Eiluned Lewis (1900–1979)

“Remembering the calendars of her school days, where date after date was scored off with a neat stroke and a bold many coloured circle adorned the first day of the holidays; she wished that somehow she should reverse the process and spin out the days like a spider’s thread, finer and finer, longer and longer, a silken rope on which to swing forever.”

This is a book built from memories.

It was written by Eiluned Lewis in rural Surrey during the second world war, but it is based on the memories of her mother, Eveline Lewis, who grew up in Pembrokeshire as the 19th century drew to a close. A very different world.

Lettice Peters is the wife of a sea captain. She has travelled the world with her husband, but now she is settled back at home in St Idris with their four children; two sons, Ivor and Archie, followed by a daughter, Matty, and then another son, Phillip.

Both the town and the family home are wonderfully evoked. It is east to picture St Idris; a coastal town, its main landmarks a Norman cathedral and, a market cross, it is set between hills scattered with farms. And to picture the family as they move around their home, the town and the surrounding countryside.

As the story opens Lettice is preparing to travel to Dundee to meet her husband, who is coming home after a long voyage. She is outwardly calm but inwardly elated. Matty though is concerned because she isn’t sure what her father’s return will mean and she can’t quite remember what he looks like.

The perspective shifts gently between Lettice and Matty as we follow the Peters family over the ensuing months. That works wonderfully well, and both perspectives are perfectly caught.

Eiluned Lewis build her story from the moments in life that we remember. Some big things of course, but also the small details that underpin lives and stay in the memory.

The whole book is a joy, but it is the small details that shine brightest: Lettice carefully packing her husband’s clothes for his next voyage, and adding a few surprises; Matty joyfully scoring a point as her big brothers tease her; Lettice working out how to help an elderly neighbour without denting his pride; Matty bored as she stands on a chair for the dressmaker; and so many more.

Simple, yes, but quite perfect and utterly real. One particular moment between Lettice and Matty brought a moment between my mother and I back to me so vividly that I had to stop to draw breath.

The Captain’s Wife creates a vivid picture of a time, a community and a way of life.

I borrowed a copy from the library, but I have already ordered one of my own because I know that it is a book that I will want to stay with me.

It is published by Honno Press, an independent press dedicated to Welsh women’s writing, in its Classics series.… (mehr)

This lovely old paperback formed part of my Librarything Virago group secret Santa gift from Jane at Fleurinherworld. It’s a slightly fragile old book with a really nice clear inscription inside – I do love to wonder about the people who have held and loved old books before me. Eiluned Lewis, the author of Dew on the Grass was completely unknown to me – and a bit of a google didn’t reveal much. She is described - by the oracle that is Wikipedia - as having been a Welsh novelist, poet and journalist. Dew on the Grass seems to have been her first published work. I can only assume that this is a very autobiographical novel – which is much less of a straight narrative and more a collection of chronological scenes, memories and vignettes.
I really do enjoy those narratives written for adults about childhood – especially when the childhoods portrayed are those of former times. This is a novel about the magic and innocence of childhood – that all too short time, before more grown up concerns begin to take over. In Dew on the Grass we meet the Gwyn children, Delia, Lucy, Maurice and little Miriam, though it is Lucy who is our eyes and ears, and it is through her we see everything. The place is Pengarth, the time probably the turn of the last century.
“The Rectory children had come to tea and now all of them had run out into the garden and were deciding what game they should play next. Released at length from the spell of Louisa’s eye and the cool, leaf shaped nursery, they danced out on the lawn, shouting, hopping with excitement, ready for something adventurous, scarcely able to contain their glee”
The children are granted a wonderful freedom – roaming through the fields around their home, blackberry picking, playing hide and seek – while acting out the magical adventures and stories that run through their imaginative little heads. Lucy is particularly imaginative – having a whole cast of wonderful characters at her fingertips – and when not concerning herself with their continuing adventures she writes poetry.
In the company of these delightful children, we take a visit to the sea, prepare for the Harvest festival, enjoy haymaking, prepare and perform a play for their mother’s birthday, entertain the rectory children and catch colds. The Gwyn children are generally well behaved children, blissfully unaware how fortunate they are, they are filled with enthusiasm and energy, their small transgressions are pretty minor by today’s standards – they respect and love the adults in their lives, including, their nurse maid Louisa, agricultural worker Davey John and a local tramp for who Lucy secures some bread and treacle. The concerns of these children are innocent, and come from a simpler time, their disappointments, on the whole small ones.
“It was a fact sad, but almost inevitable – that when on winter evenings you painted in the nursery after tea – which was the best time of day since there was no longer any possibility of being dragged out for a walk, or told to do your piano practice – then the pictures, which by lamplight had appeared so fair, wore an altered complexion next morning. Thus when Lucy had coloured, with pride and pleasure, all the illustrations in ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ it was disconcerting to find the following day that the Ancient Mariner, instead of
being ‘long and lank and brown as is the ribbed sea sand’ was long and lank purple, with a beard of deep crimson.”
Ultimately, when boarding school beckons for the eldest Gwyn and Rectory child – it heralds a time of change for the younger children, who will now be the eldest left at home. There is a wonderful sense of nostalgia about this engaging little novel, depicting a traditional way of rural life that is gone forever. The world of children and the long, warm summery innocent days spent in the gardens and fields of the Welsh borders are depicted with a deceptive simplicity and affection.
I really must thank Jane for giving me the chance of this charming little discovery; I can’t imagine I would have come across it otherwise. I am sometimes haunted by the idea of all those wonderful out of print books, I may never get to hear about.… (mehr)