A satire of middle-class prudery and closed-minded cruelty, what was mostly ignored in the years after Expiation’s first publication was how laugh-out-loud hilarious it is, so funny that we genuinely believe it to be much better than the more well-known books by ‘Elizabeth’ (the name she wrote under). It is also extraordinarily atmospheric and perceptive about the English: in some respects it is Forsterian (the greatest compliment we can pay). It too would make a wonderful play or film.
I got this in paper form from Persephone Books as part of their subscription service. As you can see from the cover it’s one of the greys (number 133 for anyone counting)
It contributes to one of my own Reading Challenges (#BeatTheBacklog) because I wanted to work on clearing down my TBR. It’s one of many books that have been waiting to be read for a while so is certainly a contender!
Much of the first 100 pages reminded me much of the film “Brief Encounter” where a married woman keeps her affair secret from her husband. It’s NOT the same (we know virtually nothing about Arthur or his involvement in the story apart from the fact he existed) but nevertheless there are similarities. The film came out long after the book, so I’ll give the book the credit here.
It starts with Millie’s husband’s will being read after his unexpected death and Millie being left a small amount of money. It turns out that Ernest had learnt of one of Millie’s secrets several years previously and the will had been amended to reflect this secret (she had a long term affair). Her extended family at the will reading, knowing nothing of the secret, dont understand the will, and to escape the resulting pity, guilt and shame, she leaves the house early the following morning. Her plan is to go visit her sister Aggie (who she has been writing to in secret since Aggie’s elopement decades before).
I did struggle with this book, especially the first 100+ pages or so, I will admit. Others class this as one of her best novels, if not her best. It might be, but I struggled.
So, the first half of the book covers Millie in London, dealing with her sister and lover, neither of which act the way Millie had expected. In the end, she returns to where her in laws are, but without her money. The second half of the book deals with how the Botts deal with Millie being in their lives. Millie is barely in this part of the book (opposite to the intense monologue we had in the first half), but her presence causes immense trouble to her inlaws who gossip between themselves, invent rumours about Millie and lots of things are brought to a head.
In a way, it is very much a statement of a certain kind of marriage at a certain time, where men are expected to be “leaders” and women are expected to follow and agree with their husbands under all circumstances, with nery unique thought in the heads. Women Know Your Place! (tell me if you dont get that reference and I will try and find it for you!).
It is a book of 2 sides – how people think things will happen as opposed to how they DO happen. Overloaded with Millie in the first half, barely heard of in the second half.
Whilst I did struggle with the book, I’m glad i stuck around till the end.
About the Author
Elizabeth, Countess Russell, was a British novelist and, through marriage, a member of the German nobility, known as Mary Annette Gräfin von Arnim.
Born Mary Annette Beauchamp in Sydney, Australia, she was raised in England and in 1891 married Count Henning August von Arnim, a Prussian aristocrat, and the great-great-great-grandson of King Friedrich Wilhelm I of Prussia.
She had met von Arnim during an Italian tour with her father. They married in London but lived in Berlin and eventually moved to the countryside where, in Nassenheide, Pomerania, the von Arnims had their family estate. The couple had five children, four daughters and a son. The children’s tutors at Nassenheide included E. M. Forster and Hugh Walpole.
In 1898 she started her literary career by publishing Elizabeth and Her German Garden, a semi-autobiographical novel about a rural idyll published anonymously and, as it turned out to be highly successful, reprinted 21 times within the first year. Von Arnim wrote another 20 books, which were all published “By the author of Elizabeth and Her German Garden”.
Count von Arnim died in 1910, and in 1916 Elizabeth married John Francis Stanley Russell, 2nd Earl Russell, Bertrand Russell’s elder brother. The marriage ended in disaster, with Elizabeth escaping to the United States and the couple finally agreeing, in 1919, to get a divorce. She also had an affair with H. G. Wells.
She was a cousin of Katherine Mansfield (whose full name was Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp).
Elizabeth von Arnim spent her old age in London, Switzerland, and on the French Riviera. When World War II broke out she permanently took up residence in the United States, where she died in 1941, aged 74.