Trying to do good

Poor Caroline is a novel by Winifred Holtby, best known for the modern classic South Riding. I have also read her book The Land of Green Ginger which I briefly review in this blog.

Caroline is the main character in this novel but she doesn’t ever speak directly to the reader and we see what she does and says through the eyes of the people around her. The story is set in the inter-war years and Caroline is a spinster woman who is trying to do good and raise the moral standards of the nation. She develops an organisation to make pure, and Christian, films for the masses and accumulates a group of other people to assist, all of whom have their own motives for being involved and all of whom are using Caroline and her cause.

The book starts with Caroline’s distant relatives talking about her funeral and you can see that they care little about her. Each chapter is then about one of the people involved in this organisation and explains why they are part of it and what they hope to get out of it. They include an impecunious playboy, a Jewish man hoping to get his son into a good school, a scarred but well-meaning priest and an American screenwriter looking to make a name for himself. The book ends where it began with the family discussing Caroline’s dreams and legacy.

This is a sharply witty book which has a lot of things to say about the class system and how single women of little fortune were regarded at the time. Most of the characters dismiss Caroline but the reader understands that she is desperate to make a difference, seeks a purpose in her life and is an incredibly hard worker.

Parts of this book are sad and some of it is very funny. All of it is cleverly put together and I enjoyed it a lot.