Girning and Gripe Water: The Careful Use of Compliments by Alexander McCall Smith

September 8, 2007 at 11:52 am (Mystery fiction)

What a perfect book for one such as myself, about to embark for Scotland! (No – I’m not “taking ship;” I’m flying, alas.) There it was, just sitting on the shelf at the library – -where I was employed until Friday August 31. (Sob! No – we won’t go there…) I didn’t even realize that the fourth Isabel Dalhousie book had come out. It is ever thus in this information-overloaded world: the one bit of information that you want – need – to know ends up reaching you quite by accident. So it was in the case of this book, with its misleadingly prosaic title, The Careful Use of Compliments.

[This review will not be a “spoiler” with regard to this particular novel; nevertheless, I will be discussing the dramatic developments in Isabel’s life that have been carried forward from the previous book in the series, The Right Attitude To Rain.]

This novel is loaded with riches. Alexander McCall Smith’s writing is marvelous, full of grace and wit. And speaking of grace, that is the name of Isabel’s long time housekeeper. Now that the lady of the house has a “wee bairn,” Grace has added childminding to her duties in the Dalhousie household. Many women would kill for the kind of freedom of movement this affords Isabel, but with that freedom comes a sharing of infant care that does not always go smoothly. For instance, one day Isabel comes home, having left little Charlie with Grace, to find that because he had been “girning” (complaining), she had given him a tonic called (rather wonderfully) gripe water. This turns out to be an herbal mixture containing mainly fennel and ginger. It has been used traditionally in Scotland to calm fretful infants. But Isabel’s knowledge of gripe water is that it is spiked with gin! – or at least, used to be. Apparently it no longer is, but she is plenty upset with Grace anyway. I couldn’t help thinking, well, Isabel, there is a price to be paid for the fabulous convenience of being able to turn little Charlie’s care over to another woman at a moment’s notice.

McCall Smith’s novel is loaded with the lore of Scotland and illuminated by his love of that country. Edinburgh springs to vibrant life, and the countryside is described in such terms that you immediately wish to be there.

Jura, an island in the Inner Hebrides, bleak, windswept and mysterious, sounds like heaven – especially to those like Isabel and her lover, Charlie’s father Jamie, who desperately need to escape the city for a while. Jamie, a musician, is the castoff boyfriend of Isabel’s niece Cat. Cat, a rather foolish, impetuous young woman, has a way of throwing away pearls richer than all her tribe. Isabel scoops this one up and finds herself immersed in a passionate love affair. At one point, while preparing a meal for the two of them, she has an epiphany: “I am blessed, and being blessed is something more than just having something; it is a state of mind in which the good of the world is illuminated, is understood. It is as if one is vouchsafed a vision of some sort…a vision of love, of agape, of the essential value of each and every living thing.”

(While Isabel is having these flights of the sublime, Cat is experiencing feelings of a very different sort. She may have rejected this attractive and devoted young man, but that does not mean that she was prepared to hand him over to Isabel. Thus does the quirky human heart operate, without regard for logic.)

Isabel Dalhousie is alternately prickly and congenial, but she is never dull. Holder of a doctoral degree in philosophy from Cambridge University, she possesses a beautiful mind, whose subtle operations McCall Smith frequently makes us privy to. She holds people to a very high standard of behavior, but the person she is hardest on is herself. Every thought and action is examined for signs of venality or meanness. This may sound tedious, but it is actually quite a fascinating process to observe. At one point in the novel, Isabel is awaiting a visit from one Christopher Dove, a philosophy professor. Professor Dove, who is coming up to Edinburgh from London, is about to supplant her as editor of her beloved Review of Applied Ethics. Although she has no liking for him, politeness would dictate that she offer to meet him at the train. The resentment and anger she is feeling at the moment, however, cause her to put off making the offer until it is too late. She berates herself thus: “That was a lesson which she should not need to learn at this stage of her life. Do not act meanly, do not be unkind, because the time for setting things right may pass before your heart changes course.”

Isabel is the fortunate beneficiary of inherited wealth. Sensitive on the subject of money, she uses it judiciously with regard to her own needs and generously with regard to family and friends. One indulgence that she does permit herself is the collection of fine Scottish paintings. We get to tag along as she visits galleries, museums, and auction houses. A possible instance of art forgery accounts for what little actual mystery there is in this novel. In addition to these delightful excursions, McCall Smith treats the reader to jewel-like poetry quotations and fascinating philosophical tidbits, such as the following: “There were two horses in the soul, [Isabel] thought, as Socrates had said in Phaedrus – the one, unruly, governed by passions, pulling in the direction of self-indulgence; the other, restrained, dutiful, governed by a sense of shame.”

[Pictured above: Two Cats and Flowers by Elizabeth Blackadder]

I’ve talked to a number of readers who say they were bored by The Sunday Philosophy Club . I would suggest bypassing that book (although I’d like to go on record as having enjoyed it myself). I have not read the second in the series, Friends, Lovers, Chocolate, but I can recommend without hesitation the third, The Right Attitude To Rain. From there, you can segue nicely into this book. Come on; give it a try! I currently know of no other novel in which a discussion of the philosophy of taxation (a surprisingly intriguing subject – or not surprisingly, we all of us being taxpayers!) is immediately preceded by a sentence such as this one: “Blessedness: she could not believe her state of blessedness; this young man, with all his beauty and gentleness, in her arms, hers.”

I picture Isabel Dalhousie as having curly brown hair, intense eyes, and a slim figure. I see her wearing a shirtwaist dress – old-fashioned, but somehow suitable for her. McCall Smith tells you virtually nothing about her appearance, so the reader is free to speculate…