Fans of Norah Lofts discussion
The Old Priory Group Read 2025
>
The Old Priory Group read 2025
Arthur is an interesting mixture isn't he, of the supremely confident and masculine (not to say outright masculinist, eg the the statement about when it comes to paid sex, he is the chooser and buyer , and his being 'deeply affronted' about having his manhood reduced by being selected as a stud . I don't suppose for an instant he thought that women might feel likewise about being selected as brood mares!) But also a profound romantic- so long as it is the right sort of woman . He only really becomes capable of the act for which he has been hired when he can convince himself she is a worthy love object . I can say I blame him though , in thinking /hoping she wasn't the author of the finale planned by the sweet little cakes Marie gave him...
I wonder if the desire to be in charge sexually, to be the one who buys and not the one who sells, is connected to his kind of dual personality - he's a sailor (or a seaman? Someone told me once that anyone can be a sailor, but a seaman is a professional), and a good one. But he's also at heart a farmer - and, well, it's three types, isn't it? He clearly is intelligent, bright enough to become literate without the education his father couldn't afford to provide. Arthur thinks it's perfectly natural for the man to be the one who controls sexual relations, but Norah Lofts might be either describing a male attitude she's observed, or added it as a piece with the idea that most sailors are drunk when they're on shore, most sailors don't have good clothing, most sailors spend their meager wages on booze and women.
He did really fall for the beautiful woman, didn't he? I kept thinking what a crazy risk to take! First of all, finding a suitable man wasn't easy, then there's no guarantee of a pregnancy, or, if there was one, that it would go to term, or produce a boy. I think I originally took it for granted that the old servant woman was the poisoner, but there are hints that the woman herself has a hard streak, and was capable of making such decisions. I can understand wanting to make sure that there'd be no reappearance of the father if the plot did work - but of course that required murder...
It's a long, long time since I read this book. I remembered the story of the sailor and the beautiful young widow, but didn't associate it with this book. Towards the end of this section came a lot of references to the typical Norah Lofts' locations which I remember from many of her books.
Yes I think I just saw it as Arthur being imbued with the usual masculinist outlook reinforced by the fact that he was good looking and sought after by women. What were the chances of pregnancy and a male one at that ? Still, long shot or not I guess it was better than the young widow had or could hope for without taking that chance . I wonder if she sent Marie out to look for a young red headed man or if Marie saw him by chance and thought ... hmmm... I wonder...
Well it paid off ( apart from the poor little black and white dog - oh and the rats of course) and so Arthur comes to , well, comes to the Old Priory . I loved the story the of the dissolution and the suspicion and superstition attaching . Arthur certainly deserved the place to work after what he put into it and the sacrifices the place itself seemed to require , and the reparation the Masonic effect seemed to have on it ,vis a vis his damaged shoulder.
I think Arthur was likeable in the first section, even with his faults. When he learned the cakes were poisoned, especially when he felt such love (lust?) for the woman he "helped", I guess we could call it, it was sad to witness.He worked hard to make the best of a supposedly cursed land and didn't give up until he married a woman as beautiful as that damsel in distress. Fortitude right there.
My thought on this second read, decades after the first (maybe 3 or 4 decades at the minimum)- I always gave considerable thought to why Arthur got so hard and bitter. It was a hard run, building up from the ruins, but he had a daughter who he did care for, and who cared for him. I didn't understand why he would put up with that constant howling reminder, for instance. Because in those days, it was perfectly allowable to ship such a wife off to a distance in the same type of surrounds she got so close. Lofts left you always guessing on that. He got so mad he had a stroke but he didn't see that coming? How he treated the pregnancy of his daughter, I understand. It was not acceptable under any circumstances to do much different then. Usually the infants were given to much lesser tenants at distance and people gladly took them in for the money. What I didn't remember much at all was Arabella. She was an excellent character. There must have been some number of women just as she was portrayed- with nearly no direction to go unless they left their home places completely. My book was old and came from another (quite far too) Chicago suburb. It still had the check out card in it with the date stamp feature. I hadn't seen one of those in years as most books have been harvested decades ago that had them. It is the only one in a huge multi-state system. But it was in fair shape. Lofts was an author who knew humans and her eras superbly. I never thought that the woman he impregnated gave the poison cakes. I always thought it was the procurer herself. She was protecting all knowledge of connection for her lady. And herself.
Carrie wrote: "I think Arthur was likeable in the first section, even with his faults. When he learned the cakes were poisoned, especially when he felt such love (lust?) for the woman he "helped", I guess we coul..."Yes, Arthur has some good characteristics and is likeable. He's not only that, though. He has some faults too - although they're not all that obvious here. Maybe he's a bit too inclined to take a gamble - a suspicious offer, the purchase of cursed land...
Jeanette wrote: "My thought on this second read, decades after the first (maybe 3 or 4 decades at the minimum)- I always gave considerable thought to why Arthur got so hard and bitter. It was a hard run, building u..."I think Arthur had a hard streak in his character from the beginning. He needed to, in order to not only survive what was one of the hardest and most dangerous of occupations, but to avoid slipping into the stereotypical sailor's role - violent and hardworking at sea, and violent and hard-drinking on shore, always poor and always wasteful of what little money he had. Even after he got enough money to buy land, he struggled to make a success of farming at first.
