Category Archives: Whipple, Dorothy

A Century Of Women – 1920’s

I have fallen behind in reviews for both of my Century projects, so I’m going to be posting quick, short, multi-book posts until I catch up. Which will probably be never.

I haven’t quite finished up the 1920’s yet, with 1920, 1921 & 1928 still open. This year, I’ve finished books for 1923, 1925 & 1928.

Anderby WoldAnderby Wold
by Winifred Holtby
Rating: ★★★
Publication Date: January 1, 1923
Genre: fiction
Pages: 278
ReRead?: No
Project: 2025 read my hoard, a century of women

Mary Robson is a young Yorkshire woman, married to her solid, unromantic cousin, John. Together they battle to preserve Mary's neglected their beloved farm, Anderby Wold. This labour of love - and the benevolent tyranny of traditional Yorkshire ways - has made Mary old before her time.

Then into her purposeful life comes David Rossitur. Young, red-haired, charming, how can she help but love him? But David is from a different England - radical and committed to social change. As their confrontation and its consequences inevitably unfold, Mary's life and that of the calm village of Anderby are changed forever.


I finished Anderby Wold, published in 1923, in February. I am a huge fan of Winifred Holtby’s South Riding – so much so that I have been considering rereading it. I didn’t like Anderby Wold nearly as much as that one, although it was still an enjoyable read. In some ways, it felt like an obvious precurser to South Riding, set in the same sort of a location and with similar, if less well-defined, characters. Anderby Wold was Holtby’s first novel, but feels like a mature novel nonetheless.

There are also connections to be made to the work of Elizabeth Gaskell and Charlotte Bronte’s lesser known book, Shirley, both of which focus on the changes that industrialization and modernity bring to small, rural British farming communities.

Mrs. DallowayMrs. Dalloway
by Virginia Woolf
Rating: ★★★★
Publication Date: May 14, 1925
Genre: classic
Pages: 197
ReRead?: Yes
Project: 2025 read my hoard, a century of women

In this vivid portrait of one day in a woman's life, Clarissa Dalloway is preoccupied with the last-minute details of party preparation while in her mind she is much more than a perfect society hostess. As she readies her house, she is flooded with far-away remembrances. And, met with the realities of the present, Clarissa reexamines the choices she has made, hesitantly looking ahead to growing old. Undeniably triumphant, this is the inspired novelistic outline of human consciousness.


I just finished Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway last week, so it is fresh in my mind. Published in 1925, it takes place on a single day in June (June 18 seems to be the day that has been designated as Dalloday), so I decided to re-read it on its centenary. I didn’t finish it one day, which is apparently a thing, where people read Mrs. Dalloway contemporaneously with the times that are vaguely identified within the novel by the ringing of Big Ben. I had forgotten how much of the novel is spent away from Clarissa Dalloway, in the lives of other characters as they move through London.

I have not read a lot of Woolf’s work. I’ve previously posted about her first novel, The Voyage Out, and I’ve read her (second most) famous novel To The Lighthouse, although it’s been years.

Reading Mrs. Dalloway really worked for me this time. I often struggle with stream of consciousness, but with this reading, I was really able to let go of my need for linearity and plot and just immerse myself in the words. It has inspired me to seek out more Woolf over the next few years.

Young AnneYoung Anne
by Dorothy Whipple
Rating: ★★★★
Publication Date: January 1, 1927
Genre: fiction
Pages: 292
ReRead?: No
Project: a century of women

Young Anne (1927), was Dorothy Whipple’s debut novel. It is about the first twenty years of a girl’s life: she lives at home mostly looked after by the kindly Emily, goes to school, falls in love and finally marries someone else.

Young Anne is Dorothy Whipple’s first and most autobiographical novel.


I can never go wrong reading Dorothy Whipple. This was my third of her novels, after The Priory (my favorite so far) and Because of the Lockwoods. There is something about her books that are completely engaging to me; each time I have started a Whipple, I haven’t been able to put it down until I finish the last page. This is true even when her books are very long – I spent five hours on my couch reading The Priory. Young Anne was my least favorite of the three so far, but was not an exception to this rule.

