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I agree entirely Alice,that is partly why I do periodic bombardment of NL questions to on the neverending. You have done ssome great ones recently ! I get so cross with myself if I get them wrong.I always had sympathy for Martha - she was burdened so young with responsibility and care - and never had love reciprocated really, Tom yes, but he took from her all her life . And *Arabella? Isabella (?) D'Aubigny just used her. Poor Martha would have been a happy woman had she had her own children to love and admonish, but she was destined to be second best in everybody's life.
* I don't think the D'Aubnignys were Huguenots, just basically emigres from Revolutionary politics.
I didn't remember for sure but was Arabella the one who got pregnant and was left behind when the young man suddenly died so Martha got her married to her brother who was a soldier back from war and he abused them terribly? As you know I get books mixed up. That is why I can read them over and over again. I guess I should go read as I want to read 100 books this year. My son challenged me. I am up to 30 right now. I want to underline in this one but also its a good copy so have mixed feelings. It helps me when I do questions. I just got about 20 Harry Potter ones wrong that should have been easy for me but I do think the quiz helps my memory.
Going to create another question right now tho that I have been intending to do but I get distracted by the quiz and want to answer more of them.
Going to create another question right now tho that I have been intending to do but I get distracted by the quiz and want to answer more of them.
Yes, that's the Isabella, Martha married her off to her brother George with one arm . He was an awful man, but when he was dead they found that he had terrible galls from the ill fitting prosthetic arm, so must have been in constant pain . A nice NL touch that .....
Nethergate is one NL novel that I would especially like to see filmed, especially for the last scenes. It would be such a great opportunity for an obscure young actor to launch his career! We'd first see him, some unknown, in what seemed to be a bit part when he appears out of the fog that night in Baildon to walk Annabel back to school, and viewers who didn't know the book might think that that was his only appearance. Then at the end, when Stephen and Annabel return to Ockley at the end of their rope after looking at that little house in the woods, we could see the background go slightly out of focus as he and Annabel see each other again and music begins to play.Incidentally, when the little house in the woods, where no one could bear to live for long, came into the story, I was sure it must be an allusion to something in one of her earlier books, but I couldn't place it. Did anyone recognize it, or was it something new just in Nethergate?
Re the house in the woods, I had exactly the same response Mary , I can't for the life of me think of the book and/or characters it referred to, yet it is unlike NL to make such an allusion without having laid the ground work elsewhere isn't it? Then again, In The Suffolk Trilogy , I can't remember which book now - the Lonely Furrow I think- the maidservant Margery(?) is spooked by certain places in the house and I can't see a reason why she should be. Apart from the tragic musunderstanding with Walter the ex-archer , nothing untoward is described as having happened there was it? .
Yes, how about that house in the woods. Always wondered who/what it was that "haunted" it. Is it the same one that the run-away girl came to and an old old man lived there and thought she was his long-dead wife, gave her a box of cosmetics to use. Cant remember which book. Also about the Knights Acre/Homecoming/Lonely Furrow: It was hinted that the ghost of the murdered wife caused the horse to spook, killing the poisoner. Near the well, I think, where they first met each other when Sir Godfrey brought home the wild girl to his wife.
I had forgotten that detail about the Suffolk Trilogy. The house at Intake was built for Bybilla, wasn't it? I remember her specifically wanting a still room. So whatever gave Margaret (or do you mean Griselda?) chills had to have happened there fairly recently. Do you remember where in the house she felt that way? As I recall, the exotic girl, whose name I can't remember now, slowly poisoned Sybilla in the hope of getting Godfrey for herself and then instead watched him waste away from grief, and then her horse was spooked by Sybilla's presence outside one night and threw her. A thought: could NL be suggesting throughout her work that in a sense EVERY house is haunted? It's a rare house of any age that hasn't been the site of Some tragic event!
Mary, yes , I totally forgot that Tana ( the exotic girl) had poisoned Sybilla!! Of course, it all makes sense ! I always thought Tana was a most tragic character, doomed to love a competely unattainable person and whose life was basically sterile and wasted because of that unattainabilty. Jassy was tragic too for the same reason, but she , perhaps because not a stranger in strange land, at least did other things with her life despite the grief. Terrible death of course ...........
Ps not Griselda who was spooked I don't think, too practical etc . Margaret was the 'slow ' daughter who married the cousin wasn't she ,after giving them all heart attacks by having sex with men in stables etc and actually got pregnant by a passing black-haired carter in a meadow , though nobody knew ( except us of course ) and she married her (also odd) cousin and the baby became Richard of Moyidan.
The spooked person Margery? was Mistress Captoft's servant who she wanted to leave behind when she left Knights Acre
Alice wrote, "I never understand why [Lord Bowdegrave kills himself:] . . . ."Neither did I on first reading, but on a later one I put some things together. We're told that he had seemed on the brink of announcing an engagment a couple of times in the past but then nothing had happened, and he commissioned that portrait of Annabel that made her look boyish. We're also told that this time his courtship had gone too far for it simply to fizzle as his earlier ones had. So clearly he just couldn't bring himself to marry any woman, no matter how hard he tried, but he couldn't honorably back out, either. In other words, he was gay at a time when it was absolutely unacceptable to be, and he couldn't live with either admitting the fact or marrying a woman.
Mary wrote: "Alice wrote, "I never understand why [Lord Bowdegrave kills himself:] . . . ."
Neither did I on first reading, but on a later one I put some things together. We're told that he had seemed on th..."
Ah! Thank you for clearing that up for me. That makes perfect sense. How very sad. Course if he had married her she wouldn't have been able to marry her true love that she found again later.
