Viragos That Aren't Viragoes But Should Be

Hello all,

From time to time members of this forum reference books that are Viragoish (if Viragoish is the word I seek), but have not been published by VMC. I thought it might be nice to keep all the recommendations in one place since I for one remember some reference vaguely but cannot find it when I go back to look.

I'm delighted to be the first nominator - and I say that everything that Rose Tremain writes belongs with VMC. Her writing is quietly beautiful; novels are well-plotted; characters are real people; thematic material is serious without being depressing or overwhelming; the historical novels are well-researched; she has never written the same book twice.

I think Iphigenia by Teresa de la Parra fits right along in with other VMCs as an early feminist work.

These are my nominations:

Gilles' Wife by Madeleine Bourdouxhe
Discipline by Mary Brunton
Sofia Petrovna by Lydia Chukovskaya
Helen by Maria Edgeworth
Ship of Widows by I. Grekova
The Artificial Silk Girl by Irmgard Keun
Nada by Carmen Laforet
School of the Sun by Ana Marĺa Matute
The Dangerous Age by Karin Michaelis
Ex Wife by Ursula Parrott
Under Observation by Amalie Skram

>4 Leseratte2: Andrew, you would choose Under Observation instead of Constance Ring?

My choices would be

The Blue Flower - Penelope Fitzgerald
Lady's Maid - Margaret Forster
Heat Wave - Penelope Lively

and/or most anything else by these ladies

Christine - Well, now that you ask, no, I'd put both down. Also Patronage and Belinda by Maria E. Now other titles are coming to mind - maybe I'd better make another list!

>4 Leseratte2: Definitely Nada by Carmen Laforet
The Double Hook by Sheila Watson
Presentation Parlour by Kate O'Brien
The Millstone by Margaret Drabble

>3 christiguc: Christina,

I want Iphigenia quite badly. I am looking for a cheap copy.

I've looked at the reviews where available and find the following interesting from the lists above:

Iphigenia - definitely
Sofia Petrovna - definitely
The Artificial Silk Girl - perhaps
Nada - definitely (who doesn't love Barcelona?)

Tremain I have ordered a book (will let you know Lizzie), O'Brien - always willing to read. Drabble - read most of hers beginning with The Millstone when it was first published. Urania - The Double Hook review makes me think absolutely no way! You'll have to make a detailed case for that one.

romain,

The review written by my friend Andrew is pretty accurate. I will say this book is lovely. It is one of the most beautiful books I have read this year.

Hmmmn - I ordered Sofia Petrovna on Paperbackswap and The Double Hook is there too but it just seems too negative. Plus it's about fishing and I'm a vegetarian, and that title.... eek! Plus I have 120 books in the TBR pile currently, so will give it a miss this time I think.

romain,

the book really is not about fishing. Fishing is simply a metaphor; however, I understand about the TBR pile.

My bad! :) I'll think about it.

Two books I have always thought of as Viragos that aren't are The Obedient Wife by Julia O'Faolain (actually, pretty much any works by O'Faolain would be a good match), and No Mate for the Magpie by Frances Molloy. O'Faolain's a writer who doesn't pull any punches, and Molloy is more someone who hasn't had any punches pulled from her, yet is able to laugh, and made me laugh out loud reading, about it.

Elizabeth Bowen to me always seems to be an author that should have been published in VMCs.

ditto verityjdo!~!

I think the only reason many of these women were not published by Virago were contracts elsewhere. Bowen is with Penguin and dead or alive is probably still locked in tight to it.

This evening I came across the box containing Summer in the Country, Living on Yesterday, and Island of Desire. I think Edith Templeton would make a worthy Virago author. I should read those again. Guess I'll add them to the "series stack", along with The Balkan Trilogy, The Levant Trilogy, and the Antonia White novels.

Andrew;
You have some marvelous titles in your collection. How long have you been reading Viragos? I find I am taking such pride in each one that comes my way. They just make me smile. I am reading my 3rd one, Frost in May and I love it. While parts of the storyline are a little painful, the story itself is exquisite. I can see why some of you have them into the hundreds.
It will be difficult for me to decide which granddaughter to leave mine to.
belva
P.S. I keep my Elizabeth Bowen on the shelves with my Viragos and Persephones. (I loved that book) Somehow it just seems to belong there. The same with my Virginia Woolfs and Tillie Olsen.

