A Clergyman's Daughter
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This book shows, to great effect, how scandal can affect prominent community members. Dorothy goes "missing" after she kisses the village's most disreputable character, Mr. Warburton. It is rumoured that she has eloped with Warburton, when in fact she has only experienced a rather dubious "loss of memory". During her time as a 'missing person' she experiences such things as sleeping rough and picking hops for a meagre wage. These elements are informed by Orwell's own experience with homelessness and poverty as described in Down and Out in Paris and London. Dorothy is eventually set up with a job as a schoolteacher by her father's mysterious wealthy cousin, in a small private 'academy' - an experience that also parallels Orwell's own life. From here, she is 'rescued' back to her old life in a twist of events that is triggered by the libelous Mrs. Semprill (who caused the rumoured scandal to be transmitted to the papers) being charged with libel as a result of another rumour spread. With Mrs. Sempril dishonoured, Mr. Warburton finds Dorothy and brings her back to Knype Hill, the small town where her father is a Rector. In the process of bringing her home, Warburton proposes to Dorothy and is rejected, despite his efforts to convince her that with her religious faith lost, her existence as a hard-working clergyman's daughter will be rendered meaningless and that marriage, while she is still young, is the only escape of a life of hardship, loneliness, meaninglessness and eventual helpless poverty.
The most important thing to note about Dorothy's experiences as a Rector's daughter, a tramp, a hoppicker, a begger at Trafalgar Square, and a school teacher, is that they all describe an extreme helplessness. Orwell has portrayed Dorothy in all cases as being dependent; dependent upon her father for money, upon a fellow transient (Nobby) for means of survival and direction while an identityless vagrant, upon the meagre wage as a picker and fellow pickers for food, upon other beggers to show her the way of that lifestyle and upon the evil Mrs. Creevy who forces her to work hard and futile hours for a scarce amounts of food and low wages, and finally upon Warburton to bring her home. This theme of helplessness and dependency is one that Orwell has developed thoroughly, leaving the reader sympathizing greatly for our protagonist and wondering at every turn how she bears it. This is especially the case with Mrs. Creevy who has no respect for Dorothy and treats her almost as sub-human.
The theme of slavishness is one that mirrors that of dependency. Dorothy is economically pressed to work extremely hard. Her meagre earnings, in all cases, restrict her escape and function to perpetuate her dependent state. Orwell draws a picture of systematic forces that preserve the bound servitude in each scenareo. He brilliantly uses Dorothy's fictitious endeavors to strongly critique certain institutions. In the case of the hop harvest Orwell critiques the fashion in which wages are systematically lowered as the season progressed and why the wages are so low to begin with. He describes the life a manual labourer with striking accuracy, right down to the constant state of exhaustion that somehow eliminates any potential for a questioning of the circumstances in which one has found herself. Orwell even captures the strange feeling of euphoric happiness that is achieved from a long, monotonous day of labouring. He perfectly describes the attitude of the seasonal worker who vows not to return the following year, but somehow forgets about the hardship and remembers only the positive side during the off season, and doubtlessly returns.
In the case of the private school system in England of Orwell's era, he manages to fit in a two page critique (irrelevant to the plotline) of how capitalistic interests have rendered the school system useless and absurd. The description of how class and economic perceptions are perpetuated in the school system mirrors his own experience as a poor student in relatively well-to-do schools. He hammers this point home with the overt attention Mrs. Creevy pays to the "good payers'" children, while completely disrespecting and marginalizing the "bad payers'" children. Mrs. Creevy is even seen to manage a better cut of meat for the children of wealthier families, while saving the fattier pieces for the "medium payers" and damning the "bad payers" children to eat brown bag lunches in the school room, apart from the rest of the students.
It is clear from this book, as well as Orwell's other novels, how a socialist leniency is prevalent, and how the reader is forced to acknowledge stark the inequalities that the story's characters are subjected to.
The book is largely experimental, with Orwell attempting to echo passages of James Joyce's 'nighttown' from Ulysses in it. Orwell himself disowned it as 'tripe' and prevented its reprinting during his lifetime. However, it certainly helped develop his reputation as an up and coming novelist in the 1930s.
External links
- [A Clergyman's Daughter] - Searchable, indexed etext.
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