Customer Reviews

Lamb in His Bosom (Modern Southern Classics)

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Caroline Miller's Lamb In His Bosom is a truly beautiful read. The unforgettable characters, the story line, the beautiful prose and dialect, all these make it the perfect book about the South and Southerners.
The book is set in Georgia about twenty years before the War Between the States, and eventually leads up to the War. The story revolves around the life and thoughts of Cean Smith (nee Carver), and how she manages as a young wife and mother in the Georgia backwoods. Her life is marked by hard work, love for her husband, and birthing, raising, and burying her babies.
I was first struck by the dialect. The more I read, the more I recognized my own mother's speech patterns and idioms. I should have expected as much, seeing as she was born and raised in a Kentucky holler, in a situation not far removed from that of Lamb's Cean and Lonzo. From the book's excellent afterward (which describes Miller's research technique), as well as from numerous contemporaneous reviews, the dialect in Lamb is probably the best record available of pre-War Between the States Southern speech, and the book therefore has historical value. Attempts by authors to portray "Southern-speak" usually come off as irritating, even insulting, poor imitations of a "Hee-Haw" script. But Miller makes the dialect not only effective, she makes it beautiful and even honorable.
The story line has several elements to commend the book. First is the utter believablity of the situations. There is nothing outrageous about the vicissitudes encountered by these characters. The power of the story is contained in large measure in the very plainess of life in the setting. Life for these folks is a few years of hard toil to scratch out an existence that is punctuated by brief moments of happiness and made joyful by enduring family ties and precious generational memories. Most prevalent in the story is the ubiquitous presence of death, which spares neither the elderly, the middle-aged, and especially the children and babies. The story made me remember the grave yards at my Alma Mater in southern Virginia, where the grave markers tell a story of a time when families had more deceased children than most people today have living relatives. And in this is the Southern heart most eloquently displayed in Lamb, for every passing is, of course, cause for mourning, but is also occasion to remember the blessing that death has become, as it is the Door that leads to the long hoped for encounter with the Great Maker, Redeemer, and Disposer of All. In Lamb, dread death is not feared as it gives way to Blessed Transfiguration.
Lamb In His Bosom has a rightful place in the Southern Canon. The story is unique; it has no real plot sublety or intricacy; it has none of disturbing Gothicity of O'Connor, none of the flagellation of Faulkner, none of the contrived humor of Welty. This in NO WAY is a diminution of those great Southern writers. Rather, it is a confirmation of the Southern Character and Ethos of seeing God and nature as good and living in close connection to both even in the face of hardship and death, loving our living, and honoring our dead. Lamb In His Bosom deserves to read, carefully and quietly. It is a book that is beautifully simple and simply beautiful, just like the South and Southerners.

Lamb in His Bosom! What do you think, when you first hear this title? Most people just think Lamb in His Breast. And for the people who just look at the cover, and don't look at the book ever again, that is all it means. However, if you actually read the book based in Southern Georgia, you learn it's a lot more. You learn that the book travel's through Cean, her husband Lonzo, and the rest of her family; it is a journey for the reader to embark on, one that they will never forget.

The story starts out twenty or so years before the Civil War and ends at the end of the Civil War. Through out the novel, you become very close to Cean, and her family which varies so differently person to person. Caroline Miller, the author, write so beautifully in the novel that the black marks on the page seem like people standing next to you for the past twenty years. You'll find yourself slumped in your chair crying over sad events, and at other times on the edge of your seat in great anxiety to move on.

Perhaps it is not just the characters that draw you into the book, but the stories/lessons you get from the book. This book is not like the classic type of story with a begining, middle, and end. It is more of just a lot of small stories, so wonderfully woven into one big story. You can tell Miss Miller spent much time writing this, and it took many interviews with people to get the story just the way she wanted it.

One last thing I want to comment on before I wrap this review up, is the use of language in the novel. To put it plain and simple, a historian of the pre-Civil War times put Caroline Miller's Lamb in His Bosom, as the "most accurate literature of the time."

Overall, the book is terrific. The only bad thing about the novel, is that it ends. Though it is a lengthy 340+ page book, you'll find yourself staying up countless amounts of hours, just reading "one more chapter." It is a shame that this, along with one more novel was the only novels that Caroline Miller had published, though she reportedly had manuscripts never published.

