My rating (4) is somewhat preliminary. This novel isn’t the kind of thing I usually read, but I’d like to read more. That said, I found Celia a bit difficult, both in following what was happening and in understanding the characters’ personalities as depicted by Young. I did find myself thinking quite often that Celia is something like me, and I enjoyed having that sort of relationship with a character. I’m going to try to come back to this review after I’ve read more novels in this area, to see how I feel about this one compared to those. ( )

I’m mixing up the order of my reviews here – with two other books waiting to be reviewed I decided to slot this one in first, for Jane’s lovely E H Young day. I have quite literally just finished the book – in fact more than half this review was written, while I was still reading, so intent was I upon the deadline. For today would have been Edith Hilda Young’s birthday. E H Young is definitely one of my favourite writers, so I really wanted to get my review up on the right day.

I chose Celia to read, one of only a couple E H Young novels I have still to read, and which fitted nicely into my ACOB.

In this novel there were some slight echoes of Chatterton Square – my favourite E H Young novel – in it’s depiction of middle class marriage. This is certainly a recurring theme for E H Young, and in this novel, she shines a keen light on three slightly mis-matched marriages.

“A family isn’t several separate persons. It’s a lot of–of dismembered people. Somebody has your head and another one has your hands and you have bits of all the others fastened onto you. You don’t belong to yourself, but then, they, poor things, don’t belong to themselves either.”

We find ourselves back in the familiar territory of Upper Radstowe between the wars, here forty-five-year-old Celia lives in a flat with her two children and architect husband. She is uninterested in the physical side of their relationship, contemptuous of her husband’s dull little house designs, though she keeps smiling kindly, and never rocks the boat. Tired too, of scrimping and saving for her family – while her brother’s family live so much more comfortably. Her only help is her daily, Miss Riggs, with whom Celia has a somewhat frank relationship. Miss Riggs lost her one love in the war, she talks about Fred as if he were only recently there. Celia often envies Miss Riggs her chaste memories of Fred, never having experienced the realities of married life.

Here we have the minutia of everyday life – the oppressiveness of domesticity, the weariness of years unvaried and unchanging. Celia is a typical E H Young character she wryly observes those around her and gives a good talking to where it’s needed. Though she hides her keen intelligence behind a veil of gentle vagueness. However, there is a frustration too.

“Men, she thought, always had this resource of attributing their failures to women…
‘Must we do everything?’ she asked herself angrily … ‘Bear their children and bring them up, manage the money, do without nearly everything we want and pretend we don’t want anything.’”

Susan; Celia’s niece – accompanies her aunt’s wealthy friend Pauline Carey on a short trip to Paris. Susan arrives home full of everything she did and saw, charmed by Mr Milligan Mrs Carey’s brother. Years earlier – unknown to everyone – Celia had loved Richard Milligan and it is the memory of this lost, long ago love that sustains her now. Susan delights in how like her aunt people say she is, and Celia imagining Richard seeing that likeness can’t help but feel a small pang of jealousy.

Celia, her brother John, and her sisters May and Hester were born into a family of drapers. John took on the shop, now a large, successful business and benefited from his father’s will more than any of his sisters. John – like his father before him – doesn’t approve of independence in women. Hester (who we don’t meet) has taken herself off to London and lives independently to the great disapproval and suspicion of John. May is married to solicitor Stephen, has three daughters – one of whom; Susan has turned the head of Celia’s son Jimmy – despite their being first cousins. John married Julia, a woman who sees herself as the perfect wife and mother, and to date has conformed to John’s ideal– they have six children. Julia is small, pretty and easily brought to tears – she sees it as her duty to dress nicely for people when she visits them – never mind the weather.

Celia, May and Julia – trip in and out of one another’s houses Julia and May meet up daily on their way back and forth to the shops, happily bickering. They are each watchful, as they carp and prey upon each other’s misdemeanours. Celia must also deal with her mother-in-law Mrs Marston who lives further along the terrace. It is, Celia acknowledges to herself, a somewhat narrow life.

Stephen suddenly announces he wants a little holiday of his own, a day or two away by himself – he has no idea where he will go and announces blithely he may just sleep under a haystack. No sooner has he told May, then he is off – and May trudges around as if she has been suddenly widowed. Julia, meanwhile, realises her eldest son Robert is desperate to not go into the drapers’ shop with his father as he is destined to – and sets herself up to save him.

