Period Piece (book)


Period Piece: A Cambridge Childhood is a 1952 autobiographical memoir by the English wood engraver Gwen Raverat covering her childhood in late 19th Century Cambridge society. The book includes anecdotes about and illustrations of many of her extended family.
As the author explains in the preface it is "a circular book" and although it begins with the meeting of her parents and ends with Gwen as a student at The Slade, it is not written chronologically, but rather arranged in a series of fifteen themed chapters, each dealing with a particular aspects of life. The book is illustrated throughout with wood engravings by the author.
The book is dedicated to her cousin Frances Cornford.
It was originally published by Faber & Faber in 1952 in hardback and as a paperback in 1960. It was reviewed in The Times and by David Daiches in The Manchester Guardian
Period Piece has been translated into Danish, Swedish and German.

Family trees

The author's immediate family consisted of her father, Sir George Darwin, her mother, Lady Maud Darwin, and their four children; Gwen and her younger siblings Charles Galton Darwin, Margaret, and William "Billy". At the very beginning of the book, two family trees are given, one for the author's mother and one for her father. The family trees are reproduced here with minor modification:

Mother's family tree

Father's family tree

The author's father was Sir George Darwin. Her father had a large extended family. Gwen's grandfather, Charles Darwin died before Gwen's birth, but his wife Emma Darwin lived until 1896. Charles and Emma had seven children who survived to adulthood - four uncles and two aunts to Gwen. All bar one of the uncles and aunts were married, and two uncles had children, resulting in five cousins:
Uncles
Aunts
Uncle's and aunt's spouses
.
Cousins
Second cousins
Although not in the trees drawn in the book, the following second cousins are also mentioned:
ChapterNameSynopsis
IPreludeGwen's family background; how her parents met, "Great Aunt Cara" and "Great Uncle Dick". The reference to Maud's suitor "Mr T" is Henry Martyn Taylor.
IINewnham Grange is the family home in Cambridge, where Gwen grows up with her younger siblings Margaret, Charles and "Billy". It regularly subject to flooding.
IIITheories
IVEducation Being educated privately.
VLadies Aunt Cara's earlier life.
VIPropriety Acting as a "chaperon", the courting process as viewed by a child, and the need to keep up appearances to avoid scandal.
VIIAunt Etty "Aunt Etty" and her husband "Uncle Richard" are described. Ill health as a Darwin characteristic.
VIIIDown Description of Down House, in Downe, Kent the former family home of the author's grandfather Charles Darwin, who had died before her birth, and where his widow "Grandmama" resides with unmarried "Aunt Bessy" during the summers until the former's death.
IX Childhood fears.
X Descriptions of the "five uncles", the Darwin brothers, sons of Charles and Emma Darwin, split into subchapters:
  • "Uncle William" and his wife "Aunt Sara".
  • "Uncle George" - Gwen's father but described as an uncle because "among uncles I include my father. A father is only a specialized kind of uncle anyhow"
  • "Uncle Frank", his son Bernard; his second wife "Aunt Ellen" and their daughter Frances, and third wife Lady Florence Henrietta Darwin,
  • "Uncle Lenny" and his first wife "Aunt Bee", and his second wife Charlotte Mildred Massingberd
  • "Uncle Horace", his wife "Aunt Ida" and their children Nora, Erasmus and Ruth.
XIReligion The author's childhood understanding of God, and morality. Going to a boarding school as a non-conformist.
XIISport Childhood games; cycling; card games, "Being Kind to Poor Pamela"
XIIIClothesClothes, makeup and their difficulties.
XIVSociety Disliking dance class; tea at Trinity, seeing "Great Men" ; a family picnic; the end of childhood with Frances's wedding.