The Spring Begins by Katherine Dunning

First of all, I just want to thank everyone who visited Caro’s Bookcase last month. My views have continued to increase with each month since I started this blog a year and a half ago, which is very encouraging. But when I checked my stats on 4 May you could have knocked me over with a feather. On that single day this blog had 733 views! Which, to put it in context, is more I had in my first two months of blogging. And, yes. I do realise that my stats may sound little league to some, but as I am only competing with myself, I’m pretty thrilled. There are so many other ways that you could be spending your time, so I just want to say that I am very appreciative to all of you who carve out some of your valuable time and spend it here with me.

As I mentioned in my last post, I got completely swept away with Katherine Dunning’s 1934 novel, The Spring Begins. I meant to sit down and just read a couple of chapters, but Dunning’s writing made it necessary to keep reading. Her descriptions of setting are gorgeous. The women in this book are so well described, and you cannot help but feel for each of them. And I think Dunning does a fantastic job of capturing the tension, unease, and vulnerability of being a woman, especially—I assume—a woman in domestic service in the 1930s.

Despite the title, this book is set in the heat of summer. The spring referred to is a figurative one alluding to the awakening of three women. At least, that’s what I inferred from the title! Lottie is a young nurse maid who cares for the two Kellaway girls, and is painfully innocent and fearful of the world of men. Maggie, the Kellaways’ scullery maid, is more knowing of men, but perhaps not as experienced with them as Cook seems to think. The oldest of the three women, Hessie, is a spinster and governess to the two Benson girls at the rectory. When her younger sister gets engaged she faces a crisis. All of these women are domestic servants within two neighbouring homes. Despite their proximity to each other, these women rarely interact, and the narrative switches from one woman’s perspective to another throughout the book. 

This is the passage that told me that me I was going to get on well with this book.

On the way to the child's bed Lottie could see herself in the long mirror of the wardrobe as she went by. The glass gave her back a strange reflection, as if her white figure had sunk deep down into the mirror's dark silver, and when she paused to wave her arms up and down she looked really queer. Her nightgown floated mistily around her and, with her startled face, startled by her own appearance, she looked like a phantom figure that had blown in from the night itself, its flapping wings disturbing the pressing darkness. (5)

The image is a beautiful one, but I think it also points to Lottie’s innocence. She is not much more than a child looking after children with all of the fascination with her reflection in the dark that one would expect of her charges. But then we see an awareness of her body and a dismissal, or a covering over, of it at once.

If she just turned quickly on her toes like the children did when they were pretending to be fairies blown through the garden by the wind, her nightgown fled out away from her, leaving her body bare and light against the air. But it was not delicate or nice to think of herself as naked. It was all right from her head down to the top of her collar, and from her knees down to her toes she was flesh and blood again, but in between there was nothing at all—just a conveniently sized dummy's model on which to hang her blue gingham frock and white apron. (5)

That it is not “delicate or nice to think of herself as naked” points to the narrative about the female body she has internalised from Nurse, the woman she works under in the Kellaway home, and likely what she was taught at the orphanage where she grew up. The combination of Lottie’s innocence and Nurse’s worrying fascination with warning Lottie that all men are bad and not to be trusted, even ones that appear to be kind, makes Lottie fearful of coming into any contact with men. 

Lottie’s love of the children she cares for, especially for the younger girl, Isobel, was really sweet to read. At times Isobel clings to Lottie and seems to really respond to Lottie’s love. Although, I did worry at times that the elder girl, Anne, didn’t get the same outpouring of love from Lottie, or anyone else, and while there is not so much as a hint that this is the case, it did worry me that Anne just about fades into the background.

Maggie, the Kellaways’ scullery maid, seems to be more sure of herself than Lottie and Hessie. She may have the lowest position among the indoor servants in the Kellaway house, Cook may rag on her, and her attic bedroom may be the hottest room in the house, but she has a spirit that will not be tamped down.

