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Collected Stories
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY Angus N. WILSON
Throughout these seventy-nine stories - love stories, ghost stories, stories of childhood, of English middle-class life in the twenties and thirties, of London during the Blitz - Elizabeth Bowen combines social comedy and reportage, perception and vision in an oeuvre which reveals, as Angus Wilson affirms in his introduction, that 'the instinctive artist is there at the very heart of her work'.
Throughout these seventy-nine stories - love stories, ghost stories, stories of childhood, of English middle-class life in the twenties and thirties, of London during the Blitz - Elizabeth Bowen combines social comedy and reportage, perception and vision in an oeuvre which reveals, as Angus Wilson affirms in his introduction, that 'the instinctive artist is there at the very heart of her work'.
896 pages, Paperback
First published February 12, 1981
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1422 people want to read
About the author
Elizabeth Bowen
208 books539 followersElizabeth Dorothea Cole Bowen, CBE was an Anglo-Irish novelist and short story writer and short story writer notable for her books about the "big house" of Irish landed Protestants as well her fiction about life in wartime London.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 64 reviews
August 13, 2018
My feeling is Elizabeth Bowen didn't have any kind of special talent for the short story which begs the question why did she write so many? (This book runs to 880 pages.) There was often the sense of a writer writing for the sake of it. The themes of the best stories here she dealt with much better in her novels. Perhaps the only exception are the stories she wrote during the war which would make a brilliant short collection. Otherwise we're treated to a lot of the social whimsy which also dominated her first couple of novels and get a glimpse of her guilty pleasures - most notably the ghost and murder story, most of which, frankly, are a bit trite.
I've always been a little baffled why she doesn't have a better reputation. Maybe here lies the answer. There can appear a hint of sexism when we're told who are the most notable British writers of the 20th century. The likes of Somerset Maughan, Graham Greene and Evelyn Waugh are much more likely to be cited than Bowen. Perhaps it's these stories that have damaged her reputation? They make it easy to dismiss her as a writer of sensibility and lightweight social comedy. Imagine if Virginia Woolf had published sixty short stories. How gleeful her detractors would be! Probably someone ought to choose the best twelve of Bowen's stories - not difficult - publish them and the rest should be consigned to the scrapheap. Her reputation might be greatly enhanced as a result.
I've always been a little baffled why she doesn't have a better reputation. Maybe here lies the answer. There can appear a hint of sexism when we're told who are the most notable British writers of the 20th century. The likes of Somerset Maughan, Graham Greene and Evelyn Waugh are much more likely to be cited than Bowen. Perhaps it's these stories that have damaged her reputation? They make it easy to dismiss her as a writer of sensibility and lightweight social comedy. Imagine if Virginia Woolf had published sixty short stories. How gleeful her detractors would be! Probably someone ought to choose the best twelve of Bowen's stories - not difficult - publish them and the rest should be consigned to the scrapheap. Her reputation might be greatly enhanced as a result.
April 11, 2021
I have long been an admirer of Elizabeth Bowen and decided it was time to tackle her short stories. I have read this huge volume slowly - perhaps just one, or two, stories a day - and so it has taken me some time to meander through this collection.
The stories are split into her First Stories, the Twenties, the Thirties, the War Years and Post-War Stories. Although Bowen is best known for her work during the thirties and the war, her early stories are often lighter, as you might expect from her age at the time. For example, there is, 'The Confidante,' where a couple tell Veronica that they love each other and the woman has broken off her engagement, only to have Veronica then claim the jilted lover as her own. Although Bowen is also often seen as above, rather than below, stairs, with the large Anglo-Irish family house, she writes a lot about moving and about the new estates that were springing up to accommodate families. In, "The Shadowy Third," one of my favourites in the collection, she writes of a young wife in a new house, on a new estate, who feels her dead predecessor inhabiting the rooms...
The Twenties also sees Bowen casting a sharp eye on those who also inhabit the houses of the wealthy, such as, 'The Parrot' where a companion goes in pursuit of her mistresses escaped bird. 'Recent Photograph,' tells of an early journalist, chasing a story and murder, and ghosts, crop up fairly often. My favourite story in the whole book occurs in the Thirties though, when Bowen was at her best. "The Cat Jumps," tells of 'Rose Hill,' a house where a murder took place and is creepy and atmospheric. Again, there are stories which occur in new houses, or on housing estates. The changing of the countryside, as estates encroach on villages, appears in Agatha Christie's Miss Marple books too and it is interesting to see those concerns mirrored here, as well as many stories featuring children, of whom Bowen - whose own childlessness was a source of great sadness - managed to retain an unromantic, but understanding, viewpoint.
Some of Bowen's best literature was written during the War Years, so I was interested to read this section. 'Oh, Madam,' has a distraught servant, coping with the aftermath of bomb damage and I loved the creepy, 'The Demon Lover,' where the past, as so often in Bowen's writing, impinges on the present. Coming to collect items from a shut up, London house, when a married woman and her family have decamped to the country, a past lover, from a previous war, still within memory at that time, makes his presence felt. I also enjoyed, 'Careless Talk,' and the group of friends in a restaurant, negotiating the difficulties of discussing anything, without asking questions relating to the war they were living in. Bowen wrote dialogue well and she manages deftly, so often, to combine the mundane - such as a new house on an estate - with the surreal.
There are only a handful of Post-War Stories, so the bulk of these are written within the period of her most successful writing periods. Well worth reading, as Bowen always is. She grows in my estimation with every one of her titles I pick up and I am glad that I still have some unread books to explore.
The stories are split into her First Stories, the Twenties, the Thirties, the War Years and Post-War Stories. Although Bowen is best known for her work during the thirties and the war, her early stories are often lighter, as you might expect from her age at the time. For example, there is, 'The Confidante,' where a couple tell Veronica that they love each other and the woman has broken off her engagement, only to have Veronica then claim the jilted lover as her own. Although Bowen is also often seen as above, rather than below, stairs, with the large Anglo-Irish family house, she writes a lot about moving and about the new estates that were springing up to accommodate families. In, "The Shadowy Third," one of my favourites in the collection, she writes of a young wife in a new house, on a new estate, who feels her dead predecessor inhabiting the rooms...
The Twenties also sees Bowen casting a sharp eye on those who also inhabit the houses of the wealthy, such as, 'The Parrot' where a companion goes in pursuit of her mistresses escaped bird. 'Recent Photograph,' tells of an early journalist, chasing a story and murder, and ghosts, crop up fairly often. My favourite story in the whole book occurs in the Thirties though, when Bowen was at her best. "The Cat Jumps," tells of 'Rose Hill,' a house where a murder took place and is creepy and atmospheric. Again, there are stories which occur in new houses, or on housing estates. The changing of the countryside, as estates encroach on villages, appears in Agatha Christie's Miss Marple books too and it is interesting to see those concerns mirrored here, as well as many stories featuring children, of whom Bowen - whose own childlessness was a source of great sadness - managed to retain an unromantic, but understanding, viewpoint.