None of his marriages were successful, either. The first died young without a son, the second left him and as for his third wife - that was a match made out of strictest practicality, and I wonder sometimes if he kept her close so he could know always where she was, and that she'd never get allies to help her escape and charge him. Now, she seems to have been too stupid to organize anything like that, and too bad at personal relationships to have anyone who might intervene on her behalf, but he still might have felt more secure having her under his eye and in his control.
Unwanted pregnancies - yes, the solution, in families that could manage it, of "visiting auntie" people used to say and then having the child adopted, or far more likely, fostered, out must go back millenia! Not quite so long ago, in the rather rural area I grew up in, it was, well, perhaps not approved, but accepted, to simply have the child at home, and the child would be brought up by the mother's parents, usually (the mother generally being unable to financially support a child even if she could get a job that would support herself), or sometimes by other relatives. Some people mildly disapproved of option 2, which was to send the child away to be adopted by strangers through an orphanage or government service. They should be kept in the family, people would whisper.
And then there was the gossip I overheard as a young girl "Well, she SAID she was just visiting her aunt in Halifax, but she was SEEN there pregnant! Why couldn't she have been honest in the first place? She should have known everyone would find out!"
But Arthur, respectable farmer aspiring to be accepted, could not have accepted one of those solutions. He was the wrong social class at the wrong time, and too hard-headed to even consider that he was sending away his grandchild to an unknown fate, and although he loved his daughter, he wasn't going to consider her views!
I do wonder what happened to the faithless Philip. I'm inclined to believe that he was sent off by Arthur, nothing more. Maybe with a bribe to ensure that he kept his mouth shut and never came back? Lettice was better off without him; I think he was clearly planning to "baby-trap" her and position himself as the heir to her father.
Great to have more people on board , lovely! Racing onward too! This section is Section 2 . Narrative by Lettice Tresize ,for those yet to come on board.
I do agree that Arthur , if not already hard , definitely had the potential , particularly where women were concerned, His first wife, Lettice's mother was really the worst sort of choice for him, gentle, melancholy, ineffectual , die-away voice and all. If he hadn't been so interested in anything but social advancement and succession he should have seen that for himself. Or maybe he was so succession-focussed he didn't care about the companionship angle .
And so, having 'only' a daughter , we come to the amazing Anne Hatton ( incidentally, isn't it interesting that Arthur got on so much better her grand relatives than with the bourgeois Turnbulls) Oh dear , Anne and her glamour and beauty and inconstant love and her awful ( though suitably dramatic ) end.......and still no son.
And then, and then .......the awful Kate , chosen entirely for her breeding capacity. I wonder had Arthur pretended to love her would she have been any better ?
PS Tanya has been rather ill , though is recovering now and asked me to post a message here to say she will be back asap
Before we leave Arthur, I’d like to add that Lofts did a brilliant job in the opening, catching our interest and making us want to keep reading. I felt a little sorry for Arthur traipsing through the countryside alone and was also angry about the unjust tradition of the first born inheriting all (or mostly all). By the time Arthur came around, there wasn’t any type of inheritance at all for was there, a fourth son? I wondered how much 200 pounds was in today’s money since it was referred to as a fortune in 1590. I found a site that showed conversions. 200 pounds is worth 58,000 pounds today or $71,000 in US dollars. (That’s why I love Google.)
I mentioned this in a past discussion but I thought it was worth repeating that Arthur reminded me of Ephorus in How Far To Bethlehem. He was a handsome sailor, fell in love with Dorcas, the beautiful prostitute, and wanted to marry her. She refused because of money.
Barbara wrote: "PS Tanya has been rather ill , though is recovering now and asked me to post a message here to say she will be back asap.I'm sorry to hear that Tanya has been ill and look forward to her return.
Peggy wrote: "Before we leave Arthur, I’d like to add that Lofts did a brilliant job in the opening, catching our interest and making us want to keep reading. I felt a little sorry for Arthur traipsing through t..."The tradition of the first-born inheriting was in some ways better than a tradition of the inheritance being equally divided. I read somewhere (really convincing reference, that!) that in some parts of Europe (and maybe elsewhere) land was divided among all the children (or maybe the male children), and in very few generations, none of the children had enough land to support a family. Whereas as system of primogeniture meant that at least one child would live in comfort, and if his parents hadn't managed to find apprenticeships or marriages for the younger siblings before they died, he'd be expected to support them.
Of course, this was mainly an issue for the poorer or middling type of landowners - the great lords would have so much land and riches that even if the oldest got the bulk of them, there would be enough to provide for the younger siblings as well.
In Arthur's case, of course, there wasn't enough for his education or apprenticeship or employment in any more promising a career than that of a seaman.
Cheryl, thank you for that insight. It’s good to know the eldest would be expected to help his siblings if he could.
Peggy wrote: "Cheryl, thank you for that insight. It’s good to know the eldest would be expected to help his siblings if he could."Yes indeed. I think I have read that rural India is poor partly because of the system of dividing land between sons, so that plots get smaller and smaller and often unviable financially .
Lettice has an appalling time under Kate's regime doesn't she? Kate was so stupid to alienate and make an enemy of her , Lettice would have tried her best I think, had Kate been even halfway kind. True, Lettice loved the memory of her mother and had loved the wayward and beautiful Anne, but they were gone , and had Kate had a particle of sense and decency she would have had a far better time and been better served all round.
Lettice would very likely have gone away to school and then been married and Kate could have reigned supreme. But, and I think this is probably at the heart of it, she would never have been loved, not by Lettice and , more to the point , not by Arthur, sons or no sons.
