Winter Sonata – Dorothy Edwards (1928)

As well as being read Ireland month it is also Dewithon – hosted by Paula at bookjotter – a celebration of Welsh literature and Welsh writers. Last year I read Rhapsody a collection of stories by Dorothy Edwards one of just two books published by the Welsh writer in the 1920s. I was fairly sure I had read her only novel Winter Sonata many years ago – but had no recollection of it, and no longer owned a copy. When I finally got round to buying a copy, I bought the edition re-issued by Honno classics in 2011.

Winter Sonata is a quiet, restrained novel – in which nothing very much happens – if you like heavily plot driven narratives, this isn’t the book for you. I very much like this kind of novel – in which the reader has the sense that no word has been written carelessly, every phase considered by the author. As the title suggests there is also a musical quality to the novel – which is told in four long chapters, like movements. Music was clearly an important part of Edwards’ life – and it seems to have greatly influenced her writing.

Winter is also key – the novel starts on the last day of summer as Arnold Nettle a shy young telegraph clerk arrives in an unnamed English village to work in his uncle’s post office. Despite Dorothy Edwards being a Welsh woman, nowhere in this novel is there a mention of her native land. Albert’s one ambition on arriving is to make it through the coming winter without illness. He has suffered from ill health throughout his life to this point.

“He had arrived only the night before. It had been cold, rainy and depressing, but now on the first day here it was beautiful, as if to welcome him. Everywhere the trees were nearly bare, but a few golden leaves still clung to the black branches. The black curving lines and the gold leaves looked as if they were painted on the cold, grey sky. The sun shone quite warmly through thin clouds, but the earth had already hardened itself for winter, and did not respond.”

With not enough room for Arnold to live at his uncle’s house, he has taken lodgings in the house of Mrs Clark. Mrs Clark lives here with her flirtatious teenage daughter Pauline and her young son Alexander. The Clark’s are a working class family – and Arnold finds them rather jarring to his nerves and is happy to have any opportunity to be out of the house after his day in the post office. Pauline tries to involve him in the little secrets she keeps from her mother – while Mrs Clark frequently annoyed by Pauline is often to be heard shrieking after her.

Soon after his arrival in the village – Arnold first sees Olivia Neran through the post office window. A few days later she comes to the post office to send a telegram. For Arnold that first sight of her seemed to herald at least the possibility of good health. From here, he is hopelessly besotted, but far too shy to do anything about it. Olivia lives with her younger sister Eleanor, their aunt Mrs Curle and her son George, who is a little pompous but really quite likeable. Arnold Nettle finds himself drawn into this family circle when he is invited to come and play his cello for their entertainment. A friendship begins to develop between Arnold, George and the Neran sisters.

Arnold longs to belong to this sophisticated circle – which is soon joined by David Premiss, a literary critic and friend of the family who comes to stay for the winter. David is an especially confident young man, very used to having the admiration of women – he is also something of a flirt. He becomes an unsettling presence – though socially quite popular. It is Premiss who helps to draw Pauline Clark into their little musical evenings – she is invited to sing. Pauline is their social inferior – but that doesn’t stop her having her head turned by the attention. Small gifts from the Neran sisters and their cousin, a box of chocolates, a dress no longer wanted, some beads – remind us of Pauline’s place in the world. Her simple joy in these gifts, her anxiety to hide them from her critical mother – and her little brother’s awe at the sight of them – is beautifully portrayed.

“She lay with her eyes open until she heard her mother go to bed, and then lighting the candle, she went to the drawer to see what the chocolates looked like and if there were two layers. She removed all the paper from the top and looked at them. They were arranged in the form of a star and wrapped in different coloured papers. And there was a layer underneath. She would have gone back to bed, but she felt the need of talking about the evening and showing someone the chocolates, so she woke Alexander with as little noise as possible and, cautioning him to be quiet, she held open the box on the bed for him to see. He looked up at her with wide-open sleepy eyes and then down at the beautiful star.

‘Where did you get it? he whispered.

‘Up at the Nerans,’ she said. ‘I’ve been there to sing, and the gentlemen gave me this.’

 Pauline Clark is very different to the Neran sisters – there is something irrepressible about her, she is the most overtly sexual character, and also the warmest character in the novel for me. Olivia is cool, very conventional, very much a product of her respectable upbringing and middle class home. She does very little – but move quietly from place to place. Her large sad eyes – described by Edwards on several occasions remind us of her burgeoning suffocation. It is only Eleanor, the younger sister, who perhaps begins to sense the inequalities in the behaviours and expectations of men and women.

The novel ends with the promise of spring – time has moved on, and not much has happened, yet we are left with a beautiful image of a time and a place. A richly rewarding reading experience, Winter Sonata is more complex than it might at first appear.