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Illustrated portrait of Miss Foote

A character in A Clergyman's Daughter

Miss Foote

The other woman who works for the Rector: a tall, rabbit-faced, dithering virgin of thirty-five who means well and makes a mess of everything, in a perpetual state of flurry. Mr Warburton compares her to a blunt-nosed creature rushing round on an eccentric orbit. Her orthodoxy is suspect — she has said she can worship God best under the blue dome of the sky — and in Dorothy Hare's absence she starts a war in the Mothers' Union with one tactless remark, takes in seven of Mr Tombs's cats, and reads novels aloud to the members.

The book

Cover of A Clergyman's Daughter by George Orwell
A Clergyman's DaughterGeorge Orwell, 1935

Orwell's second novel: a rector's daughter loses her memory, wakes up on a London street, and finds out what England does with a penniless woman.

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At a glance

In the book
The Rector's other parish helper at Knype Hill
Age
Thirty-five
Trusted with
The church decorations; not the Mothers or the Sunday School
Where she appears
Chapters 1 and 5

Who they are in the book

Spoiler-free

Miss Foote does parish work at St Athelstan's, the church at Knype Hill in Suffolk where the Reverend Charles Hare is rector. The unpaid women who do the dirty work of most parishes have dwindled at Knype Hill to four or five, and Miss Foote is the only one his daughter Dorothy Hare can count on at all regularly.

She is thirty-five, unmarried, and permanently behind. George Orwell's summary is that she means well and makes a mess of everything, and Mr Warburton, the town's resident scandal, has a line about her that Dorothy remembers: she reminds him of a comet, a ridiculous blunt-nosed creature rushing round on an eccentric orbit and always a little behind time.

There is a limit to what she is given. She can be trusted with the church decorations, but not with the Mothers' Union or the Sunday School, because although she goes to church regularly her orthodoxy is suspect: she has confided to Dorothy that she can worship God best under the blue dome of the sky. When Dorothy disappears and Miss Foote inherits the round anyway, the results reach the last chapter -- a war going on inside the Mothers' Union over a tactless remark she made, among a general collapse of the parish's accounts, registers and attendance.

How the book draws them

Appearance, manner, and tone — as the book sketches them, in our words.

  • How the book describes herTall and rabbit-faced, thirty-five, and in a perpetual state of flurry. Orwell's full phrase is a dithering virgin of thirty-five who meant well but made a mess of everything.
  • Mr Warburton's comet"A ridiculous blunt-nosed creature rushing round on an eccentric orbit and always a little behind time." It is the line the book quotes about her, and Dorothy is the one who has heard it.
  • What she is trusted withThe church decorations, and nothing that involves standing in front of people. The Mothers' Union and the Sunday School are kept out of her hands.
  • The blue dome of the skyShe goes to church regularly and her orthodoxy is still suspect, on the strength of one confidence to Dorothy: that she can worship God best out of doors.
  • The tactless remarkMade during the eight months Dorothy is away, and enough to leave the Mothers' Union in what the book calls internecine warfare. The remark itself is never reported.
  • The catsOld Mr Tombs died just after Christmas. Miss Foote took over seven of his cats herself and made heroic efforts to find homes for the others.
  • The readingShe reads novels aloud to the Mothers' Union, which is Dorothy's job when Dorothy is there. In the last pages they have finished the current book and Dorothy is trying to think what to give them next, having exhausted their favourite author.
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