Nevertheless , how dreadful is the dovecote solution ! Kate must have been not missed much by her own huge family , there is no mention of anyone coming to check things out is there ?
But Simon didn't lack for love - Lettice poured out pretty much all of hers on him. She was a lover was Lettice , her mother, her father , Anne, Jenny and , the crown of it all, Simon That she loved not wisely, but too well we will see soon.
Barbara wrote: "Lettice has an appalling time under Kate's regime doesn't she? Kate was so stupid to alienate and make an enemy of her , Lettice would have tried her best I think, had Kate been even halfway kind. I think Kate was simply very stupid. Maybe the effect of whatever intellectual lacks she was born with was worsened if her family of origin didn't practice and teach proper ways to treat others (they certainly appear to have completely ignored her after her marriage). Many people who are intellectually slow are entirely capable of developing good human relationships and learning the basic courtesies and respect that make living among other humans much more pleasant.
On the other hand, Simon, in spite of all the benefits of a comfortable home and devoted older sister in place of a mother was also not only intellectually slow, but unable to relate well to the others in his life and family. I did wonder if, in his case, it was partly because he didn't accept his intellectual limitations and how they affected the management of his property, and was envious of the sister (and Alan) who not only had those skills, but enjoyed learning and using them.
Kate's end was terrible, especially as I doubt she had the mental and emotional resources that, in rare cases, enable people in solitary confinement to survive mentally. I don't know what other solution there was, once Arthur had not only married her, but finally got a son. Divorce was rare, expensive, often came with social stigma - and there's no hint that Kate, terrible as she was, ever did anything that would be a legal reason for divorce. Arthur could have, of course, sent her to a similar kind of confinement far away - which would be more expensive and harder to supervise. Or he could have made her confinement more comfortable. I don't think that was an option, partly because Arthur was a hard man and not forgiving, and partly because Kate wouldn't have accepted it and would have caused more trouble had she been less strictly confined. I can't even blame Kate for fighting against even a more relaxed type of confinement, as much as I dislike her. Being a domineering and even a sometimes violent person isn't usually cause for lifetime solitary confinement - and Kate knew it. She also minimized her own faults, as so many do, and must have found it particularly galling to be a prisoner in a household she, by rights, should have ruled as the wife of the householder.
No , I agree, the management of Kate was always going to be difficult. I mean she manifestly wasn't 'mad' , merely , as we have said , very stupid and of course quite violent. I think though, given the times and the status of women vis a vis their husbands , Arthur could ( should? ) have easily paid for her to be kept elsewhere with few or no questions asked. Less chance of anyone from her family attempting to see her too. He was, I guess, so embittered by then that there might even have been some sort of awful perverse satisfaction in having her close . It is a little akin to what Evert Haan did in Silver Nutmeg, keeping that poor woman , his son's ex-nurse in a cage in the grounds as punishment for her supposed carelessness leading to a fall causing the child's intellectual disability . Not true of course and he actually knew it , but revenge was , I assume, his motive and I think Arthur too was not free of that
I wonder, had Simon had died would Arthur had gone into the dovecote for conjugal right visits to get another son ?
That's something I hadn't thought about - that Arthur might try again (if necessary) for another son with Kate. I suppose if he didn't totally despise her, he might have done something of the sort. Of course, there would still be the possibility that a second son would have been as unsatisfactory as Simon turned out to be. I don't think that there's much indication that he took a real interest in Simon, though - as long as he was a son, that was enough. So maybe he would have been willing to do what it took to get another son like Simon.
I'm so happy to be back, and fairly well recovered after a stunning attack of bronchitis that had me (literally!) knocked off my feet....Terrific discussion so far!
I really don;t think that Arthur ( who, after all, was rather fastidious in his person and in his habits : enough to pleasure a noblewoman, win the daughter of attorney Turnbull, as well as the rich and beautiful Anne Hatton ) could have brought himself to try again with Kate IF Simon had died ....I think his gorge would have risen...
.However, he had changed over the years...his naturally optimistic nature had been soured by the death of two wives, the behaviour of the third, a coarse slut who ill used his much loved only child, Lettice, as well as his unrelenting work on his land...I think he would simply have starved Kate to death by dismissing Dummy and then remarried to get a male heir.
Nobody remarked on the lovely, almost Arabian nights beginning to the novel....the chance come sailor to the new town, the astonishing colour of his hair, the old crone, like the wicked fairy in the tales leading him roundabout to the castle on the hill, the delicate and beautiful noblewoman he falls in love with; the fortune he is given... this is also a thread to the luck Lettice has later, when she stumbles on the castle, now deserted, in her desperate need for help with her new born child....
As well as the thread leading to Arabella later, who falls in love with, had she known it, the red haired son of Arthur at the party at the castle!
It is also lovely to hear all the old names of familiar NL territory...Layer Wood, Baildon, Ockley, the hereditary Turnbull attorneys, the Hattons from "Jassy", the Abbey at Summerfield that the dreaded Mrs. Stancey carves up to make the farm where she tortures Araminta in " To See a Fine Lady", as well as all the familiar great houses in the area : Mortiboys, Merravay, Muchanger....
I think that Arthur really loved Lettice a great deal, and she disappointed him terribly with her choice of Philip Wentworth. He loved her enough to teat Wentworth by telling him ( once Lettice had confessed that she was pregnant) he could marry Lettice, but with no money coming to her : he never meant to carry out his threat and Wentworth proved, as he had suspected, a fortune hunter and fled in the night like a thief, too cowrdly to even face Lettice.
