All Passion Spent
by Vita Sackville-West
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Classic Literature. Fiction. Literature. HTML:Irreverently funny and surprisingly moving, All Passion Spent is the story of a woman who discovers who she is just before it is too late.After the death of elder statesman Lord Slane—a former prime minister of Great Britain and viceroy of India—everyone assumes that his eighty-eight-year-old widow will slowly fade away in her grief, remaining as proper, decorative, and dutiful as she has been her entire married life. But the deceptively show more gentle Lady Slane has other ideas. First she defies the patronizing meddling of her children and escapes to a rented house in Hampstead. There, to her offspring’s utter amazement, she revels in her new freedom, recalls her youthful ambitions, and gathers some very unsuitable companions—who reveal to her just how much she had sacrificed under the pressure of others’ expectations. show less
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GeraniumCat Thematically similar to All Passion Spent this wise and gentle book is much less well-known and makes an interesting comparison.
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“On the contrary," said Lady Slane, "that is another thing about which I've made up my mind. You see, Carrie, I am going to become completely self-indulgent. I am going to wallow in old age. No grandchildren. They are too young. Not one of them has reached forty-five. No great grandchildren either; that would be worse. I want no strenuous young people, who are not content with doing a thing, but must needs know why they do it. And I don’t want them bringing their children to see me, for it would only remind me of the terrible effort the poor creatures will have to make before they reach the end of their lives in safety. I prefer to forget about them. I want no one about me except those who are nearer to their death than to theirshow more
birth.
These things—the straw, the ivy frond, the spider—had had the house all to themselves for many days. They had paid no rent, yet they had made free with the floor, the window, and the walls, during a light and volatile existence. That was the kind of companionship that Lady Slane wanted; she had had enough of bustle, and of competition, and of one set of ambitions writhing to circumvent another. She wanted to merge with the things that drifted into an empty house, though unlike the spider she would weave no webs. She would be content to stir with the breeze and grow green in the light of the sun, and to drift down the passage of years, until death pushed her gently out and shut the door behind her.”
When Lady Slane’s husband passes away well into his 90s, her six children and their spouses set about determining how she will spend the rest of her life: she will divide her time between each couple, living in their homes and contributing to the expenses in a manner which will be amply profitable to them. But 88 year-old Deborah, Lady Slane, who has always effaced herself behind her husband, the former Viceroy of India and a member of the House of Lords, decides otherwise; she will move into her own house in Hampstead, thank you very much, and furthermore, she will only invite elderly people like herself who have similar priorities and share her views on life. Now that she is closer than ever to dying, she wants nothing to do with the constant striving and ambitions of the young. Having installed herself in her new house, she makes a very good friend of the cottage’s owner, the elderly and very thoughtful Mr Bucktrout, who sets about renovating and redecorating the house at his own expense so she can live in greater comfort. Then a vague acquaintance, a man from her distant past in India, Mr FitzGeorge, who has become a millionaire and an eccentric, renown for his collection of fine art, reintroduces himself into her life. He has always been in love with the once beautiful Lady Slane, and they form a special kind of friendship which will influence the rest of her ladyship’s few remaining years.
Vita Sackville-West, who among her many passionate love affairs, famously had Virginia Woolf as a lover, here explores how a woman who has both money and rather more than a simple room of her own might choose to live out her final years, having the ability to free herself of social constraints. The back story about the close friendship between these two authors was far from my mind when I chose to read this book, so it turned out to be a very timely read so shortly after revisiting Woolf’s A Room of One's Own. I loved and took comfort in these reflections on old age, and how one might eventually look back on life from the distance of a great many decades, having acquired completely different priorities from those of earlier years. I also found it strange and intriguing that these reflections resonated perfectly with my own at this stage in my life, albeit my 93-year old friend I’ll call “Lisel” considers me to be a mere young girl still, all things being relative, as always.
The title of the novel comes from the last line of John Milton’s Samson Agonistes, a portion of which Sackville-West used as the book’s epigraph:
show less
324. From 'Samson Agonistes
ALL is best, though we oft doubt,
What th' unsearchable dispose
Of highest wisdom brings about,
And ever best found in the close.
Oft he seems to hide his face,
But unexpectedly returns
And to his faithful Champion hath in place
Bore witness gloriously; whence Gaza mourns
And all that band them to resist
His uncontroulable intent.
His servants he with new acquist
Of true experience from this great event
With peace and consolation hath dismist,
And calm of mind all passion spent.
