Welcome to Mitfordiana, the newsletter about Nancy, Pam, Diana, Unity, Decca, Debo, and me. You can find my commenting policy here.
Happy 2023, dear subscribers! As I reflected on my hopes, dreams, aspirations, comments, questions, etc. for the coming year, I realized that I have not been giving this newsletter my due attention. It turns out that starting a Substack in a fit of rage over a terrible book is not actually terribly sustainable. Who knew?! There is only so long one can use anger to fuel one’s writing efforts, and historically my primary emotion re: the Mitfords is delight. I am now endeavoring to rethink how Mitfordiana can and should be a delight in my own life as I contend with all the other things I have to do as a graduate student and general citizen of the world.
Usually when other Substack writers begin a post with the sort of paragraph I just typed, it means that they’re about to announce a hiatus or a transition to paid subscriptions or something, but I am not doing that! Instead, in the spirit of achieving my goals through ~public accountability~, I wanted to announce a series that I hope will run every other week through the rest of this winter and into the spring: Nancy’s Novels, in Order.
As I noted last time I wrote, I am always rereading and thinking about The Pursuit of Love, but Nancy published eight novels, and although I own all of them, I’ve only ever thought seriously about PoL and Love in a Cold Climate. It occurred to me over the holidays that I haven’t ever even read Christmas Pudding and Pigeon Pie! I also think that the focus on PoL and LCC to the exclusion of the other novels is an issue in Mitfordian criticism and is worth rectifying. My goal with this series is, therefore, to give each novel my full attention in the order that they were published, considering, in addition to the stories, their publishing history, reception, and relation to the rest of the Mitford Industry and my own collecting efforts. We’ll get started this coming week with Highland Fling (1931).
I am hopeful that paying sustained attention to this core of the Mitfordian canon will reinvigorate my delight in the Mitford sisters and their books, and I hope you will find it fun too. Feel free to read along, comment on each post to offer your own commentary on Nancy’s novels, and/or encourage the Mitford fans in your life to subscribe.
In tearing haste,
Diana