72. I CAPTURE the CASTLE

Dodie Smith 1948

Cassandra Mortmain at 17 lives with her family (her father, step-mother Topaz, brother Thomas, sister Rose, dog Heloise, cat Ab and helper Stephen) in an old English castle Godsend, it's tower Belmotte and a moat where she occasionally swims in the moonlight. Amidst this fairy tale and romantic setting is the reality that the castle is ancient and crumbling, their father is wasting his life away reading detective novels, they are very poor and hardly have any money for food, furniture and other necessities, and their life is soon to be very complicated by the arrival of Americans Simon and Neil Cotton. This delightful and enchanting book is divided into three books (the Sixpenny, Shilling and the Two-Guinea books) which are Cassandra's journals in her effort to become a writer and to capture the intricacies of her family life and the castle.

'I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. That is, my feet are in it; the rest of me is on the draining-board, which I have padded with our dog's blanket and the tea-cosy... And I have found that sitting in a place where you have never sat before can be inspiring-- I wrote my very best poem while sitting on the hen-house.'(opening lines)

'I have just remarked to Rose that our situation is really rather romantic--two girls in this strange and lonely house. She replied that she saw nothing romantic about being shut up in a crumbling ruin surrounded by a sea of mud. I must admit that our home is an unreasonable place to live in. Yet I love it.'(4)

'I am writing this journal partly to practice my newly acquired speed-writing and partly to teach myself how to write a novel--I intend to capture all our characters and put it in conversation... The only time father obliged me by reading one of them, he said I combined stateliness with a desperate effort to be funny. He told me to relax and let the words flow out of me.'(4)

'I finish this entry sitting on the stairs. I think it worthy of note that I never felt happier in my life- despite sorrow for father, pity for Rose, embarrassment about Stephen's poetry and no justification for hope as regards our family's general outlook. Perhaps it is because I have satisfied my creative urge; or it may be due to the thought of eggs for tea.'(11)

'When I close my eyes, I see different castles--one in the sunset light of that first evening, one all fresh and clean as in our early days here, one as it is now. The last picture is very sad because of all our good furniture has gone...'(35)

'But there is something I want to capture. It has to do with the feeling I had when I watched the Cottons coming down the lane, the queer separate feeling. I like seeing people when they can't see me.'(63)

'Gentlemen are men who behave like gentlemen.'(103)

'He sounded faintly sad. Perhaps he finds beauty saddening--I do myself sometimes. Once when I was quite little I asked father why this was and he explained that it was due to our knowledge of beauty's evanescence, which reminds us that we ourselves shall die. Then he said I was probably too young to understand him; but I understood perfectly.'(147)

'I was tired by then so I floated and Neil did too; it was lovely just drifting along, staring up at the stars. That was when we first heard the Vicar at the piano, playing "Air from Handel's Water Music, " one of his nicest pieces--I guessed he had chosen it to suit our swim, which I took very kindly.'(174)

'I do call it a sign of a beautiful nature if a girl who is in love and surrounded by all that splendor is lonely for her sister.'(193)

'I daresay I am being very sily but there it is! I DO NOT ENVY ROSE. When I imagine changing places with her I get the feeling I do on finishing a novel with a brick-wall happy ending--I mean the kind of ending when you never think any more about the characters...'(197)

'Just to be in love seemed the most blissful luxury I had ever known. The thought came to me that perhaps it is the loving that counts, not the being loved in return-- that perhaps true loving can never know anything but happiness. For a moment I felt I had discovered a great truth.'(224)

'Another great luxury is letting myself cry-- I always feel marvellously peaceful after that. But it is difficult to arrange times for it, as my face takes so long to recover; it isn't safe in the mornings if I am to look normal when I meet father at lunch, and afternoons are no better, as Thomas is home by five. It would be all right in bed at night but such a waste, as that is my happiest time. Days when father goes over to read in the Scoatney library are good crying-days.'(232)

'Man's extremity is God's opportunity... Of course, there are extremities at either end; extreme happiness invites religion almost as much as extreme misery.'(234)

'In addition, I think religion has a chance of a look-in whenever the mind craves solace in music or poetry--in any form of art at all. Personally, I think it is an art, the greatest one; an extension of the communion all the other arts attempt.'(234)

'I could hear rain still pouring from the gutters and a thin branch scraping against one of the windows; but the church seemed completely cut off from the restless day outside--just as I felt cut off from the church. I thought: I am a restlessness inside a stillness inside a restlessness.'(237)

"I've got to be needed, Cassandra-- I always have been. Men have either painted me, or been in love with me, or just plain ill-treated me-- some men had to do a lot of ill-treating, you know, it's good for their work; but one way or another, I've always been needed. I've got to inspire people, Cassandra--it's my job in life.'(274)

'And then--! Suddenly the whole plan was complete in my mind almost to the detail. But surely I meant it as a joke then? '(307)

'Now it's October. I am up on the mound, close to the circle of stones. There are still some bits of charred wood left from my Midsummer fire.'(330)

St. Martin's Press Edition
343 pages
Book borrowed from JRMD