Maggie leant farther out of the window. Gazing down at the garden and sea and up at the sky she felt as if she owned them all by virtue of the fact that she alone was looking at them. Her arms were damp with dew. Nothing stirred anywhere. No sound came from the sea, or from the birds either. Maggie ran her hands up through her hair. It was dark and shiny and waved naturally, thank God. She felt the back of her strong round neck. Yes, but for her hands and feet she was a girl well worth looking at, and Cook could say what she liked. (63)

Maggie flirts with whom she likes, from the hired waiter to the head gardener, propriety be damned. Although I worried about her less than the other women, I still had a niggling feeling in the back of my mind that perhaps she was not as capable of looking after herself around men as she might think.

Hessie, the governess at the rectory, spends a lot of time playing out scenarios in her head. At one point I had to go back and reread a section because I thought, “Wait. How would she have been privy to that conversation between Mr. and Mrs. Kellaway?” only to discover that Hessie was simply fantasising about what the couple might have said in a certain circumstance. Of all of the women in this book it took me the longest to warm up to Hessie. While holding the place of governess, she thinks of herself as a lady, and looks down on others. At times she is downright cruel, making herself come off poorly in the process. 

At the annual summer fête that the Kellaways host, she bullies a little boy, who does not know her, into joining in on “Here We Go Gathering Nuts in May”. She picks him up, despite him urging, “Let me go—let me go—”. So painfully awkward. All through the game she is fantasising about what game she will organise once this one is over. She imagines Mr. Saul, the curate, alongside, because of course she is doing all of this to get his attention and show she would make an ideal clergyman’s wife.

Panting a little, Hessie dropped the child, who glowered at her ungratefully and ran away. Now what should she suggest? A tug-o’-war? With her on one side and Mr. Saul on the other. That would be fine! His side would win, of course. A man was always gallant to a defeated woman. Besides, men were the stronger sex, they should domineer and win, and then be gentle towards the conquered. Strength and gentleness combined, and when it was over he would say, “That was a splendid game! Your little team fought gallantly but you need a rest now, Miss Price. Come—let me get you an ice.” Then side by side they would walk off, he glancing down at her, she up at him, admiringly, intimately. (132)

But it becomes increasingly apparent that Hessie lives in her imagination as a way to escape reality. The scene continues,

The game was ending now. Hessie ran forward and clapped her hands. But Mr. Saul was not there! He was threading his way through the outer fringe of children. The smile died from Hessie's lips. She put her hand to her head. (132)

As the book goes on I found myself empathising with Hessie more. I think she shows the most growth over the course of the summer, and she has the furthest to go to even recognise what is happening to her.

Supposing she screamed now. Just dropped the plates and opened her mouth and screamed. Hessie bit her under lip as she ran out into the kitchen. She laid the plates with a clatter onto the draining-board by the sink, and pressed her hands to her head. How could she live through Hilda's wedding, and afterwards, too? Evenings alone with Mother, while Hilda sat with her husband, and afterwards Hilda and Albert went, upstairs together. Hilda would be a wife, a married woman. Hilda would come back to see them, and she'd talk about ‘my husband’ and Mother and she would exchange meaning glances, leaving Hessie outside the fraternity of married women. (146)

From the start, Hessie is on the outside, standing apart in her keenness to be seen as a lady, or at least not expose herself as not being one. She is one of the surplus women left over from the First World War, and with each year it becomes increasingly unlikely that she will ever get married. I won’t spoil how her story progresses, but it is not the only aspect of this book that took me by surprise.

Well, if the length of this review is any indicator, I loved this book. It is not a plot-y book, but how the narrative alternates between these three women’s perspectives kept me glued to the page. I wouldn’t be surprised if this makes it on my top ten books of the year. There is usually at least one book from the British Library Women Writers series to be found there. I expect The Spring Begins will be on many other readers’ lists too.

Thank you to British Library Publishing for kindly sending me a copy of The Spring Begins for review. As always, all opinions on the book are my own.

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