Belva, Tillie Olsen is a VMC--with Yonnondio and Tell Me a Riddle.

Oh, oh, my Yonnondio doesn't tell me that.
It is Delta book published by Dell 1979. I like that information. Thank you Christina. You made me happy.
belva

Belva, I've been reading and collecting Viragos since 1986. Between '86 and '92 I worked in bookstores, so I ordered just about every Virago available. Of course I went crazy on other stuff, as well. The complete novels of Anthony Trollope, for example. :)

Susan Howatch especially her Starbridge series always seemed to me to be prime Virago and Masterpiece Theatre fodder - but I believe she has a publisher elsewhere - perhaps our grandchildren will read her in Virago.

> 22 - Andrew - I have also been collecting Viragos for a very very long time and a thought occurred to me that I should make some future plans for bequest of "the Collection" so that it remains intact - last year I approached a women's library in one of our major cities and was hugely disappointed with the response thus - "No , our library wouldn't have the space to take those books" (I was gobsmacked and quietly retired to rethink the bequest)!!!

Wow, that was a real knock-down wasn't it? How sad to want to do something so special and have it not be appreciated. Well, we all appreciate you and your heart and you will find the very best place for your beautiful "greens".
big gentle hug,
belva

belva - the real concern was that the library staff could be so offhand about these talented writers and their works - with so many of them out of print!!

That is crazy, Trish. And this was a library that was specifically a women's library?

The Silent Duchess by Dacia Maraini might make a good VMC.

> 26 That's really appalling, Patricia. You have a fabulous collection, they should MAKE the space. Throw out all the Danielle Steeles and Stephenie Meyers. But I'll stop here - I've been reading Delafield all day and haven't done my homework for tomorrow, so no time to rant.

What about the sequel to Nell Dunn's Poor Cow which is called My silver shoes...just reading that now!

>27 christiguc:, 29, - yes - it was a women's library!! Makes one wonder what their charter contains regarding women's literature!!

I think The Tin Flute by Gabrielle Roy would make another fine VMC..

I agree mrspenny -- but do they publish translations or just books originally written in English?

Anastasia - I had a friend in London who worked at Susan Howatch's publishers and tried to get me to read her - I never have. She's good?

Patricia - I collect African American books for underfunded schools (Kindergarten through High School). I pick them up in the best condition I can find to supplement class libraries etc. Some are like new but I have also met librarians who won't take them because they are not 'library copies' - meaning paperbacks with the 'solid' or 'hard' covers. My feeling is - anything that makes a kid want to read is okay but they do not agree.

#32> Jane, Virago also publish translations. Examples are A Fine of 200 Francs by Elsa Triolet and A Woman(wrong touchstone) by Sibilla Aleramo.

Oh yes Miss Paola A Fine of 200 Francs - a truly worthy and wonderful Virago.
My nomination would be for Dorothy Canfield's The Deepening Stream set in France - quelle surprise - during the 14-18 war.

> 33 - Barbara - I totally agree with you on that..
> 35 - as is A Woman.

Tricia - please could you explain about A Woman as I don't know it?

The right touchstone hasn't been coming up--A Woman is here.

Oh dear Trish, that is disheartening. Surely there is a place where there could be a public collection of your viragos. Those of us that are working so hard to track them down know what a labor of love your collection is and what a pity it would be to be wasted on a place like that.

#39 Seconded Maren - it seems so wrong that a library dedicated to the writing of women should be so ..... blinkered

#38 Aha - I understand now - thank you Christina.

Julie - A Woman Una Donna was written by Sibilla Aleramo and published in 1906.
To get the touchstones working I used the title Una Donna.
From the synopsis:
"This classic Italian novel published in 1906 and unavailable since then , records with passionate intensity the emotional and intellectual development of a woman through gilrhood, marriage, motherhood and growth into independent life." Her life, one of constant conflict between maternal love and desire for self-fulfilment, between confirmity and passion, reflects with merciless accuracy the texture of women's lives."

