PERIOD PIECE: A CHILDHOOD PDF, EPUB, EBOOK

Gwen Raverat | 288 pages | 20 Jun 1974 | FABER & FABER | 9780571067428 | English | London, United Kingdom : a Cambridge Childhood |

Pre-owned Pre-owned. Last one Free shipping. See all 5 - All listings for this product. No ratings or reviews yet No ratings or reviews yet. Be the first to write a review. Best Selling in Nonfiction See all. Bill o'Reilly's Killing Ser. When Women Pray Hardcover T. Jakes Christian Inspirational No ratings or reviews yet. The author's father was Sir . Her father had a large extended family. Charles and Emma had seven children who survived to adulthood - four uncles and two aunts to Gwen. All bar one of the uncles and aunts were married, and two uncles had children, resulting in five cousins:. Note: Florence Henrietta Darwin , Frank's third wife is briefly mentioned but the marriage was after the time period in the book. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The author's mother's Maud du Puy's family tree, adapted from the tree in the book. NB: Maud's siblings are missing. The author's quite extensive family tree. The author is in yellow. Period Piece. We were very, very old and we knew all about everything; but we often forgot our age and omniscience and played the fool like anyone else. I remember lying on the sofa between the dining-room windows with the peacock-blue serge curtains, and wishing passionately that I could have been Mrs. Of course, I should have liked still more to be Mrs. Rembrandt, but that seemed too tremendous even to imagine; whereas it did not seem impossibly outrageous to think of myself as Mrs. She was English enough, and homely enough, anyhow. Surely, I thought, if I cooked his roast beef beautifully and mended his clothes and minded the children—surely he would, just sometimes, let me draw and engrave a little tailpiece for him. Only just to be allowed to invent a little picture sometimes. O happy, happy Mrs. In The Origins of the English Imagination, Peter Ackroyd writes: If that Englishness in [his] music can be encapsulated in words at all, those words would probably be: ostensibly familiar and commonplace, yet deep and mystical as well as lyrical, melodic, melancholic, and nostalgic, yet timeless. Small though they are, her best prints and there are many are finely tempered expressions of a love of humanity and its landscape. Simon Brett writes in his postscript to the Silent Books edition of the catalogue raisonee of her work: The regard she turned upon reality — upon landscape, figures in landscape, sometimes the incidents of story — sees all things together. Her vision is to do with seeing that is not as obvious as it sounds. In this primacy of seeing, interpretation, expression, storytelling or imagination are gathered up into statement: this is how it is. The ease with which the figures lie, at one with their being and the world around them, thereby stands comparison with the etchings of Rembrandt that were her childhood pillow-book, or with the idylls of Titian or Seurat. Brett is echoing a point Gwen made herself. She wrote of that it was. It is the looking, the seeing that matters. William: William Carlos Williams, when explaining his poetics, said that there are no ideas but in things. They say it will simply break his heart if he is told that he is too bad to hope to make anything of it. That was an axiom. And by us I mean, not only the children, but all the uncles and aunts who belonged there. Of course all the flowers that grew at Down were beautiful; and different from all other flowers. Everything there was different. And better. For instance, the path in front of the veranda was made of large round water-worn pebbles, from some sea beach. They were not loose, but stuck down tight in moss and sand, and were black and shiny, as if they had been polished. I adored those pebbles. I mean literally, adored; worshipped. This passion made me feel quite sick sometimes. And it was adoration that I felt for the foxgloves at Down, and for the stiff red clay out of the Sandwalk clay-pit; and for the beautiful white paint on the nursery floor. This kind of feeling hits you in the stomach, and in the ends of your fingers, and it is probably the most important thing in life. Long after I have forgotten all my human loves, I shall still remember the smell of a gooseberry leaf, or the feel of the wet grass on my bare feet; or the pebbles in the path. Of course, there were things to worship everywhere. I can remember feeling quite desperate with love for the blisters in the dark red paint on the nursery window-sills at Cambridge, but at Down there were more things to worship than anywhere else in the world. William : By Jacques had been diagnosed with Disseminated Sclerosis as MS was then known and they were advised to move to the South of France for his health. Though they knew, without outwardly acknowledging it, that he was dying, their creativity was at its height. It was then that their relationship with burgeoned in an extraordinary exchange of letters. In one to my grandfather, not long before his death, Virginia wrote this extraordinary paragraph that has become totemic for me: Is your art as chaotic as ours? I expect you got through your discoveries sometime earlier. In , stressed with looking after two small girls my mother and aunt and her dying husband Jacques, Gwen still felt it a matter of life and death to not lose hold of her creative process, her way of transcending the ordinary. She wrote to her cousin : Anne : [It is] a matter of life and death to keep going at [my wood engraving] as much as I can and not lose hold. In October she wrote to Richard de la Mare son of the poet Walter at Faber and Faber: Anne : I have long been playing with the idea of writing a sort of autobiography as a peg to hang illustrations on; and I am now taking the liberty of sending you a scrap out of it not the beginning nor yet the end to see if you think it would do to publish someday with lots of pictures. I am afraid that what I have written may be too flippant and rather odious, and I would like to know what some outside Literary person feels about it. The idea of the book is not to be a continuous autobiography, but a series of separate chapters called Sport, Religion, Art, Relations, etc. She wrote to Walter that she conceived of the book… Anne : …as a social document — to be a drawing of the world as I saw it when young, not at all as a picture of my own soul though I suppose that gets in by mistake. William : By the autumn of , when Gwen was 66, she had finished the text and most of the drawings for Period Piece ironically she preferred drawings to wood-engravings for her own book, for their immediacy. But later that same year she had a massive stroke that paralysed her down her left side. Nevertheless the book was published on 10 October at one guinea. It was an immediate success. Letters of praise poured in and reviews were enthusiastic. It seems a lifetime since I came with Virginia to see you in Caroline Place… I want to say with what pleasure and admiration I have read your book and also what enormous pleasure it would have given Virginia. William : Period Piece has become one of those books that builds itself a favoured niche in the subconscious of everyone who reads it. It has been in print from Faber — albeit in editions of ever-decreasing print quality — for 61 years now. Period Piece has many qualities, not least, for members of the Darwin-Wedgwood clan, acting as a needed deflator of pretension. In her chapter on , Gwen wrote: Anne : The faint flavour of the ghost of my grandfather hung in a friendly way about the whole place, house, garden and all. Of course, we always felt embarrassed if our grandfather were mentioned, just as we did if God were spoken of. In fact, he was obviously in the same category as God and Father Christmas. Only, with our grandfather, we also felt, modestly, that we ought to disclaim any virtue of our own in having produced him. I should really send you a large bill, for buying copies for people has nearly ruined me this Christmas — and I gather must have nearly ruined many people, judging by the way the copies in the bookshops melt away. Period Piece (book) - Wikipedia

