Classics Corner: I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith; A Sweet Book About Writing About Eccentric Family Members

Classics Corner: I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith; A Sweet Book About Writing About Eccentric Family Members
By Julie Sara Porter,
Bookworm Reviews

Every beginning writer is told, "Write what you know." The cliche suggests that people capture the people and situations around them, recall their own childhood memories, or describe the setting around them. One of those writers who took that message to heart is Cassandra Mortmain, the protagonist of Dodie Smith's novel, I Capture The Castle. True to it's name this sweet novel captures the writing spirit within Cassandra and her eccentric family.

Cassandra writes shorthand in a journal with her feet resting in the kitchen sink. She plans on following in the footsteps of her author father who is a one=book wonder with Jacob Wrestling, a stream-of-consciousness work (similar to Joyce's Ulysses). Sebastian Mortmain was once a wealthy intellectual coasting on the popularity of his magnum opus. He frequently lectured at American colleges and universities and was the darling of the intelligentsia. Unfortunately, his streak ended. He suffers from writer's block, dwindling finances, and a violent unstable temperament.

Mortmain bought a dilapidated castle where he lives with his family, including his second wife former artists' model, Topaz, his young son, Thomas, and two daughters, the creative Cassandra and the mercenary, Rose. Topaz tolerates Mortmain's rages believing him to be a tortured genius who just needs space and inspiration to continue writing again. The girls see their father in less rosy terms.

Rose is tired of living in genteel poverty and longs to find a rich husband and to escape from her dowdy life. Cassandra however inherited her father's writing ability and creative spirit, using it to fascinating ends such as participating in elaborate rituals for May Day and creating Mrs. Blossom, a surrogate fairy godmother from an old mannequin. The Mortmain family would be stuck in the perpetual inertia of little financial rewards and wanting more, if not for the arrival of the Cottons.

Simon and Neil Cotton are two American brothers who are the descendants of the castle's owners and get to know the renting Mortmains. At first both families have their own misconceptions and suspicions towards each other, but in a series of misadventures including in one humorous episode when a fur draped Rose is mistaken for a bear, the two families become friends.

The novel is filled with various subplots that are fueled by the various relationships within the families. Topaz at first is relieved when Mortmain begins to socialize with the Cottons but then becomes suspicious when he starts doing things with Mrs. Cotton that he never had before like laughing and visiting people. She worries that her husband is having an affair but is also worried that he is using his new relationship to avoid writing. His writer's block is finally ended by a desperate moment of tough love from Cassandra and Thomas, resulting in a book that begins in a free association wring style imitating a child's first sentences.

Rose and Cassandra also have their relationship woes as well. Rose, forever dreaming of a rich life, becomes romantically involved and gets engaged to Simon. However she and Neil continue to take snipes at each other. She thinks he's a boor, he thinks she's a gold-digger. But anyone who has read any Jane Austen book ever knows that fighting couples disguise romantic feelings for each other. Rose and Neil act on those romantic feelings in a way that changes their families forever.

Standing at the center of all of this turmoil is Cassandra. While she practices her writing, she is dealing with her own complicated love life. She fends off the advances of Stephen, a servant boy and wannabe-poet but too successfully. She ends up inadvertently putting Stephen in the arms of a cougar who uses the young man for her personal interests. Cassandra develops an infatuation for Simon but keeps her emotions suppressed for Rose's benefit. Unfortunately, this proves for naught when Rose and Neil's secret affair is revealed.

Cassandra begins the book as a starry-eyed romantic idealist but after she captures the castle, its inhabitants, she gains maturity and realizes how little she can change things with her choices. She not only captures the castle. She captures herself.