A Month in the Country

Rating:
Summary: A literary gem: J.L. Carr's "A Month in the Country"
Review: "A month in the Country" is a literary gem. A unique book which gathers in its 135 pages a wonderful, well told story full of poetry. A twitchy, unhappy and shellshocked veteran of WW I, Tom Birkin, arrives in Oxgodby, a village in Yorkshire, hired by the Vicar, to restore a mural painting in the local church. In the time it takes him to delicately uncover and shed light on what was the work of a medieval artist, Burkin heals himself, assisted by the discovery of love, friendship and a cast of wonderful but fundamentally flawed characters. He comes to terms with his past and is prepared for what appears to be a bittersweet future. Carr writes with a light touch while not superficial; subtle but clearly not tentative. Included are interesting observations of art, lyric descriptions of a glorious English summer and some hilarious moments in his relations with some of the villagers. He brings us along a story that unfolds like flowers slowly opening to the sun, offering many precious moments which linger in you mind and tug at your heart. Like many, finishing a book always makes me sad but in this particular case, I had not only read some extraordinary literature, I was also being cut me off from a group of people that had become my friends and I wanted to know more about them.

Rating:
Summary: A short but wonderful novel
Review: A Month in the Country is unrelated (as far as I can tell) to the Turgenyev piece of the same name. It is, however, a wonderful book, made into a decent movie about 6 years ago, I believe.

It tells the story of Tom Birkin, recently returned from WW I, who goes to the town of Oxgodby to restore a medieval wall-painting in an old church. Over the course of his time there, he gets absorbed into the life of the town, falls in love, learns (and reveals) something about the nature of art, and the healing power of both art and love.

That makes it sound as if the book's some sort of mushy new-age blather, and it's not at all. It's a short and profoundly entertaining novel. I would have loved to have been assigned this in a high-school english class, because (1) Carr's vocabulary is remarkable, and the occasional strange words he uses are worth looking up (e.g., "sneck"), and (2) it has a lot of the sort of structure that one is forced to write about in English classes ("contrast the relationship between Birkin and his work with that between Moon and his...") but which in this book actually contributed something to the story -- there are multiple parallel threads in the book, and their inteweaving makes it richer. I could've written a decent essay about that...

Rating:
Summary: "Nothing's so secret as what's between man and wife."
Review: In "A Month in the Country", Tom Birkin arrives in the remote country village of Oxgodby to restore a medieval mural that has been discovered in a local church. Birkin is still recovering from WWI and suffers from nightmares about the trenches. He bears a permanent, hideous facial disfigurement, but his wounds are far deeper than this. Coming to Oxgodby is really a chance for Birkin to recoup some peace of mind. He also has domestic troubles in his past, and so the solitary workday spent restoring the mural becomes a healing process for Birkin. His intention is to work on the mural, maintain a solitary existence, and eek out the pittance he is paid for several months. And in one glorious summer, Birkin comes to terms with the horrors of his past.

The curiosity of the villagers soon pulls Birkin into the quaintness of village family life. Male companionship, in the form of the archeologist, Moon--a fellow WWI survivor offers a rare chance for Birkin to enjoy an equal intellect, but the company of the vicar's wife, Alice Keach proves to be at once the greatest distraction and the sweetest consolation. Mrs Keach is the second surprising treasure Birkin uncovers in Oxgodby.

The book is full of marvelous characters. I particularly enjoyed the precocious, wise-beyond-her-years, Kathy Ellerbeck. Even the sour Vicar, Keach, who appears dull at first, becomes interesting after Birkin visits the vicar and his wife at their bleak, vast dwelling (it doesn't qualify as a home). I enjoyed this book immensely--it's one of the very best books I've read this year and one I shall most definitely reread. "A Month in the Country" is a bittersweet tale of compromise, regret, acceptance, and the consolations that are necessary for survival. Above all, Birkin understands that "the bright belief that there will be another marvelous thing around the corner fades. It is now or never; we must snatch at happiness as it flies."--displacedhuman.

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Summary: Leisurely and lean evocation of rural England in the 1920s
Review: Like many others, I enjoyed this novella and will undoubtedly read it again. It is a slender book--both in length and in substance--but the lyrical quality of Carr's prose enhances a simple and charming "old-fashioned" story.

Tom Birkin returns from the First World War with a shattered body and to a shattered marriage. He spends a summer in a small church in a Yorkshire village and rescues a mural that had been covered by hundreds of years of paint and grime and had only recently been detected by the locals. As he restores the painting, he finds himself equally renewed, especially as several of the villagers adopt him as one of their own. There are a couple of small surprises concerning one of the friends he makes and the painting itself, but for the most part the story is like a leisurely vacation in the English countryside.

It's fair to compare this story to a Merchant-Ivory production (but without the lush landscapes). A period piece written in 1980, it feels like (as one reader points out) it could have been written in the 1920s. That is both the book's accomplishment and its weakness: although Carr impressively reproduces the tone of the era and its people, I couldn't help but compare his book to novels by, say, E. M. Forster (whose writing his occasionally resembles) or D. H. Lawrence and reflect that Carr just can't quite fill their shoes. (In his excellent introduction, Michael Holroyd reminds us that Carr initially wanted to invoke the work of Thomas Hardy, but, like Holroyd, I couldn't detect much of a likeness beyond the superficial.) Nevertheless, "A Month in the Country" is a worthwhile read, especially if you approach the book with reduced expectations.