{"id":4649,"date":"2013-11-06T12:39:31","date_gmt":"2013-11-06T12:39:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=4649"},"modified":"2013-11-08T12:52:25","modified_gmt":"2013-11-08T12:52:25","slug":"the-pure-gold-baby-by-margaret-drabble","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=4649","title":{"rendered":"The Pure Gold Baby by Margaret Drabble"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Published by Canongate Books 7 November 2013 UK<\/strong><\/p>\n

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 1 October 2013 US<\/strong><\/p>\n

304pp, hardback, \u00a316.99\/$18.25<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Elsbeth Lindner<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In an era of endless novelty, there is a great deal to be said in favour of maturity and the broad, sustaining arms of experience. Margaret Drabble\u2019s new novel radiates the kind of intelligent ability, breadth and wry insight that comes with a lifetime\u2019s practice of thinking and writing. Reading it as relaxingly satisfying as sinking into luxury upholstery.<\/p>\n

Less a story, more a sequence of minor events and observations on an impressive range of subjects, the novel develops outwards from the birth of Anna, a Down\u2019s syndrome child and the daughter of unmarried London anthropologist Jess.\u00a0 Anna, the pure gold baby who will never develop or change, plays her own role in the proceedings, but also serves as the gateway to a multiplicity of topics the book is concerned to track: mental health care; child-rearing; family; relationships; social changes in North London; aging. And then there\u2019s Africa and history, Livingstone and Wordsworth, ethnography and neurology, scholarship and sex. Drabble\u2019s range is remarkable.<\/p>\n

As a version of the seven ages of womanhood, her novel offers wisdom of an irresistible kind, whether tracking bladders and libidos or observing female representation in the art of Camille Claudel.<\/p>\n

Best of all, though, is the narrative voice as delivered by Nellie, the (fairly) self-effacing friend and observer of Jess and Anna, a cool, sometimes caustic commentator whose aper\u00e7us<\/em> occasionally have the sardonic ring of Fay Weldon.<\/p>\n

Long may senior female writers like Drabble \u2013 and Weldon and others\u00a0– continue to ply their craft, harder though it has become for some of them to find publication in these days of debuts by the bright and beautiful, as beady-eyed\u00a0Nellie might comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Elsbeth Lindner<\/p>\n

In an era of endless novelty, there is a great deal to be said in favour of maturity and the broad, sustaining arms of experience. Margaret Drabble\u2019s new novel radiates the kind of intelligent ability, breadth and wry insight that comes with a lifetime\u2019s practice of thinking and writing. Reading it as relaxingly satisfying as sinking into luxury upholstery […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,19,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-notable-books","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4649"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4649\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4699,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4649\/revisions\/4699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}