Excellent review – it reminded me that I read the Virago edition years ago. It was very well written, but I thought very sad, so I don’t think I will be re-reading it in the near future.

The Rector’s Daughter by F. M. Mayor book review | The TLS

Taschenbuch. Condition: Neu. Neuware - A wonderfully moving, harrowing but ultimately uplifting novel of love. 368 pp. Englisch. However, as I finish a lukewarm review of The Rector’s Daughter, I am chastened by the memory of my initial response to Mollie Panter-Downes’s One Fine Day. Who knows, perhaps a re-read of The Rector’s Daughter would give me an equally enthusiastic second impression? Afterwards she became an actress. She later turned to writing. Her first book was a collection of short stories, Mrs Hammond's Children, published in 1901 under the pseudonym Mary Strafford.Dora is also a spinster, but less angsty. I think I would have rather enjoyed a novel from Dora’s perspective… I agree, and believe that The Rector’s Daughter is nothing short of a masterpiece. My essay on it will be published in the Spring 2023 issue of Slightly Foxed. In 1903 she became engaged to a young architect, Ernest Shepherd, who died in India of typhoid before Mayor was able to travel out to join him. She never married, and lived closely with her twin sister Alice MacDonald Mayor (1872–1961).

The Rector’s Daughter’ by F.M. Mayor | Bag Full Of Books ‘The Rector’s Daughter’ by F.M. Mayor | Bag Full Of Books

Flora Macdonald Mayor (20 October 1872, Kingston Hill, Surrey – 28 January 1932, Hampstead, London), was an English novelist and short story writer, who published under the name F. M. Mayor. This is a novel about how hard it is to understand other people, and how many misunderstandings and even tragedies arise from it.”– Harriet, Harriet Devine’s Blog Thank you, Marybel. I loved to hear about your discovery of this beautiful book and that your librarian recommended it. I will be writing more about it soon. I really enjoyed this book, and at times thought of it in a similar way to One Fine Day in wishing to re read. l hoped you'd talk about The Third Miss Symon's as I didn't enjoy that so much. ReplyIt is usually easy to give reasons why a book didn’t work for me. Indeed, they are few more satisfying activities than laying into a poorly written novel… but The Rector’s Daughter isn’t poorly written.

The Rector’s Daughter – F.M. Mayor – Stuck in a Book The Rector’s Daughter – F.M. Mayor – Stuck in a Book

Her best-known novel is The Rector's Daughter (1924). (In October 2009 this was described in the BBC's 'Open Book' programme as one of the best 'neglected classics'.) The feeling of pity for Mary is completely overpowering. Even though Mary never complained of her lot in life and never demanded pity. This characteristic of Mary’s personality, for me, added greatly to the poignancy of the book. The Rector’s Daughter by the cruelly underrated FM (Flora Macdonald) Mayor is a book worthy to rank with anything that George Eliot or Jane Austen set their hand to. Published in 1924 by Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, it is one of those curious novels in which a cauldron of suppressed emotion and unrequited love boils away behind a landscape in which, for all practical purposes, hardly anything happens.The Rector’s Daughter (1924) concerns the life and ill-fated love of Mary Jocelyn, the rector’s daughter in question. She is motherless, and lives a life of obedient graciousness towards her father – who is deeply intellectual, but not able to show his love for his daughter. I think Mary was supposed to be in the mold of silently passionate women, having to be content with their lot. A bit like Jane Eyre, perhaps… but then I have always thought Jane Eyre a little overrated. Here she is: Mary is thirty five years old when she meets the love of her life – a scholarly man, similar in this aspect to her Father – a man called Robert Herbert who becomes a close friend of the family. With Robert, Mary discovers an intelligent mind, a passion for reading and their friendship gradually develops into a very deep love – which consumes Mary in ways, she had not thought previously possible. As with all other things in life, Mary loves Robert passionately and in her mind contemplates a life with him, filled with love and light and family. But what happens to Mary is a fate too cruel to behold and as a reader we share Mary’s feelings of dismay and disappointment. Had I simply missed this sort of thing at the beginning, or did Mayor alter the tone? I’m not suggesting that all novels ought to be comic novels, but without a slightly ironic eye, or dark humour, or even a slight reflective smile, I am rather lost. This came too late in The Rector’s Daughter– or at least I missed it. Hilary wrote in her review at Vulpes Libris that “There is no distancing irony or humour – its serious tone is relentless.” I didn’t find it quite relentless, but otherwise I agree with this sentence (although Hilary, as you’ll see at the bottom, was overall more positive about the novel.) I admire good comic writers so much more than I admire good poignant writers – it is so much more difficult to be comic – but maybe that is simply horses for courses.

The Rector’s Daughter (1924) – The Cambridge F.M. Mayor’s The Rector’s Daughter (1924) – The Cambridge

Condition: Very Good. Ships from the UK. Former library book; may include library markings. Used book that is in excellent condition. May show signs of wear or have minor defects. I haven't even heard of The Days of Abandonment – but I don't think you're selling it to me now! Reply Legget, Jane (2 March 1988). Local Heroines: A Women's History Gazetteer of England, Scotland and Wales. Pandora. ISBN 9780863580376– via Google Books. But, Dora, don’t you think there is a Love ‘Which alters not with Time’s brief hours and days, / But bears it out even to the edge of Doom’?” A robin flew up to greet them; a toad crawled forth and squatted on the path, turning his bright eyes to Mary while she talked to him… Mary and Dora stopped to look through the gap in the hedge at the view beyond, quiet, domestic, English scenery – a pond, meadows, and elm trees. These are the solace of the lonely in the country.”Lovely and impassioned, Rachel! I am sorry to disappoint (my main feeling was "Won't Rachel be CROSS.") I did read The Third Miss Symons a few years ago, and remember feelings similarly underwhelmed – not that I dislike either book, just I didn't like them as much as I thought I would. But I daresay one day I will read The Squire's Daughter anyway!