Oxfordshire - The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

[chesilbeach]

OXFORDSHIRE
 
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
 
Synopsis:
Oh, the tedium of waiting to grow up! Longing for love, obsessed with weddings and sex, Linda and her sisters and cousin Fanny are on the lookout for the perfect lover.
 
But finding Mr Right is much harder than any of the sisters had thought. Linda must suffer marriage first to a stuffy Tory MP and then to a handsome and humourless communist, before finding real love in war-torn Paris. . .
 
Other Oxfordshire books:
Lark Rise to Candleford by Flora Thompson
Some Tame Gazelle by Barbara Pym
Last Bus to Woodstock by Colin Dexter

[poppyshake]

Review: I only picked this book up for five minutes, I'd just been talking about it to Kylie and I thought I'd flick through the first few pages to reacquaint myself with it and before I knew it I was halfway through. I'm not sure what it is about it that I find just so perfectly right for me, it's probably the humour which is the sort I like best .. observational, biting and a little bit wicked. There's a touch of the Wodehouse's about it and the Waugh's and If Jane Austen had written in the 1940s it wouldn't be far off this. It's said to be semi-autobiographical in that the Radlett family certainly bear more than a passing resemblance to the Mitford's.

This is the story of Linda Radlett, as told by her cousin Fanny Logan. Linda is beautiful, naive and a hopeless romantic. Not everyone takes to Linda as a character but rather like Fanny, I love her to bits. When the book starts the girls are fourteen and desperate to fall in love. They settle on the most unlikely imaginary suitors (the Prince of Wales for Linda and a fat farmer from the village for Fanny) and have conspiratorial chats in the Hon's cupboard (a secret Radlett society which takes place in the warm linen cupboard .. anyone who is admired is a 'Hon' all enemies are 'counter Hons'.) Their great hero is Oscar Wilde ...

Fanny : 'but what did he do?'
Linda : 'I asked Fa once and he roared at me - goodness it was terrifying. He said "If you mention that sewer's name again in this house I'll thrash you, do you hear damn you?" So I asked Sadie and she looked awfully vague and said "Oh duck, I never really quite knew, but whatever it was was worse than murder, fearfully bad. And darling don't talk about him at meals, will you?"
Fanny : 'We must find out'
Linda : 'Bob says he will, when he goes to Eton.'

A couple of years later, at Linda and Fanny's coming-out ball, Linda meets Tony and falls deeply in love with him. She thinks him handsome and glamorous and doesn't look far beyond it. She's in love with love and refuses to listen to the advice of those around her. When the mist clears and the stars fade she finds herself married to one of the most terrific bores in the country. This leaves her in a bit of a dilemma. Linda needs to love and be loved and it's clear that Tony sees her as little more than a trophy wife. On the other hand she doesn't want to turn out like Fanny's mother (a woman who ran away from her men so often that she became known as 'The Bolter'.)

The star of the book is definitely Uncle Matthew (Linda's father,) a roaring, rude, ogre of a man with a list of prejudices as long as your arm and an entrenching tool over the fireplace to whack huns with. His bark is invariably worse than his bite and despite his fearsome reputation he is generally beloved by all those that truly know him.

Don't take too much notice of the synopsis which has been taken straight from the book blurb. It makes the book sound more like 'Sex and the City' which is misleading. The girls are only obsessed with weddings and sex in the manner of girls who have no inkling about either. They want to know everything but in fact know nothing and their attempts at guessing are hilarious. But for all of its hilarity, the story of Linda's search for love is also incredibly sad. The ending is short and sharp and makes me catch my breath every time.

I don't think I've ever agreed with the Daily Mail before but this book is 'utter, utter, bliss' 10/10

Edited January 20, 2014 by poppyshake

[pontalba]

Sounds great, Kay...love your review!

[julie]

Kay

 I loved that book . Back many years ago I bought a paperback that had Pursuit of Love & Love in a Cold Climate both in it . I did the same as you : opened the book, and was snagged from page one . Very good books. I also liked the humor . Made them so much more enjoyable !

Great review .

[poppyshake]

Sounds great, Kay...love your review!

Thanks Kate  .. it's one of my favourite books ever

Kay

 I loved that book . Back many years ago I bought a paperback that had Pursuit of Love & Love in a Cold Climate both in it . I did the same as you : opened the book, and was snagged from page one . Very good books. I also liked the humor . Made them so much more enjoyable !

Great review .

Thanks Julie  .. I loved both books too.

I saw the TV adaptation again the other day (a combination of the two books) and it's brilliant. The late great Alan Bates played Lord Alconleigh to absolute perfection. 

[poppy]

You introduced me to these books Poppyshake and I absolutely loved them too. I became fascinated with the Mitford sisters and went on to read a biography about them. A very interesting, eccentric family whose close association with Hitler was rather startling.

[poppyshake]

You introduced me to these books Poppyshake and I absolutely loved them too. I became fascinated with the Mitford sisters and went on to read a biography about them. A very interesting, eccentric family whose close association with Hitler was rather startling.

Well I'm very happy to hear it indeed poppy  Yes .. what a weird bunch they were ... Unity's story in particular is fascinating and Decca's. So different to each other politically and yet they had such a strong bond.

