Tag Archives: book review

2019 Year-End Book Review

17 Tuesday Dec 2019

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Since I moved to Virginia, I have made more use of the local public library than I have since I was a kid. Not only do I go there to write when home is too distracting (some tasks need to be finished in a cat- and fridge-free zone), but I go pretty much every week. Traveling to DC gives me ample time to read, and I can finish a book or two every week just reading on the train. Among the titles I read this year are some that might interest readers of this blog (and could make a good last-minute holiday gift if you need some ideas).

Princess Elizabeth’s wedding dress, by Norman Hartnell. Royal Collection Trust

The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding by Jennifer Robson (William Morrow, 2018) was a little outside my normal range. I don’t usually read historical fiction and this veered into historical romance fiction and that’s just not my thing. And yes, if you read the reviews on Goodreads, those folks make some valid points. I did read the whole thing, but what really held my attention were the descriptions of working in the couture houses of Paris and London, in particular at Norman Hartnell. Hartnell’s gowns for the queen were marked by detailed embroidery. The wedding dress was made while Britain was still under rationing, which meant that then-Princess Elizabeth used her rationing coupons for her dress; thousands of women sent her their coupons, too, in a curious gesture that is noted in the book. There are some obvious plot twists, and some trite moments, but on the whole, this was a good summer read that got me thinking about the hidden labor that goes into clothing, and ways to make that visible.

Dress in the Age of Jane Austen: Regency Fashion by Hilary Davidson (Yale University Press, 2019). I have one gripe with this book: the type is printed in grey, not black, ink so it is difficult to read at night in bed. Otherwise, this is a solid, comprehensive look at late-18th and early 19th-century clothing. The focus is Great Britain, which is clear from the title, but the information is still useful to those interpreting early 19th century America and Europe. Davidson makes excellent use of written sources along with extant garments, fashion plates, and portraits for a well-rounded examination of what people wore.

Carduus Eriophorus, formerly in an album (Vol.II, 62); Cotton-headed Thistle. 1781. British Museum 1897,0505.163

The Paper Garden: Mrs. Delany Begins Her Life’s Work at 72 by Molly Peacock (McClelland & Stewart, 2010) I knew Molly Peacock from her poetry, but stumbled across this book at my local library. Mary Delaney’s handwork included needlework and painting, but her most incredible creations were the cut paper flowers she made in the 1770s. Her life story is a good example of the choices that were (or weren’t) available to upper-class women and widows in the 18th century, and of the creative ways they spent their time.

I read plenty of other books this year, from Scandinavian murder mysteries to histories of Roanoke to histories of the suffrage movement, but aside from novels by Colson Whitehead (whichI cannot recommend enough) these three stuck with me.

Styles Style: Book Recommendation

06 Sunday Aug 2017

Posted by in Book Review, material culture, Research

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Please forgive the watch– a test shot of a gown from a runaway ad.

This is a quick one, because I’m writing in advance of a trip to New England, but for me, the best secondary source I’ve read that helped me understand the people I was clothing is John Styles’ The Dress of the People. That’s not to say that I haven’t read more, and found period resources and collections of resources equally useful. If you’re doing a poor woman in America, Don Hagist is your man, with Wenches, Wives and Serving Girls (now Wives, Slaves, and Servant Girls. Read Good Wives, Nasty Wenches, and Uneasy Patriarchs for more on period terminology).

I like Styles because he helps us understand the why of people’s clothing, and their wants. For me, context is key (I harp on this a lot) so insight into how many shifts are usual, the fashion for pocket watches, and the activity of the second hand clothes market is really helpful. So despite my love of shiny satin gowns and fashion of all eras, among the few books I didn’t send to storage when I moved was The Dress of the People. I think that’s a strong recommendation.

(researc

Book Review: Book of Ages

17 Sunday Nov 2013

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Book of Ages, by Jill Lepore.

Book of Ages, by Jill Lepore.

