Hetty Dorval

This first novel, written in 1947 by one of Canada's most distinguished novelists, is a quiet, subtle, morally complex book about a young girl's growth from innocence to maturity. Hetty Dorval seems to have behaved unconventionally, indeed immorally ('a very ugly story has followed her from Shanghai to Vancouver'). But is Frankie's adult perception of Hetty to be preferred to that of her childish innocence when she first met her? There are thus many ways to read this book. Is Hetty objectively a 'Menace'? Or is this a novel about the pernicious effect of gossip and about Donne's 'no man is an island' quoted on the frontispiece? Hetty has chosen to live outside society, but perhaps she should not be condemned for this; perhaps she should be granted some of the primaeval, elemental qualities of the British Columbia landscape which is so beautifully described.