Things My Mother Never Told Me - Hardcover

Morrison, Blake

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0701173432 ISBN 13: 9780701173432

Publisher: Chatto & Windus, 2002

Synopsis

In his acclaimed and much-loved memoir And When Did You Last See Your Father? Blake Morrison's mother remains a mysterious, shadowy figure. One of the many things that Kim Morrison never told her son was that she was born Agnes O'Shea, one of twenty children in an Irish family; he barely met his Irish relations; till her death he never knew that she was (and remained at heart) a Catholic. This is her startling and heart-wrenching story - and a son's search to uncover the truth about the pretty, reserved and remarkable Kerry girl who qualified as a doctor in Dublin in 1942, worked as an obstetric surgeon in British hospitals throughout the war, and then reinvented herself as a conventional English wife and mother. At the heart of the book is a passionate wartime love affair seen through the frank, funny, furious letters his parents wrote during their stormy courtship. Painfully honest, unusual, a new kind of memoir, Things My Mother Never Told Me paints an unforgettable portrait of a quiet, determined heroine for our times, but also brilliantly evokes a vivid, surprising picture of life and love in WWII, the obstacles they faced, the way rules were broken by even the nicest of girls, the jealousy of one doctor (his father) who was stuck in army camps far from the front treating syphilis and other everyday horrors. And at the same time an extraordinary anatomy of love and marriage. Against her husband's wishes, Kim went on working as a GP and doctor after the war and for the rest of her life - her one rebellion.

About this title

Review:

The impact of Blake Morrison’s memoir And When Did You Last See Your Father was considerable: in prose that combined lucidity and beauty with uncompromising honesty, Morrison granted the reader an insight into a family drama quite unlike anything we had encountered before--a virtual classic of literature about the family. In that book, Morrison’s mother was presented as a shadowy, usually silent figure; in Things My Mother Never Told Me, we are given her story, and it’s every bit as fascinating as anything in the earlier book. As before, the central themes of the new book concern secrets, and the slow unfolding of an (often painful) truth. Morrison’s mother kept many things from him--not least the fact that she never told him that before becoming Kim Morrison, she had previously been Agnes O’Shea, daughter of sizeable Irish family. Morrison tells us he was only vaguely aware of his Irish relations--but that was only one of the many revelations awaiting him.

As he set out to find the facts behind this deceptively quiet Kerry girl who had worked as a doctor in Forties Dublin (and subsequently in British hospitals during the war), he discovered that she had totally reinvented her personality. But the seemingly conventional housewife and mother she had elected to become was only part of the story. We are told of an all-consuming love affair during the war; we are given a strong and vivid portrait of everyday life in the hospitals and RAF training camps of the period (where Morrison’s father told the pilots of the dangers of venereal disease); and (most of all) we are taken into the world of a remarkable woman; Kim Morrison is an unsung heroine of a time increasingly distant from our own world.

Whatever our own relationships with our parents, it’s impossible to avoid identifying with Morrison’s candid and carefully structured memoir; the graceful prose involves us ever more in a narrative that has all the grip of a superior piece of fiction.--Barry Forshaw

Review:

"[Morrison's] prose has the diamond cut of a poet's eye, and his story is suffused with warmth and longing-he has brought [his mother] vividly to life in an outstanding work of family literature" (Independent)

"Honest, funny and touching, this is a loving tribute from a son to his mother" (Sunday Mirror)

"Morrison constructs the book beautifully, as always... Fine writing and expert editing...with Morrison's usual virtues of unsentimental observation and expert storytelling" (Sunday Times)

"A marvellous example of what a zen-like act of sustained attention can do to honour and illuminate the ordinary... It has a universality" (Evening Standard)

"A scintillating read... Not only a fine evocation of the period, but also a fascinating study of a marriage" (GQ)

About this edition

• Publisher: Chatto & Windus
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 0701173432
• ISBN 13: 9780701173432
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 352