Dorothy Whipple (1893–1966)
Author of Someone at a Distance
About the Author
Works by Dorothy Whipple
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Other names
- Stirrup, Dorothy (birth name)
- Birthdate
- 1893-02-26
- Date of death
- 1966-09-14
- Gender
- female
- Occupations
- fiction writer
novelist
memoirist
children's book author - Short biography
- Dorothy Whipple, née Stirrup, grew up in Blackburn, England, in the large, close-knit family of Walter Stirrup, an architect, and his wife Ada. She worked as a secretary to Henry Whipple, an educational administrator who was a widower 24 years her senior; they married in 1917 and moved to Nottingham. Here she wrote Young Anne (1927), the first of nine successful novels that included High Wages (1930), Greenbanks (1932), The Priory (1939) and Because of the Lockwoods (1949). Two of them, They Knew Mr. Knight (1934) and They Were Sisters (1943) were adapted into British films. She also published collections of short stories, including The Closed Door and Other Stories and Every Good Deed and Other Stories, several children's books, and two volumes of memoirs. Someone at a Distance (1953) was her final novel. Random Commentary: Books and Journals Kept from 1925 Onwards, was published in 1966 after her death, and provides glimpses of her earliest successes as an author and her impressions of life during World War II.
- Nationality
- UK
- Birthplace
- Blackburn, Lancashire, England, UK
- Places of residence
- Blackburn, Lancashire, England, UK
Nottingham, Nottinghamshire, England, UK - Place of death
- Blackburn, Lancashire, England, UK
- Map Location
- England, UK
Members
Reviews
This was Whipple's last novel, and its publication in 1953 was met with a deafening silence from the critics. It's hard to see why at this distance: Whipple was obviously a clever, confident and witty writer, with a gift for spotting the telling detail. Probably it was simply that the literary world in the mid-fifties wasn't looking for ironic little stories about overprivileged upper-middle-class families in the Home Counties struggling with the post-war Servant Problem and worried whether show more they would be able to keep their daughter's horse if they were forced to move. Whipple might have done better to write about factory workers and teenage pregnancies, but then we probably wouldn't be reading her books now...
It's a very simple plot, the interest is all in the characters and detailed observation. A young French woman, Louise Lanier, turns up as companion to Ellen's mother-in-law, and then somehow incrusts herself into Ellen's own home, doing her best to seduce everyone within range without the slightest concern for the consequences. It turns out that she is on the rampage and determined to avoid going home to her parents' provincial librairie-papeterie because her prestigious boyfriend has dumped her to marry someone from his own social class.
Of course, all this gives Whipple a lot of scope for playing around with British prejudices about the French and French prejudices about the British, as well as exploring some of the horrors of post-war life for women like Ellen, who grew up in a class and time where the permanence and certainty of marriage made it redundant to think about marketable skills, and where expectations of the kind of home you would live in and the things you would do there were conditioned by the availability of cheap domestic service. Ellen has to face the realities of a world where you can't get live-in servants any more, but her husband and children haven't quite registered yet that it's the washing-up she's doing when she disappears after dinner — it's always fatally easy to be lazy when someone else does all the work without complaint.
There is an element of post-war reactionary panic here, but it is nowhere near so crass as — to take an extreme example — Angela Thirkell. Whipple clearly has a lot of sympathy with people who actually do useful work for a living, and she doesn't see post-war England as a massive conspiracy to do down "people like us". Sometimes she even seems to be quietly mocking her privileged characters, as when daughter Anne discusses the possibility of not going back to boarding-school and her father points out that "there are no schools here" — "here" being a small town half an hour or so out of London. Obviously, by "schools" he means "schools where people like us go".
The real joy of the book is in the many bizarre confrontations between people who can't begin to understand each other: the arch-conservative Mrs North and her housekeeper Miss Daley, star of the Chapel choir; Louise trying to give beauty advice to Ellen, who is the type who would rather have a new pair of secateurs than a pearl necklace; the lovely M and Mme Lanier trying to make sense of their daughter's world, and so on. A quiet delight, if very much of its time. show less
It's a very simple plot, the interest is all in the characters and detailed observation. A young French woman, Louise Lanier, turns up as companion to Ellen's mother-in-law, and then somehow incrusts herself into Ellen's own home, doing her best to seduce everyone within range without the slightest concern for the consequences. It turns out that she is on the rampage and determined to avoid going home to her parents' provincial librairie-papeterie because her prestigious boyfriend has dumped her to marry someone from his own social class.
Of course, all this gives Whipple a lot of scope for playing around with British prejudices about the French and French prejudices about the British, as well as exploring some of the horrors of post-war life for women like Ellen, who grew up in a class and time where the permanence and certainty of marriage made it redundant to think about marketable skills, and where expectations of the kind of home you would live in and the things you would do there were conditioned by the availability of cheap domestic service. Ellen has to face the realities of a world where you can't get live-in servants any more, but her husband and children haven't quite registered yet that it's the washing-up she's doing when she disappears after dinner — it's always fatally easy to be lazy when someone else does all the work without complaint.
There is an element of post-war reactionary panic here, but it is nowhere near so crass as — to take an extreme example — Angela Thirkell. Whipple clearly has a lot of sympathy with people who actually do useful work for a living, and she doesn't see post-war England as a massive conspiracy to do down "people like us". Sometimes she even seems to be quietly mocking her privileged characters, as when daughter Anne discusses the possibility of not going back to boarding-school and her father points out that "there are no schools here" — "here" being a small town half an hour or so out of London. Obviously, by "schools" he means "schools where people like us go".
