In the 1960s, Barbara Pym's manuscripts languished in her linen cupboard, unpublished, until poet Philip Larkin's support sparked a late-career revival. Now, a new stage adaptation of her 1977 novel Quartet in Autumn at the Arcola Theatre, written by Booker-winning author Samantha Harvey, signals another wave of popularity for Pym's work. But what makes her stories of mid-life drudgery and single women so enduring?
A Literary Wilderness
After her publisher Jonathan Cape rejected her seventh novel, An Unsuitable Attachment, in 1963, Pym faced a string of knockbacks. She wrote in 1970: 'I get moments of gloom and pessimism when it seems as if nobody could ever like my kind of writing again.' Yet she persisted, and her next novel, Quartet in Autumn, was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1977. Today, her work is more popular than ever, with a stage adaptation at the Arcola and a TV drama reportedly in development.
Pym's World
Born in 1913 in Oswestry, Pym wrote six novels between 1950 and 1961, depicting a very English milieu filled with vicars, spinsters, and parish committees. Her heroines, like Mildred Lathbury in Excellent Women, are often unmarried women facing financial and social precarity. Pym's sharp dialogue and ironic viewpoint have drawn comparisons to Jane Austen, but her focus on the 'experience of not having' feels strikingly modern.
The Revival
In 1977, Larkin named Pym the most underrated writer of the last 75 years in the Times Literary Supplement, and Lord David Cecil also praised her. This support prompted publishers to reconsider her work. Since then, Pym has enjoyed a resurgence, buoyed by interest in overlooked mid-century female authors. In 2021, Paula Byrne published a biography, and Virago reissued nine of her books in 2022. Writers like Anne Tyler and Jilly Cooper have praised her.
Quartet in Autumn
Harvey, a 'late adopter' of Pym, read Quartet in Autumn five years ago and was struck by its sadness and darkness. The novel follows four elderly office workers on the verge of retirement, facing a world that has changed around them. Harvey says the play explores 'how can you be happy in a world that has changed underneath you, and you can't keep up?' Pym's own frustrations seep into the character Letty, who reflects that 'the position of an unmarried, unattached ageing woman is of no interest whatever to the writer of modern fiction.'
Why Pym Now?
Pym's refusal to change tack despite being deemed unfashionable is admirable, Harvey notes. Unlike Austen, Pym's heroines rarely marry, and her work avoids the marriage plot. 'You're either married and bored to tears, or you're unmarried and worried to tears,' Harvey says. With few adaptations until now, the stage play and potential TV series signal a long-overdue recognition of Pym's unique voice.
Quartet in Autumn is at the Arcola Theatre until 13 June.
