Tag: World War II

Review: The Night Watch by Sarah Waters

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The Night Watch follows the lives of four very different people during and after World War II. There’s Kay, who drove an ambulance during the war, but now, in 1947, there’s something missing from her life and she wanders the streets of London on her own, a lost and lonely figure. There’s Helen, who is feeling insecure in her relationship with the sophisticated Julia. Then there’s Viv, having problems of her own with her boyfriend Reggie, an ex-soldier. And finally, we meet Viv’s brother Duncan, who was in prison during the war and is still haunted by events in his past.

The story quickly becomes so complex and involved that it would be difficult to tell you any more about the plot without spoiling it. What I can tell you about though, is the structure of the book, which was very unusual. The story begins by introducing us to the characters in 1947, after the war has ended, then moves back in time to 1944, and then in the final section goes back further still to 1941. I both liked this structure and disliked it.

I liked it because of the way it led to some surprising revelations about the characters and their histories. I disliked it because so many storylines were left unresolved. I wanted to know what happened; I wanted to know whether Kay, Helen, Viv and Duncan would find happiness. I think this is probably the first Sarah Waters book I’ve read where I really loved and cared about the characters – they all felt so real and believable. But while the book answered some of the questions about the characters’ pasts, I was left with a lot of unanswered questions about their futures.

In comparison to Sarah Waters’ other books, this one feels much more subdued and quiet, with an overall mood of sadness. Apart from relating some of the obvious horrors of war which affected society as a whole, there are some heartbreaking moments in the personal stories of all four main characters (the story that affected me the most was probably Viv’s). I also found it interesting to read about the various jobs that were available to women during the war. With so many of the men away fighting, this was a time when it was deemed acceptable for women to do jobs that would previously have been done by the men. Kay, as I mentioned, was an ambulance driver, and there were other women also doing the same work. Helen and Viv were employed in more conventional office jobs, but were still contributing to the war effort with Helen providing support for people who had lost their homes or were in financial difficulties, and Viv working as a typist for the Ministry of Food.

As I’ve come to expect from Sarah Waters’ books, The Night Watch is both well written and well researched. She manages to incorporate an incredible amount of detail into the book, but the detail never overwhelms the story. I would recommend this to anyone who enjoys reading about life during World War II and the effects of the war on the lives of ordinary people. But if you loved Fingersmith and are looking for more of the same, I should warn you that this book is about as different from Fingersmith as you could imagine!

Recommended.

Good Evening, Mrs Craven: The Wartime Stories of Mollie Panter-Downes

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Mollie Panter-Downes was the London correspondent for the New Yorker and this collection from Persephone Books brings together a number of her contributions to the magazine which were written during World War II. The book opens with her Letter from London dated 3 September 1939 and ends with another dated 11 June 1944. Between the two letters are twenty-one short stories, each of which offers an insight into the hopes and fears of British people trying to deal with the changes the war has brought to their lives.

These stories are not particularly dramatic or sensational in any way. They are realistic stories that focus not so much on the war itself, but on the effects of the war on the women (and a few of the men) who were left behind at home. We read about women attending sewing parties, worrying about loved ones who are away fighting, preparing for their husbands to go to war, coping with being pregnant during the war and experiencing almost any other wartime situation you can think of.

After finishing the book, there are a few stories that stand out in my memory more than the others. In Clover, for example, is a story about a rich woman called Mrs Fletcher who takes in a family of evacuees from a poor part of London. This was an interesting study into how the war pushed together people of different social backgrounds who wouldn’t usually have mixed with each other. This Flower, Safety follows Miss Mildred Ewing as she moves from one hotel to another in an attempt to escape from danger, beginning to despair of ever finding somewhere safe to live. Then there’s the story of Miss Burton, who is so hungry she can think about nothing else. The title story is also one of the best; it’s about a woman who has been having an affair with a married man. On the evening before he leaves to go to Libya, she wonders how she’ll be able to find out whether he’s dead or alive:

“Don’t think I’m being stupid and morbid,” she said, “but supposing anything happens. I’ve been worrying about that. You might be wounded or ill and I wouldn’t know.” She tried to laugh. “The War Office doesn’t have a service for sending telegrams to mistresses, does it?”

