Attic Term: Readthrough, Chapters 1-4

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Thanks very much to coughingbear for writing the posts on The Cricket Term. I'm back in the saddle for this one, but if anyone is interested in a post on later chapters of this novel, on Run Away Home or the Players novels, please let me know below or by pm. Discussion proceeds here about exactly what order we're going to do things in: if you have feelings please let us know in comments at that post. Suggestions for themed posts are here.

So, forward to The Attic Term!


We pick up the story again at the end of the summer holiday that is beginning at the close of Cricket Term, leaving a swathe of unnarrated summer into which to insert fic. This has been your regularly scheduled fic prompt. Ginty and Patrick's friendship has clearly developed, and they have privately continued their Gondal fantasy. I enjoy the detail that Ginty finds more opportunities for romance with Patrick's Hamlet in reading Horatio than she does in reading Ophelia, because it's so true! There are! Her continued nervousness around Regina is an ominous sign, though, and Patrick does seem as skittish as Catkin when things get a touch amorous. Ginty's disinclination to talk to Patrick about Monica and vice versa continues the series' theme of Home and School and never the twain.

We learn something of Patrick's school life, and its contrasts with Kingscote: it seems more academically pushy, with O-levels taken early, and with far less of a culture of compulsion around extra-curricular activities. There are hints of Patrick's dissatisfaction with reform in the Catholic Church and his school's enthusiastic embrace of that--Ginty presumably knows something of his views there, because she doesn't enquire why the 'trad' Christmas Play was hastily rejected, though we sense that perhaps Patrick doesn't discuss theology with Ginty very much. (Incidentally, I'm wondering what sort of details might make a Nativity Play seem too 'trad' in a post-Vatican II climate?) It is, in any case, a lot more satisfying to have him expound his beliefs to Nicola in the next chapter, because of the resonance with the ride from Wade Abbas in End of Term. The discussion of plays--whether Hamlet or Eugene O'Neill, furthers the theme of pretence. Patrick cannot act, but he can pretend to be someone--a nice and subtle distinction. This month's number of the Journal of Read It Somewhere Studies tells me that Forest's school put on Marco Millions, which must then have been a pretty new play, since it first appeared on the Broadway stage in 1928. Anyone ever seen it?

'Imagine asking. Suppose you got told,' says Ginty of Unity Logan's officious efforts on behalf of June White, demoted from Candle Angel in the Play in End of Term. Here Ginty asks, and very nearly gets told, but in the last sentence of the chapter decides that there are some things she'd better off not knowing. It's a wonderfully light-touch portrait of two young people who like the idea of being in a romance rather more, one senses, than they actually like each other. The moment at which Patrick shies from Ginty's 'tense, insistent' face and diverts the conversation to Claudie (oh, Patrick!) is brilliant. If he was conscious of what he was doing it would be cruel, but Forest switches point of view to show us he isn't, though I'm not sure that makes him any more likeable at that moment. What do others think of Ginty and Patrick's doomed friendship?





Nicola's awkward presence at cubbing uncomfortably reminds us of happier times she's spent with Patrick. Forest--rather cunningly--doesn't give us Patrick's viewpoint in this chapter, so we're left with the sisters as mutually resentful rivals. I'm also amused by her misunderstanding of the age and state of growth of their quarry, and her perking up when she realises they're not actually sending 'fubsy' cubs to their deaths. Is Ginty's 'resigned sisterly contempt' feigned? It's only just over a year ago in story-time that she was a fervent anti-bloodsports type, after all.

The breakfast-table conversation is notably malicious on Patrick and Ginty's part--I'm glad that Mr Merrick is there to stand up for Nicola. I rather wish that Patrick had got the telling-off he deserves for his bad behaviour at the hunt in Peter's Room, though. I like the oxymoron of '"Yup," said Nicola, automatically doom-laden, her spirits leaping up.' at the news of Ginty's being summoned away to packing.

Nicola's ease with Regina contrasts with Ginty's continued nerves, as the conversation which follows is surely intended as contrast: eccentric but revealing where Ginty's interactions with Patrick are bound by certain conventions and superficial.