Showing Average rating 4. Rating details. More filters. Sort order. Start your review of Period Piece. Jul 06, Paul rated it liked it Shelves: autobiography. This is a memoir of a Cambridge childhood in the s and early s. Gwen Raverat was an artist and wood engraver and also a granddaughter of . All the art work in the book is done by Raverat. The memoir is themed, so each chapter covers a different topic: Education, propriety, childhood fears, religion, clothes, uncles and aunts, th This is a memoir of a Cambridge childhood in the s and early s. For instance, that first day, they were all singing: 'I am the Honeysuckle, You are the Bee. What on earth was it? I had never heard a popular song in my life. And they were all busy making hat-pin knobs out of coloured sealing-wax. Now why in the world did they like doing that? Nearly everything they did mystified me. One ought to have to worry sometimes about young people, because they ought to be growing out in new ways and experimenting for themselves. But my grandfather was so tolerant of their separate individualities, so broad-minded, that there was no need for his sons to break away from him; and they lived all their lives in his shadow. It was a privileged upbringing, upper middle-class and the deprivations of the commonality of humanity are mostly absent. There are lots of points of interest. Within the current debates about trans issues I often hear arguments about this being a new or modern thing. Then I might be a really good painter. A woman had not much chance of that. I wanted so much to be a boy that I did not dare to think about it at all, for it made me feel quite desperate to know that it was impossible to be one. But I always dreamt I was a boy. If the truth must be told, still now, in my dreams at night, I am generally a young man! There is no mention of her brother Lenny who died when Raverat was fourteen, nor of her nanny who died from cancer. There is a certain level of censorship here and a good deal of privilege. There are anecdotes and amusements, but the backdrop is a rather enclosed society, cut off from the life of much of society. There are some interesting insights into quite a narrow life and it is illuminating. View all 4 comments. Raverat was a granddaughter of Charles Darwin the first child of his son George but never got to meet him as he died three years before her birth. This is not a comprehensive family history or autobiography, but a portrait of what it was like to grow up in a particular time and place. Raverat was born in , but she begins two years earlier, when her American mother, Maud Du Puy, was 21 and in England for the Raverat was a granddaughter of Charles Darwin the first child of his son George but never got to meet him as he died three years before her birth. Raverat was born in , but she begins two years earlier, when her American mother, Maud Du Puy, was 21 and in England for the first time to spend a summer with her great-aunt and -uncle. She had three suitors during that time, all of them Fellows of Trinity College. The rules had only just been changed to allow Fellows to marry, so George Darwin would be among the first married members, and Gwen was in the first batch of offspring. Period Piece is a charming, witty look at daily life from the s through about — ending with the marriage of her cousin Frances, which seemed to signal a definitive end to their collective youth. Writing towards the end of her life and in the middle of the twentieth century, Raverat neatly draws contrasts between old-fashioned propriety and modern mores. For example, as a child she was often called upon to act as a chaperone to courting couples, and when ladies boated past a watering hole where boys swam naked, they would cover their faces with parasols. She herself managed to avoid the matter of sex entirely until she was an adult, though she does remember looking to an encyclopedia to find out where babies come from. One incident felt eerily contemporary to me, though: once, walking home alone at around 10 p. After much internal debate, she decided not to say a word about it to her parents. I often wonder how novelists and filmmakers get a historical setting just right. The answer is, probably by reading books like this one that so clearly convey quotidian details most people would leave out, e. Those who have visited or lived in Cambridge will no doubt enjoy spotting familiar locations. There are also amusing cameo appearances from Virginia Stephen Woolf and E. Raverat, a wood engraver, peppered Period Piece with her own illustrations — a lovely supplement to the highly visual text. Not just an invaluable record of domestic history, this is a very funny and impressively thorough memoir that could be used by anyone as a model for how to capture childhood. It has never been out of print, and still deserves to be widely read. I was delighted to find this spelling so early, as, to the end of her days, my mother always considered the saint and the internal organ as identical. View 2 comments. Shelves: 5-star-books , bedtime-reading. She was an out and out tomboy, resenting all trappings of feminity — the clothes, the dancing classes, the chaperoning duties - and relishing instead all the wonderful opportunities for adventure provided by enthusiastic siblings She loved her eccentric and academic family uncritically, and writes about them with warmth and admiration. Reverat is a very funny writer. Sometimes laugh out loud funny, but most often just a delicious underpinning of humour. Her book is full of the mores of the day, and she give fascinating insights into what life was like in a late Victorian upper class household. In our house the parties were general of twelve or fourteen people, and everybody of dinner-party status was invited strictly in turn. The guests were seated accordingly to the Protocol, the Heads of Houses ranking by the dates of the foundations of their collages, except that the Vice-Chancellor would come first of all. After the Masters came the Regius Professors in the order of their subjects, Divinity first; and then the other Professors according to the dates of the foundations of their chairs, and so on down all the steps of the hierarchy By the time I was eighteen my skirt came right down to the ground They inevitably swept the roads, however carefully I might hold them up behind; and