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livres_de_bloss's review
3.0
This book gets an A+ for meticulous and thorough research but a C for readability. It didn’t flow the way other books on the same subject or textbooks do. The overall story got lost in the details.
colorfulleo92's review
4.0
This took me about 8 days to finish, not because it wasn't good or interesting. It certainly was. But wasn't in the right mind for so much information. But it was an entertaining read and it was so interesting to learn about the life of servants. Reminded me a little about the Edwardian/Victorian cooking show on YouTube showing life and recipes in the kitchen. I'm not mad it took so long as it wasn't a book that slogged on its own. It was just me
letab's review
1.0
So dry and boring I barely made it through this one. It's the perfect book if you have insomnia! I would've much preferred a book on the actual duties and lives of these servants rather than meticulous lists of how much every servant in a house was paid and the increases of such pay through the years. Sadly, this was just a waste of my "wages" and will be quickly donated or used as a doorstop.
librarianonparade's review
4.0
You can blame Downton Abbey for this one. In this country we seem obsessed with the age of the grand country houses, the world of Upstairs and Downstairs, the golden age before the War - nd I'll confess, I'm no exception. There's something so evocative about the era, a kind of idealised image of England that probably never truly existed to begin with - and perhaps it says something about us that we hark back to it so much.
What I liked most about this book is how it managed to evoke that bygone age without surrendering to the gilt and the gloss. It pulls no punches in describing how hard the servants lives were, how often it was lonely and exhausting and miserable, and how frequently the hierachy within the ranks of the servants was as hide-bound and sharply delineated as the divide between Upstairs and Downstairs.
Of course, this book explores more than just the golden age of the Edwardian era - it traces the evolution of servants and staff right the way from the medieval household of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, right up to the present day, with the majority of country homes now owned by trusts or English Heritage. It's certainly interesting to note how servants went from being part of the 'family', not hidden away or invisible, to being very much someone who should be neither seen nor heard.
What I liked most about this book is how it managed to evoke that bygone age without surrendering to the gilt and the gloss. It pulls no punches in describing how hard the servants lives were, how often it was lonely and exhausting and miserable, and how frequently the hierachy within the ranks of the servants was as hide-bound and sharply delineated as the divide between Upstairs and Downstairs.
Of course, this book explores more than just the golden age of the Edwardian era - it traces the evolution of servants and staff right the way from the medieval household of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, right up to the present day, with the majority of country homes now owned by trusts or English Heritage. It's certainly interesting to note how servants went from being part of the 'family', not hidden away or invisible, to being very much someone who should be neither seen nor heard.
jlmb's review
4.0
Well, this was right up my alley! I enjoyed learning the specifics of how England's large country estates have been run for the past 600 years. The book took a while to read because it was so packed with details to the point of being overwhelming at times. But that's ok! I wanted the details. This is obviously not a book for the casual reader to pick up but rather one for a reader looking to further their knowledge in a subject they already know to a certain degree.
Musson does a brilliant job compiling the back matter of the book. His notes are extensive, his index thorough and his list of sources/bibliography is amazing! He separates the bibliography according to chapters so if your focus is the 17th century , it is easy to see all the sources for that particular period. It's great! I added a lot of books to my to-read list.
While most of the time I felt Musson piled the details and facts upon the reader, sometimes I felt his explanations were lacking, mainly when he was discussing certain people or locations. I guess he assumed the reader would already know who he was referring to, or where he was referring to, but I didn't always know. Luckily I had Professor Google to the rescue. I did enjoy it when he would refer to characters in novels since one of the reasons I wanted to read this book was to help me better understand older British novels that I read. I do have a better grasp now on the intricacies of social positions of various servants and how they related to the gentry they served. I think this will help in future readings of nineteenth century novels.
Reading about the amount of work some of the servants did - especially the scullery maids, laundry maids and the under housemaids - made me truly appreciate the modern inventions that ease our lives today. Thank you dishwasher! Thank you washing machine & dryer! Thank you rubber gloves! Seriously, I can't even imagine how horrific the hands of the laundry and scullery maids must have been. What nightmare jobs those would have been. Definitely some servants had it a lot easier than other. Butlers had it pretty dang easy in comparison to a poor scullery maid. Basically all the women's jobs were much more backbreaking than the men's jobs. The valet and lady's maid were very similar but other than that, no, the guys had it easier.
The strict hierarchy of the servants on large estates was fascinating. I had known from various movies and tv shows that this was the case, but I didn't realize how structured the rankings and accompanying behaviors were. Servants for the top servants. Separate dining rooms for the "Upper Ten" servants and for the "Lower Five"(i.e. everyone else & always a lot more than 5). It seemed crazy that no one was allowed to help anyone else - you were never to break rank and do any work "beneath" you. My favorite story was when some crumbs were on a table and pointed out to the butler(the table was his province) by the house librarian. "Am I to understand that crumbs on the library table are the preserve of the butler?" To which the butler replied "Yes" and then he swept the crumbs to the floor with his hand and added "And now they are the preserve of the housemaid." Haha. It wasn't until after WWII that this strict observation of roles was dismantled and people started doing more varied work.
