ali smith seasonal quartet autumn winter spring summer

One revisited theme was the blurred line between male and female, seen in the earlier novel both in the cross-dressing Renaissance artist known as Francesco del Cossa and when the ‘ghost’ of this artist sees the present day George and believes her to be a boy because she is wearing trousers. However, I additionally noticed the revisiting of several ideas from Smith’s 2014 novel, How to be both my favourite of all her books, and the one which most immediately precedes the Seasonal Quartet. For a full breakdown of the recurring features of the Seasonal Quartet, see Grumble’s Yard’s review on Goodreads – one of my favourite reviewers, who enjoyed tracking all the patterns through this quartet. Links between characters from different novels became apparent, threads were tied together, recurring motifs chimed a fourth time. In this fourth and final volume, connections across the series became solid rather than subtle. The contemporary-est of contemporary novels, they have featured current events often of only a month or two before publication, mixed in with stories about inter-connected families and friends, about female artists through the decades, about nature changing through the seasons. It’s quite sad that this series has come to an end. Because there’s no merry tale without the darkness.

Ali smith seasonal quartet autumn winter spring summer