The Ginger Griffin

by Ann Bridge

The author of the $10,000 Atlantic Prize Novel Peking Picnic-- one of the big successes of 1932-- has again chosen China for the setting of her story.Amber Harrison wanted to get away from England and a shattered romance. An invitation from her uncle in Peking offered the opportunity, and the Grant-Howard family, just assigned to the embassy in Peking, offered escort on the long P. & O. voyage. In Peking, Amber was thrown into the middle of Chino-European society, diplomatic and commercial-- people who worked harder at their pastimes than at their desks. Horses, racing, steeplechasing, furnished the chief interests. Outside the compound with its cocktail parties and flirtations lay the China of old with its exquiste temples, its russet plains and a people whose endurance was superior to famine and banditry."Most girls leave Peking engaged, generally to the wrong man, and nearly all women leave it with a broken heart." Amber's curiosity led her into dangerous places. She explored the Temple of Heaven, and she also explored-- though unwittingly-- the secret places in the affections of three diplomats.

Genres: China

Paperback

First published May 1, 1934

About the author

Mid twentieth-century novelist [real name, Mary Anne O'Malley] who began by exploiting the milieu of the British Foreign Office community in Peking, China, where she lived for two years with her diplomat husband. Her novels combine courtship plots with vividly-realised settings and demure social satire.

She went on to write novels which take as the background of their protagonists' emotional lives a serious investigation of modern historical developments (such as the leap by which Turkey progressed from a feudal-style government to become a modern republic in which women enjoyed equality of rights and equality of opportunity).

Ann Bridge also wrote thrillers centred on a female amateur detective, travel books, and family memoirs.

Reviews

[Tania · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5*

It started slow, but picked up towards the end.

[Falynn - the TyGrammarSaurus Rex · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved Illyrian Spring, so thought I'd try another of Ann Bridge's novels.

It was very interesting to see how different and yet how similar they are. Amber is much younger than Grace and recovering for a broken heart, rather than working out who she is now her children are grown. But both women are looking for meaning and purpose and, more than that, understanding. In their own ways , they are trying to figure out who they are and why they are, and how to live with that. And they both develop their ideas through interactions with others who are seeking their own answers to the same questions.

I really enjoyed this one, although not quite as much as Grace's story. The only disappointment was then ending, which felt rather sudden and too "neat". Amber's final actions feel... not "mercenary", that's not the right word, but perhaps cold-hearted, which feels out of character from who she is in the rest of the novel.

But everyone knows that a "romance" has to end with a wedding, and perhaps there's a cultural difference in 80 years which doesn't quite connect with how we (or I) see things now. (Although most of the rest of the philosophy behind both books seems to hold up pretty well to me.)

Well worth a read though, regardless of the above, and paints a vivid picture of Europeans in China in the 1930s, which is fascinating in its own right.

[Paul Cornelius · Rating 2 out of 5]

A 22 year old teenager, Amber Harrison, runs away from a failed love affair in England to pursue a new life in Peking. The 22 year old "teenager" is precisely that, because of her immaturity and lack of experience. The trouble is that I'm not sure that the author is really all that much more mature. For the gist of this book, Love and Horses, is brought off with such a narcissistic air that it seems Ann Bridge must share the perspective in her own life, not just her work. It's there on every page, the obsession with the confined and limited society of the Legation Quarter in Peking, where the Chinese themselves only appear as ghostly servants and toilers in the most hated occupations. Ann Bridge, say the reviews, was a "gentle satirist." But the satire in this work (there is some throughout perhaps the first third of the book) is so gentle as to be non-existent. And it eventually turns into heavy-handed philosophies of love, poetry, and horses.

While in Peking, Amber, of course, falls in love with yet another man, 32 year old Rupert of the British Legation. Rupert moons around himself because of a failed love affair and writes a considerable amount of bad poetry. Meanwhile, Amber finds a father figure in Nugent Grant-Howard who, along with his wife, Joanna, try to give some direction to the young woman's life. The advice Nugent provides could not consist of more useless bromides if he tried. Words from Nugent would not have been out of place on Father Knows Best. All of it is so self-obsessed and trite. And all of it going on against a background of warlords, Chinese ruins, and horses.

A few times it seems something interesting may arise. A visit to the Ming Tombs, for example. Or an exploration of the Forbidden City. But such activities soon turn to Amber's main interest in life, horses. Yes, China is caught in the grip of battling warlords, maneuvering armies, and foreign threats. But, yes, horses. Then Nugent and Joanna's annoying young boy, "Little Dickie," manages to come down with scarlet fever and diphtheria at the same time. Sadness ensues--at least for me--as he has a miraculous recovery. Then, more horses. Finally, Amber's latest love affair comes to a crashing end, a monumental disaster. But it's all resolved with--more horses. By the end, you know more about the horses than you do Amber or anyone else. The Ginger Griffin ends up being the most horse obsessed novel I've seen since My Friend Flicka.

Note: a "griffin" is a newcomer to Peking, or so I've read. Here the term applies to one of Amber's horses and Amber herself, as she is red haired and resembles the horse.

[Dianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best of 1934. Ann Bridge's foray into Peking and diplomatic circles, horseflesh, young love and old, society and glancing on world events. The writing is lush, smart and rich throughout, alas trailing off like a lost thought at the last, but better for the journey. No one writes like this now. Shame.

[Kate Thorne · Rating 4 out of 5]

How to fall in love - passionately or wisely? A wonderful story set in the non-diplomatic British colony of China pre-1937.