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La Batalla de Villa Fiorita
Dos niños ingleses viajan a Italia para rescatar a su madre rebelde de su amante y salvar a su familia en esta novela del New York Times , superventas.
Las vidas de los dos hijos de Clavering, Hugh y Caddy, han sido repentinamente trastornados por el amargo divorcio de sus padres, el coronel del ejército británico Darrell y la antes sólida y confiable Fanny. Su casa de campo inglesa ha sido abandonada en favor de un piso en Londres, y el destino de su adorado pony, Topaz, está en serio cuestionamiento. Y todo comenzó el día en que el director de cine de renombre internacional, Rob Quillet, llegó a su pequeño pueblo y se robó el corazón de Fanny.
Ahora Fanny se ha ido, se la llevó su famoso amante cineasta al norte de Italia. detrás de los pedazos dentados de su familia rota. Si bien Hugh, a los catorce años, comprende las costumbres del mundo adulto mejor que su hermana de doce, es ferozmente protector con el rebelde y obstinado Caddy, que se niega a aceptar la situación o la simpatía hueca de los adultos. Así que juntos deciden tomar medidas drásticas.
Viajando solos por Europa, los hermanos llegan a la pastoral villa italiana de Quillet con vistas al lago de Garda, decididos a luchar contra el hombre responsable de la destrucción de su familia. No puede haber paz hasta que sean victoriosos, y la victoria solo se logrará cuando traigan a su madre a casa.
Una novela que combina de manera magistral el corazón, el ingenio, la intensidad y la honestidad con una evocación impresionante de la exuberante cultura del norte. En la campiña italiana, The Battle of Villa Fiorita de Rumer Godden es otra experiencia de lectura inolvidable del New York Times , autor más vendido de The River y En esta casa de Brede .
Las vidas de los dos hijos de Clavering, Hugh y Caddy, han sido repentinamente trastornados por el amargo divorcio de sus padres, el coronel del ejército británico Darrell y la antes sólida y confiable Fanny. Su casa de campo inglesa ha sido abandonada en favor de un piso en Londres, y el destino de su adorado pony, Topaz, está en serio cuestionamiento. Y todo comenzó el día en que el director de cine de renombre internacional, Rob Quillet, llegó a su pequeño pueblo y se robó el corazón de Fanny.
Ahora Fanny se ha ido, se la llevó su famoso amante cineasta al norte de Italia. detrás de los pedazos dentados de su familia rota. Si bien Hugh, a los catorce años, comprende las costumbres del mundo adulto mejor que su hermana de doce, es ferozmente protector con el rebelde y obstinado Caddy, que se niega a aceptar la situación o la simpatía hueca de los adultos. Así que juntos deciden tomar medidas drásticas.
Viajando solos por Europa, los hermanos llegan a la pastoral villa italiana de Quillet con vistas al lago de Garda, decididos a luchar contra el hombre responsable de la destrucción de su familia. No puede haber paz hasta que sean victoriosos, y la victoria solo se logrará cuando traigan a su madre a casa.
Una novela que combina de manera magistral el corazón, el ingenio, la intensidad y la honestidad con una evocación impresionante de la exuberante cultura del norte. En la campiña italiana, The Battle of Villa Fiorita de Rumer Godden es otra experiencia de lectura inolvidable del New York Times , autor más vendido de The River y En esta casa de Brede .
329 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1963
177 people are currently reading
555 people want to read
About the author
Rumer Godden
152 books552 followersMargaret Rumer Godden was an English author of more than 60 fiction and non-fiction books. Nine of her works have been made into films, most notably Black Narcissus in 1947 and The River in 1951.
A few of her works were co-written with her elder sister, novelist Jon Godden, including Two Under the Indian Sun, a memoir of the Goddens' childhood in a region of India now part of Bangladesh.
A few of her works were co-written with her elder sister, novelist Jon Godden, including Two Under the Indian Sun, a memoir of the Goddens' childhood in a region of India now part of Bangladesh.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 120 reviews
December 10, 2018
The opening scene is captivating.
Two children are walking through an unfamiliar garden, and into an a house. Rumer Godden captured their points of view quite perfectly and he writing was gorgeous – she was so good at houses and gardens. The children see so much that it lovely and that is quite new to them, but as they move indoors it clear that they have a sense of purpose, and it also becomes clear that this story will not be a happy one.
‘The villa was on Lake Garda in northern Italy. ‘But it doesn’t matter where it was, said Hugh afterwards. It might have been anywhere; it was simply a place where two opposing forces were to meet, as two armies meet on foreign soil to fight a battle. ‘ The battle of the Villa Fiorita,’ Caddie called it afterwards and always with an ache of guilt.’
Hugh, aged fourteen, and his sister Caddie, aged eleven, have just arrived in Italy, after a long and difficult journey mainly by train from London. They ran away while their father was overseas for work and the housekeeper was distracted, with the express intention of reuniting their father and mother and rebuilding their family home.
Neither Darrell nor Fanny Clavering had been unhappy in their marriage, but when a film crew came to the village where they lived Fanny began to realise that her life was unfulfilling, that the role of wife and mother was trapping her, and that the world offered so many possibilities that she had never explored. She began an affair with the film’s director – Rob Collett – and the depth of attraction between them was such that they ran away together and her husband divorced her. The lovers settled at the Villa Fiorita, planning to get married once the dust had settled.
Darrell closed up the family home – because he knew that a country house required a wife to manage things – and moved to a modern flat in London with his children and the family’s housekeeper.
It was impossible not to sympathise with the children, who had been presented with their parents’ divorce as a fait accompli, who had been abandoned by their mother, and who had lost the home and the life they loved and been tipped into an unfamiliar new world. I had to be impressed at the way they laid their plans and made their way across Europe; Caddie even selling her beloved pony, Topaz, to provide the necessary capital.
Seeing he children again stirred feelings that Fanny had buried
‘I was going to roll it all up, roll it into a ball that I could keep hidden in my hand, or in my heart. It was to be only Rob, Rob and I, together for the rest of our lives. I had accepted that, then … and across every thought and plan and feeling came this new triumphant song: ‘They ran away. Hugh and Caddie ran away to me.’
Rob was more pragmatic, and insisted that they must be sent home; but when Hugh was struck down by food poisoning he didn’t have the heart to send Caddie – who was so like her mother back alone; and when Darrell suggested that the children stay for a few weeks, until he returned from his travel, the stage was set for a battle.
The introduction of Rob’s daughter, Pia, who had been brought up by her grandmother and was terribly spoilt, exacerbated the situation and unsettled that relationship between brother and sister.
The children were completely caught up in their mission to bring their mother home. They could not – or would not – see that she was so much happier in her new life with her love than she had ever been before; and they failed to see that some of their actions could have serious repercussions.
Rumer Godden moved seamlessly between past and present, between the childish and adult perspectives, balancing everything quite beautifully. She drew the children so well, understanding their world views, their stages in life, and the way they see and deal with the things life throws at them. She understood their parents, and the other adults in their world, just as well; and most importantly she knew that their were no heroes and no villains, just fallible human beings at different stages of life.
