LirazelAssociated University Presses, 1997 - 230 Seiten "Set in prewar and wartime London, this novel tells the story of Lirazel, named by her devoted father after the fairy daughter in Lord Dunsany's King of the Elfland." "Deeply attached to him, she wants no other life than to be with her father and his friends. These include a doctor, who has escaped from Hitler's Germany, and who finds the girl alluring. Also among their circle of friends are Robert, a young banker who had been at Oxford University and intended to become a clergyman, and Cyril, a West Indian cricketer playing at Lord's cricket grounds in the summer." "The idyll is shattered when her father contracts pneumonia while planning a holiday abroad with his daughter and dies. Lirazel is desolate. Robert takes care of all the formalities of death and looks after her. Lirazel's father had left her very little except for the house where they had lived so happily. She does not wish to give it up, and she marries the banker so as to continue living in the house. Though the doctor is angry about the marriage, it starts placidly, and she soon has a daughter, who is her delight." "Unexpectedly, since Lirazel had seen so little of her mother's family, a cousin calls on her and tells her that the family has learned that while at Oxford, Robert had had an affair with a young boy in the town. This news sheds light on her relationship with Robert. Being inexperienced, she had not known that their brief and infrequent lovemaking was unusual." "Cyril comes back into her life at that moment and shows her what lovemaking between a man and a woman should be, and Lirazel learns the joys of love." "Because their finances were tight, the young couple decides to sell her father's house and move out of London for the sake of her daughter. Then the war, which the whole nation had been expecting, breaks out, giving urgency to all the characters' plans."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Inhalt
7 | |
Chapter 2 | 22 |
Chapter 3 | 31 |
Chapter 4 | 43 |
Chapter 5 | 60 |
Chapter 6 | 72 |
Chapter 7 | 81 |
Chapter 8 | 90 |
Chapter 11 | 141 |
Chapter 12 | 150 |
Chapter 13 | 162 |
Chapter 14 | 173 |
Chapter 15 | 189 |
Chapter 16 | 206 |
Chapter 17 | 220 |
Epilogue | 229 |
Häufige Begriffe und Wortgruppen
arms asked Aunt Alice baby beautiful Blanche bookmaker brought called child Child's Hill Christopher Columbus clothes color cricket Cyril Cyril Connolly Daddy dark daughter dear doctor door dress England eyes face fairy father feel felt fetus flowers garden gave gone hair hands happened happy Henry homosexual hurt island Jamaica Joan kissed knew laughed leave lips Lira Lirazel little girl little princess lived London looked Lord's Cricket Grounds lover maid Mansfield College marriage married Mary mind mother moved never night Oscar Wilde Otto pain Parrish perhaps play Puerto Rico pulled realized remembered Robert Rupert Brooke seemed slowly smile soon stay stood suddenly sure sweet talk tears tell thought told took turned voice wait wanted watched West Indian woman women wondered young
Beliebte Passagen
Seite 120 - MY HEART aches, and a drowsy numbness pains My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk, Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk...
Seite 121 - Past the near meadows, over the still stream, Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep In the next valley-glades: Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Seite 187 - If I should die, think only this of me : That there's some corner of a foreign field That is for ever England. There shall be In that rich earth a richer dust concealed ; A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam, A body of England's, breathing English air, Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home. And think, this heart, all evil shed...
Seite 121 - Darkling I listen; and for many a time I have been half in love with easeful Death, Call'd him soft names in many a mused rhyme, To take into the air my quiet breath...
Seite 77 - ... beauty of the morning ; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky ; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. Never did sun more beautifully steep In his first splendour, valley...
Seite 136 - To regret one's own experiences is to arrest one's own development. To deny one's own experiences is to put a lie into the lips of one's own life. It is no less than a denial of the soul.
Seite 151 - It is quite true. Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.
Seite 135 - Why should I be bound to thee, O my lovely mirtle tree? Love, free love, cannot be bound To any tree that grows on ground.