Maybe it's because I'm getting older, but I really loved this book. After the death of her husband, 88-year old Lady Slane shocks her children by announcing that she plans to leave the family estate and rent a house in Hampstead Heath--a house that holds many fond memories of her younger days. Even more shocking, she dictates that none of her children, grandchildren, or great-grandchildren may visit without an express appointment (and those are given infrequently). As a woman who has spent her entire life pleasing others and doing what they expected of her, she finally decides to live as pleases herself. She recalls her early dreams of becoming a painter, and how those dreams were squelched by a proposal that everyone else thought was a show more brilliant triumph--even though the 18-year old Deborah was not convinced that she was really in love or that she was ready to give up her own independence and aspirations. Looking back on her life, she recalls moments of happiness, moments when she did indeed love (or at least appreciate) her husband and felt fleeting moments of affection for the children who, for the most part, turned out to be disappointments. But as she moves towards death, Lady Slane decides that, while there is still a little time left, she need please no one but herself.
Lately, I've been thinking more and more about the time wasted in the past and the time that I have remaining to make something of my life, and, in that regard, this novel really touched home. I listened to it on audio, brilliantly read by Wendy Hiller, who played Lady Slane in the TV adaptation. It's a quiet, contemplative book, but one well worth one's time. Vita Sackville-West gives us a portrait of aging that goes far beyond the mourning the loss of youth and beauty to ask significant questions about selfhood and the meaning of life itself. show less
Lately, I've been thinking more and more about the time wasted in the past and the time that I have remaining to make something of my life, and, in that regard, this novel really touched home. I listened to it on audio, brilliantly read by Wendy Hiller, who played Lady Slane in the TV adaptation. It's a quiet, contemplative book, but one well worth one's time. Vita Sackville-West gives us a portrait of aging that goes far beyond the mourning the loss of youth and beauty to ask significant questions about selfhood and the meaning of life itself. show less
About Love, Sacrifice, and Redemption
Upon reflection, Vita Sackville-West seems the perfect person to write the story of a highborn woman who subordinates her life fully to the needs of her husband, the demands of his public office, and to motherhood, because she lived her life in nearly complete opposite fashion. While her diplomat husband Harold Nicolson toiled in offices in Europe and the Middle East, she maintained their residence in England, occasionally visiting him and writing of her journey, as in . Lady Deborah Slane only discovers the independence VSW maintained after the death of her husband, Henry Holland, as she casts back upon her life in Part Two, the beautiful and thoughtful heart of the novel. And why did Lady Slane show more sacrifice her ambition to live her life as a painter? For the same reason VSW gave up her famously scandalous affair with Violet Trefusis:
"All the parts of her that were not Henry Holland's had pulled in opposition, yet by this single giant of love they had all been pulled over, as the weaker team in a tug-of-war. Her ambitions, her secret existence, all had given way. She had loved him so much that even her resentment was subdued. She could not grudge him ever the sacrifice he had imposed upon her."
Part Two is where VSW displays her strongly feminist (though she would vigorously object to the word, preferring human rights) viewpoint, particularly in Lady Slane's recollection of her internal struggle over the meaning of her impending marriage to Henry. Betty Friedan gave it a name in 1963: The Feminine Mystique.
Part One of the novel in three parts sets the scene. Upon the death of Henry, the Holland children, all in their 60s, and none, with the exceptions of muddling, sweet Edith and solitary Kay, a man who collects astrolabes and such, present themselves as very likable. They conspire a plan spun from their own needs to care for their mother. Then Lady Slane shocks them with her announcement she will take a house in Hampstead, an expression of unexpected independence that most of them see as a bit of senility. As VSW tells it:
"Herbert, Carrie, Charles, and William decided that their mother must be mad. They took a step forward, and from having always thought her simple, decided that old age had definitely affected her brain. Her madness, however, was taking a harmless and even convenient form. William might be thinking rather regretfully of the lost subsidy to his house-books, Carrie and Herbert might remain still a little dubious about the eyes of the world, but, on the whole, it was a relief to find their mother settling her own affairs. Kay gazed inquiringly at his mother. He had taken her so much for granted--her gentleness, her unselfishness, her impersonal activities--and now, for the first time in his life, it was becoming apparent to Kay that people could still hold surprises up their sleeves, however long one had known them. Edith alone frolicked in her mind. She thought her mother not mad, but most conspicuously sane."
