Exhibition Review ‘From Hamlet to Hollywood’ The Barley Hall York

There promises to be a lot more activity on Bookstains this year – and a lot of changes.  It seems these days that everyone and their wives are doing poetry challenges, these days so I feel that it is time to close mine in order to retain some originality.  I shall still be featuring poetry but it shall be in a completely different format.  I’m way behind with my book and film reviews, but I have taken notes, so expect these to appear in the form of posts soon.

To kick off 2012, here is a post about costume.  I was undecided at first about which blog to use for this post.  Although ‘echostains’ is an art and design blog, the clothes featured were actually worn by actors in films (period drama’s which were sometimes derived from books).

The place these pictures were taken was the wonderful Medieval Barley Hall in York, UK.  December 2011 saw us visiting one of our favorite places (York) for a few days before Christmas.  The weather was at its most treacherous – blowing a gale with lashings of Yorkshire rain.  However we managed to find a safe haven in The Barley Hall which was all set out for a Medieval Christmas.

We’ve visited York a lot, yet this was one building we have never been in.  Although it has long been known that there was a medieval building in the Stonegate vicinity, the building wasn’t actually officially recorded as Medieval until 1980.  When the site was sold for redevelopment, it then became clear that the extent of the medieval structure was substantial.

The oldest part of the reconstructed Barley Hall dates back to about 1360.  The house was  built as a townhouse of Nostell Priory, which is monastery in West Yorkshire.  In 1430, a new wing was added and soon after,  the Hall became the home of William Snawsell, a leading York citizen, who was a goldsmith, an Alderman and Lord Mayor of York.

The atmosphere of the hall is wonderful and it was especially enhanced by the Christmas decorations.  Charming as the Hall is, we received an unexpected surprise when we ventured upstairs.  An exhibition of Period Drama clothes awaited us – some of them instantly recognisable.  I didn’t know which ones to examine first, I was so excited!

Lizzie and Darcy clothes from BBC Pride and Prejudice

What a joy to be able to scrutinise  the actual clothes which Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth wore in Andrew Davies adaptation of Austen’s Pride and Prejudice BBC 1995!  Lizzie’s jacket is the one worn in the scene where Darcy successfully proposes to her.  Other Pride and Prejudice clothes  featured in the exhibition are hats worn by the characters Lady Catherine de Bourgh and the haughty Miss Bingley.

From the Georgian era to the Late Edwardian era.  Costumes from the gorgeous Downton Abbey, created and written by Julian Fellowes, which premiered on ITV, September 2010. The latest episode was shown the Christmas period 2011.  The image below shows a dress worn by Dame Maggie Smith who plays The Rt Hon Violet, Countess of Grantham.  Her costumes are built to reflect the style appropriate of her heyday (early Edwardian) rather than the younger fashions of the day.  This is a stunning gown!

As worn by Dame Maggie Smith in Downton Abbey

I spent ages examining and swooning over these costumes.  You are even allowed to try on  a variety of hats from different periods (not the exhibition ones)  The one I suited the most was from one one Henry V111 wives………

worn by Cate Blanchett in 'Elizabeth'

Another stunning dress, was the one worn by Cate Blanchett who starred in the 1998 film  ‘Elizabeth‘  incidentally, the information about the dress states ;-

“The dress in this film were undoubtably influenced by the director Shekhar Kapur who was of Indian origin and who wanted to use fabrics which were light and flowed beautifully, very much refelecting the fabrics which were traditionally used for  clothes in India.”

Not all the clothes are grand though… Dame Judy Dench and Julia Sawalla dresss from Larkrise to Candleford are quite modest.  Unlike the ‘has to be actually seen to be believed’ Elizabeth Taylor’s dress form the film ‘Young Toscanini’

Elizabeth Taylor Young Toscanini 1988

Period drama women don’t have it all their own way though – the men are well represented in this exhibition.

Alan Rickman Judge Turpin Sweeney Todd

Tim Burton’s ‘Sweeney Todd’ 2007 (which starred Alan Rickman and Johnny Depp), features a pair of bloodstained trousers and an outfit worn by Alan Rickman as Judge Turpin with an explanation of how clothes are distressed for the bloody scenes.

bloodstained trousers from Sweeney Todd

       Also featured are clothes from the 2010 film ‘The Kings Speech’, Keira Knightley’s ‘Duchess’ dress’ clothes from Sense and Sensibility, Hamlet, Casanova,   The TV series ‘The House of Elliot and much much more!  Images cannot possibly do the clothes justice.  I urge you to go if you’re in the area – and enjoy before the exhibition ends!

Thanks to York dig  for providing the first image, and The Barley Hall for providing the black and white photo.  All other photographs are my own.

The exhibition is open until March 2012 – please drop in if you are in the area.  You will be well rewarded!

For lots more information please visit http://www.barleyhall.org.uk/

More info about Tim Burton’s Sweeney Todd film costumes here

PLUS

PS it’s Chaim Soutine’s Birthday!