the roads were then much muddier than the tarred roads are now. Afterwards the crusted mud had to be brushed off, which might take an hour or more to do Outside her family, Reverat was not sociable Whilst she hated parties, she hated her dreaded dancing classes even more. The freedom the children were allowed is almost unimaginable in our time of hygiene, health and safety, and they were obviously deeply loved by both their parents - and by their aunts and uncles and cousins — all of whom are written about with great affection. This book is really enchanting. Highly recommended. Dec 11, William Pryor added it. My grandmother's book was a classic almost on the day she wrote it in , just 4 years before she died. Its circular shape is unusual for a memoir - she bundles together her memories under subjects e. Uncles, i. Despite this lack of narrative beginning, middle and end, the quality and wit of her writing carries you through to the end in a trice, helped considerably by her telling pen and ink drawings. No wonder the book is My grandmother's book was a classic almost on the day she wrote it in , just 4 years before she died. No wonder the book is still in print 57 years after it was first published. View 1 comment. Cambridge is my local city, and it is one which I absolutely adore. I will happily read anything which is set within it. This was recommended to me by Lucy, who told me that it was an absolutely lovely book, and one which was well worth a read. Gwen Raverat is the granddaughter of Charles Darwin, so along with the setting, the anthropological aspect interested me too. The places which she describes throughout are familiar to me, and I loved being able to picture the scenes exactly as they are and Cambridge is my local city, and it is one which I absolutely adore. The places which she describes throughout are familiar to me, and I loved being able to picture the scenes exactly as they are and, in most cases, how they have remained for centuries. Throughout, lovely illustrations can be found, all of them by Raverat herself. On reflection, Period Piece was not as I had expected before I began it. It was rather more of a familial than a geographical memoir, I suppose. The book is certainly interesting with regard to the scenes which it paints, but I cannot help but feel a little disappointed by it, feeling as it did a tiny bit lacklustre at times. Its charm was not quite consistent enough to make this a stand-out memoir. Period Piece is certainly of worth to the modern reader in the sense that one can see how social attitudes have altered, but not as much more in the case of this reviewer. Still, I certainly did not dislike it, so it receives a wholesome three stars. Childhood memoirs of the Victorian and Edwardian era are a lovely sub-genre that I have found to be endlessly readable. This lovely book borrowed from my friend Liz comes with lots of lovely illustrations by the author herself. Gwen Raverat was a wood engraver, the granddaughter of Charles Darwin, who died three years before she was born. Gwen was born into a large Cambridge family in , her mother; an American had met and married her father George Darwin when on a visit to Cambridge in Jan 31, Diane Barnes rated it really liked it. What a wonderful, charming, witty, beautiful memoir of growing up in a large, loving eccentric family the Darwin's in England before WW1. Superbly written, it made me nostalgic for a childhood filled with the freedom to run free and use your imagination to amuse yourself. This memoir does not read in chronological order, but is instead divided into subjects, such as Uncles, Aunts, Clothing, Religion, Amusements, etc. I gave this book 4 stars because it was a joy to read. Feb 20, Lorna rated it it was amazing. I'd forgotten about this book. A relatable, funny memoir. I particularly remember the description of Charles Darwin's wife, Gwen's grandmother, reading to the children and changing the stories as she went along, skipping the sad parts and changing the endings to happy ones. Full of joy and cosiness but with just as much wit and edge. Period Piece offers a uniquely intimate glimpse into Cambridge life and society at the end of the 19th century. With Mrs. Raverat being Charles Darwin's granddaughter, the Darwin shadow rests over the entire book, but remains incorporeal because Darwin died before the author was even born. Raverat made the excellent decision to organize her book topically rather than chronologically; this is made possible by her family's geographical immobility in the environs of Cambridge her education as a te Period Piece offers a uniquely intimate glimpse into Cambridge life and society at the end of the 19th century. Raverat made the excellent decision to organize her book topically rather than chronologically; this is made possible by her family's geographical immobility in the environs of Cambridge her education as a teenager at boarding school takes up only a few pages. Such an organization permits the characters truly the appropriate term , locations, and social norms unfold in an exciting and organic way. What makes Raverat's perspective so insightful is her dual status as outsider and insider: she is, of course, a member of a reputable and important family, one that is subject to the strict norms of behavior and propriety that characterized that time. She articulates this clearly in the chapter on propriety I was quite alone and outside. I did not belong, I was separate, just looking on; outside But it was always terrifying and lonely, and seemed to point the contrast between ME and all those other friendly people, who sat talking under the trees. In particular, the strict morality and arbitrary expectations of dress, manners, and behavior were completely lost on her. Raverat's American mother, Maud du Puy, was a driven but simple woman, an American with a puritanical streak. Her rearing of her children was founded on principles that she did not question or challenge. To Raverat, however, these things were not self-evident at all. PP is amusing precisely because of this: it never occurred to Gwen to care whether she could dance, whether she had bare feet outside the horror! Her incisive observation stands in contrast to her extended family's obliviousness and almost total lack of self-awareness. PP is an absolutely delightful book, sure to elicit as many laughs as thoughts about family, society, and morality. As Gwen Raverat herself says at the conclusion of her memoir, I remember [my childhood] as an uncomfortable time, and sometimes a very unhappy one Oh dear, Oh dear, how horrid it was being young, and how nice it is being old and not having to mind what people think. Her complete apathy toward what she calls "System C-with-a-dash-of-A" chivalry and Christian morality, respectively provided her with the perspective that in turn made her childhood nigh-unbearable. We can, however, profit from Raverat's past unhappiness without fear of Schadenfreude , so we may as well. Particular highlights of the book for me were the chapters on Propriety, Religion, Sport, and Clothes. The chapter on Ghosts and Horrors is very funny as well. I read this book at a time in my life when I am myself attempting to balance my individual personality and interests with larger social expectations