Everyday People: 'The Fortnight in September' by R. C. Sherriff – Book Recommendation

 

You don’t always need a good plot to make a masterpiece. Sometimes real lives, or something very like them, are enough. This 1931 novel by R.C. Sherriff (probably best known for the World War I play Journey’s End) recounts an annual family holiday in Bognor, featuring Mum, Dad, two late-teenaged children who have recently started jobs, and a ten-year-old. They are portrayed as a lovely and loving lower middle-class family, and absolutely nothing earth-shattering happens to them. Or does it? Believe me, this is absolutely not a boring book.

The joy of The Fortnight in September is its celebration of ordinariness and, most of all, its gentle exploration of the inner lives of its characters. In this respect, although Sherriff was not a modernist writer, the novel reminds me of Katherine Mansfield’s New Zealand stories, which I love (I have previously written about these on this blog). A holiday is a time for relaxation but also for reflection. With the Stevens family, hopes and dreams of the past and of the future are revealed alongside the small triumphs and tragedies that form the salient parts of most people’s lives. There is much focus on loyalty and routine and the strength and security that such things provide to combat fear, doubt, and change. The very fact that the novel depicts what is commonplace and unexceptional is what makes it so touching, since it’s so easy to identify with the characters’ emotions and predicaments. There is some lovely period detail, and I enjoyed getting a sense of a 1930s seaside holiday, but many of the concerns Sherriff portrays are timeless and entirely relatable.

In a world where we are bombarded on a daily basis with all that is sensational and horrible, The Fortnight in September is a wonderful and poignant book that may well restore your faith in humanity.

 

The Fortnight in September by R. C. Sherriff ISBN: 9781906462222