Some of Bowen's best literature was written during the War Years, so I was interested to read this section. 'Oh, Madam,' has a distraught servant, coping with the aftermath of bomb damage and I loved the creepy, 'The Demon Lover,' where the past, as so often in Bowen's writing, impinges on the present. Coming to collect items from a shut up, London house, when a married woman and her family have decamped to the country, a past lover, from a previous war, still within memory at that time, makes his presence felt. I also enjoyed, 'Careless Talk,' and the group of friends in a restaurant, negotiating the difficulties of discussing anything, without asking questions relating to the war they were living in. Bowen wrote dialogue well and she manages deftly, so often, to combine the mundane - such as a new house on an estate - with the surreal.
There are only a handful of Post-War Stories, so the bulk of these are written within the period of her most successful writing periods. Well worth reading, as Bowen always is. She grows in my estimation with every one of her titles I pick up and I am glad that I still have some unread books to explore.
January 7, 2023
Introduction
First Stories
--Breakfast
--Daffodils
--The Return
--The Confidante
--Requiescat
--All Saints
--The New House
--Lunch
--The Lover
--Mrs Windermere
--The Shadowy Third
--The Evil that Men Do --
--Sunday Evening
--Coming Home
The Twenties
--Ann Lee's
--The Parrot
--The Visitor
--The Contessina
--Human Habitation
--The Secession
--Making Arrangements
--The Storm
--Charity
--The Back Drawing-Room
--Recent Photograph
--Joining Charles
--The Jungle
--Shoes: An International Episode
--The Dancing-Mistress
--Aunt Tatty
--Dead Mabelle
--The Working Party
--Foothold
--The Cassowary
--Telling
--Mrs Moysey
The Thirties
--The Tommy Crans
--The Good Girl
--The Cat Jumps
--The Last Night in the Old Home
--The Disinherited
--Maria
--Her Table Spread
--The Little Girl's Room
--Firelight in the Flat
--The Man of the Family
--The Needlecase
--The Apple Tree
--Reduced
--Tears, Idle Tears
--A Walk in the Woods
--A Love Story
--Look at All Those Roses
--Attractive Modern Homes
--The Easter Egg Party
--Love
--No. 16
--A Queer Heart
--The Girl with the Stoop
The War Years
--Unwelcome Idea
--Oh, Madam ...
--Summer Night
--In the Square
--Sunday Afternoon
--The Inherited Clock
--The Cheery Soul
--Songs My Father Sang Me
--The Demon Lover
--Careless Talk
--The Happy Autumn Fields
--Ivy Gripped the Steps
--Pink May
--Green Holly
--Mysterious Kôr
--The Dolt's Tale
Post-War Stories
--I Hear You Say So
--Gone Away
--Hand in Glove
--A Day in the Dark
Bibliographical Note
First Stories
--Breakfast
--Daffodils
--The Return
--The Confidante
--Requiescat
--All Saints
--The New House
--Lunch
--The Lover
--Mrs Windermere
--The Shadowy Third
--The Evil that Men Do --
--Sunday Evening
--Coming Home
The Twenties
--Ann Lee's
--The Parrot
--The Visitor
--The Contessina
--Human Habitation
--The Secession
--Making Arrangements
--The Storm
--Charity
--The Back Drawing-Room
--Recent Photograph
--Joining Charles
--The Jungle
--Shoes: An International Episode
--The Dancing-Mistress
--Aunt Tatty
--Dead Mabelle
--The Working Party
--Foothold
--The Cassowary
--Telling
--Mrs Moysey
The Thirties
--The Tommy Crans
--The Good Girl
--The Cat Jumps
--The Last Night in the Old Home
--The Disinherited
--Maria
--Her Table Spread
--The Little Girl's Room
--Firelight in the Flat
--The Man of the Family
--The Needlecase
--The Apple Tree
--Reduced
--Tears, Idle Tears
--A Walk in the Woods
--A Love Story
--Look at All Those Roses
--Attractive Modern Homes
--The Easter Egg Party
--Love
--No. 16
--A Queer Heart
--The Girl with the Stoop
The War Years
--Unwelcome Idea
--Oh, Madam ...
--Summer Night
--In the Square
--Sunday Afternoon
--The Inherited Clock
--The Cheery Soul
--Songs My Father Sang Me
--The Demon Lover
--Careless Talk
--The Happy Autumn Fields
--Ivy Gripped the Steps
--Pink May
--Green Holly
--Mysterious Kôr
--The Dolt's Tale
Post-War Stories
--I Hear You Say So
--Gone Away
--Hand in Glove
--A Day in the Dark
Bibliographical Note
December 17, 2018
I have only recently begun to explore in any kind of depth the work of Elizabeth Bowen, and I'm frightened to think how it could have taken me so long. She is an absolute master. I especially appreciate her short stories--she wrote a great many of them--which are all little gems. Subtle, smart, amazingly crafty, and each demonstrating a very dry yet abiding sense of humor. She quietly pokes fun at a lot of her characters, but not so much so that we don't like them. Bowen certainly likes them, but boy does she like to tease them! In my opinion, Bowen does stand and should stand as one of the 20th century's greatest Modernists. Like all the great Moderns, she loved to play with inherited forms: testing them, overturning them, expanding them, using them to suggest variegated states of consciousness. And like all the great Moderns, she also, in the end, more than anything, demonstrates profound humanity in her work. These stories prove she deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as Virginia Wolff and James Joyce and T.S. Eliot and Wallace Stevens. Why isn't she?
September 10, 2007
I checked out Ms. Bowen on the reccomendation of whacked-out "manicstream" author D.F. Lewis. Her stories are nothing like Lewis' "high weird" nightmares, crawling with deformity, neologism and voodoo. And yet, there's a simmilarity in the way they dissect a peculiar British ennui. She does have at least one chilling ghost story to her credit ("The Demon Lover"), but mostly this is elegant, hyper-observant realism. I got about halfway through this tome before I had to return it to the library, vowing that I would someday finish it. To be honest, the stories were so rich with repressed emotion that I began to feel like I was choking on the stale air of a drawing room. Bowen's brilliant snapshots capture the inherent strangness of reality the psychological complexity bubbling under the lid of "ordinary" lives. They can leave you just as haunted as the most vivid hallucination.
February 15, 2021
Elizabeth Bowen was a mid 20th century Irish writer. While she is known for her novels, she was an extremely under-rated yet gifted story writer. Her stories don't tend to have a lot of movement or variety, but Bowen makes up for it by being extremely talented with structure. She often knows how to set a scene or place a telling detail at the exact right place so as to gain a reader's interest. Her dialogue is often also well done.
I don't know if I would recommend Bowen's writing for anyone, but she is a good writer to learn from if you are interested in improving your craft.
I don't know if I would recommend Bowen's writing for anyone, but she is a good writer to learn from if you are interested in improving your craft.
September 18, 2021
Elizabeth Bowen's stories range from the good through the excellent to the superb. The early stories often are character sketches cum anecdote. They're good, but often end so abruptly that you wonder if there has been a problem with the text. Over time, Bowen preserved her gift of characterization and added to it a more complete sense of form. The stories she wrote through the 1930s are in some ways good examples of the short story genre reaching its conventional apex, promising and delivering tales that are provocative and yet full. The years of WWII prompted Bowen to push and pull her stories over the conventional apex and develop works that are sui generis, haunted and hollowed out by the bombing of London and bad news from the front. And then, after WWII, when things were supposed to be all right again and yet were not all right, Bowen demanded more of herself. Her characters do things one might expect in Beckett, they turn on each other more sharply, they reflect souls still living on spiritual rations. These later stories are the ones that feel most "modern," especially since Bowen does not abandon her typical middle to upper class characters, instead she gives them sharp twists and kicks. Failing well has long been a virtue in Britain and, to some extent, in Bowen's native Ireland, but she discarded that theme after World War II and explored society failing poorly, stumbling. Her writing became less polite, if you will.
