The Daisy Chain

Daisy Chain Series #1

by Charlotte Mary Yonge

The Daisy Chain “Charlotte Mary Yonge's Victorian bestseller is a domestic story, a novel of female education, and a detailed survey of the controversies and practices of High Church Anglicanism in the 19th century. Its portrayal of the bookish, awkward heroine, Ethel May, paved the way for stories of literary heroines like Jo March and Anne Shirley, and its emphasis on the domestic life of the May family illuminates the Victorian doctrine of separate spheres, the seemingly contradictory gender politics of the Woman Question, and the relationship between religion and the rights of women in the 19th century. Absorbing, moving, and intricately plotted, The Daisy Chain is Yonge's best-known novel; this edition will provide the 21st century reader with a comprehensive education in Victorian culture, not to mention a tremendously satisfying reading experience.” - Kelly Hager, Simmons College. 597 pgs.

Genres: Classics, Fiction, 19th Century, Victorian, Young Adult, Romance, Literature

597 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1856

About the author

Charlotte Mary Yonge was an English novelist, known for her huge output, now mostly out of print.

She began writing in 1848, and published during her long life about 160 works, chiefly novels. Her first commercial success, The Heir of Redclyffe (1853), provided the funding to enable the schooner Southern Cross to be put into service on behalf of George Selwyn. Similar charitable works were done with the profits from later novels. Yonge was also a founder and editor for forty years of The Monthly Packet, a magazine (founded in 1851) with a varied readership, but targeted at British Anglican girls (in later years it was addressed to a somewhat wider readership).

Among the best known of her works are The Heir of Redclyffe, Heartsease, and The Daisy Chain. A Book of Golden Deeds is a collection of true stories of courage and self-sacrifice. She also wrote Cameos from English History, Life of John Coleridge Patteson: Missionary Bishop of the Melanesian Islands and Hannah More. Her History of Christian Names was described as "the first serious attempt at tackling the subject" and as the standard work on names in the preface to the first edition of Withycombe's The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names, 1944.

Her personal example and influence on her god-daughter, Alice Mary Coleridge, played a formative role in Coleridge's zeal for women's education and thus, indirectly, led to the foundation of Abbots Bromley School for Girls.

After her death, her friend, assistant and collaborator, Christabel Coleridge, published the biographical Charlotte Mary Yonge: her Life and Letters (1903).

-Wikipedia

The Charlotte Mary Yonge Fellowship, a website with lots of information.

See Charlotte's character page for books about her.

Reviews

[Ellie Hamilton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slow paced but a perfectly clever Victorian classic, I loved x Spiritually and set in nature riched x

[Leonie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like Little Women but more religious. So you have to like nineteenth-century domestic fiction and to have a strong stomach for didacticism. This is the story of a family of eleven children whose mother dies in the first few chapters. Their father, a country doctor, generous, absent-minded, with a temper that prevents his children at times from trusting him, has been used to leaving all domestic concerns to his wife. Naturally, his teenage daughters take on a great deal of this responsibility for him. One of these daughters, Ethel, is the main character if the book has a main character. She's rather a Jo March type who has to learn to channel her enthusiasm in order to achieve things, to sacrifice things because women can't have it all, and to become more domestic. She's the character whose virtue is worth most because we are most involved in her struggle to attain it. Not that the other characters don't have their own struggles. Yonge is particularly concerned here with how to cope with being clever, well-off and popular; she sees these as problems to be taken very seriously. Sometimes it is a character's duty to suffer heroically through being lauded and lucky and sometimes it isn't. This has the gossipy feel of small incidents in a small group of characters, punctuated by melodrama when characters die or don't die.

The thing about Yonge is that if you can get over the fact that self-sacrifice and death are presented as good things in almost any circumstance, she's a good writer. She engages with people and puts much more into the book than she has to. She doesn't drag her characters from A to B, bent only on proving her point. She takes the time to acknowledge the idiosyncrasy of particular characters' psychology so that they get to B under their own steam. The characters each have their different, carefully thought out strengths and weaknesses. She has a great imagination for moral flaws and sees them in the most unlikely places so that, for all the didacticism, your moral imagination is put to work rather than put to sleep.

