The ''Clayhanger'' Family is a series of novels by
Arnold Bennett
Enoch Arnold Bennett (27 May 1867 – 27 March 1931) was an English author, best known as a novelist. He wrote prolifically: between the 1890s and the 1930s he completed 34 novels, seven volumes of short stories, 13 plays (some in collaboratio ...
, published between 1910 and 1918. Though the series is commonly referred to as a "trilogy", and the first three novels were published in a single volume, as ''The Clayhanger Family'', in 1925, there are actually four books. All four are set in the "Five Towns", Bennett's thinly disguised version of the six towns of the
Staffordshire Potteries
The Staffordshire Potteries is the industrial area encompassing the six towns Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, Stoke and Tunstall, which is now the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. North Staffordshire became a centre of ...
.
Novels
''Clayhanger'' (1910)
This coming-of-age story set in the Midlands of Victorian England follows Edwin Clayhanger as he leaves school, takes over the family business and falls in love. Edwin Clayhanger's father, Darius, has risen from an extremely poor background, which Bennett repeatedly returns to, to become a prominent printer in Bursley, one of Bennett's "Five Towns" – his fictionalised version of the six towns of the
Staffordshire Potteries
The Staffordshire Potteries is the industrial area encompassing the six towns Burslem, Fenton, Hanley, Longton, Stoke and Tunstall, which is now the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. North Staffordshire became a centre of ...
. Edwin is not aware of his father's history and takes his family's affluence for granted. He allows his ambition to become an architect to be overruled by his father and instead becomes an office junior in his father's business. He sees through the many hypocrisies of Victorian England, but he does not confront them or become his own man until after his father's final illness and death. Then he reopens his relationship with the impoverished but exotic Hilda Lessways.
[Sutherland, John]
"Clayhanger Trilogy"
''The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Literature in English'', Oxford University Press, 1996. Retrieved 7 June 2020 [Kemp, Sandra, Charlotte Mitchell, and David Trotter]
"Clayhanger"
''The Oxford Companion to Edwardian Fiction'', ''Oxford University Press'', 1997. Retrieved 7 June 2020
''Hilda Lessways'' (1911)
The second novel in the series parallels Edwin Clayhanger's story from the point of view of his eventual wife, Hilda, telling the story of her
coming of age, her working experiences as a
shorthand
Shorthand is an abbreviated symbolic writing method that increases speed and brevity of writing as compared to longhand, a more common method of writing a language. The process of writing in shorthand is called stenography, from the Greek ''st ...
clerk and as a keeper of lodging houses in London and
Brighton, her relationship with George Cannon, which ends in her disastrous
bigamous
In cultures where monogamy is mandated, bigamy is the act of entering into a marriage with one person while still legally married to another. A legal or de facto separation of the couple does not alter their marital status as married persons. I ...
marriage and pregnancy, and her reconciliation with Edwin Clayhanger. Bennett includes some scenes from the first book retold from Hilda's perspective.
[
]
''These Twain'' (1915)
The third novel in the series was published in serial form in ''Munsey's Magazine
''Munsey's Weekly'', later known as ''Munsey's Magazine'', was a 36-page quarto American magazine founded by Frank A. Munsey in 1889 and edited by John Kendrick Bangs. Frank Munsey aimed to publish "a magazine of the people and for the people, ...
'' in October and November 1915, and published in a single volume in New York in the same year and in London in 1916.[Watson and Willison, column 430] It chronicles the married life of Edwin and Hilda. Edwin, released from the controlling influence of his father, finds himself free to run his business and his life, but his freedom is diminished by his wife's caprices. Hilda does not conform to the expected role of submissive wife, which is partly why Edwin married her, and has opinions on matters, such as Edwin's business, that in their day are regarded as for men only. Edwin has his doubts about their marriage and is brought to mostly impotent anger by his wife just as he had been by his father.[
]
''The Roll-Call'' (1918)
The fourth novel in the series concerns the early life of Edwin Clayhanger's stepson, George, who insists on remaining George Cannon and refuses to take his stepfather's name. George is an architect and thus represents what Edwin Clayhanger once wanted to be. (Edwin, now an alderman
An alderman is a member of a municipal assembly or council in many jurisdictions founded upon English law. The term may be titular, denoting a high-ranking member of a borough or county council, a council member chosen by the elected members t ...
