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Lady Into Fox

by David Garnett

3.72 · Rating details · 588 Ratings · 91 Reviews

The Tebricks, a charming and upstanding young couple, have moved to Oxfordshire to begin their married life, happily unaware of the future awaiting them. When Sylvia turns suddenly into a fox their fortunes are changed forever, despite all of her strenuous attempts to adhere to the proprieties of her upbringing and resist the feral instincts of her current form. Increasing ...more

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Paperback, 112 pages

Published February 1st 2009 by Hesperus Press (first published 1922)

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Lists with This Book

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

Bartleby, the Scrivener by Herman Melville

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Hesperus Classics

176 books — 21 voters

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May 24, 2015 Paul rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: bloomsbury

A very odd little novella. It was written by David Garnett, part of the Bloomsbury scene as a result of his affair with Duncan Grant. It was written in 1922 after they had broken up and was dedicated to Grant. It won the James Tait Black prize and the Hawthornden prize. The woodcuts in the original were by Garnett’s then wife Rachel. Later in life Garnett married Angelica Bell, daughter of Vanessa Bell.
The story is a simple one; a fable or fairy tale. Richard Tebricks marries Silvia Fox and the A very odd little novella. It was written by David Garnett, part of the Bloomsbury scene as a result of his affair with Duncan Grant. It was written in 1922 after they had broken up and was dedicated to Grant. It won the James Tait Black prize and the Hawthornden prize. The woodcuts in the original were by Garnett’s then wife Rachel. Later in life Garnett married Angelica Bell, daughter of Vanessa Bell.
The story is a simple one; a fable or fairy tale. Richard Tebricks marries Silvia Fox and they are happy. One day whilst walking in the woods Mrs Tebricks turns into a fox. After the initial shock (on both sides!) Mr Tebricks continues to look after and care for his wife. He dismisses the servants and shoots the dogs and devotes his time to his wife. Initially little changes, his wife eats the same things, plays cards; he dresses her in altered clothes and it’s all very odd.
Imperceptibly things begin to change. Mrs Tebricks becomes less comfortable with clothing, chases the ducks near the pond, her eating habits begin to change and she begins to look at their pet dove in a hungry way. All of these changes grieve Mr Tebricks who does not comprehend the growing desire to be wild, but he adapts.
As time goes on, nature takes its course and the fox becomes feral and leaves the home. Mr Tebricks descends into depression, curses God and his fate and searches the countryside for his wife. His wife turns up at the door one day and leads him to an earth where she has cubs. He finds a new lease of life playing with the cubs for some months; despite inevitable jealousy about his wife having found a dog fox. Some time is also spent avoiding the local hunts and the ending is inevitable and tragic.
The novella was written only seven years after Kafka’s Metamorphosis. It lends itself to many interpretations. It could be a paean to the enduring power of love; a fable with the moral being that if you love someone you must set them free; a controlled and rather straightjacketed masculinity trying to cope with a wilder untamed femininity; a tale about how convention can restrict and constrain; a warning about how relationships are never static and subject to change in one of the parties that might mean their destruction; don’t hold onto something when you know it is over. And so on. It may, of course, also be reflection on Garnett’s relationship with Duncan Grant.
...more

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Nov 02, 2009 Weinz rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Only the son of that dirty whore Constance Garnett could write a book so good yet so wrong at the same time.

Its allegorical message was, at times, telling my own story. I felt as though he knew women. The more I read the more I felt connected to everything he was saying. He knew. He knew women and he had it right. I started envying the relationship he must have with his wife. He knew. Not only was he describing every relationship I have ever had with men but he knew what it felt like to be me i ...more

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Jul 06, 2015 Lynne King rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: bloomsbury-group, 2015-books-to-read

His vixen had at once sprung into Mr Tebrick’s arms, and before he could turn back the hounds were upon them, and had pulled them down. Then at that moment there was a scream of despair heard by all the field that had come up, which they declared afterwards was more like a woman’s voice than a man’s. But there was no clear proof whether it was Mr Tebrick or his wife who had suddenly regained her voice. When the huntsman who had leapt the wall got to them and had whipped off the hounds, Mr Tebri His vixen had at once sprung into Mr Tebrick’s arms, and before he could turn back the hounds were upon them, and had pulled them down. Then at that moment there was a scream of despair heard by all the field that had come up, which they declared afterwards was more like a woman’s voice than a man’s. But there was no clear proof whether it was Mr Tebrick or his wife who had suddenly regained her voice. When the huntsman who had leapt the wall got to them and had whipped off the hounds, Mr Tebrick had been terribly mauled and was bleeding from twenty wounds...