After Lady Slane moves, we meet people, in addition to her equally elderly maid Genoux, we do like, namely Mr. Bucktrout, the friendly and caring landlord, and the tradesman of varied skills, Mr. Gosheron, two gentlemen who take a greater interest in her well being than her children. Later, VSW introduces Mr. FitzGeorge, the remarkably reclusive millionaire collector of invaluable art purchased at bargain basement prices, what gratifies him most in life. Each of these individuals enriches Lady Slane's last months. And it is Mr. FitzGeorge who empowers Lady Slane to truly stun her children.
Part Three expands upon her relationship with Mr. FitzGeorge, who met her in India when she was Vicereine. She had forgotten him, simply another of the many faces that passed before her during her years with Henry. She, however, forever captivated him. As the months pass, Mr. FitzGeorge explains himself and makes cogent observations about her life and, really, about the lives of many talented women, two of which will give the flavor of his thinking, doubtless the mirror image of VSW's. He says:
"Face it, Lady Slane. Your children, your husband, your splendour, were nothing but obstacles that kept you from yourself. They were what you chose to substitute for your real vocation." To which, upon consideration, she agrees. He follows with: "According to his [Henry] lights, he gave you all you could desire. He merely killed you, that's all. Men do kill women. Most women enjoy being killed; so I am told. Being a woman, I daresay that even you took a certain pleasure in the process."
In the end, Mr. FitzGeorge provides her with something of a second chance. He enables her to upend the selfish plans of her children, delight Edith and Genoux, and allow her great-granddaughter, Deborah, to escape an ordained marriage to pursue her creative dreams, as Lady Slane could and did not.
Highly recommended for its graceful beauty, insights into love and personal independence, and its forward-looking viewpoint. show less
Upon reflection, Vita Sackville-West seems the perfect person to write the story of a highborn woman who subordinates her life fully to the needs of her husband, the demands of his public office, and to motherhood, because she lived her life in nearly complete opposite fashion. While her diplomat husband Harold Nicolson toiled in offices in Europe and the Middle East, she maintained their residence in England, occasionally visiting him and writing of her journey, as in . Lady Deborah Slane only discovers the independence VSW maintained after the death of her husband, Henry Holland, as she casts back upon her life in Part Two, the beautiful and thoughtful heart of the novel. And why did Lady Slane show more sacrifice her ambition to live her life as a painter? For the same reason VSW gave up her famously scandalous affair with Violet Trefusis:
"All the parts of her that were not Henry Holland's had pulled in opposition, yet by this single giant of love they had all been pulled over, as the weaker team in a tug-of-war. Her ambitions, her secret existence, all had given way. She had loved him so much that even her resentment was subdued. She could not grudge him ever the sacrifice he had imposed upon her."
Part Two is where VSW displays her strongly feminist (though she would vigorously object to the word, preferring human rights) viewpoint, particularly in Lady Slane's recollection of her internal struggle over the meaning of her impending marriage to Henry. Betty Friedan gave it a name in 1963: The Feminine Mystique.
Part One of the novel in three parts sets the scene. Upon the death of Henry, the Holland children, all in their 60s, and none, with the exceptions of muddling, sweet Edith and solitary Kay, a man who collects astrolabes and such, present themselves as very likable. They conspire a plan spun from their own needs to care for their mother. Then Lady Slane shocks them with her announcement she will take a house in Hampstead, an expression of unexpected independence that most of them see as a bit of senility. As VSW tells it:
"Herbert, Carrie, Charles, and William decided that their mother must be mad. They took a step forward, and from having always thought her simple, decided that old age had definitely affected her brain. Her madness, however, was taking a harmless and even convenient form. William might be thinking rather regretfully of the lost subsidy to his house-books, Carrie and Herbert might remain still a little dubious about the eyes of the world, but, on the whole, it was a relief to find their mother settling her own affairs. Kay gazed inquiringly at his mother. He had taken her so much for granted--her gentleness, her unselfishness, her impersonal activities--and now, for the first time in his life, it was becoming apparent to Kay that people could still hold surprises up their sleeves, however long one had known them. Edith alone frolicked in her mind. She thought her mother not mad, but most conspicuously sane."
After Lady Slane moves, we meet people, in addition to her equally elderly maid Genoux, we do like, namely Mr. Bucktrout, the friendly and caring landlord, and the tradesman of varied skills, Mr. Gosheron, two gentlemen who take a greater interest in her well being than her children. Later, VSW introduces Mr. FitzGeorge, the remarkably reclusive millionaire collector of invaluable art purchased at bargain basement prices, what gratifies him most in life. Each of these individuals enriches Lady Slane's last months. And it is Mr. FitzGeorge who empowers Lady Slane to truly stun her children.
