Joyce & Ginnie: The Letters of Joyce Grenfell & Virginia Graham

by Joyce Grenfell, Virginia Graham, Janie Hampton (Editor)

A collection of letters spanning 50 years. Joyce Grenfell and Virginia Graham were best friends from the age of 7 until Joyce's death. When they were apart they wrote daily letters to each other. The letters date from 1929-1979, and mention such events as the Abdication and the atomic bomb.

Genres: Nonfiction

513 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1997

About the author

Joyce Irene Grenfell, OBE (née Phipps; 10 February 1910 – 30 November 1979) was an English actress, comedienne and singer-songwriter.

Reviews

[Estara · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is only for Joyce Grenfell fans, which fortunately in the UK there are still quite a few. With the huge amount of letters she had to look through of course Janie Hampton had to curate on which to include and which not. I love the fact that she has - when appropriate - footnotes at each single letter to explain all the short forms that Joyce and Ginnie use or to explore what happened later, if it's not mentioned in there.

This is a friendship which started when the girls where younger than ten, unfortunately the teenage letters haven't survived, but the 30s to 79 are represented and what I found fascinating is the portrait of time in the UK/ in World War II of a class that no longer dominates society (they still exist but they're no longer taste arbitrators or cultural curators, I'd say, except maybe for the Royal family) and how they experienced those times and saw themselves.

Then there's Christian Science which I was introduced in detail to here, and the portrait of a woman growing tolerant and less self-centred through the years - but not a saint, which is refreshing, although she really does her best to appreciate her life. She managed to see the downside of class and of apartheid (but the Huns remain the Huns of course), she was friends with quite a few homosexuals (although she never really addressed that even in these letters) but really did NOT like homosexuality and thought they were different from normal people.

Virginia Graham is a perfect foil, the honest way she articulates her feelings of having to care for her husband who had Alzheimer's - a disease not even recognized at the time and her general honesty is a lovely discovery.

This is a great book of letters to read when you want to cleanse your palate and enjoy eloquent people being eloquent in bits.

[Mikki · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was a fan of Joyce Grenfell's and was sad when she passed away in 1979. This book of her correspondence with bestie Virginia was truly enjoyable. A lot of anecdotal accounts describing lives lived in a bygone era, when writing longhand was the principal way of staying in touch. A close friendship, more like sisterhood. Not a lesbian relationship but a loving companionship sustained over many years, despite their frequent times of separation. When Joyce died, it left a big hole in her best friend's life and in that of her husband of just under 50 years. And it saddened all the many people whose lives Joyce had touched over the years of her public life. Loved the pictures their correspondence painted.