at freddie’s

At Freddie’s by Penelope Fitzgerald (David R. Godine, 1985)

A curious, somewhat half-baked novel by this masterful writer.  It takes place in the early 1960s, in London, in and around an eccentric and floundering acting school for young children, which has long supplied fledgling talent to West End theaters.  It is owned and operated by Freddie (Frieda), an ancient, though ageless, doyenne of the British theater world, whose origins can be traced to the origins of the Old Vic (if not further) and whose supporters include just about everyone, including the Master himself, Noel Coward.  Two young Irish newcomers in London are hired to teach academics to the unruly and uninterested children, and the slight book follows their tentative and insufficient romance.  Fitzgerald writes with her customary assured, all-knowing brilliance, but the books is too scattered  and unfocused to satisfy the reader.  For once her brevity and succinctness seems inadequate, and the book doesn’t seem to be completely thought out and perfectly executed, as do her others.  But what there is, is often wise and delightful; it just doesn’t add up to anything much

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