Have you read their letters? .. I thought they were fascinating. Also Decca's biography Hons and Rebels is excellent.

[chesilbeach]

Oh, how I love the eccentricity of the British upper class families in the 1920s!  I read this a couple of months ago, and thoroughly enjoyed it, and was surprised by some of the turns the story took.  The writing is quintessentially of the period and that class, and I loved that we see the story through Fanny's eyes, who has the familiarity and affection for the family being very close to them, but also an outsider who can give a different, more objective view too.

 

It seems amazing that as late as the 1920s, the girls never had a formal education, and that it wasn't required for them to attend school.  I think this is why they remained such strong and unique individuals, but often seemingly without what we would consider the standards of society, but this also makes them vulnerable people.

 

I really enjoyed the progression of the story, from the innocence of first loves through to the reality of married love, and the passion of affairs, and leads to, what I felt, was and unexpected and surprising conclusion.  A very enjoyable book.

[Janet]

I have had Love in a Cold Climate by Nancy Mitford on my wish list for some time. It features Fanny, the narrator of this book, but stands alone from this title. The BBC dramatised both The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate on TV in 2001 (Christmas, I think) under the title of the latter, but I must have been doing something else at the same time (probably surfing the internet!) as I have no recollection of it at all! I really should have paid more attention, although then again maybe not, as TV productions, with a few notable exceptions, are seldom as good as the book. Anyway, I digress…

Fanny, who - as Linda wistfully and with a touch of jealousy likes to point out - has such “wicked parents”, lives with her Aunt Emily in the Cotswolds, but spends most of her time at Alconleigh in Oxfordshire, the large country home of her irascible but loveable Uncle Matthew, Aunt Sadie and various cousins – the Hons – who spend much of their time ensconced in the airing cupboard making plans against various perceived enemies - unworthy Counter-Hons - and dreaming of love. The novel follows the children of the family – Fanny and her Radlett cousins, and particularly Linda – in their pursuit of love…

This novel was a complete surprise to me. I didn’t expect it to be… well, such fun! It’s a brilliant satirical novel full of extraordinary characters. It’s totally un-PC by today’s standards and it’s just so funny – such a brilliant, irresistible tale of an eccentric English upper-class family.

It is not often I laugh out loud when reading a book, but I laughed more times than I can count whilst listening to this (and got some funny looks as a result!) – it made me want to go out walking just so I could listen to some more of it! Emilia Fox does such a brilliant job of narrating it.

I also cried. I won’t tell you when or why. If you’ve read the book already then you’ll know, and if you haven’t then I don’t want to spoil a thing.

I’m a little disappointed to find that Patricia Hodge narrates Fanny in Love in a Cold Climate , although Emilia Fox is back narrating Don’t Tell Alfred, so that’s good. Hopefully Patricia Hodge will do an equally good job and I am definitely going to either read or listen to them!

If you like social history fiction with more than a touch of satire then I urge you to try this book. I’m sure you won’t be disappointed. I am sad that it has ended – I want more!

Now, if anyone wants me you’ll find me in the Hons’ Cupboard, waiting for Fanny and her cousins, Aunts Sadie and Emily, dear Davey and especially Uncle Matthew!


5/5 (I absolutely loved it!)

[poppyshake]

Yay, yay and thrice yay!!! :cows:  

So glad you loved it Janet  

 

The drama is in fact well worth checking out surprisingly (once you've read LIACC.) Great, great, cast. Alan Bates plays Uncle Matthew (so, so, brilliantly) and Celia Imrie plays Aunt Sadie. Linda is played by Elisabeth Dermot Walsh .. you don't see her much these days, though I think she plays a doctor in Doctors. Fanny is played by Rosamund Pike who is everywhere now. The Bolter is played by Frances Barber. 

 

This was my favourite of the two (or three .. but I haven't read Don't Tell Alfred yet) but only slightly .. I love Love in a Cold Climate too. The drama did a good job of combining the two

[Janet]

I watched the first 20 or so minutes of it on You Tube yesterday, Kay, and thought what I saw was very good, even if it did (for obvious reasons) cut a lot of the story out.    I might invest in a copy.

 

I love, love, loved Uncle Matthew in the book!  I loved all the characters in one way or another - even those that weren't likeable were so well written.

 

I know you like audio books - did you listen to this, or read it? 

[Alexi]

Copied from my book log:

 

I had heard of this book before the English Counties Challenge was devised, but knew next to nothing about it. However, reviews on here persuaded me to bump it up the pile. 

 

Having read this some time ago, I'm struggling to remember much of the intricacies of the plot, but the lively characters and brilliantly sparky dialogue are what remains with me. Some of the family elements are larger than life - but most of those are actually autobiographical, even if I was shaking my head going surely not!

 

What a household it must have been to grow up in!

 

The family are determined to seize life and love, and spend their youth dreaming of both. But ultimately, Linda's search for love is littered with pitfalls and really tugs on the heart strings. 

 

Mitford shows us an aristocratic world that was being threatened by the imminent arrival of World War II and the politics of the time, which are introduced. But ultimately, it's a funny story about an outrageous family. It's often the ending that lets down books, I find, but this one only enhances Mitford's work. 

 

Thoroughly enjoyable and I shall seek out the next in the series. 

 

4/5 (I really liked it)