This story is the recalling by Elisabeth herself of a summer spent without guests in her house and garden in Germany. She talks about the books she reads, when and where, because there is a right moment and place for each book. She goes on a lot about her garden and how beautiful it is. Furthermore, she also talks about the members of her family that have weird denominations, her husband, The Man of Wrath and her children, always called the babies… the baby of May, the baby of June and the baby of July, no first names. Likewise, she also mentions the poor farmers who live around her, from the height of her comfort and wealth. I can’t decide if the tone of superiority in the book is what she really thinks, or if it is a humorous twist. I will go for that interpretation because it is the only way for me then to appreciate this reading.
“It is a mystery to me, when I see the narrowness of the bedsteads, how so many people can sleep in them. They are rather narrower than what are known as single beds, yet father and mother and often a baby manage to sleep very well in one, and three or four children in the opposite corner of the room in another. The explanation no doubt is that they do not know what nerves are, and what it is to be wakened by the slightest sound or movement in the room and lie for hours afterwards, often the whole night, totally unable to fall asleep again, staring out into the darkness with eyes that refuse to shut. No nerves, and a thick skin—what inestimable blessings to these poor people! And they never heard of either.”