of Bursley, appears only briefly in this novel.) Unlike his mother and stepfather, George has not experienced poverty and has been spoiled by having too easy a life (a theme that Bennett had previously explored with other characters in ''The Old Wives' Tale
''The Old Wives' Tale'' is a novel by Arnold Bennett, first published in 1908. It deals with the lives of two very different sisters, Constance and Sophia Baines, following their stories from their youth, working in their mother's draper's sho ...
'').[Drabble, pp. 225–226]
Reception
''The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Literature in English'' says of ''Clayhanger'', "The provincial Methodist background, Darius's penniless childhood and his rescue from the workhouse, and the growing prosperity and cultural aspirations of the family are described in sharply observed cumulative detail. The novel provides a wealth of accurate documentation about the manners and industry of the region".[ ''The Oxford Companion to Edwardian Fiction'' comments, "After the critical and commercial success of '']The Old Wives' Tale
''The Old Wives' Tale'' is a novel by Arnold Bennett, first published in 1908. It deals with the lives of two very different sisters, Constance and Sophia Baines, following their stories from their youth, working in their mother's draper's sho ...
'' (1908), ''Clayhanger'' set the seal on Bennett's reputation as the laureate of the commonplace". The article adds that the conflict between father and son "is also a conflict between eras: between Victorian thrift and (somewhat tentative) Edwardian pleasures".[
''The Oxford Companion to Edwardian Fiction'' says of ''Hilda Lessways'', "On the whole, reviewers admired Bennett's ability to describe from a woman's point of view events he had described from a man's point of view in Clayhanger (1910)".][ '']The Manchester Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' said, "It is almost incredible that two novels which have so much material in common should nevertheless possess such an absolute individuality that the effect of reading one is an immediate desire to refer to the other for new light on the situations described by both". ''The Observer'' called it "a meticulous analysis of a woman's life, but it is more scientific than passionate".
''The Observer'' thought ''These Twain'' "an unsatisfactory conclusion to the Clayhanger trilogy. It lacks the unity of the first two volumes. Incidents are haphazard, and there is a suspicion of spinning out the stuff to make a volume". ''The English Review'' said, "It is all very interesting, deftly spun, accurately observed; it is certainly life, and presented without trickery or nonsense, yet we must express the hope that there won't be a sequel".
''The Roll Call'' was generally felt to be inferior to the first three books. In her 1974 study of Bennett, ''Margaret Drabble'' finds that although the book "has one or two good things in it" it is "not very successful: there is something peculiarly dispiriting about the whole novel, which is hard to analyse".[ ''The Oxford Companion to Edwardian Fiction'' calls it "somewhat inferior" to the other three Clayhanger books.][
]
Clayhanger Street, Burslem
Clayhanger Street in Burslem
Burslem ( ) is one of the six towns that along with Hanley, Tunstall, Fenton, Longton and Stoke-upon-Trent form part of the city of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England. It is often referred to as the "mother town" of Stoke on Trent.
...
was named after the first novel in the series. It runs beside the Wedgwood Institute
The Wedgwood Institute is a large red-brick building that stands in Queen Street, in the town of Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England. It is sometimes called the Wedgwood Memorial Institute, but it is not to be confused with the former ...
.
TV versions
''Hilda Lessways'', a television drama series, was transmitted by the BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
as Hilda. The first three novels were dramatised as a 26-part serial by
in 1976. The cast includes
as Tertius Ingpen. The serial was released on DVD in 2010.