Oil and Water

This book traces the rise and decline of the Anglo-Irish country gentry, particularly during the lifetime of Molly Keane (1905 - 1996), one of its most original and witty novelists. Molly Keane's life spanned two world wars, the 1916 rising, the 'Tan War' and the Civil War. The Anglo-Irish did their best to ignore these defining struggles, until their houses started getting burned down and their men, and later their women, joined the British forces. Molly's family was a typical example. She however rejected the life mapped out for her (living at home until a 'suitable' young man married her) and moved to Woodroffe House near Clonmel, when she met playwright John Perry. The book tracks Molly's career from writing a first novel in her teens, through discussion of her eleven subsequent books and the five plays she wrote or co-wrote with John Perry, all of which were directed by Sir John Gielgud. The death of her much loved husband in his thirties, followed some years later by the failure of her last play effectively stopped Molly writing for almost twenty years.
She moved to Ardmore with her two children and little was heard of her until 1981, when her famous Good Behaviour failed to win the Booker Prize. Molly wrote two more bestselling novels, Time after Time and Loving and Giving.