I thought of another novel that explored the consequences of divorce for adults and children thirty year before this one – ‘Together and Apart’ by Margaret Kennedy – and I was struck by how little had changed.
The story told in this book was compelling and utterly believable. There was – of necessity – a little more drama and less gradual pressure than real life, but it worked.
I’ve seen concerns expressed about the resolution of the story, but I saw signs of how it would be early in the story, and as the end drew near I realised that it was inevitable.
I’m still thinking about that, thinking about everything that happened, and wondering what happened next.
Two children are walking through an unfamiliar garden, and into an a house. Rumer Godden captured their points of view quite perfectly and he writing was gorgeous – she was so good at houses and gardens. The children see so much that it lovely and that is quite new to them, but as they move indoors it clear that they have a sense of purpose, and it also becomes clear that this story will not be a happy one.
‘The villa was on Lake Garda in northern Italy. ‘But it doesn’t matter where it was, said Hugh afterwards. It might have been anywhere; it was simply a place where two opposing forces were to meet, as two armies meet on foreign soil to fight a battle. ‘ The battle of the Villa Fiorita,’ Caddie called it afterwards and always with an ache of guilt.’
Hugh, aged fourteen, and his sister Caddie, aged eleven, have just arrived in Italy, after a long and difficult journey mainly by train from London. They ran away while their father was overseas for work and the housekeeper was distracted, with the express intention of reuniting their father and mother and rebuilding their family home.
Neither Darrell nor Fanny Clavering had been unhappy in their marriage, but when a film crew came to the village where they lived Fanny began to realise that her life was unfulfilling, that the role of wife and mother was trapping her, and that the world offered so many possibilities that she had never explored. She began an affair with the film’s director – Rob Collett – and the depth of attraction between them was such that they ran away together and her husband divorced her. The lovers settled at the Villa Fiorita, planning to get married once the dust had settled.
Darrell closed up the family home – because he knew that a country house required a wife to manage things – and moved to a modern flat in London with his children and the family’s housekeeper.
It was impossible not to sympathise with the children, who had been presented with their parents’ divorce as a fait accompli, who had been abandoned by their mother, and who had lost the home and the life they loved and been tipped into an unfamiliar new world. I had to be impressed at the way they laid their plans and made their way across Europe; Caddie even selling her beloved pony, Topaz, to provide the necessary capital.
Seeing he children again stirred feelings that Fanny had buried
‘I was going to roll it all up, roll it into a ball that I could keep hidden in my hand, or in my heart. It was to be only Rob, Rob and I, together for the rest of our lives. I had accepted that, then … and across every thought and plan and feeling came this new triumphant song: ‘They ran away. Hugh and Caddie ran away to me.’
Rob was more pragmatic, and insisted that they must be sent home; but when Hugh was struck down by food poisoning he didn’t have the heart to send Caddie – who was so like her mother back alone; and when Darrell suggested that the children stay for a few weeks, until he returned from his travel, the stage was set for a battle.
The introduction of Rob’s daughter, Pia, who had been brought up by her grandmother and was terribly spoilt, exacerbated the situation and unsettled that relationship between brother and sister.
The children were completely caught up in their mission to bring their mother home. They could not – or would not – see that she was so much happier in her new life with her love than she had ever been before; and they failed to see that some of their actions could have serious repercussions.
Rumer Godden moved seamlessly between past and present, between the childish and adult perspectives, balancing everything quite beautifully. She drew the children so well, understanding their world views, their stages in life, and the way they see and deal with the things life throws at them. She understood their parents, and the other adults in their world, just as well; and most importantly she knew that their were no heroes and no villains, just fallible human beings at different stages of life.
I thought of another novel that explored the consequences of divorce for adults and children thirty year before this one – ‘Together and Apart’ by Margaret Kennedy – and I was struck by how little had changed.
The story told in this book was compelling and utterly believable. There was – of necessity – a little more drama and less gradual pressure than real life, but it worked.
I’ve seen concerns expressed about the resolution of the story, but I saw signs of how it would be early in the story, and as the end drew near I realised that it was inevitable.
I’m still thinking about that, thinking about everything that happened, and wondering what happened next.
June 30, 2017
This novel is the fourth bestseller from 1963 that includes infidelity as a major element of the plot: The Group by Mary McCarthy, Caravans by James Michener, Elizabeth Appleton by John O'Hara, and now Rumer Godden's novel at #10 on the list. If that doesn't presage the sexual revolution of the late 1960s and the 1970s feminist movement, I don't know how else to account for it.
Of course, women have been leaving their lawfully married husbands for someone better or more exciting for centuries. In fact I have come across the topic fairly often in my reading. I have the idea that Rumer Godden has a religious bent, possibly because the only other book of hers I have read is In This House of Brede which features nuns. I wondered how she would handle infidelity.
Fanny Clavering, mother of three and wife of Darrell, meets a dashing and renowned movie director, Rob Quillet, and falls head over heels. Darrell, being a British Army colonel, is forever being sent on diplomatic missions. He has been gone more than he has been home for their entire married life.
Rob woos Fanny away with secret dinners in restaurants and lovemaking that clearly is nothing like what Fanny ever got from Darrell. So after much dithering, Fanny divorces Darrell and takes off with Rob to the glamorous Villa of Fiorita, Italy.
Her two younger children, 14-year-old Hugh and 12-year-old Caddie, are devastated by the breakup of their home. They scrape up as much money as they can and travel alone to Italy, intending to "rescue" their mother and bring her home.
Thus ensues a tragicomic encounter between the two generations made even more complex by the arrival of Rob's love daughter from Paris. Does anyone remember The Parent Trap where Haley Mills plays both of the twins who scheme to get their parents back together? Rumer Godden's book is a bit more serious and of course it is British.
She creates wonderful child characters and makes you feel their confusions, their torn loyalties, and all the growing up they suddenly have to do. The adults do not come off as well and I was dismayed by the ending.
Really? Must a woman pay so dearly for following her heart, for pursuing pleasure? Does her life belong to her children? Tough questions and readers, I have lived them.
Of course, women have been leaving their lawfully married husbands for someone better or more exciting for centuries. In fact I have come across the topic fairly often in my reading. I have the idea that Rumer Godden has a religious bent, possibly because the only other book of hers I have read is In This House of Brede which features nuns. I wondered how she would handle infidelity.
Fanny Clavering, mother of three and wife of Darrell, meets a dashing and renowned movie director, Rob Quillet, and falls head over heels. Darrell, being a British Army colonel, is forever being sent on diplomatic missions. He has been gone more than he has been home for their entire married life.
Rob woos Fanny away with secret dinners in restaurants and lovemaking that clearly is nothing like what Fanny ever got from Darrell. So after much dithering, Fanny divorces Darrell and takes off with Rob to the glamorous Villa of Fiorita, Italy.
Her two younger children, 14-year-old Hugh and 12-year-old Caddie, are devastated by the breakup of their home. They scrape up as much money as they can and travel alone to Italy, intending to "rescue" their mother and bring her home.
Thus ensues a tragicomic encounter between the two generations made even more complex by the arrival of Rob's love daughter from Paris. Does anyone remember The Parent Trap where Haley Mills plays both of the twins who scheme to get their parents back together? Rumer Godden's book is a bit more serious and of course it is British.