and concerns, so this was a nice read. Reading an account of such a harmonious family also appealed to me greatly, given how turbulent my own can be. Dec 13, Sylvester rated it really liked it Shelves: memoir-biography. This has been my Year of the Memoir - I don't know how many I've read, but this one must be the best yet. Gwen Raverat is witty and feisty, and her pen and ink illustrations are the icing on the cake. I liked that she organized her memoir by topic rather than keeping to chronology, too. Her wry description of Victorian society and it's strange standards is quite pointed and funny. I absolutely loved the chapter "Sport" in which she tells of all the games she and her siblings and cousins would ge This has been my Year of the Memoir - I don't know how many I've read, but this one must be the best yet. I absolutely loved the chapter "Sport" in which she tells of all the games she and her siblings and cousins would get up to - they ran utterly wild, incredibly so, even by our modern standards, and no one least of all her mother was in the least worried about them. And they did all this in their horribly stifling and uncomfortable Victorian outfits. Just a wonderfully written book of a very happy and full childhood. Her descriptions of her Uncles and Aunts make up a large part of the story, and they are interesting people, to say the least. The little mention made about her Uncle Lenny being president of the Eugenics Society sent a shiver down my spine. So scary, how an otherwise wonderful human being could hold to an evil such as that. Love this little paragraph - and it's the tone the whole book is written in: "Dear Reader, you may take it from me, that however hard you try - or don't try; whatever you do - or don't do; for better, for worse; for richer, for poorer; every way and every day; The parent is always wrong. So it is no good bothering about it. When the little pests grow up they will certainly tell you exactly what you did wrong in their case. But, never mind; they will be just as wrong in their turn. Oct 03, Kay rated it liked it Shelves: biogr-memoir , nonfiction , victoriana , humor-whimsy. Period Piece is a charming exercise in nostalgia, though I quickly found I was only up for small doses of Childhood Memories in any one sitting so it took me a rather long time to finish it. Indeed, it never ceases to amaze me how well some people remember their childhoods. Gwen Raverat's was particularly memorable and happy , surrounded and supported by a vast assemblage of eccentric aunts, uncles, and cousins. Having spent a year in Cambridge back in the 80's, though, my favorite portions of Period Piece is a charming exercise in nostalgia, though I quickly found I was only up for small doses of Childhood Memories in any one sitting so it took me a rather long time to finish it. Having spent a year in Cambridge back in the 80's, though, my favorite portions of the book pertained to what life was back in the city during the Victorian era. The line drawings accompanying the text were particularly nice. Nov 08, Beth Bonini rated it it was amazing. I adored this memoir. For years now, I've been visiting Cambridge and walking by the blue plaque that says "Gwen Raverat lived here. She was a truly original person and her humorous, distinctive voice makes this memoir something really special. Dec 24, Paul Taylor rated it it was ok. A bit smug and marred by a faux humility. The author is a closet snob who could have written something more incisive about the privileged and educated classes at the end of the Victorian era and the period upto the First War. Dec 12, Orinoco Womble tidy bag and all rated it it was ok Shelves: don-t-bother , rather-heavy-going , stonking-great-disappointment. I had hoped to be able to snuggle down into memories of Nanny and buttered toast by the nursery fire, followed by jolly good boarding school fun and the angst of Coming Out. She would send down to the cook to ask her to count the prune-stones left on her plate, as it was very important to know whether she had eaten three or four, prunes for luncheon. She would make Janet put a silk handkerchief over her left foot as she lay in bed, because it was that amount colder than her right foot. And when there were colds about she often wore a kind of gas-mask of her own invention. It was an ordinary wire kitchen-strainer, stuffed with antiseptic cotton-wool, and tied on like a snout, with elastic over her ears. In this she would receive her visitors and discuss politics in a hollow voice out of her eucalyptus-scented seclusion, oblivious of the fact that they might be struggling with fits of laughter. In the year , when she was seventy-seven, one of her little great-nieces happened to get chicken-pox in her house. Aunt Etty wrote to Charles at Cambridge, asking him to look in the Down family Bible to find out whether she had had the disease herself, as she did not want to catch it. He was not able to find the Bible at once—it was in a box at the bank—so she wrote again, very urgently. William : There are definitely Darwinian genetic traits apart from hypochondria, not least the tendency to make mountains out of minor mole hills. Take this account from Period Piece which could so easily be describing the gritted-teeth approach to family fun and frolics I experienced in my youth 60 years later: Anne : It was a grey, cold, gusty day in June. The aunts sat huddled in furs in the boats, their heavy hats flapping in the wind. The uncles, in coats and cloaks and mufflers, were wretchedly uncomfortable on the hard, cramped seats, and they hardly even tried to pretend that they were not catching their deaths of cold. But it was still worse when they had to sit down to have tea on the damp, thistly grass near Grantchester Mill. There were so many miseries which we young ones had never noticed at all: nettles, ants, cow-pats. The tea had been put into bottles wrapped in flannels there were no Thermos flasks then ; and the climax came when it was found that it had all been sugared beforehand. This was an inexpressible calamity. They all hated sugar in their tea. Besides it was Immoral. Through them she met and the other Bloomsberries. The romance of their bohemian attitude to art and love had its effect on Gwen, though it would never dominate her. There was a moment, no doubt under the spell of the Stephen sisters, that Gwen thought she might just be a writer. She started a novel. She could be writing of my teenage years of intense, dope-filled beatnikery: Anne : We met, we found we had many ideas in common; we found that we could talk. And so we talked from morning to night and from night till morning, and for the first two years we did practically nothing else. We had been shy and diffident; we had wondered if anyone had ever had such ideas as ours before; we had wondered if they could possibly be true ideas; if there was the remotest chance that we could be worth anything. He used to lie in his great armchair, his legs stretched right across the floor, his fingers twisted in his hair; while Jacques sat smoking by the fire, continually poking it; his face was round and pale; his hair was dark. We smoked and ate muffins or sweets and talked and talked while the firelight danced on the ceiling, and all the possibilities of the world