As soon as I saw Paul’s review https://www.goodreads.com/review/show..., I knew that I had to read this book. Why you may ask? Well I am an avid Bloomsbury Group lover and have been for over two decades. We are dealing with a group of individuals here who were quite unique to our life on earth, be it as novelists, painters, economists, etc. They had it all – they were avant-garde; the forerunners of our modern society today! These individuals were dreamers, romantics, they lived for the present, they saw a world that they could change and they did try. The paintings of Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant continue to this effect, as do the literary works of Virginia Wolf, Lytton Strachey, the economist Maynard Keynes and the outsiders in the group such as Aldous Huxley. A world that I wish I could have been a part of. A truly golden era and one that I’m so proud that I stumbled across through a rather erudite friend. He didn’t think that I would take to all of these works but I did indeed like a duck to water. I have read so many biographies on these iconic and yet mesmerizing individuals. Never to be forgotten in fact. They lived for their beliefs, be it as conscientious objectors after the First World War but also they created a remarkable, invigorating presence that lives on today.

As for this work. Well how does one interpret it? It is dedicated to David Garnett’s former lover Duncan Grant who had shared a house with Vanessa Bell for many years, in fact until her death. She knew Duncan’s sexual inclinations, was prepared to put up with it, she even had a child by him called Angelica, who subsequently married David (Bunny) Garnett. Duncan Grant being the father. All very convoluted I must confess but it appeared to suit them. The value of love has different levels with certain individuals and Vanessa was known as the mother figure, very wise and with a sister, Virginia, who had a very nervous disposition. They all got on very well indeed!

I really cannot imagine why Bunny dedicated this book to Duncan. It was a very strange relationship. Bunny was heterosexual but felt sorry for Duncan and so went along with his sexual proclivities. He was also really taken with Vanessa too, even though she was older than him and so it was a rather strange relationship but everyone was (apparently) quite happy to participate in it. It was the norm for them. The love that Vanessa had for Duncan never disappeared until her death and she was prepared to put up with his infidelities. The fact that Bunny married Angelia when he prophesized many years before that he would marry her at twenty rather unnerved me, I must confess.

As for the book I believe it is a tribute not only to Duncan but also to Bunny’s life with Vanessa, and latterly Angelica.

The plot - Richard Tebrick had married Silvia (née Fox – bizarre) in 1879. They were recently married and all was well and then one day she was transformed into a fox in front of his eyes. Imagine that! What a shock. He cared for her as a loving husband even while she slowly transformed into a fox of the wild, eventually giving birth to five foxes in her earth and Mr Tebrick more or less adopted them even though he had met the male fox. Now that to me is true love. His favourite fox was Angelica (his future wife) and life continued in this rather odd vein. All the neighbours thought that he was quite mad as he had withdrawn so much from society.

A beautiful book which resonates within one’s soul.

As an added note, my delicious little hardback is a sixth impression published in 1923, after the first publication in October 1922. It makes one wonder how many copies were in each print-run? The wood engravings by R. A. Garnett are an added bonus but the true beauty of this book is that handwritten note on the frontispiece with L.M.H. which I understand stands for Lady Margaret Hall, one of the Oxford colleges. It seemed right to read that, I don’t know why! A true social document.

These old books have such a sense of age about them…
...more

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Aug 27, 2014 J. rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: ghosts, strange-taste, eccentric-practices, crack-in-the-sky

Strikingly short, clear as clear water, and none of the above, all at once. Garnett's book conjures old-style fairy tales or bedtime stories, where simple elements resonate, and even the inevitable outcome is also a little confounding, a little mysterious.

Short version, 1922, English dude's wife turns into a fox one day, flips him right out.

In the tradition of the truly chilling ghost story, however, we're not done there. Somehow we're kept in a kind of trance, along with the protagonist, who j Strikingly short, clear as clear water, and none of the above, all at once. Garnett's book conjures old-style fairy tales or bedtime stories, where simple elements resonate, and even the inevitable outcome is also a little confounding, a little mysterious.

Short version, 1922, English dude's wife turns into a fox one day, flips him right out.

In the tradition of the truly chilling ghost story, however, we're not done there. Somehow we're kept in a kind of trance, along with the protagonist, who just cannot fathom what he's going to do about this soul-shattering development. But as with everything else in life as we know it, little things accompany big things, night follows day, and no crying over spilled milk. We as readers are led into the surreal assurance that a logical investigation, an explanation, will only naturally follow, and it never does.

One night long into the predicament of his wife having changed, the narrator dreams that she is a human woman once again. But the price of this return is incalculable :

After an hour or two the procession of confused and jumbled images which first assailed him passed away and subsided into one clear and powerful dream. His wife was with him in her own proper shape, walking as they had been on that fatal day before her transformation. Yet she was changed too, for in her face there were visible tokens of unhappiness, her face swollen with crying, pale and downcast, her hair hanging in disorder, her damp hands wringing a small handkerchief into a ball, her whole body shaken with sobs, and an air of long neglect about her person. Between her sobs, she was confessing to him some crime she had committed but he did not catch the broken words, nor did he wish to hear them, for he was dulled by his sorrow..

That the story is an allegory of anything in particular, the author disputes; that it may touch chords of fidelity and abandonment-- he will allow.