Book: The worst street by Fiona Rule

The Worst st in London by Fiona Rule

Where does the time fly to?  It is a couple of weeks or so since I last posted on here.  That doesn’t mean that I haven’t been busy reading though – or watching.  I have now finished ‘The worst street in London’ by Fiona Rule.  The street in question is Dorset Street, Spitalfields London.  I was inspired to read this book after our excursion to Denis Severs House in Spitalfields (read my post on echostains a collection of time-travel experiences and atmospheres)

The olden Dorset St

Though the book has an introduction by Peter Ackroyd it’s really  nothing like Ackroyds ’London’ or in his style. Neither is it a dry text-book nor really academic, but it is a good read, once it gets going.  Common lodging houses, Jack the Ripper and his victims, crime, vice and unsavoury characters – this was their stomping ground, where they earned their living and their bed for the night: where they drowned their sorrows and ultimately, where they died –  sometimes by violence, sometimes by dissipation and sometimes, I suspect – with blessed relief

Dorset St 1888

We have 17th century Huguenot silk weavers weaving their own strands on the loom of Dorset street and the Spitalfields area.  The immigrants, the opportunists, the lodging house proprietors.  When machinery replaced the silk workers they left the area.  The  1870′s  saw the tranformation brought about by the slum clearances which in turn made way for tenement blocks –  ruled by landlords like John McCarthy.  Jack the Ripper features strongly in this book.  Mary Kelly, the Ripper’s last victim was killed on Dorset street and Rule retells her sorry story, somehow made even more poignant  by placing Kelly in the context of her environment.

Millers court

The street was later renamed  Duvall Street, but the bricks were so well seeped with disrepute that the black marketeers, gangsters, spivs and the East End gangs are embedded in its fabric. The Kitty Ronan murder in 1909 has an eerie echo of Mary Kelly’s.  In fact the whole of the Dorset Street story relates like a cinema projection of a danse macabre – the dance never finishing and the film on continuous reel.  The book ends in a car park - but the crime continues.  A good researched and interesting read.  There’s an added bonus  at the back – a detailed walk of the Spitalfields area!

More about the book and it’s author here

image 1 Dorset st  2 Millers Court (Ripper Walks), 3 Dorset St 1888 and 4. Dorset St today (London walks)

book image here

The empty Bookcase (nearly)

The journey is long behind me...

  

Well I finished my Flashback challenge a while ago, and I shall be writing about it (eventually).  I’ve read an assortment of books lately like ‘The worse Street in London’ by Fiona Rule (introduction by Peter Ackroyd) and the Dukan Diet by Dr pierre Dukan.  Talking of Ackroyd I have just bought Ackroyds ‘Hawksmoor’ and ‘Wolf Hall’ by Hilary Mantel, which I’ve been after for a while.  So looking forward to reading these.  I have run out of DVD’s again.  I recently bought ‘Return to Cranford’ and was bought  The Jane Austen Collection, containing Emma, Northanger Abbey and Mansfield Park - of course I watched them one after another (and I had seen them all separately before)  

Peter Ackroyd

  

I have read a few Ackroyd books Including his wonderful ‘London’, Dickens – Public life and Private Passion, Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem.  I tried The House of Doctor Dee’ but couldn’t quite get into it. The same applied to the Clerkenwell Tales.  I feel that I am missing out a bit not being able to get into these books, so I shall have to persevere (at some point).   

poor Darcy - how he must feel it!

  

Oh and I must mention one book which I got for Christmas and keeps slipping my mind (even though I’ve read everything else and I haven’t bought anything new, – and that is Mr Darcy Vampyre by Amanda Grange.  The idea of Darcy as a vampire, – well, poor Darcy how could he endure it? living on the blood of mere mortals?

Titus Groan: Swelter receives a surprise

Titus Groan, read but still writing about it

Well I finished Titus Groan  a several weeks ago.  I saw him safely come into his Kingdom and I have been propelled five years into the future.  Ghosts haunt Gormenghast – but some aren’t dead.  Flay is living, not roughly but quite nicely thank you.  He has now acquired two caves for himself, which he has furnished sparsely.  He had become a keen hunter, he cooks, he cleans, he still slips into Gormenghast from time to time, he watches and he waits – but what for, he doesn’t know.  But he has survived.

So has Steerpike.  he has dispensed with the Doctors dispensary and spare room and ensconced himself in a nice apartment befitting his new position – but I am getting beyond myself: far into Gormenghast.  I am following on from Keda, Titus’s wet-nurse.

sepulchrave played by Ian Richardson

Sepulchrave haunts the burnt out library.  He travels from shelf to shelf reciting the classics.  he is joined by burnt up Barquentine – minus head.  If you remember, his head had to be replaced with that of a small calf as the original had been stolen.  Well, the original does turn up again, in a further chapter…

Swelter is another ghost.  He has been replaced by a bow-legged chef with a mule shaped head and mouthful of metal teeth!  Where do they get their staff from?  I digress.  Back to Titus Groan.