seemed open to us. For a time we were very decadent. We used to loll in armchairs and talk wearily about Art and Suicide and the Sex Problem. We used to discuss the ridiculous superstitions about God and Religion; the absurd prejudices of patriotism and decency; the grotesque encumbrances called parents. We were very, very old and we knew all about everything; but we often forgot our age and omniscience and played the fool like anyone else. I remember lying on the sofa between the dining-room windows with the peacock-blue serge curtains, and wishing passionately that I could have been Mrs. Of course, I should have liked still more to be Mrs. Rembrandt, but that seemed too tremendous even to imagine; whereas it did not seem impossibly outrageous to think of myself as Mrs. She was English enough, and homely enough, anyhow. Surely, I thought, if I cooked his roast beef beautifully and mended his clothes and minded the children—surely he would, just sometimes, let me draw and engrave a little tailpiece for him. Only just to be allowed to invent a little picture sometimes. O happy, happy Mrs. In The Origins of the English Imagination, Peter Ackroyd writes: If that Englishness in [his] music can be encapsulated in words at all, those words would probably be: ostensibly familiar and commonplace, yet deep and mystical as well as lyrical, melodic, melancholic, and nostalgic, yet timeless. Small though they are, her best prints and there are many are finely tempered expressions of a love of humanity and its landscape. Simon Brett writes in his postscript to the Silent Books edition of the catalogue raisonee of her work: The regard she turned upon reality — upon landscape, figures in landscape, sometimes the incidents of story — sees all things together. Her vision is to do with seeing that is not as obvious as it sounds. In this primacy of seeing, interpretation, expression, storytelling or imagination are gathered up into statement: this is how it is. The ease with which the figures lie, at one with their being and the world around them, thereby stands comparison with the etchings of Rembrandt that were her childhood pillow-book, or with the idylls of Titian or Seurat. Brett is echoing a point Gwen made herself. She wrote of wood engraving that it was. It is the looking, the seeing that matters. William: William Carlos Williams, when explaining his poetics, said that there are no ideas but in things. They say it will simply break his heart if he is told that he is too bad to hope to make anything of it. That was an axiom. And by us I mean, not only the children, but all the uncles and aunts who belonged there. Of course all the flowers that grew at Down were beautiful; and different from all other flowers. Everything there was different. And better. For instance, the path in front of the veranda was made of large round water-worn pebbles, from some sea beach. They were not loose, but stuck down tight in moss and sand, and were black and shiny, as if they had been polished. I adored those pebbles. I mean literally, adored; worshipped. This passion made me feel quite sick sometimes. And it was adoration that I felt for the foxgloves at Down, and for the stiff red clay out of the Sandwalk clay-pit; and for the beautiful white paint on the nursery floor. This kind of feeling hits you in the stomach, and in the ends of your fingers, and it is probably the most important thing in life. Long after I have forgotten all my human loves, I shall still remember the smell of a gooseberry leaf, or the feel of the wet grass on my bare feet; or the pebbles in the path. Of course, there were things to worship everywhere. I can remember feeling quite desperate with love for the blisters in the dark red paint on the nursery window-sills at Cambridge, but at Down there were more things to worship than anywhere else in the world. William : By Jacques had been diagnosed with Disseminated Sclerosis as MS was then known and they were advised to move to the South of France for his health. Though they knew, without outwardly acknowledging it, that he was dying, their creativity was at its height. It was then that their relationship with Virginia Woolf burgeoned in an extraordinary exchange of letters. In one to my grandfather, not long before his death, Virginia wrote this extraordinary paragraph that has become totemic for me: Is your art as chaotic as ours? I expect you got through your discoveries sometime earlier. In , stressed with looking after two small girls my mother and aunt and her dying husband Jacques, Gwen still felt it a matter of life and death to not lose hold of her creative process, her way of transcending the ordinary. She wrote to her cousin Nora Barlow: Anne : [It is] a matter of life and death to keep going at [my wood engraving] as much as I can and not lose hold. In October she wrote to Richard de la Mare son of the poet Walter at Faber and Faber: Anne : I have long been playing with the idea of writing a sort of autobiography as a peg to hang illustrations on; and I am now taking the liberty of sending you a scrap out of it not the beginning nor yet the end to see if you think it would do to publish someday with lots of pictures. I am afraid that what I have written may be too flippant and rather odious, and I would like to know what some outside Literary person feels about it. The idea of the book is not to be a continuous autobiography, but a series of separate chapters called Sport, Religion, Art, Relations, etc. She wrote to Walter that she conceived of the book… Anne : …as a social document — to be a drawing of the world as I saw it when young, not at all as a picture of my own soul though I suppose that gets in by mistake. William : By the autumn of , when Gwen was 66, she had finished the text and most of the drawings for Period Piece ironically she preferred drawings to wood-engravings for her own book, for their immediacy. But later that same year she had a massive stroke that paralysed her down her left side. Nevertheless the book was published on 10 October at one guinea. It was an immediate success. Letters of praise poured in and reviews were enthusiastic. It seems a lifetime since I came with Virginia to see you in Caroline Place… I want to say with what pleasure and admiration I have read your book and also what enormous pleasure it would have given Virginia. William : Period Piece has become one of those books that builds itself a favoured niche in the subconscious of everyone who reads it. It has been in print from Faber — albeit in editions of ever-decreasing print quality — for 61 years now. Period Piece has many qualities, not least, for members of the Darwin-Wedgwood clan, acting as a needed deflator of pretension. In her chapter on Down House, Gwen wrote: Anne : The faint flavour of the ghost of my grandfather hung in a friendly way about the whole place, house, garden and all. Of course, we always felt embarrassed if our grandfather were mentioned, just as we did if God were spoken of. In fact, he was obviously in the same category as God and Father Christmas. Only, with our grandfather, we also felt, modestly, that we ought to disclaim any virtue of our own in having produced him. I should really send you a large bill, for buying copies for people has nearly ruined me this Christmas — and I gather must have nearly ruined many people, judging by the way the copies in the bookshops melt away. Period piece: a Cambridge childhood

