The Sugar House

What could be more appealing than living in a sugar house? This pleasant image turns sinister as young bride Clara equates her situation with that of Hansel and Gretel. After bad luck on the stage and in love, Clara impulsively marries a childish, alcoholic young man of indeterminate sexuality. The two are miserable together in every way. Finally, Clara seeks--and finds--a way out of the sugar house.

Clara is an unusual heroine; she's both naïve and determined, messy but honest about her faults. No doubt she is based on Antonia White herself.

This novel is the third installment in White's Frost in May quartet. I'm looking forward to reading the fourth one, Beyond the Glass.

The Sugar House, the third novel in Antonia White’s Frost in May quartet, picks up four years after the events of The Lost Traveller. It can be read as a stand-alone; however, the context the previous book provides is useful. Now 21, Clara, having recently completed training at The Garrick School of Drama, is working as an actor with a travelling theatre troupe. She believes herself to be in love with an older actor whom she met at drama school, a WWI vet with a drinking problem, and she seems unaware (or unwilling to accept) that Stephen Tye mainly likes the reflection of himself he sees in her naïve, young eyes. When the relationship with Stephen—if you can call it that—does not work out, Clara allows dissolute oddball Archie show more Hughes-Follett back into her life. She had been on the brink of marrying him four years earlier, but her mother had been able to talk some sense into her. Now, Clara makes the fatal error she’d earlier avoided. With the urging and approval of two ardent Catholics—her father and Lady Theresa Follett, whose ten-year-old son accidentally died when Clara was his governess—Clara marries Archie.

Archie is from an extremely wealthy old Catholic family, and he is to come into his full inheritance at the age of 25. Until that time, his father’s will dictates he is under the guardianship of his uncle. Archie believes this is due to pure malice on the part of his father, whose hatred of Archie prevails beyond the grave, but everyone else is aware that Archie is an impractical misfit, full of dreams and unworkable schemes. For now, he receives an allowance, most of which he fritters away on drink, for Archie has an even more serious problem with booze than Stephen. Though I know that social awareness of alcoholism (and addiction in general) in the time White is depicting (the 1920s) was not what it is today, I was still slightly taken aback that two adults who ought to have known better would’ve encouraged Clara in making such a marriage.

Most of The Sugar House tells the story of Clara’s—and Archie’s, too—entrapment in an absolutely disastrous marriage. Although Clara experiences a certain sexual revulsion towards Archie, she hadn’t quite bargained for him falling into bed completely sloshed on their wedding night (and many nights thereafter) either. The fact is: Archie is asexual—something noted very early in the book by Clara’s fellow actor and roommate, Maidie. (In fact, the marriage is never consummated.) At one point, Clara’s domineering and controlling father blames her for Archie’s problems, which makes for some pretty enraging reading. Otherwise, the overbearing pater familias, Claude, plays a far less significant role in this book than the one that preceded it.

While I enjoyed this novel, I found that it lacked the narrative momentum of the other two I’ve read in the quartet. The reader knows from the start that Clara’s marriage doesn’t stand a chance; therefore, its unravelling is not overly compelling. Characterization, however, remains a real strength. show less

The Sugar House is the third novel in Antonia White’s Frost in May quartet. At the end of The Lost Traveller, Clara Batchelor had just freed herself from an impetuous engagement to Archie Hughes – Follett. As The Sugar House opens, Clara is about to embark on a tour of a play with a theatrical company. She is head over heels in love with Stephen Tye, a fellow actor who will be touring with a different company.

“At last the whole company stood yawning and shivering on York platform. In the murk under the sooty roof on which rain drummed steadily, it was hard to realise that it was half past four on a summer morning. Everyone was longing for a cup of tea, but no buffet was open at that hour”

As Clara endures a series of drab show more provincial boarding houses, sharing a room with the irrepressible Maidie, a fellow catholic, she dreams of meeting up with Stephen, determined to marry him even if, as she suspects, he makes her unhappy in the process. Clara receives a letter from her father, informing her that Archie is back from South America and wants to see her, she prepares herself to see the man she jilted four years earlier, the man who can’t but help remind her of the tragedy that had preceded it.
Following their awkward meeting in Birmingham, Archie, cynical and drinking too much, hooks up with Clara’s theatre company. Archie is often childlike, his enthusiasms and sulks extreme and often unrealistic. He still loves Clara, declaring he would still marry her – on any terms. Despite being twenty-three – Archie’s family money is held in trust for another two years – he is hopeless at managing his allowance and is constantly looking around for a quick money making scheme. When Stephen betrays Clara, reeling and hurt Clara marries Archie, much to her father’s delight and her mother’s dismay. Taking a tiny house they can ill afford in a Chelsea populated with artists, Clara is desperate to find the safety she once knew in childhood and to win her father’s approval. Archie and Clara are like children playing at house. Clara comes to think of her dream house as a sugar house, like that of Hansel and Gretel. However they are not children anymore, and the realities of their situation and the world they live in starts to turn to a nightmare.