Ethel should have married the Scottish laird though.

[Classic reverie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book from first to last page and found it very spirituality enriching. It was marketed for young as well as old and I so agree, being in my early 50's, it was a wonderful read. There are so many books I wished I read as a young person and this is one. I rarely read modern books, so I can't really comment on young adult books of today but my guess they probably lack the piety that is so evident in this book but done with class. I did not feel a religious sermon but a way for one to look at living a good life. I loved Ethel May and her family through all their trials and hopes. In my mind this modern world needs more novels like this for uplifting life and not the self centering times we live.

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have an old copy of this book, and I disagree almost totally with the description given on the book. The main theme of this story is the need to, and consequences of, submitting our gifts and opportunities to God's service and joyfully doing our duty, rather than seeking personal glory. It is also a reflection on the importance of spiritual goals and standards in life, especially for children and youth. It is a book I read periodically as an 'air-freshener'.

[Elizabeth]

This book is far too complex for a star rating so I hope to write a longer review soon. The ending is intensely bittersweet and the whole book is full of CMY’s characteristic sprightly portrayal of the inner workings of a big family that draws others into its orbit. CMY also explores grief particularly well in this novel.

[First Second Books]

From reading the introduction to my edition of this book, I learned that Charlotte Yonge is one of the authors who inspired Louisa May Alcott. By the time I had read this tome, I wasn’t surprised -- it’s basically an eight hundred page long YA novel from the eighteen hundreds.

What’s surprising about _The Daisy Chain_ is just how readable it is. So much is different in this world – the extremely patriarchal family structure, the focus on religion, the place of women, and the society itself – that the writing is smooth and dynamic enough to have come out of the last decade’s YA market gives the book an added interesting dimension.

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

there were times when i really wanted to dislike this book, but i couldn't! it's incredibly engaging. no wonder it was a bestseller in its time.

[Kelsey Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Rating: 4.5 stars. My first impression is amazement over how Yonge portrayed each of the eleven children in the May family as unique individuals with their own growth and character arc. That's no small feat, considering most authors who portray large families usually gloss over the majority of kids or give them maybe one distinguishing characteristic. It's also amazing that not only were the May children well drawn, but so were all the other numerous characters, such as their parents and friends.

After the first few chapters, I had no trouble keeping Dick and Margaret May's eleven children straight: Richard, Margaret, Flora, Norman, Ethel, Harry, Mary, Tom, Blanche, Aubrey, and Gertrude. I liked them all to varying extents, but I think my favorites were Norman and Ethel, who were narrowly the most prominent in the story. Norman, a 16-year-old gifted scholar when the story opens, has a lot to learn about aspirations and ambitions, as does his sister Ethel, one year younger and eager to keep up with him in all his studies. The one part that bothered me was an accurate depiction of the time: Ethel was told she wasn't as smart as Norman because she was a girl. But I really did enjoy their spiritual journeys as they learned to follow God's leading and become selfless servants to His will.

This was not a suspenseful or exciting story, but my interest never lagged. It was very much a "slice-of-life" story showing a family's triumphs, sorrows, and coming-of-age. It reminded me of Louisa May Alcott's domestic fiction, only I think the spiritual content went deeper. I was convicted on a few occasions, but it didn't feel preachy to me. I could tell Yonge truly felt what she was saying and had genuine experience with the heart issues her characters confronted.

Why not five stars? It was sad in a very bittersweet way. I did like it more than Yonge's other novel I've read, The Heir of Redclyffe, and it's hard to say why ... maybe it felt more realistic to me? Maybe because it was about a big family? Anyway, I'd love to find a print copy of this to treasure with my other favorite Victorian novels.

A few favorite quotes:
"The only plan is not to think about ourselves at all," said Mrs. May. "Affection is round us like sunshine, and there is no use in measuring and comparing. We must give it out freely ourselves, hoping for nothing again."