Thanks ever so much, Alice
Neither did I on first reading, but on a later one I put some things together. We're told that he had seemed on th..."
Ah! Thank you for clearing that up for me. That makes perfect sense. How very sad. Course if he had married her she wouldn't have been able to marry her true love that she found again later.
Thanks ever so much, Alice
Doing a re-read of this book and being struck by some things I hadn't noticed earlier:Martha commenting that Isabella looked exactly like Lady Rosaleen did when she first went to work for her. This makes the romance between Isabella and Alan somewhat freaky.
Next, when George Pratt dies and Isabella leaves town with Annabelle, Joanna finds the tavern empty and as she leaves, walking shakily, comments that the whole thing has done her an injury. Did anybody else get the impression that she may have sustained a slight stroke--not just a blow to her feelings?
Also, Isabella's mind cracking near the end of the book - I tried to figure out her age. Say she was 18 when she came to England and Annabelle was 18 or 20 at the end of the book, this just puts her in her late 30's/early 40's. She had some terrible struggles--thinking she was abandoned by Alan (thanks to the horrible Lady Rosaleen), being abused by her husband, and then, after some years of happiness, finding out they were homeless without much money after Mr. Franklin died--but her mind cracking doesn't seem realistic to me. Has anyone heard of such an experience in real life?
I'm not being critical of the book; it's classic Norah Lofts, even if it does have a rare happy ending.
As you say, it is classic Norah Lofts - Marion Draper, after the betrayals, ended up practically catatonic. I haven't personally heard of exactly similar things, but I have read about people who suffer a mental collapse, what used to be called a mental or nervous breakdown, after severe strain. And Isabella had been under a strain for years, even if she did seem to have convinced herself that Mr. Franklin wouldn't carry through with his threat. I've known elderly people become mentally very confused after hospitalization, which was described to me as 'decompensation' - they can't handle the stress, and their mental functioning goes way down. Sometimes, with time and care, it comes back; other times, not so much. As I said this isn't the same as a comparatively young woman like Isabella cracking up, but I don't see why it wouldn't happen to a younger person if she had been suffering for a long time from a lot of stress.
I appreciate that insightful answer, Cheryl. It gives me a better understanding of Isabella. Such a hard life at a young age and isolated without much social support, no family besides her daughter--she even mentioned suicide to Joanna. It's a wonder she held up as well as she did now that I think of it.
I have read this book again recently and have become fascinated by the 'House in the woods.' I have found a few references to it in other books but am not sure from the geography whether it is the same house. In 'Pargeters' a witch lived in an isolated house and is left there to despair. In 'Jassy' there is a reference to an isolated place in Layer wood as well where there was a final stand by the Saxons during the Norman conquest. The house was held despairingly until it was fired. In Nethergate it crops as a place which no one can live in because they feel such despair. Have any other readers found other references about this house in NL books?
Elizabeth, we've talked about this and not come to any conclusion but you've raised some new points. It would be logical to me that there was a reference in Jassy, as I think of Nethergate as a kind of sequel. I don't remember your reference in Jassy though, I'll have to get out my copy. Also will have to refresh my memory, do you remember if this house within walking distance or did Stephen and Isabella use horses to get there?
Elizabeth wrote: "I have read this book again recently and have become fascinated by the 'House in the woods.' I have found a few references to it in other books but am not sure from the geography whether it is the ..."I never though about the Pageter's house in the wood where the wise woman lived , now that it a possibilty isnt it ?
I have just re read Jassy to see if there was another reference but I didn't find one. I will keep looking in other books. I have a feeling that there might be something in Michael and all the Angels.
The only reference in Jassy which may be related is the one I described earlier about how Mortiboys got the name. This was a description of the final stand by the Saxons during the Norman conquest. The house was held despairingly until it was fired.
Elizabeth, there isn't anything in Michael and All Angels, pretty much the whole thing takes place at the Golden Fleece . Would make it easy to film actually, it occurs to me!
Barbara wrote: "Elizabeth, there isn't anything in Michael and All Angels, pretty much the whole thing takes place at the Golden Fleece . Would make it easy to film actually, it occurs to me!"I was thinking of the part where Harriet goes into the a hut/ house in the wood to consult a witch about a cure for her face. It seemed to me to be a bit of a link with Pargeters and the witch in the woods.
Stephen specifically says that the cottage in the woods was built by his grandfather for a gamekeeper - but I can't for the life of me think of a situation like that in any other book. Have we come across Stephen's grandfather? His father was Sir Evelyn Fennel, wasn't he?
I have just finished a reread of Nethergate, since it connects with our recent discussion of Jassy. I was also intrigued by the "house in the woods" and vaguely remembered everyone's recollections above. I don't think this house connects with the Saxon stand, since that house was destroyed, unless it is the spot, and not the actual house, that holds the feelings of despair and coldness.I liked the description of this house being built of "dressed flint with a good thick thatch" that at first convinced Stephen of this reason for the cold he encountered.
Since we are not sure what caused the feelings of despair in the little huntsman's house, I am going to list this house in the "Haunted Houses" thread, so that we can find it again if we run into a plausible cause in another book.
My grandmother went out as a serving girl at age 12 in Arkansas so this book is interesting even if Martha Pratt has a tendency to be mean except to her brother Tom. As I recall she cared for him her whole life.
I did not find a listing here so started one. I hope I didn[t over look something. I did my first question on this book. I may do ten more in order to create more awareness of Norah Lofts great books so maybe they will print new ones. Is there method to my madness? LOL!