She creates wonderful child characters and makes you feel their confusions, their torn loyalties, and all the growing up they suddenly have to do. The adults do not come off as well and I was dismayed by the ending.
Really? Must a woman pay so dearly for following her heart, for pursuing pleasure? Does her life belong to her children? Tough questions and readers, I have lived them.
July 7, 2024
As I look back, I realise I was focussed on the question, to the exclusion of everything else...
‘Who is a ‘Mummy?’
At eleven I knew all the answers to the question...
A Mummy is a very special person;
Take the case of my best friend Cintia...
we used to share everything, stories, sweets, picture papers, went to tea to each other’s houses and then Cintia just left me and started being friends with Lucy. How I tried to be her friend...I wept, threatened but Cintia and Lucy just laughed, called me a whiner...
Mummy was there for me and she hugged me and hugged me...She and Gwen got a splendid tea for us all but there were all my favourite things. Mummy just knew how terribly hurt I was...
And whenever I returned from grooming Topaz, Mummy was there to listen to all the stories about him. She never said, ‘Darling I am busy’...She listened, she truly listened...
That is a Mummy...
So when we returned from our holidays and rushed to meet Mummy. Dad hugged us tightly, ‘Mummy has gone away’...’ Gone away but where?’ ‘She has found a new person to love, Rob’. Daddy sounded absolutely broken...
That Night we could not sleep and next door we heard Daddy weeping as though his heart would break and truly Mummy had broken our hearts.
Apparently, Mummy had met this Rob creature when they were filming quite close to Stebbings and Mummy had fallen in love with him. But why we kept asking ourselves, why, didn’t she love Daddy, kind, very kind Daddy? He who called her his Mona Lisa?
But she had and she had gone off with Rob, gone off to Italy...
Sadly we had to stay in a London flat; Daddy could not manage Stebbings all by himself. And my poor, poor Topaz had to be kept with a farmer. How I felt... who would groom him? Who would feed him carrots? Who would talk to him?
Unlike Hugh, I thought of ways to get Mummy back...
And we did... We managed to get money; I made the ultimate sacrifice of selling Topaz, but it was after all for a good cause. We took trains, we walked for miles, we were tired, very dusty, and very hungry but we were doing it for Mummy, we wanted her back.
And there we were at the Villa Fiorita...
The Villa was splendid...the gardens, the house, the smells of the flowers mixed with the smell of the Sea was divine. Was this Rob so very rich, to own a Villa like this?
Mummy was very happy to see us, but Rob and we could understand, wanted us to go back immediately...
Of course Mummy protested vehemently but then Hugh was violently ill, puking all over the place. Rob was adamant, Hugh could stay for a while but I had to go immediately.
So I went to airport...
Just when I was about to board the plane, I will never ever know why...but Rob yanked me out collected my bags and here comes the surprise, I had the most wonderful dinner and then Opera. Even today after so many years I can never understand why Rob was so kind to me...
We returned to the Villa, but things got really bad for Rob and Mummy, they fought constantly and it was all about us.
It never seemed to strike them how much Mummy meant to us...Mummy had been with us all of our lives...
And then Rob got his daughter Pia to the Villa. Did Mummy know that Pia was there in Rob’s life?
We did not want Rob to marry Mummy and Pia did not want Rob to marry Mummy so we decided on a hunger strike...
At that time I believed in people...in Hugh, in Pia that they would stick to the deal. That they would stick through even if it meant terrible hunger with all the good food around us.
It was at the Villa that I learnt what betrayal meant, Hugh and Pia had been eating, they had not followed the hunger strike...Things went from bad to terrible when Hugh and Pia ran away on the boat and met with an accident.
Luckily they were saved but Pia had a broken bone... Rob went off with his daughter and we realised that the Villa was not Rob’s at all. It had been rented... Mummy looked terrible, as though she had been kicked in the stomach.
I was immensely happy that Mummy was coming home with us...but as Hugh said was it the same Mummy? The Mummy we had adored, this Mummy’s heart was with Rob now not with us at all...
At the Villa I learnt what betrayal was...And I realised I was alone and it did not really matter so much...
‘Who is a ‘Mummy?’
At eleven I knew all the answers to the question...
A Mummy is a very special person;
Take the case of my best friend Cintia...
we used to share everything, stories, sweets, picture papers, went to tea to each other’s houses and then Cintia just left me and started being friends with Lucy. How I tried to be her friend...I wept, threatened but Cintia and Lucy just laughed, called me a whiner...
Mummy was there for me and she hugged me and hugged me...She and Gwen got a splendid tea for us all but there were all my favourite things. Mummy just knew how terribly hurt I was...
And whenever I returned from grooming Topaz, Mummy was there to listen to all the stories about him. She never said, ‘Darling I am busy’...She listened, she truly listened...
That is a Mummy...
So when we returned from our holidays and rushed to meet Mummy. Dad hugged us tightly, ‘Mummy has gone away’...’ Gone away but where?’ ‘She has found a new person to love, Rob’. Daddy sounded absolutely broken...
That Night we could not sleep and next door we heard Daddy weeping as though his heart would break and truly Mummy had broken our hearts.
Apparently, Mummy had met this Rob creature when they were filming quite close to Stebbings and Mummy had fallen in love with him. But why we kept asking ourselves, why, didn’t she love Daddy, kind, very kind Daddy? He who called her his Mona Lisa?
But she had and she had gone off with Rob, gone off to Italy...
Sadly we had to stay in a London flat; Daddy could not manage Stebbings all by himself. And my poor, poor Topaz had to be kept with a farmer. How I felt... who would groom him? Who would feed him carrots? Who would talk to him?
Unlike Hugh, I thought of ways to get Mummy back...
And we did... We managed to get money; I made the ultimate sacrifice of selling Topaz, but it was after all for a good cause. We took trains, we walked for miles, we were tired, very dusty, and very hungry but we were doing it for Mummy, we wanted her back.
And there we were at the Villa Fiorita...
The Villa was splendid...the gardens, the house, the smells of the flowers mixed with the smell of the Sea was divine. Was this Rob so very rich, to own a Villa like this?
Mummy was very happy to see us, but Rob and we could understand, wanted us to go back immediately...
Of course Mummy protested vehemently but then Hugh was violently ill, puking all over the place. Rob was adamant, Hugh could stay for a while but I had to go immediately.
So I went to airport...
Just when I was about to board the plane, I will never ever know why...but Rob yanked me out collected my bags and here comes the surprise, I had the most wonderful dinner and then Opera. Even today after so many years I can never understand why Rob was so kind to me...
We returned to the Villa, but things got really bad for Rob and Mummy, they fought constantly and it was all about us.
It never seemed to strike them how much Mummy meant to us...Mummy had been with us all of our lives...
And then Rob got his daughter Pia to the Villa. Did Mummy know that Pia was there in Rob’s life?
We did not want Rob to marry Mummy and Pia did not want Rob to marry Mummy so we decided on a hunger strike...
At that time I believed in people...in Hugh, in Pia that they would stick to the deal. That they would stick through even if it meant terrible hunger with all the good food around us.
