The Weather In The Streets (Virago Modern Classics)

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Homelessness can be an incredibly isolating experience so even something as simple as asking someone on the streets how they are or offering to buy them a hot drink can make a world of difference. What every local authority will have done is to make arrangements to find extra accommodation that they can bring people into in these situations. These might be hotels, B&Bs or hostels run by homelessness charities or it might be church or community spaces that are made available for those purposes. Perhaps with it being out of season, it might include places like holiday parks.

When she published this novel Rosamond Lehmann was well established. She had gained a reputation of being a little racy with Dusty Answer. Like a number of women writers of the twentieth century, Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Taylor are two examples, she was able to convey so much in one sentence, one movement, one piece of dialogue and had the skill to convey the reactions people had to each other through their words. Here is the moment when Olivia and Rollo hesitate just before committing themselves to an illicit relationship. Pervading the whole story of the affair is Olivia’s love for Rollo; even in the face of traumatic experiences and his frequently caddish behaviour, she relishes the ‘happiness of loving’ and longs to be with him. But Lehmann’s representation of love is shrewd and complex. It is shown to be all-encompassing, overwhelming and deeply distressing: far more powerful than any social mores. The English writer Rosamond Lehmann seems to fall somewhere in the intersection between Elizabeth Taylor and Virginia Woolf, her modernist style and piercing insight into character marking her out as a writer of great skill and distinction. The Weather in the Streets (1936) is a sequel to Lehmann’s earlier novel, Invitation to the Waltz, in which seventeen-year-old Olivia Curtis is captivated at her first society ball by the dashing Rollo Spencer. Nothing much comes of their meeting on the terrace at the time. Rollo belongs to a higher social class than Olivia and remains somewhat out of her reach, and yet she is mesmerised by him all the same.

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While many rough sleepers will be known by outreach services and found and given the support they need, Ms Colley says there will be some people they don’t know who are new to the streets or who haven’t been found – and she says it is vital the public plays a part in helping vulnerable homeless people. Rosamond Lehman writes about the inner torments of isolated young women with great effect. This was the strength of Dusty Answeras well as Invitation to the Waltz. In this novel, Olivia is not yet self-assured, not yet happy in any social group. Being separated from her husband she is not welcome in most social circles, and out of tune with her family’s social connections. Rollo pays her attention, as he did at the party when she was 16, and she warms to him. They get on well and at first everything is ecstatic. But once established as his mistress she finds herself always waiting. It was all over before now, it could still be nothing, never happen … I don’t know how, there wasn’t one moment, but he made it all come right as he always did, saying: ‘She won’t be coming in, will she?’ (144-5) Told in three sections, the middle one in Olivia's voice, this is an old (old) story of love, desire, subterfuge, jealousy and mis-matched expectations. It's quite a feat to make both characters sympathetic, even as things start to unwind, but Lehmann manages it.

With brilliant dialogue and intense passages of elation and despair, The Weather in the Streets takes you on the rollercoaster of their relationship’ ESTHER FREUD, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH Despite her apparently new appealing, Olivia is still the insecure and fearful creature who seeks approval and reassurance and, seeing Rollo after so many years arouse forgotten feelings in her, making her blunt and blind to the consequences of starting an affair with him. Taking up where Invitation to the Waltz left off, The Weather in the Streets shows us Olivia Curtis ten years older, a failed marriage behind her, thinner, sadder, and apparently not much wiser. A chance encounter on a train with a man who enchanted her as a teenager leads to a forbidden love affair and a new world of secret meetings, brief phone calls and snatched liaisons in anonymous hotel rooms. Absolutely loved this book. I finished it (very) late last night and have been thinking about the characters on and off all day today. Surely that is a sign of a great book. Written in 1936 this novel was years ahead of it's time, with it's story of an extra marital affair, secret meetings and hotel rooms and the resulting consequences.

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When we get periods of extreme weather, local authorities invoke those protocols and bring into place their emergency plans for helping bring people in off the streets. However, Lehmann’s book does give visibility to characters who struggle with their lot in life and decide to seek more for themselves, while trying to not damage or hurt the people around them. She’s an expert at describing falling in love, the invisible currents between two people, how each takes it a little further until it’s a settled thing. She illuminates the way love can put you into a bubble, when nothing exists except in relation to this wonderful thing that’s happening. And those little jolts, the sparks when one of the pair is offended, but the other hasn’t noticed. In the passage above I notice how smoothly Rollo uses his alibi, set up ten years ago. Has he needed it before, will he need it again? Is this a man of honour? And I notice how Olivia sacrifices her own freedoms, her own life to wait for him.