Where the reader is led, on this obvious/ unsettling trail, is down the same paths as other deeply-sorrowful torch songs in literature: of Tam-Lin, whose true love must hold him fast as the witches transform him into beast, serpent and flame; of Kwaidan, where the faint touch of fingertips from the next world is always present; and of Poe's Annabel Lee, whose dark seaside spirits infuse their author with infinite, rueful sadness ...

One of the simplest, saddest things I've ever read.

...more

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Aug 06, 2007 Greg rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Magical and sad. Great wood-cuts illustrate the story throughout. Yay foxes!!

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Nov 30, 2015 Wastrel rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

It’s hard to say too much about Lady into Fox – it’s a short novella, and very simple. Indeed, I didn’t really feel that I was reading the work of an author – more just hearing an articulate, literate man tell me a story. The prose isn’t always polished – and is speckled with little oddities from the common speech of the era – and the story is straightforward and unadorned. Put bluntly, it’s about an English gentleman whose wife one day turns into a fox, and the difficulties that are posed by th It’s hard to say too much about Lady into Fox – it’s a short novella, and very simple. Indeed, I didn’t really feel that I was reading the work of an author – more just hearing an articulate, literate man tell me a story. The prose isn’t always polished – and is speckled with little oddities from the common speech of the era – and the story is straightforward and unadorned. Put bluntly, it’s about an English gentleman whose wife one day turns into a fox, and the difficulties that are posed by this unexpected turn of events.

That’s a potentially rich – incredibly rich – scenario for a story, and there were many ways the story could have gone. Garnett for the most part chose the most obvious and the least memorable path. But that’s not necessarily a criticism. I was expecting a story that perhaps leant more heavily into social satire, or brought out the comic absurdities more greatly – I suppose I was thinking of how this might go if the story were by Saki, or indeed by Cabell, whose almost exactly contemporaneous own novel, Jurgen, I’ve only just read.

And indeed, there is satire here, and there is absurdity, and wit. But for the most part, Garnett focuses on the pathos, and he does it through precise, transparent realism, avoiding excesses of style or content that might distract from the basic humanity at the core of his story. His style is casual, in the formal manner in which an English gentleman of the era might be casual, and despite the strikingly modern moment of surrealism at the story’s core (Lady into Fox was published only a few years after Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis” was published, and long before it became famous), his approach is largely conservative. The fantasy, like most earlier but little later fantasy, is shrouded in a dislocating frame, in this case the conventional, by then perhaps even traditional, Victorian ghost story declaimer, an entire page spent stressing how the author has heard this from unimpeachable sources and is otherwise a skeptical man not prone to believing fanciful stories etc etc. This frame is made a little more personal by the fact that the author does not overtly divide himself from the narrator, happy even to identify himself by name at one point. There’s something of a newspaperman’s approach here, a plainspoken verity that has no time for artistic airs and pretences. I wonder whether even that title, the oddly curt ‘Lady into Fox’, may be intended to suggest the clipped headline of a newspaper report or magazine article.

Yet despite the pretence of unpretentiousness, Lady into Fox is a piece of art, and not only because of the implausible central conceit, that of a lady transformed into a fox – and not, Garnett take pains to stress, in a believable, piece-by-piece, drawn-out, organic manner, but in a flash, as a fait accompli, the way that Gregor Samsa simply wakes up one morning to discover himself the victim of a metamorphosis. No, the true metamorphosis here is the way that what is presented as a story is really a political position paper.

Of course, all stories are symbolic, particularly those involving elements of fantasy. “The Metamorphosis” is symbolic. But Lady into Fox is symbolic in a much more all-encompassing, more honest, way. It is, quite plainly, a fable, and there is no doubt here that we are to consider what may be the Moral of the Tale. It is perhaps precisely because of the author’s political intent that he so eschews overt manipulations and authorial cadenzas: he is trying to show us the case as it is, matters as they are, to point us to a conclusion – for all that he is doing so through symbols and analogy. Anything that instead called attention to the work as a work of art, or worse as a work of craft, would detract from its objective.

But it’s not quite so simple. On the surface, Lady into Fox is a direct analogy for...

...the rest of the review you can read on my blog.

Short version? It's a small and simple, but very attractive little fable that undisguisedly, but lightly, presents the Bloomsbury worldview, but in a way that relies on the strength of the story itself, rather than distracting from it. It's too slight to really consider a masterpiece, and it's a little roughhewn around the edges (Garnett is an articulate and literate writer, but not an exceptional stylist), but it's a beautiful book that is well worth the hour or two required to read it.

[This edition bears original illustrations by the author's wife - these are pretty, but inessential] ...more

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Oct 01, 2012 Rand added it · review of another edition

Shelves: sir-real-is-um, novella, fable, metamorphoses

A lovely set of symbols that is perhaps best enjoyed at face-value.

There's a certain elusive quality here which manages to pull the reader in many directions in turn: wonder, tragedy, farce, tedium, contentment.

