May 27, 2023
Review "Down on your knees
And thank heaven, fasting, for a good man’s love,
For I must tell you friendly in your ear,
Sell when you can; you are not for all markets."
Much Ado About Nothing. The whole book could be regard as an an explication of that quote.
It is the story of a rich girl who along with all the other girls of her class has nothing to do, done nothing, never even been out to a shop on their own and has just one thing to do to make her parents happy: get married before the age of 21. All this at the time the suffragettes were agitating for the vote.
The book exposes the double standards surrounding chastity in women and men and how even the suspicion of impropriety reduces a woman's value. Or in the case of the book, totally cancels it. It is as if a woman is essentially a worthless creature that has only one possession that would interest a man looking for marriage, a wife, a mother to his children, and a partner. If she isn't 'pure', then she's out of the game. Or in some countries and cultures, dead.
It is a fairly simple story, but it's value lies in that it challenges social norms of the time. Since women can earn their own living, they now no longer need men for status or motherhood. And if they belong to one of the cultures or religions that do hold firm to the evils of valuing chastity or 'honour', they can simply leave. I realise that is a bit simplistic, some can't. But most can.
My heart sinks when I hear of 'purity balls', those conservative Christian father-daughter events where the daughter promises her father she will remain an untouched (not even kissed) virgin until marriage when he will give her away to another man. I always wonder why there are no mother-son purity balls? Is it because all women are fair game to 'ruin' to men, that they can't be expected not to try it on with every woman until they find one who resists and then he knows she might be the right one to marry, all the others being spoiled?
__________
Reading notes I spent all day reading this excellent and important book. It would make a great costume drama set in the early 20th C but with a difference. It might be about the upper class, with servants, debutantes' balls and a life bygone now, but it is also extreme social commentary on the terrible lives and indignities heaped on young girls from the moment they were born. There are many parallels with the countries and religions where 'honour' killing is part of the culture, and in fact made such murders a great deal more understandable to me.
I just wrote a review on Nobody's Victim: Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, Pervs, and Trolls and the two books tie in together.
__________
Something about the cover caught my eye, that and the strange title. I rarely read fiction, but since it caught my eye, I read some reviews including a long review on basically h0w bad it was and everything written made me interested. As it was the reviewer said there was no plot or character development. We obviously didn't read the same book. But 1 star reviews are sometimes a spur for me to read a book, and this is a 5 star read, excellent and enjoyable. It would make a great addition to school reading, but in the US would probably end up on the banned list.
And thank heaven, fasting, for a good man’s love,
For I must tell you friendly in your ear,
Sell when you can; you are not for all markets."
Much Ado About Nothing. The whole book could be regard as an an explication of that quote.
It is the story of a rich girl who along with all the other girls of her class has nothing to do, done nothing, never even been out to a shop on their own and has just one thing to do to make her parents happy: get married before the age of 21. All this at the time the suffragettes were agitating for the vote.
The book exposes the double standards surrounding chastity in women and men and how even the suspicion of impropriety reduces a woman's value. Or in the case of the book, totally cancels it. It is as if a woman is essentially a worthless creature that has only one possession that would interest a man looking for marriage, a wife, a mother to his children, and a partner. If she isn't 'pure', then she's out of the game. Or in some countries and cultures, dead.
It is a fairly simple story, but it's value lies in that it challenges social norms of the time. Since women can earn their own living, they now no longer need men for status or motherhood. And if they belong to one of the cultures or religions that do hold firm to the evils of valuing chastity or 'honour', they can simply leave. I realise that is a bit simplistic, some can't. But most can.
My heart sinks when I hear of 'purity balls', those conservative Christian father-daughter events where the daughter promises her father she will remain an untouched (not even kissed) virgin until marriage when he will give her away to another man. I always wonder why there are no mother-son purity balls? Is it because all women are fair game to 'ruin' to men, that they can't be expected not to try it on with every woman until they find one who resists and then he knows she might be the right one to marry, all the others being spoiled?
__________
Reading notes I spent all day reading this excellent and important book. It would make a great costume drama set in the early 20th C but with a difference. It might be about the upper class, with servants, debutantes' balls and a life bygone now, but it is also extreme social commentary on the terrible lives and indignities heaped on young girls from the moment they were born. There are many parallels with the countries and religions where 'honour' killing is part of the culture, and in fact made such murders a great deal more understandable to me.
