For the first time in a very long time I am nearly, oh so nearly, up to date with blog posts. All those half written reviews I had languishing on the laptop for weeks on end have now been posted as part of a three week long burst of activity which probably clogged up a few news feeds and inboxes; sorry about that. Thankfully I might now be able to go back to more regular, less erratic blogging habits.
Elizabeth von Arnim’s novel The Enchanted April is a really lovely book with which to welcome in this new era, especially because it perfectly demonstrates the impact of blogger recommendations on my ever evolving reading habits. I hadn’t really heard of von Arnim until a short while ago and it was only noticing the consistently favourable reviews popping up on the various book blogs I follow that encouraged me to give this one a try. Now that I’ve read it I can wholeheartedly add my voice to all those many others that sing its praises. It does mean that I’m very conscious that all the words I want to use in this post – ‘enchanting’, ‘gentle’, ‘delightful’, ‘magical’ and so on – are going to sound quite tired though. I’ll try to refrain from being too gushing or trite if I can.
To those who appreciate wistaria and sunshine, small medieval Italian castle on the shores of the Mediterranean to be let furnished for the month of April. Necessary servants remain. X, Box 1000, The Times.
When the above advertisement appears in The Times, Mrs Wilkins and Mrs Arbuthnot see a chance to escape from their quietly miserable lives in wet, dreary London. To defray the cost they place an advert of their own in the paper and recruit two strangers as holiday companions: formidable Mrs Fisher and the young, cynical Lady Caroline Destler. Each woman arrives at beautiful San Salvatore with her own unhappiness in tow but after the petty squabbles and misunderstandings die down the relationships between them thaw and the castle begins to work its magic.
This is a warm, witty novel and one of my favourite things about it has to be von Arnim’s character observations. She moves carefully from one character to another, giving each one’s complex, changing, conflicting feelings her equal and undivided attention. They’re so beautifully, so minutely drawn that I could see traces of myself in each one (even when I didn’t want to). There’s something quite sincere and personal about the way she approaches her characters so that even when they’re at their most selfish they’re strangely sympathetic. In theory the spoilt Lady Caroline – whose wealth and beauty have become something of a burden – should be truly insufferable but I was absolutely on her side in every possible way. Of course it must be hard to be so attractive to everyone. Of course she needs peace and quiet in which to take stock of herself. Of course she needs a retreat from all those ‘grabbers’ out there. Maybe I too was seduced by her ethereal looks and melodious voice.
It probably goes without saying that I was also a huge fan of the setting. I read somewhere that the castle of San Salvatore is based on a real medieval castle on the Italian Riviera in which von Arnim spent some happy summer months. Her descriptions of the castle gardens are so evocative. You can feel the heat of the sun through the pages and smell the wisteria on the breeze.
Of course, no novel is perfect and I was a little disappointed by the way in which von Arnim wraps everything up towards the end; I’m clearly a bitter, resentful person because I still can’t forgive the menfolk their poor behaviour quite so easily. It troubled me that none of the real issues at the heart of all the loneliness in this novel were really addressed and I finished with an awful niggling feeling that maybe the magic of San Salvatore wouldn’t continue to work after the characters returned home. But I am trying not to think about that one too much. This novel is so damn charming that you can’t let negative feelings like that hang about for too long.
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