It is the morning of the Titus’s christening and all are preparing for the event.  Even the head gardener Pentecost (where does Peake get these names from) is cutting flowers and polishing the apples in his little leather cape.

In Gormenghast violet eyes are an unfortunate disfigurement.  Titus’s are mentioned quite a few times in a uncomplimentry way.  It’s a good job Elizabeth Taylor wasn’t born in Gormenghast – her career would never have taken off.  But I digress…..

flay

Nannie Slagg is trying to awaken Fuschia, Sepulchrave and Sourdust are eating breakfast together.  Rottcodd is still dusting and the Dr is singing away in his bath.  The main action in this chapter comes from Flay and Swelter though:-

Suddenly the door opened and Flay came in.  He was wearing his long black moth-eaten suit, but there had been some attempt on his part at getting rid of the major stains and clipping the more ragged edges of cuff and trouser into straight lines.  Over and above these improvements he wore around his neck a heavy chain of brass.  In one hand, he balanced on a tray, a bowl of water.  The negative dignity of the room threw him out in relief as a positive scarecrow.  Of this he was quite unconscious.  He has been helping to dress Lord Sepulchrave. and had made a rapid journey with the christening bowl as his lordship stood polishing his nails by the window of his bedroom……..

I love this encounter between these old adversaries, but Flay is no match for Swelter’s dripping sarcasm..

A voice came out of the face: ‘Well. well well,’ it said, ‘may I be boiled to a frazzle if it isn’t Mr Flee.  ‘The one and only Mr Flee, Well, well, well.  Here before me in the Cool Room.  Dived through the keyhole I do believe.  Oh, my adorable lights and liver, if it isn’t the Flee itself.’

swelter as played brilliantly by Richard Griffiths

To add insult to injury, Swelter then proceeds to introduce Mr Flay to his kitchen boys:-

‘Mr Flee, I will introduce you,’ said Swelter as the boys approached, glueing their frightened eyes on their precarious cargoes.  ‘Mr Flee – Master Springers – Mater Springers – Mr Flee.  Mr Flee – Master Wrattle, Master Wrattle – Mr Flee.  Mr Flee – Master Spurter – Mr Flee…….

For Flay, this proves too much.  He strikes Swelter across the face with the heavy chain.  But before there can be any retaliation, Flee manages to escape.  The next encounter between the two enemies is interrupted by Sourdust being there, so there can be no return match.  Later.

Titus Groan: Keda

Alas no image of Keda

I’ve not wrote about my re reading of Titus Groan by Mervyn Peake for a while.  But that doesn’t mean that I’ve haven’t been reading it.  I have and am very nearly finished the first book and shall be soon into Gormenghast itself.   But as far as the writing concerned, I am up to the chapter about Titus’s wet-nurse Keda.

This woman seems to alien compared to the other characters – even the Dwellers.  I think this is down to her having a kind of vitality and beauty.  Beauty in the Gormenghast region seems very scarce. The Dwellers have it for such a short time before premature ageing.  They have a hard life and cluster around the bottom of the mountain – like they have been  cast out of Shangri la..

Keda has a past, and she’s running away from it.  Her ancient husband died and she had to choose between two lovers.  She is glad to go to Gormenghast.

With the dark cloth hanging to her ankles and caught in at the waist with the thong of jarl root: with her bare legs and feet and her head still holding the sunset of her darkened day, she was in strange contrast to little Nannie Slagg, with her quick jerky walk, her dark satin dress, her black gloves, and her monumental hat of glass grapes.  Before they descended the dry knoll towards the archway in the wall, a sudden gutteral cry as of someone being strangled, froze the old womans blood and she clutched at the strong arm beside her and clung to it like a child.  Then she peered towards the tables.  They were too far for her to see clearly with her weak eyes, but she thought she could make out figures standing and there seemed to be someone crouching like a creature about to spring…….

Keda had not long ago buried her baby.  She came willingly to be Titus’s nurse, though her first meeting with the little boy was fraught with sorrow:-

Keda stared down at Titus.  Tears were in her eyes as she watched the child.  Then she turned to the window.  She could see the great wall that held in Gormenghast.  The wall that cut her own people away, as though to keep out a plague; the walls that barred her view the stretches of arid earth beyond the mud huts where her child had so recently been buried…..

The relationship between the wet-  nurse from the Dwellings becomes increasingly unbalanced as the story unfolds.  It seems that Keda has two babies to look after (the other being Nannie Slagg who becomes more and more reliant on her).  Meanwhile:-

Titus had stolen the limelight and Keda’s indifference was soon forgotten, for he was beginning to cry, and his crying grew and grew in spite of Mrs Slagg dangling a necklace in front of his screwed up eyes and an attempt at singing a lullaby from her half-forgotten store.  She had him over her shoulder, but his shrill cries rose in volume.  Keda’s eyes were still upon the wall, but of a sudden, breaking herself away from the window, she moved up behind Nannie Slagg and, as she did so, parted the dark brown material from her throat and freeing her left breast, took the child from the shoulders of the old woman.  Within a few moments the little face was pressed against her and struggles and sobs were over.  Then as she turned and sat at the window, a calm came upon her as from her very centre, the milk of her body and the riches of her frustrated love welled up and succoured the infant creature in her keeping.