I just wrote a review on Nobody's Victim: Fighting Psychos, Stalkers, Pervs, and Trolls and the two books tie in together.
__________
Something about the cover caught my eye, that and the strange title. I rarely read fiction, but since it caught my eye, I read some reviews including a long review on basically h0w bad it was and everything written made me interested. As it was the reviewer said there was no plot or character development. We obviously didn't read the same book. But 1 star reviews are sometimes a spur for me to read a book, and this is a 5 star read, excellent and enjoyable. It would make a great addition to school reading, but in the US would probably end up on the banned list.
April 7, 2023
Nobody wanted to marry her, and Monica's deepening terror and dismay told her that, if she could not marry - and the chance of it were lessening year by year - there was very little left for her in life.
The light and frothy tone of this book belies the absolutely chilling story that plays out here: in reality, this is a kind of a 'death of the heart' story only the victims are more or less willing, submitting themselves to the brain-washing of middle class Edwardian culture that sees non-marriage for women - it doesn't matter who to, as long as he is 'one of our world' - as, literally, a fate worse than death.
Delafield has a light touch and it's easy to criticise Monica and her friends for not having the gumption to throw off their shackles - but that would be unfair. These girls have known from their first consciousness that the only thing that will compensate their poor parents for not having been born boys is to marry rapidly, ideally during their debutante season when they are teenagers.
The results are horrific: every man is scoured for whether he 'might be any use' (as a husband or to introduce her to a husband), every young woman is assessed in terms of her competition in looks or attractiveness to men, every older unmarried woman is pitied and serves as the horror story of what not to become.
These are young women who have no education, quite literally nothing to do other than to put themselves on the marriage market. This is such a bourgeois world: the upper classes/aristocracy won't care so much about any one else's opinions; and the bohemian girls (think Woolf and the suffragettes whose activities are mentioned with horror in Monica's mother's drawing room) are too busy overturning the stifling rules under which Monica exists - but for Monica and her companions, social performance and public opinion is everything.
Delafield keeps her writing bright but there are some grim portraits here, not least the Marlowe girls who epitomise the pathologies that are allowed to fester when their spirits are so broken.
Beneath what appears to be a light-hearted surface, lies a scathing and angry consciousness: 'And thank heaven, fasting, for a good man’s love' - indeed!
June 9, 2018
E. M. Delafield is best remembered for her light and bright Provincial Lady books, but she wrote a great deal more than that. This book, reissued by Virago back in the day and by Bloomsbury more recently, is my first venture into those ‘other books’ and I found that it was very different and very good.
‘Thank Heaven Fasting’ speaks profoundly of the restrictive ridiculousness of upper class society in Edwardian Britain. The author grew up in this society, she struggled with it, and it is clear from the very first page that the passage of time had not tempered her feelings:
‘Much was said in the days of Monica’s early youth about being good. Life — the section of it that was visible from the angle of Eaton Square — was full of young girls who were all being good. Even a girl who was tiresome and “didn’t get on with her mother” was never anything but good, since opportunities for being anything else were practically non-existent.
One was safeguarded.
One’s religion, one’s mother, one’s maid…. But especially one’s mother.’
Monica Ingram was the much loved only child of a socially ambitious mother and wealthy father. They wanted only the very best for their darling daughter and they had made her aware of the supreme importance of a good marriage for a woman. She understood a woman who failed to elicit a proposal of marriage from the right man would be viewed as a failure for the rest of what would inevitably be a joyless life. She would have no wedding day, no home of her own, no children, no social position …
When Monica takes her first steps as a debutante things go very well: she is pretty, she is charming and she speaks quite naturally with the people round her. Her mother is cautiously optimistic and she is very pleased when she finds that Monica has an admirer; though she is quick to tell her daughter that he is not ‘The One’.
“Besides, though he may be a very nice young man, we’ve got to remember that he isn’t, really, very much use. He’s too young, for one thing, and there’s no money at all, even if he hadn’t got an elder brother.”
Monica, disconcerted and disappointed, did not quite know how to reply. She was afraid that her mother was going to say that she would not be allowed to be friends with Claude Ashe any more.
