
''Precious Bane'' is an
historical romance
Historical romance is a broad category of mass-market fiction focusing on romantic relationships in historical periods, which Lord Byron, Byron helped popularize in the early 19th century. The genre often takes the form of the novel.
Varieties
...
by
Mary Webb
Mary Gladys Webb (25 March 1881 – 8 October 1927) was an English romance novelist and poet of the early 20th century, whose work is set chiefly in the Shropshire countryside and among Shropshire characters and people whom she knew. Her ...
, first published in 1924. It won the
Prix Femina
The Prix Femina is a French List of literary awards, literary prize awarded each year by an exclusively female jury. The prize, which was established in 1904, is awarded to French-language works written in prose or Verse (poetry), verse by male ...
Vie Heureuse Prize in 1926. Webb wrote it while living in
Hampstead Grove
Hampstead Grove is a street in Hampstead in the London Borough of Camden. It heads northwards from Holly Hill, Hampstead, Holly Hill running towards Hampstead Heath, but curving back towards Lower Terrace which connects it to the Heath. It runs ...
in
London
London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
.
Synopsis
The story is set in rural
Shropshire
Shropshire (; abbreviated SalopAlso used officially as the name of the county from 1974–1980. The demonym for inhabitants of the county "Salopian" derives from this name.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West M ...
during the
Napoleonic Wars
{{Infobox military conflict
, conflict = Napoleonic Wars
, partof = the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
, image = Napoleonic Wars (revision).jpg
, caption = Left to right, top to bottom:Battl ...
. It is narrated by the central character, Prue Sarn, whose life is blighted by having a
cleft lip
A cleft lip contains an opening in the upper lip that may extend into the nose. The opening may be on one side, both sides, or in the middle. A cleft palate occurs when the palate (the roof of the mouth) contains an opening into the nasal cavi ...
. Only the weaver, Kester Woodseaves, perceives the beauty of her character, but Prue cannot believe herself worthy of him. Her brother Gideon is overridingly ambitious to attain wealth and power, regardless of who suffers while he does so. Gideon is set to wed his sweetheart Jancis, but he incurs the wrath of her father, the cruel and scheming self-proclaimed wizard Beguildy. An act of vengeance by Beguildy makes Gideon reject Jancis and tragedy engulfs them both. Prue is wrongly accused of murder and set upon by a mob, but Kester defies them and carries Prue away to the happiness she believed she could never possess because of her deformity.
Setting
The setting for the story has been attributed to the Meres of northern Shropshire, but is more likely to have been the area around
Bomere Pool which was closer to the author's own home at Spring Cottage on
Lyth Hill. The travel writer
S. P. B. Mais recorded being taken to the pool to see the location of “Sarn” in the 1930s. These locations remained very rural at the time the novel was written, and Mary Webb was herself very much part of local country life there in the 1920s. Webb uses the rural setting to isolate Prue Sarn and her fellow characters from the larger world; at one point Prue tells us, "four years went by, and though a deal happened out in the world, naught happened to us.
Title
The title of the story has a double meaning. It is taken from
John Milton
John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674) was an English poet, polemicist, and civil servant. His 1667 epic poem ''Paradise Lost'' was written in blank verse and included 12 books, written in a time of immense religious flux and politic ...
's ''
Paradise Lost
''Paradise Lost'' is an Epic poetry, epic poem in blank verse by the English poet John Milton (1608–1674). The poem concerns the Bible, biblical story of the fall of man: the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their ex ...
'' (Book I, lines 690-692):
:Let none admire
:That riches grow in Hell; that Soyle may best
:Deserve the precious bane.
It refers to the love of money, which, as Prue records, blights love and destroys life, but the title also refers to Prue's deformity, which she comes to recognize as the source of her spiritual strength. In one of the most moving passages in the book, she relates: "...there came to me, I cannot tell whence, a most powerful sweetness that had never come to me afore... as if some creature made all of light had come on a sudden from a great way off, and nestled in my bosom.... Though it was so quiet, it was a great miracle, and it changed my life.... If I hadna had a hare-lip to frighten me away into my own lonesome soul, this would never have come to me.... Even while I was thinking this, out of nowhere suddenly came that lovely thing, and nestled in my heart, like a seed from the core of love."
Main characters
The critic
G. K. Chesterton wrote that the characters in this novel "live a hard life; they probably on occasion live a hungry life; they are quite capable in some circumstances of living a gross or ferocious life. But they do, in a very deep sense, live a full life."
*Prue Sarn – The narrator of the novel is in her teens when we first meet her. She is loving towards her mother, obedient to her demanding brother. The natural world of Shropshire offers her some consolation to the back-breaking work on the farm, and the fact that she can read and work with numbers is a source of pride and solace. Her "hare-shotten" lip is her own bane, and she bears it at times with dignity, at other times with deep feelings of shame. The English poet and critic
Glen Cavaliero writes that "...Prue is spirited and stoical, with a vein of humor and no self-pity: her hare-lip is a source of wonder to her as much as heartbreak."