There is a new collection of stories by Bowen just out with an introduction by John Banville, which I happened to read in the New York Review of Books. That's what caused me to read this collection--the same stories, after all, and Kindle is great for short stories. Banville elevates Bowen to the highest ranks of short story writers. Think Chekhov. I'm not sure I go along with his judgment in part because fat collections often include early stuff that isn't magnificent. Chekhov, too, wrote many light sketches early in his career that are good but not compelling. So I do prefer what are known as "selected" stories or "selected" poems, and if I were compiling such a volume, I would focus on Bowen's work from the late 1930s through WWII and into the war's aftermath.
There is a new collection of stories by Bowen just out with an introduction by John Banville, which I happened to read in the New York Review of Books. That's what caused me to read this collection--the same stories, after all, and Kindle is great for short stories. Banville elevates Bowen to the highest ranks of short story writers. Think Chekhov. I'm not sure I go along with his judgment in part because fat collections often include early stuff that isn't magnificent. Chekhov, too, wrote many light sketches early in his career that are good but not compelling. So I do prefer what are known as "selected" stories or "selected" poems, and if I were compiling such a volume, I would focus on Bowen's work from the late 1930s through WWII and into the war's aftermath.
March 5, 2009
More "misses" than hits in this collection, though admittedly a number of stories are "near-misses," seeming _almost_ very good, but perhaps just a little too precious or "distilled".
I thought the best stories in the collection were the ghost tales and the ones set in London during World War II. The pain of memory and the ache of lonely human souls are Ms. Bowen's great themes, and when she is good, she is very very good indeed. "The Demon Lover" and "Ivy Gripped the Steps" are among the very best short stories I've ever read.
IF you have the time, and IF you are interested in really tracing the gradual evolution of an artist, and the development of her talent, THEN I can heartily recommend this collection. Otherwise, you'd probably do best just looking out for a collection with just her wartime or ghost stories.
I thought the best stories in the collection were the ghost tales and the ones set in London during World War II. The pain of memory and the ache of lonely human souls are Ms. Bowen's great themes, and when she is good, she is very very good indeed. "The Demon Lover" and "Ivy Gripped the Steps" are among the very best short stories I've ever read.
IF you have the time, and IF you are interested in really tracing the gradual evolution of an artist, and the development of her talent, THEN I can heartily recommend this collection. Otherwise, you'd probably do best just looking out for a collection with just her wartime or ghost stories.
January 28, 2019
I first read this fourteen years ago during a long spell in hospital, and decided to revisit to get me through my worst cold of the winter so far - any excuse for a spot of reading in bed!
I have fallen in love with Bowen's beautiful prose and stories that somehow manage to be both acerbic and poignant.
I have fallen in love with Bowen's beautiful prose and stories that somehow manage to be both acerbic and poignant.
Want to read
August 21, 2011The first few pages of "The Disinherited" sold me on this.
October 9, 2023
actually only read the encounters short story collection, but GoodReads is a wee bit unspecific sometimes.
Want to read
January 1, 2024PLACEHOLDER REVIEWS
plunging into some "will soon enter the public domain" (in January 2025) stories of Elizabeth Bowen, for eventual showcase on Pseudopod (we work pretty far ahead)....
Here's "Dead Mabelle" by Elizabeth Bowen in which young William Strickford (a cautious man overly obsessed with planning - today he would be diagnosed as "on the spectrum," methinks) - finds his orderly life thrown into chaos when he attends a movie starring the newest screen sensation, the titular Mabelle (who seems compounded of a number of Flapper-era sex bombs of the screen). He quickly becomes obsessed, but then distraught when Mabelle is killed (in some horrible way - we never get the details) and the world moves on. But William finds he cannot, as Mabelle still appears in revivals of her earlier films. There are all kinds of interesting things about this story, For one, the writing style is aggressively modernistic - although this could be seen as problematic, since I couldn't actually determine what happens at the story's climax (which seems to give us two options). For another, this story is very much about the intrusion into the social sphere of films/cinema and their figures, and how strangely magical they are (good description of hushed halls with giant looming figures playing broad emotions as they seem to thrust out at you from the screen) and yet also unhealthily entrancing. Interesting.
"Mrs. Moysey" is another interesting slice of life, in which the titular widow takes in nephew when he returns from Japan. But said nephew is a bit of a shirk a work (and philanderer), although these aspects don't change her routine and protected life that much (rumor in the neighborhood is that she's secretly an imbiber, because there's not much else to build rumors on) - until, when nephew Leslie receives a letter and bolts for London, whereupon sedate Mrs. Moysey has to engage with Emerald, his previously unknown abandoned wife who has come calling, bringing their two children with her. And Mrs. Moysey agrees to watch the children as Emerald continues attempting to track down the deadbeat, and finds her life - well, transformed may be a bit much, but somewhat altered by the new additions, even as on Emerald's return Mrs. Moysey's secret (her REAL secret, if it can be called that) is exposed. Interesting, various level of class stuff and some exquisite writing.
"The Dancing Mistress" gives us a sketch of a dancing class putting on a recital, while we spend a bit more time (before and after), psychologically, with Miss Joyce James (the teacher), her pianist Miss Peel and the male attendant Lulu. Some of the students are accomplished, others are not (clumsy, chubby Margery). Lulu, who will soon be returning to Sweden, has designs on Miss James, which Miss Peel seems aware of, but Miss James is just exhausted and nods off on the trip home in the taxi, following dinner with her two workmates - dreaming, perhaps joyfully, of the passive sadism she has inflicted on Margery that day. Interesting. Modern.
In, "Foothold," we are given a ghost story - but told in a very modernistic and atypical way. Thomas is visiting his good friends Gerard and Janet, who are settling into their new home and grounds. Thomas is very close to them both, and worries about Janet, even as they make him aware of the fact that they've seen a ghost in their house, who they've named Clara (after a resident from the previous century), who really does very little but cause the mistaken impression that Janet has just walked by (so, in a sense, a ghost with almost no personality). This is also an interesting piece - I call it a "sentimental" ghost story mostly just to indicate that it is not "spooky" (or intending to be) when it really is kind of melancholic and sad. The writing, Bowen's style one must say at this point, is Modernistic - closely calculated conversations in which the sense of meaning behind words is more important than what's beings said, clean descriptions of simple actions. I liked it.
"The Cat Jumps" was the story I was most looking forward to, as it seems to be one of the more heavily anthologized of Bowen's work. After a recent, horrific murder (awful detail made the news), no one will buy the home in which it occurred - except someone finally does, the thoroughly modern, rational (everything can be explained by psychiatry and "complexes") and un-superstitious Wrights family (whose patriarch shares a same first name with the now executed killer). Put when they throw a small house-warming party, things slowly begin to sour among the guests, psychologies clash, conflict & consternation reign, and the talk turns to the recent, ugly events... and then everyone heads off to bed... Well, it's a pretty damn nasty story, that brings the reader right up to the edge of suspense and then leaves them, unsettled.
plunging into some "will soon enter the public domain" (in January 2025) stories of Elizabeth Bowen, for eventual showcase on Pseudopod (we work pretty far ahead)....