It was at the Villa that I learnt what betrayal meant, Hugh and Pia had been eating, they had not followed the hunger strike...Things went from bad to terrible when Hugh and Pia ran away on the boat and met with an accident.
Luckily they were saved but Pia had a broken bone... Rob went off with his daughter and we realised that the Villa was not Rob’s at all. It had been rented... Mummy looked terrible, as though she had been kicked in the stomach.
I was immensely happy that Mummy was coming home with us...but as Hugh said was it the same Mummy? The Mummy we had adored, this Mummy’s heart was with Rob now not with us at all...
At the Villa I learnt what betrayal was...And I realised I was alone and it did not really matter so much...
November 11, 2017
One of the things I have come to appreciate in Rumer Godden’s novels for adults, is the way she writes children and young people. She always seems to fully understand their view of the world, the way they feel the hurts and disappointments that force them to grow up.
In The Battle of the Villa Fiorita we meet Hugh (14) and Caddie (almost 12) – they have an elder sister who they speak about from time to time, but who we never actually meet. As the novel opens, Hugh and Caddie have just arrived in Italy, following a long, arduous journey mainly by train from London. They have run away.
“She and Hugh were both gilded in sun; the things they held, the grips, coats, and net, had edges of light as had Hugh’s bare head, Caddie’s panama. Light bathed their tired dusty faces, their clothes which were crumpled and dishevelled as only clothes that have been slept in all night can be; it lay on their hands and legs, their dusty shoes, a light more warm and gold than anything they had known, but, ‘It’s Italian,’ said Caddie as if suspicious of it.”
They are on a mission to win back their mother – return her to their father and the family home. Their mother Frances (usually called Fanny) Clavering has recently been divorced by their father, following an affair with a film director, who she met whilst he was filming near to the family home. Now, Fanny has left England with her lover Rob Quillet. They are staying at the Villa Fiorita near Lake Garda, planning to get married in the near future.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
In The Battle of the Villa Fiorita we meet Hugh (14) and Caddie (almost 12) – they have an elder sister who they speak about from time to time, but who we never actually meet. As the novel opens, Hugh and Caddie have just arrived in Italy, following a long, arduous journey mainly by train from London. They have run away.
“She and Hugh were both gilded in sun; the things they held, the grips, coats, and net, had edges of light as had Hugh’s bare head, Caddie’s panama. Light bathed their tired dusty faces, their clothes which were crumpled and dishevelled as only clothes that have been slept in all night can be; it lay on their hands and legs, their dusty shoes, a light more warm and gold than anything they had known, but, ‘It’s Italian,’ said Caddie as if suspicious of it.”
They are on a mission to win back their mother – return her to their father and the family home. Their mother Frances (usually called Fanny) Clavering has recently been divorced by their father, following an affair with a film director, who she met whilst he was filming near to the family home. Now, Fanny has left England with her lover Rob Quillet. They are staying at the Villa Fiorita near Lake Garda, planning to get married in the near future.
Full review: https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2017/...
September 7, 2020
This was my first Rumer Godden book and I am utterly impressed. This was a novel peopled with flesh and blood characters including adolescents whom Godden draws so authentically, with respect for their feelings as well as those of the adults. The prose was descriptive and engaging, it was reminiscent of some of Elizabeth Jane Howard's work. Reading this after the mediocrity of 'Miracle Creek' was such a breath of fresh air; I could feel myself relax into the tempo of the book, as Godden expertly enfolds the reader in an engrossing story with characters with whom you come to empathise. I wish Godden had continued the story of these characters. Reading a book like this, one is reminded that the first job of a novelist is to entertain and I found this book to perfectly do so. This book is a 5 star for me, not because it is on par with Wharton or Tolstoy, but because of Godden's immense story-telling skills and the enjoyment I had while reading. In many ways, a perfectly wrought novel.
March 1, 2021
4.5 stars
Some people are good at extramarital affairs, being not overly burdened by guilt and slippery by nature. For other people, they are emotionally catastrophic: a taste of 'goblin fruit,' as the protagonist Fanny Clavering describes it.
Fanny is a a straightforward, shy upper-middle class mother living at 'Stebbings' - a large country house, with three children, a dog and a pony - when she meets the film director Rob Quillet who is filming in her Hampshire village. She has a companionable and correct marriage with her husband, Colonel Darrell Charles Clavering, but he is frequently away for work and Fanny is vaguely aware that she is happier when he's away. Fanny realise that she and Darrell do not 'need each other' the way same couples do, but Fanny is the type of woman that no one would ever suspect of breaking her marital vows.
When Fanny falls in love with Rob, she describes herself as 'virgin to love':
This novel is set during the early 1960s, a time when UK divorce law is cruel to women. There is no such thing as a 'no fault' irreconcilable differences, and adultery is one of the only grounds for divorce. On page 10 the reader is made aware of the public shaming of Fanny in The Times. She has been divorced by her husband for adultery and he has been awarded custody of the children and the costs of the divorce, to be paid by the co-respondent - her lover, Rob Quillet. At the very beginning of the novel the new couple has been reunited after a long separation. Fanny has been in Scotland, seeing to the affairs of her Aunt Isabel who has just died. Rob has questioned why she feels the need to punish herself (and him) by this separation and she replies that 'somehow I should feel better' by a bit of self-flagellation. It's a telling detail.
Some readers may be unhappy with the ending of the novel, but I do not think they can expect anything other than a tragedy. (This is not a spoiler to my mind as it should be clear to the reader from the start.) I felt like I knew Fanny, and could completely understand her. Perhaps not everyone will feel this way - but it was totally obvious to me that Fanny, a woman who has devoted her whole life to being a mother, will be torn between her lover and her angry, wounded children. Her divided loyalties are tested to the absolute dramatic hilt when her two youngest children - 14 year old Hugh and 12 year old Caddie - decide that they are not going to tolerate being shunted off to a London flat to live with their father. To that end, they travel by stealth to the Villa Fiorita on the Lake Garda in noethern Italy. Their mother has not yet married Rob and they are determined to bring her back with them to London. They come to Italy with the objective of doing 'battle' for their mother.
Even at first meeting, Rob becomes aware that Caddie, especially, is stricken by 'real grief'. Although Hugh is old enough to sense the bond that exists between his mother and Rob, a bond that is so obviously sexual, Caddie's desire to reinstate her former family is dangerously pure and innocent. She is a formidable adversary because she is so very direct in her methods. When the children engage in 'battle' against the adults, it opens a rift between Rob and Fanny because it exposes their very different views on what is owed to children.
It's a story that is melodramatic - operatic, even - in atmosphere and tension. Indeed, the tension is unrelenting and the unfolding events of the story have a proper emotional punch to them. Although the characters, indeed the scenario, may seem dated to the contemporary reader, this novel still gets at the very heart of what makes divorce so tragic. The worst of it is that the author shows us so clearly why neither side can be a 'winner' in this battle.
She was last on every list and automatically the one to give up everything, to stay behind, to go without. 'Well, mothers are like that,' she would have said. 'Some mothers,' said Rob.