This is a book about reading and writing as much as it is a book about Jane Franklin, Benjamin Franklin’s little sister. Book of Ages has been reviewed elsewhere, and Lepore wrote a really lovely piece in the New Yorker called The Prodigal Daughter that is unfortunately behind a subscription firewall, but which I have read on actual paper. If you can get hold of it, I do recommend reading it before you read Book of Ages. It makes the book all the more poignant to know something about Lepore’s process.

This is, in many ways, another book about mud and misery (see the best bits of Longbourn). Because Jane Franklin Mecom (her married name– she married at 15) left behind so little, Lepore builds much of her story out of the context of Boston and New England in the mid-18th century.

It’s not exhaustive in its detail, and that’s fine: the book is an easy, comfortable read that still provides well-researched information about the lives of women in the 18th century. I finished it over a week ago, but details still remain (and that is a testament to Lepore– these could have been supplanted in my mind by details of exterior water meters, skunk removal techniques, or indexes for early vital records). Among the details I recall: Funerary and mourning customs, from published sermons to the distribution of mourning gloves and rings; soap making and trades practiced by small holders in home workshops; Jane Franklin Mecom’s wartime flight to Rhode Island; the power and practice of extended family networks.

It also reminded me of the differences in educational methods or standards for boys and girls, which helps remind us all of the importance and significance of the ideal of free public education for all. (We had some early proponents here in Rhode Island.) What might Jane Franklin’s life have been like in other circumstances? Honestly, even if she’d been well-off and well-educated, as as woman in the 18th century, she would never have had the same chances as her brother, no matter how evenly their intellects might have been matched.

If anything, that’s reason alone to read Lepore’s book, to celebrate the life of a woman who was both ordinary and extraordinary, and to recognize how much closer to all the anonymous, disappeared women of the past we can get through this example.

Longbourn: Book Review

19 Saturday Oct 2013

Posted by in Book Review, Literature

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The Chocolate Girl is adapted for the cover of Jo Baker’s new book

 On Sunday, I read the NYT review of Jo Baker’s new book, Longbourn. As soon as I finished the review, I ordered the book, which arrived Wednesday evening. By 2:00 AM Thursday, I had finished it.

I like Austen, but my favorite Austen novel is Mansfield Park, not Pride & Prejudice. The BBC and other adaptations sometimes make the world of her novels seem too cloistered, too precious, and too refined to me. (Mrs Hurst Dancing can be a helpful corrective.) So of course I was captivated by the premise of Longbourn: “The world of the people who laid the fires, cooked the meals and fetched the horses for Jane Austen’s Bennet family.”

The story was engaging–heck, I stayed up until 2:00AM  to find out how it ended–and while I found it slightly romantic for my taste, on the whole, the world was believable.

For one thing, there is plenty of mud. And Sarah the housemaid must clean the mud off the Bennett girls’ petticoats. The hauling of water, laying of fires, and the chill and exhaustion the maids feel is pretty well rendered. Baker addresses the question I’ve always had, How did servants tolerate servitude? by portraying Sarah’s struggle with resentment and resignation to her lot.

I thought, too, that the way Baker described women as “breeding” was also good; she referred as well to Elizabeth Bennett’s “dark, musky” armpits, and that seemed a nice way to slip in historical hygiene information. But women in English gentry were valued for their breeding capabilities: the need for a male heir didn’t die with Henry VIII, and it is much of what drives, or drove, the plot of Downton Abbey. For women, the past was a smaller world, and Sarah’s life is particularly small. Her carriage rides help define the very real confinement of her world.

There are a few slips: backpack instead of knapsack once or twice, but not many. It feels well-researched, well imagined, and believable. I don’t want to wreck it for you, so I won’t go into too much…there are some classic plot twists and devices that I put up with because they’re so typical of the literature of the period. I particularly enjoyed that Sarah reads from Mr Bennett’s library, including Pamela. It was a nice way to reinforce Wickham’s creepiness, and the echoes between the novel derived from a novel, in which  fictional characters read real novels, delighted me. (Being a fictional character myself.)

Jo Baker’s not Hilary Mantel-– this isn’t the kind of writing where the language stops you cold and sentences leave you breathless with awe, but for historical fiction derived from Jane Austen, Baker’s book is excellent and well-written.