The real joy of the book is in the many bizarre confrontations between people who can't begin to understand each other: the arch-conservative Mrs North and her housekeeper Miss Daley, star of the Chapel choir; Louise trying to give beauty advice to Ellen, who is the type who would rather have a new pair of secateurs than a pearl necklace; the lovely M and Mme Lanier trying to make sense of their daughter's world, and so on. A quiet delight, if very much of its time. show less
So what if it wraps up a shade too neatly and a bit too nicely? Who cares if people get away with things you'd rather they'd been punished for? And why make a big deal over it, if one of the big crises in the story is "previously pampered girl has to work for little pay and live in a crappy room for a while?"
That's how pleasurable I find it, reading anything (so far) by Dorothy Whipple. This was my favorite to date. I love when a building actually becomes a character, for one thing, and I show more don't think I've read many books where the sentient characters are quite so human. Meaning, in other words, that no one is spared. We see both the good and the terrible about all of them, and it's all written, as far as I can tell, with absolutely no judgement.
Here is the Major, barely three pages into the book: "Half-way up the avenue the Major halted to survey the cricket field, which lay to the left. Empty, with its little black sodden shuttered pavilion, it was typical of winter and he hated winter. He would have liked to blame somebody for winter."
And later, when one of his daughters decides not to bother explaining her point to him: It was no good pusuing such subjects with her father. He made no attempt to see another person's point of view; he simply said it wasn't there, couldn't be there, it was so silly."
Who does not know a person like that?
Anyway, loved this. It's the 40th that Persephone published and the 10th I've read. show less
That's how pleasurable I find it, reading anything (so far) by Dorothy Whipple. This was my favorite to date. I love when a building actually becomes a character, for one thing, and I show more don't think I've read many books where the sentient characters are quite so human. Meaning, in other words, that no one is spared. We see both the good and the terrible about all of them, and it's all written, as far as I can tell, with absolutely no judgement.
Here is the Major, barely three pages into the book: "Half-way up the avenue the Major halted to survey the cricket field, which lay to the left. Empty, with its little black sodden shuttered pavilion, it was typical of winter and he hated winter. He would have liked to blame somebody for winter."
And later, when one of his daughters decides not to bother explaining her point to him: It was no good pusuing such subjects with her father. He made no attempt to see another person's point of view; he simply said it wasn't there, couldn't be there, it was so silly."
Who does not know a person like that?
Anyway, loved this. It's the 40th that Persephone published and the 10th I've read. show less
Since this is the second-to-last Dorothy Whipple I happen to own at the moment I thought I would take my time in reading it, gaze off into the distance now and then to ponder some note of brilliance, turn the pages slowly and lovingly etc etc. Instead I could hardly put it down.
The sisters, Charlotte in particular, are so well-drawn it is almost painful. In fact much of the story is painful, but the rays of hope and light are so heartening that the pain is worth it (I mean for the reader, show more not necessarily the characters and in some cases, definitely not the characters).
Dorothy Whipple was a genius and is absolutely one of my favorite authors. show less
The sisters, Charlotte in particular, are so well-drawn it is almost painful. In fact much of the story is painful, but the rays of hope and light are so heartening that the pain is worth it (I mean for the reader, show more not necessarily the characters and in some cases, definitely not the characters).
Dorothy Whipple was a genius and is absolutely one of my favorite authors. show less
Part of the Persephone Classics series that covers forgotten authors, Dorothy Whipple (unbeknown to be) wrote 8 successful novels from the 1930s up to 1953, when she wrote this, her final novel.
[Someone at a Distance] tells the story of the North family, who are leading an idyllic, happy life in the commuter belt until a cold and calculating young French woman comes to live for a short time with Mr. North's mother. Setting her sights on Mr. North, she succeeds in tearing apart not only show more Ellen and Avery North's happy marriage, but the loving trust and security of the whole family unit.
This quietly disarming book excels at getting into the psychology of it's characters, delving painfully into the complexity of how the affair affects each of the family members, including the perpetrator Mr. North. The affair itself is so subtly and delicately developed, Whipple capturing so perceptively how it only takes the igniting of the tiniest spark to painfully change the course of a happy marriage forever.
This is not a book with any pretensions of literary brilliance, yet it is brilliant - pared back, hard hitting and thought provoking. Is it so simple to put 20 years of marriage in the past? How do children impact the decisions that you make about that marriage?
The characterisation is just fantastic - you are totally drawn into the whole painful mess, feeling the myriad of emotions that the characters swing between. Lust, greed, pride, sloth, shame - how each of these can blind us and send us down the wrong path.
A quietly brilliant observation of human frailty - 4.5 stars. show less
[Someone at a Distance] tells the story of the North family, who are leading an idyllic, happy life in the commuter belt until a cold and calculating young French woman comes to live for a short time with Mr. North's mother. Setting her sights on Mr. North, she succeeds in tearing apart not only show more Ellen and Avery North's happy marriage, but the loving trust and security of the whole family unit.
This quietly disarming book excels at getting into the psychology of it's characters, delving painfully into the complexity of how the affair affects each of the family members, including the perpetrator Mr. North. The affair itself is so subtly and delicately developed, Whipple capturing so perceptively how it only takes the igniting of the tiniest spark to painfully change the course of a happy marriage forever.
This is not a book with any pretensions of literary brilliance, yet it is brilliant - pared back, hard hitting and thought provoking. Is it so simple to put 20 years of marriage in the past? How do children impact the decisions that you make about that marriage?
The characterisation is just fantastic - you are totally drawn into the whole painful mess, feeling the myriad of emotions that the characters swing between. Lust, greed, pride, sloth, shame - how each of these can blind us and send us down the wrong path.
A quietly brilliant observation of human frailty - 4.5 stars. show less
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