A review by sarahmatthews
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

medium-paced

The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford

Read in Braille

Hamish Hamilton

Pub. 1945, 192pp

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This funny, charming book starts off in the English countryside, in the early 1900s, at the Radlett family house, describing life growing up in the home of a very eccentric and overbearing father (based on Nancy Mitford’s own), it’s a satire of the aristocracy that’s witty and surprising.

Our narrator is Fanny, cousin to the 7 Radlett children, who stays with Uncle Matthew and Aunt Sadie often due to her absent and rather disgraced parents. 

Fanny is brought up by Aunt Emily, a genuinely thoughtful and caring person and spends a large amount of her holidays with her cousins. She’s most friendly with Linda, who we realise as the narrative progresses is the centre of the novel. Linda’s quite a character; self absorbed, outspoken, a risk taker, and hopelessly in love with the idea of being in love.

Fanny and Linda see Linda’s older sister, Louisa, find a husband and escape from the restrictions imposed by Uncle Matthew and are impatient and jealous. Two years later, when it’s their turn, they persuade Aunt Sadie to let them spend their summer season in London, and spend it yearning for their adulthood to begin:

“It was a house with so little character that I can remember absolutely nothing about it, except that my bedroom had a view over chimney-pots, and that on hot summer evenings I used to sit and watch the swallows, always in pairs, and wish sentimentally that i too could be a pair with somebody.”

They go to dances and enjoy the feeling of being grown ups for a few weeks. Linda’s story continues from here with many dramatic twists and turns. As the outbreak of World War 2 grows closer she finds herself in Paris:

“She always loved the spring, she loved the sudden changes of temperature, the dips backward into winter and forward into summer, and, this year, living in beautiful Paris, her perceptions heightened by great emotion, she was profoundly affected by it. There was now a curious feeling in the air, very different from and much more nervous than that which had been current before Christmas, and the town was full of rumours. Linda often thought of the expression ‘fin de siecle’. There was a certain analogy, she thought, between the state of mind which it denoted and that prevailing now, only now it was more like ‘fin de “vie’.”

this is a wonderful coming of age story (always a treat) and I’m so pleased that it’s the start of a series! Having been written when it was, however, there’s some outdated language, reflecting many of the views held at the time. 

There are some great comic creations ; I particularly liked Davey and Lord Merlin for their eccentricity and warmth. The writing is so funny, the characters endearing because of and despite their many and obvious flaws, and I enjoyed being in their fanciful world for a while.