Review of Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner
Originally published on Goodreads on December 30th, 2022
★★★★★
Lolly Willowes is delicious and near sadistic in its espousal of freedom from society, family, religion – or in a word, obligation. This is a book for the burdened to be reminded that burdens are not always noble or meaningful.
There are some really great ideas interwoven throughout a deceptively simple story. They range from the more overt feminist trope of witchcraft lending independence to the more subtle and just as interesting critiques on how harshly we judge sin – especially when the sinners fail to be in any way what we call productive – to the very relatable championship of reclusiveness.
It was a bit slow to start, but I think this was very much intentional on the part of Townsend Warner. I don’t enjoy making this claim often as it feels like giving an author a cop out but in Lolly Willowes there is no climactic feeling of payoff without the drudgery of the initial set up. Townsend Warner seems adamant that sympathy for Lolly is not enough, we must empathise with her and through that begin to see ourselves in her.
Solid read to end the year, managed to reach my goal 🙂