Barbara Pym Libros

Mujeres excelentes está considerada una de las mejores novelas de Barbara Pym. Mildred Lathbury, la narradora, es una mujer soltera que vive en Londres y ocupa su tiempo en diversas tareas en la parroquia, en tomar el té con las amigas, en obras de caridad y en satisfacer las necesidades de los demás. Es inteligente y observadora, pero también tímida e insegura, en parte debido a su soltería, pues muchos querrían verla casada ya a sus treinta y pocos años. Además de sus buenos amigos, el vicario Julian Malory y su hermana Winifred, Mildred intimará con sus vecinos, los Napier, recién instalados en el piso de abajo de su casa. Conocerá también a Allegra, una viuda que se aloja en la parroquia, y a un sinfín de personajes más. Mildred se verá implicada en diversos asuntos de índole sentimental. Con una extraordinaria y sutilísima ironía, Barbara Pym traza en Mujeres excelentes un espléndido retrato sobre la cotidiana realidad de unos personajes, cuyas vidas se debaten entre sus sentimientos y sus convencionalismos. En 1977, en un artículo-encuesta en el suplemento cultural del Times, el crítico lord David Cecil y el poeta Philip Larkin afirmaron que la obra de Barbara Pym era una de las más importantes e influyentes de la literatura.

A unique autobiography of Barbara Pym, celebrated author of Quartet in Autumn, includes an introduction by Jilly Cooper

A classic comedy of manners from Barbara Pym, the acclaimed author of Quartet in Autumn, Jane and Prudence and Excellent Women

Set in St Basil's, a North London parish, Barbara Pym's novel is full of high comedy. Her depiction of characters begins with Mark the vicar, and his wife Sophia who is quite obsessed with cats, as is Daisy Pettigrew, the vet's sister.

Here, Barbara Mary Crampton Pym sails off into a wickedly comedic farce, focusing on the unsuitable romantic entanglements of a curate and a pretty young girl, both of whom live in the same rooming house, and a starry-eyed university professor and his female student.

Wilmet Forsyth is well dressed, well looked after, suitably husbanded, good looking and fairly young - but very bored. Her husband Rodney, a handsome army major, is slightly balder and fatter than he once was. Wilmet would like to think she has changed rather less. Her interest wanders to the nearby Anglo-catholic church, where at last she can neglect her comfortable household in the more serious-minded company of three unmarried priests, and, of course, Piers Longridge, a man of an unfathomably different character altogether.

A charming and funny tale of parish life by an author whose many fans include Philip Larkin, Alexander McCall Smith and Jilly Cooper.

Quartet in autumn is the story of four people in late middle-age who work in the same office and who all suffer from loneliness. Poignantly and with humour, Pym takes us through their small lives and the facades they erect to defend themselves against the outside world.

Dulcie Mainwearing is always helping others, but never looks out for herself - especially in the realm of love. Her friend Viola is besotted by the alluring Dr Aylwin Forbes, so surely it isn't prying if Dulcie helps things along? Aylwin, however, is smitten by Dulcie's pretty young niece. And perhaps Dulcie herself, however ridiculous it may be, is falling, just a little, for Aylwin. Once life's little humiliations are played out, maybe love will be returned, and fondly, after all.

This volume includes an early novel and three novellas, which were discovered and published after Barbara Pym's death in 1980.

'One of her very best - comic, heartrending, brave; in short, like life itself' Shirley Hazzard

Middle-aged Jane is the well-intentioned but far from perfect clergyman's wife and mother. Prudence, who at 29 is teetering at the edge of spinsterhood, is an attractive, educated working girl. The two best friends share memories of their carefree days at Oxford, leisurely lunches, and gossip, but their ultimate goal is to find a suitable mate for Prudence.

Over Barbara Pym's 30-year writing career her primary subject was the intricate rituals of English life, which she observed with a sharp but understanding eye. Her novels now enjoy a devoted following and belated recognition as classics of the British comic novel. In The Sweet Dove Died , first published in 1978, she sardonically uncovers the sometimes troubling truths behind relationships. A chance encounter over a Victorian flower book brings together Humphrey, an antique dealer, James, his nephew, and Leonora. Although she is considerably older, Leonora develops a fondness for James. She's determined to keep him under her spell, until she realizes that she has to contend with the bookish Phoebe. When Ned, a wicked young American, appears on the scene, the book begins to live up to its droll title, taken from John Keats.

In a wonderful twist on her subjects, Pym has written a book that inspects the behavior of a group of anthropologists. She pits them against each other in affairs of the heart and mind.

A delightful comedy of manners, An Academic Question is prime Barbara Pym