Some people are good at extramarital affairs, being not overly burdened by guilt and slippery by nature. For other people, they are emotionally catastrophic: a taste of 'goblin fruit,' as the protagonist Fanny Clavering describes it.
Fanny is a a straightforward, shy upper-middle class mother living at 'Stebbings' - a large country house, with three children, a dog and a pony - when she meets the film director Rob Quillet who is filming in her Hampshire village. She has a companionable and correct marriage with her husband, Colonel Darrell Charles Clavering, but he is frequently away for work and Fanny is vaguely aware that she is happier when he's away. Fanny realise that she and Darrell do not 'need each other' the way same couples do, but Fanny is the type of woman that no one would ever suspect of breaking her marital vows.
When Fanny falls in love with Rob, she describes herself as 'virgin to love':
Fanny knew now that most women only have a mirage of love. To her it had been a revelation. Yet because of Darrell, over it, each time, there was a shadow.
This novel is set during the early 1960s, a time when UK divorce law is cruel to women. There is no such thing as a 'no fault' irreconcilable differences, and adultery is one of the only grounds for divorce. On page 10 the reader is made aware of the public shaming of Fanny in The Times. She has been divorced by her husband for adultery and he has been awarded custody of the children and the costs of the divorce, to be paid by the co-respondent - her lover, Rob Quillet. At the very beginning of the novel the new couple has been reunited after a long separation. Fanny has been in Scotland, seeing to the affairs of her Aunt Isabel who has just died. Rob has questioned why she feels the need to punish herself (and him) by this separation and she replies that 'somehow I should feel better' by a bit of self-flagellation. It's a telling detail.
Some readers may be unhappy with the ending of the novel, but I do not think they can expect anything other than a tragedy. (This is not a spoiler to my mind as it should be clear to the reader from the start.) I felt like I knew Fanny, and could completely understand her. Perhaps not everyone will feel this way - but it was totally obvious to me that Fanny, a woman who has devoted her whole life to being a mother, will be torn between her lover and her angry, wounded children. Her divided loyalties are tested to the absolute dramatic hilt when her two youngest children - 14 year old Hugh and 12 year old Caddie - decide that they are not going to tolerate being shunted off to a London flat to live with their father. To that end, they travel by stealth to the Villa Fiorita on the Lake Garda in noethern Italy. Their mother has not yet married Rob and they are determined to bring her back with them to London. They come to Italy with the objective of doing 'battle' for their mother.
Even at first meeting, Rob becomes aware that Caddie, especially, is stricken by 'real grief'. Although Hugh is old enough to sense the bond that exists between his mother and Rob, a bond that is so obviously sexual, Caddie's desire to reinstate her former family is dangerously pure and innocent. She is a formidable adversary because she is so very direct in her methods. When the children engage in 'battle' against the adults, it opens a rift between Rob and Fanny because it exposes their very different views on what is owed to children.
It's a story that is melodramatic - operatic, even - in atmosphere and tension. Indeed, the tension is unrelenting and the unfolding events of the story have a proper emotional punch to them. Although the characters, indeed the scenario, may seem dated to the contemporary reader, this novel still gets at the very heart of what makes divorce so tragic. The worst of it is that the author shows us so clearly why neither side can be a 'winner' in this battle.
July 22, 2023
3.5 stars
ENGLISH: This book is written in Rumer Godden's inimitable style. It's somewhat confusing for the reader, due to the continuous jumps in time, sometimes in the same paragraph.
Written before her conversion to Catholicism, the novel shows the author's interest through the eyes of Caddie, a twelve-year-old girl. Godden was also divorced, and it's clear she knows what she's talking about.
The novel is preceded by a preface by the author and a short life of Rumer Godden written after her death. Both are quite interesting, although in my opinion the preface should be read after the novel.
In the preface she says: Let's have a book where the children will not be victims but fight back. And they do, although in fact they have the help of God.
ESPAÑOL: Este libro está escrito en el estilo inimitable de Rumer Godden. Es algo confuso para el lector, debido a los continuos saltos en el tiempo, que a veces tienen lugar en un solo párrafo.
Escrita antes de su conversión al catolicismo, la novela muestra el interés de la autora a través de los ojos de Caddie, una niña de doce años. Godden también estaba divorciada y está claro que sabe de lo que habla.
La novela está precedida por un prefacio de la autora y una breve vida de Rumer Godden escrita después de su muerte. Ambos son interesantes, aunque en mi opinión el prefacio debería leerse después de leer la novela.
En el prefacio dice: Hagamos un libro donde los niños no sean víctimas sino que se defiendan. Y lo hacen, aunque en realidad cuentan con la ayuda de Dios.
ENGLISH: This book is written in Rumer Godden's inimitable style. It's somewhat confusing for the reader, due to the continuous jumps in time, sometimes in the same paragraph.
Written before her conversion to Catholicism, the novel shows the author's interest through the eyes of Caddie, a twelve-year-old girl. Godden was also divorced, and it's clear she knows what she's talking about.
The novel is preceded by a preface by the author and a short life of Rumer Godden written after her death. Both are quite interesting, although in my opinion the preface should be read after the novel.
In the preface she says: Let's have a book where the children will not be victims but fight back. And they do, although in fact they have the help of God.
ESPAÑOL: Este libro está escrito en el estilo inimitable de Rumer Godden. Es algo confuso para el lector, debido a los continuos saltos en el tiempo, que a veces tienen lugar en un solo párrafo.
Escrita antes de su conversión al catolicismo, la novela muestra el interés de la autora a través de los ojos de Caddie, una niña de doce años. Godden también estaba divorciada y está claro que sabe de lo que habla.
La novela está precedida por un prefacio de la autora y una breve vida de Rumer Godden escrita después de su muerte. Ambos son interesantes, aunque en mi opinión el prefacio debería leerse después de leer la novela.
En el prefacio dice: Hagamos un libro donde los niños no sean víctimas sino que se defiendan. Y lo hacen, aunque en realidad cuentan con la ayuda de Dios.
February 15, 2017
After more than 40 years still captivating!
January 20, 2019
What a good book! The battle refers, not to wartime as one might expect, but to the conflict that results when two English children arrive unexpectedly at an Italian villa to convince their mother to leave her true love and return to her stuffy but blameless husband. The lover, a darkly handsome and sexy divorced film director, then invites his own young daughter to visit, hoping that will soothe the troubled waters. However, that means that there are now three children who don't want this marriage to happen. The children wear down their mother's resistance and the two girls take matters to the extreme when they go on a hunger strike. The reader is left guessing right to the end -- will the adults give way to the combined will of the children? This was made into a movie with Maureen O'Hara although some of the circumstances were altered for the film.
January 23, 2019
Speaking as someone who has holidayed there, I can confirm that Lake Garda is a jewel, one of Italy's many natural delights and the largest of its lakes, nestled at the foot of the Dolomites. When viewed from Limone on the western shore the picturesque town of Malcesine is dwarfed by the bulk of Monte Baldo rising behind it two kilometres into the sky, but in Malcesine itself the eye is drawn by the waters, to the craft which ply its surface and the changing outlook determined by the time of day and the weather. It was so in the nineties, and it was so in the early sixties when this novel is set. But for one of the main characters in The Battle of the Villa Fiorita trouble is looming, just as Monte Baldo looms above the seemingly impregnable castle of Malcesine.
