The flight and the song, L.M. Anderson and S.M.C.

The flight and the song, A Tale of Old Devon, L.M. Anderson and S.M.C. 

All the sternness of the grey granite tors of Devon, all the purple enchantment of its moors, are evoked in this haunting and poetic novel. No more appropriate setting could have been devised for the characters depicted.

Here are ignorant, lowly folk, whose talk is of pixies and dimpsies, changelings and yeth-hounds yet who never lose sight of what is real, and who are filled with a granite-like resolution. Here is a "changeling," Robin, who, like the purple heather, is nurtured by the moors, drinking in their sunshine and their wild companionship, wandering and singing always in an ecstasy of meditation.

By gentleness and delight in nature he brings blessings upon those whose path he crosses and in the end the healing of old wounds and added kindness of neighbors and friends for one another.

This is a book of merriment and song, a historical romance woven in brilliant colours though spun out of sombre stuff. Its background is the dissolution of the monasteries under Henry VIII and the effect of this dissolution upon a monk and a nun of Devon and upon the villagers themselves. Although it deals with persecution and flight and fear and death, it is still a joyous tale, full of ghostliness and entrancing lyrics, and charmingly realistic with the local gossip of the poor.

Here is a tale as fragrant as a sprig of heather and as sturdy as a granite cliff. Here is all the song and poetry of Devon moors woven into a story thrilling in its suspense, convincing in its characterization and deliciously archaic in its style.

Details

• Hardcover with dust jacket (Used & Covered with plastic protection
• First Edition, 1946
• Condition: Good, has name and library stamp on first page (see photo's)
• Publisher: Longmans, Green and Co.