Stevie Smith (1)Rezensionen

Whew. This one was so much harder for me to get through than Novel on Yellow Paper! To be honest, I still have 15-20 pages of it left. Not much of a plot, which was expected, but instead of making up in richness what it lacked in plot, I sort of just found myself completely detached from her friendships and affairs in this one. Still a devout Stevie Smith fan, though. It did have its blindingly gorgeous moments.

This book is definitely not for those who love straight-forward plots and prose. The book reads like a poem. It takes time to read, too, re-reading passages to figure out what she means, much like one of the more dense Joyce novels. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and thought the character of Pompey had amazing insights and was an especially forward thinker for the time (20th century in the years immediately leading up to WWII). She questions and struggles with the unity of marriage, the church, love, lust, suicide, people with more down-to-earth goals in life and those with more of a free spirit who don't want to be tied down by commonalities and mundane day-to-day things, etc.

Pompey also is suffering a sort of break down from a failed relationship, and it is lovely to see her reveal this throughout the book. It's more stream of consciousness but with a very defined purpose. Stevie Smith, in all her writing, is full of intent, full of deeper meanings. I so much adore the character of Pompey. Novel on Yellow Paper is for those who like JD Salinger's short stories, e.e. cummings poetry, and the insight of Graham Greene (very specifically, if you loved the diary part of The End of the Affair like I did, you'll enjoy this book).

The poem is so short I can reproduce it here:

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he’s dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.

Profound...so many are not waving but drowning and so often no one notices.

I don't know why I waited 11 years after reading the first of Stevie Smith's three novels, Novel on Yellow Paper, which I enjoyed almost as much as her poetry, to read her second. Anyway, Over the Frontier turns out to be fascinating and profoundly odd even by Smith's standards. The first half is a continuation of Novel on Yellow Paper, following Stevie's alter-ego Pompey Casmilus, secretary to a senior civil servant or possibly financier or both, as she succumbs to melancholy in the wake of her break-up with darling Freddie. Eventually her pal Josephine persuades her that what she needs is six months at a Kurhaus on the German Baltic, and it's shortly after they get there that things take a turn for the oneiric. Pompey is drawn into the orbit of a dashing military man — all this takes place (and the novel was published) just before WWII — and caught up in a spy/adventure yarn in the runup to war, with double agents aplenty among the hotel guests, secret cyphers and midnight rides "over the frontier" into Poland. But it all takes place behind the veil of Smith's nebulous prose, the boundaries between perception, imagination and reality almost totally effaced. The way I read it was that Pompey in the fantasy world of the Kurhaus, surrounded by the ugliness of Nazism and the drums of looming war, is seduced by her own power fantasy, perhaps as a way of finally putting darling Freddie behind her. It's almost impossible to describe, this mix of the personal and political, and I'm not sure if it works or not. But I won't be waiting another 11 years to read The Holiday, her own favourite of her novels, and I'm as convinced as ever of her uniqueness as a writer.

aimless not really a novel about young woman going about English society between wars. I read this because Jane Duncan mentioned that a publisher's reader had compared her work to it.

Totally won over by Stevie Smith and ready to force feed friends some of these poems.

Bought this for the cover picture - on my copy detail from 'Woman in Yellow' by Tamara de Lempicka. This is Catherine Carrington by Dora Carrington - and just as enticing! Well done Virago. Neither Stevie Smith nor Pompey Casmilus is to be summed up by the likes of me. Finishing it sent me to the poetry books and I can find only one book in the house with any of her poems - British Poetry since 1945 - so these three poems are possibly the only I have ever read. Easy to read but hard hitting on the heart and brain - no book at bedtime as I had to take up another book before I could sleep.....

Interesting but odd. Poetry is such an individual thing. I read an entire book and like five out of one hundred poems...does that make the book worth reading?

Totally won over by Stevie Smith and ready to force feed friends some of these poems.

Poems on relationships, animals, pets and nature, religion, war, and remembrance, but mainly on death. Smith isn't morbid or excessively melancholy, but here, in the last set of poems she wrote before her death (published posthumously), she meditates upon the approach of her lifetime's end, reflecting that, "I aspire to be broken up". Of death, she had elsewhere said it was the knowledge that there was an end that helped, through her periods of depression, to keep her in life. In the present collection, she says in the poem Oblivion,

"I cannot help but like Oblivion better
Than being a human heart and human creature,
But I can wait for her, her gentle mist
And those sweet seas that deepen are my destiny
And must come even if not soon."