Her unerring humour brings an adult perspective to bear on her childhood experience; throughout the book she mocks the things she celebrates. On the very last page Raverat says oh dear, oh dear, how horrid it was being young. That, of course, is hindsight. Raverat wrote the memoir in her sixties after the death of her mother, when she cleared out the old family house and came across letters written by her parents during their courtship: and carried on reading until she came to her own birth. She had stumbled across the source material for the first chapter of Period Piece , which she described to her editor. I have long been playing with the idea of writing a sort of autobiography as a peg to hang illustrations on; and I am now taking the liberty of sending you a scrap out of it not the beginning nor yet the end to see if you would think it would do to publish some day, with lots of pictures. I am afraid that what I have written may be too flippant and rather odious, and I would like to know what some outside Literary Person feels about it. The idea of the book is not a continuous autobiography, but a series of separate chapters called Sport, Religion, Art, Relations, etc. The book itself she describes as a circular one, it does not begin at the beginning nor go on to the end; it is all going on at the same time, sticking out like the spokes of a wheel from a hub, which is me. So it does not matter which chapter is read first or last. It is however warm, humorous, affectionate and shrewd and well worth reading. It is also beautifully illustrated by the author. Post to Cancel. There was a real sense of warmth within some of the characters, and it was made entirely clear that those like Idgie — one of the main protagonists, and the co-owner of the Whistle Stop Cafe — were both revered and respected within their community. I loved how headstrong she in particular was. It looks rather a chunky book — indeed, the Vintage edition which I read runs to just over five hundred pages — but it is a surprisingly quick read. Purchase from the Book Depository. I can tell why he likes it, as throughout it felt like an incredibly masculine book. The novel, first published in , tells of a detective who often seems rather detached from the cases in which he dabbles. Oddly, I found it devoid of emotion at times, and the behaviour which the characters demonstrated sometimes felt bizarre and inconsistent. The most interesting aspect of The Big Sleep for me was its storyline. I will happily read anything which is set within it. This was recommended to me by Lucy thank you, Lucy! Gwen Raverat is the granddaughter of Charles Darwin, so along with the setting, the anthropological aspect interested me too. The places which she describes throughout are familiar to me, and I loved being able to picture the scenes exactly as they are and, in most cases, how they have remained for centuries. Throughout, lovely illustrations can be found, all of them by Raverat herself.

Period Piece by Gwen Raverat

As Gwen Raverat herself says at the conclusion of her memoir, I remember [my childhood] as an uncomfortable time, and sometimes a very unhappy one Oh dear, Oh dear, how horrid it was being young, and how nice it is being old and not having to mind what people think. Her complete apathy toward what she calls "System C-with-a-dash-of-A" chivalry and Christian morality, respectively provided her with the perspective that in turn made her childhood nigh-unbearable. We can, however, profit from Raverat's past unhappiness without fear of Schadenfreude , so we may as well. Particular highlights of the book for me were the chapters on Propriety, Religion, Sport, and Clothes. The chapter on Ghosts and Horrors is very funny as well. I read this book at a time in my life when I am myself attempting to balance my individual personality and interests with larger social expectations and concerns, so this was a nice read. Reading an account of such a harmonious family also appealed to me greatly, given how turbulent my own can be. Dec 13, Sylvester rated it really liked it Shelves: memoir-biography. This has been my Year of the Memoir - I don't know how many I've read, but this one must be the best yet. Gwen Raverat is witty and feisty, and her pen and ink illustrations are the icing on the cake. I liked that she organized her memoir by topic rather than keeping to chronology, too. Her wry description of Victorian society and it's strange standards is quite pointed and funny. I absolutely loved the chapter "Sport" in which she tells of all the games she and her siblings and cousins would ge This has been my Year of the Memoir - I don't know how many I've read, but this one must be the best yet. I absolutely loved the chapter "Sport" in which she tells of all the games she and her siblings and cousins would get up to - they ran utterly wild, incredibly so, even by our modern standards, and no one least of all her mother was in the least worried about them. And they did all this in their horribly stifling and uncomfortable Victorian outfits. Just a wonderfully written book of a very happy and full childhood. Her descriptions of her Uncles and Aunts make up a large part of the story, and they are interesting people, to say the least. The little mention made about her Uncle Lenny being president of the Eugenics Society sent a shiver down my spine. So scary, how an otherwise wonderful human being could hold to an evil such as that. Love this little paragraph - and it's the tone the whole book is written in: "Dear Reader, you may take it from me, that however hard you try - or don't try; whatever you do - or don't do; for better, for worse; for richer, for poorer; every way and every day; The parent is always wrong. So it is no good bothering about it. When the little pests grow up they will certainly tell you exactly what you did wrong in their case. But, never mind; they will be just as wrong in their turn. Oct 03, Kay rated it liked it Shelves: biogr-memoir , nonfiction , victoriana , humor-whimsy. Period Piece is a charming exercise in nostalgia, though I quickly found I was only up for small doses of Childhood Memories in any one sitting so it took me a rather long time to finish it. Indeed, it never ceases to amaze me how well some people remember their childhoods. Gwen Raverat's was particularly memorable and happy , surrounded and supported by a vast assemblage of eccentric aunts, uncles, and cousins. Having spent a year in Cambridge back in the 80's, though, my favorite portions of Period Piece is a charming exercise in nostalgia, though I quickly found I was only up for small doses of Childhood Memories in any one sitting so it took me a rather long time to finish it. Having spent a year in Cambridge back in the 80's, though, my favorite portions of the book pertained to what life was back in the city during the Victorian era. The line drawings accompanying the text were particularly nice. Nov 08, Beth Bonini rated it it was amazing. I adored this memoir. For years now, I've been visiting Cambridge and walking by the blue plaque that says "Gwen Raverat lived here. She was a truly original person and her