Part Three expands upon her relationship with Mr. FitzGeorge, who met her in India when she was Vicereine. She had forgotten him, simply another of the many faces that passed before her during her years with Henry. She, however, forever captivated him. As the months pass, Mr. FitzGeorge explains himself and makes cogent observations about her life and, really, about the lives of many talented women, two of which will give the flavor of his thinking, doubtless the mirror image of VSW's. He says:
"Face it, Lady Slane. Your children, your husband, your splendour, were nothing but obstacles that kept you from yourself. They were what you chose to substitute for your real vocation." To which, upon consideration, she agrees. He follows with: "According to his [Henry] lights, he gave you all you could desire. He merely killed you, that's all. Men do kill women. Most women enjoy being killed; so I am told. Being a woman, I daresay that even you took a certain pleasure in the process."
In the end, Mr. FitzGeorge provides her with something of a second chance. He enables her to upend the selfish plans of her children, delight Edith and Genoux, and allow her great-granddaughter, Deborah, to escape an ordained marriage to pursue her creative dreams, as Lady Slane could and did not.
Highly recommended for its graceful beauty, insights into love and personal independence, and its forward-looking viewpoint. show less
An elderly woman’s husband dies, and her six children (in their 60’s themselves) debate what is to be done with her. They get a surprise when she makes decisions for herself, counter to their wishes, and we readers later get a surprise as she reminisces over her life and find out what her interests really were, long ago. While ostensibly she led a fulfilling, successful life by traveling the world, raising a family, and appearing in society’s eye, we find out how she really felt about it, and in a nuanced way. There are few absolutes, like most lives.
This is a landmark book in feminist literature, with a clear message of the hypocrisy and unfairness of women having to subjugate their desires (and lives!) in marriage to men, who show more went merrily on as before with complete freedom.
However, the book is also empowering to the elderly, showing that it’s never too late to take control of one’s life - and given that there are only so many years of it, one really should, regardless of the opinions of others. (“Compromise is the very breath of negation.”) Sackville-West was 39 when she wrote it, but somehow channeled great wisdom and the perspective of one who learned from living a full life.
Lastly, she empowers those who are unconventional, those who don’t want to fit the mold society makes for them. The others on the road ‘more travelled’ cannot know what it’s like for artists or eccentrics, and while they are ‘not practical’, their lives are meaningful nonetheless, and there is a place in the world for them too, for they “act as a leaven”, and, “as the present-day became history, the poets and the prophets counted for more than the conquerors.”
Authenticity is what matters, both in relating to others, and most importantly, to oneself.
Quotes:
On life, and whether one is “happy”:
“Absurd of ask of those, had she been happy or unhappy? It seemed merely as though someone were asking a question about someone that was not herself, clothing the question in a word that bore no relation to the shifting, elusive, iridescent play of life; trying to do something impossible, in fact, like compressing the waters of a lake into a tight, hard ball. Life was that lake, thought Lady Slane, sitting under the warm south wall amid the smell of the peaches; a lake offering its even surface to many reflections, gilded by the sun, silvered by the moon, darkened by a cloud, roughened by a ripple; but level always, a plane, keeping its bounds, not to be rolled up into a tight, hard ball, small enough to be held in the hand, which was what people were trying to do when they asked if one’s life had been happy or unhappy.”
On solitude:
“All he asked was to be let alone; he had no desire to interfere in the workings of the world; he simply wanted to live withdrawn into his chosen world, absorbed in his possessions and their beauty. That was his form of spirituality, his form of contemplation. Thus the loneliness of his death held not pathos, since it was in accordance with what he had chosen.” show less
This is a landmark book in feminist literature, with a clear message of the hypocrisy and unfairness of women having to subjugate their desires (and lives!) in marriage to men, who show more went merrily on as before with complete freedom.
However, the book is also empowering to the elderly, showing that it’s never too late to take control of one’s life - and given that there are only so many years of it, one really should, regardless of the opinions of others. (“Compromise is the very breath of negation.”) Sackville-West was 39 when she wrote it, but somehow channeled great wisdom and the perspective of one who learned from living a full life.
Lastly, she empowers those who are unconventional, those who don’t want to fit the mold society makes for them. The others on the road ‘more travelled’ cannot know what it’s like for artists or eccentrics, and while they are ‘not practical’, their lives are meaningful nonetheless, and there is a place in the world for them too, for they “act as a leaven”, and, “as the present-day became history, the poets and the prophets counted for more than the conquerors.”