“It’s quite all right, darling,” said Mrs. Ingram very kindly. “I like you to make friends of your own age, and one wants people to see that — well, that there’s someone running after you, more or less. Only I want you to realize that you mustn’t take anything at all seriously, just yet.”
Things go terribly wrong when Monica encounters Captain Lane at a party. He draws her away from the company, he charms her, he kisses her, and she responds. In her innocence, she believes herself to be in love, she believes that what is happening can only be the precursor to a proposal of marriage, and she forgets everything that her mother taught her.
Monica’s parents are appalled. They know that Captain Lane is a notorious rake, they know that their daughter’s behaviour has been noticed and that there will be gossip; and that it will ruin her chances with any respectable man. The only course open to them is to bring the romance to a swift conclusion and take Monica away to the country for the summer, in the hope that when she returns, all will be forgotten.
When the Ingrams return to London memories have faded but they haven’t gone away; and events have taken their toll on Monica, she is a year older and her prettiness has faded too. She comes to realise that, she sees a new generation of debutantes catching the eyes of eligible young men, and she realises that her chance of marriage is diminishing rapidly.
Poor Monica.
She is thrown back into the company of her childhood friends, Frederica and Cecily, who had also failed to elicit proposals; because their upbringing had been so sheltered that they were uncomfortable and awkward in society; and because they felt the disappointment of mother, who was successful in society but seemed not to understand that her daughters needed her help and support.
Monica had a much closer relationship with her own mother, but seeing her friends’ position intensified her fears for the future.
In the end she had just two gentleman callers. One was a friend, who appreciated Monica’s willingness to listen to tales of his great lost love, and the other was an older man who had proposed to many and been turned down each time. Had Monica’s hopes of matrimony gone, or did she still have a chance?
Her story made a wonderful book.
Monica, her family, her friends, and her suitors were all trapped by ridiculous social conventions; and the range of characters and different experiences reinforced that point. Making herself attractive and appealing to men was the sole object of her life; because marriage was the only career opportunity for a woman of her class and anything other than that would constitute failure.
Her failure meant that she remained in her mother’s care, she continued to be a child and she never learned to understand her own feelings or make decisions for herself. No woman ever needed to, because she would pass form her parent’s charge to her husband’s!
This could have been a polemic but it wasn’t; because the characters lived and breather and because everything that happened was horribly believable.
The writing was clear and lucid. The dialogues rang true and they said everything that needed to be said.
The end of this book gave me hope for Monica but it also made me realise how trapped she was.
‘She could never, looking backwards, remember a time when she had not known that a woman’s failure or success in life depended entirely on whether or not she succeeded in getting a husband.’
Sad but true.
‘Thank Heaven Fasting’ speaks profoundly of the restrictive ridiculousness of upper class society in Edwardian Britain. The author grew up in this society, she struggled with it, and it is clear from the very first page that the passage of time had not tempered her feelings:
‘Much was said in the days of Monica’s early youth about being good. Life — the section of it that was visible from the angle of Eaton Square — was full of young girls who were all being good. Even a girl who was tiresome and “didn’t get on with her mother” was never anything but good, since opportunities for being anything else were practically non-existent.
One was safeguarded.
One’s religion, one’s mother, one’s maid…. But especially one’s mother.’
Monica Ingram was the much loved only child of a socially ambitious mother and wealthy father. They wanted only the very best for their darling daughter and they had made her aware of the supreme importance of a good marriage for a woman. She understood a woman who failed to elicit a proposal of marriage from the right man would be viewed as a failure for the rest of what would inevitably be a joyless life. She would have no wedding day, no home of her own, no children, no social position …
When Monica takes her first steps as a debutante things go very well: she is pretty, she is charming and she speaks quite naturally with the people round her. Her mother is cautiously optimistic and she is very pleased when she finds that Monica has an admirer; though she is quick to tell her daughter that he is not ‘The One’.
“Besides, though he may be a very nice young man, we’ve got to remember that he isn’t, really, very much use. He’s too young, for one thing, and there’s no money at all, even if he hadn’t got an elder brother.”
Monica, disconcerted and disappointed, did not quite know how to reply. She was afraid that her mother was going to say that she would not be allowed to be friends with Claude Ashe any more.
