Good Evening, Mrs Craven: The Wartime Stories of Mollie Panter-Donnes (Persephone Classics) - Softcover

Mollie Panter-Downes

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1906462011 ISBN 13: 9781906462017

Publisher: Persephone Books Ltd, 2008

Synopsis

Mollie Panter-Downes was noted for her wit, perception and incisiveness thanks to her reflections on English domestic life during the war years. This collection of her short stories explores the common themes of the day, discussing fear, separation, evacuations and the wartime obsession with food.

About this title

Synopsis:

For fifty years Mollie Panter-Downes' name was associated with "The New Yorker", for which she wrote a regular "Letter from London", book reviews and over thirty short stories; of the twenty one in "Good Evening, Mrs Craven", written between 1939 and 1944, only two had ever been reprinted - these very English stories have, until now, been unavailable to English readers. Exploring most aspects of English domestic life during the war, they are about separation, sewing parties, fear, evacuees sent to the country, obsession with food, the social revolutions of wartime. In the "Daily Mail" Angela Huth called "Good Evening, Mrs Craven" 'my especial find' and Ruth Gorb in the "Ham & High" contrasted the humor of some of the stories with the desolation of others: 'The mistress, unlike the wife, has to worry and mourn in secret for her man; a middle-aged spinster finds herself alone again when the camaraderie of the air-raids is over...'

About the Author:

Mollie Panter-Downes (1906-97) was brought up by her mother in Sussex. She published her first novel, The Shoreless Sea, when she was seventeen, which was a bestseller. She wrote three more popular novels as well as articles, short stories, and the very popular column, Letters from London, for the New Yorker.

About this edition

• Publisher: Persephone Books Ltd
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 1906462011
• ISBN 13: 9781906462017
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 240