trennels | Fairness in the Marlow household

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Fairness in the Marlow household

I was wondering if anyone had any thoughts on the fair/unfair treatment of the Marlow young by their parents. I'm thinking specifically the treatment of Nicola by her parents/mother in Cricket Term. Is there anyway this could have been handled better? Should it actually have been Nicola who was going to have to leave? Should they have told her or dropped it on her in the summer holidays? Should they have removed all the girls, or perhaps just both twins?

For that matter, should Lawrie have been given the Prosser? (I know this wasn't her parents' decision, I'm just interested whether people think it was a good judgement call on the part of the staff.)

In a similar vein, what about the horse business in Peter's Room? Was it fair that their mother bought Ginty a horse for her birthday, and said no-one else was to ride it? Was it reasonable to buy herself one before ensuring the children all had equal access to a horse for hunting? In effect, she created a situation where one daughter was the only one in the family who was unable to go hunting (without hiring a horse), which seems harsh to me. But then, I'm from a small family where such unequality with gifts never happened - is this normal for a large family? Was Lawrie's reaction reasonable, or did other readers take it as just one more example of her throwing whiny tantrums?

These two occasions seemed to me to best illustrate Mrs. Marlow's failings as a mother (and also perhaps where the children got their selfishness) - I wondered if anyone else felt the same.

Can anyone else think of any other examples of this kind of thing? Or of fairer treatment?

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> But I don't think it's unreasonable for each one to have one nice set; and one best set can be used for lots of things other than just parties. What's "unreasonable" about that?

Speaking as a mother myself, I'm more inclined to spend on everyday clothes than on party clothes. Indeed, when my children were younger, I always bought their party clothes at the second-hand store (or had them bought by a doting grandmother). The children simply didn't wear them often enough to make them cost-effective. Note that the Trennels children seem to need evening clothes only in the Christmas season, which means that they get, at most, one year's wear per child unless they're handed down.

Most of my daughter's elaborate dresses were passed on to cousins undamaged, and much appreciated. One coat made it into three different sets of Christmas pictures.

That's true - I always try to buy my god-daughter something fancy for Christmas, because her parents aren't that well off so they spend money on necessities - and I know they appreciate getting such things as a gift.

But "best clothes" as oppsed to "party clothes" can be used for all sorts of things, if they're adaptable enough. Not that hand-me-downs can't also be used for this. I think I should have stuck to my original point about the girls having equal access to a pony rather than getting into the clothing thing, because it actually didn't register that much with me when I read the book!

But "best clothes" as oppsed to "party clothes" can be used for all sorts of things, if they're adaptable enough.

Not in their situation, they can't: Nicola and Lawrie are going to parties in the Christmas season or wearing "that dreggy uniform dress" at school. The same would have been true of Ann and to a certain extent of Ginty. Rowan may well need a "good" outfit to meet with bank managers, as Karen no doubt needs one when she's at Oxford, and no doubt they have what they need.

I was thinking of weddings, christenings, family get-togethers etc, and parties at Easter and summer, which are certainly possible. Hunt Balls, perhaps. The Marlows were in effect still newcomers to the county at their first Christmas at Trennels, so I'd expect their holiday social lives to improve gradually. Not that we've seen the Marlows at any of those, but they are still hypothetically something their parents would consider.

And from the description of outfitting for the Merrick's party, the prospect of Kay getting a new dres is something looked forward to by her younger sisters as something they'll inherit/share.

But again, what you'd wear for a wedding or a christening is vastly different to what you'd wear to a Christmas party-cum-ball or a hunt ball. Also, winter parties tend to be evening affairs but summer parties that kids are invited to are more daytime affairs.

Completely different dress code - think of it as the different type of uniform Commander Marlow might wear to each occasion. There's a civilian female equivalent for each.

But something (e.g. a little black dress sort of thing) could be worked at a number of occassions. And anyway, by that logic, they needed more clothes between them, not fewer.

Yeah, but proper party dresses? Low priority.

Yeah, but versatile attractive dresses? High priority. And a lot cheaper than a horse, I would think, based on the fact that Mrs. Marlow was quite prepared to go out and buy Ginty a new one when none of the other girls' cast-off would fit her.

IMO, that is.

For kids the age of the twins?

Still not a priority. Not compared with the older girls.

So you're saying it is high priority for the older girls? But even Ann got a hand-me-down. And Rowan borrowed one of her mother's dresses. Neither of them got new.

From the family's point of view, yes, certainly the older girls are a higher priority. They're the ones expected to have a social life that may include parties - the "children" are not.

There was still a certain level of age distinction in how the girls found dresses - Ginty showing up in a horror was a far more distressing prospect than Nicola doing so.

And for that era and that culture? As long as Nicola was decently and appropriately dressed, it wasn't expected that she should actually *like* the outfit or that it would suit her. Think bridesmaids - especially attitudes towards younger ones - for the attitude that prevails here.

Exactly. If a daughter isn't yet eligible for marriage (or nearly so), all that matters is that she be decent. You invest in clothes only when you're preparing her for matrimony.

Were they preparing Ginty for matrimony? She's a little young. Or even Karen?

I think in both cases when they got new clothes, it was actually more a case of necessity, rather than that they were being displayed on the marriage market. Mrs. Marlow's distress the following Easter shows she didn't really consider Karen ready to marry.

But she seems okay with the thought that she might have got engaged to someone nearer her age, to marry after Kay's finals.

she seems okay with the thought that she might have got engaged to someone nearer her age, to marry after Kay's finals.

But does that mean Mrs. Marlow saw Karen as being of marriagable age, or that that would have been the lesser of the two evils (the greater obviously being Edwin!)?

Engage-able age, maybe, but not marriagable, was what I was saying.

Fair enough; I just don't see "willing to let her get engaged, to marry after her Finals" as being the same as "preparing her for marriage". I meant that I didn't think they were actively displaying her to the county as being open to offers, so to speak. But I see that wasn't your point; someone else said that higher up the thread, and I was conflating the two. :)

And thank you for that. Reading this, I was starting to think I lived in a different universe, where I lived in hand-me-downs from my sister that were in turn handed down to my younger cousins (and at 29 I still receive with thanks cast-offs of my sister's) and my daughter (though, yes, she's still a baby) has owned about 5 items of new clothing in her life - most are handed down from my sister's son and most of those were not new to him. What on earth is wrong with that? And the more so for party clothes, which have no chance of being worn out before being outgrown. Apart from the fact that the Marlow books are (mostly and sort of) set at a time when wastefulness would have been far more frowned on than it is now, I actively like the idea of reading books where disposability is not a virtue.

What on earth is wrong with that?

I'm not suggesting that they chuck old clothes away (I'm sure there are plenty of people they could have been donated to), nor that hand-me-downs are bad things to have - I too had loads from my elder cousins. I just don't think it's unreasonable for the girls to want new, or to think that some of the money from the Last Ditch could have been spent on a nice gesture for all the girls - witness how happy the twins were the year after when they got new party dresses for Christmas. Was that a waste of money?

For God's sake, I'm not bagging on hand-me-downs - surely I've made that clear by now. Just saying I think it would have been nice for the girls to get something posh and new out of the financial "windfall".

But they weren't new-new party dresses: they were Doris makeovers of old dresses of Mrs Marlowe's (probably a lot better than anything they'd be likely to have shopbought).

Oh, were they? I've misremembered that then. I thought they were new. Back to the books!

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Fairness in the Marlow household

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