The Dutch House a Marvel

The Dutch House (2019)

By Ann Patchett

Harper, 352 pages

★★★★★

Ann Patchett is one of the best at probing how individuals construct different realities when confronted by the same situations and stimuli. She also has a knack for showing how a single decision ripples across place and time. 

The namesake of The Dutch House is indeed a domicile. Much of Patchett’s three-generational novel is situated in, outside, and in the imagined life of an ornate mansion in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania. Elkins Park is a real place, a suburb of Philadelphia that has been the home of American business titans such as retailer John Wanamaker, hat manufacturer John Stetson, financier Jay Cooke, and inventor/Standard Oil stockholder William Lukens Elkins for whom the unincorporated settlement is named. In other words, it has been a repository of Big Money.

In our case, though, it is also where Cyril Conroy resettled his wife Elna and their two children, Maeve and Danny. Cyril is the ultimate self-made man, a blue-collar guy who parlays skill at buying and rehabbing homes into a sizable bank account. Like many of his ilk, Cyril confused fortune and breeding. He bought the Dutch House for a song when the last of the genteel Van Hoebeeks died, restored it, and took on Jocelyn, a cook; Fluffy, a nanny; and Sandy, a housekeeper. The trappings of wealth did little to hide Cyril’s lack of education, his workingman’s wardrobe, his construction worker’s habits, and his Catholicism. In the eyes of their neighbors, the Conroys have cash but not class. That does not faze Cyril, but Elna abandons her family without even leaving a note. Danny admires his father, but both children are de facto orphans, with Fluffy serving as a surrogate mother until Maeve takes on that role toward Danny, becomes a protective lioness, and lives vicariously through him. 

The Dutch House plumbs the dynamics between an imperious sister and her malleable brother, but the house itself is a curse–an object of desire for some, disgust for others, and a restless ghost for all. Things begin to deteriorate in a big way when Cyril dates and eventually weds Andrea. She brings two daughters to the marriage: Bright and Norma. Danny is fond of them, Maeve despises Andrea, and the later has plans that don’t include either Conroy offspring. When Cyril unexpectantly dies, Maeve and Danny are for-real orphans. Andrea takes charge and, as lawyer Gooch informs them, there isn’t much they can do about their expulsion from the Dutch House. Danny couldn’t care less about that, but Maeve wants revenge and Danny is her instrument. There is a small crack in the otherwise airtight will and Maeve makes certain that Danny exploits it.

We follow the fortunes, misfortunes, passions, and ennui of Cyril’s survivors as they get schooled, work, wed, procreate, and stew in their respective juices. In an interesting twist, Maeve and Andrea are the iron-willed characters and Danny a passive receptacle through which schemes are poured. Although Danny is happy to forget the Dutch House, he indulges Maeve’s ritual of driving by it, parking within view of it, and conjuring scenarios of what Andrea is doing. Among Danny’s issues is that he is far more devoted to his sister than to his wife, Celeste, and it doesn’t help that Maeve doesn’t think much of her either. At one point a question is raised: “Do houses ever die of grief?” Danny must decide whether he can defy Maeve, let go, and avoid duplicating his father’s path. For her part, Maeve has never gotten over the loss of her mother and it embitters her. This prompts Danny to ask, “Do you think it’s possible to ever see the past as it actually was?” Indeed!

Much, much more happens in the novel and each new twist is an existential crisis for some and a new cause for acrimony in others. For decades Maeve and Danny have been human quantum entanglements to the detriment of their respective individualism. Things will happen that disrupt their link, including the appearance of an unexpected visitor. Among the things I admire about Ann Patchett is that she leads us to resolutions that seem genuine rather than tidy and contrived. She also has a fondness for things best described as bittersweet.

I adored this novel. It surely deserves to reside in the top eaves when awards are considered for the best works of fiction for 2019.

Rob Weir