Also a testament that great books, having been unjustly buried, are still able to enthrall new generations of readers. I read the McSweeney's edition edited by Paul Collins and was pleased to find that another publisher has more recently chosen to reprint this one. (The more recent cover ...more

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Jun 26, 2009 Miriam rated it liked it · review of another edition

Recommended to Miriam by: Deborah Boliver Boehm

Shelves: fantasy

"Here we have something very different. A grown lady is changed straightway into a fox. There is no explaining that away by natural philosophy. The materialism of our age will not help us here."

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Jan 02, 2009 Andrea rated it liked it · review of another edition

David Garnett's debut novel about a woman who turns into a fox and her husband's troubles in dealing with her transformation. The dialogue that the husband has about how to deal with this is meant to mirror that of the people dealing with loved ones who were traumatized and changed by WWII.

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Apr 03, 2017 Alan rated it really liked it

Shelves: novels

short novella about a woman who turns into a fox, and her husband's attempts to keep her safe (he shoots dogs and buries them, chases after foxhunts etc.) and treat her like his wife as far as he can (dresses her at first for example, buys her grapes), but nature takes over. Well written, to the point, very nice woodcut illustrations. Odd, memorable.

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Jul 02, 2010 Leah rated it liked it · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. What an odd book.

This short read is the third tome in the Collins Library. The gist of the story is that a woman (who detests fox hunting for its cruelty) one day mysteriously turns into a fox. For awhile she seems to retain her human knowledge and interests, but as time passes she becomes more animal-like. Her devoted husband hides and protects her, growing to think of her only as his wife, species aside.

The story is rich with metaphor, although it's sometimes hard to detect exactly what the What an odd book.

This short read is the third tome in the Collins Library. The gist of the story is that a woman (who detests fox hunting for its cruelty) one day mysteriously turns into a fox. For awhile she seems to retain her human knowledge and interests, but as time passes she becomes more animal-like. Her devoted husband hides and protects her, growing to think of her only as his wife, species aside.

The story is rich with metaphor, although it's sometimes hard to detect exactly what the moral is supposed to be. It mostly centers around the little fact Collins points out in his introduction, that "sometimes a person changes, and we are powerless to stop it." The main character, then, seems like a woman who longs for the freedom to act outside of the traditional limits of her time. As she changes her husband remains devoted to her, but he is always trying to get her to behave, act more like a lady, and remain within his safely set boundaries. He eventually lets her go to escape into the wild and raise a family. However, after some time they are reunited and he spends much time with her pups in the forest. He grows to accept her as she is and loves her all the more for it.

But then, the end.

She is attacked by a party of fox hunting dogs and dies in her husband's arms.

What is that supposed to mean? That failure to comply with society's standards will get one killed? That no matter what one does in life everyone meets the same fate? That the world is a cruel place, regardless of what one's friends and family do? That even though the woman's husband loved her, in trying to protect and shelter her he quickened her demise? Or is it simply an end to a story, with no inherent meaning other than to move the plot along... breaking the reader's hearts along the way?

It can be interpreted in more ways than I care to write, but perhaps that's what makes it great. After all, the meaning in literature is mostly derived from its readers. Whatever you bring to a book shapes what you will find. In the words of Emerson, "What can we see, read, acquire, but ourselves. Take the book, my friend, and read your eyes out, you will never find there what I find." ...more

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Mar 17, 2012 Abbey rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: scifi-fantasy, vintage, horror, kindle, dnf-alas, bright-young-things

BOTTOM LINE: Whimsical, slow-moving old-fashioned creepy story that I might enjoy at another time.

This was another of those classic ScienceFiction/Fantasy novels/stories that I hadn't yet read but was highly looking forward to. Written in 1922, it's considered to be an extremely famous/special story in the history of SFF writing, and I'm currently attempting to fill in a few of the gaps in my reading history. There are very few true "classics!" of the genre that I haven't read, actually, so ope ...more

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May 14, 2014 Lee Broderick rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, fiction-fantasy, fiction-classics

It is, perhaps, easy to see Lady into Fox simply as a modern day fairytale. A whimsical fantasy from the early twentieth century. To do so though, would be to ignore the praise and attention that the tale won on its publication and since. A simple fairytale, surely, would not win the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. In fact, David Garnett uses humour, fantasy, allegory and realism to explore pain, passion, conjugal fidelity, love, death and, as Douglas Adams once famously wrote, 'everything'. ...more

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Jul 14, 2012 Emily rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: bloomsbury, animals, interwar-years, secondhand-bookstore-find, bought-in-scotland

Deceptively simple, beautiful. I didn't realize how much it affected me until I told my spouse the plot and started crying. Found this in one of the many wonderful bookshops in St. Andrews. I'm trying to think of a way to put this on a syllabus soon. It could pair well Ovid's _Metamorphosis_ or Swift's _Gulliver's Travels_ with Coetzee's _Lives of Animals_.

