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Seldom
Seldom marks the literary debut of an amazingly talented writer, Dawn Rae Downton, whose mother, Marion, grew up in a tiny Newfoundland outport in the years before the island joined Canada in 1949. In prose that captures the rhythms of Newfoundland speech, Downton tells the mesmerising and heartrending story of her mother’s family – and of their neighbours – people so well acquainted with tragedy that for them life was ultimately more mysterious than death.
Sidney Wiseman, a prosperous skipper, and his wife, Ethel, a former teacher who now ran the outport’s general store, were married in 1922 and went on to have six children; Marion was their third. They lived in Little Bay Islands, a small community, where everybody knew everybody else’s private whose son or father had been lost at sea; whose pregnancy was “seen to”; whose brother had gone to the hospital in Twillingate for his weak chest, as tuberculosis was called. But none knew – or chose to know – exactly what was going on in Ethel and Sidney’s house. None except the children. For long months each year when their father was home from the sea, he lay on a daybed in the kitchen like a serpent, watching, forever watching, his wife and children, waiting for an excuse to strike.
Downton does not so much relate the story of the Wisemans as she recreates it, taking readers along the wharves and coves of Little Bay Islands, where the family lived, crafting her powerful narrative from a kaleidoscope of intimate, revealing incidents, from whispers and glances, from the secrets and lies that protected the Wisemans’ reputation and blighted their lives. The narrative swirls like a Newfoundland storm as furious as Sidney Wiseman, and at its calm centre is Ethel, his loyal wife and an extraordinary mother.
A virtuoso portrait of a close-knit community, at once succoured and brutalized by the cold, capricious ocean, Seldom is also the story of one too-proud family, one indomitable woman. Downton dares much in this riveting book, and succeeds brilliantly.
From the Hardcover edition.
Sidney Wiseman, a prosperous skipper, and his wife, Ethel, a former teacher who now ran the outport’s general store, were married in 1922 and went on to have six children; Marion was their third. They lived in Little Bay Islands, a small community, where everybody knew everybody else’s private whose son or father had been lost at sea; whose pregnancy was “seen to”; whose brother had gone to the hospital in Twillingate for his weak chest, as tuberculosis was called. But none knew – or chose to know – exactly what was going on in Ethel and Sidney’s house. None except the children. For long months each year when their father was home from the sea, he lay on a daybed in the kitchen like a serpent, watching, forever watching, his wife and children, waiting for an excuse to strike.
Downton does not so much relate the story of the Wisemans as she recreates it, taking readers along the wharves and coves of Little Bay Islands, where the family lived, crafting her powerful narrative from a kaleidoscope of intimate, revealing incidents, from whispers and glances, from the secrets and lies that protected the Wisemans’ reputation and blighted their lives. The narrative swirls like a Newfoundland storm as furious as Sidney Wiseman, and at its calm centre is Ethel, his loyal wife and an extraordinary mother.
A virtuoso portrait of a close-knit community, at once succoured and brutalized by the cold, capricious ocean, Seldom is also the story of one too-proud family, one indomitable woman. Downton dares much in this riveting book, and succeeds brilliantly.
From the Hardcover edition.
- GenresNonfiction
304 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
January 3, 2025
This biography/memoir is not an easy read. It is the story a granddaughter wishes to tell about the life of her grandmother and mother who lived in Newfoundland in the 1900s and their difficult lives in one of the isolated outports that dotted the island’s coast.
The story begins as we are introduced to Ethel Wellon Wiseman the writer’s grandmother, who married Sidney Wiseman in 1922 when she was thirty and he was twenty-two. Sid was the youngest son of a well to do family, a handsome and charming young man who had his own fishing schooner. Ethel was a respected, well-educated teacher and Sidney was not her first choice for a husband, but chance and misfortune from the wars and the fishery deprived her of her first loves. After a short courtship, Sid declared his love for Ethel and the two were soon married.
Ethel bore six children during her marriage to Sidney a man who turned out to be a brutal, sadistic bully. His anger was fueled by jealousy and self-pity although often his violence was irrational and erupted for no reason. Sid often hid in the kitchen pantry, watching the coming and goings of his family, a place where he could beat his wife and children away from the prying eyes and censure of his neighbors. For Ethel and the children, the worse part was not knowing what would set him off, sometimes it was small things, sometimes it was nothing at all. Sid never took an interest in his children and Marion, the first girl in the family and the writer’s mother, became one of his favorite targets. In her father’s eyes she could never do right, receiving her father’s first savage beating when she was only six years old.
Early in her marriage Ethel tried to escape, but returned when she knew she was pregnant. She was a woman who always made the best of things, believed that a wife’s place was beside her husband, that it was important to keep the family together and knew her children needed a father to provide for them. She stayed with Sidney for thirty-five years, surviving his beatings, chokings, his frightening threats with knives pointed at her throat and after one severe beating had to have a kidney removed. She endured his cruelty because leaving was impossible. There were no other options. She had no place to go and no way to support her children.
