The Taste of Sorrow
Its risible opening is a mixture of sexual fantasy and an account of the death of Maria Bronte nee Branwell, mother of the Bronte sisters. Clearly not a combination with a lot of potential, unless you're trying to be funny, and I don't think Morgan was. In short The Taste of Sorrow is a fictional version of the lives of the Bronte siblings. Once we get going it very quickly becomes utterly beguiling. It is a very emotional realisation of the lives of six people not least because it is their relationships with each other, as much as their relationship with their writing, that dictates the tone of the novel. It is easy to forget, seeing them as we do through the prism of their writing, that of course the defining feature of their lives was not their work but what they were to each other, to their friends, to their father and aunt, and in Charlotte's case to her husband. The lovely thing about The Taste of Sorrow is that the characters that are created, and created utterly without cliche, would make a very readable novel even had they never put pen to paper in any meaningful way. And of course three of the siblings don't ever do that.
One of the great delights of this book is that its opening section, focusing on Maria, Elizabeth and the very young Charlotte, is not rushed in order that we can get to the famous threesome. Instead Morgan takes real time to build a convincing portrait of the eldest sisters: brave and intelligent Maria, and kindly and steady Elizabeth. "Maria will inspire her, and Elizabeth will comfort her," says the Rev Bronte as he sends Charlotte to Cowan Bridge School after her sisters.
The portraits of the father and aunt are slightly tending to caricature, not unlike Nellie and Joseph in Wuthering Heights, but are nonetheless sharply drawn. Swift dialogue nails a temperament to the page:
"Pray for Lord Byron's soul?" Again the stony chuckle. "Well, I dare say you can try."
And Aunt Branwell crystallises as the words flow past.
The emotional enormity of those early losses manages to be both elegant and unsparing. Charlotte tries to convey Cowan Bridge to Branwell:
"You couldn't get near the fire," she said at last. "The big girls shut you out so. You hung about hoping... But mostly you had to imagine yourself warm. You had to have the fire inside."
And when the time for Elizabeth's funeral comes Charlotte cannot console herself, as she had done since she was a child who'd just lost her mother, by thinking of her two elder sisters as barriers against the world leaving her safely in the middle of her siblings. After an abortive, and prophetic, attempt to push Branwell forward in the funeral procession, "You're the boy, you should follow Papa," realisation dawns that she is now at the head both literally and metaphorically and she doesn't like it, not one bit:
So she went first; after the coffin (so light, swooping up), after Aunt and Papa, she led the way, and stepped out into the gentle sunlight with such a feeling of stinging merciless exposure that she wanted to throw her arms in protection against a world besetting her; a world where there was no longer any middle to inhabit, only edge, brunt naked extremity.
Throughout the prose is this rich, this emotional. However it suits the biographical tale, and balances the physical bleakness of the lives of the four Brontes who reach adulthood, and the end result feels balanced, and witty, and light. There are lovely moments throughout, though we immerse ourselves in Branwell's nightmare and Charlotte's depressions, as we must.
If I had read the first page in a bookshop I'd have dropped this book like a hot brick. Which would have been a shame. I read it only because it was lent by a friend with a strong recommendation. In the end it was such a great pleasure, despite knowing the facts of the Brontes inside out, to see them walking and talking and writing and thinking in front of me. I loved it so much that I got my paws on a copy of Morgan's Passion
What do you think of using real lives as the mainstay of a novel?
I'm glad to hear you liked this--it seems to be getting good reviews all around. I used the last bit of my UK cash to pick up a copy last year at Heathrow, but I haven't read it yet. I am glad I got it over there, because the US version is titled Charlotte and Emily, which I find more than a little appalling!
Posted by: Teresa | June 03, 2011 at 10:12 PM
Teresa - what a ghastly change of title! And it really isn't the Charlotte and Emily Show, which was just why I liked it.
Posted by: Juxtabook | June 04, 2011 at 11:34 AM