“It’s quite all right, darling,” said Mrs. Ingram very kindly. “I like you to make friends of your own age, and one wants people to see that — well, that there’s someone running after you, more or less. Only I want you to realize that you mustn’t take anything at all seriously, just yet.”
Things go terribly wrong when Monica encounters Captain Lane at a party. He draws her away from the company, he charms her, he kisses her, and she responds. In her innocence, she believes herself to be in love, she believes that what is happening can only be the precursor to a proposal of marriage, and she forgets everything that her mother taught her.
Monica’s parents are appalled. They know that Captain Lane is a notorious rake, they know that their daughter’s behaviour has been noticed and that there will be gossip; and that it will ruin her chances with any respectable man. The only course open to them is to bring the romance to a swift conclusion and take Monica away to the country for the summer, in the hope that when she returns, all will be forgotten.
When the Ingrams return to London memories have faded but they haven’t gone away; and events have taken their toll on Monica, she is a year older and her prettiness has faded too. She comes to realise that, she sees a new generation of debutantes catching the eyes of eligible young men, and she realises that her chance of marriage is diminishing rapidly.
Poor Monica.
She is thrown back into the company of her childhood friends, Frederica and Cecily, who had also failed to elicit proposals; because their upbringing had been so sheltered that they were uncomfortable and awkward in society; and because they felt the disappointment of mother, who was successful in society but seemed not to understand that her daughters needed her help and support.
Monica had a much closer relationship with her own mother, but seeing her friends’ position intensified her fears for the future.
In the end she had just two gentleman callers. One was a friend, who appreciated Monica’s willingness to listen to tales of his great lost love, and the other was an older man who had proposed to many and been turned down each time. Had Monica’s hopes of matrimony gone, or did she still have a chance?
Her story made a wonderful book.
Monica, her family, her friends, and her suitors were all trapped by ridiculous social conventions; and the range of characters and different experiences reinforced that point. Making herself attractive and appealing to men was the sole object of her life; because marriage was the only career opportunity for a woman of her class and anything other than that would constitute failure.
Her failure meant that she remained in her mother’s care, she continued to be a child and she never learned to understand her own feelings or make decisions for herself. No woman ever needed to, because she would pass form her parent’s charge to her husband’s!
This could have been a polemic but it wasn’t; because the characters lived and breather and because everything that happened was horribly believable.
The writing was clear and lucid. The dialogues rang true and they said everything that needed to be said.
The end of this book gave me hope for Monica but it also made me realise how trapped she was.
‘She could never, looking backwards, remember a time when she had not known that a woman’s failure or success in life depended entirely on whether or not she succeeded in getting a husband.’
Sad but true.
April 13, 2019
Thank Heaven Fasting is a perceptive look at the coming out of a debutante and her increasingly desperate search for a husband. It's sympathetic to the heroine, Monica, and to her mother (and does the relationship between them beautifully), but underneath there's a scathing look at the society Monica has to deal with.
January 18, 2012
Like many of the Virago books, this was great but depressing.
It was particularly interesting to read this right after The House of Mirth: again, great but depressing, but in a very different way. While Wharton begins with a rich, detailed world, and proceeds further and further into it, Delafield takes the deceptively simple route, approaching the plot through the lens of her protagonist Monica's extremely limited worldview. Among the minute decisions of hairdressing, ribbons, perfect poise, graceful gestures, & fragments of polite small talk, how can anyone tell what will really affect their life? Nothing important is ever happening--until suddenly everything has already happened.
This book has the most ignorant protagonist I've ever seen. It's a big shift from the ignorance-turned-knowledge of the typical bildungsroman; in fact, since Monica never actually gains any significant knowledge, I wouldn't call this a bildungsroman at all. A tragedy, maybe--and the hardest kind: a banal tragedy--but not a bildungsroman. The whole business ends up being a severe and justified judgement of keeping females stupid and only grooming them for marriage. So all is as it should be.
It was particularly interesting to read this right after The House of Mirth: again, great but depressing, but in a very different way. While Wharton begins with a rich, detailed world, and proceeds further and further into it, Delafield takes the deceptively simple route, approaching the plot through the lens of her protagonist Monica's extremely limited worldview. Among the minute decisions of hairdressing, ribbons, perfect poise, graceful gestures, & fragments of polite small talk, how can anyone tell what will really affect their life? Nothing important is ever happening--until suddenly everything has already happened.
