Welcome to Upper Radstowe – the world of E H Young

Recently I read and reviewed Chatterton Square by E H Young – and judging from some of the comments I got on that post, it seems she isn’t an author who is very well known these days. So, allow me to introduce you to Edith Hilda Young.

I often marvel at the unexpectedness of the lives which lie behind the politely composed, conventional black and white photographs of the writers I love to read. I think Emily Hilda was a little unconventional, she was it appears careful not to flaunt her unconventional lifestyle, and having worked as both a stable groom and a munitions worker, I imagine a woman who never shied away from hard work either.

Emily Hilda Young was born in Northumberland in 1880, but upon her marriage in the early 1900s she moved to the Clifton area of Bristol. This was a very fashionable area – it is still an area dominated by rows of gracious residences often with white or cream facades, I am reminded Bristol is a city I have never visited.

Although Emily was to leave the Clifton area after her husband’s death – to live in a ménage a trois with her lover and his wife in London – it was Clifton that she recreated in almost all her books. Thinly disguised as Upper Radstowe – she used the provincial world of Clifton as her canvases which are generally small – exploring themes of marriage and women’s place in society. Her heroines are often outspoken, unconventional, raising the collective eyebrows of the conventional, pompous members of their community. Church plays a part in many of her stories too – with several vicars among her characters.

E H Young wrote eleven novels for adults and two for children, and during her lifetime she was very successful. It is sad that her novels are read so much less now, surely her wonderful books are ripe for re-issuing? I have read seven out of those eleven adult novels, I have an eighth waiting tbr. The first three novels that E H Young published are much harder to come by, although I think I have a kindle copy of Moor Fires (1916) her third novel, which I have heard is not as strong as her later work. Still, I suspect any E H Young novel is worth reading, I have hugely enjoyed all those I have encountered so far – and would love to see more people reading her books, which are quite widely available second hand from all the usual places online – and are worth looking out for in second hand bookshops.

Here are a list of her adult books, with some brief details about the books (barring the first three which I don’t know anything about)– I would love to see some of you reading her soon.

• A Corn of Wheat (1910) and Yonder (1912) I haven’t any information about either of these.

• Moor Fires (1916 – another early novel I have no information about but I am keeping an eye out for a  hardcopy – though I have a kindle copy.

• A Bridge Dividing (1922) (republished as The Misses Mallett) my VMC edition has the later title – The narrative of the enormously charming novel, concerns aging spinster sisters Caroline and Sophia, and their younger half sister Rose, and their niece, the young Henrietta. Henrietta comes to live with the sisters upon the death of her mother, and is immediately drawn into their beautiful genteel world.

• William (1925) William of the title is William Nesbitt, an ageing successful business man, happily married to Kate for many years, they have five grown up children. Mable married to John, Walter married to Violet, Dora married to Herbert, Lydia living in London and married to Oliver, while Janet the youngest remains unmarried and living at home. Kate Nesbitt has her own idea of how her children should live their lives, how they should behave toward their husbands and children; they often unsettle and worry her. William however is a remarkable father, he tries hard to understand his children, but more than that he seems to properly understand that they need to make their own way in the world. That all he can do is support them.

• The Vicar’s Daughter (1927) – I sadly don’t own a copy of this, I think I read Liz’s copy – so it is another one I need to look out for. The story of Maurice Roper, who having been care taking his cousin’s parish awaits his return, and that of Margaret, the woman he once loved and his cousin married.

• Miss Mole (1930) I think this was my first E H Young, again I borrowed my copy from Liz, but have since replaced it with a pretty hardback. It’s a book I really want to re-read, although there are other novels I have to read for the first time. Miss Hannah Mole is a forty-year-old spinster who earns her living as a companion/housekeeper. She is unconventional; outspoken, a bit of a fibber. When Miss Mole becomes housekeeper to a widowed minister and has an impact upon everyone she meets.

• Jenny Wren (1932) tells the story of two sisters, concentrating on the younger sister. Jenny and her older sister Dahlia Rendall have recently moved from their old home at the white farm, in the countryside to a house in Upper Radstowe. Here their mother has installed the first of her lodgers, young Mr Cummings, who knows about antique furniture and has ambitions for a shop of his own. Jenny and Dahlia are socially superior to their mother, taking after their gentleman father who had previously protected them from their mother’s common ways and the gossip surrounding some supposed affair years earlier. Now Jenny and Dahlia feel the sharp glances of their neighbours who see the still beautiful Louisa as not respectable and assume her daughters are no better. Dahlia’s story is told in a later novel.

• Celia (1937) – I have waiting tbr – it is a satisfyingly fat book, which focus on the marriages of three couples.

• The Curate’s Wife (1934) Sequel to Jenny Wren Tells the story of Dahlia Rendell. The Curate’s Wife of the title is Dahlia – who has just arrived back to Upper Radstowe from her honeymoon. She has married the rather serious, very conventional, curate Rev. Cecil Sproat. Dahlia is anything but conventional; beautiful, irreverent she sees Cecil’s vocation as rather old womanish – and ridiculous, seeing humour in things that leave poor Cecil a little puzzled.

• Chatterton Square (1947) I read most recently, and it is almost certainly her best novel.