The children who referred to their father as The Old Man, protected the family’s reputation with secrets and lies, believing if they ever revealed the truth, their father would kill them all. They all did well in school, supported by Ethel’s attention and her large library of books. They adored their mother who loved and protected them, and hated their father, doing whatever they could to avoid him. Each escaped from home as soon as it was possible.
In telling the story, Downton had to make some educated guesses about what her main characters were thinking and feeling, but on the whole, she believes her story holds true. The research she has done to describe the devastating effects of the two world wars on the island’s families, the literary accommodation she has made to communicate the rugged lilt of the Newfoundlander’s speech and her descriptions of the bitter and unforgiving cold climate are a testament to that work. Climate and geography were what ruled life. At that time, many children were conceived and born but did not live past birth or childhood with infectious disease, household accidents and drownings as the main causes of death. The war also took many young men, leaving families devastated, children without their fathers and lovers without their soulmates. Life was unforgiving, rescue not always possible and sudden death was just an accepted part of life.
This was not an easy story for Downton to write, but it tells the compelling history of her mother’s family, life in an unforgiving climate and the culture and social structure of that time. I found the last section in which there were leaps of time and narrative shifts jarring, bringing the story to a quick close. Although it was an uncomfortable read, it is also a fascinating piece of a Canadian history.
The story begins as we are introduced to Ethel Wellon Wiseman the writer’s grandmother, who married Sidney Wiseman in 1922 when she was thirty and he was twenty-two. Sid was the youngest son of a well to do family, a handsome and charming young man who had his own fishing schooner. Ethel was a respected, well-educated teacher and Sidney was not her first choice for a husband, but chance and misfortune from the wars and the fishery deprived her of her first loves. After a short courtship, Sid declared his love for Ethel and the two were soon married.
Ethel bore six children during her marriage to Sidney a man who turned out to be a brutal, sadistic bully. His anger was fueled by jealousy and self-pity although often his violence was irrational and erupted for no reason. Sid often hid in the kitchen pantry, watching the coming and goings of his family, a place where he could beat his wife and children away from the prying eyes and censure of his neighbors. For Ethel and the children, the worse part was not knowing what would set him off, sometimes it was small things, sometimes it was nothing at all. Sid never took an interest in his children and Marion, the first girl in the family and the writer’s mother, became one of his favorite targets. In her father’s eyes she could never do right, receiving her father’s first savage beating when she was only six years old.
Early in her marriage Ethel tried to escape, but returned when she knew she was pregnant. She was a woman who always made the best of things, believed that a wife’s place was beside her husband, that it was important to keep the family together and knew her children needed a father to provide for them. She stayed with Sidney for thirty-five years, surviving his beatings, chokings, his frightening threats with knives pointed at her throat and after one severe beating had to have a kidney removed. She endured his cruelty because leaving was impossible. There were no other options. She had no place to go and no way to support her children.
The children who referred to their father as The Old Man, protected the family’s reputation with secrets and lies, believing if they ever revealed the truth, their father would kill them all. They all did well in school, supported by Ethel’s attention and her large library of books. They adored their mother who loved and protected them, and hated their father, doing whatever they could to avoid him. Each escaped from home as soon as it was possible.
In telling the story, Downton had to make some educated guesses about what her main characters were thinking and feeling, but on the whole, she believes her story holds true. The research she has done to describe the devastating effects of the two world wars on the island’s families, the literary accommodation she has made to communicate the rugged lilt of the Newfoundlander’s speech and her descriptions of the bitter and unforgiving cold climate are a testament to that work. Climate and geography were what ruled life. At that time, many children were conceived and born but did not live past birth or childhood with infectious disease, household accidents and drownings as the main causes of death. The war also took many young men, leaving families devastated, children without their fathers and lovers without their soulmates. Life was unforgiving, rescue not always possible and sudden death was just an accepted part of life.
This was not an easy story for Downton to write, but it tells the compelling history of her mother’s family, life in an unforgiving climate and the culture and social structure of that time. I found the last section in which there were leaps of time and narrative shifts jarring, bringing the story to a quick close. Although it was an uncomfortable read, it is also a fascinating piece of a Canadian history.
March 2, 2018
A heart-wrenching memoir, truth which reads like fiction, based on the life of the author's mother who grew up in a Newfoundland outport through the30s and 40s. Marion Wiseman suffered through a childhood marred by unceasing domestic violence from her troubled father, barely mitigated by the love and super-human efforts of a sainted mother. This is well-written, but difficult to read because of the sheer sadness of a family living a 'hidden' life with a monster.