Fanny Clavering is unhappy in her Home Counties village of Whitcross: she rattles around her home, her army officer of a husband is often abroad, her children preoccupied with their own lives. She finds herself attracted to Rob Quillet, who is directing a film in the vicinity, and they begin a chaste affair, meeting clandestinely for quiet meals and outings. There comes the inevitable moment when, rejecting her husband Darrell's advances, she escapes, divorcing her husband and eloping with Rob to the Villa Fiorita near Malcesine. Here she discovers an idyllic existence on the borrowed property, one she had hardly ever dreamed of. But, like the sudden squalls that sometimes buffet the lake, a tempest is on its way to the villa in the persons of her two youngest children, Hugh and Caddie.
The novel is beautifully composed, like an extended piece of music. The principal themes are the two children, Fanny of course, and Rob, and the reader is presented with first one then another's point of view as we sidle backwards and forwards in time. We follow Fanny's slow courtship by Rob and the drama of her break with Darrell; we observe Hugh and Caddie's different responses after they decide, like Fanny, to journey to Italy; unlike Fanny, their principal motive is to bring her back home, back to an imagined status quo. Rob's increasing frustration after they've interrupted Fanny's idyll and his work is well chronicled, especially after he makes the mistake of summoning his daughter Pia to the villa. As events follow with increasing rapidity we realise that battles usually conclude with some combatants being winners and others losers; but even in victory there may be pain.
The author is adept at orchestrating the rise and fall of the action, the ripples that result from minor incidents, the waves that threaten the lives of individuals. Like the visit to the opera at La Scala, Milan, the unfolding action has its supporting cast of upper-class villagers in England and chorus of Italian locals by the lake. While our sympathies are initially with Fanny, and we get a sense of Hugh's pubescent angst on occasion, it is the figure of Caddie who latterly draws our attention: her sacrifices, the determination which occasionally wavers, her unconscious attempts to understand, even acclimatise to, Italy's mysteries and enchantments. There's little doubt that it is Caddie in the end who breaks our hearts:
As the car drove out of the gates, Caddie noticed what she had not seen before: that the whitethorn flowers had dropped, their petals were scattered in the road. The hedges now did not disguise their pricks and, almost before the car turned up the road, Giulietta ran and shut the gates.
This edition has an informative introduction by Anita Desai and an equally enlightening preface by the author herself, both of which you may want to tackle subsequent to reading the novel if you want to avoid major spoilers. What does come through in both pieces though is how much is semi-autobiographical in these pages, even though outcomes are rather different. The sense of lived experiences -- the claustrophobic nature of some English villages, being trapped in an unhappy marriage and having to manage distressed children, an Arcadian existence by an Italian lake, a second chance with a new partner -- adds a definite quality of realism to the narrative, encouraging the reader to invest in the characters and their situations.
Fanny Clavering is unhappy in her Home Counties village of Whitcross: she rattles around her home, her army officer of a husband is often abroad, her children preoccupied with their own lives. She finds herself attracted to Rob Quillet, who is directing a film in the vicinity, and they begin a chaste affair, meeting clandestinely for quiet meals and outings. There comes the inevitable moment when, rejecting her husband Darrell's advances, she escapes, divorcing her husband and eloping with Rob to the Villa Fiorita near Malcesine. Here she discovers an idyllic existence on the borrowed property, one she had hardly ever dreamed of. But, like the sudden squalls that sometimes buffet the lake, a tempest is on its way to the villa in the persons of her two youngest children, Hugh and Caddie.
The novel is beautifully composed, like an extended piece of music. The principal themes are the two children, Fanny of course, and Rob, and the reader is presented with first one then another's point of view as we sidle backwards and forwards in time. We follow Fanny's slow courtship by Rob and the drama of her break with Darrell; we observe Hugh and Caddie's different responses after they decide, like Fanny, to journey to Italy; unlike Fanny, their principal motive is to bring her back home, back to an imagined status quo. Rob's increasing frustration after they've interrupted Fanny's idyll and his work is well chronicled, especially after he makes the mistake of summoning his daughter Pia to the villa. As events follow with increasing rapidity we realise that battles usually conclude with some combatants being winners and others losers; but even in victory there may be pain.
The author is adept at orchestrating the rise and fall of the action, the ripples that result from minor incidents, the waves that threaten the lives of individuals. Like the visit to the opera at La Scala, Milan, the unfolding action has its supporting cast of upper-class villagers in England and chorus of Italian locals by the lake. While our sympathies are initially with Fanny, and we get a sense of Hugh's pubescent angst on occasion, it is the figure of Caddie who latterly draws our attention: her sacrifices, the determination which occasionally wavers, her unconscious attempts to understand, even acclimatise to, Italy's mysteries and enchantments. There's little doubt that it is Caddie in the end who breaks our hearts:
As the car drove out of the gates, Caddie noticed what she had not seen before: that the whitethorn flowers had dropped, their petals were scattered in the road. The hedges now did not disguise their pricks and, almost before the car turned up the road, Giulietta ran and shut the gates.
This edition has an informative introduction by Anita Desai and an equally enlightening preface by the author herself, both of which you may want to tackle subsequent to reading the novel if you want to avoid major spoilers. What does come through in both pieces though is how much is semi-autobiographical in these pages, even though outcomes are rather different. The sense of lived experiences -- the claustrophobic nature of some English villages, being trapped in an unhappy marriage and having to manage distressed children, an Arcadian existence by an Italian lake, a second chance with a new partner -- adds a definite quality of realism to the narrative, encouraging the reader to invest in the characters and their situations.
November 16, 2010
I was not terribly impressed with this book. It was enjoyable in a way, but I think the fact that I only managed to finish it because it was all I had to do on a plane is not exactly complimentary. I think, though, that it's supposed to be rather removed from reality.
This is a story of two children who travel to Italy, where their mother is living with her lover. Their intention is to stop the divorce and have her return home. They do succeed, though by the end of the novel one can only wonder whether or not that's a good thing. I think this is an interesting commentary on the reality of life versus the fantasy. Fanny and her lover are enjoying an idyllic honeymoon (for want of a better word) waiting for the divorce to go through so that they can marry. And then Fanny's two younger children arrive, determined to convince her that she's making a mistake. The actions of the children, Caddie in particular, are the centrepoint of the novel.
Though the children do eventually succeed in breaking the relationship between the two adults I think that says more about their relationship than the children. Their relationship is not able to survive the reality of children. Children, moreover, that are wilful, angry and hurt. Rob's complete inability to understand that Fanny is both woman and mother and that he will not always be the most important thing in her universe is what finally breaks their relationship. I think, however, that the true success in this book is when Caddie realises that no matter what happens she will still be herself. In that moment she has truly grown up, despite only being about eleven. The knowledge that she can only depend on herself for her happiness and the completeness of her life makes her more mature at the end of the book than any other character, particularly the adults.
