Falconer's Lure readthrough: Chapters 4-6

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

Before we get down to business: a tremendous thank you to the heroic lilliburlero for so many fantastic posts (talk about a hard act to follow!) and to the mods and book-sharers without whom this would not be happening at all. I am very glad to be with you for one week to talk about Falconer's Lure, Chapters 4-6.

I love the beautiful circularity of this chapter: Pam Marlow's really quite thoughtful abandonment of her mother's approach ('There's nothing you can tell me about pudding-basin hair-cuts. Grandmother used to cut mine and Aunt Molly's like that.'), in favour of a presumably more comely professional job -- even for someone as young as Nicola; even though in general nobody is that fussed about the twins' appearances, beyond mere neatness -- only to find herself snookered by Lawrie. It is rather funny that now-Madame Orly ('the sort of hats you saw in Vogue at the dentist's'! -- poor old Ginty, I hope she got her own subscription a couple of years on) should have taken that approach to hair-dressing, I think: was anyone else surprised? Her later preference for Ginty suggests she prefers feminine, 'nicely presented' girls; perhaps that preference is a general one, but her daughters were always a subsidiary interest to her sons?

This chapter has plenty of scattered reminders that everyone is feeling at least weird, in some cases actually grief-stricken or guilty, about Jon. We have Karen's refolded newspaper (bets on how long this lasts? I can't see a crossword person stopping forever -- my guess is that she starts again at Oxford); Rowan's face 'gone suddenly blank and formal', when she and Nicola meet the Vicar (the next sentence is: 'But the Vicar didn't mention Jon.' -- Forest is subtly but clearly suggesting that even the usually imperturbable Rowan is thrown off balance at the prospect of an unexpected talk-about-the-dead); and, of course, Peter: 'the memory of the plane plunging down the sky and the sudden realisation that something had gone very wrong indeed, was still as sharp as if it had happened yesterday.'

This Falconer's Lure re-read, coming (naturally enough) in the wake of TMTT, has made me wonder more generally about Forest and grief, and how many of her books have a death or a near-death in them: not something we can discuss in detail now, perhaps, with the spoiler issues, but something to keep in mind during the rest of the readthrough? At a conservative estimate, of her thirteen books, I count at least eight with important deaths. All of these seeded references prepare the way, I think, not only for the later, darker books (for all that FL in effect opens with, and then deals with the fallout from, Jon's death, it is still for me one of Forest's more light-hearted, and literally more 'sunlit' novels -- partly because it's so humorous), but for Pam Marlow's momentary lapse of control in Chapter 6, when Nicola sings 'Fear No More'.

The Colebridge Market trip affords Forest the chance for some pretty important exposition, via the Vicar and Rowan, and also allows her to set up most of the tensions (will Captain Marlow leave the Service? who will run Trennels?) and events which will drive the rest of the book: Rowan discovers the Festival leaflet which unfolds all the joys of elocution, singing, regatta and gymkhana... I am charmed by Nicola's ignorance of her talent for singing, and by so many other tiny details of characterisation in this passage: Rowan and Nicola's distinct food preferences (Nicola eating her fish quickly 'to get it out of the way'!); Rowan thoughtfully declining to read the hawk remedy aloud; Nicola's coldness at Rowan knowing her so annoyingly well, when Rowan suggests that she'd better take up 'The Ancient History of the Marlows at Trennels' (and, of course, in the end she does: score one for Rowan).

Apart from it making plot sense (at a Doylist level) -- are there any good Watsonian explanations of why it's Rowan and Nicola, and of how Nicola's hair has managed to grow noticeably longer than Lawrie's in the first place? I remember reading here on trennels that possibly there'd been some sense of certain older siblings 'pairing up' with younger ones: it's canon that Lawrie turns to Karen for help when she needs it, so perhaps there's something of a tradition of R&N going together, and K&L going together, rather than saddling one older relative with both twins?

The mystery of Geoff Marlow's parents: how and when did they die? Rowan says he was at Trennels at 'our age', i.e. in his teens, so I suppose one can narrow it down a bit depending on presumed birth-date. The wording, 'were killed', doesn't sound much like influenza or similar, or as if one was carried off by apoplexy and the other faded away soon after. Crime? Shipwreck? Expedition to distant lands gone horribly wrong? (This, if not too morbid and remote -- if it is, I apologise for my proclivities -- is your regularly scheduled ...&c.)

Lawrie the Spider and/or Aged Crone makes me laugh every time. I really enjoy the sense that she is privately working away at her craft much more than anyone in the family ever realises.