Arthur had another crushing blow: his rage, once directed at his ill fortune with his first two wives and his disgust with Kate, now turns on Lettice, who had more promise than any of them : he condemns her to Oxney, where she is to give birth in secret and be deprived of the child she has now come to love passionately.
I'm glad to see you recovered and back with us, Tanya! Great comments, too. I'm not so certain about Arthur's possible reaction to a loss of his son, although your idea is certainly plausible. I think, had he survived, he would have become reconciled eventually with Lettice. He did love her very much, and they were in a way two peas in a pod - intelligent, hardworking, passionate about farming.
Yes, the beginning was a bit like a fairy tale. It was so unlikely to work, too, but the lady was desperate enough to try anything, and her plan was a success. Of course we can speculate whether the poisoned cakes were her idea or that of the old woman! I tend to think we don't know, but it could have been either. There's a hint of a hard streak in the lady's character, even though Arthur is convinced that the old woman is responsible.
I think both the beautiful lady and her maid knew that Arthur had to go....it was too dangerous to let him go out into the world..what he'd lived was too delicious not to boast about when he was drunk, or carried away, they must have thought...and so I imagine the lady let her maid handle the actual (attempted) murder..In that, they underestimated Arthur, who was too realistic to imagine that it could have lasted, or that the lady would have come away with him, as he begged her to.
He also realised what a narrow escape he's had, and that must have cured him, and kept his mouth resolutely shut!
Lettice's stay at Oxney reminds me of another NL character who was forced to be a dressmaker's apprentice and who had to pretend to be blind to escape...Lettice's determination to envisage another future rather than adoption was also fuelled by her growing love for her unborn child.
Although Arthur - after his initial bitterness and determination to repudiate his bastard grandchild - never referred to the matter again and took Lettice out with him socially as usual, Lettice, deprived at a blow of both her faithless lover and her doting father, now narrows all her abundant and passionate love - for she is a passionate woman- that she has hitherto spent on father, lover and, most of all, her beautiful half brother Simon, down to the future if her child, whom she is resolved not to lose at any cost.
Oxney, in a wild heathland on the borders between Suffolk and Norfolk, " was a curious mixture : part jail, part poorhouse, part country mansion ". Anonimity - on everyone's part, for every reason. present and future- was the keyword.
Lettice's name was changed to Polly, her jewels were confiscated (ie stolen) by the 2 lates, Scott and Lincoln, who were the bosses of this sinister place, and her clothes replaced by an anonymous smock and cloth shoes ( to prevent escape on foot, one presumes).
We now see the stuff Lettice is made of - most of which must have come from Arthur.
Once she has realised that her baby, once born, will vanish from her life, she wastes very little time.
Already heavily pregnant, she steals Mistress Scott's dress and shoes and escapes as soon as it is dark into the dark unknown.
I see we have an option at the bottom of comments to click a box that says "notify me when people comment." However, I do not think this is an option on the app. (The app needs improvement.)Anyway, to the discussion, Tanya, I am glad you are feeling better. Bronchitis can be exhausting to deal with. I had a bout back in November.
Great recap on Lettice's situation in Oxney. I admire her character more and more as the book progresses and have now lost all sympathy with Arthur, not to be regained, lol! Lettice's romance with Philip also reminded me of Lovers All Untrue (Marion) and Road to Revelation (Mehitable).
Tanya Mendonsa wrote: "Lettice's stay at Oxney reminds me of another NL character who was forced to be a dressmaker's apprentice and who had to pretend to be blind to escape...Lettice's determination to envisage anothe..."
Oxney reminded me a bit of a high class version of the Victorian baby-farmers. And it was rather similar to a place operating in a neighbouring province up to the mid 1940s run by an "obstetrician" (actually a midwife) and her husband. They charged unwed mothers for their services, adopted out what babies they could (at a very high price) and the rest...well, they tended to die, and were buried on the property in the boxes butter was shipped in. The Butter Box Babies they were called when the story eventually came out.
Lettice was wise to run, and strong, lucky and clever enough to survive everything so she could turn up home with a plausible tale.
Tanya Mendonsa wrote: "I think both the beautiful lady and her maid knew that Arthur had to go....it was too dangerous to let him go out into the world..what he'd lived was too delicious not to boast about when he was dr..."They did do what they could to ensure he didn't trace them, but there was still a risk, especially with such an unusual and identifiable hair colour.
Peggy wrote: "I see we have an option at the bottom of comments to click a box that says "notify me when people comment." However, I do not think this is an option on the app. (The app needs improvement.)It doesn't seem to work at all Pegs I contacted Goodreads and the only notifications they do now are 'likes' on things .....Lettice said of herself re Wentworth ( that utter cad) that she supposed it was inevitable she should fall in love with him, So true that more experienced girl and women have been taken in - and still are - by fortune hunters such as him. The outcome, though perhaps not as inevitable, a commonplace too wasn't it ? There was an 'Oxney' not too far from my rural childhood home in northern England . Girls who went there were said to be visiting their aunties in another part of the county. Everyone pretended to believe it and I don't expect the conditions and fate of the babies was much different than 'Oxney"
Narrative by Lettice Tresize Part 3
Lettice , her father's daughter in so many ways makes a daring escape , and miraculously had the baby, literally in a ditch, pretty much without any problem except pain ( if I may advert to my rural upbringing again , I knew a then 14 year old who did just that, only in her tiny cottage bedroom with her family around in theirs and no one heard or knew a thing until the next day , when the baby was whisked away forever by whatever authorities did that stuff )She told me ' ah its not so bad, nothink like they tell you ....." So I had no difficulty in believing Lettice's tale here .