“And she thought they were all rather pathetic, these men and women of her family. They were all more or less mis-mated yet they could not and they did not wish to break their bonds. Even she could not break hers. Though the one attaching her to Gerald had worn thin, it held still, and primitively, unreasonably, she resented the idea that the one from him to her had worn thin too.”

So, while Celia had often imagined May and John’s marriages to have been more successful than her own, we see, as the novel progresses, that none of these relationships are ideal.

E H Young’s domestic settings are not always comfortable – she portrays marriages of disappointment or inequality in this and other novels, and in doing so seems to question the very institution itself. She was, I firmly believe an important writer – and despite her legion of fans has been sadly neglected. Surely, she is someone who should be re-issued and introduced to a whole new audience. ( )

In Celia, one of E.H. Young’s later novels, the author shifts her focus from young, optimistic marriageable women to the middle-aged, married, and mostly disenchanted. Celia’s marriage to Gerald has little emotional or intellectual connection and she flat out avoids the physical aspects. She also must endure a truly horrible mother-in-law. But Celia finds genuine satisfaction in running her household, and raising her children. Celia believes her sister May and brother John are in healthier relationships, but as the novel unfolds it’s clear no one’s situation is perfect.

Celia’s disillusionment is fueled by memories of an affair from several years earlier; she can’t help feeling that life with Richard would have been more satisfying, even though deep down she knows that is not the case. These feelings resurface when Richard falls seriously ill and is being cared for by another friend. Celia knows surprisingly little about her sister May and her marriage to Stephen and likewise, her brother John and his wife Julia. Both of these couples put on a bold public face to mask their conflicts, and even in times of strife find it difficult to confide in anyone, even a close family member.

Most of this novel is spent inside Celia’s head, as she processes all of these relationships and explores her own feelings about Gerald, Richard, and life in general. While this made for sober reading, E.H. Young is so skilled at character development I found myself completely immersed in the story, and even relating to parts of it on a more personal level. ( )

This novel is a story of domestic simplicity that explores the intricate exchanges of relationships in quiet and mundane family settings. Celia is the protagonist, a middle aged woman with two children, married to a man she doesn't love. She married Gerald just before he shipped off to war, and did so out of sympathy and pity rather than passion. Her emotional disconnect is revealed at the start of the book.

Celia still lives in the town where she grew up, along with her brother and sister. May, her sister, married a childhood friend. They also have two children. Celia feels much closer to her brother-in-law, a lawyer with a quick wit. As for Celia's brother, John, he married the pretty and perfect Julia, a woman who glories in her role as mother and wife. The whole family considers Celia good-natured but dim-witted, all except Stephen, who sees the intelligence behind the languid nature and droopy eyes. Celia is content to foster this illusion, as it spares her from being unnecessarily involved.

As the story progresses, all three marriages encounter rough patches that reveal some of the darker secrets hidden within. Stephen takes an unexpected holiday that is completely out of character, and he doesn't tell May or their two daughters where he is headed. Julia decides she must take a stand against John for the sake of her oldest son, Richard, but when she does, John unexpectedly comes around and offers the boy what he wants, leaving Julia in the cold. Celia becomes an unexpected source of advice and support for both May and Julia, and even has her moment with John. Although all the situations are resolved - Stephen returns from his holiday, and John and Julia eventually reconcile - Celia and the reader have learned that these marriages have serious flaws. Stephen admits to Celia that he left to meet Hester, Celia's only other sibling who refuses to live near John and be under his thumb. Stephen and Hester discovered they were in love after he had already married May, but it was too late then and it is too late now. They go their separate ways after spending one afternoon together. John and Julia see their true nature for the first time, the ones beneath their habitual masks, but they can't accept that reality and retreat into their illusions. The couples will keep trecking along, and try to bury these inconvenient moments without dwelling on them.

