An Academic Question

Professor Maynard always gave a party at the beginning of autumn. Caroline Grimstone, Caro, is the narrator of the book. She is married to Alan and has a four year old daughter, Kate. The university had grown up from a local technical college. Crispin Maynard heads Alan's department. The Pym voice is fully present in this work, notwithstanding the fact that Hazel Holt used two drafts to make a coherent whole of this posthumous work. A mother and son couple, Coco, (Corcoran), and Kitty Jeffreys are friends of Alan and Caro and also attend the party. Coco is a research fellow in Caribbean Studies. Crispin is an historian and Alan an anthropologist, and both men are specialists in the study of pre-literate peoples. Iris Horniblow is someone who is new in the department and Caro wonders if Alan is interested in her. Dolly Arborfield is a friend and the sister of Kitty Jeffreys. Her interests run to old books, junk, and animals. In her sixties, it seems that Dolly has rather lost contact with people. Through Dolly Arborfield, Caro pursues good works by going to an old peoples' home, Normanhurst, to read to a missionary living there. The paper read is one authored by Crispin Maynard. The missionary, Mr. Stillingfeet, has a box of papers that even Crispin Maynard has not seen. In a Henry James-like plot, Caro and Alan distract the old missionarya day prior to his death with a bag of crisps while Alan gains entry to the box. Later, Caro, a volunteer at the university library, has to find a way to secrete the manuscript in the librarian's office. Alan, an up and coming academic, uses the information gained in a piece for a scholarly journal. It turns out that Crispin knows what has transpired, at least sort of. There is the suggestion in the book that Crispin would have used the advantage gained from seeing the papers had he been in Alan's shoes. What Caro really thinks of the matter is not fully disclosed. Everything is treated in a tone of irony. This is a very good, and completely modern, book.