I find myself at the end of a Barbara Pym reading binge--and in the midst of A Very Private Eye: An Autobiography in Diaries and Letters. Pym is often compared to Jane Austen, writing as she does about ordinary people with ordinary lives. I find her writing comforting, in these turbulent times and return to it now and again.
Pym's diaries and letters reveal so much about her--the years at Oxford and her unhappy penchant for falling in love and hanging on, even when it was clear the object of her love was no longer interested in her.But it was her writing during WWII that struck a chord with me. "Who knows what the war will bring though? Already to think is to be full of sorrow, but I am never without hope. The winter has never seemed so long or so cold as this year and I am sure I never had chilblains before. And now that I have come down to the ridiculous I can tell you that most of my hopes are very small ones and my pleasures too. Getting letters, finishing my blue tweed jacket, watching my bulbs sprout and flower (that's not so small), imagining that one day I shall see my friends again. I suppose everyone lives from day to day now and it really is the best way if you cannot see anything pleasant in the future." I had a friend to lunch last week, and we drank (a little) wine and talked about books. She emailed me later that it felt HUMAN to chat over coffee and talk about books. Indeed it did. I think Miss Pym would have approved. And may we all get through these troubled times, just as she did WWII.
