Who remembers Marghanita Laski? The photograph suggests a woman who would always make quite an impression, but her fame revolved not around her looks, but around her talent for writing, for public speaking and for her extraordinary intellect. In the 1950s and 60s, she was a household name appearing regularly on British radio and television.
When she wasn’t in the studios, she wrote a clutch of well-received novels set around the time of the Second World War, several now re-printed by Persephone Books, and I have just finished The Village. As it is the only one of hers I’ve read, I’m not going to claim to be any sort of expert, but it certainly fitted happily into the groove of mid 20th century British novels I described when I wrote about RC Sherriff’s novel Greengates (that the language will be fresh, interesting but simple, the plots will feature everyday events and locations, the writing will probably start at the beginning, have a middle and an end just where you expect them to be, will be rich in observation, have comic touches and relatable characters, and will warm your heart).
The Village is set in 1945, indeed it starts on VE Day as the inhabitants of a small village on the outskirts of London, Priory Dean, emerge from behind their blackout curtains to celebrate the end of the War in Europe. The plot is driven by the surprisingly strong survival of a destructive British class structure, and Laski paints a terrible but highly plausible picture of community snobbery, genteel poverty, and the rise of the labouring classes, who, heaven forbid, might even vote for Mr Attlee. All the happy mixing of the classes during the War, embodied in the night shifts of First Aid Duty shared by Mrs Trevor, wife of a retired army officer, and her cleaner, Mrs Wilson, will be forgotten as if it had never happened. When young Margaret Trevor, untalented and unloved, falls in love with working class Roy Wilson, already earning an enviable £15 a week as a printer’s compositor, class prejudice will threaten the couple’s happiness as harshly as any star-crossed lovers in an Austen or Trollope novel.
Priory Dean is a thinly disguised version of Abbots Langley, a large village in Hertfordshire just beyond Watford, now mostly famous as the site of the ‘Warner Brothers Harry Potter Experience’. This is where Laski lived in some comfort right through the War (1937-45) in The Abbot’s House. 1937 was the year she married John Howard, a publisher (founder of the Cresset Press) whom she met while she was studying at Somerville College, Oxford. She had been born in Manchester into a wealthy Jewish family: her father was President of the London Committee of Deputies of British Jews, her uncle, Harold Laski, was a well-known campaigning Socialist, an Economics Lecturer at the LSE and the highly vocal Chairman of the Labour Party during the War, later pushed aside by a nervous Clement Attlee: ‘a period of silence on your part would be welcome.’
After the War, Marghanita Laski became a well-known personality, appearing on What’s My Line, Any Questions and The Brains Trust. This last programme is worth noting, particularly if you are ever interested in the question of whether our media has been ‘dumbed down’. The panel of ‘Brains’ answered questions submitted by members of the public, and alongside Marghanita appeared, among others, Sir Isaiah Berlin, AJ Ayer, AJP Taylor, Malcolm Muggeridge, Bertrand Russell, Jacob Bronowski, Harold Nicolson and CS Lewis. She was one of the handful of women, including Jennie Lee and Violet Bonham Carter. It was regularly watched by 12 million people in Britain in the 1950s, an audience figure even my favourite podcast producers can only dream of.
The final most extraordinary fact about this startling woman that I want to share with you is her contribution to the Oxford English Dictionary. This has always, since it was first begun in Victorian times, relied on volunteers to send in ‘slips’ containing words they have found in books they read, giving a definition, a context and a date. Starting in 1958, Laski contributed over 250,000 slips to the editors, making her the single most prolific contributor, male or female.
Books past, present and future, but not in that order:
There may be more to follow on the Laski family, as there are obvious links to my next project. I am particularly interested in the women of Laski’s generation, born in the shadow of the First World War, entitled to further education in the way their mothers were not (only if they had the money or the scholarship funds, of course), given the Vote, expected to work or serve during the Second World War, and then to cope with the return of the men who had fought. I am looking at a small group of these women for my next project, particularly those connected to the Labour Party…currently just scoping it out and wondering where to start…
In other news, my biography of the Macmillan Brothers is now on the websites of all good booksellers, available for pre-order. Disappointingly the cover design is not up there yet, although I have seen a draft and it looks perfect to me. Meanwhile, here is ‘the blurb’:
From publishing Alice in Wonderland and Tom Brown’s School Days to the hugely influential science magazine Nature, Daniel and Alexander Macmillan’s achievements are revealed in this entertaining, superbly researched biography.
Daniel and Alexander Macmillan arrived in London in the 1830s at a crucial moment of social change. These two idealistic brothers, working-class sons of a Scottish crofter, set up a publishing house that spread radical ideas on equality, science and education across the world. They also brought authors like Lewis Carroll, Thomas Hardy and Charles Kingsley, and poets like Matthew Arnold and Christina Rossetti, to a mass audience. No longer would books be just for the upper classes.
In Literature for the People Sarah Harkness brings to life these two amusing, warm-hearted men. Daniel was driven by the knowledge that he was living on borrowed time as his body was ravaged by TB. Alexander took on responsibility for the company as well as Daniel’s family and turned a small business into an empire. He cultivated the literary greats of the time, weathered controversy and tragedy, and fostered a dynasty that would include future prime minister Harold Macmillan.
Including fascinating insights about the great, the good and the sometimes wayward writers of the Victorian era, with feuds, friendships and passionate debate, this vibrant book is bursting with all the energy of that exciting period in history.
Finally, as we make room in our garage for various new projects, I have a few copies of my first book sitting idly by, and it occurred to me that if you subscribe to my blog, you might be interested in a FREE SIGNED COPY?? if so, all I would ask is for you to cover the postage. Email your postal address to sarah.harkness1208@gmail.com and I will reply with postage cost and how to pay (I’m hoping Paypal will work for most people?)
It is a beautifully produced book, 234 pages, with some 50 illustrations, many of them in colour. And it had some lovely reviews on Amazon- here are just a couple:
‘This book has it all. Long lost artist life story, great detective work, thorough research, interesting historical facts about people and places in Britain and abroad, a heroine beautiful and talented, wonderful illustrations; the author Sarah Harkness keeps us turning the pages. Her style is enthusiastic and infectious.’
‘Nelly Erichsen, talented artist and illustrator, is today largely forgotten but in this thoroughly engaging biography is deservedly brought back to life. Sarah Harkness ends her book with a quotation from Middlemarch, about how our world is enriched by those “who live faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs”. No longer hidden, Nelly’s life, full of incident and interest, is explored here and no doubt her tomb will once again be visited.’