Mental Health and the Victorian (or Modern) Lady

I had a strange chain of reads recently that I want to share with you.

First, I picked up Mrs. Robinson's Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady by Kate Summerscale (of Mr. Whicher fame) from my TBR as my first non-fiction read of the year. It's the story of Isabella Robinson, a woman who made the mistake of a) marrying an a-hole and b) keeping a diary of her feelings, flirtations, and, possibly, indiscretions. In 1858, England started allowing faster and cheaper divorces and Mr. Robinson was first in line, accusing his wife of infidelity based on the diary that he found in her desk while she was ill. What followed was a battle in the public eye over whether she was an evil adulteress or a typical woman, deranged by her malfunctioning uterus.

The book really got to me. It was difficult to read how women were marginalized and abused, both by society and by the law, in Victorian times (and earlier). Isabella moved in rather grand circles and one of her purported lovers owned a health spa, frequented by the likes of Charles Darwin and female authors Dinah Maria Mulock and Georgiana Craik. It was this doctor who put up the defense during the divorce proceedings (because he was named as co-defendant) that her journal was nothing but fantasy, a writing exercise, and that she had such vivid imaginings because of her female troubles. The book does not come to a conclusion as to the veracity of the journal but we as readers do come to the conclusion that Isabella was very unjustly treated by one or more men in her life.

So then I picked up Wish Her Safe at Home by Stephen Benatar, knowing only that it had something to do with mental illness and I was obsessed with the topic at the moment. Holy cow. This is a first person account from a woman that is truly off her rocker. I don't know what her diagnosis would be today but Rachel Waring most definitely has a progressing mental illness throughout this story. To read this after Isabella Robinson's story just made me feel the unjustness of that true tale even more as she never once showed real signs of madness. I didn't love this book but was glad to have read it as it was different from my usual reads. 

But, strangely, one of the books mentioned in WHSaH was ...

John Halifax, Gentleman by Dinah Maria Mulock, which I had received a copy of when Harper Perennial released this beautiful Legacy Edition last year. Mulock wrote this book while staying at Moor Park, the aforementioned health spa, in Surrey. So, you can see how I couldn't resist reading this one immediately. And, while it's mainly the story of a lifelong friendship between two men, there's also a subplot about a woman who a) marries an a-hole and b) becomes unfaithful and leaves him, eventually returning broken and mentally deranged (though she didn't have a diary). I think it's no coincidence that this book was published in 1856, shortly before the Robinson divorce trial but after the couple was already legally separated.

The main part of this story was a lovely tale of friendship between an invalid boy and an orphan as they age. It was interesting to read a Victorian story written by a woman that was not a sensation story. This one had social messages, such as the ones you would find in Dickens, but also had quite a bit of moralizing in it. I didn't 100% love everything in this one but I was sobbing by the end so I guess that tells you something! I'm glad that some of these lesser known novels are being repackaged and rereleased. Thank you, Harper!

Burning my diary,

K

RIP Read 1: The Oxford Book of Victorian Ghost Stories

I didn't mean to go missing for two weeks from the blog. I guess back to school tasks in the school library, getting back to the gym regularly and taking two weeks to read this book all conspired to keep me away. But here I am, with my first RIP VIII book done. Hooray!

The Oxford Book of Victorian Ghost Stories is a collection edited by Michael Cox and R.A. Gilbert. It has 35 stories, written between 1852 and 1908. As they are presented in chronological order, it was quite interesting to see the progression of the ghost story through time, though the basic elements of the stories really did stay the same.

Some of the best stories in the collection were --

Elizabeth Gaskell, The Old Nurse's Story
J.Y. Akerman, The Miniature
Tom Hood, The Shadow of a Shade
Mary Elizabeth Braddon, At Chrighton Abbey
Thomas Street Millington, No Living Voice
Wilkie Collins, Miss Jéromette and the Clergyman
Anonymous, The Story of Clifford House
Amelia B. Edwards, Was It an Illusion?
Charlotte Riddell, The Open Door
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Captain of the 'Pole-Star'
Robert Louis Stevenson, The Body-Snatcher
Mary Louisa Molesworth, The Story of the Rippling Train
B.M. Croker, To Let
E. Nesbit, John Charrington's Wedding
Jerome K. Jerome, The Man of Science
Algernon Blackwood, The Kit-bag

If you read Victorian fiction, you probably recognize a lot of the names on that list (and there were other stories by Dickens and Kipling and more). It was interesting to see that ghost stories were standard fare for many authors of the time. The story that I found most haunting was the last in the book, the one by Algernon Blackwood. It made me seriously uncomfortable while I was reading it and it was just a great ghost story, with a fully explained but nonetheless frightening scenario. I've done you a favor and found an online copy of The Kit-bag. If you need just one creepy story to get you in the mood for the season, this might do the trick. Enjoy!