"I look after what I care about," said Ethel. "One sees more with one's mind that one's eyes. The best sight is inside."

"Please, miss, I was thinking on how Mr. Hazlewood said that God fits our place to us, and us to our place."

"His will is sometimes that we should be uncertain," said Richard. "And that is the most trying."

[Barbara Lovejoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't remember now where I first heard about this author and her books. I was drawn to them and have finally been able to read one of them. What a WONDERFUL treat!!! I came to love this family and felt like I was part of the family. I have already ordered other books by Yonge and look forward to reading them.

[Shelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read the electronic version.
Originally published in 1856.

This is one of the few books I gave full points to in my own log of what I've read (i.e. outside of GoodReads).

[Elisabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a beautiful story of family, sacrifice, love and loss, and living life as a true Christian.
Actually the first time I read it I didn't like it nearly as much as some of Charlotte Mary Yonge's other books, (looking at you Pillars of the House and Heir of Redclyffe). I think this wasbecause I didn't LOVE any of the characters as much as in other books, (looking at you Felix and you Guy.) But this time reading it I loved it just as much. Maybe because I spent a lot more time on it the second time (I listened to it as an audiobook while cross stitching:-), I don't really know. All I can say is I love it so much, and I am so grateful Charlotte Mary Yonge wrote so many books!
For the characters, (A long list):
Doctor May Who couldn't help loving Doctor May? I can imagine some people would be annoyed with his impetuosity and heedlesness, but I am a bit myself so I didn't mind, it made him relatable. He is so warm hearted, and kind, and repentant when he makes mistakes, I just love him. (If any one would like to know he is the father of the May family (11 children, *wild I love big families in books cheers*))
NB: I shall be doing the children in age order.
Richard: There is no doubt I am extremely different from him. He is meticulous and patient, and not very quick (as an aside I love how the author makes characters who are not very good looking or clever endearing. She shows them as they really are, people. I find in so many books that people who are not clever or goodlooking are shown as somehow not human, which is fundamentally, morally, and humanly wrong.)
Margaret: I liked Margaret. Sometimes her fears annoyed me a bit (rather like Ethel), but overall she was good. Charlotte Mary Yonge specializes in making good characters have faults but still be likable. No character is the same and there is a person for everyone. She was certainly very different from me, but I can appreciate how different she is:-) Alan and her are so sad, and so romantic, and I love it.
Flora: I can safely say Flora annoyed me tremendously through almost the whole book, except at the end where I fel verry sorry for her but was still irritated by her. She is so cold and calculating, very different from warm hearted me XD.
Norman Oh Norman, I don't know what to say about you. Quite honestly I didn't really love him, but I could empathize a lot with him, andI felt for him and him and Meta are PERFECT together. Poor Norman he went through a lot.
Ethel Of all the characters I am probably most like Ethel. Her ideals, philisophical reasoning, being really enthusiastic one minute and not caring the next. One thing though, I like girlish things more than she does andI am more romantic. More of a typical girl:-) But I am very fondof Ethel and I love her very much.
Harry Yes I like Harry. He is proably my favourite of the May brothers (come to think of it, I think I didn't like the Daisy Chain as much the first time, because of the lack of boys I like a lot...). There isn't a lot of him, but yes I like him.
Mary Oh Mary, you are a dear, but I don't really have much to say about you. You are just Mary.
Blanche She isn't in much really and not given much character but I like her... She likes Hector how could I not...?
Tom Well I don't like Tom that much,but I am proud of him at the end. But poor Tom, he is going through some hard times at the start. That bullying was despicable.
Aubrey He is funny in this book with his classical tastes. I don't like him at all in the second book, but whatever.
Gertrude Well Gertrude is mostly a baby the whole time so... yeah. She is cute.
Alan Earnescliffe: I like Alan very much. He is very nice, and also sad...
Hector Earnescliffe I like Hector very much... He is just the kind I like. I wish there was more of him... (also I have a weakness for the name Hector...)
George Rivers Ehhhhh...
Meta Rivers I like Meta a lot. She is so sweet and full of sunshine. I love her a lot.
At last, I am done with all the characters I am doing. I will end thisvery long review by saying that you (whoever is reading this) needs to read this book. It is amazing! (Phew that review took so long to write.)