What a tender moment this is between baby and Keda – the only mother Titus will ever know.

Authors I have read – Charles Dickens

charles-dickens

 

Charles Dickens is one of my favorite authors of all time – I just love his characterisations and observations concerning the quirkiness of human behaviour.  I have read nearly all his books, but there are one or two that have passed me by and some, though popular with others, leave me cold. 

Miss Haversham

 

My favorite book changes from time to time.  It is actually ‘Great Expectations’, but having recently re watched the latest Bleak House remake, I’m beginning to dither…  But no, I will go by the book.  So it’s ‘Great Expectation’ 

Magwitch using the stolen file

 

Great Expectations 

What I love about it: The marshes, the cruel stepmother, the impervious Estella and Miss Haversham.  I love the idea of the old bride still in her tattered bridal gown – I love the cake which mice have made their home in and the clock that’s stopped.  I love the way simple Pip becomes a snob then changes back when he finds out his real benefactor. 

 Thrills: Magwitch in the graveyard, Pip being saved by the convicts escape, the fire at Miss Havershams.  Magwitch’s daring visit to Pip and the way he drowns.  Last and not least the renting of those dirty curtains from the windows and the scales dropping from Estella’s eyes as she realises that Pip is her own true love!

Pip is told he has great expectations

 

Oliver Twist 

Oliver dares to ask for more

What I love about it:  the poor woman in the workhouse, the beadle who names the child, Sowerby the undertaker – who in their right mind would like to sleep with coffins, the hideous Claypole who gets his come uppence, the thieves den, Dodger, Nancy and Fagin.  I love the tangled web that is woven, the intricate relationships and the honour among thieves.  The Brownlow connection, trust and betrayal and how everything comes out right in the end. 

Bill Sykes gets a fright

 

Thrills: Plenty to be had, the Murderous Sykes and the ghost of Nancy on the roof, the workhouse regime, the actual murder of poor Nancy, the match made in hell in the form of Bumbles wife (actually, that’s more comical) and the triumph of Bulleye as he escapes a drowning.  The man who stop Oliver with a punch when he runs off after they think he is a pickpocket – well he deserves a punch himself.  I love the way that all the threads come together in this story.  It is so well thought out and told and what an array of characters! 

David Copperfield 

David Copperfield

What I like about it:  the perils of a cruel stepfather and what happens when his mother dies.  The novel is very like Dickens’ own early life – including the factory.  Betsy Trotwood his aunt who proves a good sort.  Mr Dick is an enigma – I can’t quite make him out.   I love the idea of Peggotty’s relatives living in an upturned boat.  The sweet Emily.  Dora Davids fluffy but useless wife.  Big daft Ham who loves Emily, whose head is soon turned when she sets eyes on Steer forth. 

The Cheeryble brothers by Phiz

 

Thrills: Not many apart from Ham drowning to save Steerforth and poor Emily’s father searching all over London for his fallen daughter.  The creepy slimy character of Uriah Heep who is slowly plotting his takeover of Wicklow’s firm, swindling all who gets in his way. Ham and  Dora’s death is more sad than thrilling though. 

Nicholas Nickleby 

Nickleby makes himself comfortable at Dotheboys Hall

 

What I love about it:  Mr Murstone who kicks things off for Nicholas.  ‘Dotheboys’ Hall’, Wackford Squeers and his wife and especially the ridiculous Fanny Squeers who takes a liking to Nickleby.    The horrible uncle Ralph Nickleby, the pitiful Smike, the loyal Noggs. I like the bleakness of ‘Dotheboys’ Hall and the humour and general niceness of the Cheeryble brothers.  I am not keen on the theatrical bits of the novel, although the ‘Infant Phenomenon’ is quite an amusing character.

confrontation

Thrills: Ralph Nickby who would compromise poor Kate, the cruelty of Squeers to those poor boys, especially to Smike who could have had a nice home and family. Pathos comes from the gentle Smike, secretly in love with Kate and his eventual death – very moving. 

Bleak House

Bleak House

What I like about it: Reputation was all.  I like the mysterious Nemo, the bored Lady Dedlock and Miss Flyte and her birds.  I’m not keen on Jarrdyce versus Jarndyce, which gets a bit monotonous, but I like Esther Summerson and the simple way that she accepts everything, she has no pity for herself at all I also like the way that the court case makes people act in ways they wouldn’t normally act – putting their life on hold for an outcome that is by no means a forgone conclusion.  Skimpole the ‘child’ who is anything but, kind Mr Jarndyce who has seen this Will fever ruin many a poor man.  I like the way that secrets which get into the wrong hands can be lethal – there must have been a lot of blackmail around in Victorian times.