This book has the most ignorant protagonist I've ever seen. It's a big shift from the ignorance-turned-knowledge of the typical bildungsroman; in fact, since Monica never actually gains any significant knowledge, I wouldn't call this a bildungsroman at all. A tragedy, maybe--and the hardest kind: a banal tragedy--but not a bildungsroman. The whole business ends up being a severe and justified judgement of keeping females stupid and only grooming them for marriage. So all is as it should be.
January 4, 2012
A serious study of a young upper class woman early in the 20th century, who is confined by social rules and trained as a debutante almost exclusively for her coming out and husband-hunting. Some of the details that Delafield provides are somewhat subtle but a treat when you catch them -- especially references to those troublesome girls who want to get the vote. A tragic story, written by the highly talented Delafield using a highly detached narrator (an excellent point made by Penelope Fitzgerald's in the afterword).
October 2, 2016
Although its story is far from original in outline, this book reads well thanks to the urgency with which the author conveys the plight of its heroine, Monica. Like all upper-class girls of her generation, Monica has been reared with only one end in mind: to make the best marriage possible, as early as possible after "coming out." Unfortunately, Monica loses her head the moment an attractive man pays her a compliment, and from the minute she lets him kiss her, her value on the marriage market declines sharply. Delafield does a very good job of describing this horrendous system, and its toll on whole families, most especially, of course, daughters and their mothers. Most mothers who haven't had sons see themselves as cursed, resulting in low self-esteem for lots of girls, who are then at a disadvantage when it comes to appearing at ease with themselves and attractive to men. After her mis-step, Monica spends years in a kind of twilight zone, more and more eager to marry anybody, yet too ashamed of herself to flaunt her few assets. Her friends Frederica and Cecily are in an even worse boat, because their beautiful mother openly despises them, and does nothing to break the toxic bond between them, to the extent than when an intelligent doctor proposes to Cecily, she lets Frederica destroy the engagement and Cecily's last chance of happiness. Monica's mother is a far more sympathetic character, which adds to the interest of the book. Clearly, she isn't indifferent to Monica's feelings, and if she adheres to a very strict code of conduct, it is because she knows how unforgiving her world is to the slightest impropriety in a girl'd behavior. That at the eleventh hour, Monica gets a proposal from a kind, older gentleman and seizes it gratefully adds to the poignancy of the tale.
August 19, 2015
In a sense, this is a good companion to Ansari's Modern Romance. It's focus is the "dating Scene" around 1910. At that time, young woman had their first "season"--parties and dances to make friends and meet eligible young men--at around age 18. IF you weren't married within three seasons, though, you were pretty much doomed to be an old maid and social outcast.
Also, if you dared to slip away from a party with a man for a few minutes--that could ruin you.
The book drips with the limits on woman that built up the importance of men. It describes how only by marriage could a mid-to-upper class woman leave home and have a job (as wife and mother). The consequence is--if you made it to your late 20's still unmarried--if anyone asked you to be his wife you were over the moon with joy and sure you were living happy forever.
The story makes one think of the author's own life, since she does not marry until close to 30. And if her husband was anything like the Provincial Lady's Robert, she got no prize. What a tough world where women had to bound themselves to jerky men.
Also, if you dared to slip away from a party with a man for a few minutes--that could ruin you.
The book drips with the limits on woman that built up the importance of men. It describes how only by marriage could a mid-to-upper class woman leave home and have a job (as wife and mother). The consequence is--if you made it to your late 20's still unmarried--if anyone asked you to be his wife you were over the moon with joy and sure you were living happy forever.
The story makes one think of the author's own life, since she does not marry until close to 30. And if her husband was anything like the Provincial Lady's Robert, she got no prize. What a tough world where women had to bound themselves to jerky men.
September 2, 2014
If you come to THANK HEAVEN FASTING (for a good man) (from Shakespeare) from the Provincial Lady books, you may find FASTING to be unredeemably, unremittingly unlikable.
Beware - spoilers.
