Biography: When Michael Holroyd's biography of Lytton Strachey first appeared in 1968 it caused something of a stir because of the author's frank discussion of his subject's sexual behaviour.
Strachey's last surviving sibling only died the same year but a certain number of his contemporaries and relatives were still alive and not all of them relished seeing his personal life made public. Barbara Caine's book is unlikely to meet a similar response. We are, after all, now rather too familiar with the world of Bloomsbury since, post- Holroyd, a flood of other publications thoroughly explored the same terrain.
For this reason alone and no matter how hard she pleads her cause on the grounds of feminist history, Caine's contribution looks belated. For those unfamiliar with them it needs to be explained that the Stracheys were for several generations involved in extending British interests in India; Sir Richard Strachey, father of Lytton, devoted much of his life to imperialist interests as, in her own way, did his wife, Jane, although in old age she became engaged with the advancement of women's suffrage.
The latter cause engaged the interest of several of their 10 children and while Lytton acquired a reputation as an iconoclastic historian, his younger brother James was an early and ardent advocate of Freudian psychoanalysis. Some of the offspring were better known than others, a few were, frankly, unremarkable and one son, Ralph, was considered even by his own siblings to exhibit few family traits.
Nevertheless, any one of the tribe deserving the slightest interest has already been examined, although usually in isolation from the others. Caine, on the other hand, has decided to examine the entire family, which is a considerable challenge when the various brothers and sisters of Richard and Jane Strachey are taken into account, along with their offspring's own spouses and children. It should, therefore, make for a fascinating read, but it doesn't. This is not the fault of the material; the Stracheys remain a most engaging clan, which is precisely why they have been so thoroughly investigated by previous historians and biographers. In addition, many members of the family not only wrote a large number of letters but preserved their correspondence, which means the Strachey archives are richer than most. But Caine's book proves that no matter how good the material, in the wrong hands it can still become uninspiring and lifeless. Such is the case here, in part due to the author's style, exemplified by her tendency to state the obvious with remarks such as "Unlike other life stages, old age lacks clear or unequivocal markers". This hardly qualifies as a revelation and nor does much else she chooses to include in the book.
Instead, Caine plods through her subject as though wearing the literary equivalent of wellington boots, without humour or elan or even, one often feels, any sense of pleasure in the task. The impression is left that she really does not care for the Stracheys, as when she proposes that for all the younger generation's supposed inclination towards modernity, some members, such as Lytton, retained traits of the old imperialistic and patriarchal order. Well of course they did: ideology and behaviour rarely form a perfect match in anyone.
This propensity for telling us what we already know might have been kept in check had the author chosen to broaden her examination beyond the immediate boundaries of the Strachey family. Despite the inclusion of an impressive bibliography, she still manages to appear surprised that Richard and Jane's offspring were less affluent, or indeed fecund, than their parents. The large Victorian family was a phenomenon that passed away with the end of the 19th century, just as the large Irish Catholic family has also effectively vanished; an explanation for each of these can be found without much difficulty. It would have been helpful, both for Caine and her readers, if she had set the Stracheys within the context of their era and provided more information on the changing social, economic and social circumstances of the decades through which they lived.
As if a flat prose style and a fondness for pointing out the unremarkable were not sufficiently tiresome, other than in her earliest chapters Caine opts to disregard chronology in favour of successive themes such as Gender and Sexuality, and Sibling Ties. The result is repetition as she is obliged to return to the same sources and quotes and to reiterate the same points. There are sound reasons why history is usually told in a linear fashion and it is unwise to disdain this method, not least because this way contradictions are less likely to occur. At one stage Caine describes The Cause, Ray Strachey's story of the early years of the women's movement in Britain, as being "in some ways anachronistic" even when it first appeared in the 1920s. Yet, 70 pages later, returning to the same topic (and quoting from the same correspondence) she declares the book "essential reading for any historian of feminism". This is rich coming from an author who seems unhappy at inconsistencies in the character of certain Strachey family members. It's probably just as well that the Stracheys have already been so well examined; Bombay to Bloomsbury adds nothing of consequence to our understanding or appreciation of them.
Bombay to Bloomsbury: A Biography of the Strachey Family, By Barbara Caine, Oxford University Press, 488pp. £25
Robert O'Byrne is a writer and journalist. His most recent book, Mind Your Manners, is published by Sitric Press