*

Mr Merrick seems like a good egg, doesn't he? I like the balance in FL between comic scenes and the much quieter witty replies which are laced into the dialogue all the time (...and also, of course, the sense that despite all this, the world she's showing us is a precarious place, really, and that -- as it already has done, once -- summer happiness can turn on a dime). I'm not in the least convinced by Patrick's 'All terrifically humane and nothing the R.S.P.C.A. could even begin to object to', but -- at least AF admits into the narrative a degree of approved ambivalence concerning the welfare of the prey? (It's okay if Nicola has a qualm: not if it's Ginty.) Some of my favourite bits about prey actually come later, so I won't trespass on anyone else's commentating territory by jumping too far ahead, but I think Forest does a decent job of building narrative complexity in this difficult territory. Are people still enjoying the falconry at this point? I admit that I like it less than the family scenes, but I don't skip it because some of AF's descriptive writing, and some of her animal writing ('Jael's body, warm and palpitating, in her grasp'), is so good. The development of The Sprog as an independent (hilarious, adorable, unique) character really begins in this chapter, and I LOVE IT. It gets even better later, but she's laying the seeds here.

Nicola and Patrick seem incredibly young at tea-time, in contrast to the near-adult nature of some of their pursuits: Patrick's serious historical reading; even the falconry itself. Do you think Forest is good at writing the various ages she deals with convincingly? Personally I think she is: the teen years are, to the best of my recollection (!) a weird muddle of increasingly mature interests intermingled with outbursts of childishness. Nicola 'acts up' to Patrick, I think, to some extent -- not that she's inauthentic (as she will later inwardly accuse Ginty of being...), but she presents her best and oldest self to him most of the time (as in Chapter 6, when both are panicked in the wood, and she decides not to admit to it, even though Patrick has: 'When you were thirteen and a girl, you had to be more careful.'), and then relaxes back into a more childish role at home. Over the next few books we see her starting to push against that role more and more. Yet the child-like, and sexless, nature of their friendship (as is appropriate to their ages and era) is underlined by Nicola asking Patrick to stay in the bathroom with her while she does her first-aid.

Lawrie has NOT been cured of castleing-in-the-air, despite everything that happened in Autumn Term. I suspect she never will be: 'For now she swam enough to be allowed in the deep end of the school baths, her ambitions were legion: Next year, she would be one of the Under-fifteens in the School Swimming Team; these holidays, she might achieve a rather spectacular rescue if only someone would be so obliging as to put themselves in danger of drowning; she would certainly win the Beginners' Race in the Regatta; and if only Peter or Ginty or Rowan would have the decency to coach her, she was quite sure she would win the Beginners' Diving too.' ...oh, Lawrie. Peter isn't much older than the twins, but he's clearly miles from being a beginner -- do you think they're behind in learning on account of their past delicacy? It seems unlikely that a sporty, sea-favouring family like the Marlows (with, at least at times, their own boat) would neglect this aspect of an all-round education, but perhaps if the twins were constantly ill, especially with chest and/or sinus stuff, immersing them in cold water might have seemed unwise. Lawrie's ambitions seem instantly even funnier when we start to read about her actual swimming, which is clearly quite basic. I'm confused by Peter reneging on the no-ducking bargain, though! His reasoning seems entirely logical (Lawrie WILL take revenges: her character is entirely consistent as to fairness and balance, albeit meted out according to her own weird lights), so I don't see why he'd suddenly change his mind, if he dislikes being ducked himself.

'Even the high walls Patrick used to prance round, saying they were the walls of Troy, and daring Peter to follow because he knew Peter hated even standing on them, seemed lower than they used to be. All the same, he hoped Patrick had forgotten about the walls of Troy. He didn't really think he'd care to walk along them even now.' [my bold] -- Gosh, little!Patrick was a bit of beast, wasn't he? I think this is horribly unkind, and they were, what, six or seven? Children of that age are perfectly well able to understand the idea that others have fears. I am quite alarmed to discover that this re-read is making me like Patrick less: has anyone else found that their opinion of a character has changed quite considerably? I do see his charm, of course, and often find myself caught up in it while I'm actually reading, but thinking about it afterwards: not so much. Not that I am condemning him on the basis of being bratty at age six or seven, of course -- this just stood out as an especially unkind thing to do. Poor little!Peter: the vertigo and fear of heights is evidently very long-standing.