Here's "Dead Mabelle" by Elizabeth Bowen in which young William Strickford (a cautious man overly obsessed with planning - today he would be diagnosed as "on the spectrum," methinks) - finds his orderly life thrown into chaos when he attends a movie starring the newest screen sensation, the titular Mabelle (who seems compounded of a number of Flapper-era sex bombs of the screen). He quickly becomes obsessed, but then distraught when Mabelle is killed (in some horrible way - we never get the details) and the world moves on. But William finds he cannot, as Mabelle still appears in revivals of her earlier films. There are all kinds of interesting things about this story, For one, the writing style is aggressively modernistic - although this could be seen as problematic, since I couldn't actually determine what happens at the story's climax (which seems to give us two options). For another, this story is very much about the intrusion into the social sphere of films/cinema and their figures, and how strangely magical they are (good description of hushed halls with giant looming figures playing broad emotions as they seem to thrust out at you from the screen) and yet also unhealthily entrancing. Interesting.
"Mrs. Moysey" is another interesting slice of life, in which the titular widow takes in nephew when he returns from Japan. But said nephew is a bit of a shirk a work (and philanderer), although these aspects don't change her routine and protected life that much (rumor in the neighborhood is that she's secretly an imbiber, because there's not much else to build rumors on) - until, when nephew Leslie receives a letter and bolts for London, whereupon sedate Mrs. Moysey has to engage with Emerald, his previously unknown abandoned wife who has come calling, bringing their two children with her. And Mrs. Moysey agrees to watch the children as Emerald continues attempting to track down the deadbeat, and finds her life - well, transformed may be a bit much, but somewhat altered by the new additions, even as on Emerald's return Mrs. Moysey's secret (her REAL secret, if it can be called that) is exposed. Interesting, various level of class stuff and some exquisite writing.
"The Dancing Mistress" gives us a sketch of a dancing class putting on a recital, while we spend a bit more time (before and after), psychologically, with Miss Joyce James (the teacher), her pianist Miss Peel and the male attendant Lulu. Some of the students are accomplished, others are not (clumsy, chubby Margery). Lulu, who will soon be returning to Sweden, has designs on Miss James, which Miss Peel seems aware of, but Miss James is just exhausted and nods off on the trip home in the taxi, following dinner with her two workmates - dreaming, perhaps joyfully, of the passive sadism she has inflicted on Margery that day. Interesting. Modern.
In, "Foothold," we are given a ghost story - but told in a very modernistic and atypical way. Thomas is visiting his good friends Gerard and Janet, who are settling into their new home and grounds. Thomas is very close to them both, and worries about Janet, even as they make him aware of the fact that they've seen a ghost in their house, who they've named Clara (after a resident from the previous century), who really does very little but cause the mistaken impression that Janet has just walked by (so, in a sense, a ghost with almost no personality). This is also an interesting piece - I call it a "sentimental" ghost story mostly just to indicate that it is not "spooky" (or intending to be) when it really is kind of melancholic and sad. The writing, Bowen's style one must say at this point, is Modernistic - closely calculated conversations in which the sense of meaning behind words is more important than what's beings said, clean descriptions of simple actions. I liked it.
"The Cat Jumps" was the story I was most looking forward to, as it seems to be one of the more heavily anthologized of Bowen's work. After a recent, horrific murder (awful detail made the news), no one will buy the home in which it occurred - except someone finally does, the thoroughly modern, rational (everything can be explained by psychiatry and "complexes") and un-superstitious Wrights family (whose patriarch shares a same first name with the now executed killer). Put when they throw a small house-warming party, things slowly begin to sour among the guests, psychologies clash, conflict & consternation reign, and the talk turns to the recent, ugly events... and then everyone heads off to bed... Well, it's a pretty damn nasty story, that brings the reader right up to the edge of suspense and then leaves them, unsettled.
September 16, 2008
This collection of short stories covers the early years,the twenties, and up to the post-war period.Elizabeth Bowen's world is one of uppers class routines, tea in the library, dressing for dinner, country house weekends.But her perceptive clever writing is about human relationships, the underlying feelings and the things that aren't said.In 'Making Arrangements' a deserted husband takes revenge on his wife through her dresses,
"Now looking down, he watched the dresses, tense with readiness to fall upon them if they stirred and pin them down and crush and crush and crush them.If he could unswervingly and unsparingly hold them in his eyes, he would be able to detect their movements, the irrepressible palpitation of that vitality she had infused into them".
Some of the best stories feature children and Elizabeth Bowens talent lies in being able to remember what its like to be a child, the little betrayals by friends, and the sometimes bewildering behavior of adults. 'The Little Girl's Room' about a lonely child who retreats to a strange fantasy world in her bedroom to deal with her 'enemies' is a good example. 'The Visitor' about a young boy whose mother is dying and he can't bear the moment when he will be told the news is a beautiful sad story, but really captures a child in an adults world,
"Roger gazed up into the apple tree. The branches were big and far apart, the bark looked slippery.'I'm afraid' he thought, and tried to drown it.He was a little boy, he was afraid of the pain of death 'I don't dare go up, and I don't dare go back to the house.I must know, I can't let them tell me' It would be as though they saw me see her being killed.Let it not have to be"
The stories from the war years were some of the best, they tell of London in the blitz, lonely squares of bombed out houses contrast with busy cafes full of smoke and chatter.In 'The Happy Autumn fields' a woman lies in her bombed out house dreaming about a long ago family in the countryside, whose scattered photos, diaries and letters lie in the debris around her.In 'Sunday Afternoon' a visitor from London to Ireland brings the realities of the war time London to a group of old friends gathered for a pleasant afternoon. In 'Mysterious Kor" a young couple wander the streets of London on a moonlit night as they have nowhere else to go on his first night of leave, except back to her cramped flat and waiting room-mate.The story in this collection that sticks in my mind the most is 'Ivy Gripped The Steps' a man goes back to visit an overgrown house where he spent his childhood Summers with a seemingly kind widow, who he was vaguely obsessed with, but she was only amusing herself with him like a puppy.Like the ivy on the house, his life and ability to love has been strangulated by his time with her.There are so many brilliant stories in this collection it really is worth dipping into if you like short stories or taking nine months to read it like me! Other stories I liked were 'The Demon Lover' 'The Working Party' and 'Songs My Father Sang Me'.
"Now looking down, he watched the dresses, tense with readiness to fall upon them if they stirred and pin them down and crush and crush and crush them.If he could unswervingly and unsparingly hold them in his eyes, he would be able to detect their movements, the irrepressible palpitation of that vitality she had infused into them".