I read this book years ago... as a college project to read classic, but little known writers. It was often called "THE POOR MAN'S GONE WITH THE WIND". It has the flavor of the recent book, COLD MOUNTAIN because it does not romantize the South or the Civil War. The writing is very descriptive and the pity is that Caroline Miller never wrote another book.

Beautiful and painful, this winner of the 1934 Pulitzer Prize, has the power to bring forth memories of things which one has never experienced. Though set among the Georgia country folk of the mid-nineteenth century, the universality of hope and despair and hope resurging victorious, of character and motive and temptation and struggle against self and circumstance will speak to anyone willing to stop and listen and absorb from those who though dead "yet speaketh". Going far deeper than a mere period piece (though the historicity is fascinating of itself), Lamb in His Bosom evoked in me, at some level, sympathy, understanding and even degrees of identification with the bared souls of each of the major characters. This book is not for the faint of heart or those who confine their swimming to safe and shallow waters, but for those who are willing to dive deep into the pool of sense and emotion, of depths of contemplation which Lamb in His Bosom provides, you may be profoundly affected and saddened ... yet wonderfully pleased by what you discover.

This book, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, is immediately absorbing. Miller's language and sense of detail impart a realistic and personal experience of the flow of life for these Georgia country folk in the early 1800's. Her characterization is without false sentimentality or stereotype, permitting you to feel as if these are people you know and wish well. This book was a pleasure.

I'm a man about to turn 50 with 4 yr. olds twins (boy & girl)and an 18 mo. old baby girl. I only offer up this trivia as fodder. Reading "Lamb in His Bosom" made me reach for my babies more often & with squeezes that were nigh ta' make their eyes bug; for I am truly a blessed man. If you can read my silly words then you have access to a computer and you're somewhat educated. You too have great fortune in your life....and that's all I know of you.

A common life of hardship and pain with persons whom you can call friends and neighbors is what's in store for you in this haunting, powerful, unforgetable & sad read. Caroline Miller has a Steinbeck(esque)way of getting you to fall for and love her characters (especially Cean). This is the 1st book to make me weep like an ol' sentimental fool. Perhaps it's 'cuz I'm 'bout ta' turn 50; perhaps it's 'cuz I got little 'uns; perhaps it's a beautifully written story. My supposition is all of the above....the right book at the right time. Nothin' like it.

I certainly don't recommend it to anyone under 40 or even anyone over 40 for that matter who doesn't have kids and hasn't rebounded from some of what life can really dish out. Save it for when ya' got just enough silver in your hair.

Apparently Margaret Mitchell's favorite author was Caroline Miller. The reader can tell that Mitchell tried to be Miller, but the talent and skill is amazing. I was totally absorbed.

This 1934 winner of the Pulitzer is a delightful read giving a glimps into life on the edge of the Georgia fronter in the middle of the 19th Century. Caroline Miller captures the earthy speech patterns of these people in what I must call an excellent example of regional historical realism. The story centers mostly around Cean and includes the very real and often times tragic lives of those around her. It reads more like a journal rather than a typically developed modern novel. Nonetheless, the lack of a definite plot actually gives the work a tone of authenticity that is most moving.

First of all, my name is Sidney Miller Horton. Caroline Miller was married to my father's first cousin, Will Miller. Even with the family connection, I just heard about Caroline and the book right before Christmas. By the way, I am 63 years old so it is amazing to me that I just found this book.

It is wonderful. Caroline obviously did a hugh amount of research before beginning the book. To be able to consistently write in the dialect of the time is increadable. It is very interesting to me that she wrote about the non slave holders, unlike Margaret Mithcell.

I wish that I could say that I am blood kin to Caroline Miller but I can't. I am just sorry that somehow I didn't know about her until recently.

Sidney Horton

I had a difficult time starting this book... the action seemed slow... the characters without depth, but as I continued reading I was amazed by the complexity of the relationships with each other, with the earth, and with God. One thing that tells me Miller wrote good characters is that Lias, the cheating, deserting husband generated some sympathy and sentiment in the end (at least for me!) Margot was one of my favorite characters, and I didn't feel like her situation with Jasper was ever totally tied up, like the book ended too quickly. Maybe that's just because I wanted to keep reading about them all... Cean's story wasn't over. It was just beginning anew.

This definitely isn't a book for the impatient reader. With each page you venture further and further into the backwoods until you're completely immersed.

From a historical perspective, I found it fascinating that the town was as untouched by the war. I envisioned this hidden village. The boys that went to fight didn't even understand why they were fighting. Some things don't change, do they?

I loved the book.