Hasting to Heaven

You know, I love Trollope’s Barsetshire novels, so when I recently came across Angela Thirkell’s Barsetshire series, I was intrigued. I’ve begun with High Rising and although I see where she’s used some similar names and places as Trollope, I see no real connection as of yet…

From what I’ve read so far, I wouldn’t place the two authors on a similar plane at all. Thirkell tends to exasperate me as a reader, but her psychological depth and ironic comedy are undeniable. So far her characters carry no where near the impact of a Mr. Harding, say, but the “old” way of talking and thinking, especially about children, and the “real” tendencies of communication we used to know, are shockingly refreshing for us in the politically world correct world we live in today. I feel like I’ve come home to someone who gets me and doesn’t judge every word I say — gets my heart and can trust that.

How many times did I hear growing up — “Do that again, and I’m gonna kill you!” from the grown-ups around me. Now I know that I grew up in a privileged world where love was a given, but I never once thought that phrase was to be taken literally. Our society today is so caught up in the “fact” that language is violence, that have to police every word we say or think, and, as a result, our lives and interactions have lost so much authenticity. I can’t even call my students “kids” when talking to my colleagues now without causing some to bristle.

Thirkell is such a breath of fresh air! I’m reminded of this over and over as I make my way through this novel. No one talks like this anymore — expect maybe in the privacy of our own homes or thoughts…

Laura Morland seems to be a great mother, who, the reader understands from the get-go, loves her family deeply, as seen in asides like this one which describes a scene with her youngest, Tony: “‘Goodbye, Mrs Birkett, and thank you very much for having me to tea,’ said Tony, looking so seraphic that his mother had to concentrate her mind on his disgusting hair and suit to keep herself from hugging him on the spot” (10).

The observations continue and Thirkell just keeps keeping it real: “He suffered from what his mother called a determination of words to the mouth, and nothing except sleep appeared to check his flow of valueless conversation” (19). Yes, sometimes kids talk nonstop and their conversation might even be characterized as “valueless,” but we aren’t allowed to say that anymore. If we think that, does it mean we love them less? Heavens, no! It’s just an adult, healthy understanding of childhood that we’ve lost almost entirely these days.

And how about this one: “‘Look, Tony,’ said his mother, stifling a desire to kill him, ‘there’s Mr Reid’s shop. We shall be home in a minute’” (20). Losing patience with a child is something we can all identity with, but our society makes even loving parents seem like ogres when they do. Later Laura remarks: “I once thought I’d learn some Greek to help the boys with their homework, but not being able to master the alphabet, I gave it up, and it was just as well, because whatever I helped the boys with, we always lost our temper” (140). In our home, we used to go round and round, especially with math and I would always feel so guilty for my frustration. I’m not making excuses here, but so much of parenting is realizing that some of the hurdles are common to so many others and we’re not alone in our shortcomings and not having to sugar-coat everything can indeed be therapeutic.

And what parent can’t identify with this description?

Laura flung her own coat and hat on a chair and sat down. Darling Tony. How awful it was to be a person of one idea. The elder boys said she spoiled him. It was not so much that she deliberately gave way to Tony, she pointed out to them, as that, after bringing three of them up, she was too exhausted to do anything about the fourth. When, for about a quarter of a century, you have been fighting strong young creatures with a natural bias towards dirt, untidiness and carelessness, quite unmoved by noise, looking upon loud, unmeaning quarrels and abuse as the essence of polite conversation, oblivious of all convenience and comfort but their own, your resistance weakens (21-22).

And here, the strong, fierce love of a parent even in the midst of their exhaustion and frustration:

Oh, the exhaustingness of the healthy young! Laura had once offered to edit a book called Why I Hate my Children, but though Adrian Coates had offered her every encouragement, and every mother of her acquaintance had offered to contribute, it had never taken shape. Perhaps, she thought, as she stood by Tony’s bed an hour later, they wouldn’t be so nice if they weren’t so hateful. There lay her demon son, in abandoned repose. His cheeks, so cool and firm in the day, had turned to softest rose-petal jelly, and looked as if they might melt upon the pillow. His mouth was fit for poets to sing. His hands – spotlessly clean for a brief space – still had dimples where later bony knuckles would be. Foxy was pressed to his heart, while Neddy, taking, as Tony had predicted, the middle of the bed, had pushed his master half over the edge. Laura picked up the heavy, deeply unconscious body, and laid it back in the middle of the bed. Neddy she put revengefully on the table. Then she tucked the bed-clothes in, kissed her adorable, hateful child, who never stirred and, turning out the light, left the room (38-39).

In our day, we scrutinize every word we say or write and insist on a literal interpretation and wind up with a sterile, stupid understanding of what it means to be human. I’m not saying that earlier generations did everything perfectly in their child-rearing by any means, but our child-centered, coddling mentalities of today are inferior in so many ways.

Thirkell’s expression of emotional honesty would shock many today, I think. Laura goes off, understandably, on her friend and publisher after he misjudges the effects of the New Year’s punch and has an accident:

I’ve no objection to your partaking freely of George Knox’s excellent vintages all through dinner, but when it comes to overdoing it with punch, just before you drive a lady home, words almost fail me – but thank goodness, not quite. I should have thought a man of your age who had been at Bump Suppers and Authors’ Benevolent Society Dinners and what not,’ said Laura, unjustly confounding two quite separate festivities, ‘would have the wits to know how strong George’s punch was. George is a fool, anyway, but that is no reason why you should be one. Here am I, trying to give you a Happy New Year, and all you do for me is to run a car – your own car, thank God, and I hope it isn’t insured – into a ditch and frighten me out of my wits, and drag me out of a window like a dead sheep, all because you and George Knox are a couple of idiots. I hate you both’ (96-97).

Whereas, the next morning on New Year’s Day, she retorts with: “‘Now,’ she said, ‘not a word about last night. That’s forgotten” (104).

“I hate you” … “that’s forgotten”. Real. Adult. Grace.

Sadly, our language has become so sterilized now, and, coincidentally, our emotions so lifeless. Oh, to recover some honesty in how we talk and to become secure adults who can appreciate metaphor and irony and humor and trust one another beyond stupid literalism.