Esther Summerson and Caddy Jellyby by Phiz

Thrills: Absolutely lots!  the opium dens, Krook the rag and bottle merchant who finally combusts literally -  only a pair of smoking legs are left.  the murder of blackmailer Tulkinghorn by Hortense.  This is a wonderful book with a great plot and a very dark and mysterious aura about it.

A Christmas Carol

What I like about it: Who doesn’t like this Christmasy tale!  This story has got everthing really.  It’s sentiments unfortunately are rarely thought about apart from at Christmas time.  Charity and the turning over of a new leaf cheers the reader on and the thought occurs that it’s never too late to trun over a new leaf.

Scrooge and dead partner Marley by Leech

Thrills;   It has to be the ghosts of course: the rattling chains, the ghostly light, the pointing finger, the glimpses into what the future could hold….

Little Dorrit

Fanny and Little Dorrit calll on Mrs Merdle

What I like about it: The exciting glimpse into the Marshalsea prison where debtors carry on like they were at home and are encouraged to do so.  I love poor little Amy Dorrit and despair of her selfish father.  The story is full of lots of little sub stories that make it more complicated than most.  However, Little Dorrit is a lovely character, full of kindness, patience and  self-sacrifice – which are rewarded in the end 

Thrills include the mystery of the paper in the back of the watch case.  The very strange luring away of Tattycoram (what a name!).  The murderous Rigaud and the strangely weird Mrs Clennham and Miss Wade. 

The Old Curiosity shop

daniel cattermole illustration Quilp in the background grinning

 

What I like about it:  The cast of characters.  The hideous hunchbacked Quilp who lends money to Nell’s Grandfather putting him in debt.  Nell and grandfather become homeless and wander as beggars as Quilp takes their shop.  Kit, Nell’s friend, Dick Swivvler and Nell’s brother all join in the search for Nell and grandfather , aided by the nasty Quilp. 

Little Nell's death

Thrills:  Not a lot, this is a very sad book, as Little Nell dies in the end of fatigue.  Critics said that this particular novel was over sentimental – and so it is in places, the death scene in particular is a real tear jerker.  I still like this book though more than some of the others. 

Martin Chuzzlewit

frontpiece for Martin Chuzzlwitt by Phiz

 

What I like about it:  It’s alright – that’s about it really.  I didn’t enjoy this as much as some of the other books and I think this is down to  Chuzzlewit’s adventures in America (reflecting Dickens’ opinion). I am amazed that Dickens thought this his best novel.  It is the least popular with most people.

Thrills?

. 

Hard Times

Gradgrind catches Louisa and Tom at the circus

 

What I like about it:  Very different to other Dickens books.  I have only read it once and found it quite sobering.  it is political, set in fictitious Coketown and about Class, education and trouble at t’ mills.  I can’t remember much about it to be honest, but it is something I wouldn’t read again, but I would choose it over  Martin Chuzzlewit. 

Tale of Two cities

Tale of two cities by Phiz

What I like about this book: not a favorite, but great if you are interested in the French Revolution.  Basically its about one man sacrificing himself for another because he loves the others wife.

Tale of two Citoes frontpiece Darnay and Carton

Thrills; Lots of intrigue and underground Revolutionists.  Sydney Carton who starts out a dissipated man ends up a martyred hero.  It’s not a book I would read again, but it has been translated quite well into very watchable films. 

Pickwick Papers

Mr Pickwick addresses the club

 

Why I like it?  I just don’t.  I have read this book twice and I cannot for the life of me see what others see in it.  To me it tries to be too clever.  Sam Weller really gets on my nerves.  I know it’s not his fault poor chap, but Dickens gives him an impediment that makes his character hard to read.  Idon’t care much for their ‘hilarious’ adventures either.  But, having said this, I shall at some time try again to read this book – I might actually ‘get’ it eventually 

The Victorian websiteDickens pages HERE

Titus Groan – Nannie Slagg’s outing

nannie Slagg played by June Brown in the BBC adaptation

Back to the story.  I am now more than half way through ‘Titus Groan’, the writing is miles behind though…. This chapter deals with Nannie Slagg undertaking to get baby Titus a wet-nurse from the dwellings outside the castle.

The acacia trees, silhouetted on her right, cut patterns against the mountain and on her left glowed dimly with a sort of subterranean light.  Her path was striped like the dim hide of a zebra from the shadows of the acacia trunks.  Mrs Slagg, a midget figure beneath the rearing and overhanging of the aisle of dark foliage, awakened small echoes in the neighbouring rocks as she had moved, for her heels beat a quick uneven measure on the stone path.

Whenever Nannie Slagg is mentioned,  her height (or lack of it) is always alluded to.  I should still like to know how tall the old nurse is.   I am sure I saw a picture somewhere of her perched on Prunesquallor’s knee and she looked miniscule.

