Good Evening, Mrs. Craven: The Wartime Stories of Mollie Panter-Downes

Good Evening Mrs. Craven is a collection of 21 short stories that Mollie Panter-Downes wrote for The New Yorker during the war years. Although she was English and lived in Surrey for most of her life, her work both as a short story writer and as a journalist has been virtually forgotten in England; and yet she was a prolific writer, writing over 800 pieces for The New Yorker during her career.

Mollie Panter-Downes’s stories are vignettes that focus on short moments in the day of average Britons during the war. None of these people is particularly remarkable, but they live in extraordinary times, and how they cope with that is what’s so fascinating about this collection. From country housewives serving on Red Cross committees and show more housing evacuees, to young working women surviving the London Blitz, to a spinster who fantasizes about the food she can’t have, to an old Major who looks forward with relish to the fighting (even though he can’t join in), these stories are funny and poignant at the same time.

The characters in these stories are very loosely connected to one another, and only one appears more than once (Mrs. Ramsay, the housewife, whose reflections on her circumstances are brilliantly funny; I wish Panter-Downes had written more stories featuring her). The most moving of these stories is the title story, “Good Evening Mrs. Craven,” in which a mistress (mistakenly called Mrs. Craven by a maitre d’ at a restaurant) has to mourn her lover in secret. These stories have been published here in the order that they were published, and throughout the book you can see the war unfold. Although each story is only a few pages, the characters are very well rounded; in fact, there’s so much material here that the author could have written a full-length novel centering around any one of them. I don’t normally read much in the way of short stories, but this collection is top-notch. show less

This book is a collection of short stories originally published in The New Yorker between 1939 and 1944. Despite being written for an American magazine, however, the stories focus on the experiences of Englishmen and -women (mostly the latter) during World War II. The plots of these stories range from the plight of evacuees in the English countryside to the effects of a long separation on husbands and wives to the radical reorganization of the British social classes.

The thing that impressed me most about these stories was how incredibly well-written they are. Each one is crafted meticulously, with no wasted words or excessive descriptions. The author uses a gently ironic style to evoke poignant human flaws and foibles. The endings are show more especially well done, driving home the point of each story without being too unsubtle or direct. I also liked the subject matter of the stories, as I’m becoming more and more interested in the World War II era. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in the time period, especially since the author actually wrote these stories while the war was still going on. show less

If you really hate short stories... you should read this anyway.

I myself am not a terrific fan of short stories - I read Flannery O'Connor's [b:The Complete Stories|284996|The Complete Stories|Flannery O'Connor|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1557999886l/284996._SY75_.jpg|886814] last year and figured that would do me until 2025 or so. Then I got this surprise in the mail (a gift from my husband, chosen by the lovely people at Persephone Books based on my previous purchases), and now I want to immediately read [b:Minnie's Room: The Peacetime Stories of Mollie Panter-Downes|1683769|Minnie's Room The Peacetime Stories of Mollie Panter-Downes|Mollie show more Panter-Downes|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348318119l/1683769._SX50_.jpg|1680371].

These stories were just so good. In each of them is a picture of the effects of WWII on the English who were at least a few, and in some cases, quite a few steps removed from the actual fighting. For example, the "Mrs. Craven" of the title, who is not a Mrs. at all but a mistress, and who worries that she'd never hear of it, should Mr. Craven be injured or worse, killed. As with nearly every Persephone I've read so far, I'm amazed that this book and its author are not more widely known.

This is the 8th book that Persephone published, and, coincidentally, the 8th that I've read. show less

" 'Don't think I'm being stupid and morbid,' she said, 'but supposing anything happens. I've been worrying about that. You might be wounded or ill and I wouldn't know.' She tried to laugh. 'The War Office doesn't have a service for sending telegrams to mistresses, does it?'

"He frowned, because this sounded hysterical ... With an effort, she remembered that he loved her because she was not the kind of woman to make scenes ..."

"Wartime was a period of intense and varied creativity for Mollie Painter-Downs. She was in her prime and bristling with the writer's powers of perception.

"Her best short stories do not depend on conventional action-driven plots because their sphere is psychological, emotional and social. They are brief, dramatic -- show more and comic -- testimonials to the ordinary English women who did not fight in the war, but lived through it as acutely as any soldier."
~~front flap

Vignettes more than short stories -- most 5 pages long, or less. But woven with amazing accuracy into the emotions of the women portrayed -- always evocative, always of a woman who you might know. Compelling and thought provoking, and well worth the read. Or the reread. show less

Superb war time stories set among those Keeping the Home Fires burning while the menfolk were away..
The wealthy, struggling along minus servants; those forced to share a home with friends or evacuees; sewing parties; a wife preparing for her husband's departure..
Originally written for the American audience of the New Yorker, these are quite superb; humorous, touching and well observed.
Could anything beat this description of an unlovely working class evacuee infant:
"The baby, sitting impassively in its mother's arms, wore a dirty red knitted cap in which it oddly resembled a wizened old sans-culotte, a mummified Marat with a snotty nose."
Brilliant writing.

The 21 stories in Good Evening, Mrs Craven portray the lives of people on the Home Front, getting on with their lives set against the backdrop of war. They’re not stories of action but their subjects are psychological, emotional and social. They offer a glimpse into what life was like then - the mood, the atmosphere, the tension and the fear, the hopes and the devastation, the loss and the loneliness, the stress and the tragi-comedy of life.

Mollie Panter-Downes’s style is fluent, a touch journalistic, sometimes subtly ironic and most pleasurable to read. There are stories of housewives, evacuees, billeted soldiers and Home Front volunteers, of the ladies in the Red Cross sewing party who met ‘twice a week to stitch pyjamas, drink show more a dish of tea, and talk about their menfolk’, the effects of food rationing, of lovers separated by the war and of ‘The Woman Alone’.

See also my blog. show less

Good Evening, Mrs Craven is a wonderful selection of short stories written by Mollie Panter-Downes as articles for The New Yorker during WWII. The stories focus on middle-class women and how they were affected by the war, whether it's trying to say goodbye to a husband leaving for active service, opening your home to receive evacuees or a mistress worrying about whether she would ever find out if her lover is hurt or injured. The selection of stories are arranged chronologically which gives a good sense of the changing mood and worsening conditions in England throughout WWII. Some are funny, some sad, but each one feels as if Mollie Panter-Downes has managed to lift a curtain and allow the reader a brief glimpse of her characters' lives show more before the curtain falls and they carry on. I think what I'm trying, rather clumsily, to say, is that all the characters and situations she wrote about felt very real to me, and I felt like I'd been given a real glimpse into what life was like for certain groups of people during WWII. And, of course, the Persephone edition is a joy to read. show less