*


This chapter is one of my favourites, even though in terms of 'action', comparatively little happens in it. But before we get to the playroom scene, there's some wonderfully-written falconry! I think Jael and the hare gives us Forest at her best, when it comes to the nature-and-animals writing which is one of her marked strengths. It's difficult to pick out quotations from a passage as strong and well-sustained as this one, especially because the writing isn't showy; it's restrained, built up by touches and dabs into a heart-capturing, throat-catching drama of flight and loss and finding, of the victory and the kill. I love the practical tenderness of Patrick carrying Jael under his jacket. One of the superb moments in Forest's treatments of prey -- as I mentioned above -- is Jael's hare: 'The hare's pelt was soaked. In a last effort he had swum the pond, and Jael, no hound to be shaken off, had hovered above, and taken him as he reached the other side.' This miniature tale of exhausted, fruitless effort, in which we still half-want (or more than half-want) the predator to 'win' -- and we know already that she has won -- because we know her, because Forest and Patrick and Nicola have taught us to love her, is so stripped, so pitiless in its wording, that it makes the inherent, inalienable pity of nature felt more immediately than any declaration of pity possibly could.

And so to the playroom: Ginty seeking solace in a familiar old text (and with a family more sympathetic than her own...?); Rowan the self-constituted mistress-of-ceremonies. I think thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds would shun a toy cupboard these days, but some vestigial, archeological interest, on a wet day, seems plausible enough for the late 1940s. In the wrangling and the chatting and the form-filling we see various characteristics which have appeared, and which will appear again, reinforced: Lawrie's thrift (and her commitment to ~justice~ ...my favourite off-the-wall fic idea is modern!Lawrie turning into a passionate SJW-type: this is up for grabs, as I'm over-committed on the fic front already), Nicola's gift for strategic thinking (she's clearly devoted some time to working out her best chance of making bank out of the Festival: and quite right too!). Rowan really has her knife into Ginty -- I think Ginty's remark when Pam comes upstairs (Pam: 'I can't be as young as I was.' Ginty: 'Nor none of us are.') is innocuous enough; maybe the tiniest tincture of morbid, but hardly lugubrious. Is Rowan just so sick of 'Ginty: Woman of Feeling' that everything her sister says has started to grate?

Anyone else surprised that Ann is 'aghast' about the uniform change? It seems an oddly strong choice of word. Does it simply underline her personal conservatism? I love Nicola's hopefulness re: scarlet hats, and am personally regretful that she is doomed to disappointment. Another tiny, perfect detail in this chapter is Peter's fondness for music.

We finally have Rowan's big reveal: she's sprung into it by the exigencies of the uniform change. I really enjoy the sense that there are these bombshells, errors (everyone seems to have thought she wanted to be a games mistress), and even tides of misinformation that have to be fought: Falconer's Lure is a fantastic exploration of how information is shared, managed, hidden and uncovered within a group -- primarily, but not exclusively, the family. I think this will be something to revisit later, especially in The Ready Made Family, Cricket Term and Run Away Home: will the Marlows learn more helpful ways of telling each other things? Do they get better at hiding? After the relative muddle of FL (where the Lower Deck is usually the last to know -- but as in this case, not always), there is, I think, something of a move in the direction of deliberately curating information (Nicola is certainly very keen to manage who knows what, to a perhaps untenable extent?). But is this a good decision for Rowan? Should her parents let her do it? Presumably they could force her to go back to Kingscote, given her age (and class).

I enjoy the contrast between Lawrie's pleasure in performance -- both the silly poem and the serious one -- and Nicola's unintended, unplanned song, continued only because Ann has joined in on the piano. Strong emotion often seems to turn up like this in AF: as the product of a series of quite random, weird coincidences -- that Nicola should happen to choose that song, that Peter should happen to mention 'Sigh No More' and thus necessitate a quick two-line demo, that Ann should begin to play. Devastation surprises. And into this charged atmosphere, with the sibling banter bucketing on -- I love Lawrie's snippet from Choral Speaking [a. k. a. the subject I most wish my school had offered! Anyone else?], and her stern refusal to wander lonely as a cloud or come the dear children for anyone -- falls Lawrie's second poem.