[Kj · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only got half way through, but that was both as far as I could handle and as far as I needed. My two reasons for finally sitting down with a Charlotte Yonge text were 1) she's important to my research so I wanted to see for myself how she narratively expressed her sacramental theology instead of just reading quotes that say she did, and 2) I read in a footnote that "The Daisy Chain" was written in response to "Jane Eyre" so I wanted to see how that was expressed. 250 pages in was far enough to see how she embodies sacramental values of baptism, confirmation, etc- so I didn't need to go much farther to grasp her style. But half way in I still couldnt see how, other than being a polemic against personal ambition, this was a religious response novel to "Jane Eyre". I'm still researching that, but at the point in the novel where a 13 year old boy is morbidly concerned over the state of his salvation when he's forbidden from Confirmation beause of a prank he pulled on his sister- I had to make a strategic research choice to put down the book and follow better leads. It's extrememly taxing to read a novel about morally upright children who berate themselves for not being morally upright enough. I know that compared to the religious novels which preceded Yonge's, her books feature fleshed out/semi-realistic characters rather than unabiguously good or evil stick figures, but as scholars other than myself have pointed out, this genre of religious domestic fiction so directly responds to Victorian concerns that its nearly unpalatable to a modern reader, regardless of one's theology. It's not poorly written, just poor fiction compared to what was evolving in the mid-nineteenth century. (Though I'll confess, Yonge's characters had me unwittingly subjecting myself to moral self-reflection at times. She really knows how to get to you, and I applaud her for that). I respect Yonge's proflific literary output and her influential contextualization of her spiritual and social values. I just disagree with too many of those values to find these texts galvinizing in any lasting way or compelling in any literary way. But at least I undertand her a bit better now.

[Mary Ronan Drew · Rating 4 out of 5]

In its day, The Daisy Chain was extremely popular. Published in 1856 and very much in the style of the day, Charlotte M Yonge's novel reinforced all of the mores of mid-Victorian England. Religion underpins the lives of the characters, along with respect for parents and other authority figures, women and girls dedicated to making life easier and more rewarding for boys and men, self-effacement, modesty, humility, forgiveness, self-sacrifice, stifling of one's yearnings, and absolute honesty.

The story begins with the death in a carriage accident of the mother of the May family, and the permanent crippling of the eldest daughter, Margaret. Dr May is left with 11 children to raise on his own, relying very heavily on his elder daughters to guide the younger ones as their mother would have done.

The plot is thready, with episodes concerning crises in the lives of the May children arising and being dealt with in serial fashion. Bullying at school, over-reaching for a scholarship, the surprising choice of husband for one of the girls, the founding of a school for the children of brickmakers, and eventually a church in their neighborhood, all are examined and analyzed and the most honest, self-effacing, and generous solution discovered. Then the story moves on.

The novel's primary character, the child whose development we are most interested in, is Ethelred May, in her early teens when he mother dies, and a keen scholar, actually tutoring her brothers who are in school while she teaches herself at home. She is clearly more intelligent and suited for scholarship than they are and she loves the Latin and Greek she is immersed in.

Scholarship is Ethel's gift and the reader's heart breaks as she eventually convinces herself that she must sacrifice it to become a real woman, focused on helping the others in her family and denying herself that which she is best at and loves most. This was vastly appealing to the Victorian reader, and influenced many other novels of the time. The modern reader's reaction ranges from heartbreak to fury as Ethel turns from her books and instead applies her intelligence and hard work to teaching Sunday school, running the household, and giving wise advice to her siblings.