AUTHOR: Born Rina Pierangeli Faccio in 1876 in Piedmont - adopted the name Sibilla ALeramo in 1903 - died in Rome in 1960 after a life dedicated to writing and education.
Other works : Forests of Love and Fragments from my Diary (touchstones not working).

Paola - can you add further information regarding the Author's life?
Do you know of a biography (translated) of Sibilla Aleramo?

The main female character in (VMC) My Brilliant Career was named Sibilla - I wonder did Miles Franklin get her inspiriation from Sibilla Aleramo?

Patricia, I want to make "I'm appalled" noises too. I am. I can't imagine that the person you talked to has any sense of what she turned down - or else, she has no sense of history. Are there any women's colleges in your area?
I have a wonderful niece and nephew who will appreciate my good stuff, but a lot of my library was second-hand and battered when I bought it. I cherish every single book. Oh well.

Patricia, that's sad. Well, perhaps you will befriend a young woman who loves reading and you can leave your collection in her trustworthy hands. Didn't that happen to someone here, they got much of their collection from another woman?

I remember someone telling that they met someone on PaperbackSwap that they got a ton of books from. Just in the right time and place.
I am having fun hunting them down on the net but I don't always know what I am getting until it arrives. Sometimes they don't have the correct picture, sometimes they call it a Virgao Press and it is another publisher. "So ya pays your $ and ya takes yer chances."
belva

#43, 44> Tui and Belva, the lucky one who got much of her collection from another woman is Deborah (Cariola).
I confess I have always envied that, since, with very few exceptions since I have been on LT and we have started our mooching, I had to hunt down my Viragos.

aluvalibri;
A daunting and difficult, but pleasant task, isn't it? While I would love to find a windfall as well, I must admit that I do enjoy the hunt.
belva

Has anyone read Anita Mason's Bethany? Mason has skirted the Booker Prize a couple of times and I bought my copy of this along with about 10 remaindered Viragos in Birmingham years ago so it is sort of associated in my mind. But I loved this book and it is totally on Virago themes: a lesbian couple working a small farm are invaded by a group of hippie travelers led by the horrible but charismatic Simon who begins to take over one of the women and the legal rights to the farm.

Just catching up after a long absence!

#6 (romain): I read Penelope Fitzgerald's The Bookshop over my vacation, and it felt like reading a Virago.

#3 (christiguc): Definitely Iphigenia. Is it still in print from University of Texas Press?

Back to an old hobbyhorse: Margery Sharp's The Foolish Gentlewoman should be a Virago.

And if Carol Shields ever goes out of print, she is a perfect Virago candidate. I especially love Swann, The Stone Diaries, and Unless.

I have most of Fitzgerald's because Carmen Cahill lists The Blue Flower as one of her favorite books of all time. I was reluctant to read it because it is set in late 18th C Germany but OMG, once I started it...

I also have most of Shields who is amazing and of course would be a Virago if Penguin didn't have her. The Stone Diaries is another of those books that once I forced myself to open it blew me away.

I have The Blue Flower sitting on Mt. TBR. I haven't yet scaled its heights. My balance is still wobbly from NDEs and TBIs. I have to content myself with so-called bedside (or in my case floor side books). And . . . Everyman now has three book in one out for Fitzgerald: The Blue Flower, The Bookshop, and The Gate of Angels all for the pleasing price of $15.64. More temptation for the politically incorrect Virago. urania walks off whistling innocently.

Over my vacation, I read, and fell deeply in love with, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I recommended it to my wife, who was sucked into it without pausing to look at the publication data. She actually thought it was written in 1946, and that it was probably one of my Viragos!

Hello, im new to this so please be gentle if i make a mistake! I always feel that jeanette winterson should be a vmc that i can keep next to my Angela Carters and Atwoods. I also agree with the Carol Shields. I also just picked up the above book today in a charity shop, glad its got a good recomendation.

Welcome, weaponxgirl!
You are right, Jeanette Winterson should be a VMC!
:-))

>51 rbhardy3rd: I also just finished the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society and loved it too! It was so delightful and I loved all the characters.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society is on my TBR too- I can't wait to read it.

On Gabrielle Roy, I think just about all of her books could be Viragoes.