Her daring entrance to the great house and the 'disguising; of herself and , most of all, stealing the horse was an enthralling bit of story telling I thought. And her luck holds all the way home and into her arrival.....
Lettice certainly deserves her luck...Although, living as she did, the only prosperous family in that part of Sufolf, better than the farmers, yet not yet gentry, what opportunity did she have to meet suitable young men? It was inevitable that she should fall for Wentworth...but she bounced back amazingly, all her instincts for survival centered, not on herself, but on the safety of her unborn child....so it was all her life : she'd dedicated herself to Simon, now to her own baby.
But it is this coincidence of the castle that continues the thread of the fairytale, which weaves throughout this novel...the catle just barely abandoned, the horse available, arriving to find her father dead and the way made clear for her to tell whatever story she chose to...
And being, for the time being, mistress of the situation.
What a relief it must have been for her, after all those months of different kinds of strain : disappointed love, abandonment in her pregnancy, being shuffled away, giving birth on her own, getting on her feet and soldiering on ( the word is very appropriate!) and, at last, coming to the safe haven of her home...
I didn't initially connect the castle to which Arthur was taken to the one where Lettice found supplies! And I thought that episode was like a fantasy because I couldn't imagine the biggest of great houses being left THAT unattended!
Yes, it was the same!And the contact with that particular castle will pop up again !
I think it was a great manor house, belonging to the Duke of Norfolk, not an actual castle , not that it matters I guess ! I thought on first reading it might have been the very manor in which Arthur's secret liaison took place, but that belongs, as we learn later, to the Lord Gorleston so, no.So now we come to Part 4, Alan Heath's narrative. Do you think everyone knew , or surmised at least, who his mother was? I think Lettice would have done well to let the the speculation that he was Arthur's illegitimate son flourish , but she was disinclined wasn't she , because she was his mother and even the totally incorrect idea that her father was her son's father was too awful to contemplate.
Poor Lettice and , to an extent, Alan, so much at the mercy of Simon's monumental stupidity and selfishness . Largely due to Arthur's will, of course. NL often has issues caused by poor wills or contracts and general ignorance of the law doesn't she ? I'm thinking of Nethergate and the dreadful contract made by Isabelle's husband Pratt when 'buying' the inn. Also that she need never have married him had she known about Fleet marriages !
Yes, men didn't trust women to manage ( or understand money or property) and women were kept, by their lack of exposure and education at that period, ignorant of much of the law - like poor Isabella, who, even had she wanted to check on the Pratt's version of marriage law, had no one she could consult...Arthur's will counted on his heir Simon's "generosity" and respect for his father's will on paying Lettice an annual allowance and letting her live in her part of the house for her lifetime. To do him justice, Arthur died untimely, never saw Simon grow up to be a selfish, stupid monster, and most unlikely to be fair to his half sister...
I quite understand Lettice not taking the easy way out and fostering the assumption about Alan being Arthur's natural child, as she loved him so passionately ...indeed, their minds ran along parallel tracks, as we shall see when it comes to Simon!
I ALWAYS assumed it was the same castle throughout...the beautiful young lady's son became Lord Gorleston, so he would naturally live in his (supposed ) father's ancestral castle, wouldn't he?
Barbara wrote: "Alan Heath's narrative. Do you think everyone knew , or surmised at least, who his mother was?"I think Lettice got away with it, and the assumption generally was that Alan was possibly Arthur's child. Of course, there was speculation, but as one of the maids said "Well you needn’t and you shouldn’t. His navel wasn’t healed and she flat as a board. And on horseback, too!". Simon certainly appears to have known or guessed about Alan's parentage.
I think the business about poorly written wills and lack of knowledge about legal right is more constantly than historically true. There are still plenty of people who don't know their legal rights and don't even think about finding out what they are and how to enforce them. Ideally, adults should have wills, and wills should be written by lawyers who know what they're doing, but many people don't have wills or write their own. I don't think anyone realized until my grandfather died that his will, prepared by a lawyer, stated that if he died before my grandmother she inherited everything (not that there was much) unless she married again! In the event, she died first, and I don't think such provisions were enforceable by then anyway. One of my relative snorted that the lawyer who prepared the will was as old-fashioned as my grandfather himself, which may well have been the case.
Tanya Mendonsa wrote: "Arthur's will counted on his heir Simon's "generosity" and respect for his father's will on paying Lettice an annual allowance and letting her live in her part of the house for her lifetime. "I think that the will would have worked out well enough if Simon had been a reasonable person - well, reasonable and intelligent and a good money manager instead of a gambler and wastrel. I think he came to resent Lettice and Alan, partly because of their affection for each other and also because they could so easily do things that bored him, like manage the farm. But the house was a big one, and although there were some points about access that hadn't been considered, they should have all been able to live there amicably enought had they all got on better.
i>Cheryl wrote: "Tanya Mendonsa wrote: "Arthur's will counted on his heir Simon's "generosity" and respect for his father's will on paying Lettice an annual allowance and letting her live in her part of the house f..."Yes, the paternalist idea that women had/have no need to fear being dependants of men because men would surely do the right thing was and is the most pernicious idea , based solidly in patriarchal thinking and belief. Faugh ! as they say in old novels. And eff that, as we say now!
