Sylvia Townsend Warner kept a diary for more than 50 years, and from the rather forced jollity of the initial entry of December 3rd, 1927 ("We looked at Lavenham. It is a compact town on a hill and at the end of each street one looks into damp grey-green fields") to the self-deprecating curtness of the final "Fell several times - not at my best" of January 6th, 1978 it is a fascinating glimpse into an intensely English life, punctuated by publishers and academics and the rhythm of the changing seasons in the garden. Passion streams in somewhat unexpectedly in the form of her lesbian relationship with the poet Valentine Ackland, the pleasure - and, increasingly, the pain - of which is recorded in an almost brutally matter-of-fact way.
Arminta Wallace