The Dwellers live in mud huts and always ate their suppers out in the open on long tables arranged in rows.  The actual terrain outside the castle walls is curious – drab grey dust and cacti which sounds more like a desert:-

From the lush shadows of the acacia drive Mrs Slagg had suddenly broken in upon an arid world.  She saw the rough sections od white Jarl root and their bowls of sloe wine standing before them.  This long tubular Jarl root which they dug each day from a wood in the vicinity, stood upon the tables every evening, sliced up into scores of narrow cylinders.  This, she remembered with a flutter that her social status was very much in advance of that held by these poor mud hut dwellers….

I have searched in vain for ‘Jarl root’, but it seems to be a delicacy that Peake invented.  I would think it would be like bamboo which panda’s eat or bamboo shoots.  Full of fibre probably. They are using spoons to eat with, so it must be quite soft.  It doesn’t seem very appetising, but it’s all they have.  The Castle people are luckier with Swelter’s cuisine, though it shall be seen that the Dwellers do get a few scraps from those enormous kitchens thrown them 

Nannie is very proud to announce the purpose of her visit to the Dwellers and let’s them know in  no uncertain terms of the honour that is being bestowed upon them.  That a wet-nurse from among them shall be selected to feed the heir of Gormenghast:-

We are all proud.  All of us.  The Castle,’ (she said this in a rather vain way) ‘is very very satisfied and when I tell you what has happened, then you’ll be happy as well; oh yes, I am quite sure you will.  Because I know you are dependent on the castle’

Mrs Slagg was never very tactful.  ‘You have some food thrown down to you from the battlements every morning, don’t you?’  She had pursed her mouth and stopped a moment for breath.

A young man lifted his thick black eyebrows and spat.

‘So you are very much thought of by the Castle.  Every day you are thought of aren’t you?  And that’s why you’ll be so happy when I tell you the wondrous thing that I am going to tell you.’……

It is decided almost immediately who shall be going with Mrs Slagg back to the castle.  Her name is Keda.  Her story is next.

Titus Groan – Fuchsia’s attic and adventures with cake

Fuchsia played by Neve McIntosh BBC adaptation

Fuchsia has gone on an adventure.  She has pulled back her bed, opened a cupboard door and ascended into darkness with only a candle to lead her.  This is Fuchsia’s secret world – her attic:-

One of these narrow beams lit Fuchsia’s forehead and shoulder, and another plucked a note of crimson from her dress.  To her right was an enormous crumbling organ.  It’s pipes were broken and the keyboard shattered.  Across its front the labour of a decade of grey spiders had woven their webs into a shawl of lace.  It needed but the ghost of an infanta to arise from the dust to gather it about her head and shoulders as the most fabulous of all mantillas.

What wonderful imagery!  Peake is so descriptive with his words – he paints with them.  This attic is filled with all sorts of junk – some of it very strange indeed, for example;-

Within reach of her hand the hide and head of a skinned baboon hung dustily over a broken drum that rose behind the dim ranges of this attic medley.

Now where did the skinned baboon come from?   Did an ancestor actually leave Gormenghast to acquire it?  Was an ancestor in touch with other countries, other lands?

I am alone,’ she said, her chin in her hands and her elbows on the sill.  ‘I am quite alone, like I enjoy it.  Now I can think, for there’s no one to provoke me here.  Not in my room.  No one to tell me what I ought to do because I’m a Lady.  Oh no.  I do just what I like here.  Fuchsia is quite alright here.  None of them knows where I go to.  Flay doesn’t know.  Father doesn’t know.  Mother doesn’t know.  Even Nannie doesn’t know.  Only I know.  I know where I go.  I go here.  This is where I go.  Up the stairs and into my lumber room.  Through my lumber room and into my acting room.  All across my acting room and up the ladder and on to my verandah.  Through the door and into my secret attic.  And here it is I am.  I am here now.  I have been here lots of times but that is in the past.  That is over, but now I’m here it’s in the present.  This is the present.  I’m looking at the roofs of the present and later on when I’m older, I will lean on the window- sill again.  Over and over again.

I too used to have an attic that I used to escape to.  An attic full of what most people would perceive as junk or rubbish.  But I didn’t, it was a secret world to escape to – indeed a place to think and talk to myself (I still do that – with no attic).  Every so often I would think ‘I must remember this moment and this scene when I am grown up’  And I do sometimes.  At least I think that I do – memory can play strange tricks.

Further on, perhaps we have a clue to the adventurous ancestor:-

The other walls were less imposingly arranged, fifteen pictures being distributed among the three.  The head of a jaguar, a portrait of the twenty-second Earl of Groan with pure white hair and a face the colour of smoke as a result of immoderate tattooing, and a group of children in pink and white muslin dresses playing with a viper were among the works which pleased her the most…..

She instinctively knows that there is something afoot in the castle, something that they are not telling her.  I had the same sort of feeling when I was eight and my mother was expecting my sister.  I don’t remember how I felt exactly – but I remember that I wasn’t exactly pleased at the time.  With typical childishness my brother and I felt very much left out of things and isolated.