Oh, Forest! These are the moments when I wish she was alive most of all, so I could ask her about her choices -- in my opinion, it's flawless (perhaps almost too perfectly suited for Karen plausibly to have picked it out at no notice? but Kingscote evidently gives a strong literary education, and a lucky choice is always possible), and if you haven't tried reading it aloud I would strongly, strongly advocate doing so: it's such a good poem for vocal performance, but in some ways more difficult than it looks. There are traps; it could be done badly; but one can well imagine Lawrie doing it absolutely brilliantly. The way Forest blends it into this stormy chapter, which opens with a threatening but ecstatic wood and closes with a sky which has cleared once more, is nothing short of masterly, in my view. But I know not everyone likes the inclusion of full poems in novels: what about here, do you feel that three (including the song) in one chapter is too many? Does Lawrie's gift convince you? Something to return to in Chapter 8, I think.

*

Well: that was great fun! And now -- with renewed thanks to lilliburlero for letting me step briefly into her esteemed shoes -- over to you.

Comments

Re: Rowan's decision

[antfan.livejournal.com]

Agree with all you say here (and I'm VERY much looking foward to the discussions of the historicals). You say there used to more of the "allusive style" in children's lit - wondered what examples you were thinking of?

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

I'm fascinated by the fabricated fear, actually: the specific phobia is fabricated, but the trauma is not, and it seems to me that Ginty is trying to process that genuine trauma into some kind of understandable form, for herself as well as for Unity's benefit. Her trauma at the Foley business is compounded with guilt, so perhaps the secrecy about it is rather worse for her than it is for Peter or Nicola., and Ginty suffers anyway from guilty re-playings of situations where she might have acquitted herself better. She's trying to condense a lot of messy feelings into a simple and--with the company she's keeping at school if not at home--acceptable one. I wonder if Ginty ever tells Unity about her real phobia--of confined spaces? She seems considerably ashamed of that, as people often are about phobic reactions. I think Rowan, being reasonably perceptive, senses the the air of fabrication, but Rowan doesn't know how serious the trauma really is; if she did, I doubt she would be as unsympathetic; she is a Good Officer, after all. Though Marlow family handling of phobia is pretty bizarre anyway: look at the weird maze of taboo Nicola negotiates wrt Peter's fear of heights.

I sympathise with them both, though: Rowan's just made a difficult decision that I think she knows from the start is going to make her less happy (Rowan's not a very happy person anyway, is she? Her sardonic outlook on life can be very funny, and there's something to admire in the pitilessness of it, but I can't imagine it's very much fun from the inside, as it were), possibly for the rest of her life, and what she sees is Ginty making a spurious fuss about having been run aground and stranded at a lighthouse for two nights, some months before. And her reaction is we all have to do things we don't like, so here's yours. It's not particularly edifying or admirable in Rowan, but I can forgive her for it, and it's a very likely and realistic reaction. But I also have a lot of sympathy for Ginty, whose trauma after the events of TMAAT has been woefully handled.

[biskybat.livejournal.com]

Yes, I like Peter too. I think he's the most interesting character and AF shows us a 14 year old boy's thoughts and feelings (in the 40s , of course, probably different now)with great perceptiveness. He has weaknesses, is frequently afraid, having to push himself hard so people don't guess, has real feelings of inferiority on occasions and seems constantly to be trying to live up to the God awful Marlow image because it must be right because he's a Marlow. Plus having to tread in He Who Can Do No Wrong Giles' footsteps.

I can't think of another example where a teenage boy is portrayed so accurately in children's literature at the time AF was writing. Boys were often written as leaders, or teasers, or jokers and almost always as the ideal sex.

Patrick, on the other hand, is just horrid. There are undertones (or do I mean overtones?) of Giles in AF's writing of him which may be why Nicola is drawn to him.

I think it's odd that Patrick makes no attempt to meet Peter in spite of them once being friendly as small children, and, in fact, puts him off. No wonder it's all a bit stiff when they do meet.

Perhaps there was a Peter in the large family AF used to play with. She writes him so well.

Nicola's dismissiveness of girls and complete acceptance that boys are automatically better has always grated. But I get my own back on AF by thinking that Nicola would never have wanted to read any of her work, especially the school stories, apart, possibly, from the historical novels.

Rowan

[buntyandjinx.livejournal.com]

I don't much like Rowan in any of the books - to me she's another subversion of fictional archetypes and of the people Nick worships (or dislikes, sometimes unfairly). So you have Karen = head girl but also a bit wet and ineffectual, Ann = good but also deeply annoying, Rowan = games captain material but also prone to being deeply insensitive, a bit of a bully and who ends up making a disastrous decision vis a vis her own life, jacking it all in to run Trennels, and not very happily.

Re: Re: Rowan's decision

[hooloovoo_42]

I was Roger, or Nancy!

[occasionalhope.livejournal.com]

Very true.

