At Lady Molly’s was published by Heinemann in 1957 and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. The novel centers on the household of Lady Molly Jeavons — a chaotic, hospitable establishment in South Kensington where everyone in the Dance’s social world eventually passes through. It is at Lady Molly’s that Jenkins meets Isobel Tolland, whom he will marry — an event he communicates to the reader with characteristic understatement.
The Tolland family — ten siblings of varying temperaments, from the socially ambitious Frederica to the left-wing Erridge (who will go to Spain during the Civil War) — provides the Dance with a new social network and a new range of comic possibilities. Powell’s handling of large families — the alliances, rivalries, and mutual incomprehensions that sustain family life — is among his greatest strengths.
Widmerpool’s engagement to Mildred Haycock, an older woman with a complicated past, provides the volume’s central comic thread. The engagement dinner is a masterpiece of social comedy — everything that can go wrong does, culminating in revelations about Widmerpool’s sexual inadequacy that will haunt him for volumes to come.
Collecting At Lady Molly’s
First edition (Heinemann, London, 1957): Cloth binding, dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $150–$400
- Very good/very good: $60–$150