Another revelation is in this book is the wonderful poetry of Peake – unexpected.  The style, I feel,  is a cross between Lewis Carol and Edward Lear;-

The Frivolous Cake

A freckled and frivolous cake there was

That sailed on a pointless sea

or any lugubrious lake there was

In a manner emphatic and free.

How jointlessly, and how jointlessly

The frivolous cake sailed by

 On the waves of the ocean that pointlessly

Threw fish to the lilac sky.

Oh, plenty and plenty of Hake there was

Of a glory beyond compare,

And every conceivable make there was

Was tossed through the lilac air

Up the smooth billows and over the crests

Of the cumbersome combers flew

The frivolous cake with a knife in the wake

Of herself and her curranty crew.

Like a swordfish grim it would bounce and skim

(This dinner knife fierce and blue),

And the frivolous cake was filled to the brim

With the fun of her curranty crew

Oh plenty and plenty of hake there was…..

As usual, it is up to poor Nannie Slagg to spill the beans about the prospect of Fuchsia’s brother.  Needless to say, the girl does not take the news at all well:-

“No!’ shouted Fuchsia, the blood rushing to her cheek.  ‘No! no! I won’t have it.  Oh no, no, no!  I won’t!  I won’t!  It mustn’t be, it mustn’t be!’  And Fuchsia flinging herself to the floor burst into a passion of tears.

 Here is a wonderful detailed extract about the attic by Sebastian Peake, and The Gormenghast website

 The whole of The Frivolous Cake poem HERE

Titus Groan – Climb upon my knee Nannie Slagg

Nannie Slagg played by June Brown in the BBC adaptation

The reading is now 18 chapters ahead – the writing is following at a slower pace.  In this chapter we get another glimpse into Fuchsia’s bedroom;-

The sunlight was streaming through the eastern turrets and was lighting the Carvers battlements and touching the sides of the mountain beyond.  As the sun rose, thorn tree after thorn tree on Gormenghast mountain emerged in the pale light and became a mass until the whole shape was flattened into a radiant jagged triangle against the darkness.  Seven clouds like a group of naked cherubs or sucking-pigs, floated their plump pink bodies across a sky of slate.  Fuchsia watched them from her window sullenly.  Then she thrust her lower lip forward.  Her hands were on her hips.  Her bare feet were quite still on the floorboards

‘Seven,’ she said, scowling at each.  ‘There’s seven of them.  One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.  Seven clouds.’

It is curious that Peake uses the term ‘sucking-pigs’ instead of ‘suckling’, but I love the juxtaposion of them against the grey slate.  It’s not often we get a glimpse outside Gormenghast.  The battlements being  the hallowed ones used by the lucky  Bright Carvers who have earned the privilege to walk them.

Fuchsia loves to scrawl on her wall.  Scribblings which mean something only to herself.  She is superstitious too in her counting of clouds, rather like we count magpies – I can only get up to 10 myself and the tenth one is very dubious (being a bird you cannot miss), I talk of the children’s programme ‘Magpie’ now, popular many years ago.

But back to Nannie Slagg whose chapter this is.  When Fuchsia is trying to remember what the seven ‘clowds’ are for, old Nannie Slagg is preoccupied:-

Fuchsia stamped her foot and peered into the poor old nurses face.  Nannie Slagg made little noises in her throat which was her way of filling in time and then said “would you like some hot milk my precious?  Tell me now because I am busy, and I must feed your mother’s white cats.  Just because I’m of the energetic system, my dearheart, they give me everything to do.  What did you ring for?  Quickly, quickly my caution.  What did you ring for?’

 

Demanding a big breakfast, Nannie is dispatched to prepare it.  Nannie is an old woman – just how old? we do not know, only that she has been a Nannie for a long long time so was probably Lord Groan’s too.  What  we do know is that she is very small, ancient and of a nervy disposition.  She is prone to tears and much wringing of hands.  Yet both the Groan children are in her charge and she does take her duties seriously, even though she is always compaining about her ‘poor weak heart’.  In her haste to prepare the girl’s breakfast, she collides with strange Dr Prunesquallor.  This gives us an insight into the old nurse’s thoughts and feelings:-

‘Well, well, well, well, well, ha, ha, ha,, if it isn’t dear Mrs Slagg, ha, ha, ha, how very, very, very dramatic,’ said the doctor, his long hands clasped before him at his chin, his high-pitched laugh creaking along the timber ceiling of the passage.  His spectacles held in either lens the minute reflection of Nannie Slagg.

The old nurse had never really approved of Doctor Prunesquallor.  It was true that he belonged to Gormenghast, as much as the tower itself.  He was no intruder, but somehow, in Mrs Slagg’s eyes he was definitely ‘wrong’.  He was not her idea of a doctor in the first place, although she could never have argued why.  Nor could she pin her dislike down to any cause.  Nannie Slagg found it very difficult to marshal her thoughts at the best of times, but when they became tied up with her emotions she became quite helpless.  What she felt but had never analysed was that Dr Prunesquallor rather played down to her and even in an obtuse way made fun of her.  She had never thought this, but her bones knew it.

