"Once Upon a River" by Diane Setterfield
A book review
Once upon a time, there was an author who wrote
stories, really good stories. She loved stories so much that she wrote a novel
about them – about the way in which stories mould our world, fashion our
thoughts, shape our past and help us fathom our present; about the way in
which, like a living being, tales change and grow at each retelling; about how
each and every one carry stories in our hearts, whether we choose tell them or not...
Diane Setterfield’s third novel Once Upon a River
is an ambitious and complex work, but one which wears its erudition lightly and
hides its artifice well. At one level,
in fact, it can be enjoyed as a well-crafted historical mystery. We are in the 19th Century, on the evening of
a winter’s solstice. The door of The
Swan, an inn at Radcot on the River Thames, opens to reveal a badly injured man
carrying a little girl. She’s seemingly
dead – Rita, the local nurse and midwife, can detect no breath or
heartbeat. Yet, against all odds, the
girl revives and wakes up, whether by magic, as a result of a miracle or
through some natural wonder. This does
not solve the enigma of the girl’s identity, which cannot be easily ascertained
especially since she turns out to be mute.
The girl could well be the daughter of the Vaughans, kidnapped two years
previously finally returned by her captors.
Or the illegitimate granddaughter of a local farmer, abandoned by her
mother before she committed suicide on being forced into prostitution. Or, if one is to believe Lily, the parson’s
housekeeper, she might be a revenant, the ghost of Lily’s long-dead
sister.
This mystery lies at the heart of the novel and makes a page-turner out of it, particularly in the rather breathless final
chapters. Setterfield houses her story
in a well-researched historical context which is conjured through loving descriptions
of the Thames and its communities, and through references to the new scientific
worldview which was then challenging more conservative religious and
supernatural views. The story is peopled
by interesting characters, including farmer Robert Armstrong, the dark-skinned
illegitimate son of an earl and a housemaid; strong-willed Rita, a self-taught
scientist; and Henry Daunt, who is actually based on the real-life Henry Taunt,
photographer and chronicler of the Thames.
Setterfield also subtly evokes the period through references to the
literature of the time – echoes of Dickens and, to my mind at least, Wilkie
Collins, abound.
All this would have been enough to make of the novel
a considerable achievement. But Once
upon a River is also a post-modern piece of meta-fiction. This insightful review on the Opinionated Reader blog makes the valid point that the novel purposely includes familiar tropes of British Gothic
literature, particularly the river and the inn.
This is very true – the Thames, in particular, could be considered
not just a setting but a central character in the book, whereas the Swan is the
place where the novel starts and ends.
But the novel is also rich with other references to legends and folklore. Key scenes occur on the winter and summer
solstice and the Autumn equinox; there are mentions of dastardly highwaymen, water
sprites, goblins, ghosts, changelings, clairvoyants. And even though most of the supernatural
aspects of the tale can be (but are not necessarily) rationally explained (Ann Radcliffe-style), the otherworldly is never too far too seek. Setterfield also throws her net wider than the reaches of British folklore – the figure of Quietly, the ghostly ferryman, owes as much to
Classical mythology as to the classic English ghost story, and the motlew crew
at the Swan act as a more modest version of a Greek chorus.
What is impressive, at the end of the day, is that
all these knowing references are presented in an intriguing and involving story
worthy of the classic 19th century novelists.
True, it’s a tall tale, and some of the loose ends are perhaps too
conveniently tied up at the end. But, we don't really mind... Like the patrons of the Swan, we all love a great story, don’t we?
Hardcover, 464 pages
Published December 2018 by Transworld Publishers/Random Books
 |
| Henry Taunt at Marsh Mills, Henley |
***
As listening suggestions to accompany this novel, I
would like to propose some works of classical music by English composers
inspired by the river. George Frideric
Handel’s Water Music, composed in 1717 for a concert on the Thames,
immediately came to mind, but their stately grandeur did not seem to fit the
mood of the novel. So I will start with
a contemporary piece – Thames Reflections by Clive Jenkins (b. 1938) premiered
by the Chamber Ensemble of London at a concert celebrating music and composers
associated with the Thames
Summer Night on the River was composed by Frederick Delius in 1911. It is a rather ironic choice, given that it
was not inspired by an English river but by the French river Loing. It is, however, a lovely piece, evoking
mysterious mists shimmering above the water.
In
his three Parables for Church Performance, Benjamin Britten combined
elements of the Japanese noh plays with English medieval “mysteries” to
create a new yet timeless music theatre form.
Curlew River, the first of the set, is based on Umidagawa (Sumida River) by Juro Motomasa (1395–1431),
which Britten saw during a visit to Japan and the Far East in early 1956. His librettist, William Plomer, moved the
setting of the original to the fictional Curlew River in East Anglia. This ‘church opera’, rather surprisingly, reflects
some elements found in Setterfield’s novel, including a mysterious Ferryman, a woman
looking for her lost child, and the ghost of a dead boy. Here’s the
ritualistic opening of the work, taken from a recording conducted by the composer himself.
Despite its very English setting Once upon a
River also harnesses images from Greek mythology. And so a Greek river is next : Lethe one
of the five rivers which flowed through Hades where all those who drank from it
experienced complete forgetfulness. It
is evoked in the last movement of Arcadiana, a work for string quartet
by Thomas Ades, written when the precocious composer was still in
his early twenties.
And if you’d like to explore the other movements of
this wonderful composition, do start with the meltingly beautiful O
Albion. To save you looking for it,
here it is in a live version performed by Ensemble Perpetuo. It was recorded during a concert appropriately
themed Rivers and Oceans, bringing us back to where it all started...
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