Several of the poems are in a nursery rhyme style, though the underlying feelings are not childish, while several others are like fairy tales, suspended between reality and fancy. Of these, Angel Boley is the darkest poem in the collection, and startlingly relevant to the increasing awareness in society of the nature, extent and impact of childhood sexual abuse (the sexual element of the abuse is not explicitely mentioned, but seems to me implicit). Sixteen-year-old Angel Boley lives with her wicked mother, Malady Festing, and equally wicked husband, Hark Boley, in a lonely, moorland house.

"Hark, said Malady, it is time
To take another couple of children
Into our kitchen.
Hark laughed, for he too was wicked and he knew
For what purpose the little children
Were required."

Chilling! The suggestion of cannibalism being a metaphor for other, perhaps darker, passions. Angel's life lived in a dream of absentmindedness, In order not to be too much aware, has the feel of that psychological dissociation consequent upon severe and repeated trauma. The suspicion in which Angel is held by the neighbouring villagers on account of her relationship to her feared mother smacks of victim-blaming, whilst the failure to report their concerns to the police speaks of that collective turning away from the horror of abuse that has led to the silencing of so many survivor's voices. That Angel prevents any further abuses is a consolation for the tragedy of her ending, though the judgement of Heaven turns out to be less severe than the judgement of the law, doctors and ministers of religion.

Not all is dark in this collection, however, and Smith is whimsical and affectionate in her treatment of dogs, cats and donkeys, and nostalgically reflective about her childhood.

This is my first exposure to Smith's poetry (other than her much-anthologised Not Waving But Drowning), and I feel a most present sense of her as a person. I'm left with a affectionate regard for her and, if asked, "Which people from history would you invite to a dinner party?" I'd hope Stevie would be one of those attending.

it's hard to give a plot synopsis. does it have a plot? but i enjoyed it very much while i was actually reading it. but i can't really tell you what was going on.

One of my all-time favorite poems is Stevie Smith's "Not Waving But Drowning," which is included in this collection. Some poems I loved and some lines made me laugh out loud, but after a time, her obsession with death seemed to weigh the volume down. I think readers will take away a few favorites, as I did, but don't expect every poem to be brilliant.

The New Selected Poems of Stevie Smith are a must have for any poetry lover!

At first unnoticed as a poet, Stevie worked in a London publisher’s office until 1953. Steadily gaining respect, Smith won the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 1969. Her poetry speaks with a fiercely comic voice, underneath which lie serious questions about contemporary life.

Her light, comic verse is characterized by her unique use of sound and meaning. Her poems-many of which combine elements from nursery rhymes, songs, and hymns are characterized by a simplicity of diction and a youthful lively wit.

Stevie Smith’s poetry is uniquely dark and comical.

I enjoyed this book but I do think it is very much of its time: it feels like it was written in the 40s (which it was), although I did relate to the mood of the book, which is pensive and melancholic (hmm, what does this say about me...?!). It focuses on a young woman, Celia, whose job (and life) is sometimes meaningful but which often seems pointless in the post second world war London. Relationships are tense and people cry - a lot - which I found moving occasionally, and irritating too.

There were some beautiful poetic passages in the book, like 'I feel absolutely ghost-girl deficient' which I think captures the strange existence the group of people experience and reflect. The book also tackles some serious issues of the day in terms of the politics of post-war Britain and topics such as the place of women in society: 'he said the more gadgets women had and the more they thought about their faces and their figures, the less they wanted to have children...he said women who thought about scanty panties never had a comfortable fire burning in the fire-place, or a baby on the house, or a dog or cat or a parrot...' (p.69 in my edition).

I didn't find the book a pleasure to read, but I did think it raised some interesting questions and left me with an impression of what post-war Britain might have been like for some people (the characters are definitely not representative of anything but a small section of well-off society), as well as being beautifully written overall.½

The Holiday is set in England in 1949 and tells the story of Celia who works in a government Ministry. She and her cousin, who she's secretly in love with, go to stay with their Uncle Heber for a holiday. And that's it really. The story's a bit slow for me and I drifted off during some of the long conversations between Celia and her cousin, but I did enjoy the discussions about what victory means for a country. There was a real sense that after the intense experience of the Second World War and the excitement of victory, it's not clear what remains, apart from some very damaged people.

The Poems of Stevie Smith appear at first reading to be simple and easy. But beneath the surface there is a lot more going on than you would ever imagine.
CROFT 'Aloft,
In the loft,
Sits Croft;
He is soft.

FAFNIR AND THE KNIGHTS which begins 'In the quiet waters
Of the forest pool
Fafnir the dragon
His tongue will cool

Some of her best loved poems are about cats,and one of the best is THE SINGING CAT which begins 'It was a little captive cat
Upon a crowded train
His mistress takes him from his
box
To ease his fretful pain.
The same poem concludes 'He lifteth up his innocent voice
He lifteth up,he singeth
And all the people warm themselves
In the love his beauty bringeth.