“Now!’ said Archie, in a tone of immense satisfaction. She opened her eyes. Spread out on the floor were two magnificent Bassett-Lowke model engines; a tail of coaches for each; stations, signal boxes and a glittering heap of rails. She could do nothing but stare open mouthed.
‘Thought that would knock you flat,’ said Archie, grinning with pleasure.”

Judging by other reviews I have seen of this book, The Sugar House may be the least popular of the four novels. Having loved The Lost Traveller so much when I read it a couple of months ago – I was looking forward to this novel, and for me it didn’t disappoint, although The Lost Traveller is still my favourite to date. I loved the first half of the novel, with Clara touring with the theatrical company. Antonia White brilliantly depicts the life of provincial boarding houses and the actors that made their living by going from town to town on late night trains. There is much less emphasis on Catholicism in this novel, although Clara’s religion still helps guide her through her life and marriage. As this novel ends Clara is still only twenty-two – and I long to know what life holds in store for her. show less

This is the third in Antonia White's autobiographical series of novels. In two previous works, Clara Batchelor came of age through convent education and a job as a governess. The Sugar House takes place in 1920, when Clara is 21 years old and working as an actress with a touring company. Her naivete is evident from the start, when jokes about two gay actors go right over her head. Clara shares rooms with an older, brassier actress named Maidie. She also pines after Stephen Tye, an older actor she met prior to leaving on tour. Stephen is full of empty promises and strings Clara along for a while. When the inevitable happens, Clara turns to Archie, a former love who has turned up after a long absence. Clara met Archie while working as a show more governess, and was even engaged to him for a time. Archie has changed over the years, and not necessarily for the better. Eager to escape theatrical life and yet remain independent from her parents, Clara is blind to Archie's flaws and agrees to marry him. Almost immediately, the couple find themselves severely in debt due to a general unwillingness to live within their means, and exacerbated by Archie's drinking problem. He pours money into hare-brained schemes that go nowhere, and she loses confidence in her own ability to earn a living either by acting or writing.

As Clara and Archie's relationship deteriorates, Clara's depression worsens and she retreats into a bit of a cocoon. Two chance encounters help her emerge from the chrysalis with greater self-awareness. She is no longer a girl, but a woman desirable to other men. The novel concludes with a number of loose ends, but Clara is poised to exercise her independence in completely new ways. The Sugar House reinforces Virginia Woolf's view that that a woman needs "a room of her own" and an independent income, while also highlighting the importance of sexual discovery and independence. show less

In The Sugar House, the 3rd book of the Frost in May quarter, Clara Batchelor has fallen in love with an older actor, while still pursued by her ex-fiancé. This was the best book so far in the series and I was drawn inexorably into the little tragedy of this novel. Really well done.

The Sugar House is the second novel in a trilogy of books that began with The Lost Traveller. Clara Batchelor is now twenty-one; having graduated from drama school, she’s now a member of a traveling acting group. She has a love affair with another actor (although we can tell that it won’t end well) and ends up marrying her former fiancée Archie. Although newlywed, Clara—and Archie—still have a lot to learn about life; and for better or worse, the second half of the novel is how they try to cope with the demands of marriage and, at the same time, grow up.

Antonia White has laid on the symbolism and imagery pretty thickly; the title is in reference to the Hansel and Gretel story. The similarities are so close that you might think show more that White is retelling the old myth, with the house made of confectionery representing the house in Chelsea, and the trail of breadcrumbs and witch representing Clara and Archie’s marriage. Because of this, the book seems kind of claustrophobic; indeed, most of the scenes in this book take place indoors. It’s a clever analogy, but it’s not so skillfully done in that Antonia White actually has to tell her reader what the title means in the text of the novel. Still, I enjoyed reading the continuation of Clara’s story; and it’s interesting to watch how she matures from childhood to adulthood in this book.

The Catholicism of White’s earlier novels is less obvious in this novel, but still present. Antonia White was very strongly influenced by her religious upbringing, and so it shows clearly in her series of novels that were based on her personal history from the ages of 9 to 23. The Sugar House fictionally details White’s marriage to Tom Hopkinson as well as White’s attempts to be both a writer of fiction and work as an advertising copywriter. You don’t need to have read The Lost Traveller or Frost in May (which is also unofficially a part of the series) previously, but it helps. Given what happened to Antonia White in real life, it’ll be interesting to see how the story unfolds in the last book Beyond the Glass. show less

I'd been putting off reading The Sugar House because I thought it would be slow going. But I ended up picking it up as a back-up travel read and ended up reading most of it today while waiting for my train/when on the train, quite effortlessly. It did take me a while to start remembering details of Clara's life in the previous book, The Lost Traveller but the book helpfully gave a few hints.

At the beginning, Clara is starting a new life in a touring theatre, in love, writing stories and advertising copy--at the end her marriage isn't working, she's no longer writing and unhappy--not the easiest of progresses to follow through a book but well worth reading.