When our Book Group, which is picking flora or fauna related titles at the moment, didn’t pull this one out of the hat for ‘J’, we recycled it for ‘O’!
Published in 1994, Lively’s memoir centres on her childhood in Egypt in the 1930s. Her father worked for an Egyptian bank in Cairo; her mother socialised, they lived outside Cairo in small town now gobbled up by the city’s expansion. Young Penelope was left in the care of Nanny Lucy, who stayed with her until her return to England in 1945 when Penelope was twelve, and shortly went off to boarding school. It was an isolated childhood with the class system ensuring that she rarely had any ‘suitable’ playmates.
Every child has to cope with the confusing codes of its own society – beginning with the family and working outwards, Every child is confronted with the puzzle of class distinctions. My particular challenge was that I was growing up in accordance with the teachings of one culture but surrounded by all the signals of another. Egypt was my home, and all that I knew, but I realized that in some perverse way I was not truly a part of it.
A good part of our discussions centred around Penelope’s mostly absent parents. Her father seems to have been jolly on occasion, but was always at work. Her mother just ignored the poor girl – indeed she ran off with another man – leading to her parents’ eventual divorce, something more stigmatising than staying separated. Even once she reached England, and was shunted between grandmothers for the next few years during the holidays, there was no mention of her parents, her father who’d been seconded to the Khartoum branch for a while, was meant to be following her to England in a matter of months – but we never hear when he arrived. We questioned whether we’d been too hard on her parents – we decided no, but would give the father some leeway.
Meanwhile, Penelope did have a surrogate mother in Lucy, with whom she stayed in contact until her death, after Lucy moved on to another family – her talents being in demand. Lucy was everything to Penelope, she loved her very much, and they did nearly everything together – including lessons. All the English schools were in Cairo and transport was an issue, so Lucy found the Parents National Education Union – a homeschooling organisation set up in the 1890s (which lasted until 1984). Together they navigated through its lesson plans – often subsituting books at hand for those recommended, and learning the maths together. It was fascinating to read about 1930s lesson plans!
Interspersed throughout the novel, Lively comments on the differences between childhood and adult perception of events and places. We didn’t feel that these ruminations added much to the memoir. Adult hindsight being naturally different to childish innocence. Indeed her innocence came over clearly, isolated child that she was, and Lively is able to remember how she felt as a child.
The whole, however, was a little bland. Although a good thing, young Penelope’s life was not dramatic. The drama of her parents split happened off-stage as it were, and she, having Lucy, wasn’t really involved until the plan to return to England as the war ended happened. Indeed, WWII didn’t seem to have touched their lives in Egypt much. All in all, this memoir did provoke a really good discussion, particularly about the way things were done back then if you were of a high enough class, and being short at 180 pages in the hardback, made it a good book group read.
Source: Own copy. Viking hardback 1994, 180 pages. BUY from Blackwell’s (Penguin Mod Classics) via my affiliate link (free UK P&P)
I think the bits that appeal to me most would definitely be the bits about Lucy. What an extraordinary job, and role in a child’s life—as close as an older sibling, but employed by the parents and therefore always a subordinate member of the household. And what must it have been like for Lucy to choose that life, far from home but seeing so many new things! There’s a journal by an English governess, Olive Garnett, who worked in Russia in the late 1890s, which appeals for the same sorts of reasons.
Lucy was definitely the highlight.
This does sound interesting, it’s a shame overall it was a little bland.
Not that we wanted anything nasty to happen to her, but it was just her and Lucy for almost the whole book, so bland in that way. It was still a good read.
It does sound like an interesting story, even if you think it was a little bland. I lived in Egypt between 1991-94 and it might be interesting to read this story, and see how it was to live there so many years ago. However, maybe life in Cairo does not come out that much, since she seems to have been rather isolated?
She does go back and finds it very different. It was only bland in that nothing much happens – it’s just her and Lucy – it was always interesting though.
I’ve never read Lively, although I do have a couple of her novels in the 746 so I’ll get to her at some point!
I’m quite enthusiastic to read more by her. This was my first, amazingly.
I suspect Lively’s experience wasn’t particularly unusual for her expat class. I’m glad she had Lucy.
Absolutely! (I was reminded of Old Filth who was a child of the Raj).
I’m sure I owned a copy of this once, but I think I never got to it. I *have* read some of her autobiographical work, which I enjoyed, but I’m a little put off by the hint of blandness!
It was only bland in that her life was largely drama and friends-free apart from her parents’ divorce. It was just her and Lucy. But I did enjoy reading it.
I haven’t read anything of hers. It does sound as though she had a lonely and rather neglected childhood which perhaps contributed to her seeking solace in books and stories.
Luckily she wasn’t neglected by Lucy, whom she adored.
Although this is not my favorite Lively, I enjoyed it very much. I didn’t find it particularly bland. As to my favorite Lively, it keeps changing the more of her that I read. Right now I would have to say Passing On. This novel tells the story of two middle aged characters who have always lived with their manipulative and mean mother who dies at the beginning of the book. This book is about the two siblings’ lives in the months following the mother’s death. A truly wonderful book.
Maybe being in Egypt, I expected more drama and excursions to the big city. It was so much just her and Lucy in the family home. I did enjoy reading it though.
Bland but also fascinating, especially that childhood in Egypt – that sense of straddling two cultures is familiar to me from, for instance, struggling with sums in shillings and farthings, bushels and pecks while Hong Kong in the 1950s had dollars and cents and coming across a bushel wasn’t an everyday occurrence. I’ve a couple of Lively’s adult novels to tackle but would be interested in reading her other memoir, Ammonites and Leaping Fish.
I would definitely read more by her. The blandness was only in the isolation of her life with just her and Lucy, whom luckily, she adored.
Ooh, I’d love to read this! Definitely adding to the wishlist!