
Anyone who was required to complete a first-year English module with a name like “history of women’s literature” has probably heard of this novel, which was one of the very early examples of the English-language Discontented Wife sub-genre. (Emma Bovary beat it there, but you know. The French.) Thanks to my old habit of recording the date and location of my book purchases along with my name on the title page, I can confidently state that I bought this in 2003 from a second-hand bookstore in Ashfield that is now, tragically, a real estate agent. Until a couple of weeks ago, I had never read it.