Some of the best stories feature children and Elizabeth Bowens talent lies in being able to remember what its like to be a child, the little betrayals by friends, and the sometimes bewildering behavior of adults. 'The Little Girl's Room' about a lonely child who retreats to a strange fantasy world in her bedroom to deal with her 'enemies' is a good example. 'The Visitor' about a young boy whose mother is dying and he can't bear the moment when he will be told the news is a beautiful sad story, but really captures a child in an adults world,
"Roger gazed up into the apple tree. The branches were big and far apart, the bark looked slippery.'I'm afraid' he thought, and tried to drown it.He was a little boy, he was afraid of the pain of death 'I don't dare go up, and I don't dare go back to the house.I must know, I can't let them tell me' It would be as though they saw me see her being killed.Let it not have to be"
The stories from the war years were some of the best, they tell of London in the blitz, lonely squares of bombed out houses contrast with busy cafes full of smoke and chatter.In 'The Happy Autumn fields' a woman lies in her bombed out house dreaming about a long ago family in the countryside, whose scattered photos, diaries and letters lie in the debris around her.In 'Sunday Afternoon' a visitor from London to Ireland brings the realities of the war time London to a group of old friends gathered for a pleasant afternoon. In 'Mysterious Kor" a young couple wander the streets of London on a moonlit night as they have nowhere else to go on his first night of leave, except back to her cramped flat and waiting room-mate.The story in this collection that sticks in my mind the most is 'Ivy Gripped The Steps' a man goes back to visit an overgrown house where he spent his childhood Summers with a seemingly kind widow, who he was vaguely obsessed with, but she was only amusing herself with him like a puppy.Like the ivy on the house, his life and ability to love has been strangulated by his time with her.There are so many brilliant stories in this collection it really is worth dipping into if you like short stories or taking nine months to read it like me! Other stories I liked were 'The Demon Lover' 'The Working Party' and 'Songs My Father Sang Me'.
August 29, 2011
I have not read all of the stories in this collection -- I plan to savor them over time. This is a goldmine of beautiful short stories like I have not seen before. Elizabeth Bowen was a master of the short story as well as of longer fiction as well. She was an Anglo-Irish author who lived and wrote through many decades of the 2oth century. She lived through the changes and upheaval of the century and through much distress in her private life also. I can hardly compare her writing with that of anyone else.
This collection is nicely categorized by eras and is filled with such a variety of characters, young and old, ghostly, radical, upper class, lower class, but mostly vulnerable and challenged by changes in some way. Some of the stories feel like a small inner light against a cold world, and some of them simply feel stark, emotional. Most seem to present an insoluble feel that really speaks to all the times of change of the century.
Elizabeth Bowen is probably a very overlooked author.
This collection is nicely categorized by eras and is filled with such a variety of characters, young and old, ghostly, radical, upper class, lower class, but mostly vulnerable and challenged by changes in some way. Some of the stories feel like a small inner light against a cold world, and some of them simply feel stark, emotional. Most seem to present an insoluble feel that really speaks to all the times of change of the century.
Elizabeth Bowen is probably a very overlooked author.
February 12, 2016
Elizabeth Bowen is a genius, evoking place and time and mood - this is the sort of anthology to take along to a desert island. No end to the pleasures.
November 11, 2021
One word: Uninteresting.
August 7, 2025
"Do things like that happen? Could a person go on loving and loving and never be wanted?" (from "The Shadowy Third", 82).
Elizabeth Bowen is one of my favorite authors. She writes in droll language that is at once unassuming, then suddenly out of nowhere, her words pack such a punch.
She is a master of writing multiple themes that all seem different from one another, yet connect so perfectly. From displaced and ambivalent women, to children victimized by boorish adults, and of the supernatural and the macabre- the 78 stories featured in this brick of a book is Madame Bowen's short story oeuvre. And this took me awhile to finish-over 700 pages!
Memorable stories include:
"The Tommy Crans"- a bizarre story about incest.
"The Working Party"- a story about Irish politics set amidst their independence in the 1920s.
"Dead Mabelle" is about a dead actress, and of an obsessed fan who watches her movies alone as if he wishes to bring her back from the dead.
"The Evil That Men Do" is about a married woman about to meet her lover, only to be interrupted by the arrival of her husband at home. She never makes it as her lover is hit by a bus.
"Daffodils" is about a lonely teacher yearning for connection. She attempts to connect with her students by inviting them to her house. When they can't behave themselves, it becomes an awkward power dynamic between she and them.
"The Cat Jumps" is about Jocelyn and Harold, a rich couple who purchase a mansion where a grisly murder has occurred. A man has murdered his wife, and chopped up her body parts in different parts of the house. Undaunted, Jocelyn and Harold throw a housewarming party where they invite their single friends Muriel and Mr. Cartaret.
They hope to set them up as a couple, but Muriel suddenly thinks that Mr. Cartaret might embody the personality of a murderous fiend. She locks everyone in the rooms of the house terrified. This is a macabre and a devilish story of both paranoia and a satire on aristocratic indifference.
"Maria" is the story of a wayward, orphaned girl who falls prey to Mr. Hammond whom she later attempts to expose as lecherous.
"A Walk in the Woods" is about an older woman named Carlotta on a picnic date in the woods with her young boytoy Henry. As they begin to engage in sex, a crone suddenly pops out of the bushes and is a willing voyeur. Carlotta is embarrassed.
The collection includes two of Bowen's best known story masterpieces, the ones I read back in college:
"Summer Night" is a lurid, cinematic masterpiece of love gone wrong. The story begins off dramatically where a woman named Emma is driving to the home of her lover Robinson. They know that their affair is about to end. It begins with Emma hysterically driving to a hotel needing to speak to Robinson on the telephone, and the events that unfold.
We meet the oddball characters in Robinson's home: There's Justin, who is gay and is attracted to Robinson. There's a deaf woman, dear Aunt Fran, and Queenie. The story is about Emma and Robinson trying to hold on to one another as the anxiety of World War II looms, and the existential dread that the world's coming to an end.
"The Demon Lover" is one of the most perfect stories ever.
It's about Kathleen Drover, a woman who returns to her abandoned home after being bombed during the Blitz. She finds a letter she left behind years ago that was written by her lover K, asking her to meet him.
Although he's probably dead, she is intrigued by the possibility of seeing him again, "that unnatural promise drive down between her and the rest of all human kind. No other way of having given herself could have made her feel so apart, lost" (Bowen 664).
As Kathleen leaves and hails a taxi, "the aperture driver and passenger, remained an eternity eye to eye...Mrs. Drover's mouth hung open for some seconds before she could issue her first scream" (Bowen 666- what a COINCIDENCE!) we come to find that Kathleen Drover either is face to face with a psycho taxi driver off to dispatch and murder her- or is it the ghost of K come back to life in the form of the taxi driver? It's an unnerving, chilling end. It’s one of ambivalence and something leading to violence, a perfect metaphor of war disillusionment.
Some of the stories in this collection shows Bowen's penchant in writing about isolation and loneliness, and of characters who may or not be closeted. There are overtones of LGBTQ angst and stories that seem to embody psychological inner turmoil towards society at large especially when experiencing a worldwide crisis such as World War 2.
Many of her stories begin with rich, textured imagery that establishes either city life or bucolic settings. Then it delves into the actions of each character, always in motion. Whether eating, walking about, gossiping, or wistfully idle- her characters all come to life with rich texture that demands attention.
I can see how other great British women writers such as Iris Murdoch, Ali Smith, and Beryl Bainbridge were influenced by Elizabeth Bowen in their own work. This is truly, a magnificent collection of one of the Bloomsbury Circle's most underrated Modernists.