humorous, distinctive voice makes this memoir something really special. Dec 24, Paul Taylor rated it it was ok. A bit smug and marred by a faux humility. The author is a closet snob who could have written something more incisive about the privileged and educated classes at the end of the Victorian era and the period upto the First War. Dec 12, Orinoco Womble tidy bag and all rated it it was ok Shelves: don-t-bother , rather-heavy-going , stonking-great-disappointment. I had hoped to be able to snuggle down into memories of Nanny and buttered toast by the nursery fire, followed by jolly good boarding school fun and the angst of Coming Out. Unfortunately that is not what you get in this book. I would have enjoyed it much more if she had focused on her own life, such as being an art student at the Slade. Instead, most of this book focuses on her adult relations. That's why she put a family tree in the front of the book--because aside from her famous grandfather, I had hoped to be able to snuggle down into memories of Nanny and buttered toast by the nursery fire, followed by jolly good boarding school fun and the angst of Coming Out. That's why she put a family tree in the front of the book--because aside from her famous grandfather, Charles Darwin, ten will get you fifty you haven't heard of any of the rest. She just naturally assumes that you have internalised the tree after all, she put it there, weren't you attending? If they're not actually titled she makes sure you know how important they are as artists or writers or statesmen or whatever. Not that you'll have heard of half of them. If only an editor had stepped in and put her childhood memories first, so we got a semi-accurate picture of what it was like to grow up at that time, and then had her tell about what the adults did. Then I could have dnf'd the dull part, which is nearly half of the text, including all her humblebrags about how "badly" they treated the servants and how "delicate" ie demanding she herself was. I could also have done without the "clever" little captions to the author's own of course illustrations, which are as arch as the Saint Louis monument, particularly any pictures involving the dog. I like dogs, which is why I didn't like the use she made of Sancho. I won't be reading this again. Shelves: memoirs , history , non-fiction , women- list. I picked up this book during a visit to Cambridge last year. You know how when you visit a bookshop in a new city, it always tends to have a section of 'local' works? Well, this was on that same said table and its' lavender cover unlike the image shown caught my eye. I shelved it when I got back home and didn't think much about it since. But then about a week ago, while shelving another book nearby, this one's binding caught my eye. I'd been on a streak of books on women, either written by the I picked up this book during a visit to Cambridge last year. I'd been on a streak of books on women, either written by them or about them, and felt like this memoir might just be the next perfect thing to read. I was completely right. This was simply the loveliest of childhood memoirs. Beautifully written and wonderfully detailed, it transports one to a time and place utterly unknowable to a 'modern' reader. Yes, Raverat was Darwin's granddaughter, but he's gone by the time she's born. But the family she's born into is truly remarkable and so is she. It's not really told chronologically, so one could dip in and out as wanted, as even the author recommends. As for me, i read it in order and found it a marvelous little thing. I wanted to find out more about Gwen - about what happened to her after she grew up, which she here and there alludes to. But alas it seems she didn't write any other books. Still, we have this lovely one, full of fun and silliness that allows us to delight and be ever envious of such a childhood. I'd heartily recommend this book to anyone who's ever been a child ;o May 03, Trisha rated it it was amazing. In fact, he was obviously in the same category as God and Father Christmas. Only with our grandfather, we also felt modestly, that we ought to disclaim any virtue of our own in having produced him. My copy of the book was printed in and was illustrated with her charming line drawings that sent me to the internet for more information. She was very well known for her gorgeous wood engravings which she created to be used as book illustrations. Mar 20, Theresa rated it really liked it. This book was written by Charles Darwin's granddaughter, Gwen Raverat, in , and was about her life growing up. It was refreshing in the sense that, even though set in the Victorian era, there was a distinct lack of religious mores unusual for the time. There were strong behavioral codes, some of them admirable, such as a tremendous emphasis on humility. What I didn't know until I had finished the book is that Raverat was a well-known and respected artist. I was happy to learn that she led a f This book was written by Charles Darwin's granddaughter, Gwen Raverat, in , and was about her life growing up. I was happy to learn that she led a fulfilling life, not surprising for someone as intelligent as she and with such a common-sense attitude. Of course, her money and family connections most likely helped speed her along her way. This quote is an example of her straightforward attitude toward life: "I simply made up my mind that as I could not be good-looking or well-dressed, I would never again think about my appearance at all. I would have enough clothes to be decent, but I would try to be as nearly invisible as possible, and would live for the rest of my life like a sort of disembodied spirit. Of course I knew that this was not the best possible solution, but it was the only one that seemed to be practicable. And at any rate this decision did really set me free; I hardly ever thought about my clothes or my looks any more at all; and, except for sometimes at the beginning of a party, nearly always forgot to be self-conscious. Sep 01, Val Robson rated it it was amazing Shelves: owned. I was given this book as a gift in and cannot understand why it has taken me this long to read it. It is the most charming and lovely read covering the childhood of Gwen Raverat from her birth in to the turn of the century. Gwen is the grand- daughter of Charles Darwin and Emma Wedgwood. Her writing is a great piece of social history of those times. The book is beautifully, and often humourously, ill I was given this book as a gift in and cannot understand why it has taken me this long to read it. The book is beautifully, and often humourously, illustrated throughout by Gwen's line drawings. There is also a chapter on 'Down' - the home of Charles Darwin in Downe, Kent where the author spent her summers with many other family members. I live in Cambridge and recently visited Down House now owned by English Heritage so I particularly enjoyed reading about places I know. Nov 28, Ross Perlin added it. The book sheds brief glimmers of light on famous figures Vaughan Williams, E. Forster, Darwin himself , but mostly details the lifestyle and foibles of a very well-to-do and connected family of the time—and Victorian girlhood. Also a great read for specific tidbits on old Cambridge who knew how new punting is! The title says it all really - it really does reflect a time of the past. Hard to conceive of such a straitened society just down the road and just over a years ago. Very little indeed to do with Darwin, but none the worse for that. It was only after I'd read it that I discovered it's a small classic, read by many over the years. This was an enchanting book to read! It's full of hilarious characters, beautiful places and interesting stories. The tone is very humorous, and the book gives a charming account of life at the time. I hadn't previously read any memoirs, so I found it difficult to get through being used to books with more plot and a faster pace, but it was an enjoyable book to read a little bit at a time! I read this memoir slowly, dipping in and out of it over months, whenever I wanted to remind myself that there existed a world of croquet mallets, chaperoning courting couples, and corsets. A world that Gwen Raverat made out to be peopled by endearing yet slightly ridiculous characters, their quirks brought to the fore by her dry and almost, cruel wit. And oddly sanitized for our consumption? Absolutely superb autobiography, until age 16, of C Darwin's granddaughter. Funny and heart- warming. Jan 31, Patricia rated it really liked it Shelves: botany-garden-nature. I loved the drawings most of all, the sometimes pouty, strong- minded young Gwen, the tiger lurking in the bed canopy, and the longsuffering family dog. Oct 21, Steve Shilstone rated it it was amazing. Absolutely delightful Victorian childhood memoir filled stem to stern with endearing humor. Nov 29, Debra B. What a delightful book! I was, however, somewhat misled by that article. Gwen Raverat was a member of the famous , but this book, though a memoir, is really about her childhood. She was a granddaughter of Charles Darwin, and the people in her family included her five famous uncles. She also lived in a famous complex of buildings in Cambridge, England; all of which are now owned by the University. The book is charming, and delightfully told. She asked the older generation of ladies about hooped skirts and crinolines, and was told they far preferred that to the later insistence upon tight stays and bodices. It kept your petticoats away from your legs, and made walking so light and easy. The boats were moored in very deep water, beneath a steep bank, perhaps four or five feet high, and Cordelia and I had scrambled into one of them to receive the baskets, when Jane appeared at the top of the bank. From that height! She hit the edge of the boat, which would certainly have upset if I had not instinctively thrown all my weight over on the other side. After wobbling wildly for a moment both she and the man, who tried to hold her, fell with a terrific splash into the deep water. Then might have been seen the glorious spectacle of English Manhood at its best; one gentleman was already swimming about in the flood; another dived splendidly into the stream, and then found that he had chosen a place which was not really deep enough for diving; and Charles, who had been at some distance away, arriving on the bank when the rescue was already well in hand, obviously felt that, as a host, he must not be behindhand in getting wet. So he waded in, at a shallow place, till the water came just below his watch-chain— I saw his hand on his watch —and thus honour was satisfied. But at last everyone was saved. Nov 24, Susannah Shaw rated it it was amazing. Wonderful memoir of a childhood in an eccentric family in academic Cambridge. Great humour and perception of late Victorian manners at the end of 19th century. Lovely illustrations. Obviously some commentary 'of it's time'. Jun 17, Bunta Potter rated it really liked it. This is a great addition to everyone's essential 'smile on your face' bookshelf - a really enjoyable read. She also, incidentally, gives unromantic details of daily life in the not-so-good old days when she remembers that town sewage was discharged into the picturesque there's quite a bit about smells in t This is a great addition to everyone's essential 'smile on your face' bookshelf - a really enjoyable read. She also, incidentally, gives unromantic details of daily life in the not-so-good old days when she remembers that town sewage was discharged into the picturesque River Cam there's quite a bit about smells in this book and there was terrible rural poverty among 'a class ignored by the story-books'. Her life as one of the cultivated, prosperous Darwin family was secure and comfortable but she is very alive to the bizarre and absurd, as well as the restricting, aspects of Victorian upper middle class conventions and expectations and describes them with zestful amusement. But this book is more than a sociological record. Its most lively and memorable passages give a vivid sense of eccentric, individualistic people whose foibles and fancies win warm responses from the author. Unsurprisingly, family members are painted in greatest detail, but there are telling sketches of passers-by too - like pedagogical Miss S and rich Mrs C. Its thematic structure makes this book just perfect for dipping into, while Gwen Raverat's illustrations are delightful. This is a lovely book to re-read and a joy to discover. There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Readers also enjoyed. Biography Memoir. Book Club. About Gwen Raverat. Gwen Raverat. She married the French painter in They were active in the Bloomsbury Group and Rupert Brooke's Neo-Pagan group until they moved to the south of France, where they lived in Vence, near Nice, until his death from multiple sclerosis in They had two daughters: Elisabeth , who married the Norwegian politician Edvard Hambro, and Sophie Jane , who married the Cambridge scholar M. Pryor and later Charles Gurney. Raverat is buried in the Trumpington Extension Cemetery, Cambridge with her father. There is a memorial to Raverat in Harlton Church, Cambridgeshire, where her family and friends donated towards the restoration of the church in her memory. Cambridge and the people associated with it remained very much the centre of her life. At the very beginning of the book, two family trees are given, one for the author's mother and one for her father. The family trees are reproduced here with minor modification:. The author's father was Sir George Darwin. Her father had a large extended family. Charles and Emma had seven children who survived to adulthood - four uncles and two aunts to Gwen. All bar one of the uncles and aunts were married, and two uncles had children, resulting in five cousins:. Note: Florence Henrietta Darwin , Frank's third wife is briefly mentioned but the marriage was after the time period in the book. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The author's mother's Maud du Puy's family tree, adapted from the tree in the book. NB: Maud's siblings are missing. The author's quite extensive family tree. The author is in yellow. Period Piece. The Times , Wednesday, Oct 15, ; pg. Categories : non-fiction books British autobiographies Culture in Cambridge Faber and Faber books. Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata Articles containing Danish-language text Articles containing Northern Sami-language text Articles containing German-language text. 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