*Gideon Sarn – A few years older than Prue, he inherited both his father's farm and cruel temperament. He is Prue's opposite number, taking no delight in nature, and showing little affection for his aging mother. Above all else he is motivated by money, and relentlessly works the farm, and Prue, to get ahead. His single-minded determination to become rich is symbolized in part by his decision to put most of his fields in wheat (called corn in the book in accordance with British usage), the crop that was at the time the most lucrative.
*Beguildy - Owner of a neighboring farm, a man more committed to his wizardry and spells than to his fields and crops. A poor or more likely lazy farmer, he is often gone for days at a time, working charms and spells believed to heal the sick and injured in the community. He teaches Prue to read, write and work with numbers, but shows little care for his wife and daughter.
*Jancis Beguildy - The wizard's daughter and Gideon Sarn's intended wife, plump, blonde with a lush, pleasing mouth always forming a lovely "oh."
*Missis Beguildy - Beguildy's wife who fears her husband and yet does not hesitate to collude with Gideon and Jancis in their plans to be together. She is crafty in her methods to get her husband out of the house for days at a time, and she is sharp in her observations of the people in the community.
*Kester Woodseaves - He is a skilled itinerant weaver, making his living by traveling through Shropshire, weaving in the homes and farms. He is intelligent and compassionate - he prevents a
bull baiting from taking place on a market day in town, but pays dearly for his efforts. He is a discerning judge of character, quickly recognizing Prue's qualities despite her deformed lip.
Adaptations
A planned film adaptation by the
Rank Organisation
The Rank Organisation (founded as the J. Arthur Rank Organisation) is a British entertainment conglomerate founded in 1937 by industrialist J. Arthur Rank. It quickly became the largest and most vertically integrated film company in the Uni ...
in 1947, to be directed by
Robert Siodmak
Robert Siodmak (; 8 August 1900 – 10 March 1973) was a German Jewish film director. His career spanned some 40 years, working extensively in the United States and France, as well as in his native country. Though he worked in many genres, he was ...
and featuring
Ann Todd and
David Farrar, was abandoned when the star
Robert Donat
Friedrich Robert Donat ( ; 18 March 1905 – 9 June 1958) was an English actor. Making his breakthrough film role in Alexander Korda's ''The Private Life of Henry VIII'' (1933), today he is best remembered for his roles in ''The Count of Monte C ...
withdrew from the production. In 1957 the book was made into a six-part
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
television drama series starring
Patrick Troughton
Patrick George Troughton (; 25 March 1920 – 28 March 1987) was an English actor. He became best known for his roles in television, most notably starring as the Second Doctor, second incarnation of The Doctor (Doctor Who), the Doctor in the lo ...
and
Daphne Slater. In March 1957 Earl St John of Rank said his company might make a film of the novel starring Virginia McKenna but none was made.
Under its French title ''Sarn'', it was produced as a television play by French Television
ORTF in 1968, with
Dominique Labourier
Dominique Labourier (born 29 April 1943) is a French actress. Born in Reims, France, she is best known outside France for starring as Julie in Jacques Rivette's film '' Celine and Julie Go Boating'' (''Céline et Julie vont en bateau'', 1974). ...
as Prue,
Josep Maria Flotats
Josep Maria Flotats i Picas (; born 12 January 1939) is a Catalan actor and theatre director.
He was born in Barcelona, where he started as an actor in Associació Dramàtica de Barcelona, and made his theatre debut in 1957 with ''Les maletes d ...
as Gedeon and
Pierre Vaneck
Pierre Vaneck (born Pierre Auguste Van Hecke; 15 April 1931 – 31 January 2010) was a French people, French actor. During his career, he won a Molière Award in 1988 and received a César Award nomination in 2009.
Biography
Son of a Belgian ar ...
as Kester; the director was
Claude Santelli. In 1989 it was again adapted for British television by the BBC, directed by
Christopher Menaul
Christopher Menaul (born 25 July 1944) is a British film, television director and television writer. Since the late 1970s, Menaul has amassed credits in episodic television and by directing television films.
Filmography
Film
*'' Feast of July' ...
and starring
John Bowe,
Clive Owen
Clive Owen (born 3 October 1964) is an English actor. He first gained recognition in the United Kingdom for playing the lead role in the ITV series '' Chancer'' from 1990 to 1991. He received critical acclaim for his work in the film '' Close ...
and
Janet McTeer
Janet McTeer (born 5 August 1961) is an English actress. She began her career training at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art before earning acclaim for playing diverse roles on stage and screen in both period pieces and modern dramas. She has r ...
.
References
Bibliography
* Greco, Joseph. ''The File on Robert Siodmak in Hollywood, 1941-1951''. Universal-Publishers, 1999.
* Wade, Christopher. ''The Streets of Hampstead''. Camden History Society, 2000.
External links
*
* {{librivox book , title=Precious Bane, author=Webb
1924 British novels
Novels set in Shropshire
Novels set in the 19th century
British historical novels
British novels adapted into television shows
Novels by Mary Webb
Jonathan Cape books