November 30, 2017
While I enjoyed this book overall, I struggled with it a bit. This book is a literary memoir of an outport Newfoundland family. Part of the problem is that my nostalgia about all things Newfoundland often runs up against with my historian's awareness that Newfoundland was often a a hard place populated with some truly despicable people. This book is about one of those people (Skipper Sid Wiseman) and the physical and emotional abuse he inflicted upon his wife (Ethel) and their children in outport Newfoudland. There are many heartbreaking and frustrating passages where I found myself wondering how anyone could be do vile and exasperated about how anyone could stay and survive these events. What makes it worse is that early in the book there is a photo of Sid and Ethel, with both of them looking happy and carefree, yet as the book progresses this idyllic picture of marital happiness is quickly shown to be a lie. Yet, that photo haunts the rest of the book. My major criticism is that the book is not written chronologically, but it is often not obvious when the time frame has changed, resulting in pages of confusion test often have to be read again. A more chronological would have been preferred and I don't think it would have detracted from the story.
December 29, 2010
Evocative, beautifully written and harrowing. The author takes the reader to a small, isolated island off Newfoundland where her mother, aunt and uncles grew up in fear of their tyrannical, sadistic father and in awe of their saintly, long-suffering mother.
However it wasn't until I finished reading the book that the lightbulb started flashing. Why did intelligent and well-educated Ethel stay with the lazy, bullying Sid despite the almost constant beatings and mental torture? She'd had two other suitors to choose from, and both were still single, well-to-do and apparently waiting in the wings. But no, Sid was the one she loved, she said, despite the horrific punishments he meted out to her and to their children.
Something wasn't right here. The characters of Ethel and Sid seemed altogether too black and white. I wondered if there hadn't been some kind of co-dependency, with Ethel feeding off Sid's nastiness to showcase her saintliness. In one chapter she organises a visit by one of her former suitors (a uniformed WWII officer) and receives him in her home behind closed doors, leaving Sid to mind their shop, all too aware of what's happening. Surely a woman who knew her husband's track record would arrange things differently if she wanted to avoid a beating.
I admit that after thinking over many of the incidents in the book I began to see Ethel playing the role of martyr rather than mother, with her children as her sympathetic and devoted audience. Could this be some kind of condition akin to Munchausen's by Proxy? Otherwise how could an intelligent, seemingly caring mother stand back and watch her children being virtually tortured and placed in life-threating situations as "punishment" for trivial or imagined misdemeanours? I wondered why the same thoughts had not occurred to the author.
Otherwise I loved the way the story was interwoven with memoirs of childhood in such a harsh but beautiful part of the world, the quirkiness of the island's population and the sense of community.
However it wasn't until I finished reading the book that the lightbulb started flashing. Why did intelligent and well-educated Ethel stay with the lazy, bullying Sid despite the almost constant beatings and mental torture? She'd had two other suitors to choose from, and both were still single, well-to-do and apparently waiting in the wings. But no, Sid was the one she loved, she said, despite the horrific punishments he meted out to her and to their children.
Something wasn't right here. The characters of Ethel and Sid seemed altogether too black and white. I wondered if there hadn't been some kind of co-dependency, with Ethel feeding off Sid's nastiness to showcase her saintliness. In one chapter she organises a visit by one of her former suitors (a uniformed WWII officer) and receives him in her home behind closed doors, leaving Sid to mind their shop, all too aware of what's happening. Surely a woman who knew her husband's track record would arrange things differently if she wanted to avoid a beating.
I admit that after thinking over many of the incidents in the book I began to see Ethel playing the role of martyr rather than mother, with her children as her sympathetic and devoted audience. Could this be some kind of condition akin to Munchausen's by Proxy? Otherwise how could an intelligent, seemingly caring mother stand back and watch her children being virtually tortured and placed in life-threating situations as "punishment" for trivial or imagined misdemeanours? I wondered why the same thoughts had not occurred to the author.
Otherwise I loved the way the story was interwoven with memoirs of childhood in such a harsh but beautiful part of the world, the quirkiness of the island's population and the sense of community.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 18, 2017
Didn't like this one although I think it could have been o.k. except for the style of writing of the author. I never could follow the story in a chronically ordered way. It also had a lot of details about Greenland and their role in the wars that wasn't really necessary to the story.
February 27, 2025
A disturbing telling of the life of the author's mother's family.
A story of domestic violence and great cruelty meted out on a wife and mother and her children in the harsh environment of the Newfoundland outports in the early twentieth century.
This little slice of history is difficult to read knowing that domestic and family violence kills more than one woman each week - and scars countless children - in my own country.
A story of domestic violence and great cruelty meted out on a wife and mother and her children in the harsh environment of the Newfoundland outports in the early twentieth century.
This little slice of history is difficult to read knowing that domestic and family violence kills more than one woman each week - and scars countless children - in my own country.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews