Another book I don't know what to think of... it ALMOST did it, but not quite. As if Margaret didn't quite dare to take it to the level it could have been.

I didn't like most of the characters. Tessa grew on me. I think I liked old Charles best. I think the best part of the book was the little tea discussion Tessa and Charles had. I wish Charles had told Tessa to move to live with him and become his little girl so that she could have had a life.

Lewis... a disgusting piece of crap. And he killed her. As certainly as if he had shot her. It was his fault that Florence said what she said, he should have taken better care of her during the journey to Brussels, and then the window. Selfish little piece of shit.

But Florence... that bitch was something. How can you accuse a 15 years old of seducing an adult man?
And Lewis, f-ing p-ile. He would have f-d her had she not died. She was 15, and he had known her since she was a little girl, if not even earlier. And he was like twice her age.

Oh, and it's f-ing misogynist and racist as well.

**It's really hard to take a book seriously in which a main character dies from trying to open a window.**

I enjoyed this novel very much. It has wonderful characters, and it’s well-written and skillfully plotted. First published in 1924, it’s set in the Austrian Alps and in London. The novel revolves around musical genius, and the way that polite British society deals with crazy musicians.

The first character to be introduced is Albert Sanger, a brilliant musician who lives a chaotic life - travelling around the continent, staying with long-suffering friends, sleeping with their wives, borrowing money from them, and generally abusing their hospitality. But in the spring and early summer, Sanger and his family go to a chalet in the Alps. All his friends are invited to come too, and many of them do, with all household arrangements managed by Sanger’s sensible oldest daughter, Kate. Sanger has had two wives die on him, and as the novel begins, he has seven children, mostly in their teens, and a rather greedy mistress.

One of his friends is Lewis Todd, who is also a reprobate and a musical genius, just beginning to get some attention in Europe for his work. His temperament – untidy, ill-spoken, often rude, careless of everything and everybody, given to mad fits of inspiration – fits right in, and he’s very close to all of Sanger’s children. He has a special longstanding affection for Tessa, the 15-year-old middle child.

All the Sanger children are interesting, and their anarchistic household makes for great writing. Their education is entirely slipshod, but they are right in the middle of the best of European culture, so they are both innocent and sophisticated.

Not far into the book, Sanger dies, and this is not a spoiler, since it’s announced in the first line of the novel. It’s mentioned that, while he’s lauded everywhere in Europe, nobody in England knows who he is. At his death, the house is full. Between his children, his mistress, and a selection of family friends (including Lewis Todd), everything becomes even more disordered. One daughter has already run off with an older family friend, although everything works out quite well with this. However, Lewis becomes worried that the two middle daughters, Tessa and Paulina, need protection. He writes to their mother’s brothers, suggesting they be sent to school.

And so we move to a pleasant, orderly household in London, where the children’s uncles and cousin live. Their cousin, Florence, is a sensible and civilized young woman in her 20s, used to running her widowed father’s house. She decides to go with her uncle to fetch the children. But the beauty of the Alps overcomes her, and for her, Lewis Todd embodies this broodingly lovely romantic world. He becomes besotted with her too. And so they marry, and she takes both him and the children back to London.

Neither the children, nor Lewis, are particular domesticated, however, and so this is a thorny situation. London is not really ready for Lewis Todd’s music either - although, now that he’s dead, they’re finally discovering Sanger. The novel contrasts the demands of polite society and the equally insistent demands of genius, as it shows how the transplanted Sanger household comes apart. Even Florence discovers that she is not as genteel as she thought she was.

Tessa is a great character, the constant nymph of the title. I did have some reservations about the tragic fate that the author arranges for her. However, Kennedy handles tragedy with the same delicacy in which she moves through all other facets of the human experience.

This is a novel that will elicit complex reactions.

It's engaging and enjoyable while simultaneously being cringe-worthy and irritating. In some ways it has aged well, yet the ways in which it is dated are deplorable.

The blithe attitude towards what would now be considered grooming/ephebophilia and the ambivalent but casual anti-semitism have been mentioned in other reviews, so I'll simply agree that it's hard to gloss over them.

Apart from these, the thing which most annoyed me from the middle to the end of the narrative is that the author clearly wants readers to blame or laud the women for their upbringing as though they had any say in it. Florence is as much a product of her environment as Tessa is. I found the contrast Charles sees between his daughter and his niece rather traitorous and hypocritical. Portraying the battle between the 'bohemian' and 'civilized' in this way is facile and unsatisfying.
Considering how willing Kennedy is to quietly demystify some of the glamour surrounding so-called Great Men, I rather wish she had gone further. Also, the ending is melodramatic, and you can see it coming a mile away.

Ultimately, though Kennedy has some interesting insights, there's something uneven about her development of the characters and the plot.

I know it’s of it’s time, but I couldn’t get past the creepy pedophilia and the anti-semitism (at this point in her career, Kennedy really loathed the Jews, and apparently her first novel was as bad, though given her upbringing it’s not entirely surprising). If I could squint past these issues, the Sangers are each a marvellous creation. But given the love triangle at the centre of the book involves a man in his 30s lusting over a 14 year old - apparently a common trope in fiction back in the early 20th Century - it’s hard not to feel ick about it. (Did I mention the anti-semitism... I’ve never blanched and cringed so much at the word Jew - already a harsh word even when said in a neutral or positive way).

Really surprised by how much I liked this. A sprawling cast of characters, but with a few key personalities at the center holding it all together, and a great wisdom about human affairs underscoring it all too. I suspect I'll be revisiting this later on.

Another book I don't know what to think of... it ALMOST did it, but not quite. As if Margaret didn't quite dare to take it to the level it could have been.

I didn't like most of the characters. Tessa grew on me. I think I liked old Charles best. I think the best part of the book was the little tea discussion Tessa and Charles had. I wish Charles had told Tessa to move to live with him and become his little girl so that she could have had a life.

Lewis... a disgusting piece of crap. And he killed her. As certainly as if he had shot her. It was his fault that Florence said what she said, he should have taken better care of her during the journey to Brussels, and then the window. Selfish little piece of shit.

But Florence... that bitch was something. How can you accuse a 15 years old of seducing an adult man?
And Lewis, f-ing p-ile. He would have f-d her had she not died. She was 15, and he had known her since she was a little girl, if not even earlier. And he was like twice her age.

Oh, and it's f-ing misogynist and racist as well.