Jennifer Birmingham's Reviews > Despised and Rejected

We learn the most about history by reading the texts that were actually written during the time we are studying. This book covers the period from right before WWI to about two years in, and occupies the lives of individuals in upper middle class England.

It involves LGBTQ topics, pacifism at the time of war, socialism, pro-semitism (is this a word -I mean the opposite of anti-semitism), bohemian lifestyle, suffragette, pro—Irish, etc. all the outcasts and misfits of the time.

One of the most interesting topics covered in this book is - what did it mean to be gay in 1914? The woman in this book initially doesn’t know it is a concept beyond the fact that she is just not attracted to the various male suitors her grandmother sets her up with. The gay man in this book knows that he, himself, is working against social norms and is considered to be “sensitive” and “artistic” by his family.

The argument for socialistic pacifism gets a bit preachy and blah blah boring.

The book is well written. It’s a shame that there is nothing else in print by this author.