'I sometimes think I see more than eccentricity in Kitty'
By sally tarbox TOP 500 REVIEWER on 17 April 2013
Format: Paperback
Published in 1905, this Edwardian melodrama is the story of William Ashe , a charming young politician whose career is in the ascendant, and his love for Kitty Bristol.
From the start we foresee problems: daughter of a dubious society hostess (" For meanness and vileness combined, the things I know of the woman who was Blackwater's wife have no equal in my experience"), Kitty might be expected to have been a failure as a political wife. But in addition there seems to be a determination on her part to act outrageously.
Although William is determined to cope ("She may scandalize half the world", he said to himself, stubbornly - "I shall understand her"), can her relentless misbehaviour be tolerated, especially when she is introduced to writer Geoffrey Cliff, regarding whom she admits frankly "he is bad, false, selfish, but he excites me" ?
As I read this novel, I was unclear as to whether Kitty was nothing but a selfish and outrageous minx or truly had some mental disorder thus meriting the reader's sympathies. For me the latter part of the novel dragged on somewhat, and my irritation with Kitty meant I felt little sorrow at the sad bits. ( )

"He sought disconsolately through all his pockets for the wherewithal to pay his fly, while the spring rain pattered on his wide-awake." This sentence alone is why i love turn of the century novels. You are always learning something new. While I had an idea what a "fly" was, a "wide-awake" was a complete mystery. Upon further research I learned that a "fly" was indeed what I thought; the 1904 horse and carriage version of our modern day taxi. A "wide-awake" took more looking but it turned out this was a type of hat worn by "religious types" in the late 19th century.

Beyond the language, this was also a morality tale that was wonderfully told because it was not revealed until the very end. The husband has refused to take his wife back because of her infidelity. The "religious type" in the above sentence responds to the husband who has said that his obligation to his wife has been cancelled by the laws of Christian faith. The Deacon replies "I do not so read it!" "Men say so, 'for the hardness of their hearts.' But the divine pity which transformed men's idea of marriage could never have meant to lay it down that in a marriage alone there was to be no forgiveness." I thought it interesting that this book dwells on the subject of separation and divorce and was the #1 bestseller in 1904. I always had the impression that in the beginning of the twentieth century, divorce was rarely discussed.

One last interesting item from this book. Again, researching the book further, I found that the author, Mrs. Humphry Ward, came from a prominent, literary London family and was strongly associated with the anti-suffragette party of the time...Unlike Mrs. Banks from the Disney movie, Mary Poppins, here was an author on the other side of the issue expressing her thoughts in a wonderfully written book.