NB: I read the Hesperus edition with John Burnside's forward, which has a much prettier cover than what I'm seeing now on Goodreads.

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Feb 25, 2010 Adam rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: in-my-daughters-future, elegance, great-short-reads

David Garnett’s 1922 novella is modern folktale, rich in sentiment and in prose style, and always highly readable. This is a strange but simple-told story about a newly married man whose wife suddenly and inexplicable transforms into a fox, and about the long period of heartbreak he experiences in accepting this change and giving her up to the wild. It is a surprisingly touching story and a fine book for reading aloud.

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Jul 29, 2016 Aglaja rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2016

TOP-Buch, super geschrieben und zum Nachdenken / Spekulieren anregend: Was bedeutet die Verwandlung der Frau in einen Fuchs? Wofür steht der Fuchs? Und der Ehemann? Geht es nur um die Frauen, oder hat es auch ein autobiographisches Anliegen des Autors?
Hierzu wichtig: er gehörte der Bloomsbury Gruppe, wie Virginia Woolf.

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May 10, 2017 Conny rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: classics-fiction

Ein kleines, feines Buch das davon erzählt, wie sich eine Dame beim Spaziergang mit ihrem Mann plötzlich in eine Fähe verwandelt. Zunächst verhält sie sich, obwohl in diesem fremden Körper gefangen, immer noch ganz so wie zu menschlichen Zeiten. Nach und nach nehmen aber die füchsischen Züge auch in ihrem Charakter Überhand.

Es ist eine schöne und zugleich traurige Geschichte. Da sie bereits 1922 erschienen ist, kann sie wohl als Parabel gesehen werden: Die Frau befreit sich aus der Abhängigkeit ...more

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Jan 02, 2017 Michael Bohli rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2017

Märchenhaft, romantisch und naturalistisch - der erste Roman von David Garnett ist eine kurze Fabel und hat auch fast 100 Jahre nach seiner Entstehung nichts von der Wirkung verloren. "Dame zu Fuchs" lässt uns ohne grosse Umschweife in ein kurzes Abenteuer eintreten, in dem der Autor mit Hilfe einer schier kafkaesken Verwandlung das Zusammenspiel von Mensch und Umwelt genauer betrachtet.

Wenn die Frau von Herr Tebrick sich nämlich urplötzlich in eine Fähe verwandelt, ist dies nicht der Beginn ein ...more

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Mar 16, 2009 Josiah rated it really liked it · review of another edition

[Partway into Brideshead Revisted, the narrator is in Sebastian's room waiting for him and finds this book and reads it while he waits. Although I like to follow references like this one, in Lady the main character read Clarissa (Samuel Richardson) to the Fox, but that might be a little heavy right now.:]
I am personally rather a fan of allegory. There is little dialog; everything is dependent on the narrator, who has, he tells us, sorted out the truth from "all floating rumor and village gossip. ...more

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Jul 06, 2009 Bettie☯ rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: shortstory-shortstories-novellas, fantasy, re-read, one-penny-wonder, magical-realism, britain-england, published-1922, winter-20092010

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jul 24, 2010 Hol added it · review of another edition

Bizarre little gem from 1923 about a genteel woman who, abruptly and without warning, one day turns into a fox. Reading it was like witnessing someone else's dream: I felt I lacked the ability to interpret the imagery. Wild, in both senses of the word.

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Nov 03, 2009 Mari rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: all-around-favorites

incredible. unlike anything i've ever read, an absolutely perfect look at physicality, love, and the changing of both.

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Jan 13, 2008 Lily rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: prim and proper people

Fabulously starched collar fairy tale about the wild sovereignty of the feminine as it eludes the rational linearity of the masculine, and the transformational power of love.

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Feb 09, 2009 Sus rated it liked it · review of another edition

What a profoundly odd little book. I'm still trying to decide whether or not I'm impressed by it.

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Jul 09, 2009 Joseph rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: fict

Guy meets girl.
Girl turns into fox.
Guy loves fox.
Fox meets male-fox.
Guy finds fox family.
Guy depressed.
The end.

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Feb 19, 2017 Amethyst Marie rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, classics

I debated my rating on this book long and hard. I eventually decided on a one-star rating in the best possible sense. Like the kind of one-star rating that will motivate me to invite my friends over to watch some wondrously terrible piece of crap on Netflix and laugh out loud through the whole thing.

****SPOILERS TO FOLLOW****

Sylvia is a ridiculously perfect heroine in the spirit of Elsie Dinsmore. She grew up in the country, so she's innocent, but she was raised by a Protestant governess, so she I debated my rating on this book long and hard. I eventually decided on a one-star rating in the best possible sense. Like the kind of one-star rating that will motivate me to invite my friends over to watch some wondrously terrible piece of crap on Netflix and laugh out loud through the whole thing.