The author, Charlotte M Yonge, never married, and she devoted herself and the proceeds from her many and popular novels to just the undertakings she praises in the novel: bringing education and religion to the working classes, missionaries, and devotion to the Church of England and especially the Oxford Movement. (John Keble was a neighbor and friend.)

Yonge donated large amounts of money for the missionary movement in the South Seas, and she sends some of her characters in The Daisy Chain as missionaries to New Zealand and Melanesia. The boys, influenced by Ethel and their eldest brother, Richard, undertake careers that they are not entirely convinced will be satisfying to them in order to do what their religion and family loyalty expects of them.

The Daisy Chain has a sequel, The Trial, published in 1864, which I discovered after working my way through the 661 pages of the novel. Its 416 pages bring the story of the May family to more than 1,000 pages, all of which we are told were eagerly read and re-read by Yonge's admirers, which included George Eliot, Lewis Carroll, Christina Rosetti, Tennyson, and Trollope.

[Lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

It has to get 5 stars because I could not put it down. Yonge possessed a real gift for writing believable characters of all ages, and should be appreciated for her writing about death and disaster in an unsentimental way. But I did find the moralistic nature of this particular Yonge rather heavy. It seems that no misdemeanour, however small, goes unpunished. I didn't want to belong to this family as I did the family in 'Pillars of the House' - I'm afraid I would be too like poor Ethel, sacrificed to family duty, turned away from her desire for learning, and not allowed to wear glasses for her short sight. An absorbing read, though.

[Elizabeth Lund · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a 600-page Victorian family story. It's unabashedly didactic, but the characters (especially Ethel, who seems like an inspiration for Jo March) and the (relative) lack of melodrama make it tolerable. I may even read the sequel.

[Marni]

If all else fails in attempts to find this to read, Google Books has all 594 pages of it.

[Tien · Rating 3 out of 5]

The scene opens with a typical sort of day in a genteel rural family –a physician with a number of well-loved children. Children of all ages with their own strength and foibles –each and every one of them unique and yet traces of each parent are visible in each. I just started to settle down thinking of a leisurely read when disaster struck! The pillar on which their lives evolved around has been removed and all felt lost…

This story is told from the perspective of Etheldred. She is not the oldest or the youngest. She is not the most intelligent or the dullest. She is, however, possibly the second most intelligent child and yet, the most intelligent of female child. Along with her intelligence, she also has inherited most of her father’s characters and they were thought to be unseemly in a girl child. I understand certain things like tidiness of oneself needed to be ingrained in oneself by habit and Etheldred needed to pay more attention to things like that however, it was most interesting that her mind is the analytical sort which needed a reason as to why things are a certain way prior to being able to apply herself to do things correctly! And yet, despite her intelligence and her analytical mind, because of her sex (and therefore, her position in the family), she had to give up her studies to serve her family.

It certainly is a humbling experience to read of Ethel’s sacrifice. Whilst it was, at first, with a heavy heart that she gave up her time from studies to household & other duties, she loves her family in such a way that she was willing to do so. And at the end of the book, you do not see her only willing but to have been transformed to be a humble serving young woman (I don’t mean like a servant but one who serves others out of love) that even if it is not an ending I would have preferred, I do admire her for her character improving work to become who she is. Etheldred is a character to warm your heart.

[Sobriquet]

DNF. I love Victorian novels usually but this one failed to keep my attention. It is about the May family and their 11 children. There is a family tragedy in the beginning of the novel and the story concerns the fall out from it as well their day to day family life. I was concerned in the beginning that I would loose track of all the characters however the younger children are kept in the background as the novel mainly focuses on the older children.

The issue I had with this book is that it is heavily moral much more so than Little Women for example. In almost every scene the children are admonished by others and then chastise themselves for minor infractions either of conduct or personality and are driven to improve their characters. These flaws are minor such as not pinning up your dress properly so that it drags in the mud (walking to undertake charitable endeavors does not get you off), feeling irritated by your french teacher, being over ambitions, too enthusiastic. The moral tone is too heavy and it makes the characters a collection of virtues and self-improvements rather than interesting. I wanted the children to do something really bad - fraud or theft or slapping your sister across the face, that way I would be able to read their self berating agonies in a better spirit.