There are lots of little stories like the one above that put a personal face upon the history. I really took delight in reading those. This book is well worth the read if you want to further your understanding of that period of time in Britain. It would be a boring slog to those not already keen on the subject matter.
Musson does a brilliant job compiling the back matter of the book. His notes are extensive, his index thorough and his list of sources/bibliography is amazing! He separates the bibliography according to chapters so if your focus is the 17th century , it is easy to see all the sources for that particular period. It's great! I added a lot of books to my to-read list.
While most of the time I felt Musson piled the details and facts upon the reader, sometimes I felt his explanations were lacking, mainly when he was discussing certain people or locations. I guess he assumed the reader would already know who he was referring to, or where he was referring to, but I didn't always know. Luckily I had Professor Google to the rescue. I did enjoy it when he would refer to characters in novels since one of the reasons I wanted to read this book was to help me better understand older British novels that I read. I do have a better grasp now on the intricacies of social positions of various servants and how they related to the gentry they served. I think this will help in future readings of nineteenth century novels.
Reading about the amount of work some of the servants did - especially the scullery maids, laundry maids and the under housemaids - made me truly appreciate the modern inventions that ease our lives today. Thank you dishwasher! Thank you washing machine & dryer! Thank you rubber gloves! Seriously, I can't even imagine how horrific the hands of the laundry and scullery maids must have been. What nightmare jobs those would have been. Definitely some servants had it a lot easier than other. Butlers had it pretty dang easy in comparison to a poor scullery maid. Basically all the women's jobs were much more backbreaking than the men's jobs. The valet and lady's maid were very similar but other than that, no, the guys had it easier.
The strict hierarchy of the servants on large estates was fascinating. I had known from various movies and tv shows that this was the case, but I didn't realize how structured the rankings and accompanying behaviors were. Servants for the top servants. Separate dining rooms for the "Upper Ten" servants and for the "Lower Five"(i.e. everyone else & always a lot more than 5). It seemed crazy that no one was allowed to help anyone else - you were never to break rank and do any work "beneath" you. My favorite story was when some crumbs were on a table and pointed out to the butler(the table was his province) by the house librarian. "Am I to understand that crumbs on the library table are the preserve of the butler?" To which the butler replied "Yes" and then he swept the crumbs to the floor with his hand and added "And now they are the preserve of the housemaid." Haha. It wasn't until after WWII that this strict observation of roles was dismantled and people started doing more varied work.
There are lots of little stories like the one above that put a personal face upon the history. I really took delight in reading those. This book is well worth the read if you want to further your understanding of that period of time in Britain. It would be a boring slog to those not already keen on the subject matter.
samstillreading's review
2.0
I found this book in one of my favourite bookstores, Reader’s Feast, in Melbourne. Their non-fiction section always has a great range of books to suit all your favourite interests as well as igniting a few interests you never knew you had! Being a big fan of the television series Downton Abbey, I decided to give this book a go. It chronicles the life of the servants in English country mansions over the centuries. I knew it was non-fiction, and wouldn’t contain as much drama as Downton, but still…I thought it would be interesting.
It is an interesting book, in a factual, history type way. The book does get bogged down at times in details and facts and I found myself skimming over sections. I would have liked to know a bit more about the typical day-to-day role of a housemaid or scullery maid rather than facts on how many servants and what their job title was. Musson must be praised however on the amount of painstaking research that has been done to produce such a detailed book. There is a chapter for each century of servant life up until the 1800s and 1900s, where there are two chapters for each. There are a lot of houses covered – I would have liked to have seen fewer houses, more detail if it was possible. However, the bibliography is incredibly impressive if I wanted to pursue this further...
While I did learn quite a bit about the types of roles that were needed to run a big house and estate, I also discovered that my interest in this subject is more about the people rather than the logistics. I think I should read a biography of one of these servants to try to gain more understanding about life was like for the individual. Any suggestions? Oh, and a bit of drama and intrigue wouldn’t go astray!
http://samstillreading.wordpress.com
It is an interesting book, in a factual, history type way. The book does get bogged down at times in details and facts and I found myself skimming over sections. I would have liked to know a bit more about the typical day-to-day role of a housemaid or scullery maid rather than facts on how many servants and what their job title was. Musson must be praised however on the amount of painstaking research that has been done to produce such a detailed book. There is a chapter for each century of servant life up until the 1800s and 1900s, where there are two chapters for each. There are a lot of houses covered – I would have liked to have seen fewer houses, more detail if it was possible. However, the bibliography is incredibly impressive if I wanted to pursue this further...
While I did learn quite a bit about the types of roles that were needed to run a big house and estate, I also discovered that my interest in this subject is more about the people rather than the logistics. I think I should read a biography of one of these servants to try to gain more understanding about life was like for the individual. Any suggestions? Oh, and a bit of drama and intrigue wouldn’t go astray!
http://samstillreading.wordpress.com
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