>51 rbhardy3rd:, >54 tuppy_glossop: ooh dear - I didn't like it much myself! I reviewed it before we had the option to add in books we'd read but not owned on here, but my BookCrossing review is here: http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/6757041 - I spose it was more a "meh" review than an active dislike, but so many people have raved about it that I was disappointed not to like it more!

Last night I finished The Other Garden by Francis Wyndham as part of my reading-skinny-books-to-reduce-my-TBR-pile thing. I found it recommended in Toibin and Callil's The Modern Library. I tend to concentrate on Callil's picks of best books because she is after all our Virago leader, but sometimes Toibin's slip in unnoticed and this was one. It could have been a Virago if not written by a modern man. All the ingredients - pre Second World War, English country village. But more than that - it was exquisite and at 106 pages, worth taking a chance on.

I am also listening to The Lodger (written in 1913) by Marie Belloc Lowndes which for you young 'uns was a famous movie about a destitute couple who unwittingly rent a room to Jack the Ripper. The book keeps all the murders off camera and concentrates on the disintegration of two people who know what's under their roof, but literally can't afford to evict him. I presume the subject matter kept it from being a Virago but Lowndes - who I have never read before - is a wonderful writer.

My copies of Ship of Widows and No Mate for the Magpie are published by Virago, but they're not VMCs.

#57 Barbara, after reading your post, I rushed over to amazon and picked up a copy of The Modern Library which I had never heard of and (of course) subsequently ordered The Other Garden as well (which is a lovely New York Review Books edition). Naughty girl.

Cate;
dear heart, you could never be naughty. Just ask Mother.
hugs,

romain;
You are going to get me into so much trouble. Maxed out credit card and still ordering good recx!~!
HUGS,

belva

Oh Cate I am so glad - I love these books about books and especially when the person doing the recommending is the lady who started Virago Books. Don't you find it lovely that among her fave books are Georgette Heyer and Agatha Christie. I had of course read some of the books but many were new to me, including some I have subsequently disliked, such as American Psycho and Blood Meridian which I presume were Toibin's choices. But it's always good to broaden one's reading. I am sure a number of them are now NYRBs - the Frances Wyndham is and The Balkan Trilogy, The Siege of Krishnapur etc.

Cate,

Oh dear. Oh tear. Mother Urania feels a temptation coming on. She may have to retire to The Other Garden soon ;-)

I just scanned the list and I'm surprised Rumer Godden isn't there. Her books appear to go in and out of print. I'm just finishing Greengage Summer and it has the feel of a Virago, I think.

@ #62;
Hello Mary. I have been missing you. I hope you have been well. Things just aren't the same around here without you and your very caustic wit.
love ya;
hugs,
belva

And @ Nickelini;
Greengage Summer is indeed Virago quality.
I totally agree.

Oh, I do love Rumer Godden. One of my favourites of hers is Kingfishers Catch Fire, which would also make a very good VMC.

Joyce - we often discuss Rumer Godden on this thread. I am a huge fan and own all her books. My absolute fave is (as people in this group know) In This House of Brede but Kingfishers Catch Fire is a VERY close second. Godden was locked into Penguin as her publisher so Virago never got a look in with her, but she was also not overly feminist or left wing so may have not met their political standards either.

Glad to see this thread was revived! I'd love to see some Marjory Sharp reprinted, especially Brittania Mews.

#67> Kasthu, I agree with you except on the fact that Britannia Mews is easy to find (I came across a few copies at different library sales), whereas Rhododendron Pie, for example, is very difficult to find and, those few copies, are quite expensive. I bought a copy, a couple of years ago, and I think I was lucky because it was less (not much) than 100 dollars.
So, I think it should be reprinted, definitely!

#66- Romain -- interesting comments about Rumer Godden. I see what you mean about her politics perhaps not quite fitting. Makes sense. It looks like her books have gone in and out of print over the years though--does Penguin get to keep the rights even if they're not publishing her? I don't know much about the publishing industry.

Rumer Godden sells steadily in Britain - or did until recently. I know nothing about publishing either but I am imagining that if she sells steadily Penguin would pay to keep her and could also pay more than Virago. I'm not sure when the copyright runs out on books now. Phil Collins was working to have artistic copyright continue for 75 years after an artist's death so that the family would get the royalties. I believe it's 50 years at the moment, or was if Phil lost his bid. I'm sure someone on this thread knows though.