The story line although dramatic at times gets bogged down with conversations and discussions on the May children's struggle for perfection so that I just found reading it tedious. I also disliked the father in this story as he was rather keen on improving the defects of his children's characters while they indulged his.

I did not finish this novel so I cannot tell if it improves but I have the feeling the moral tone will remain the same. I might have to re-read Wuthering Heights as a tonic.

[Leslie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Many aspects of this book will be hard for 21st-century readers to take. In particular, its insistence on the need, especially but not only for women, to deny one's wishes and dreams and preferences in service to higher ideals of service and duty to others, will rub a lot of people the wrong way, will seem life-denying and constrictive. But as a window into ideals of Victorian family life and the ways in which those ideals both fostered and limited certain ways of being in the world, it's both invaluable and fascinating. Yonge was an enormously popular and prolific author, and reading the work of authors who were read with great pleasure in their day but who have not worn well because their styles and values fit badly with our own is tremendously useful in understanding how different the past genuinely was, how values and worldviews have changed. If we read only those texts that fit with our values and worldview, that make easy sense to us, we lose the opportunity to think through both our assumptions and the ways in which earlier periods genuinely thought differently.

[Vivian Valvano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally published in 1856, this domestic Victorian novel was the perfect book to sink into and try to keep thoughts of Trump and his administration at bay for hours at a time. It's too long, but that's not tragic. It's set in a small English village; the central family is headed by a wise country doctor. A tragedy occurs early on, and we then follow the doctor's very large family through several years that take us to London and the South Pacific, but primarily, we stay in the rural village. The family is grounded by religion, tradition, and loyalty. Characters are beautifully drawn, especially, in the May family, the Doctor, Margaret, Ethel, and *Norman and nearby, the lovely young neighbor *"Meta," real name Margaret, one of the "daisies." Yonge influenced Louisa May Alcott. It shows. In addition to everything else, there is feminism.

[Charity U · Rating 3 out of 5]

As you can see, this was a really really really long book, with small type and thin pages. :P Full pages. I didn't love it, unfortunately. I probably will not re-read it for years, if ever. But for now, I think I'm glad I did. According to the back, it paved the way for heroines like Anne Shirley and Jo March! Originally a newspaper chapter-a-week type of story.

I didn't love it...but if you need something to read, you could try this.

[Mhairi Gowans · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. The characters were brilliantly written, the vast majority of the book had very believable plot lines, and on the whole, even the moralising wasn't too bad. Although it was mainly a book of daily life, resulting no big chapter cliff hangers, I was earnest to keep reading because I found I cared about the characters - even those I didn't like so much! I'd definitely recommend this to anyone who has a love for Victorian fiction!

[Elizabeth Licata · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't enjoy this as much as The Clever Woman of the Family. Yonge's rigid views on the place of women and their need to be saintly moral arbiters got in the way of otherwise masterful characterizations and descriptions. I found it rather turgid at times.
However, this is still engaging and worthwhile.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I became very involved with the characters in the book, and think they will stay with me as real people to wonder about how they are getting on. But at the same time, as a modern reader, the racism, sexism and anti-glasses policy were hard to read.

[Summer Taylor · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only read this because I had to for my course at university.
It was an endurance test.
I can't remember the plot. I'm not sure there was one. It was mainly dialogue.
Everyone had the same name.
Not fun.

[Amanda B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this book for a History of Children's Lit course. This used to be a staple children's book. All about familial duty and piety. Gag.

[Libby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really enjoyed the characters, but it made me almost as angry on behalf of the female protagonist as The Mill on the Floss...

[Abigail · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good characterization, very meandering (slow) plot.

[Darcy · Rating 3 out of 5]

As an avid fan of Victorian Literature, I expected to like this book more. However, it was a real slog to get through.

[Margo · Rating 3 out of 5]

interesting ... long and a little hard going but has a twist