****SPOILERS TO FOLLOW****

Sylvia is a ridiculously perfect heroine in the spirit of Elsie Dinsmore. She grew up in the country, so she's innocent, but she was raised by a Protestant governess, so she's not tomboyish and received a classical education.

One day while Sylvia and her husband are out for a walk in the woods, Sylvia turns into a fox. We don't know how or why. She just does. She can't speak, but she is still sentient, still modest (she insists on wearing clothes), still pious (she makes the sign of the cross with her paws to remind her husband it's time for prayers, but she's not *Catholic* because she disapproves of playing cards on the Sabbath), and still refined and cultured (her husband plays classical music on the piano and reads books to her).

The next couple of chapters go into great detail about Sylvia's husband taking care of his fox wife. Bathing her, brushing her, dressing her, making all major decisions for her because he has to do it for her own good, obvs. We're reminded that she's still more intelligent and more equal of a companion than "Oriental women" who are kept in such seclusion that they could never have the kind of conversations with their "masters" that Sylvia the nonverbal fox has with hers. (Incidentally, yes, "Civilized Western women have it so much better than savage Asian and Middle Eastern women and should be grateful" is a very old trope. I've seen it in books from the early 1800s, none of which actually have anything to do with Asia or the Middle East.)

But eventually, dear Sylvia the fox-wife starts going feral. She doesn't say her prayers. She doesn't want to wear clothes. She doesn't keep the Sabbath anymore. When her magnanimous husband concedes to take her outside, she runs wherever she wants and doesn't come when she's called. She starts hunting rabbits and eating them raw which is THE WORST because omg you're supposed to cook them in between hunting and eating them! (I feel the need to state once again that THIS IS A FOX.) Her husband berates her for her savage, "hoydenish" (that means tomboyish, btw) behavior, and he gets really excited when she acts ashamed and penitent, because obviously that means she's still a woman inside.

Somewhere around this point, the husband gets hammered while he and Sylvia are playing together. If you are thinking, as did I, that there's no way they'd go there, you would be wrong.

So. Wrong.

HE FUCKS THE FOX.

Thankfully, the act is not described in explicit detail, but the morning after narration makes it abundantly clear what happened. Which is that he fucked the fox.

Sylvia becomes more and more feral. Eventually she runs away, is gone for about a year, and comes back with a litter of baby foxes. Husband is delighted with this. He names and christens all of them (like, he holds a christening ceremony in the woods and sprinkle-baptizes them). Then the father fox shows up and the husband realizes, "Oh, yeah, I guess she had to fuck a fox for this to happen. WTF, that bitch cheated on me after everything I've done for her???" But then he comes to accept his metamour as part of their blended family. This acceptance is accompanied by musings about how it's impossible for animals to sin because they're innocent.

They all live happily ever after until a hunt kills Sylvia. The end.

I still cannot stop laughing, or saying "Dafuq did I just read? DID I ACTUALLY JUST FUCKING READ THAT??" I really hope I did, because I don't want to believe I'm capable of imagining this glorious shitshow on my own. ...more

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Jun 07, 2017 Jane rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction

Schöne Sprache, ungewöhnliche Geschichte.

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Jul 09, 2014 Raül De Tena rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 2014

El gran mal de la literatura moderna es, sin lugar a dudas, la ultra sofisticación de su forma. La imposición de la Gran Novela Americana (mamotreto de más de mil páginas con predilección por la estructura de novel río, con enormes flash-backs historicistas y con vocación alarmante de Pulitzer) sólo ha peligrado en los últimos momentos ante el hermetismo de la narrativa fragmentada postmoderna (es decir: Pynchon, secuaces y herederos indeseados)… Entre unos y otros parece que se han llevado por El gran mal de la literatura moderna es, sin lugar a dudas, la ultra sofisticación de su forma. La imposición de la Gran Novela Americana (mamotreto de más de mil páginas con predilección por la estructura de novel río, con enormes flash-backs historicistas y con vocación alarmante de Pulitzer) sólo ha peligrado en los últimos momentos ante el hermetismo de la narrativa fragmentada postmoderna (es decir: Pynchon, secuaces y herederos indeseados)… Entre unos y otros parece que se han llevado por delante aquella literatura que, sin necesidad de utilizar las mayúsculas constantemente, sabía alcanzar unas cotas de calado literario inalcanzable para la gran mayoría de los escritores actuales. Pongamos, por ejemplo, “La Dama Que Se Transformó En Zorro” de David Garnett.

Advierto: no es un ejemplo elegido al tuntún. Es un ejemplo que viene a dinamitar a cualquier obra que, superadas las trescientas páginas, no haya conseguido concretar un discurso tan sumamente sugerente como el de este libro publicado ahora por Periférica en nuestro país. Y es que, a priori, lo de “La Dama Que Se Transformó En Zorro” es poco más que un cuento sin pretensiones en el que Garnett narra un suceso que, en otras manos, no pasaría de entrañable y fantástico: un buen día, la mujer del señor Richard Tebrick se transforma en zorro. Al principio, su esposa sigue manteniendo la conciencia humana y, lo que es más importante, sigue sintiendo un pudor extremo hacia su propia forma, un pudor que le obliga a aparentar que el cambio no ha sido tan traumático y que puede seguir comportándose con la misma dignidad que ostentaba cuando era simple y llanamente la Sra. Tebrick. Pero, poco a poco, la conciencia humana va disolviéndose dentro de la bestia animal, y ahí es cuando el corazón del marido empieza a sufrir realmente.