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

I'm not convinced Rowan is saying that, at all. Bearing in mind she has no idea about Foley, the kidnapping at gunpoint, near death etc of MATT, what she sees is her physically fearless younger sister, who adores swimming and diving, affecting a fear of the sea to make herself more interesting. So I think Rowan's saying, oh, put a sock in it and drop the posturing, put the application in and you'll enjoy it when you get there.

Re: Re: Rowan's decision

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

Do you find these as satisfying to re-read now?</>

Absolutely and every bit!

And I do think Picts and Martyrs is very satisfactory in terms of character development - Nancy, in particular, has "grown up" a lot and has developed more self-control. She acts in ways that I don't think the Nancy of two years earlier, in Swallowdale, would have done at all. And it's not too surprising that she then reverts to more childish ways in Secret Water (also a favourite, because we used to sail there as children), after having made such a huge effort earlier.

Re: Rowan's decision

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

Surely "don't worry your mother" is just about the fact that if you've got eight children, you'd spend your life in a constant froth of anger and terror if all of them were troublemakers? I don't think you have to be particularly patronising to tell your kids to be good under the circumstances.

Re: Re: Rowan's decision

[learnsslowly.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly sure, from internal evidence in the books, that Secret water happened towards the end of the same holidays as Pigeon Post and therefore before Picts and Martyrs, set at the very beginning of the next summer holidays. It is therefore even less surprising that Nancy is much more mature in Picts and Martyrs than in Secret Water.
I rather take it that having let the Walkers down somewhat in Secret Water, she is all the more reluctant to let her mother, or the D's, down in Picts and Martyrs.

Re: Re: Rowan's decision

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

You could well be right - somehow, I thought it happened a year later.

Re: Rowan's decision

[sprog-63.livejournal.com]

But at this point in the story, Pam has only ever been a summer visitor to Trennels, hasn't had a chance to make friends in the area, the obvious neighbour who might become a friend (in theory) is about to go and live in London. I think she would be feeling a bit anxious about what happens when they all go back to school. Yes she would meet people hunting, and doubtless move into the horsey circles, but they wouldn't be there at breakfast or in the evenings: and she hardly has a chatty cosy relationship with Mrs Bertie. I think she would have been extremely lonely without Rowan. The odd snippet we get, it always seems to me that she and Rowan, do in fact get on well, but I'm not sure that I think she accepted the idea because of this, just at a subconscious level didn't put up much of a fight? In fact if you add in the rationing and financial aspects that have been suggested there are a lot of reasons for her to say her piece (that she didn't think Rowan giving up school to farm was a good idea) but not push the point! It was therefore easy as well as very convenient for Geoff to prioritise Rowan's voice, on the grounds "it's her life".

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[sprog-63.livejournal.com]

That puts it better than I did!

Re: Rowan's decision / timeline.

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

It's the moving timeline that creates all the debate about Rowan's decision. In 1948, it would be entirely normal for a child to leave education and start work before the age of 18. I'd bet everyone on Trennels knows of an elderly acquaintance or relative who couldn't go to university/train for chosen career because either their family couldn't afford it and/or their family needed an extra wage coming in. Admittedly it would be less usual for that to happen in an upper class family, but it was still fairly normal for a daughter to stay at home to help the family in various ways (keeping a widowed parent company, for example). And in 1948 Rowan would have had a social life in the country - not just the hunting/ horsey set at parties, but in daily life there would have been a lot of people working on farms, and more young people growing up in the village.
By the early eighties though, when RAH is set we are into the era of student grants for all, an expectation that any reasonably bright child will go to university, and a huge choice of potential careers for girls. Also, by the eighties, farms which had once employed twenty workers were only employing a couple of people at most, and young people had moved from the country to the town because they couldn't afford the house prices, so a country life would become a more lonely life for Rowan.

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[biskybat.livejournal.com]

Ginty's self esteem must be at an all time low. There she is - traumatic ordeal followed by half a term at home where there is no indication that she was treated with any great empathy or understanding (probably a lot of 'FGS Ginty, get over it. Nicola and Peter have')followed by a return to school where she's not allowed to talk about what really happened and shoved into Middle Remove which must have just about finished her off in the self esteem stakes. Unity Logan might have been quite beneficial. At least she gave Ginty some attention. It looks like she might have been the only one. As Ginty wasn't allowed to be truthful about the events in TMATT it looks as if she fabricated fears and anxieties as something that she could actually talk about and receive some sympathy for.

I can't really blame Rowan as she doesn't know the extent of what happened, although I don't like her bullying tactics.

