They had an unconventional marriage, and troughout her life Sackville-West had a number of other relationships with both men and women. Now that he's gone, his older children, senior citizens and big advocates of productive lives, assume that their gentle and pliable mother will be passed around between their homes. edition, hardback, 8vo, 294pp, owner's initials dated 1932 on endpaper, edges brownig, otherwise clean and sound, mauve cloth, black titles, spine slightly faded, corners slightly bumped; overalll Very Good condition / no dustwrapper. Lady Slane looks back over this “vale of Soul-making” in her imagination and acknowledges what she has learned in a life, which in retrospect, she can appreciate as full. Vita Sackville-West was undeniably cynical, but stopped shy of coming across as bitter, at least not in this small gem of a tale.

Published in 1931, it is one of Sackville-West's most popular works and has been adapted for television by the BBC. In a time when old age seems more denigrated than celebrated, I found All Passion Spent even more powerful than when I first read it a few years ago.I re-read this one a little while ago, and here’s my review if you’re interested https://librofulltime. I’m sure there are many widowed elderly ladies whose families think they know best and ride roughshod over their mother’s own wishes. In 1913, she married diplomat Harold Nicolson and traveled extensively before settling in 1930 at Sissinghurst Castle, where she designed a world-famous garden. They want to organise their widowed mother's life but Lady Slane has her own ideas and creates her own new life where she has always wanted to be and acquires new friends, eccentric and elderly.

Part Two is where VSW displays her strongly feminist (though she would vigorously object to the word, preferring human rights) viewpoint, particularly in Lady Slane's recollection of her internal struggle over the meaning of her impending marriage to Henry.

There is a field of people who think you should always look at an author’s background when analyzing the text, and another group who say you should read nothing about them. But what if she rotated among the married couples, spending time with each as a kind of paying guest? They know their duty but really none of them want her as a permanent fixture in their homes (far too disruptive). After almost seventy years of conforming to every wish of her just-deceased husband, she decides to live her remaining years to her own liking, “calm of mind, all passion spent. The elderly and eccentric owner and agent of Lady Slane's cottage, who forms an understanding and regular friendship with Lady Slane.