The Pinecone

British author Jenny Uglow has used a pinecone as the central symbol of the life and beliefs of an upper class British woman in her new non-fiction book The Pinecone: The Story of Sarah Losh, Forgotten Romantic Heroine - Antiquarian, Architect, and Visionary (#410).  It's less of a biography than it is a capsule history of Carlisle and the nearby village of Wreay during the eighteenth and nineteenth century.  The lives of the Losh family are chronicled along with their multitude of friends, their changing fortunes and political movements of the period, and their intense interests in the arts, philosophy, religion and natural science. 

I believe Sarah is singled out because of a curious church she built to her exact specifications which still stands in Wreay today.  Although it is used as a Christian church, much of the symbolism in the building itself apparently has nothing to do with Christianity and caused much consternation to those who saw it after it was dedicated in the 1840s.  Sarah was rich, cultured, unmarried and free to travel and indulge her interests in business, the arts and sciences without having to answer to anyone.  A fortunate life, indeed.  She was clearly ahead of her time with her hands-on approach, and shrewd in catching and riding the next wave of burgeoning technology with the advice of her family and its far-flung and influential friends and acquaintances.  The problem with this biography is that Sarah is largely on the periphery of her own story. The only opinion I could form of her was that she was rather spoiled and, wearing velvet riding boots, very content to ride rough shod over any whose opinions clashed with her own.  She invariably won.

I did win this book on Good Reads, and since I'm addicted to historical fiction (especially British!), I did find a lot of the material in this book quite interesting.  The problem for American readers is that Ms. Uglow presupposes an intimate knowledge of English geography, history, politics and social mores during the eighteenth and nineteenth century.  I even found much of what I've learned so far in my Education for Ministry course quite useful in understanding the squabbling going on in Anglican circles of the period.  I can see that it would be easy to get lost in the thickets of this book if you don't at least have a mental picture of the forest involved.

On the plus side, there are a number of helpful illustrations and pictures included in The Pinecone.  I only wish the author had included a legible map.