Guy and Pauline

Guy Hazlewood, a recent Oxford graduate, has thrown up both the consular career he once thought of, and the opportunity to teach at his father’s school, in favour of retiring to the country on limited resources to become a poet. He chooses the idyllic village of Wychford somewhere near Oxford. Almost immediately, he meets the daughters of the local vicar and falls for the youngest, Pauline, who returns his love. Various obstacles are thrown in the way of their slow courtship, including family doubts on both sides; rural conventions; financial problems; and the conflict between Guy’s sophistication and intellectual pretensions and Pauline’s innocence, strong religious belief and lack of education. The longer their engagement lasts, the more these issues come to the fore until Guy and Pauline reach a crisis and have to decide if their love is worth fighting for.