Then there is Celia and her husband. She may have a great deal of intuitive wisdom about others and herself, but that does not help her to establish domestic bliss with Gerald. She doesn't love him, scorns his work as an architect but tries to hide it, and can't stand having sex with him. While Gerald was away during the war, Celia fell in love with another man, the brother of her best friend. They never consummated their love, but she has kept it alive all these years in memories and fantasies. When her love falls ill, and is thrust into her life more than he has been for years, she is faced with the horrible possibility that the love has been one-sided for many years. As her illusions are crumbling around her she also discovers new things about Gerald, and learns that her estimation of him may have been wrong all these years as well.

While a novel can be character driven and still captivate with its literary prowess, I found this one to be underwhelming. The characterization is wonderful, but it wasn't enough. The writing doesn't have the artistry to carry off a story that is so introspective. Honestly, I crawled through the reading, and was sometimes bored. It also didn't help that I gradually began to dislike Celia. By the end, I had more sympathy for Gerald. On the positive side, the book did have its moments where the suspense and action picked up and I was pulled in for a few chapters. The author superbly handled the nuanced multiplicity of relationships, and also let the reader infer information without being heavy handed. The writing is good and clean, if not masterful. Celia is a fine little story, but not one that inspires me to find more by this author. ( )

I have been avoiding writing a review of this novel because my take on it keeps changing. The book is like an onion. You keep peeling away at it and when you come to the center you find, not an onion, but a strawberry. (Bad analogy, but the best I can think of).

CELIA is the story of three marriages, none of which is a good marriage or a bad marriage, just middle-class people living out their lives in the 1930's. Celia is married to Gerald Marston, an indifferent architect who designs tacky little houses and doesn't make much money doing it. They married at the beginning of WWI, glassy-eyed with patriotism when couples wed because the boys were going off to war and it might be the only chance they had for happiness. Unfortunately, for Celia and Gerald, when he comes home they find they have nothing in common, except two wonderful children.

While Gerald was away, Celia had found her soul-mate in the brother of her best friend. He, too, was a soldier and he spent months recuperating from a leg amputation at his sister's home. Although their affair was not sexual, she knows that she could never love another man and for twenty years she has lived with the memory of their love. In her rather ugly flat (converted without grace by Gerald from a larger, private home) she becomes lost in her thoughts and often will mutter what she is thinking aloud, much to the chagrin or amusement of her husband and children. She escapes to her perfect little sitting room, just the right size for herself, and cherishes her memories of the beloved man who now lives a solitary and lonely life abroad,

The second marriage is Celia's brother's. John married a much younger woman, Julia, whose purpose in life is to be the "perfect" mother and best friend to her six children. She appears not more than a child herself, despite having a teen-aged son. She twists her husband around her finger with the ability to weep beautifully when she wants something or when she is chided for doing something inappropriate. In reality, she has a hard core, knows what she wants and uses her wiles to get it. Her chief delight is being the bearer of bad news and then helping the afflicted person to cope.

The third marriage is Celia's sister May and her husband Stephen. May is "stupid", but with the natural ability to create a beautiful environment around her. Stephen is a solicitor who has loved someone else from before he was married. The crisis in the novel is precipitated when he, on the spur of the moment, decides to take a trip without his wife.

This family is close and the women are constantly visiting each other. Their children drop in to Celia's house for her sympathetic ear because Celia has a way of helping the younger generation understand the painful process of growing up. She is the perfect mother and aunt who gives wise counsel, maybe because she is so divorced from her own life that she can manage to view young love objectively.

How these three couples work out their relationships and face their futures is the story in this book.

As I was reading, I bemoaned the situations of these three women. Celia cannot be with the man she loves, cannot stand her husband in bed, and is disappointed in his career of designing those unlovely houses. May is unimaginative, even though she has the gift of making everything around her beautiful; she runs a smooth house and bores her husband. Julia is a manipulator and cannot admit that she is an adult; she tries to be the child wife she thinks her husband wants.

BUT, after mulling the book for two weeks, I believe that Young had much more to discuss than the ennui of these marriages. Are these women victims of their social class or are they victims of their own ideas of themselves? Are the men keeping their wives in their place or just trying to do the best they can with what they can to make a home? Is everyone discontented because they talk to each other, but don't communicate with each other? . Should the ideals and dreams of youth be kept as a sacred flame or doused in the practicalities of life?

This is an inadequate review of a wonderful book. Each reader must decide if these characters are shallow or deep or just six people doing the best they can. ( )