I am currently half way through The Hours and it definitely should be a Virago. It is wonderful and to my mind meets all Virago criteria.
belva

>71 rainpebble:: other than being written by a man ... ?

There are some written by men--Shaw and Gissing at least.

and William Thompson and George Meredith.

I did not know that!

and H. G. Wells

In VCM's, 29-31 were Shaw, H. G. Wells, Gissing, and Meredith. Did they ever publish men again? I wonder if those books sold less or if the first board of advisors "vision" of the early Viragoes wasn't fulfilled. Could someone more versed in the VMC publication history comment on those four publications?

>73 christiguc:: I didn't know that either! The Virago website describes VMCs as "dedicated to the celebration of women writers and to the rediscovery and reprinting of their works." Hmmm.

>77 Liz1564:: someone versed in VMC publication history = Trish/mrspenny. As our Oracle of Delphi Viragos, hopefully she can comment on this!

The Gissing book is wonderful and deserved to be published by Virago and of course Wells slipped in along with the multitude of women authors he seduced. But don't get me started on that yet again...

Ah, come on Barbara.......don't go soft on us now.

I agree with Barbara. The Odd Women is one of Gissing's best books. I read it years ago and still remember his description of poor Virginia Madden in her shabby little room, going through her nightly ritual of preparing gin-and-sugar-water to sip while she reads a trashy novel.

I assume that the books by male writers were because of what they offer as an insight into the position of women in society at the time - I certainly think that's true of The Odd Women - however, I do think there's a value in Virago prioritising women writers, when it was founded and still today - I think women writers sell in lots of genres now because of the efforts of Virago and others in getting them started.

Here is a snippet from the introduction to the Virago edition of Appeal of one-half the human race, women; against the pretensions of the other half, men to retain them in political, and thence in civil and domestic slavery by William Thompson. Richard Pankhurst records that Thompson dedicated the book to Anna Wheeler, an Irish pioneer feminist, Libertarian and anti-capitalist thinker. Thompson credits Anna Wheeler with the major responsibility for "Appeal". He declares that part of the book was the exclusive product of her “mind and pen”, while the remainder was their “joint property”, for he was her “scribe and interpreter” who had merely endeavoured to express feelings which had “emanated” from her mind.

Emphasising her contribution he explains that though he had long reflected on “the inequalities of sexual laws”, she had actually suffered from them, for which reason he was indebted to her for “those bolder and more comprehensive views, which perhaps can only be elicited by the concentration of the mind on one darling though terrific theme”.

He goes on to say that the only reason why he and not she had written the book was that “for her, leisure, and resolution to undertake the drudgery of the task were wanting”. Mrs Wheeler had married in Ireland at the age of fifteen and had borne six children but eventually “escaped” to Guernsey and London. She became widely known in feminist circles and Disraeli described her as “something between Jeremy Bentham and Meg Merrilies, very clever but awefully (sic) revolutionary”.

>83 mrspenny:: “for her, leisure, and resolution to undertake the drudgery of the task were wanting”.
Hmmm ... I'm going to try that excuse at home and see if it inspires my other half to take up things I just can't be bothered with. Like that nasty dirt on all the windowsills.

>84 lauralkeet: - if that doesn't work - perhaps you can call on the other half to "become at length rational" and cast aside the "tattered cloak" of male despotism. If that doesn't work, then you have the same response that William Thompson received on publication of his work on women's right to equality.

In his Will, William Thomson left an annuity to Anna Wheeler and the remainder of his estate and his extensive library to the Co-operative Movement. The will was challenged by his relatives who argued that Thompson was insane and had advocated views "contrary to the laws of God and man". The relatives eventually won the case but not before most of the estate funds were absorbed in legal fees. The Co-operative movement did receive a small sum from the estate but its historian George Jacob Holyoake sadly commented that it was "impossible to leave money for purposes of social or mental progress, not of a conventional, orthodox character", for the courts, as then constituted, did not believe in "the sanity of anyone who sought unknown improvement in an untrodden path".

Ha! Those are great lines, Trish.
In my husband's defense, however, I must say he is anything but a male despot. We share household tasks fairly equally. But that doesn't mean I like doing them ...