Book Fourteen - Cold Comfort Farm - Part Two

Stella Gibbons
From Open Library
openlibrary.org/authors

So, yeah I was wrong when I thought this book was the inspiration for that Nicole Kidman movie about the Civil War. Must remember this list was compiled by the BBC and most of the authors are British. I don’t suppose there are too terribly many Britons interested in our Civil War. (Nor, for that matter, many Americans.)

However, Cold Comfort Farm does involve a war of sorts. A young woman sets about imposing her will upon others, much to their chagrin, of course. She is the puppet master, attempting to change everyone into what she thinks they should be. I can hear you object, but remember this book is a parody. It is meant to make fun of itself, and it does so very well. The farm’s cows are named Aimless, Feckless, Graceless, and Pointless. The name of a wealthy family’s home is Hautcouture Hall. From page 137 of my Penguin Classics edition –

‘I thought poetry was enough,’ said Elfine, wistfully. ‘I mean, I thought poetry was so beautiful that if you met someone you loved, and you told them you wrote poetry, that would be enough to make them love you, too.’

‘On the contrary,’ said Flora, firmly, ‘most young men are alarmed on hearing that a young woman writes poetry. Combined with an ill-groomed head of hair and an eccentric style of dress, such an admission is almost fatal.’

I was disappointed in a couple of things but I won’t specify because that would be a spoiler. It was a fun book though it didn’t have the humor or the depth of Brideshead Revisited or even of Bleak House.

I’m currently reading The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck for my book club, and I’m not sure what will come after that.

Book Fourteen - Cold Comfort Farm - Part One

I'm enjoying the book but reading is going very slowly. (It's that irons in the fire thing.) A sample -

So that was it. Aunt Ada Doom was mad. You would expect, by all the laws of probability, to find a mad grandmother at Cold Comfort Farm, and for once the laws of probability had not done you down and a mad grandmother there was.

The whole thing is like that! It reminds me of Northanger Abbey in that it's a send-up of typical novels of the time. This one is a parody of books about rural life. I've always thought I should read a few gothic novels to better appreciate Northanger Abbey, and my enjoyment of this book would be greater if I had read any of the books Gibbons parodies. Nonetheless, I am enjoying it very much as it is laden with descriptions of people, and people don't really change from one era to the next.