Precious Bane (Virago Modern Classics)

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One day, as Prue was walking through the fields, Kester met her. When she tried to hide her face, Kester took her by the shoulders and looked straight into her eyes. He did not laugh but talked to Prue as a man talks to a woman who is beautiful and attractive. His words were almost more than Prue could bear. Literary critic John Sutherland refers to the genre as the "soil and gloom romance" and credits Webb as its pioneer. [16] She was born Mary Gladys Meredith in 1881 at Leighton Lodge in the Shropshire village of Leighton, where she was baptised at St Mary's parish church, [1] 8 miles (13km) southeast of Shrewsbury. Her father, George Edward Meredith, a private schoolteacher, [2] inspired his daughter with his own love of literature and the local countryside. Her mother Sarah Alice was descended from a family related to Sir Walter Scott. Mary explored the countryside around her childhood home, and developed a sense of detailed observation and description, of both people and places, which later infused her poetry and prose. I give easement and rest now to thee, dear man. Come not down the lanes nor in the meadows. And for thy peace I pawn my own soul. Amen.' Missis Beguildy - Beguildy's wife who fears her husband and yet does not hesitate to collude with Gideon and Jancis in their plans to be together. She is crafty in her methods to get her husband out of the house for days at a time, and she is sharp in her observations of the people in the community.

She manages to connect with people on many levels and for all sorts of reasons. Her lyrical style in poetry and prose, her love of Shropshire with its varied landscapes and its local people, fired her imagination and were the inspiration for her novels and poetry. The prose is what makes this book special. The prose fits the story to a T. Life in the countryside of 1800s Shropshire, England, is what is drawn. There is a heavy use of dialect. The story is told as it should be told—the dialect, the idioms, and manner of speech all blend together. They create a whole that feels genuine. The atmosphere of the time and place is captured. Old traditions and beliefs, nature, the mystical and the supernatural are the essence of the story. Reading this, you immerse yourself in another world. Nature i In 1921, they bought a second property in London, in the hope that by being in the city, she could achieve greater literary recognition. This, however, did not happen, although she won the Prix Femina Vie Heureuse for Precious Bane in 1926. By 1927, she was suffering increasingly bad health, her marriage was failing, and she returned to Spring Cottage alone. She died at St Leonards-on-Sea, aged 46. She was buried in Shrewsbury, at the General Cemetery in Longden Road. [11] Legacy [ edit ]Her writing in general was reviewed as notable for poetic descriptions of nature. Another aspect throughout her work was a close and fatalistic view on human psychology. [12] Mary’s father, George Edward Meredith, was a schoolmaster with strong pride in his Celtic-Welsh heritage, and ignited Mary’s love of literature and the natural world. Her mother, Sarah Alice Scott, was from Edinburgh and descended from a family related to Sir Walter Scott. She won the Prix Femina Vie Heureuse for her best-known novel Precious Bane, whose heroine Prue Sarn is a sensitive young woman scorned because she has a hare-lip.

Prue destaca por ser resilente, por resistir y poner siempre buena cara ante la adversidad... y en su vida, encontraremos muchas adversidades. Quizás esta tragedia en la que se profundiza durante la segunda parte del libro es lo que me costó un poquito más... No estoy en un momento de mi vida en que pueda soportar muchas tragedias. Por otro lado, la historia se centra mucho en el cruel hermano de Prue (personaje odioso a más no poder) y también en su historia de amor, algo que se me hizo algo repetitivo. In the end, Webb’s is a story about punishment for all-consuming greed. Jancis Beguildy’s father, the local wizard who provides charms and snake-oil cures and who may be in league with the devil, is known to have held a long grudge against Old Sarn, and he has even less use for the man’s son, Gideon. Idle and amoral, Beguildy is motivated by lust for easy money. He believes he can get a better price for his beautiful daughter, Jancis, than Gideon is likely to give, and he is fully prepared to auction her off to the highest bidder. When Gideon sleeps with the girl to stake his claim to her, however, the young man cements his fate. Beguildy’s curses and revenge will deprive him of all he’s worked for. Si algo me gustó de esta historia fue Prue, su protagonista, por su inteligencia y valentía, su dulzura y nobleza. Durante la primera mitad del libro la adoré a ella y muchas de esas descripciones sobre los bosques, la tierra y ese otoño/invierno que se percibe eterno en la historia.Today it continues to thrive, with members all over the world. The honorary vice president is Donald Meredith, Mary’s nephew. Prue works almost as hard as he does, but her focus is on helping others--always first to sacrifice herself for someone in need. She goes particularly far to help the man of her dreams, the man she has fallen for, the weaver Kester Woodseaves. This novel is full of musical prose, but I found the romantic parts particularly tender and beautiful.

Mary became very self-conscious as a result, avoiding social gatherings and wearing large hats and scarves to disguise her condition," says Liz. The famous writer in later life. The story is set in rural Shropshire during the Napoleonic Wars. It is narrated by the central character, Prue Sarn, whose life is blighted by having a cleft lip and cleft palate. Only the weaver, Kester Woodseaves, perceives the beauty of her character, but Prue cannot believe herself worthy of him. Her brother Gideon is overridingly ambitious to attain wealth and power, regardless of who suffers while he does so. Gideon is set to wed his sweetheart Jancis, but he incurs the wrath of her father, the cruel and scheming self-proclaimed wizard Beguildy. An act of vengeance by Beguildy makes Gideon reject Jancis and tragedy engulfs them both. Prue is wrongly accused of murder and set upon by a mob, but Kester defies them and carries Prue away to the happiness she believed she could never possess because of her deformity. Then a thought came to me all of a sudden. I wonder it didna come afore, but then I'd never much minded having a hare-lip afore. It seems to me that often it's only when you begin to see other folks minding a thing like that for you, that you begin to mind it for yourself. At the “love-spinning” for Gideon and Jancis—a gathering at which local women spin the wool that will be woven into fabric for the young couple—Prue first sees the weaver, Kester Woodseaves. He’s a powerfully handsome figure, but her attraction, the reader is told, transcends the physical. In those first mystical moments, he becomes her “master” and his image and spirit will infuse her thoughts in the hard days ahead. In time, Prue will save his life, and he will ultimately save hers. A monumental bust of Mary Webb, commissioned by the Mary Webb Society, was unveiled in the grounds of Shrewsbury Library on 9 July 2016. [22]I give easement and rest now to thee, dear man, that ye walk not over the fields nor down the by-ways. And for thy peace I pawn my own soul.' What is the effect of local superstitions and folklore on the villagers’ trust in, and relationships with, one another? There's a love story here, and tragedy, and family. When she was a young girl the narrator expressed wonderment that her mother kept on telling her father, in moments of anguish--"Could I help it if the hare crossed my path? Could I help it?" I, too, found this puzzling not knowing what it meant until later it dawned on me: it has something to do with superstition, of which there were plenty during the old times, and what the girl-narrator is (though she be unconscious of it). Superstitions which, themselves, bring informative delight.