Tanya , I agree that the later Lord Gorleston whom we meet in Nethergate did inherit the castle ( Dunwich Castle I think) in which Arthur's liaison took place , I just don't think it was the same place that Lettice did her stuff in. That was described as " a great house' - not a castle - belonging (probably) to the Duke of Norfolk , being cleansed in the usual way of such places. Lettice describes it as leaving her house and Muchanger and Merravey for dead, but never suggests it is a castle,
In any case I also think it was too near The Old Priory to have been Arthur's liaison place , He roamed far and wide after it before he came upon the Old Priory , so no, attractive as the idea is, I don't think it was the same place.
So are we ready for Alan Heath's Narrative? Such a lovely boy, and grew to be lovely man if we overlook the little matter of (view spoiler)
Barbara, I stick to my guns!! I think it was the same castle....remember, the old crone of a maid drove Arthur in circles and in such a roundabout way that he had absolutely no idea as to distances...however, we shall agree to disagree!Yes, Cheryl, you are so right about women not knowing their rights just by custom, not really historically - human nature doesn;t change, does it?
Yes, let's move on to Alan's narrative ....I'm glad that at least Lettice was never disappointed in her son - she deserved the joy he gave her and the unspoken communion they shared.
Alan is as sensitive as she is : at even 6 years of age, he already realises that Simon is inimical to him, remarking " in a nasty voice" that HE never had such a good pony as a boy as Alan does, and Lettice very cleverly saying that Alan, when grown up, would ride Simon;s acres when she was too old to do so, thereby cleverly emphasizing the difference in Simon and Alan's social status, smoothing Simon's ruffled feathers.
What a monster he turns out to be!
I think we will have to agree to disagree darling , because for me NL's own words saying that it was 'a great house ...probably belonging to the Duke of Norfolk' not Dunwich Castle where the Gorlestones live is the clincher. But never mind eh!!Alan Heath's Narrative
I do like Alan too, and yes I am glad for Lettice that she had him to support her in her dealings with the frightful Simon. Alan was, as you say , sensitive and a wonderful son even when he didn't know he was one. But he was also robust and able to deal with school bullies and the like, and we will see to what lengths he will go to protect Lettice. Deliberately failing the Cambridge entrance exams was just the start !
There is a point where Lettice says Arthur's will was wise, after Simon offensively point out that even if he was starving, her ( small ) annuity is the first charge on the estate and she retorts that their father knew whilst she was alive the estate would be properly managed.
I don't know about wise , if he knew Simon had idle , expensive wastrel tendencies, surely he should have realised that he was capable of selling off crucial land to fund his lifestyle and that Lettice would be powerless to stop it. What do you all think?
Sorry, Barb - I goofed on the castle bit...mea culpa! Simon was still very young when Arthur died...one could say that his character- and tendencies- hadn't yet been fixed. After all, he was being viewed by a fond father and a doting sister at that point.
It is to Lettice's credit that she keeps her temper with Simon, even when she must have wanted to strangle him, seeing his utter stupidity and wanton wastefulness...and seeing her inheritance crumbling away- and, with it, her beloved son's future..
I think that Arthur had such ingrained respect for and belief in the power of owning land that it was almost a sacred charge for him : he might have imagined Simon growing up to be extravagant and wasteful, even, but I would think he never ever envisaged him selling the land he had sweated to acquire...
Tanya, I think you are right re Arthur being understandably a bit blind to Simon's character, he was the much longed for son, and he was, as you say, very young when Arthur died . And poor Lettice poured all her heart into him , probably indulging him far too much . I like too your point about the sacred character of land , which Arthur inherited from his farming background and Simon , really, never saw . But Alan did ! His potato scheme and his understanding - via Lettice- of the crucial importance of good husbandry. Arthur would have been proud of him I think, no matter what his birth was . Or would he? He was touchy, proud
man and might not have tolerated Alan's presence, unless he want along with the pretence that he was his own illegitimate child . Mind you . Lettice was almost hysterically keen not to have people believe that wasn't she .
PS sorry about the castle thing, I didn't mean to make a thing of it adn your idea was so much more romantic !
Arthur also, coming from a poor background, knew that it was only by the most improbable of circumstances that he could ever manage to buy land, and knew intimately how much sheer hard labour (and probably, given that it is farming, a bit of luck with weather and plant pests) it took to make the land productive enough to fund their lifestyle. Simon, born with a silver spoon in his mouth, never had that gut-deep knowledge of what it took to reach and maintain his standard of living.
Norah Lofts sometimes seems to waver between the nature and nurture theories of development, and often people display bit of each. I think in Simon's case, he probably did inherit his mother's lack of intelligence to some degree. but there are indications he was very much indulged as a boy, which can't have been good for his character or work habits.
I'm sure that Arthur ( who was fundamentally from a simple background with very set ideas, despite his romantic second marriage : which turned out badly, remember, because Anne ran away!) would never have accepted Alan as either Lettice's illegitimate child or his own : the most one could have hoped for was an abandoned child who Lettice took pity on and brought home ( which was, in fact, her story)....Alen, in fact, inherited all of Arthur's good qualities : his love of the land, his very hard working ethic, his loyalty to his blood family - and, let's not forget that, his beautiful hair !!