[antfan.livejournal.com]

Poor AF - her books shunned by her own lead character! (But maybe if Nicola read the historicals she'd be prepared to give the others a go.) It is a bit of paradox, though, you're right - school stories featuring a character who would absolutely despise them.

Agree with most of what you'd say, though (even though I'm far from being a Patrick fan) I wouldn't describe him as outright horrid until Peter's Room. (And come to think of it, in The Thuggery Affair he's almost sympathetic...)

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[coughingbear]

I don't think Rowan knows Ginty is claiming a fear of the sea - as far as I can tell, Unity's the only person Ginty has said that to. What she sees is 'her physically fearless younger sister...' sitting around doing nothing. Which may or may not be worse!

Re: Rowan: belated thoughts

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Well, given that most jobs for women at the period in the Marlow sort of class were about 'filling in the time before marriage' (or even genteelly husband-hunting, by choosing particular jobs),possibly with a side-order of 'in case your husband is a wastrel/leaves you destitute', this doesn't seem an entirely implausible course for Rowan. Unlike Karen, she's not been talent-spotted as university material (I'm now wondering about her conscious choice in the matter as opposed to being fast tracked for the benefit of Kingscote's honours board), and doesn't, unlike Ann or Lawrie, have any particular leaning.

If you're filling in time until marriage, and have Rowan's interests, it probably beats being a secretary.

I have also been wondering as to whether it might also be an out from marriage if she is not that way inclined ('the tweedy Miss Marlows' - shades of Agatha Dawson?)

Re: Rowan's decision / timeline.

[antfan.livejournal.com]

You're right in a way - obviously what would have seemed appropriate in one period is quite outrageous a bit later. (There's also the fact that probably all of us know that Rowan won't turn out to be happy with her choice, and that's maybe colouring our responses.) But - I'm not sure that's sufficient explanation, really. Because when she's writing about Kingscote, Forest is very subversive of established values right from the start. There's no sense of the girls worshipping the headteacher or prefects, for example - it's fairly clear that Miss Keith, Miss Cromwell, Miss Redmond et al are fallible and capable of being unfair, and that the girls know this, and no sacrificing oneself for the sake of the school kind of moral code. The hierarchy is often poked fun at.

BUT then suddenly in the family setting we have Daddy is perfect, Big Brother Giles is perfect, and of course a mere girl like Rowan should sacrfice herself for the greater good of their naval careers. It's this kind of attitude that grates on me - an assumed respect for traditional hierarchy and authority that Autumn Term so gloriously disregards. It's as if my exapectations of Forest that have been created as a reader in the earlier books are being now disappointed - she's gone all Chalet School on me somehow.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

Yes, but there's a difference between a school pool and a public swimming baths - certainly my mother didn't allow us to go to one local pool as she said it was dirty (I did go with friends, and didn't know what the fuss was about), and I, some quarter of a century later, didn't allow my daughter to go to one of the local pools as it, too, was dirty - at least, the changing-rooms were disgusting! I can't speak to the quality of the water....

Re: pudding bowls and Catholicism

[chiasmata]

Doesn't she just! That's a wonderful photo.

[colne-dsr.livejournal.com]

It has struck me as strange that AF did not intend to write a sequel to Autumn Term, and that book featured Peter in one small scene during half-term in which he had about 6 lines, and yet he was born (as it were) small, but perfectly formed. And therefore conveniently placed to star in the Marlows and the Traitor.

Re: Rowan: belated thoughts

[fengirl88.livejournal.com]

I like the connection with Agatha Dawson, and the idea that taking on Trennels might be an out from marriage for Rowan. I also like the succession that version of Rowan would create, since I'm with those who read Jon as Not The Marrying Kind.

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

Yes! I can definitely see a parallel to that conversation.

(Sorry to be replying so late; have been offline a lot for personal reasons.)

Re: Does Rowan think Ginty is malingering?

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

Rowan's not a very happy person anyway, is she? Her sardonic outlook on life can be very funny, and there's something to admire in the pitilessness of it, but I can't imagine it's very much fun from the inside, as it were

This fascinates me: I think that Rowan's competence and self-sufficiency (99% of the time) seem so complete -- even a little off-putting -- to me that I'm inclined to take them at face value and presume that she manages her own life as effectively as she manages everything else. I hadn't really considered whether she was happy (is anyone happy in AF?). But you're quite right, there's no evidence that she is, and it seems more likely that she isn't, very. How interesting.

(Sorry for horribly late replies -- offline for a bit with health issues.)