There is nothing quite so luxurious as an entire afternoon completely alone with a book. And if you can start and finish said book in the same afternoon alongside a pitcher of chilled, tart lemonade, well…pure bliss.
Such is how I found myself on a summery screened porch with the novel Interpretations of Love in my hands. It’s the second work and first novel from Jane Campbell. (Cat Brushing, her debut collection of stories published as she turned 80, provocatively explores the sensual lives of older women — highly recommended!) Campbell was 82 when this novel come out, and her earned appreciation for life’s details comes across with loving care. Like so many good stories, Interpretations begins with a long-buried secret provoked by a past family tragedy.
In 1946, the young and foppish Malcolm promises to deliver a letter for his older sister, Sophy, now married to Kurt and mother to four-year-old Agnes. The letter, we learn, is written to a young medic named Joe with whom Sophy spent a brief but intense night during the 1942 Blitz. Do the math.
Malcolm decides to keep the letter not out of malice but rather because shortly after Sophy gives it to him, she and her husband are killed in a car crash, leaving Agnes an orphan.
Agnes is raised by her emotionally distant grandparents, and Malcolm goes on to live a long but far from fulfilling life — he’s a spiky and hard-to-like character, much like a pet hedgehog you never want to cuddle. He hardly seems to like himself, telling a now-grown Agnes he’s “crusty” and “dissatisfied.”
The withholding of the letter — and its enlightening contents — affects not only Malcolm (his lifelong guilt) but also Joe (his complete unawareness) and, most centrally, Agnes.
Past and present finally collide as old “Uncle Mally” and Agnes convene for the occasion of Agnes’ only daughter’s wedding. It’s an intimate affair, only 12 guests, held at the home of Agnes’ ex-husband. Discomfort upon discomfort!
But Campbell’s deft writing about the emotions that roil beneath what should be a happy and celebratory day — the start of a new life for two young people in love — is what makes the unexpected ending all the more powerful. The “interpretations” of the title seem to be the many ways a single expression of love can become complicated by well-meaning actions or intentions.