Simon had nothing except his good looks, which would have coarsened with time.
Alan's adoption of the potato was sheer genius, given the conservative nature of the farming community : but he was, let's not forget it, a scholar : in fact, he was quite perfect, while Simon had no redeeming qualities whatsoever! In any case, he deserved his end, because he had absolutely no concern for anyone but himself and his own comfort : we feel no pity at all!
Alan and Simon are wonderful contrast aren't they ! Poor Lettice who loved them both so much and who must have been so hurt and disappointed in Simon ( well, anyone would )I wonder what his father would have made of him had he lived long enough to see who Simon became. Mind you , with Arthur still alive , Simon would have had very little leeway and freedom to behave as he did. He would have just become an unsatisfactory , disappointing, idle son I guess. The sort that might have gone to ' The Colonies ' !
And so we come to The Stretched Rope... I guess we have to suspend our disbelief a bit that both Lettice and Alan come to exactly the same resolution and in exactly the same way at the same time. but I never mind a bit of suspension for the sake of a good tale.
And thus ends the egregious Simon of whom Alan says
"Neither one of us had said a word of pity or remorse and that, in its way, was an epitaph". But Simon gets the last word, the last throw of the loaded dice against Lettice and Alan .
And so begins The Narrative of Marian Thorington and the entry of her and her frightful mother Babcock .
What do we think of Lettice's decision to abide by her father's desire she should stay in her half of the house, poisoned as it would be by the rancorous hate of Mistress Babock ?
I think that Lettice, despite everything, believed that things would turn out well in the end.After all, despite her ill health, she held the ace in the hole - Alan, who would not only never desert her, but who's so bright and full of ideas.
Also, she so despises the awful Babcock that, in a way, she's determined to pretend she literally doesn't exist, despite the realities of the entrance, the lack of access to her beloved garden, the awful stink of the tannery pits....
Poor, lovesick Marion is a bit of a comfort, but it is Alan who, unconsciously, she counts on, don't you think?
When Alan tries to remonstrate with Simon for his treatment of Lettice, Simon says, " It is, after all, generally reckoned a Man's duty to look after his mother!"....and Alan realises why exactly Simon hates him so much and, also, that, for once, he has stated no less than the truth...
All the money Lettice has lent Simon is lost, because she has no redress _ no IOU,no witness to the lendings...Simon can sell off the estate bit by bit to fund his gambling, and if , as Turnbull the lawyer says, there is no estate left, tere can be no allowance paid out of the estate to Lettice, as Arthur's will decrees.
" Heresay is not evidence", says Turnbull - so Lettice is penniless, her only solution the " rent-free accomodation" of an almshouse.
And so, both Alan and Lettice ( between whom an uncanny, unspoken communication existed : that of two people in complete mental and emotional harmony ) hit on the same plan for at least getting rid of Simon, even if the estate could not be gotten back.
Barbara wrote: "What do we think of Lettice's decision to abide by her father's desire she should stay in her half of the house, poisoned as it would be by the rancorous hate of Mistress Babock ?"I think Lettice had no choice but claim her inheritance - or she thought she had no choice, since she was unwilling to go into an almshouse (or other charitable institution) and I think felt initially that she'd be a burden on Alan if she went with him when he was barely able to support himself.
She also seems to have thought of the house, or part of it, as hers, the only thing she had of her own and that last remnant of what her father had achieved.
Once she had a roof over her head, she could turn the space into a mini-farm that would support her, whereas if she had gone with Alan, he would have done the farming and she might not have had anything to contribute.
Marion is, in a way, a little bit like Lettice but on a smaller and more restricted scale. She doesn't have the options Lettice does - no inheritance, and a terrible family. But her oppressed step-father comes through in a pinch, and offers her an escape, which she takes. Marion seems to lack initiative, and whatever awareness she had of a better way of life (the school, Lettice and of course Alan) doesn't seem to have made her feel that she can aspire to anything other than life with a brutal mother, and part-time work as a not very successful whore. But she's a survivor. She grabs at the opportunity her stepfather provides, endures an apprenticeship that gave her skills she used all her life, and is brutally honest. She knows she' s manipulating Robin into marrying her, but she's willing to pay for what she did. Although her later life wasn't great, and she continued to yearn after Alan, she was a good wife, mother, and participant in the business - no raising hens for pin money for her! All in all, her life was better than her mother's; certainly, she did not harm those about her as her mother often did, and she lived in some comfort in a family that treated her well. After, of course, her mother-in-law got over her initial dislike of her.
Both Marion and Lettice took difficult situations, and in their own ways, handled them well.
Marion, I agree, is a survivor : she also knows she has no chance with Alan, who, despite his " democratic" views, IS Lettice's true son and, although he might feel sorry for Marion, would balk at going any further. He, also, like Lettice, is a romantic, and would only marry for love.Poor Marion is brave, despite all the drawbacks of her upbringing and family. I feel sorry for Robin, who's caught by his old promise...however, Marion, as you said, Cheryl, made him a good wife.
Too bad for the traps of romantic love, which is only too rarely reciprocated, or rarely lasts!
Oh I have nothing to add to the excellent summaries of Cheryl and Tanya - except my admiration that is. We don't have many functioning members , but goodness they are good !!!Btw, why do you think knowing Lettice was Alan's mother made Simon so hate him Tanya ? I wouldn't have thought he cared much about anybody who didn't directly affect him, and I understood Lattice to have been very careful not to let her love for Alan show.
