The Pastor's Wife by 'Elizabeth' (1914)

The biggest surprise must have been this book's size, to the author's fans, when it was first published. A good third bigger than her longest book to date, the main question must have been whether the author's wit could stand, extended to 500 pages. And, as they read, they must have been deeply gratified - it undoubtedly could. In many ways, this is her 'standard' story: young Englishwoman, rather green, goes romantically to live with new German husband on the piny plains of Pomerania, and gets an education in what a variety of experience she hasn't yet sampled. But what 'Elizabeth' manages to do this time is to focus our attention on the woman rather more thoroughly than her erring man. And, as predicated by the length, she takes it slowly, savouring many of the perhaps painful and emotional lessons Ingeborg has to learn with gentle wit that has a concomitant swift stab to it. That deepens the picture. This definitely has a more gentle slope to its topography than The Caravaners, its predecessor, which was rapier-like and a truly grand example of comedy. I wonder whether the death of Henning von Arnim, her husband, in 1910, caused a reflective reflex in the author, where she wanted, for the last time, to visit the theme that had made her famous, to make a final statement upon it. Whatever, this gently humorous novel is a joy comprised of one part sympathy and two parts schadenfreude; Ingeborg's daffy, stumbling realisations of the harsh realities of life form a counterpoint to a vision of compromised content in her life with a very faulty husband. A cynical outlook at its base perhaps, but likely a true one, and transformed by the author's talent.