A wonderful collection of Stevie Smith's ,at times somewhat incomprehensible work.

My favorite authors, and Stevie Smith is defintely among them, have something unique to convey: something that I cannot describe with any degree of adequacy. They also do whatever it is they do in a way that is unique and that, again, I cannot adequately explain. So the long and short of it is -- I'm inadequate. These little tales and essays seem so inconsequential, and yet there is so much there: ' like a very deep pool with little goldfish swimming very close to the surface.

The voice of Pompey Casmilus is one of the most unique narrative voices I’ve read in a long time. A personal secretary working for Sir Phoebus Ullwater, Pompey throws her thoughts down on yellow paper “because often sometimes I am typing it in my room at my office, and the paper I use for Sir Phoebus’s letters is blue paper with his name across the the corner ‘Sir Phoebus Ullwater, Bt.’ and those letters of Sir Phoebus’s go out to all over the world.” So behind the stream of consciousness babble and flow that is Pompey’s voice, we divine that there is a very smart and sensible young woman at work. And indeed, there is.

Pompey writes, one suspects, much as she thinks. She will pivot on an interjected “oh” and take off in what seems another direction altogether but will pivot again to take us right back to her original thought (and original they are), finishing the subject off neatly. She talks with a fake German accent when in Germany, throws in frequent interjections in German, French and Latin without translations (sink or swim, reader).

But the pure delight of the novel is what Pompey thinks about and how she thinks about whatever it is, whether Jews, Nazis, her friends, her aunt, sex, her love(s), her acquaintances. Whether she is defending the English to her German lover, Karl, or talking about a play she has seen or the drawing rooms of the upper crust or a Pomeranian named Fifi with broken knees, Pompey had me enchanted from start to finish. She is pure delight talking about her aunt “the Lion” and just extraordinary talking about her broken heart after her dear Freddy broke it off with her. She is a “feet off the ground person” and yet one with a broad streak of self awareness, knowing her own needs and limitations. A typical Pompeyism, summing up the conversation of a Frau K.:
“There you are you see, quite simple. If you cannot have your dear husband for a comfort and a delight, for a breadwinner and a cross patch, for a sofa, a chair or a hot-water bottle, one can use him as a Cross to be Borne.”

A loamish read, as Pompey herself would say.

Funny. Awful. Gruesome little poems that sneak up on you. Al those sing song nursery rhymish rhymes...Some were just funny. Being me I liked the macabre ones best.

OK, I'll confess: before I read this book, the only bit of Stevie Smith's work that I had come across was 'Not Waving But Drowning'.
This ignorance did not prevent my forming an opinion upon the lady. This book has shattered all those pre-conceptions. Smith's work is not, as I had expected. avant garde or feminist; rather, it is a rather sad evocation of a bygone era.
Stevie Smith has an ability for which I long; the ability to draw a word picture in few words. I can see why she is respected as an author but, not really my cup of tea.½

Not as much a novel as extended musings, from a young woman's point of view, on life death and relationships. Interesting if somewhat breathless use of language that managed to keep me engaged, even without a plot, up to the last few pages.
Good but just a tad too long.

The Holiday is set in post-war uncertainty. It contains lots of uncertainty; uncertainty over the war, over India, over Britain's role in the world, over love, and over life. It starts as Celia is at work in the ministry. We're introduced to her friends and family in a witty almost biting tone. Stories about their childhood and ideas about politics are passed back and fourth in dizzying conversation (warning for purists: no speech marks, although once you get into things it's not a problem) Eventually (it feels like an eternity) she goes on the promised holiday and talks more of politics and religion and ideals.

It's a difficult novel, frustrating at times. In it is contained a number of poems a short story that really broke things up and tried my concentration. It's painful to read too, Celia's love for her cousin Caz can never come to conclusion (or really be admitted) and she cries often. It's not only Celia that cries. Caz seemed to me to be harsh and repulsive in a childish way that almost made be want to scold him.

I'm not sure if I should say but here. Is it despite the difficulty or because of it? Either way I should not go without saying that this novel is a beautiful portrait of confusion, uncertainty and pain.½

Everyone knows Smith's famous "Not Waving But Drowning," but there is lots more where that came from. She is an acquired taste. Is she trying to rhyme, or not? Rather like Dickinson in her use and disregard for formal rules. The drawings provide guidance into her tone and style: that juncture of wit and pain. A bit like Dorothy Parker, but with an English accent. She struggles with and against Christianity and life in general.