Do you think perhaps jealousy? That insofar as Simon loved anyone, he did love Lettice and detected hers for Alan and resented any part of her affection being 'alienated' from him ?
I liked Marian, she kept her head high and her armour polished. I was bit sad at her final words, that Robin's burden had lifted and vanished altogether but "Mine never did"
( Though, speaking as a cynical old bat, I do think perhaps think these nostalgic yearnings after a lost first love are not quite as agonising as they are made to seem. I'm thinking of Merravey, where Elizabeth, Jon Borage's first love who, apparently happily married to the lovely - and prosperous - Tom Rowhedge , was said to have loved and sorrowed after Jon all her long life . He would , imho, have made her a hopeless husband anyway and I think she was quite pragmatic and sensible enough to know that really, but liked the romance of the lost love )
So now to the final Narrative
Arabella Shawcross and the convoluted connections between Gorlestone Castle and Alan Heath , which we know about and they dont !
Yup, Barb, I think that Simon ( with his very limited intelligence of the heart that Walter de la Mare prized so highly) was very, very jealous of Alan - don't forget, Lettice was the only "mother" he'd ever known, and if he felt a spark of true feeling for anyone it was for himself, and anything taken away from him and given to another ( no matter how discreet Lettice was about her love for her true son) was fiercely resented.Remember, these apparently leather skinned characters are uncannily shrewd when it comes to sensing something felt but not heard or seen : like the unspoken communication ( indeed, communion) between Lettice and Alan....Simon must have burned with resentment!
Also, I think that Lettice wanted to hang on to the house to hope that eventually Alan could inherit it...Arthur's passionate love for and attachment to his own land was passed on to both his daughter and his "true" grandson : who knows what awful genes Simon's coarse mother passed on to him as his bitter inheritance?
Arabella Shawcross reminds me of the straw haired heroine in one of NL's books ( Bless This House? ) who saves the horses from the burning stable and so has the man she loves so passionately fall in love with her.....
I do agree about first loves, sadly, Barbara....I doubt if my own would have made me happy had he married me and quite possibly Marion was well off with her sturdy Robin ( who stood by his forgotten promise so bravely) than she could ever have been with Alan, given their total disparity of upbringing and values, no matter how delicate she was in her hidden heart...
Barbara wrote: "Though, speaking as a cynical old bat, I do think perhaps think these nostalgic yearnings after a lost first love are not quite as agonising as they are made to seem.."I agree. Marian's sentimental memories of the man she thinks of as her true love reminds me of those stories of people who have similar attachments to their high school sweetheart. When they meet each other decades later, the adored one hasn't given the ex-sweetheart a thought in 30 years, is boring, balding, and happily married to someone else.
Tanya Mendonsa wrote: "Yup, Barb, I think that Simon ( with his very limited intelligence of the heart that Walter de la Mare prized so highly) was very, very jealous of Alan - don't forget, Lettice was the only "mother"..."I think Simon resented not having Lettice's attention focused solely on him - and as much as she tried to pretend Alan was just another foundling, she couldn't have concealed all her interest in him. Moreover, much of her time and energy must have gone into running the estate, something Simon was not interested in. He didn't even have the intelligence (or is it emotional intelligence?) to try to please Lettice by sharing her passion for the land. If he had everything might have been different.
Simon was spoiled, but on the other hand, she was his closest, really his only human contact, and he couldn't deal with not taking first place in her eyes.
It's interesting that his main adult attachment was to a rough prostitute probably old enough to be his mother, literally.
Poor Simon - a Jocasta complex! , one really can't feel sorry for him, with all the riches ( literally!) piled on his sunny curly head....And now Arabella Shawcross, who is plain and who enters the story at 18 - and already in love with chestnut haired Lord Gorleston, although her strict grandmother tells her tartly that young lords didn't seek their brides in country parsonages!
She goes to Yarmouth ( where this novel begins, with young Arthur as a sailor entering it), to buy material for a dress in which to entrance this beautiful young man, the present Earl, whose Dunwich family is hosting a noonday assembly to assist indigent sailors, at the Yarmouth Guildhall, to which anyone can buy tickets.
Naturally, being in love with the heir, Arabella eagerly seizes on any news of anytthing connected with him (behaviour that any woman who remembers being in love with someone unattainable can remember!)...and so we hear of the formidable old Lady Dunwich, Lord Gorleston's mother, who is heavily made up, but who had " sad eyes", as Arabella remarks......this is the beautiful, charming, fragile, dark haired beauty who had entranced Arthur.
And, at this assembly, Arabella, in her new dress and the emerald and diamond parure her generous ( but absent!) ex pirate father had given her, is asked carelessly to dance by Lord Gorleston and, as carelessly, fatally and hungrily kissed - kissed once and then forgotten: at least, by him.
Naturally, this leaves an indelible mark.
It opens with Arthur Tresize , made able by a very strange turn of events to reclaim the Old Priory and turn it's Henry 8th caused ruins into a house. On the face of it , Arthur is a straightforward kind of man, with a straightforward kind of ambition. But the events that made him able to reclaim the Old Priory reverberate down the years, and the Old Priory itself and its aura cast a serious cloud....
The Old Priory is broken into narratives , so I propose we discuss each one in turn, so we are currently doing the Narrative by Arthur Tresize