Jumping at every little sound,
K

New-ish Release: The Somnambulist

The Somnambulist by Millais (1871)

It's a bit strange for me to be reading a lot of Victorian fiction in the spring but after The Solitary House, I was in the mood for more so I grabbed The Somnambulist by Essie Fox as my next read. This is one that I was looking forward to and I really enjoyed it. The only way that it suffered in my super-picky mind was because I was expecting a neo-Victorian novel of the variety written by Michael Cox (his books could almost have been actual Victorian novels) whereas this one had some decidedly modern topics and scenes.

Told from the point of view of Phoebe Turner, a young lady of modest means, this is a tale of devotion, deception and redemption. In a household torn in two between the performing arts and religion, between aunt and mother, Phoebe isn't entirely sure who she is or who she wants to become -- and a number of things will push her in many different ways before she becomes a woman with her own mind and heart.

Though I was never entirely sympathetic to Phoebe, her story was compelling and I enjoyed this story. As I said before, I was a bit surprised by some hot and steamy scenes but only because of my own expectations for this novel. There's also a strong thread of anti-Semitism through the novel, something that readers of Victorian novels will be familiar with, though perhaps not to the extent that it is explored in this book. There is also a bit of the supernatural in the story -- just enough to add some flavor and to cause the reader to question Phoebe's reliability as a narrator (and her mental health). All of these elements are put together very well and I hope that Essie Fox has another book in the works.

Wide awake,
K

"Not so tiny any more, that's a fact."

I received Louis Bayard's Mr. Timothy for Christmas last year and ended up saving it to read this year due to its holiday setting. This is the story of the adult Timothy Cratchit, a.k.a. "Tiny Tim" from Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. Things have changed for Tim -- his parents are both dead as are some of his siblings, he no longer has a cane and braces but only walks with a slight limp and, perhaps saddest of all, he turns out to have never been the pious, optimistic child that we saw through Dickens' eyes.

Timothy is homeless right after his father's funeral but ends up with a room in a brothel. He doesn't patronize the business but rather helps the madam learn to read. Things are relatively comfortable for Tim until one day when he sees a young girl dead in the street a few blocks from his home. As Tim passes by the scene, he notices a strange brand on her arm -- a G with demonic eyes in the middle. As he dredges the Thames with an old sailor friend, Gully, looking for bodies worth money to grieving families and medical colleges, they bring up another girl with the same brand and appearance. Eventually, Tim feels compelled to investigate and find out what is happening to these girls. Joined by a street urchin named Colin and a frightened young Italian girl named Philomela, Timothy works to rid London of a horrific evil and also to exorcise his own demons of guilt and self-doubt.

Published in 2003, this is Bayard's first historical mystery and while it didn't have the same polish as his others (The Pale Blue Eye starring a young Edgar Allan Poe and The Black Tower about the missing Dauphin in Paris), this book easily transported me back to Victorian London. There were characters like the kind-hearted and optimistic Gully who could have been penned by Dickens himself. My only real issue with this novel was my decision to read it at Christmas time. Though it is based on A Christmas Carol, it is a dark and sometimes gut-wrenching story that was difficult to read in a time of happiness. Still, i enjoyed it and Mr. Bayard remains one of my authors to follow.

Appreciating comfort and joy,
K


Support our site and buy Mr. Timothy on Amazon or find it at your local library. We bought our own copy.

"It must have been late autumn of that year, and probably it was towards dusk for the sake of being less conspicuous."

One of the first books I read this year was The Quincunx by Charles Palliser. It was published in 1989 and is almost 800 pages long. It is set in 19th century England -- a period I read about quite frequently. I had seen this book a few times over the years at my local Barnes and Noble on the shelf for books recommended by store employees. The book has no synopsis on the back so it took me a few years to decide to read it.

I think if it did have a synopsis it would be simply this "the story of a boy who becomes a man - in a field of rakes". You know this image from cartoons -- the unfortunate character steps one direction onto a rake that snaps up and nails him in the face and when he turns to go another direction, another rake is there to hit him in the nose again. This book was 787 pages of agony. And yet --- I would read it again. I know, what am I thinking, right? But the book was thoroughly engaging and though you knew the worst would happen -- because it kept happening -- you hoped in each situation that this would be the time that it worked out for young John Huffam. But sadly, there would be 400 pages left with no story and so it continued through the whole book.

The Quincunx, by the way, is the five-pieced symbol on the cover of the book. It represents the five families that are players in the story.

Who would I recommend this book to? Anyone with a lot of patience for misery, an interest in the less-fortunates of 19th century London or the desire to completely escape into another era for a week or two as this book is quite a long read.

Until next time,
K

Postscript: The title of the post is the first line of the book ... i think i will do that in each post so that you can see if it catches your fancy.


Buy The Quincunx on Amazon or find it at your local library.