Synopses & Reviews
Now a major motion picture from the Academy Award-winning producer of
Shakespeare in LoveI Capture the Castle tells the story of seventeen-year-old Cassandra and her family, who live in not-so-genteel poverty in a ramshackle old English castle. Here she strives, over six turbulent months, to hone her writing skills. She fills three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries. Her journals candidly chronicle the great changes that take place within the castle's walls, and her own first descent into love. By the time she pens her final entry, she has "captured the castle"--and the heart of the reader--in one of literature's most enchanting entertainments.
Review
"This book has one of the most charismatic narrators I've ever met."--J.K. Rowling, author of the
Harry Potter series
"Dreamy and funny . . . an odd, shimmering timelessness clings to its pages. A thousand and one cheers for its reissue. A+"--Entertainment Weekly
"I Capture the Castle is finally back in print. It should be welcomed with a bouquet of roses and a brass band. Ever since I was handed a tattered copy years ago with the recommendation 'You'll love it,' it has been one of my favorite novels."--Susan Isaacs
"It is an occasion worth celebrating when a sparkling novel, a work of wit, irony, and feeling is brought back into print after an absence of many years. So uncork the champagne for I Capture the Castle."--Los Angeles Times
"A delicious, compulsively readable novel about young love and its vicissitudes. What fun!"--Erica Jong
Review
“Althea’s tongue-in-cheek commentary…and her razorlike quips are abundantly entertaining, but it is the heroine’s remarkable ingenuity and compassion for loved ones…that make her so endearing.”—
Publishers Weekly, starred review
“Kindl writes with sharp, effervescent, period-specific language that is so spot-on readers may find themselves adopting a British accent. This witty take on classic Regency romances is frothy fun.”—Booklist, starred review
This droll tale set in 19th-century England will earn smiles of recognition from those familiar with Pride and Prejudice…archly humorous.”—School Library Journal, starred review
“[A] clever take on Jane Austen’s ‘Pride and Prejudice’”—The Boston Globe
“A romp of a Regency romance . . . funny as well as satisfying.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Fans of costume dramas and novels of manners will recognize touches of other influences (Downton Abbey, for instance, and even Miss Manners) as well as clear Austen homages…a very satisfying story.”—BCCB
Review
PRAISE AND AWARDS FOR
KEEPING THE CASTLE:
STAR “Altheas tongue-in-cheek commentary . . . and her razorlike quips are abundantly entertaining, but it is the heroines remarkable ingenuity and compassion for loved ones . . . that make her so endearing.”—Publishers Weekly, starred review
STAR “Kindl writes with sharp, effervescent, period-specific language that is so spot-on readers may find themselves adopting a British accent. This witty take on classic Regency romances is frothy fun.”—Booklist, starred review
A Kirkus Reviews Book of the Year
A School Library Journal Best Book of theYear
A Booklist Editors Choice
A Texas TAYSHAS and Lone Star Reading List Selection
Synopsis
One of the 20th Century's most beloved novels is still winning hearts
I Capture the Castle tells the story of seventeen-year-old Cassandra and her family, who live in not-so-genteel poverty in a ramshackle old English castle. Here she strives, over six turbulent months, to hone her writing skills. She fills three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries. Her journals candidly chronicle the great changes that take place within the castle's walls, and her own first descent into love. By the time she pens her final entry, she has "captured the castle"-- and the heart of the reader-- in one of literature's most enchanting entertainments.
"This book has one of the most charismatic narrators I've ever met." -- J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series
Synopsis
One of the 20th century's most beloved novels is still winning hearts, Dodie Smith's I Capture the Castle
"This book has one of the most charismatic narrators I've ever met." -- J.K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter series
Adapted to a feature film in 2003, I Capture the Castle tells the story of seventeen-year-old Cassandra and her family, who live in not-so-genteel poverty in a ramshackle old English castle. Here she strives, over six turbulent months, to hone her writing skills. She fills three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries. Her journals candidly chronicle the great changes that take place within the castle's walls, and her own first descent into love.
By the time she pens her final entry, she has captured the castle-- and the heart of the reader-- in one of literature's most enchanting entertainments.