Young Anne is Whipple’s first novel, published in 1927, and is a bildungsroman of the title character who seems to be a bit of a stand-in for Dorothy herself. We follow Anne from childhood, through first love, first job, and marriage to a much older and wealthy doctor.

I feel like I could read all of Whipple’s novels in about two weeks, they are so engaging. But, if I were to do that, then I would have entirely run out of Whipples and have no more to anticipate. So, instead, I am spreading out the reading. I actually own one of them, Someone at a Distance, which is sitting on my book cart, waiting for me to pick up.

Book 56: Because of the Lockwoods by Dorothy Whipple

Because of the LockwoodsBecause of the Lockwoods
by Dorothy Whipple
Rating: ★★★★½
Publication Date: January 1, 1949
Genre: fiction
Pages: 466
ReRead?: No
Project: a century of women

The story is deceptively simple: the entanglement of two families in a northern town called Aldworth. One, the Lockwoods, wealthy and powerful, in a position to patronise and help the second family, the poor Hunters, who have been left fatherless with a weak, ineffectual mother.

Though the thudding heart of the story draws the reader inexorably along, hoping for the meek to conquer the strong, it is a surprising book in many ways, not least for its subversive portrayal of family – the children are often the adults, the parents the untrustworthy, unwise ones, and Whipple makes it clear that what we call today the nuclear family is not the answer to happiness. But what may be most satisfying about the book is how the climax is reached as a result of character. This is twentieth-century British fiction at its very best.


This is my second book by Dorothy Whipple this year, and I’m trying to figure out where she has been all my life. Also, how does Whipple manage to make stories in which almost nothing happens, involving very mundane mid-twentieth century family concerns, so suspenseful?

The book begins with the Hunters and the Lockwoods as part of the same social circle and social class in the rather grim town of Aldworth, in the industrial north of England. I was reminded several times of North and South, by Elizabeth Gaskell, in reading this book – I’ll follow up on this a bit later. The Hunters and the Lockwoods own large neighboring country homes on the outskirts of Aldworth, where they are the local gentry. Mr. Hunter is an architect, Mr. Lockwood does something in law/finance. In the first few pages, Mr. Hunter dies, leaving his wife and three children: Molly, Martin and Thea, basically destitute. Mr. & Mrs. Lockwood also have three children – daughters all – a set of twins named Bee and Muriel who are seemingly around Thea’s age, and Clare, who is younger.

And here the paths diverge.

There is a moment, very early in the book, where Mr. Lockwood engages in some very self-serving and unethical behavior, and basically converts a pretty large percentage of the very small estate left by Mr. Hunter to himself. This really sets the stage for the entire relationship between the Lockwoods and the Hunters, in which the Lockwoods pretend that they are doing the Hunters good turns by allowing them to associate with them, when what is really happening is that they are using and mistreating the Hunter family.

I became very, very frustrated with Mrs. Hunter during the course of this book. I struggle with weak, ineffectual characters, especially when those weak, ineffectual characters have children and need to buck up and get on with it. Mrs. Hunter was entirely incapable of bucking up and getting on with it, which meant that her children suffered quite a lot. She was perfectly willing to prostrate herself before the garish and rather vulgar Lockwoods, if it meant continuing to be recognized by them. In addition, she turned their finances over to Mr. Lockwood, who felt quite put upon, and this, as it turned out, was a really bad idea.

So, the Lockwoods essentially run their lives, but in ways which solely benefit the Lockwoods. When the oldest Hunter child, Molly, reaches the age of 15, Mrs. Lockwood farms her out to a family that needs a governess, in spite of the fact that Molly is shy, not particularly academic, and is a terrible governess. This goes on for years, making Molly miserable, as she is shunted from family to family, underpaid, by Mrs. Lockwood. Molly’s only real talent is baking – and she is quite accomplished. Mrs. Lockwood shows up for tea with Mrs. Hunter, and literally eats them out of house and home, completely blind to the fact that the Hunters are broke and she is eating their dinner.

Moving on to Martin, the middle Hunter child and the only son – Martin wants to be a doctor. When he reaches approximately 15, Mr. Lockwood bursts his dream and sends him out as a bank clerk. Now both Martin and Molly are miserable. It’s worth noting that, thus far in the book, none of the Hunters have an ounce of gumption, which they could sorely use. I was on the edge of my metaphorical seat, waiting and wanting desperately for someone to tell Mr. or Mrs. Lockwood, or their horrible twin daughters, to go fuck themselves. I mean, in very polite, 1949 language.

