International Yearbook of Education, 1987: Secondary Education in the World Today, Vol. 39 Book

I expected more on the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 in India, but I was pleasantly surprised, in any case. This was a delightful comedy/farce/satire on women in the Victorian period. I found myself chuckling from time to time at the author's wit.

The two Talbot sisters, Lilian and Alice, are two 'round pegs in square holes', not the stereotypes of Victorian womanhood at all--think Bronte sisters or any woman travellers of that period, say, Gertrude Bell. They live with their father, an eccentric and inveterate Collector [his collection will bring a smile to your face], several dear aunts, and odd gentlemen with bizarre interests, who live with the family, helping Mr. Talbot. After an 'indiscretion', Lilian is married off and packed off to India. The strong Alice remains as curator of her father's collection of curios and objets d'art from all over the world. She is also an amateur photographer and caretaker of the family hothouse, in which she wheels a peach tree from the hotter area to the cooler area and back again as needed. She receives a mysterious letter from her sister, ostensibly about tiger-skin cushions. A photographer, Mr. Blake, one of her father's guests, helps her decipher the letter. The evil [or is he just misguided in his pursuit of scientific knowledge?] Dr. Cattermole, a friend of her father's, has ideas about Alice's future and plans to act on them.

In India, Lilian, married to a dour, humorless missionary, begins to assert herself. She disappears from time to time to paint Indian flora and makes some money at it. Her husband, the hypochrondriac Selwyn Fraser, is appalled at her behavior. The other English are types, but funny, all the same. Lilian's husband dies; as a widow, her forceful personality is revealed more and more. She dresses 'native', adopting native habits. The other English want her to remarry. Lilian notes in one place in the novel: as a girl or wife, a woman is under her father's or husband's thumb; as a widow, people respect her opinions. In trying to escape her oppressive life, she is embroiled in the Sepoy Mutiny. Mr. Blake [along with part of the Collection] helps Alice escape her planned fate. Do the two girls finally reunite?

Witty writing and an unusual story were pleasurable. The descriptions of the Collection were very clever; the scene of the eruption of the artificial volcano made me smile. The novel reminded me in parts of the play and movie "You can't take it with you" by Moss Hart, although with different setting.


Recommended.