Authenticity is what matters, both in relating to others, and most importantly, to oneself.
Quotes:
On life, and whether one is “happy”:
“Absurd of ask of those, had she been happy or unhappy? It seemed merely as though someone were asking a question about someone that was not herself, clothing the question in a word that bore no relation to the shifting, elusive, iridescent play of life; trying to do something impossible, in fact, like compressing the waters of a lake into a tight, hard ball. Life was that lake, thought Lady Slane, sitting under the warm south wall amid the smell of the peaches; a lake offering its even surface to many reflections, gilded by the sun, silvered by the moon, darkened by a cloud, roughened by a ripple; but level always, a plane, keeping its bounds, not to be rolled up into a tight, hard ball, small enough to be held in the hand, which was what people were trying to do when they asked if one’s life had been happy or unhappy.”
On solitude:
“All he asked was to be let alone; he had no desire to interfere in the workings of the world; he simply wanted to live withdrawn into his chosen world, absorbed in his possessions and their beauty. That was his form of spirituality, his form of contemplation. Thus the loneliness of his death held not pathos, since it was in accordance with what he had chosen.” show less
When 90-year-old Lord Slane dies, his six children and their spouses come to the home of their mother and condescendingly pat her hand while they plan her future. Ah, but Lady Slane has already made a different plan -- a plan of independence and solitude that she’s been dreaming of through the decades that she devoted to her husband, children and public service.
If you like English-literature classics (including Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own), you’ll like this 1931 novella. If you like quiet stories about aging (for example, Taylor’s Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont and Pym’s Quartet in Autumn), you’ll like it. It called to my mind Kate Chopin’s short-short work, “The Story of an Hour” which captures in a brilliant flash show more the devastation of going-along vs pursuing one’s own interests. This novella captures it also, though the extended rumination dulls it a little.
(Review based on a copy of the book provided by the publisher.) show less
If you like English-literature classics (including Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own), you’ll like this 1931 novella. If you like quiet stories about aging (for example, Taylor’s Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont and Pym’s Quartet in Autumn), you’ll like it. It called to my mind Kate Chopin’s short-short work, “The Story of an Hour” which captures in a brilliant flash show more the devastation of going-along vs pursuing one’s own interests. This novella captures it also, though the extended rumination dulls it a little.
(Review based on a copy of the book provided by the publisher.) show less
First published in 1931, All Passion Spent is a bold piece of early feminist literature. Deborah, Lady Slane, is an 88-year-old woman whose husband has just passed away at the age of 94. Her six children, all in their 60s, are greatly concerned about how to care for her, but she surprises them by declaring her intent to live independently in a new, smaller home. Having taken this bold step, Deborah enters a period of reflection on her life. Vita Sackville-West uses Deborah's voice to decry woman's role in society and female subservience to males through marriage:
Oh, what a pother, she thought, women make about marriage! and yet who can blame them, she added, when one recollects that marriage -- and its consequences -- is the only thing show more that women have to make a pother about in the whole of their lives? Though the excitement be vicarious, it will do just as well. Is it not for this function that they have been formed, dressed, bedizened, educated -- if so one-sided an affair may be called education -- safeguarded, kept in the dark, hinted at, segregated, repressed, all that at a given moment they may be delivered, or may deliver their daughters over, to Minister to a Man? (p. 159)
Henry by the compulsion of love had cheated her of her chosen life, yet had given her another life, an ample life, a life in touch with the greater world, if that took her fancy; or a life, alternatively, pressed close up against her own nursery. For a life of her own, he had substituted his life with its interests, or the lives of her children with their potentialities. He assumed that she might sink herself in either, if not in both, with equal joy. It had never occurred to him that she might prefer simply to be herself. (p. 178)
Deborah is acutely aware that she is nearing the end of her life, and is clear in her need for independence. She sets very clear boundaries: no visits from children or grandchildren! Once established in her home, the rest of the book is a reflective piece as Deborah mentally re-lives her adult life. She also forms a few friendships important to her new-found independence. The ending is quite profound, as Deborah begins to see how life could be different for women of younger generations. show less
