The Thursday Night Book Club discussed The Narrow Door by Joanne Harris. The author (most acclaimed for her
work Chocolat) has written this psychological thriller as a dialogue between Roy Straightly, elderly Latin Master,
and Miss Buckfast, new head mistress of the school .Through this dialogue, the author explores the idea that the
past controls what we do, shapes who we are and cannot be hidden away from forever. The predominant themes
of gender, memory and trauma and the clash between old and new were discussed in the context of women
entering a man’s professional world. “Men walk in through the main gates. Women have to improvise. All we need
is a narrow door.”
