The Pool in the Desert

"The Pool in the Desert" by Sara Jeannette Duncan is a novel likely written during the late 19th century. The story centers on the life of a woman navigating the challenges of motherhood and societal expectations while living in British India. The protagonist, Mrs. Farnham, reflects on her relationship with her husband, John, and their daughter, Cecily, revealing the complexities of familial bonds against the backdrop of colonial life. The opening of the novel introduces Mrs. Farnham's struggle to manage her household's finances while caring for her family in a foreign land. She recounts the early days of her daughter's life and especially the difficulties posed by her husband's military duties and her eventual separation from Cecily. As the narrative unfolds, it becomes clear that Mrs. Farnham's relationship with Cecily is marked by distance, both physically and emotionally, as Cecily grows up with her aunts in England, creating a sense of alienation between mother and daughter. This dynamic sets the foundation for the exploration of maternal instincts, societal pressure, and the impact of separation on family ties in a colonial context. (This is an automatically generated summary.)

Sara Jeannette Duncan was a Canadian author and journalist, who also published as Mrs. Everard Cotes and Garth Grafton among other names. First trained as a teacher in a normal school, she took to poetry early in life and after a brief teaching period worked as a travel writer for Canadian newspapers and a columnist for the Toronto Globe. Afterward she wrote for the Washington Post where she was put in charge of the current literature section. Later she made a journey to India and married an Anglo-Indian civil servant thereafter dividing her time between England and India. She wrote 22 works of fiction, many with international themes and settings. Her novels met with mixed acclaim and are rarely read today. In 2016, she was named a National Historic Person on the advice of the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.