Oh, what a pother, she thought, women make about marriage! and yet who can blame them, she added, when one recollects that marriage -- and its consequences -- is the only thing show more that women have to make a pother about in the whole of their lives? Though the excitement be vicarious, it will do just as well. Is it not for this function that they have been formed, dressed, bedizened, educated -- if so one-sided an affair may be called education -- safeguarded, kept in the dark, hinted at, segregated, repressed, all that at a given moment they may be delivered, or may deliver their daughters over, to Minister to a Man? (p. 159)
Henry by the compulsion of love had cheated her of her chosen life, yet had given her another life, an ample life, a life in touch with the greater world, if that took her fancy; or a life, alternatively, pressed close up against her own nursery. For a life of her own, he had substituted his life with its interests, or the lives of her children with their potentialities. He assumed that she might sink herself in either, if not in both, with equal joy. It had never occurred to him that she might prefer simply to be herself. (p. 178)
Deborah is acutely aware that she is nearing the end of her life, and is clear in her need for independence. She sets very clear boundaries: no visits from children or grandchildren! Once established in her home, the rest of the book is a reflective piece as Deborah mentally re-lives her adult life. She also forms a few friendships important to her new-found independence. The ending is quite profound, as Deborah begins to see how life could be different for women of younger generations. show less
About Love, Sacrifice, and Redemption
Upon reflection, Vita Sackville-West seems the perfect person to write the story of a highborn woman who subordinates her life fully to the needs of her husband, the demands of his public office, and to motherhood, because she lived her life in nearly complete opposite fashion. While her diplomat husband Harold Nicolson toiled in offices in Europe and the Middle East, she maintained their residence in England, occasionally visiting him and writing of her journey, as in . Lady Deborah Slane only discovers the independence VSW maintained after the death of her husband, Henry Holland, as she casts back upon her life in Part Two, the beautiful and thoughtful heart of the novel. And why did Lady Slane show more sacrifice her ambition to live her life as a painter? For the same reason VSW gave up her famously scandalous affair with Violet Trefusis:
"All the parts of her that were not Henry Holland's had pulled in opposition, yet by this single giant of love they had all been pulled over, as the weaker team in a tug-of-war. Her ambitions, her secret existence, all had given way. She had loved him so much that even her resentment was subdued. She could not grudge him ever the sacrifice he had imposed upon her."
Part Two is where VSW displays her strongly feminist (though she would vigorously object to the word, preferring human rights) viewpoint, particularly in Lady Slane's recollection of her internal struggle over the meaning of her impending marriage to Henry. Betty Friedan gave it a name in 1963: The Feminine Mystique.
Part One of the novel in three parts sets the scene. Upon the death of Henry, the Holland children, all in their 60s, and none, with the exceptions of muddling, sweet Edith and solitary Kay, a man who collects astrolabes and such, present themselves as very likable. They conspire a plan spun from their own needs to care for their mother. Then Lady Slane shocks them with her announcement she will take a house in Hampstead, an expression of unexpected independence that most of them see as a bit of senility. As VSW tells it:
"Herbert, Carrie, Charles, and William decided that their mother must be mad. They took a step forward, and from having always thought her simple, decided that old age had definitely affected her brain. Her madness, however, was taking a harmless and even convenient form. William might be thinking rather regretfully of the lost subsidy to his house-books, Carrie and Herbert might remain still a little dubious about the eyes of the world, but, on the whole, it was a relief to find their mother settling her own affairs. Kay gazed inquiringly at his mother. He had taken her so much for granted--her gentleness, her unselfishness, her impersonal activities--and now, for the first time in his life, it was becoming apparent to Kay that people could still hold surprises up their sleeves, however long one had known them. Edith alone frolicked in her mind. She thought her mother not mad, but most conspicuously sane."
After Lady Slane moves, we meet people, in addition to her equally elderly maid Genoux, we do like, namely Mr. Bucktrout, the friendly and caring landlord, and the tradesman of varied skills, Mr. Gosheron, two gentlemen who take a greater interest in her well being than her children. Later, VSW introduces Mr. FitzGeorge, the remarkably reclusive millionaire collector of invaluable art purchased at bargain basement prices, what gratifies him most in life. Each of these individuals enriches Lady Slane's last months. And it is Mr. FitzGeorge who empowers Lady Slane to truly stun her children.