Elizabeth Bowen is one of my favorite authors. She writes in droll language that is at once unassuming, then suddenly out of nowhere, her words pack such a punch.
She is a master of writing multiple themes that all seem different from one another, yet connect so perfectly. From displaced and ambivalent women, to children victimized by boorish adults, and of the supernatural and the macabre- the 78 stories featured in this brick of a book is Madame Bowen's short story oeuvre. And this took me awhile to finish-over 700 pages!
Memorable stories include:
"The Tommy Crans"- a bizarre story about incest.
"The Working Party"- a story about Irish politics set amidst their independence in the 1920s.
"Dead Mabelle" is about a dead actress, and of an obsessed fan who watches her movies alone as if he wishes to bring her back from the dead.
"The Evil That Men Do" is about a married woman about to meet her lover, only to be interrupted by the arrival of her husband at home. She never makes it as her lover is hit by a bus.
"Daffodils" is about a lonely teacher yearning for connection. She attempts to connect with her students by inviting them to her house. When they can't behave themselves, it becomes an awkward power dynamic between she and them.
"The Cat Jumps" is about Jocelyn and Harold, a rich couple who purchase a mansion where a grisly murder has occurred. A man has murdered his wife, and chopped up her body parts in different parts of the house. Undaunted, Jocelyn and Harold throw a housewarming party where they invite their single friends Muriel and Mr. Cartaret.
They hope to set them up as a couple, but Muriel suddenly thinks that Mr. Cartaret might embody the personality of a murderous fiend. She locks everyone in the rooms of the house terrified. This is a macabre and a devilish story of both paranoia and a satire on aristocratic indifference.
"Maria" is the story of a wayward, orphaned girl who falls prey to Mr. Hammond whom she later attempts to expose as lecherous.
"A Walk in the Woods" is about an older woman named Carlotta on a picnic date in the woods with her young boytoy Henry. As they begin to engage in sex, a crone suddenly pops out of the bushes and is a willing voyeur. Carlotta is embarrassed.
The collection includes two of Bowen's best known story masterpieces, the ones I read back in college:
"Summer Night" is a lurid, cinematic masterpiece of love gone wrong. The story begins off dramatically where a woman named Emma is driving to the home of her lover Robinson. They know that their affair is about to end. It begins with Emma hysterically driving to a hotel needing to speak to Robinson on the telephone, and the events that unfold.
We meet the oddball characters in Robinson's home: There's Justin, who is gay and is attracted to Robinson. There's a deaf woman, dear Aunt Fran, and Queenie. The story is about Emma and Robinson trying to hold on to one another as the anxiety of World War II looms, and the existential dread that the world's coming to an end.
"The Demon Lover" is one of the most perfect stories ever.
It's about Kathleen Drover, a woman who returns to her abandoned home after being bombed during the Blitz. She finds a letter she left behind years ago that was written by her lover K, asking her to meet him.
Although he's probably dead, she is intrigued by the possibility of seeing him again, "that unnatural promise drive down between her and the rest of all human kind. No other way of having given herself could have made her feel so apart, lost" (Bowen 664).
As Kathleen leaves and hails a taxi, "the aperture driver and passenger, remained an eternity eye to eye...Mrs. Drover's mouth hung open for some seconds before she could issue her first scream" (Bowen 666- what a COINCIDENCE!) we come to find that Kathleen Drover either is face to face with a psycho taxi driver off to dispatch and murder her- or is it the ghost of K come back to life in the form of the taxi driver? It's an unnerving, chilling end. It’s one of ambivalence and something leading to violence, a perfect metaphor of war disillusionment.
Some of the stories in this collection shows Bowen's penchant in writing about isolation and loneliness, and of characters who may or not be closeted. There are overtones of LGBTQ angst and stories that seem to embody psychological inner turmoil towards society at large especially when experiencing a worldwide crisis such as World War 2.
Many of her stories begin with rich, textured imagery that establishes either city life or bucolic settings. Then it delves into the actions of each character, always in motion. Whether eating, walking about, gossiping, or wistfully idle- her characters all come to life with rich texture that demands attention.
I can see how other great British women writers such as Iris Murdoch, Ali Smith, and Beryl Bainbridge were influenced by Elizabeth Bowen in their own work. This is truly, a magnificent collection of one of the Bloomsbury Circle's most underrated Modernists.
May 7, 2025
In my review of Silas Marner, I said that in art, you could make nearly anything work if you do it well enough.
My first encounter with Bowen makes me glad I said 'nearly'.
When I start reading a book, I can tell quickly if I like an author. I used to push through initial distaste, giving a highly regarded author or work a chance to improve on initial acquaintance. However, I was so rarely rewarded for this perseverance, that I eventually learned to just trust my initial impression - trust there was more to it than me just 'making a snap judgement'.
Nowadays, if I encounter something about a book I find offputting enough, I just stop right there on the spot. It may only take a page, or in a dire literary strait, as little as a single sentence - but there are many books to read, and life is short. Certainly too short to force myself to read fiction I don't like.
So, I mention all this to say: I broke my rule with Bowen.
Within half a page, I started to feel that here was an author I would not like. I immediately noticed a contemptuous quality, a bitterness to the writing that felt ominous, and so I put the book down. But I was drawn back in by the hagiography on the back of the book - in retrospect no more than the usual veneration accorded anyone who gets a Classic publication - and so I tried one more time.
Further confusing experiences rewarded my misguided optimism. The fact is that Bowen, even early in her writing career, was *brilliant* - an absolutely *superb* writer. Her gift for rendering full-featured characterisation almost instantly is astounding - a few strokes suffice for her to create a vivid image. She can create a story of deep weave in very short spaces of text.
But what felt to me like a bitterness of spirit, never left my vision - even through the three whole stories I read in this compilation.
Stories of small, unpleasant interactions, private contempts, lives lived in the ruined husks of potential better lives. Endless sneering, in all directions. I stopped at the end of the third story because I felt genuinely queasy, like a thin film of grease had been smeared on my own life.
So, yes - there are some works of art, I am sad to find, that cannot be made whole by the sheer force of the artist's talents.
My first encounter with Bowen makes me glad I said 'nearly'.
When I start reading a book, I can tell quickly if I like an author. I used to push through initial distaste, giving a highly regarded author or work a chance to improve on initial acquaintance. However, I was so rarely rewarded for this perseverance, that I eventually learned to just trust my initial impression - trust there was more to it than me just 'making a snap judgement'.
Nowadays, if I encounter something about a book I find offputting enough, I just stop right there on the spot. It may only take a page, or in a dire literary strait, as little as a single sentence - but there are many books to read, and life is short. Certainly too short to force myself to read fiction I don't like.
So, I mention all this to say: I broke my rule with Bowen.
Within half a page, I started to feel that here was an author I would not like. I immediately noticed a contemptuous quality, a bitterness to the writing that felt ominous, and so I put the book down. But I was drawn back in by the hagiography on the back of the book - in retrospect no more than the usual veneration accorded anyone who gets a Classic publication - and so I tried one more time.
Further confusing experiences rewarded my misguided optimism. The fact is that Bowen, even early in her writing career, was *brilliant* - an absolutely *superb* writer. Her gift for rendering full-featured characterisation almost instantly is astounding - a few strokes suffice for her to create a vivid image. She can create a story of deep weave in very short spaces of text.
