The Two Sisters

Jenny and Tessa, two sisters living with their father in rural England, discover that they are both in love with the same man.‘The Two Sisters’ was the first of the H.E. Bates novels. It is set in the English midlands, and he wrote it at the age of 19, when he was a clerk employed in a warehouse. He managed to find many idle moments during the day to write this novel! It was published in June 1926, having been rejected ten times by publishers before it finally won favour at Jonathan Cape –thanks to the recommendation of Edward Garnett. The novel concerns sisters Jenny and Tessie Lee, living on a farmstead with their tyrannical father, widower Jacob, and two brothers, Jim and Luke. The two sisters both dream of escaping… It is fair to suggest that Bates showed remarkable maturity in this first novel, and it was a clear indication that he had a big future as a novelist and short-story writer.