FASTING is a literary device rather than a novel. It's a cautionary tale about superficiality in society and repression of women in English culture a hundred years past.
There is no wit, no humor, no character development, no life, no likability. Only unremitting, plodding, numbed condemnation of Victorian-style parenting, courtship, and marriage culture as suffered by the protagonist, Monica. By showing us the stunted brain and heart of a product of that culture, Delafield may be depicting reality. But the lack of authentic love of any kind in the book is not realistic. Moreover, superficiality isn't confined to those with Victorian values. The stereotypes women were forced to adhere to at that time are no different from the type that girls voluntarily adhere to today.
Being proposed to is all that Monica cares about. Love is meaningless. This is the Anti Pride & Prejudice. Monica is a Charlotte Lucas, only stupid.
The last section of the book is entitled The Happy Ending. I was hoping things were going to turn around for Monica - Delafield was about to relent. Maybe Monica would wake up or meet a nice guy. Nope. Just more humorless satire. When Monica finally receives her long-awaited proposal, it's from an old guy with prawnlike eyes. She is SO grateful. She marries him. The book ends with her prayer that she will be a good wife, and if she has a child, it will be a son.
Monica is so brainwashed, she means this prayer literally. It's not that she wants a child who will be free from the kind of repression she experienced. She wants to present her husband with a son. Even in this last sentence, it seems that Monica is still shackled by her culture. The reader could interpret the sentence to mean that Monica doesn't want a daughter who might have to suffer as she did -- but nothing in Monica's thoughts or actions have led the reader up to such an assumption. It would have been preferable if she had. Though that would have lifted the veil of the literary device. Delafield appeared to want to keep a veil consistently lowered over her own true feelings as author.
It's odd that the satire is so flat, so humorless - it doesn't feel like satire. You never see Delafield peering out from the pages with a wink or a nod, as you do in the Provincial Lady books. It's as though she's not there at all. It's so dry, it's dried up. So detached, the reader may be, too.
She could have made the same points about repressed women and still offered us one FASTING character we could like, could cheer for, be cheered by. But I was fettered with the prejudice of having loved the Provincial Lady books -- and I was expecting to find something of the same Delafield in FASTING. She's not there. Maybe I would have been able to find more to admire if I had read FASTING without knowing the Provincial Lady.
People who go looking for more from the author of the Provincial Lady should be warned.
Beware - spoilers.
FASTING is a literary device rather than a novel. It's a cautionary tale about superficiality in society and repression of women in English culture a hundred years past.
There is no wit, no humor, no character development, no life, no likability. Only unremitting, plodding, numbed condemnation of Victorian-style parenting, courtship, and marriage culture as suffered by the protagonist, Monica. By showing us the stunted brain and heart of a product of that culture, Delafield may be depicting reality. But the lack of authentic love of any kind in the book is not realistic. Moreover, superficiality isn't confined to those with Victorian values. The stereotypes women were forced to adhere to at that time are no different from the type that girls voluntarily adhere to today.
Being proposed to is all that Monica cares about. Love is meaningless. This is the Anti Pride & Prejudice. Monica is a Charlotte Lucas, only stupid.
The last section of the book is entitled The Happy Ending. I was hoping things were going to turn around for Monica - Delafield was about to relent. Maybe Monica would wake up or meet a nice guy. Nope. Just more humorless satire. When Monica finally receives her long-awaited proposal, it's from an old guy with prawnlike eyes. She is SO grateful. She marries him. The book ends with her prayer that she will be a good wife, and if she has a child, it will be a son.
Monica is so brainwashed, she means this prayer literally. It's not that she wants a child who will be free from the kind of repression she experienced. She wants to present her husband with a son. Even in this last sentence, it seems that Monica is still shackled by her culture. The reader could interpret the sentence to mean that Monica doesn't want a daughter who might have to suffer as she did -- but nothing in Monica's thoughts or actions have led the reader up to such an assumption. It would have been preferable if she had. Though that would have lifted the veil of the literary device. Delafield appeared to want to keep a veil consistently lowered over her own true feelings as author.
It's odd that the satire is so flat, so humorless - it doesn't feel like satire. You never see Delafield peering out from the pages with a wink or a nod, as you do in the Provincial Lady books. It's as though she's not there at all. It's so dry, it's dried up. So detached, the reader may be, too.