But what felt to me like a bitterness of spirit, never left my vision - even through the three whole stories I read in this compilation.
Stories of small, unpleasant interactions, private contempts, lives lived in the ruined husks of potential better lives. Endless sneering, in all directions. I stopped at the end of the third story because I felt genuinely queasy, like a thin film of grease had been smeared on my own life.
So, yes - there are some works of art, I am sad to find, that cannot be made whole by the sheer force of the artist's talents.
May 3, 2023
GEMS EXEMPLARY
It has been a long slow pleasure to read through this collection of 79 stories spanning four decades and 860 pages. If you are a Bowen fan you will know what to expect; if not, you really won't! Her style here in the short form is not very different from that of her novels. She still delivers her sentences in a strong, crisp, eternally unpredictable way. In a review of one of her books I labelled her "Virginia Woolf with muscles." That is still true here, although her muscles are generally not quite so strong in a sprint as they are over the full distance.
Reading these stories in chronological order pointed up the development of her skills. She hit her stride in the 1920s and reached her peak in the thirties. The war years seem to have diminished her focus a little, hardly surprising I suppose, although her gift for atmosphere and strangeness intensifies a little through this time. The eerie and supernatural feature regularly but not too frequently.
In the penultimate story she goes back to the early twentieth century for her setting, and it carries an almost Victorian feel of 'classic' mystery and social tension.
But really you can read almost anything from her best decades and find highly skilled deployment of characters, setting and mood. The most outstanding stories include 'Ann Lee's', 'Charity', 'The Tommy Crans', 'The Disinherited' and 'Maria'; and 'The Needlecase' is one of the most beautiful, perfectly constructed pieces of short fiction you are ever likely to encounter.
This book has been a comfort at my bedside for many months now, quietly cheering me with the assurance of treats still to come; so I am a little sad to have that comfort missing now, at least for a while. But I don't think it will be too long until I return to some of these exemplary gems once more.
It has been a long slow pleasure to read through this collection of 79 stories spanning four decades and 860 pages. If you are a Bowen fan you will know what to expect; if not, you really won't! Her style here in the short form is not very different from that of her novels. She still delivers her sentences in a strong, crisp, eternally unpredictable way. In a review of one of her books I labelled her "Virginia Woolf with muscles." That is still true here, although her muscles are generally not quite so strong in a sprint as they are over the full distance.
Reading these stories in chronological order pointed up the development of her skills. She hit her stride in the 1920s and reached her peak in the thirties. The war years seem to have diminished her focus a little, hardly surprising I suppose, although her gift for atmosphere and strangeness intensifies a little through this time. The eerie and supernatural feature regularly but not too frequently.
In the penultimate story she goes back to the early twentieth century for her setting, and it carries an almost Victorian feel of 'classic' mystery and social tension.
But really you can read almost anything from her best decades and find highly skilled deployment of characters, setting and mood. The most outstanding stories include 'Ann Lee's', 'Charity', 'The Tommy Crans', 'The Disinherited' and 'Maria'; and 'The Needlecase' is one of the most beautiful, perfectly constructed pieces of short fiction you are ever likely to encounter.
This book has been a comfort at my bedside for many months now, quietly cheering me with the assurance of treats still to come; so I am a little sad to have that comfort missing now, at least for a while. But I don't think it will be too long until I return to some of these exemplary gems once more.
September 29, 2021
SUMMARY - 6+ books in one, which offers a panoramic journey through the Irish-English mindset in the second quarter of the twentieth century.
There is nothing short about this collection, which is an omnibus of six complete short story collections, plus selected post-war gleanings. Despite it's doorstop 900-page heft, it wad a joy to read. The language is not overtly 'popular', and I ended up with a reasonable list of unfamiliar words. A golden sticker to anyone who could have told me what a marabout or galantine are. However, Bowen is not unnecessarily florid, and deftly describes the atmospheric settings for her micro-dramas.
The impact of cinema on interwar writing is probably the subject of substantial literature in its own right. Certainly Bowen's writing was illuminated at times by the arcs and incandescents on contemporary film, with transitions and extreme close-ups that called to mind a night at the flicks. As on screen, Bowen's figures are often antagonised, enchanted or compromised by others, which throws their lives off balance. Unlike film, however, few take the heroic stand of stars and starlets. Instead we find men, women and children casting round for approval and support from others.
Many of the stories focus on the lives of children, and Bowen's background meant that we often get an upstairs-downstairs view of well-to-do lives, mired in interwar trivialities (shopping, moving house, affairs), before they take a darker turn as the clouds of war threaten. The mix of domestic tedium (from the first story set at a breakfast table) to life-altering London Blitz (where homes are broken physically and psychologically) traces a nation's emotional preoccupations.
The breadth from <1923 (Encounters) to the 1950s means we get an historical panorama, besides the intrinsic quality of Bowen's short story writing. Both are fascinating, and the latter exemplary with only a few (usually I thought post-war) stories that I found less compelling, perhaps because Bowen felt a compulsion to innovate. I cannot though really fault Bowen, and the stories captured my attention and admiration to the last.
There is nothing short about this collection, which is an omnibus of six complete short story collections, plus selected post-war gleanings. Despite it's doorstop 900-page heft, it wad a joy to read. The language is not overtly 'popular', and I ended up with a reasonable list of unfamiliar words. A golden sticker to anyone who could have told me what a marabout or galantine are. However, Bowen is not unnecessarily florid, and deftly describes the atmospheric settings for her micro-dramas.
The impact of cinema on interwar writing is probably the subject of substantial literature in its own right. Certainly Bowen's writing was illuminated at times by the arcs and incandescents on contemporary film, with transitions and extreme close-ups that called to mind a night at the flicks. As on screen, Bowen's figures are often antagonised, enchanted or compromised by others, which throws their lives off balance. Unlike film, however, few take the heroic stand of stars and starlets. Instead we find men, women and children casting round for approval and support from others.
Many of the stories focus on the lives of children, and Bowen's background meant that we often get an upstairs-downstairs view of well-to-do lives, mired in interwar trivialities (shopping, moving house, affairs), before they take a darker turn as the clouds of war threaten. The mix of domestic tedium (from the first story set at a breakfast table) to life-altering London Blitz (where homes are broken physically and psychologically) traces a nation's emotional preoccupations.
The breadth from <1923 (Encounters) to the 1950s means we get an historical panorama, besides the intrinsic quality of Bowen's short story writing. Both are fascinating, and the latter exemplary with only a few (usually I thought post-war) stories that I found less compelling, perhaps because Bowen felt a compulsion to innovate. I cannot though really fault Bowen, and the stories captured my attention and admiration to the last.
February 24, 2025
I have been getting through this collection for such a length of time that there’s something quite nostalgic about finally finishing it… Waking up to make a cup of coffee and reading a short story before I start the day has been such a regular part of my routine that I am truly going to miss it. Bowen’s short stories are actually SHORT - probably ten pages on average - which makes them ideal to have a quick look at once a day. I absolutely loved them.