Thea, the youngest of the Hunter children, on the other hand is not so easily squashed. And this is really her story, although we don’t get to it until about 40%.

And then, Oliver Reade, a young upstart who is definitely not of the Hunter’s class, moves in next door. Like Mr. Lockwood, he is a managing sort with his fingers in many pies, which are becoming more lucrative every day. Unlike Mr. Lockwood, he is a very good and ethical person. He immediately falls for Thea, and Thea immediately dislikes him, which brings me back to the North and South reference from above. Oliver Reade, like John Thornton, is in trade. Thea, like Margaret Hale, is from the upper class, albeit one which has fallen on hard times. He is a great character and I fell for him immediately, mentally yelling at Thea to stop being such a brat and to pull her head out of her backside.

The idea that anyone could think that the Lockwoods were superior to Oliver Reade is preposterous and shows the rot endemic in any hereditary aristocracy or class system.

I’m going to stop here, because I don’t want to spoil the story, but suffice it to say, it is really satisfying. I can’t say that I absolutely loved the ending, which is why I knocked off that final half-star. It could have been perfect, but it wasn’t. I wanted just a bit more.

2022: Book 12 – The Priory by Dorothy Whipple

The PrioryThe Priory
by Dorothy Whipple
Rating: ★★★★½
Publication Date: January 1, 1939
Genre: classic, fiction
Pages: 536
ReRead?: No
Project: a century of women, back to the classics, classics club round 2

The setting for this, the third novel by Dorothy Whipple Persephone have published, is Saunby Priory, a large house somewhere in England which has seen better times. We are shown the two Marwood girls, who are nearly grown-up, their father, the widower Major Marwood, and their aunt; then, as soon as their lives have been described, the Major proposes marriage to a woman much younger than himself - and many changes begin.


This was my 1939 book. I thought it finished out the 1930’s for my Century of Women, but a closer look reveals that I still have 1933 to read, so that was a bit of a disappointment. I was very excited to close out a decade.

This book, though – not at all a disappointment. I have been meaning to read Dorothy Whipple for years, and I actually own a Persephone edition of Someone at a Distance (published in 1953), so when I saw that she had a title published in 1939 and my library had a copy, I decided to give her a try.

There was something about this book that reminds me of Dodie Smith’s beloved I Capture the Castle. It’s probably the utter uselessness of the prominent male figures – Major Marwood, in this one, spends all of his extremely scarce money on cricket, badly neglecting his obligation both to his home and his family; Mr. Mortmain, from I Capture the Castle, is a feckless writer suffering from writer’s block who would just as soon his family starve than engage with the world to feed them. I find this type of adult male character to be unbearably frustrating, especially in books set during the time period when women are unable to just get down to it and rebuild the family fortunes on their own.

However, like I Capture the Castle, there was a lot about this book that really charmed me. All of the characters were very complicated – except Major Marwood, who could have been hit by a bus and no one would have really lost anything. The two daughters, Christine and Penelope, were both interesting. I preferred Christine to Penelope – Penelope, as it turned out, had a lot of her father in her. But Christine, ultimately, finds a work ethic and some inner strength that I don’t think anyone would have expected to her to possess. I also really liked Sir James and Sarah, although Sir James, at least, provides quite a bit of domestic tension and has a lot of growing up to do for a man in his probable fifties.

I had a mixed opinion of Anthea; I liked her show of independence and strength a lot, and being married to Major Marwood would have been wildly infuriating, but she was really annoying about the twins. I’ve borne two children, and women who act like they are the first people on the planet to get pregnant, or that giving birth is some major accomplishment just irritate me. All mammals give birth; get over yourselves, ladies.

Anyway, it’s a testament to the quality of Whipple’s writing that I was so deeply engaged in an over 500 page book in which very little happens that I read it in less than a day. This is a book that I will ultimately buy after I return it to the library, so I can have it on my shelves and return to it again and again. I wish that she had written a sequel, so I could find out how Sir James’s new venture at the end turned out, and hear how these characters survived the war. I haven’t stopped thinking about them since I closed the book.