Crampton Hodnet

Description

INTRODUCED BY LOUIS DE BERNIERES 'I'm a huge fan of Barbara Pym' RICHARD OSMAN 'I'd sooner read a new Barbara Pym than a new Jane Austen' PHILIP LARKIN Formidable Miss Doggett fills her life by giving tea parties for young academics and acting as watchdog for the morals of North Oxford. Anthea, her great-niece, is in love with a dashing undergraduate with political ambitions. Of this, Miss Doggett thoroughly approves. However, Anthea's father, an Oxford don, is carrying on in the most unseemly fashion with a student - they have been spotted together at the British museum! But the only liaison Miss Doggett isn't aware of is taking place under her very own roof: the lodger has proposed to her paid companion Miss Morrow. She wouldn't approve of that at all. 'Brilliant, hilarious and so very, very English' DAILY MAIL 'My favourite writer . . . I pick up her books with joy' JILLY COOPER

Barbara Pym (1913-80) was born in Shropshire and educated at St Hilda's College, Oxford. When in 1977 the TLS asked critics to name the most underrated authors of the past 75 years, only one was named twice (by Philip Larkin and Lord David Cecil): Barbara Pym. Her novels are characterised by what Anne Tyler has called 'the heartbreaking silliness of everyday life'.

An entertainment that is funny, poignant, observant and truthful Pym at her absolute funniest * Daily Mail * The rare charm of Crampton Hodnet is in the glimpse it offers of Pym's imagination as it pauses for a moment in perfect understanding of a character. That sympathy stretches beyond the horizon of comedy * Time * Brilliant, hilarious and so very, very English * Daily Mail * I'd sooner read a new Barbara Pym than a new Jane Austen -- PHILIP LARKIN Barbara Pym is the rarest of treasures; she reminds us of the heartbreaking silliness of everyday life -- Anne Tyler My favourite writer . . . I pick up her books with joy -- Jilly Cooper I'm a huge fan of Barbara Pym -- Richard Osman