Part Three expands upon her relationship with Mr. FitzGeorge, who met her in India when she was Vicereine. She had forgotten him, simply another of the many faces that passed before her during her years with Henry. She, however, forever captivated him. As the months pass, Mr. FitzGeorge explains himself and makes cogent observations about her life and, really, about the lives of many talented women, two of which will give the flavor of his thinking, doubtless the mirror image of VSW's. He says:
"Face it, Lady Slane. Your children, your husband, your splendour, were nothing but obstacles that kept you from yourself. They were what you chose to substitute for your real vocation." To which, upon consideration, she agrees. He follows with: "According to his [Henry] lights, he gave you all you could desire. He merely killed you, that's all. Men do kill women. Most women enjoy being killed; so I am told. Being a woman, I daresay that even you took a certain pleasure in the process."
In the end, Mr. FitzGeorge provides her with something of a second chance. He enables her to upend the selfish plans of her children, delight Edith and Genoux, and allow her great-granddaughter, Deborah, to escape an ordained marriage to pursue her creative dreams, as Lady Slane could and did not.
Highly recommended for its graceful beauty, insights into love and personal independence, and its forward-looking viewpoint. show less
Upon reflection, Vita Sackville-West seems the perfect person to write the story of a highborn woman who subordinates her life fully to the needs of her husband, the demands of his public office, and to motherhood, because she lived her life in nearly complete opposite fashion. While her diplomat husband Harold Nicolson toiled in offices in Europe and the Middle East, she maintained their residence in England, occasionally visiting him and writing of her journey, as in . Lady Deborah Slane only discovers the independence VSW maintained after the death of her husband, Henry Holland, as she casts back upon her life in Part Two, the beautiful and thoughtful heart of the novel. And why did Lady Slane show more sacrifice her ambition to live her life as a painter? For the same reason VSW gave up her famously scandalous affair with Violet Trefusis:
"All the parts of her that were not Henry Holland's had pulled in opposition, yet by this single giant of love they had all been pulled over, as the weaker team in a tug-of-war. Her ambitions, her secret existence, all had given way. She had loved him so much that even her resentment was subdued. She could not grudge him ever the sacrifice he had imposed upon her."
Part Two is where VSW displays her strongly feminist (though she would vigorously object to the word, preferring human rights) viewpoint, particularly in Lady Slane's recollection of her internal struggle over the meaning of her impending marriage to Henry. Betty Friedan gave it a name in 1963: The Feminine Mystique.
Part One of the novel in three parts sets the scene. Upon the death of Henry, the Holland children, all in their 60s, and none, with the exceptions of muddling, sweet Edith and solitary Kay, a man who collects astrolabes and such, present themselves as very likable. They conspire a plan spun from their own needs to care for their mother. Then Lady Slane shocks them with her announcement she will take a house in Hampstead, an expression of unexpected independence that most of them see as a bit of senility. As VSW tells it:
"Herbert, Carrie, Charles, and William decided that their mother must be mad. They took a step forward, and from having always thought her simple, decided that old age had definitely affected her brain. Her madness, however, was taking a harmless and even convenient form. William might be thinking rather regretfully of the lost subsidy to his house-books, Carrie and Herbert might remain still a little dubious about the eyes of the world, but, on the whole, it was a relief to find their mother settling her own affairs. Kay gazed inquiringly at his mother. He had taken her so much for granted--her gentleness, her unselfishness, her impersonal activities--and now, for the first time in his life, it was becoming apparent to Kay that people could still hold surprises up their sleeves, however long one had known them. Edith alone frolicked in her mind. She thought her mother not mad, but most conspicuously sane."
After Lady Slane moves, we meet people, in addition to her equally elderly maid Genoux, we do like, namely Mr. Bucktrout, the friendly and caring landlord, and the tradesman of varied skills, Mr. Gosheron, two gentlemen who take a greater interest in her well being than her children. Later, VSW introduces Mr. FitzGeorge, the remarkably reclusive millionaire collector of invaluable art purchased at bargain basement prices, what gratifies him most in life. Each of these individuals enriches Lady Slane's last months. And it is Mr. FitzGeorge who empowers Lady Slane to truly stun her children.
Part Three expands upon her relationship with Mr. FitzGeorge, who met her in India when she was Vicereine. She had forgotten him, simply another of the many faces that passed before her during her years with Henry. She, however, forever captivated him. As the months pass, Mr. FitzGeorge explains himself and makes cogent observations about her life and, really, about the lives of many talented women, two of which will give the flavor of his thinking, doubtless the mirror image of VSW's. He says:
"Face it, Lady Slane. Your children, your husband, your splendour, were nothing but obstacles that kept you from yourself. They were what you chose to substitute for your real vocation." To which, upon consideration, she agrees. He follows with: "According to his [Henry] lights, he gave you all you could desire. He merely killed you, that's all. Men do kill women. Most women enjoy being killed; so I am told. Being a woman, I daresay that even you took a certain pleasure in the process."
