The Man in the Wooden Hat, Jane Gardam
The Man in the Wooden Hat, Jane Gardam
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The Man in the Wooden Hat

Author: Jane Gardam

Narrator: Bill Wallace

Unabridged: 6 hr 50 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 09/15/2020

Categories: Fiction, Legal, Humorous


Synopsis

The New York Times called Sir Edward Feathers one of the most memorable characters in modern literature. A lyrical novel that recalls his fully lived life, Old Filth has been acclaimed as Jane Gardam’s masterpiece, a book where life and art merge. And now that beautiful, haunting novel has been joined by a companion that also bursts with humor and wisdom: The Man in the Wooden Hat.

Old Filth was Eddie’s story. The Man in the Wooden Hat is the history of his marriage told from the perspective of his wife, Betty, a character as vivid and enchanting as Filth himself.

They met in Hong Kong after the war. Betty had spent the duration in a Japanese internment camp. Filth was already a successful barrister, handsome, fast becoming rich, in need of a wife but unaccustomed to romance. A perfect English couple of the late 1940s.

As a portrait of a marriage, with all the bittersweet secrets and surprising fulfillment of the 50-year union of two remarkable people, the novel is a triumph.

The Man in the Wooden Hat is fiction of a very high order from a great novelist working at the pinnacle of her considerable power. It will be read and loved and recommended by all the many thousands of readers who found its predecessor, Old Filth, so compelling and so thoroughly satisfying.

"In Old Filth avoiding parenthood is presented as almost a relief. In The Man in the Wooden Hat it’s an unspeakable tragedy."—Christian Science Monitor

About Jane Gardam

Jane Gardam is the only writer to have been twice awarded the Whitbread/Costa Prize for Best Novel of the Year, for The Queen of the Tambourine and The Hollow Land. She also holds a Heywood Hill Literary Prize for a lifetime's contribution to the enjoyment of literature. She is the author of five volumes of acclaimed stories: Black Faces, White Faces (David Higham Prize and the Royal Society of Literature's Winifred Holtby Prize); The Pangs of Love (Katherine Mansfield Prize); Going into a Dark House (Silver Pen Award from PEN); Missing the Midnight; and The People on Privilege Hill. Her novels include God on the Rocks, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize; Faith Fox; The Flight of the Maidens; the bestselling Old Filth, which was shortlisted for the Orange Prize in 2005; The Man in the Wooden Hat; and Last Friends. Jane Gardam was born in Yorkshire. She now lives in east Kent.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Alicia on May 01, 2012

Just so you know where my prejudices lie: I read Old Filth then Man in the Wooden Hat and fell in love with Jane Gardam. So I am astonished to read negative reviews of Wooden Hat. In it, Gardam goes where so very few writers do. Perhaps because I am no longer young, this book spoke clearly to me of......more

Goodreads review by Barbara on March 07, 2022

This is the second book in Jane Gardam's trilogy about Edward feathers, A.K.A. Old Filth, and his wife Betty Feathers, nee Macintosh. Book one, Old Filth, centered on the life of Edward, his unhappy childhood, career as a brilliant judge in Hong Kong, and marriage to Betty. This novel is through Bet......more

My eyes are still wide with wonder and surprise with how Gardam’s second book about Edward Feathers has exceeded my expectations. This could have been another cozy tale about English ex-pats marrying for unexpressed reasons and then striving for an equilibrium – but it is not! Gardam plays with this......more

Goodreads review by Thomas on July 25, 2018

I read Old Filth about a decade ago. 1. You absolutely don't need to read Old Filth before this one. 2. I LOVED this book. 3. Gardam is one of those writers who can be wry and funny and penetrating all at the same time and showing very little effort. 4. I have no idea why I waited so long to follow up......more

Goodreads review by Claire on June 04, 2021

A love story. The second novel in Gardam's Old Filth trilogy. Old Filth (Failed in London try Hong Kong) is a QC. The first novel is his story, but this is his wife, Betty's. Her indecision over his proposal, a secret love (for two men) that she keeps for all of her life, her tragedies, and her simp......more