Synopsis
Seventeen-year-old Althea is the sole support of her entire family, and she must marry well. But there are few wealthy suitors--or suitors of any kind--in their small Yorkshire town of Lesser Hoo. Then, the young and attractive (and very rich) Lord Boring arrives, and Althea sets her plans in motion. There's only one problem; his friend and business manager Mr. Fredericks keeps getting in the way. And, as it turns out, Fredericks has his own set of plans . . . This witty take on the classic Regency--Patrice Kindl's first novel in a decade--is like literary champagne!
Synopsis
Now a major motion picture from the Academy Award-winning producer of
Shakespeare in LoveI Capture the Castle tells the story of seventeen-year-old Cassandra and her family, who live in not-so-genteel poverty in a ramshackle old English castle. Here she strives, over six turbulent months, to hone her writing skills. She fills three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries. Her journals candidly chronicle the great changes that take place within the castle's walls, and her own first descent into love. By the time she pens her final entry, she has "captured the castle"--and the heart of the reader--in one of literature's most enchanting entertainments.
Synopsis
The Winthrop Hopkins Female Academy of Lesser Hoo, Yorkshire, has one goal: to train its students in the feminine arts with an eye toward getting them married off. This year, there are five girls of marriageable age. Theres only one problem: the school is in the middle of nowhere, and there are no men. Set in the same English town as Keeping the Castle, and featuring a few of the same characters, heres the kind of witty tribute to the classic Regency novel that could only come from the pen of Patrice Kindl!
About the Author
Dorothy Gladys "Dodie"
Smith, was born in 1896 in Lancashire, England, and she was one of the most successful female dramatists of her generation. She wrote "Autumn",
"Crocus",
and "Dear Octopus",
among other plays, but her first novel,
I Capture the Castle (Little Brown, 1948) was written when she lived in America during the '40s and marked her crossover debut from playwright to novelist. the novel became an immediate success and was produced as a play in 1954. Her other novels were
The Town in Bloom,
It Ends with Revelations,
A Tale of Two Families, and
The Girl in the Candle-Lit Bath. Today, however, she is best known for her stories for young readers,
The Hundred and One Dalmations (Heinemann, 1956) and
The Starlight Barking (Heinemann, 1967; Simon & Schuster, 1968).
The Hundred and One Dalmations was inspired by Dodie's own Dalmation named Pongo, and became the basis of two Disney films.
The Starlight Barking is also available in paperback from St. Martin's press. Dodie Smith died in 1990.
Reading Group Guide
1.
I Capture the Castle was first published in 1948. How might readers have responded differently to the novel at that time? How might their responses have been the same? Why does the novel continue to appeal to readers today as it did in 1948?
2. I Capture the Castle is told through Cassandra's entries in her journals, an exercise she has undertaken in order to teach herself how to write. Why do you think Dodie Smith chose the form of the diary to tell the story of Cassandra and the Mortmain family?
3. Mortmain's celebrated novel is described throughout I Capture the Castle as a literary breakthrough, a predecessor to James Joyce's work, and meriting the analysis of famous literary critics. Yet beyond a few spare descriptions, Smith tells us little about the actual story. What do you imagine Jacob Wrestling to be about?
4. A voracious reader, Cassandra compares her situation to that of the Bennets in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. How would you compare the situation of the Mortmain sisters to that of the Bennet sisters?
5. Why does Mortmain encourage Cassandra to be "brisk" with Stephen? What does I Capture the Castle say about class in mid-twentieth-century England?
6. What is the meaning of the book's title?
7. Cassandra is fascinated by the Cottons and their American mannerisms, traditions and expressions, just as the Cottons are fascinated by the Mortmains and their English mannerisms, traditions and expressions. What does I Capture the Castle say about English preconceptions of Americans and America and vice versa?
8. How does I Capture the Castle reflect society's changing views toward women during the first half of the century? How do the women in the novel view the roles and opportunities open to them both in the family and in the world at large differently? Consider Cassandra, Rose, Topaz, Mrs. Cotton, and Mrs. Fox-Cotton.
9. Over the course of the novel, Cassandra comes to seem less a child "with a little green hand" and more a young woman. How is I Capture the Castle a story of Cassandra's coming of age?