She could have made the same points about repressed women and still offered us one FASTING character we could like, could cheer for, be cheered by. But I was fettered with the prejudice of having loved the Provincial Lady books -- and I was expecting to find something of the same Delafield in FASTING. She's not there. Maybe I would have been able to find more to admire if I had read FASTING without knowing the Provincial Lady.
People who go looking for more from the author of the Provincial Lady should be warned.
July 5, 2015
A perfect, ironic book, that hides the bitterness of a caged world in laughter and wry charm.
June 11, 2013
As I recall, this poor girl makes the mistake during her first season out of kissing a young man and sort of being labelled "loose" thereafter. I thought this was a very nicely done book about all that rigmarole surrounding trying to marry the right guy and get ahead in society.
June 22, 2017
Wonderful novel. Beautifully written and a joy to read. But was it a 'happy ending'?
October 4, 2020
Thank heaven fasting if you are not a young woman from fashionable society in Edwardian London's marriage market. E.M. Delafield's wry and poignant portrayal of Monica's struggles to navigate her way through the byzantine rules for landing a suitable (presentable and well-off) husband is very sympathetic. Had they known the expression, 'stressed out' would have described Monica and her circle exactly, as with each season the urgency of finding a husband in an ever diminishing pool generated more pressing anxieties and fears. Men had their labels too, 'not quite....' and 'not much use' the most damning. The frustrating restrictions on women's lives, their minimal education and lack of opportunity are keenly felt by E.M. Delafield and her characters. Sometimes tough compromises must be made to achieve social 'success' and time wears people down. The novel's conclusion is ambiguous but left me very sad.
February 13, 2023
Thank Heaven Fasting is the tale of an early 20th century upper class young woman who has been raised to think life’s highest goal is to be married. When this does not happen in her first few seasons (because of a petty scandal), she is adrift, filled with shame, guilt and lack of purpose. While some might rebel against such a constraining system, Monica is an obedient creature, and never seriously thinks of going against her parents or class. This would be unpleasant reading if not for Delafield’s wry sense of humor. We end of caring for Monica, despite her limitations, and feel a sadness that she does not feel as she settles into marriage with an older man (who resembles a prawn!). The book ends on her wedding day when she says a prayer that if she has a child, she wishes it to be a boy.
December 14, 2010
Had to return to Interlibrary Loan and could not finish. Not as good as her books, Life of a Provincial Lady, etc.
October 4, 2016
A very interesting book, better than Delafield's other ones about married life.
March 1, 2023
A sort of romance in reverse, very absorbing read and interesting insights into Edwardian society
May 15, 2025
I will be reviewing this engaging and important book, but need time to think about it. In the meantime, here is a quote from another reviewer, "Petra in Aotearoa."
"Down on your knees
And thank heaven, fasting, for a good man’s love,
For I must tell you friendly in your ear,
Sell when you can; you are not for all markets."
Much Ado About Nothing.
The whole book could be regarded as an an explication of that quote.
It is the story of a rich girl who along with all the other girls of her class has nothing to do, done nothing, never even been out to a shop on their own and has just one thing to do to make her parents happy: get married before the age of 21. All this at the time the suffragettes were agitating for the vote.
The book exposes the double standards surrounding chastity in women and men and how even the suspicion of impropriety reduces a woman's value. Or in the case of the book, totally cancels it.
January 24, 2020
Absolutely charming story of Monica, a young girl coming out in Edwardian England, where the search for a husband is everything.
July 24, 2021
A world which has, fortunately, vanished, where single women have only one ambition in life - marriage. Anything else is just failure.
December 26, 2023
A great example of how young women were placed on the marriage market, called “coming out”.
November 24, 2025
Set roughly in the Edwardian period, Monica is raised for only one occupation: Marriage.
She's basically a grown child which could be the saddest aspect of the book.
She's basically a grown child which could be the saddest aspect of the book.
March 11, 2022
One of Delafield's bleaker novels, but none the worse for that.
December 16, 2015
Enjoyed it on the whole and had some unexpected twists. The ending, I felt, was a bit lame.
Read
October 18, 2017Unspeakably bleak, but so tightly and compellingly written.
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