"A stunning, spellbinding, poetic triumph." --Toronto Star
From Giller-shortlisted author Kathleen Winter (author of the
bestseller Annabel): A stunning novel reimagining the lost years of
misunderstood Romantic Era genius Dorothy Wordsworth.
When young James Dixon, a local jack-of-all-trades recently returned
from the Battle of Waterloo, meets Dorothy Wordsworth, he quickly
realizes he's never met another woman anything like her. In her early
thirties, Dorothy has already lived a wildly unconventional life. And as
her famous brother William Wordsworth's confidante and creative
collaborator--considered by some in their circle to be the secret to his
success as a poet--she has carved a seemingly idyllic existence for
herself, alongside William and his wife, in England's Lake District.
One day, Dixon is approached by William to do some handiwork around the
Wordsworth estate. Soon he takes on more and more chores--and quickly
understands that his real, unspoken responsibility is to keep an eye on
Dorothy, who is growing frail and melancholic. The unlikely pair of
misfits form a sympathetic bond despite the troubling chasm in social
class between them, and soon Dixon is the quiet witness to everyday life
in Dorothy's family and glittering social circle, which includes
literary legends Samuel Coleridge, Thomas de Quincy, William Blake, and
Charles and Mary Lamb.
Through the fictional James Dixon--a gentle but troubled soul, more
attuned to the wonders of the garden he faithfully tends than to vexing
worldly matters--we step inside the Wordsworth family, witnessing their
dramatic emotional and artistic struggles, hidden traumas, private
betrayals and triumphs. At the same time, Winter slowly weaves a darker,
complex "undersong" through the novel, one as earthy and elemental as
flower and tree, gradually revealing the pattern of Dorothy's rich,
hidden life--that of a woman determined, against all odds, to exist on
her own terms. But the unsettling effects of Dorothy's tragically
repressed brilliance take their toll, and when at last her true voice
sings out, it is so searing and bright that Dixon must make an
impossible choice.
