Compton Mackenzie (1883–1972)

When I compiled my list of books published in 1951 and came across this book by Compton Mackenzie I was expecting it to be a light hearted but social comedy. I was not expecting it to be a history of a pottery china works on the banks of the river Severn in Shropshire, but this is what I got. I suppose it being subtitled 1750-1950 was a bit of a giveaway. Compton Mackenzie is best known for his two comic novels Whiskey Galore and The Monarch of the Glen, but he also wrote a number of biographies and histories as well as poems, plays essays and children's books, he was nothing if not prolific.

It looks like a book that Mackenzie was commissioned to write, although I can find no details that this was the case. It is a sympathetic story as far as the founders and owners of the works are concerned and tells the story from the beginning with the establishment of the first worksop at Caughley some 4 miles from Coalbrookdale on the banks of the river where it was established as a major pottery works. It specialised in fine hand painted bone china with its production method being a closely guarded secret for a number of years. The factory was established by William Reynolds and was then owned outright by John Rose. It made a connection with the Sèvres the porcelain city just outside Paris, where patterns were exchanged and workers were persuaded to come over to England.

In 1799 there was a ferry-boat disaster when the ferry transporting workers across the river Severn capsized and 28 people were drowned. Under The Rose familie's management the company established itself as a leading producer of fine pottery, but spiralled into a slow decline. In 1885 it was taken over by the Bruff family and John Bruff revived its fortunes for a time. The first world war and then in 1923 a long strike made it increasingly unprofitable and the old factory was sold dismantled and rebuilt in Shelton Staffordshire. It then became part of the Crescent works in Stoke on Trent and Mackenzie's final chapter is a walk through the factory in 1950 with some pictures of the workers hand painting the pottery items, some surviving from Coalport.

The book which looked to be finely illustrated serves its purpose as a story of Coalport pottery, it is more a story of the ownership and the people who worked there, than a technical explanation of the production of the pottery. 3 stars.… (more)

In this companion piece to "Vestal Fire" Mackenzie further distills his experiences on Capri in the 1920's into the characters of several lesbians and has them stirred, shaken and poured into different but similar crises of love.
Jealousy, petulance, despair, passions of all sorts, nudity (no sex, please), beautiful clear skies and tranquil azure seas whipped into a frothy satire of female love. No one is spared his wit, no one is judged, no one is ridiculed. It's all a bit silly, but good fun to read, and Mackenzie's descriptions and dialogs are wonderful.… (more)

Before beginning the text of Vestal Fire, Mackenzie offers an introductory welcome to his Caprisi friends "who will be fancying that they recognize themselves in these pages, and who will be convinced that they recognize their neighbors," then proceeds to lampoon these neighbors, that "crowd of vulgar Americans and seedy English people" that created Capri's reputation for lascivious indulgence during the twenty years before WWII. There is a tenuous plot line, but the book is essentially a series of skits, a burlesque wherein 86 characters gambol through 17 villas, enjoying apparently daily parties fueled by absinthe, opium and champagne, and snarky banter. Occasionally he writes as though telling a fairy tale:

"Mrs. Onslow, Mrs. Gibbs and Mrs. Rosebotham were three sisters, all of whose husbands had found them impossible to live with. So they imported their old mother, Mrs. Kafka, to come out and form with them a thoroughly nice English household on the southern slope of San Giorgio. There in the Villa Minerva they protected themselves against the scorching rays of scandal which might have made hay of their grass-widowhood by making hay of other people's reputations first. There was nothing of which Mrs. Onslow, Mrs. Gibbs, and Mrs. Rosebotham were not ready to accuse the rest of Sirene."

Now, one hundred years on, the subjects of Mackenzie's parodies are long gone, though many personalities are quite recognizable: Norman Douglas, Axel Munthe, Graham Greene, and Somerset Maugham, for instance. Gone as well are those who knew them and their eccentricities, along with the sunny immorality in which they swam. Modern readers can't enjoy the winks and nudges he dispenses as he elbows his way through the crowd, but the sharp and witty dialogue, more acerbic sometimes than Noel Coward's, is timelessly entertaining. Before the last of the 420 pages, though, the cleverness and innuendo have become a bit tiresome.… (more)

I have to say it - this was a rollicking good read! Rollicking - exuberantly lively and amusing - this is the perfect description for Whisky Galore! Set durning WW2 on two neighbouring Hebridean islands. Can you believe it? Both islands are dry, there’s not a drop of whisky nor a bottle of beer to be had anywhere! How can a man be hospitable if he can’t offer up a dram or two to a visitor. If the ship hadn’t run aground when it did, life wouldn’t have been worth living. Now all the villagers have to do is get the thousands of bottles of whisky salvaged before the excise men arrive. Can they do it?? Lots of great characters and a good fun read!… (more)