REVIEW: Welsh Adventure
Feb. 22nd, 2018 09:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
feather_ghyllWelsh Adventure: Viola Bayley. The Children’s Book Club edition 1968
I had to get this to read! It’s another of Bayley’s junior suspense stories, set in an unusual location. I’d normally use the adjective ‘exotic’, but for me, Snowdonia is less exotic than Jersey, and certainly not a place I’d describe as ‘foreign’. So I was reading this from a different perspective to the one I normally hold when I read her books, and a different perspective to that of most of her readers, not to mention reading it half a century after its publication and as an adult.
When it comes to her understanding of the location and the people who live there, Bayley is no Mabel Esther Allan, who shows much more sympathy and the result of an attempt to dive into the Celtic experience in her books. I am aware that things were very different in the 1960s, so the Anglicised versions of name places were to be expected – Carnarvon for Caernarfon, although Bettys-y-Coed (beetroot in the trees!?) is plain wrong - it’s Betws-y-Coed, and therefore it’d be Bettws, while and ‘Dhu’ for ‘Ddu’ is odd. She raised my hackles by referring to Snowdonia’s mountains as hills. They may seem piddling when you’re familiar with the giant mountain ranes of the world, but show some respect. What was worse, apart from some minor characters who threw in ‘look you’, there wasn’t much differentiation between English and Welsh characters, which was particularly striking when it came to the charatr of Owen Rees, a bright farm boy who had been adopted. It wasn’t entirely clear whether he was a Welshman by birth. He didn’t seem to speak Welsh to his grandmother, or even refer to her as ‘nain’, as you’d expect from someone living in rural Snowdonia. It wasn’t their nationality that was the barrier between him and the girl he loved, Serena, so much as money and class.
Otherwise, this is a fairly typical story for Bayley, in terms of the adventure promised by the title and delivered within the pages of the book. Jeannie’s younger brother, David, has been ill, so it’s arranged for them to go and spend their Easter holidays in a house party with friends at Craigwen House, Snowdonia. Aunt Georgie, their hostess, is quite a character, someone who has trotted the globe and is keen to share her home with others and offer a holiday for invalids or people who would probably go without. So, a strange collection of people find themselves under the same roof.
When mysterious events start to happen, Jeannie is one of a gang of young people who investigate. Jeannie is both the main character and narrator of the story, and her characterisation is skilfully done. She feels the force of the geography, is sensitive to the atmosphere of the nearby dam and the tales that Owen and Nannie tell. She’s approaching the end of her time at school and on the verge of becoming an adult, greatly admires Serena, who used to go to her school. Jeannie can see the tensions between Owen, a childhood friend of Serena’s, who might be more if his family circumstances were different; wealthy Serena, who is as beautiful as Olwen of the Mabinogion; and Jimmy, a nice chap of Serena’s class, who has turned up from London to try his luck. Jeannie’s younger brother David, and his new friend May are part of this loose gang, who are happy enough to go outside after everyone should have gone to bed to follow other night walkers.
Of course, things get serious, and it’s no longer an option to keep the adults out of it, with the nightmarish lake at the centre of it all. I must admit that I hadn’t guessed what or who lay at the heart of the mystery, but there was too much exposition from the villain towards the end. I liked the appropriate subtlety about the emerging relationship between Jeannie and Jimmy, while Owen and Serena had a more obvious romantic connection. I expect I’d have enjoyed the story more had it been set somewhere I was less familiar with (although I have yet to climb Snowdon, look you, indeed.)
I had to get this to read! It’s another of Bayley’s junior suspense stories, set in an unusual location. I’d normally use the adjective ‘exotic’, but for me, Snowdonia is less exotic than Jersey, and certainly not a place I’d describe as ‘foreign’. So I was reading this from a different perspective to the one I normally hold when I read her books, and a different perspective to that of most of her readers, not to mention reading it half a century after its publication and as an adult.
When it comes to her understanding of the location and the people who live there, Bayley is no Mabel Esther Allan, who shows much more sympathy and the result of an attempt to dive into the Celtic experience in her books. I am aware that things were very different in the 1960s, so the Anglicised versions of name places were to be expected – Carnarvon for Caernarfon, although Bettys-y-Coed (beetroot in the trees!?) is plain wrong - it’s Betws-y-Coed, and therefore it’d be Bettws, while and ‘Dhu’ for ‘Ddu’ is odd. She raised my hackles by referring to Snowdonia’s mountains as hills. They may seem piddling when you’re familiar with the giant mountain ranes of the world, but show some respect. What was worse, apart from some minor characters who threw in ‘look you’, there wasn’t much differentiation between English and Welsh characters, which was particularly striking when it came to the charatr of Owen Rees, a bright farm boy who had been adopted. It wasn’t entirely clear whether he was a Welshman by birth. He didn’t seem to speak Welsh to his grandmother, or even refer to her as ‘nain’, as you’d expect from someone living in rural Snowdonia. It wasn’t their nationality that was the barrier between him and the girl he loved, Serena, so much as money and class.
Otherwise, this is a fairly typical story for Bayley, in terms of the adventure promised by the title and delivered within the pages of the book. Jeannie’s younger brother, David, has been ill, so it’s arranged for them to go and spend their Easter holidays in a house party with friends at Craigwen House, Snowdonia. Aunt Georgie, their hostess, is quite a character, someone who has trotted the globe and is keen to share her home with others and offer a holiday for invalids or people who would probably go without. So, a strange collection of people find themselves under the same roof.
When mysterious events start to happen, Jeannie is one of a gang of young people who investigate. Jeannie is both the main character and narrator of the story, and her characterisation is skilfully done. She feels the force of the geography, is sensitive to the atmosphere of the nearby dam and the tales that Owen and Nannie tell. She’s approaching the end of her time at school and on the verge of becoming an adult, greatly admires Serena, who used to go to her school. Jeannie can see the tensions between Owen, a childhood friend of Serena’s, who might be more if his family circumstances were different; wealthy Serena, who is as beautiful as Olwen of the Mabinogion; and Jimmy, a nice chap of Serena’s class, who has turned up from London to try his luck. Jeannie’s younger brother David, and his new friend May are part of this loose gang, who are happy enough to go outside after everyone should have gone to bed to follow other night walkers.
Of course, things get serious, and it’s no longer an option to keep the adults out of it, with the nightmarish lake at the centre of it all. I must admit that I hadn’t guessed what or who lay at the heart of the mystery, but there was too much exposition from the villain towards the end. I liked the appropriate subtlety about the emerging relationship between Jeannie and Jimmy, while Owen and Serena had a more obvious romantic connection. I expect I’d have enjoyed the story more had it been set somewhere I was less familiar with (although I have yet to climb Snowdon, look you, indeed.)
