[The Virgin in the Garden] is a good example of proper literary ambition. It is, and practically declares itself to be, a novel in the European realist tradition, and it demands comparison with the masters in that tradition. The characters are full and rounded…. Mrs Byatt's talents are not confined to sketching members of a single social class.

The integration of the matter of the book—the reign of the first Elizabeth, Astraea, Shakespeare, the scholarship of Frances Yates and others, and Alexander's own elaborate play—is complete, and works on whatever level the book is read. There is a great deal of art in the book, and except for a little uncertainty about what becomes of Frederica, whom the reader comes to like too much to see her simply disappear from the stage without comment, the book as a whole is perfectly realised…. What I liked best...