La prosa de Garnett es cristalina como la de un cuento infantil, pero es precisamente este gusto por la transparencia el que, al fondo de una forma pluscuamperfecta, deja ver un monstruo de oscuridad que repta con parsimonia letal. Porque puede que el punto de partida de “La Dama Que Se Transformó En Zorro” no sea nada sofisticado, pero la trascendencia de su propuesta apunta alto, tan alto como un retrato sublime de ese momento en el que te das cuenta de que estás durmiendo con alguien a quien no conoces: ambos pasáis por ese momento en el que ambos hacéis ver que nada está pasando, que nada ha cambiado, pero tarde o temprano la naturaleza y los instintos se acaban imponiendo, de tal forma que le dolor y el sufrimiento son la única salida a una situación que nunca (absolutamente nunca) presenta la posibilidad de la marcha atrás.

La pluma de David Garnett muestra una lucidez cortante cercana al escalpelo quirúrgico. Sus párrafos pueden arrancar con la liviandad de una leyenda transmitida de forma oral para, a continuación, ganar en densidad y atentar de forma agresiva contra quien está leyendo: “Verla tan atribulada le proporcionó la más extraña mezcla de dolor y alegría que hubiese experimentado jamás, pues, sintiendo un arrebato de renovado amor hacia ella, no podía soportar ser testigo de su aflicción, y, sin embargo, debía disfrutar de ello, pues alimentaba sus esperanzas de que volviera a ser un día una mujer. Así pues, cuanta más angustia padecía el zorro, más esperanzas albergaba él, hasta que, debatiéndose entre el amor y la compasión, casi llegó a desear que siguiera siendo sólo un zorro para que no tuviera que sufrir tanto por ser medio humana“.

“La Dama Que Se Transformó En Zorro” puede que no sea más que un pequeño gran cuento, puede que no tenga vocación de novela para pasar a la historia, aunque en su interior alberga una parábola que deja al descubierto uno de los momentos más dolorosos por los que puede pasar una historia de amor… Pero esta maestría de la forma justa y comprimida que encapsule un fondo palpitante, vibrante, subyugante, es algo que cuesta encontrar en la literatura actual. Así que acerquémonos a Garnett y celebremos que, por lo menos, en 1922 alguien supo hablar de esta realidad que, a día de hoy, sigue doliendo con la misma fuerza sin mayores pretensiones, sin mayores sofisticaciones. ...more

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Apr 20, 2012 Charles Dee Mitchell rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-fiction

Sylvia Fox and Richard Tebrick have both been raised as upper-class British citizens living in remote Oxfordshire houses. Sylvia's uncle worries that she has married Mr. Tebrick because he is the first man she ever met. But Mr. and Mrs. Tebrick are a happy couple, living quietly, enjoying one another and the countryside. Then Sylvia, while out walking with her husband one autumn day, turns into a fox.

True to his class and upbringing, Richard accepts this transformation stoically and with concern Sylvia Fox and Richard Tebrick have both been raised as upper-class British citizens living in remote Oxfordshire houses. Sylvia's uncle worries that she has married Mr. Tebrick because he is the first man she ever met. But Mr. and Mrs. Tebrick are a happy couple, living quietly, enjoying one another and the countryside. Then Sylvia, while out walking with her husband one autumn day, turns into a fox.

True to his class and upbringing, Richard accepts this transformation stoically and with concern only for Sylvia's comfort and safety. He immediately dismisses their few servants and shoots his two dogs. Dogs and foxes: not a good idea. He cuts down some of Sylvia's house clothes to fit her new form, feeds her at usual place at the table, sleeps with her in their bed, and they pass the time playing cards. But Sylvia begins to develop other interests. She tears apart her entire wardrobe so she can run about au naturel, and when they go for walks in their enclosed garden, Sylvia's interest in their ducks seems more than merely ornithological. RIchard and Sylvia are growing apart. Richard, with his increasingly laughable efforts to keep Sylvia true to her human self, is not concerned with keeping up appearance. What he fears losing is the deep love he feels for his wife. But she runs away.

Every one of her foxy ways was now so absolutely precious to him, that I believe if he had know for certain she was dead, and had thoughts of marrying a second time, he would never have been happy with a woman. No, indeed, he would have been tempted to get himself a tame fox, and would have counted that as good a marriage as he could make.