Poor old Nannie Slagg.  She is surrounded by larger than life characters.  Her whimperings are drowned out by the whinnyings of Prunesquallor, the monosymbolic barking of Lady Groan and the crushing caresses of Fuschia.   Out of all the characters in Gormenghast, Nannie Slagg is probably the most ordinary.  She might not be able to express herself vocally, being overshadowed by one and all.  But she does have feelings.  She feels the weight of responsibility at times, feels helpless at other.  When the mood strikes her she can be full of her own self-importance.  She cries a lot, is frightened a lot, sucks her knuckles a lot and loves babies so much that she could ‘eat them up!’

Nannie Slagg is coerced into sitting upon the long bony knee of Prunesqaullor.  I always find this image very surreal.  How long is the Doctor’s knee?  He is squatting at the time too.  How small is Nannie Slagg? and how frightened she must be of this strange man!  He does his best to put her at her ease though, by talking about her favorite subject:-

‘Do you like babies my dear Mrs Slagg?’ asked the doctor, shifting the poor woman on to his other acutely bended knee-joint and stretching out his former leg as though to ease it.  ‘Are you fond of the little creatures, taken by and large?’

‘Babies?’ said Mrs Slagg in the most animated tone that she had so far used.  ‘I could eat the little darlings, sir, I could eat them up!’

Nannie Slagg is very maternal, which offsets her character against the Countess.  Slagg is the only mother Fuschia has ever really known.  But Fuchsia is now 17 years of age and she has no friends – just her old nurse who she has now outgrown.  The teenager does love her old nannie but she does get frustrated with her times:-

‘Can’t wait until doomsday – you’re so SLOW!’

This is the note left on Fuchsia’s door.  She has given up waiting for her breakfast.

HERE is the wonderful website of Gormenghast

Lot’s of information about Peake and his work at Peake Studies

Authors I have read – Thomas Hardy

‘The Authors I have read category only has one criterion – and that is I must have read at least more than one of their books.  

The maddening Captain Troy

Of course, there are some books by this author I haven’t read yet like ‘Under the Greenwood tree’, and ‘A a pair of blue eyes’ but no doubt I shall get around to them.  It is my intention to critique some of these books properly when I get time.  In the meantime – some brief comments and my preferences, in order;

which is movie is the best though?

Far from the madding crowd  Definitely my favorite book, I have read this lots of times and am always thrilled with it.  I just like everything about this tale of vanity and patience.  Bathsheba has to be one of the vainest heroines ever!  We can excuse her age however.  Captain Troy is a bad un, but did he really love poor Fanny Robin?  He did turn up for the church so I suppose he must have.  All Hardy’s books have many layers and many morals, so each time you read them you find yet another aspect that you hadn’t even thought of before. Gabriel Oak is the real hero in the story though, winning out in the end.  I have also watched two films of this book.  I will contrast and compare these later, as each has some to commend them.

thomas_hardy the mayor of casterbridge

The Mayor of Casterbridge  Another brilliant tale about a man who sells his wife at a fair – and whose crime comes back to haunt him.  What a curious tale this is – lots of twists and turns.  I think that there is a moral in there somewhere (like in all Hardy’s tales) .  His future and past are dependant on each other.

TESS

Tess of the D Urbavilles  Although this book is loved, I  still prefer Far from the Madding Crowd.  The poor Durbeyfields are misinformed by the local vicar that they are related to the noble family of d’urberville.  the misunderstanding that ensues from this ends of course in tragedy.  This story has many layers: Angel Clare and Alec d’Urberville seem to exchange places throughout the book in goodness and badness.  Tess herself, I can never make my mind up about.  Is she weak, or willful  or just a victim of circumstance?

Jude the obscure - the DVD is good too

Jude the Obscure  This book is so well written, but heavy and so sad and tragic it made me cry.  I can’t let that stop me from making it number 4 though.  The tale of a man Jude Fawley who educates himself, marries unwisely and falls in love with his cousin Sue Brideshead who is married.  The pair run off together and live in ‘sin’.  The tragic end to this story still shocks me.  The film is true to the story too – but painful to watch.

The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy

The Woodlanders  I read this book for the first time last year – it made a pleasant read.  A woman plans to marry his childhood sweetheart, but finds that through education, she (Grace Melbury) has now risen above him.  Her father makes her marry the Doctor Edred Fitzpiers who turns out to be another bad one.  Another tragic tale of unrequited love and sacrifice.  And that is what is so good about Hardy – he does not have conventional happy endings - at best it is more a case of settling for, or making the most of what is left  (well, Far from the Madding crowd was I suppose)

Wessex Tales – another book I only read recently.   Nice gentle little stories about rural life, with lots of humour and observation.  A few of these have been made into plays or films.  I believe there is going to a film about them collectively – I shall look forward to that!