This beautiful, vexed and tragic novel is well served by its title, for its narrating heroine both wrestles with and represents the female forces of retribution; and since Orestes at last escapes maternal retribution, Janet Hobhouse's Helen is arguably the more tragic character of the two. Yet the saddest page of the book comes before the story: 'Hobhouse, Janet, 1948-91 ... Copyright 1993 by the Estate of Janet Hobhouse'. I had met (I cannot say 'I knew') Janet Hobhouse in her youth, when I was a graduate student at Oxford and she was an undergraduate. I feel embarrassed about surviving such a vital person who was substantially younger than myself. Perhaps the most surprising thing about death, that great commonplace, is that it never ceases to surprise.

LRB 11 March 1993 | PDF Download