A Girl at the Tiller

by Geoffrey Lewis

With the outbreak of peace in 1945, life on the Grand Union Canal seems fit to settle back into its steady pre-war pattern -but change is on the way! With a Labour government, the prospect of nationalisation brings hopes of new investment, better maintenance, for the canals; but before that can happen, the winter of 1947, the big freeze, strikes... In this sequel to A Boy Off The Bank, the familiar characters of Michaeland Ginny, Alby Baker, and other boating families- the Hanneys, the Caplins -continue their lives in peacetime Britain, plying their trade despite the deteriorating state of the waterways. And new faces appear, one of whom is to have a greater impact on the crew of the Sycamore and the Antrim than they could ever guess... The pleasures and hardships of a working life on the canals, the occasional joy or tragedy, from the backdrop of a deeply human tale in which the reader becomes enmeshed in the lives of his characters.

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Geoffrey Lewis was an English Turkologist and the first professor of Turkish at the University of Oxford. He is known as the author of Teach Yourself Turkish and academic books about Turkish and Turkey.

Lewis was born in London in 1920 and educated at University College School and St John's College, Oxford (MA 1945, DPhil 1950; James Mew Arabic Scholar, 1947).

At St John's College Lewis initially studied Classics. With the outbreak of the Second World War, he served from 1940 to 1945 as a radar operator in the Royal Air Force. Posted primarily in Libya and Egypt, he taught himself Turkish through local Turkish acquaintances, from the Turkish newspaper Yedi Gün available in Cairo, and from Turkish translations of English classics sent to him by his wife. He returned to Oxford in 1945 with his newly acquired interest in Turkish and on the advice of H. A. R. Gibb took a second BA degree in Arabic and Persian as groundwork for Ottoman Turkish, which he finished with first-class honours (not achieved in this double subject since Anthony Eden in 1922) in just two years. He spent six months in Turkey before pursuing his doctoral work on a medieval Arabic philosophical treatise at St John's College.

Turkish was not taught at Oxford before Lewis was appointed to his academic post in 1950; it was through his efforts that it became established in the Oxford syllabus of Oriental studies by 1964.

Reviews

[Rikki]

The second in the series, this is both better written and has a better storyline than "A Boy off the Bank" which actually had me wondering how the "villain" - who believes she is doing good - would be defeated. The nuance of good people doing bad things (lying) and bad people doing good things (attempting to prevent child abuse) has timeless quality and one wonders how many of today's social workers have the tenecity (and short sightedness) of the villain of the book.

That said, the over sugared geniality of some of the characters continues. This is still a polemic for the goodness of the boaters that is a bit too nice to be believeable. I'd have preferred a bit more gritty reality. At least this time the "true" character of nurse Sister (Amos) Mary WARD BME was worth introducing as she's a true hero of mine. My Gt Aunt was awarded the Croise de Guerre after WW1 for similar unqualified work.

[Georgiana Betty]

Loved this one. Much more fluid that the first and had me on the edge of my seat at times.

[Malachi Jones]

The second book in the series. Much the same ilk as the original book. The continuation of, by now, well-known characters are followed through into the post war years, set against a backdrop of the nationalisation of the working boats.

Well written and the language and accents of the boat people are faithfully reproduced.