In the end, Mr. FitzGeorge provides her with something of a second chance. He enables her to upend the selfish plans of her children, delight Edith and Genoux, and allow her great-granddaughter, Deborah, to escape an ordained marriage to pursue her creative dreams, as Lady Slane could and did not.
Highly recommended for its graceful beauty, insights into love and personal independence, and its forward-looking viewpoint. show less
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Author Information
99+ Works 7,264 Members
Poet and novelist Vita Sackville-West began writing as a child. Born at elegant Knole Castle, scene of Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando (1928), Sackville-West was educated in that 365-room dwelling. In 1913 she married Harold Nicolson (see Vol. 3), journalist, diplomat, and biographer. Despite Nicolson's homosexuality and her own lesbian affair with show more Violet Trefusis, this marriage survived. Poems of East and West, her first book, was published in 1917. She remained unknown except by a small group of literary connoisseurs until 1927, when she received the Hawthornden Prize for a second volume of poetry. At this time she lived in London and was part of the Bloomsbury group, which also included Lytton Strachey (see Vol. 3), E. M. Forster, John Maynard Keynes (see Vol. 3), and Woolf. Sackville-West published many novels and volumes of poetry, biography, and family history, and several books on gardening, as well as book reviews and criticism. All of her writings reflect the same unhurried approach, deep reflection, and brilliantly polished style. Her influence on other writers, especially Woolf, was perhaps greater than her own individual achievement. The Edwardians (1930) and All Passion Spent (1931) are her best-known novels. Sackville-West's son, Nigel Nicholson, recounted the close, but unconventional relationship of his parents in the memoir Portrait of a Marriage, published in 1973. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- All Passion Spent
- Original title
- All Passion Spent
- Alternate titles*
- Toda pasión concluida
- Original publication date
- 1931
- People/Characters
- Deborah Holland (Lady Slane); Mr FitzGeorge; Genoux; Mr Bucktrout; Mr Gosheron; Deborah (Lady Slane's great-grandchild) (show all 12); Edith Holland; Kay Holland; Herbert Holland; Carrie Holland; Charles Holland; William Holland
- Important places
- London, England, UK; Hampstead; India
- Related movies
- All Passion Spent (1986 | TV | IMDb)
- Epigraph
- His servants he with new acquist
Of true experience from this great event
With peace and consolation hath dismist,
And calm of mind, all passions spent.
Samson Agonistes - Dedication
- For Benedict and Nigel
who are young
this story of people who are old
FOR
BENEDICT AND NIGEL
WHO ARE YOUNG
THIS STORY OF PEOPLE WHO ARE OLD - First words
- Henry Lyulph Holland, first Earl of Slane, had existed for so long that the public had begun to regard him as immortal.
Vita Sackville-West began writing All Passion Spent in the spring of 1930. (Introduction) - Quotations
- Man has founded his calculations upon a mathematical system fundamentally false. His sums work out right for his own purposes, because he has crammed and constrained his planet into accepting his premises. Judged by other law... (show all)s, though the answers remain correct, the premises would appear merely crazy; ingenious enough, but crazy.
Of course, she would not question the wisdom of any arrangements they might choose to make. Mother had no will of her own; all her life long, gracious and gentle, she had been wholly submissive - an appendage. It was ssumed t... (show all)hat she had not enough brain to be self-assertive. "Thank goodness," Herbert sometimes remarked, "Mother is not one of those clever women." That she might have ideas whcih she kept to herself never entered into their estimate.
Henry by the compulsion of love had cheated her of her chosen life, yet had given her another life, an ample life, a life in touch with the greater world, if that took her fancy; or a life, alternatively, pressed close up aga... (show all)inst her own nursery. For a life of her own, he had substituted his life with its interests, or the lives of her children with their potentialities. He assumed that she might sink herself in either, if not in both, with equal joy. It had never occurred to him that she might prefer simply to be herself.lf. - Last words
- (Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
"In the presence of death," she said to Mr. Gosheron, taking refuge in a last convention, "you might at least take off your hat."
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)All Passion Spent, the theme and title of her best novel, was not to be her own epitaph. (Introduction) - Blurbers
- Glendinning, Victoria; Nicolson, Nigel
- Canonical DDC/MDS
- 823.912
*Some information comes from Common Knowledge in other languages. Click "Edit" for more information.
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