The stories are published in chronological order, as they appeared in New Yorker between 1939 and 1944, showing how life in Britain changed as the war progressed. Despite the subject matter, these stories are not all bleak and depressing – there’s also a lot of humour in Panter-Downes’ writing, in the form of gentle wit and irony.

As with most of the short story collections that I’ve read, there were some that didn’t interest me very much, but others that I loved and wished were longer. However, I think reading them all at once was a mistake as it was a bit too much for me. I think I would have enjoyed this collection even more if I had dipped in and out and taken the time to appreciate each story individually.

Recommended.

Review: Miss Ranskill Comes Home by Barbara Euphan Todd

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Barbara Euphan Todd was best known as the children’s author who wrote the Worzel Gummidge series about a scarecrow who comes to life. Miss Ranskill Comes Home, first published in 1946, was her only adult novel.

Shortly before the start of World War II, Nona Ranskill was swept overboard whilst on a cruise and was washed up on a desert island. The only other inhabitant of the island is a man known as ‘the Carpenter’, who had also fallen overboard on an earlier occasion. At the beginning of the book, the Carpenter has died and we first meet Miss Ranskill as she’s digging his grave. Before his death however, he had managed to finish building a boat with which he had intended to sail himself and Miss Ranskill to safety. After burying the Carpenter, Miss Ranskill makes an attempt to escape from the island on her own. Luckily, before she becomes hopelessly lost at sea, she is rescued by the British Navy. Returning to England after almost four years, Miss Ranskill discovers that it’s not the England she left behind: in her absence, World War II has begun…

This may all sound very far-fetched, but Todd actually makes it seem believable. I thought the whole idea of someone being cut off from the world and returning home only to find themselves suddenly thrown into the middle of a war was absolutely fascinating. I particularly enjoyed the first half of the book which deals with the first few days of Miss Ranskill’s arrival in England, when everything feels strange and surreal. Even the English language seems different and full of unfamiliar words. When she tries to buy food she can’t understand why she’s asked for her ‘ration book’, or why she needs ‘coupons’ to purchase clothes. This leads to some very amusing situations but at the same time you can’t help but feel sorry for poor Miss Ranskill.

Although he’s dead before the story even begins, the strongest character in the book is the Carpenter. He is constantly in Miss Ranskill’s thoughts and his presence is there on almost every page in the form of flashbacks and memories. Although Miss Ranskill’s friends found it scandalous that she had spent four years in the company of a strange man – particularly a man they consider to be of a lower social standing – I think anyone who has read this book will agree that if we were stranded on a desert island, the Carpenter is exactly the type of person we would like to be stuck there with.

Makes it more homely-like, Miss Ranskill, see.
That had been one of his favourite expressions. He used it as he arranged stones round the smoky fire, and when he handed her a shell.
Saucer, see, Miss Ranskill. We mayn’t have cups, but we’ve plenty of saucers. Makes it more homely.

His optimism and words of wisdom had helped to sustain Miss Ranskill during her time on the island and continue to give her comfort on her return to wartime Britain. However, the years on the island and the company of the Carpenter have given her a new outlook on life and she finds it difficult to adjust. Unlike her friends and family who are all absorbed in their war work, Miss Ranskill feels detached from what’s going on and spends most of the book remembering the island and even feeling nostalgic about the fact that she had to eat fish for every meal and wear the same clothes for nearly four years! England may have changed, but Miss Ranskill has changed even more.

This book has the perfect blend of humour and poignancy and gives us an opportunity to explore World War II from a unique perspective. Recommended.

Pages: 328/Publisher: Persephone Books/Year: 2003 (originally published 1946)/Source: Library book