In this House of Brede

Philippa Talbot is a successful London career woman turned forty when she feels the call of the religious life. "I thought I was very well as I was, she told the Brede Sacristan later, "a human, balanced person with a reasonable record; with the luck of having money, friends, love. Only suddenly it wasn't enough. She is one of the most attractive and sympathetic characters in Rumer Godden's long and well-loved fictional roster.

This, then, is a story of the life in an enclosed house of nuns and of the relevance of this contemplative existence to our changing world—a challenging theme. The novel unfolds chiefly through Philippa, from the day of her entrance, through one crisis of mind and heart to another, until she faces an ultimate and almost unbearable sacrifice. Woven with her personal story is a much larger one—the story of the House, its history, and the present inmates who have vowed to live and die within its walls. The nuns are English Benedictines whose House is centuries old in tradition, a stronghold of faith and prayer. yet they are up-to-date, alive, aware of the world—and matter of fact. In Rumer Godden's hands, they are fully realized individuals whom we come to know and care about, adding rich dimensions to the novel as they live out their vocations.

Through them, the book gives us on the outside a picture of how everyday religious life is lived, day in, day out "without sloth or haste" as St. Benedict's Rule lays down. Part of the novel's attraction is its clear and abundant showing of the meaning of that life to those who live it, of its rules and ritual, and this makes the most uncommon and fascinating "shop."

It is the mark of Rumer Godden's unique magic that she immerses the reader wholly and unforgettably in the cloistered yet universal existence of her House of Brede.

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RUMER GODDEN was born in Sussex County, England, but spent the greater part of her childhood in India. The first of her books to be widely read in America (also about nuns) was Black Narcissus (1939). It was in fact her third novel. She has now published fifteen in all, including such favorites as Breakfast with the Nikolides, An Episode of Sparrows, and The Greengage Summer, as well as short stories, poems, children's books, and the autobiographical Two Under the Indian Sun, written with her sister Jon.

In This House of Brede took three years to write. To facilitate and authenticate the gathering of her material, Miss Godden was allowed to live at the gates of a Benedicthe monastery in England, and to have help and advice from the nuns.

Jacket design by S. A. Summit

—from the dust jacket