This is a story of two children who travel to Italy, where their mother is living with her lover. Their intention is to stop the divorce and have her return home. They do succeed, though by the end of the novel one can only wonder whether or not that's a good thing. I think this is an interesting commentary on the reality of life versus the fantasy. Fanny and her lover are enjoying an idyllic honeymoon (for want of a better word) waiting for the divorce to go through so that they can marry. And then Fanny's two younger children arrive, determined to convince her that she's making a mistake. The actions of the children, Caddie in particular, are the centrepoint of the novel.
Though the children do eventually succeed in breaking the relationship between the two adults I think that says more about their relationship than the children. Their relationship is not able to survive the reality of children. Children, moreover, that are wilful, angry and hurt. Rob's complete inability to understand that Fanny is both woman and mother and that he will not always be the most important thing in her universe is what finally breaks their relationship. I think, however, that the true success in this book is when Caddie realises that no matter what happens she will still be herself. In that moment she has truly grown up, despite only being about eleven. The knowledge that she can only depend on herself for her happiness and the completeness of her life makes her more mature at the end of the book than any other character, particularly the adults.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 22, 2012
I'm not quite sure where to start. I had wanted to start, "Good grief, man, if you pursue a married woman with children, of course you are going to have to deal with her children!" or, "You say this is love, and the description is indeed pleasant, but you realize you are describing a spa vacation, right?"
As the reader, I found my allegiance switching more frequently than I expected. The breaking of Darrell and Fanny's marriage is well and delicately described. The turmoil the children feel is palpable, and their self-centered needs are, I think, accurate.
Much of this book is humorous, sometimes painfully so, but I think the story is a tragic one, though sympathetic.
I think Rob is not a good father, but his relationship with Pia's grandmother is never really explained.
I don't want to be one of those readers who needs everything spelled out, but the end is not clear to me in a lot of ways. I know what happened, and I know a lot of why, but I don't really understand the characters' motivations. If it really is that poor Fanny does what she is told by whichever man claims her, then I do understand, and the story is more tragic than I had hoped.
As the reader, I found my allegiance switching more frequently than I expected. The breaking of Darrell and Fanny's marriage is well and delicately described. The turmoil the children feel is palpable, and their self-centered needs are, I think, accurate.
Much of this book is humorous, sometimes painfully so, but I think the story is a tragic one, though sympathetic.
I think Rob is not a good father, but his relationship with Pia's grandmother is never really explained.
I don't want to be one of those readers who needs everything spelled out, but the end is not clear to me in a lot of ways. I know what happened, and I know a lot of why, but I don't really understand the characters' motivations. If it really is that poor Fanny does what she is told by whichever man claims her, then I do understand, and the story is more tragic than I had hoped.
September 7, 2012
Out of respect for Rumer Godden, whose autobiographical books I enjoyed, I finished this dated clunker of a book. Oofa!
Wealthy white woman problems, unless they're handled by Edith Wharton or Henry James, are hard to sympathize with, and
Godden, alas, is not of that caliber. Perhaps because divorce is such a part of life today, I couldn't buy into the notion that a
woman would crumble in the face of her childrens' demands and go home to Daddy. Fanny's appeal was tenuous to begin with,
but when she lets her kids force her hand, it was all over for me. And let's not discuss the melodramas the kids create. This was
The Parent Trap with all the humor sucked right out of it. Also, I loathe books that are sprinkled with just enough of a foreign
language - Italian here - to let you know the author is (or wants to appear) fluent.
Wealthy white woman problems, unless they're handled by Edith Wharton or Henry James, are hard to sympathize with, and
Godden, alas, is not of that caliber. Perhaps because divorce is such a part of life today, I couldn't buy into the notion that a
woman would crumble in the face of her childrens' demands and go home to Daddy. Fanny's appeal was tenuous to begin with,
but when she lets her kids force her hand, it was all over for me. And let's not discuss the melodramas the kids create. This was
The Parent Trap with all the humor sucked right out of it. Also, I loathe books that are sprinkled with just enough of a foreign
language - Italian here - to let you know the author is (or wants to appear) fluent.
October 20, 2017
The age-old dilemma of a woman trying to give equal attention to her kids and to her new man so that neither party will feel slighted. My advice: forget them both and lavish all the attention on yourself.
I was okay with the character of Fanny, the mother who just wanted to be happy. It was everyone else I could do without. Rob is your typical "It's all about me. I'm never wrong." alpha male which I can't stand. The kids were dyed in the wool xenophobes. For me the only time the story was enjoyable was when Caddie unleashed her wrath, but that's way towards the end. I hate you, Rob. I hate you, Hugh. I hate you, Pia. You annoyed me, Caddie. Run away, Fanny! Run away from all of them!
If you are into furniture porn, I guarantee you this book will give you a chairgasm.
I was okay with the character of Fanny, the mother who just wanted to be happy. It was everyone else I could do without. Rob is your typical "It's all about me. I'm never wrong." alpha male which I can't stand. The kids were dyed in the wool xenophobes. For me the only time the story was enjoyable was when Caddie unleashed her wrath, but that's way towards the end. I hate you, Rob. I hate you, Hugh. I hate you, Pia. You annoyed me, Caddie. Run away, Fanny! Run away from all of them!
If you are into furniture porn, I guarantee you this book will give you a chairgasm.
August 23, 2013
Rumer Godden's trilogy, The Battle Of The Villa Fiorita, The Greengage Summer, and A Episode Of Sparrows, are all excellent, I can't recommend them enough.
I have read them over many times and they never disappoint, although I love The Greengage Summer the best. Who could not? (Any woman who is a mother should read The Battle Of The Villa Fiorita. It will break your heart.)
Godden does not romanticize children, which is why these three books are so very good.
There is something about the mid-century writers that I have always loved. There are so few writers in the past decades who even come close, I am sad to say.
I have read them over many times and they never disappoint, although I love The Greengage Summer the best. Who could not? (Any woman who is a mother should read The Battle Of The Villa Fiorita. It will break your heart.)
Godden does not romanticize children, which is why these three books are so very good.
There is something about the mid-century writers that I have always loved. There are so few writers in the past decades who even come close, I am sad to say.
February 16, 2009
I read this right after "The Greengage Summer." Terrific book, highly recommended.
May 24, 2011
I always like Rumer Godden. This is a satisfying story of a family almost riven, but brought back together by the children.
September 5, 2009
A wholly remarkable book. This must be the grandaddy of all those “problem” YA books, 90% of which, it seems, revolve around kids dealing with divorcing parents. But this, first off, doesn’t show any signs of being intended for young readers, despite the central character being 11. It is also so far superior, in terms of skill and subtlety of writing, to those other books as to be scarcely comparable. This is a story, not a lesson. The depiction of all the parties is unblinkingly sharp, and the nuances of experience in mother and children – not so much the lover or the father – hit home. A sign of a fine story: when the ending is unimaginable until it arrives, and then appears inevitable. Splendid.
December 24, 2020
No book has made me more sad about not traveling this year than this one. I'm not even that into Italian lakes, but I desperately need to stay in a villa on Lake Garda now.