Yet all this proceeded one may say from a passion, and a true conjugal fidelity, that it would be hard to find matched in this world. And though we may think him a fool, and almost a madman, we must, when we look closer, find much to respect in his extraordinary devotion...

But his devouring love ate into him like a consumption, so that by sleepless nights, and not caring for his person, in a few month he was worn to a shadow of himself.

Garnett's novella has surprises that once they occur seem like inevitabilities. He tells his story fluently and well, so no matter how outrageous the situation may be the reader is never tempted to consider the whole thing absurd. Sylvia's increasing vulpinity never makes her less a lady. Richard's ability for self-delusion has almost no bounds, but he's a sweet guy. He is happy to be considered a harmless if possibly insane deserted husband. He knows the real situation.

Garnett was part of the Bloomsbury circle, and he dedicated Lady into Fox to Duncan Grant. So much about Bloomsbury makes me cringe, but Garnett's book is a delight. Popular in the 1920's when it was published, it was even put out in a special "service man's edition" during World War II. It's reappearance here is thanks to writer and editor Paul Collins, whose Collins Library, an imprint of McSweeney's, brings back to print the odd gems Mr. Collins has a knack for finding. ...more

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Feb 17, 2015 Eleanor Toland rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, magic-realism, read-in-2015, fairy-tale, animal-fable, romance

The story of marriage between a human and a shape-shifter is an ancient one, dating back to Greek myth and probably neolithic times, echoed in Beauty and the Beast and all those fables of selkies and kitsune.Lady into Fox, David Garnett's short but powerful novella, transports the 'animal spouse' motif into upper-class 1920s England. It is notable for its arch, witty writing style and the unusual psychological depth with which the fantasy elements are handled.

Richard Tebrick persuades his new w The story of marriage between a human and a shape-shifter is an ancient one, dating back to Greek myth and probably neolithic times, echoed in Beauty and the Beast and all those fables of selkies and kitsune.Lady into Fox, David Garnett's short but powerful novella, transports the 'animal spouse' motif into upper-class 1920s England. It is notable for its arch, witty writing style and the unusual psychological depth with which the fantasy elements are handled.

Richard Tebrick persuades his new wife Sylvia to witness a fox hunt. She is reluctant, but he almost literally drags her along only to see her transform instantaneously into a vixen. There is never any explanation for why this happens, though the opening pages vaguely hint at a hereditary tendency to werewolfism in her family, whose last name is, of course, Fox.

At first Sylvia retains her human mind, insisting on wearing her old clothes, listening to the piano and playing cards with her husband. Richard dismisses his servants and shoots his beloved dogs, and determines that their relationship will continue as before, and his faith to his wife will never waver no matter what
her species. But Sylvia's animal nature becomes increasingly dominant, replacing her formerly refined nature with that of a beast who eats meat raw, chases ducks and eventually, tries to burrow her way out of Richard's garden into the wild. The story grows more intense and uneasy as the inevitable dark conclusion ticks nearer.

In older shape-shifter marriage stories, it is often a partner's lack of faith that leads to disaster, but here Richard is apparently punished for having the opposite problem. He sacrifices everything for his wife
long after she ceases to recognise him, eventually moving to the woods and sleeping on the ground to be closer to her.

Richard is something of a male version of Twilight's Bella Swan in his determination to be a martyr. The novella is only 91 pages, but even over that short length the descriptions of Richard weeping, praying, throwing helpless tantrums and so forth become gratingly repetitive. If there is an moral to Lady into Fox, and it is almost impossible not to read a deeper allegory into such a strange story, it seems to be a warning on the dangers of denial, of clinging to a relationship broken beyond repair, of failing to cope with the fact someone you love has changed.

It all sounds very depressing, but David Garnett's style give a lightness of touch to what might in other hands have been an overwrought melodrama. The author is deprecating to both his characters and himself. To quote a particularly sparkling passage:

"In this way I met not long ago with someone who, after talking some little while and not knowing me or who I was, told me that David Garnett was dead, and died of being bitten by a cat after he had tormented it. He had long grown a nuisance to his friends as an exorbitant sponge upon them, and the world was well rid of him." ...more

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About David Garnett

David Garnett (9 March 1892 – 17 February 1981), known as "Bunny", was a British writer and publisher. A prominent member of the Bloomsbury Group, Garnett received literary recognition when his novel Lady into Fox, an allegorical fantasy, was awarded the 1922 James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction. He ran a bookshop near the British Museum with Francis Birrell during the 1920s. He also founde ...more

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“Wonderful or supernatural events are not so uncommon, rather they are irregular in their incidence. Thus there may be not one marvel to speak of in a century, and then often enough comes a plentiful crop of them; monsters of all sorts swarm suddenly upon the earth, comets blaze in the sky, eclipses frighten nature, meteors fall in rain, while mermaids and sirens beguile, and sea serpents engulf every passing ship, and terrible cataclysms beset humanity.” — 5 likes

“Where his wife had been the moment before was a small fox, of a very bright red.” — 2 likes

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