While Bowen’s novels are getting increasing attention from critics/readers, her short stories still do not get the recognition they deserve. I cannot understate how brilliant, readable yet complex, diverse but cohesive these are. Bowen knew just how to raise enough questions in her reader’s mind, leave them intrigued and thoughtful but not overly frustrated.
Some of my personal favourites (to name just a few!) were ‘Ann Lee’s’, ‘The Cat Jumps’, ‘Look at All Those Roses’, ‘Pink May’ and ‘Hand in Glove’. This collection, which I highly recommend to scholars of Bowen too, feels like entering the writer’s mind and familiarising oneself with her « addictions » - ghosts, houses (a LOT of houses), traumatic pasts, love affairs, murders, orphans and aunts…
Of course in such a huge collection (there are about 80 titles), some inevitably spoke more to me than others; but this does not minimise the richness, depth, beauty and fun of the majority. I cannot recommend them enough!
While Bowen’s novels are getting increasing attention from critics/readers, her short stories still do not get the recognition they deserve. I cannot understate how brilliant, readable yet complex, diverse but cohesive these are. Bowen knew just how to raise enough questions in her reader’s mind, leave them intrigued and thoughtful but not overly frustrated.
Some of my personal favourites (to name just a few!) were ‘Ann Lee’s’, ‘The Cat Jumps’, ‘Look at All Those Roses’, ‘Pink May’ and ‘Hand in Glove’. This collection, which I highly recommend to scholars of Bowen too, feels like entering the writer’s mind and familiarising oneself with her « addictions » - ghosts, houses (a LOT of houses), traumatic pasts, love affairs, murders, orphans and aunts…
Of course in such a huge collection (there are about 80 titles), some inevitably spoke more to me than others; but this does not minimise the richness, depth, beauty and fun of the majority. I cannot recommend them enough!
February 18, 2021
Quote from the 'The Shadowy Third':
"The maid came in to say supper was ready, and they went into the dining-room. Here the curtains were undrawn and they could see the lights twinkling out in the windows of the other houses. He often felt as though those windows were watching him; their gaze was hostile, full of comment and criticism. The sound of the wind among the bushes in the garden was like whispered comparisons."
Why have so many writers struggled to convey the tedium and oppression of suburbia when it was already done to perfection around a century ago in the final sentence of that paragraph?
And here's a nice snatch of dialogue from 'Songs My Father Sang Me':
"Peace," he said. "Look hard at it; don't forget it."
"What's peace?" I said.
"An idea you have when there's a war on, to make you fight well. An idea that gets lost when there isn't a war."
And to finish off with, this gem in the final paragraph of 'Hand in Glove':
"In the end, the matter was hushed up - which is to say, is still talked about even now."
"The maid came in to say supper was ready, and they went into the dining-room. Here the curtains were undrawn and they could see the lights twinkling out in the windows of the other houses. He often felt as though those windows were watching him; their gaze was hostile, full of comment and criticism. The sound of the wind among the bushes in the garden was like whispered comparisons."
Why have so many writers struggled to convey the tedium and oppression of suburbia when it was already done to perfection around a century ago in the final sentence of that paragraph?
And here's a nice snatch of dialogue from 'Songs My Father Sang Me':
"Peace," he said. "Look hard at it; don't forget it."
"What's peace?" I said.
"An idea you have when there's a war on, to make you fight well. An idea that gets lost when there isn't a war."
And to finish off with, this gem in the final paragraph of 'Hand in Glove':
"In the end, the matter was hushed up - which is to say, is still talked about even now."
December 5, 2020
I am going to mark this as read. Have about 13 stories left. But I will be reading them over time. I love her descriptions .. clothes, fashion, attitudes, natural scenes, events. Some of my favorite stories in the large collection. A Queer Heart, The Girl with the Stoop, The Cassowary, Shoes: An International Episode, The Man of the Family, Breakfast, Recent Photograph, The Parrot (maybe my fave), The Contessina.. and many more. oh.. also.. Coming Home ..
"Teresa lit the two oil-lamps under their dark pink shades. Mrs. Massey, one hand on her drawing-room mantelpiece, swayed with the noble naturalness of a tree. Her form , above a smoulder of peat fire, was reflected in a mirror between the two dark windows- a mirror that ran from ceiling to floor."
"Teresa lit the two oil-lamps under their dark pink shades. Mrs. Massey, one hand on her drawing-room mantelpiece, swayed with the noble naturalness of a tree. Her form , above a smoulder of peat fire, was reflected in a mirror between the two dark windows- a mirror that ran from ceiling to floor."
November 3, 2021
It took me a year to read this, in bursts. Every time I dipped in I enjoyed the beauty of the writing, the acuteness of the observations, the originality of the descriptions. But in most cases, as soon as the short stories got interesting, they ended. Often abruptly. A few others never really took flight. I'm fine with that on occasion - I don't need a bowtie or twist at the end each time. But it begins to grate when it's repeated for 860 pages.
I'm still very glad I read all of this, and I can see myself returning to individual stories again in the future (but never to the whole collection). Now that I have been introduced to her excellent writing, I will follow the advice of many other reviewers and look into her novels.
I'm still very glad I read all of this, and I can see myself returning to individual stories again in the future (but never to the whole collection). Now that I have been introduced to her excellent writing, I will follow the advice of many other reviewers and look into her novels.
October 7, 2020
Beautifully written, rather depressing literary short stories about people and life between the world wars in England and Ireland. I had thought, mistakenly as it turns out, that I was getting ghost stories since she wrote those as well. "The Demon Lover" is utterly chilling and there are ghostly elements in some of the other stories, but the other stories were mostly not my jam, hence the lower number of stars. You might like her more literary work if you're a fan of precursors to Shirley Jackson, perhaps, but she doesn't have quite the same edge. Interesting slice of life, vivid descriptions, lovely writing, however.
January 20, 2018
These short stories were very detailed and pretty interesting. Every time I took a second to think I was amazed at how delicate and fragile the writing seemed and how detailed it was. Elizabeth Bowen was a talented writer. I could imagine these stories weren’t stories but real people experiencing real things. But they were just stories. Are they? Is there a such thing as just a story?
November 25, 2022
I had read that she had written very good ghost stories, but I couldn't find a volume that carried them all. I bought this book instead, and I'm very glad I did. She has a very lyrical way of writing that is not pretentious or too much. Her characters live. Her stories are good. I was never bored reading the 780+ pages of this paperback.
May 25, 2020
I will revisit this book ...over the course of time.
Not in the mood for short stories at the moment.
Reading is a hit and miss activity
in the time of a Corona crisis.
79 short stories in 5 sections
Part 1:
Favorites: The Return, Requiescat, Lunch and The Shadowy Third
Not in the mood for short stories at the moment.
Reading is a hit and miss activity
in the time of a Corona crisis.
79 short stories in 5 sections
Part 1:
Favorites: The Return, Requiescat, Lunch and The Shadowy Third
May 16, 2022
These are not so much short stories as slices of life, miniatures, but excellently executed. Impressive precise style in which each word counts, making it a bit tiresome for a non native speaker if you try to read too many of them in one go. I read the earliest section of 1910-20. To be continued.
April 28, 2023
Well I didn’t quite finish. I picked through the stories and read quite a few but there are a lot and they began to feel a bit the same. It’s due back at the library so I’ll return it and maybe borrow another time.
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