County Chronicle

Deliciously delightful. Angela Thirkell does it again. Lots of characters as usual, but I've now reached the point where I don't have to refer to my Thirkell encyclopedia, so well do I know most of them.
Book opens with the contemplation of a marriage between two people of a "certain age" who, in the last book, arranged it as a matter of practicality but very soon find out that they both love each other very much. Other characters are at loose ends, like Isabel Dale, whose fiance died in the war and who now offers herself as a sort of extra daughter to the Marlings, or Lavinia Brandon, whose son and daughter-in-law simply won't find their own house and prefer living in hers. Life marches on for this lot of sensitive yet stiff-upper-lip show more people, and it's somehow very comforting to read. Always tinged with bits of irony that can be terribly funny but are never too harsh. show less

County Chronicle is book 19 of 29 in Angela Thirkell’s Barsetshire series, which captures the life and times of the inhabitants of a fictional English county in the early 20th century. These novels are light satire of people in every echelon of society, and the political events of the day. In this post-World War II novel, Thirkell’s conservative politics and dogged adherence to Empire are a bit too much in evidence, but if the reader can look past that they will find a pleasant series of typical Barsetshire events. The book opens with the wedding of a couple well-known from previous novels, and another recently-married couple have twins. There are garden parties and fêtes, and the steady ebb and flow of romantic relationships in show more which the most fruitful lead to the usual two weddings at the end of the book.

By this point in the series, many characters have aged and some have died. One of my favorite older characters figured prominently in this novel, and her story resolved in a satisfying way. It was also refreshing to see a few younger characters playing more prominent roles, no doubt providing a foundation for the remaining books. show less

As usual, Thirkell's reactionary politics are a bit hard to take — she seems to have written this in the run-up to the 1950 election and loses no opportunity to throw in undiluted, bitter propaganda against "Them" (i.e. Attlee's Labour government). At one point a character reflects that there is nothing much to show for all the "millions" They have spent "except ... free hospitals". Thirkell doesn't seem to have any conception what a huge benefit the introduction of the NHS was for the majority of British people, nor what a miracle Attlee and Stafford Cripps had performed keeping the economy afloat and even growing despite the Americans pulling the plug on lend-lease. Unfortunately, it was the short-sightedness of people like Thirkell show more with their ideological dislike for Labour's "interference" in the traditional way of life of the middle-classes that brought Attlee down.

But I think this one is still worth reading, despite the far-right-Torygraph ethos that informs it. There is a new conviction in this book that we have to go on and live our lives as agreeably as we can, despite "Them"; there are all the usual Thirkell comic bonuses, like squabbling servants, frustrated authors, cantankerous old men, and thoughtless young ones; there is an unusually rich selection of splendid set-piece scenes (a wedding, a christening, a funeral, a garden-party at the Bishop's Palace, and a Conservative fete); there is even a surprising amount of proto-feminist reflection about the ways in which men make women's lives harder. (And of course we can get a wicked giggle out of Thirkell's rather unhappy choice of name for the one truly depraved and criminal family in the neighbourhood — the Thatchers!)

There seem to be rather more direct Trollope references here than in the previous Barsetshire books. As well as various descendants of Thornes, Dales and Greshams, we penetrate Omnium Castle to meet the direct descendants of Plantagenet Palliser, who have been kept rather out of the frame up to now. It clearly suits Thirkell's purpose to show us a great Duke reduced to living in penury in the servants' wing of the castle as an example of the evil effects of Labour government, but the Duke and his daughter Lady Cora are splendid new characters despite that. show less

More of the same but this one has even less of a plot than others. It really is a collection of incidents.