I read The Greengage Summer this spring, and this is another Rumer Godden book about British children experiencing another culture for the first time. But that book was about France and this one is set in Italy and they are very different. But there's so much good food in both! I love the way Rumer Godden tells a coming of age story. Her characters are introspective, even when they're being stubborn or petty, and it just saves the reader so much angst.
I read The Greengage Summer this spring, and this is another Rumer Godden book about British children experiencing another culture for the first time. But that book was about France and this one is set in Italy and they are very different. But there's so much good food in both! I love the way Rumer Godden tells a coming of age story. Her characters are introspective, even when they're being stubborn or petty, and it just saves the reader so much angst.
March 31, 2022
Rumer Godden writes slow, thought-provoking stories and "The Battle of the Villa Fiorita " is no exception. I love to see how her characters grow in them...and I always have pages of quotes by the end.
"This was the juggernaut power of adults, crushing what they did not even see..."
"She's not the same. I'm not the same, or you, or Father. Even if she came back it's gone -- forever. Can't you see that?"
"...and it was then that Caddie made a startling discovery: she was alone, defeated, she had lost everything --and she was still herself, Caddie, still all right."
"This was the juggernaut power of adults, crushing what they did not even see..."
"She's not the same. I'm not the same, or you, or Father. Even if she came back it's gone -- forever. Can't you see that?"
"...and it was then that Caddie made a startling discovery: she was alone, defeated, she had lost everything --and she was still herself, Caddie, still all right."
August 2, 2014
You can run, but you can't hide - from your responsibilities. Or can you? Caddie & Hugh travel to Italy alone to find their mother after she leaves the family for another man. A candid look at the effects of infidelity on a family.... in the end, the children get what they want - or do they? Classic Rumer Godden, well-written and thoughtful.
January 16, 2016
This book is really painful and challenging. Temptation, adultery, divorce, and the destruction of a family. There is so much selfishness and emotional brutality in this book that it is hard to read. But there is also such truth communicated through the power of these emotions that I will think about this book for a long time.
February 8, 2021
Precocious is the word for the children.
Overwhelmed is the word for the mother and that makes for an
unfortunate combination. The battle is entertaining although somewhat frustrating for the reader. Nevertheless I read to learn what new angle one of them would bring up. The end came swift and hard.
Overwhelmed is the word for the mother and that makes for an
unfortunate combination. The battle is entertaining although somewhat frustrating for the reader. Nevertheless I read to learn what new angle one of them would bring up. The end came swift and hard.
February 16, 2011
God, what a depressing story. Well-written, interesting characters, fairly gripping - but the world view underlying it rubbed me entirely the wrong way. In fact, I blame my bad mood today on having just finished this book.
August 27, 2012
This is one of those books that I've read more than once. Her descriptions of Lake Garda and the Italian countryside make for a nice escape. And each of the characters -- and their attempts to guide the situation toward the outcome they desire -- provides a counterpoint to the idyllic setting.
September 27, 2018
Godden writes so seamlessly - I can’t quite find the right metaphor, but it’s like the words slide off the page. I found this plot interesting and was eager to learn the resolution. The plot will seem dated to some, but I think it is a solid reminder that kids are not just casualties in a divorce.
February 13, 2021
Not so satisfying
I have read several of Godden’s books and this is the least rewarding so far! Just don’t see any final thesis or purpose . In fact, rather depressing at the end, when love is squashed and motherhood dies in martyrdom.
I have read several of Godden’s books and this is the least rewarding so far! Just don’t see any final thesis or purpose . In fact, rather depressing at the end, when love is squashed and motherhood dies in martyrdom.
May 5, 2022
"Caddie could not understand a word of what they sang, nor did she know what the opera was about, except that the hunchback and Gilda seemed in terrible distress, but as she listened to those four voices it was as if a skin parted in her mind, something tight and stretched in which she had been sealed and against which her unhappiness had boiled and seethed. For days she had been too small a Caddie for all that was in her. 'I have grown too big for me,' she could have said. Now she escaped, let out on the sound of that music, sound that she could not have believed. Oddly enough, it was to do with Topaz. What could a little pony in England have to do with singing in Milan? Yet, mysteriously, she seemed to be stroking Topaz's neck again; his mole warmness had vibrated and flowed under her hand, as this singing vibrated and flowed through her so that she seemed to be stroking, not a pony, but life itself.
Up and up went Gilda's voice and Caddie seemed to be going with it as if she were one of Celestina's birds let out of its cage. Then Rigoletto's and the Duke's blended with Gilda's, Maddalena's came up in such an orgy of sound that Caddie was lost, yet still she knew it was there, the bigness could not be split up, not into an individual girl and her pony, into a man's or woman's voice. The pony was more important than the girl, the song than the singers. Caddie sensed that--and how few people sense it--but it and they were one. It was all a oneness and--everything is everything, thought Caddie certainly, on the tide of that singing."
Up and up went Gilda's voice and Caddie seemed to be going with it as if she were one of Celestina's birds let out of its cage. Then Rigoletto's and the Duke's blended with Gilda's, Maddalena's came up in such an orgy of sound that Caddie was lost, yet still she knew it was there, the bigness could not be split up, not into an individual girl and her pony, into a man's or woman's voice. The pony was more important than the girl, the song than the singers. Caddie sensed that--and how few people sense it--but it and they were one. It was all a oneness and--everything is everything, thought Caddie certainly, on the tide of that singing."
September 15, 2017
This is a fictional work about a woman (Fanny) who had an affair and was divorced by her husband. She went to live with the new man (Rob) in Italy and two of her children showed up to fetch her back where, in their opinion, she belonged.
So right from the set up you see that this is a book about sin, and that there is probably not going to be any way to have a happy ending. (No spoilers needed for that!) And, true to life, there wasn't. Everyone involved continued to receive ugly consequences and wounds from the sin that had occurred.
Unfortunately the author did not include any significant redemptive value to the story other than showing how the characters, especially the children, grew through their experiences. I found it a story well-told, but not a happy one, and am glad that these characters are not my real life friends, as my heart would hurt for all of them. This is in contrast to the same author's _In This House of Brede_, where I felt glad to know the characters as friends.
So right from the set up you see that this is a book about sin, and that there is probably not going to be any way to have a happy ending. (No spoilers needed for that!) And, true to life, there wasn't. Everyone involved continued to receive ugly consequences and wounds from the sin that had occurred.
Unfortunately the author did not include any significant redemptive value to the story other than showing how the characters, especially the children, grew through their experiences. I found it a story well-told, but not a happy one, and am glad that these characters are not my real life friends, as my heart would hurt for all of them. This is in contrast to the same author's _In This House of Brede_, where I felt glad to know the characters as friends.
May 25, 2022
Superb. This edition includes an introduction by the author which adds to the reader’s enjoyment of the themes post completion.
A very interesting treatise on family dynamics set in beautiful Lake Garda.
The book creates a sharp contrast between the Italian catholic family and the English protestant family.
The lake almost serves as another character in the book and brings the climax and tensions to a shuddering crescendo.
A very interesting treatise on family dynamics set in beautiful Lake Garda.
The book creates a sharp contrast between the Italian catholic family and the English protestant family.
The lake almost serves as another character in the book and brings the climax and tensions to a shuddering crescendo.
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