'"Though I suppose she is quite used to strangers nowadays"' (ouch, Patrick!) is flagged by the authorial voice as significant; if it implies that Nicola is a stranger, it also suggests that Ginty is one too. Nicola's cheerful acceptance of the labour of sweeping out (the Merrick Boy displaying his extraordinary tact and charm again) eases the atmosphere between them, and their conversation becomes almost immediately quite profound, with Nicola's revelation of Edwin's researches into the farm log. Patrick's moment of reaffirmation in faith (and Nicola's initial misunderstanding of it) is quite touching, I think, the more so because it only makes emotional sense: his ancestor's courage on the scaffold doesn't render his beliefs (or Patrick's traddiness) any whit more true (as Nicola's later, private conviction that nothing is worth Tyburn acknowledges.)

Nicola and Patrick's shared dislike of being 'talked to' in ways they see as patronising by adults perhaps provides a further contrast with Ginty's horror of rows, and offers a distant fore-echo of Ginty and Nicola's later interviews with Miss Keith. I'm tickled and a bit appalled by Patrick's desire for 'masters to keep their distance and answer to Sir' (just like dogs in trouble, splendid bit of landed gentry arrogance from the Merrick Boy there). But he's clearly unhappy enough at school to want to leave before A-levels--I can't imagine that he struggles academically in the humanities, though I can quite believe his own estimate of his maths. Patrick's account of his school assemblies provides the irony that the trendier end of the Catholic Church is rather more low church (with extempore prayer and 'holy pop') than the Church of England solidities that Nicola is used to. In his reluctance to stand up and be counted we see Patrick's shyness emerging again, but perhaps also an ironic contrast with his illustrious ancestor. Later in the chapter, Patrick reflects sadly that there's no real danger involved in his modern sort of recusancy, only the sort of social embarrassment that a 'madly trad' assembly might bring. (I'd be inclined to regard this a very callow and silly sort of nostalgia were Patrick not the sort of bloke who brings an eighteenth-century throwing-knife to a showdown in a medieval dovecote, sees someone killed with it, hops into a stolen Rolls-Royce for a sexually-charged joyride with a teenage drug-smuggler who dies crashing it and then casually passes an ounce of uncut cocaine to his naval cadet friend as a souvenir of a crowded weekend. He's nothing if not a risk-taker.)

Mention of the Forty (Martyrs of England and Wales) places us presumably in summer 1971, since their canonization took place in October 1970. Anyone more up on matters theological than I care to comment on Patrick's views on the Vatican II reforms? How well do they represent traditional Catholicism in general, and Forest's own in particular?

I simply adore Nicola's persistent analogies of the Catholic Church with the Navy, by the way, and her reflections on Ginty's showing off to Patrick by affecting interest in Dante and medieval Latin are delicious. I first read Dante in Sayers' translation, and retain a fondness for it despite its terza rima being pretty cumbrous. (It's the only translation I know that bothers with a linguistic difference between Dante and Sordello, for example, for which I'll forgive it a lot--Sayers' Sordello speaks (rather kailyard) Scots.) But I also rather like The Constant Nymph, whose themes of rivalry and jealousy are obviously relevant here (also the source for Edwin's surname?) Forest seems associatively to connect The Constant Nymph with Sayers through Hilary's admiration of it as a bestseller with artistic merit in The Nine Tailors.

How do people read Nicola's interest in going to Mass? It's picked up again in Run Away Home, and I'm sure there'll be more discussion there, but what do you think her motivations are?

Though really, I think Nicola deserves better than the Merrick Boy, it is delightful to see them happy and self-forgetfully, adolescently earnest together; and by the time Nicola's recalled to Trennels, she's a good deal happier.





The differing reactions of the family to Nicola's arrival are nicely observed, I think, from Rowan's amusement, through Ann's worried humourlessness ('remindingly' is a good adverb), to Lawrie's immediate relating of the situation to her own concerns (the detail that Lawrie has developed a genuine fondness for the Idiot Boy, though, is charming--even if--typically Lawrie, she only does so when he is actually hers.) And oh dear, Ginty's jealous fury. Her anger at her mother betrays her into positively Lawrie-ish fantastic hyperbole ('suddenly famous and interviewed on TV'). Nicola's 'bubble of happiness' breaking as she realises that the conversation doesn't necessarily mean a renewal of her friendship with Patrick is rather heartbreaking though. But at least she's lucky at the dentist. I rather like the subtle difference drawn between 'smug' and 'cat-with-creamy', too: though 'unusually perceptive' is backhanded: Forest can't quite let Ann have her due.





We begin with a glimpse of Mrs Lambert's officious inefficiency, which will later produce some disastrous results. Causation and responsibility are important themes here--the novel is in fact full of 'coughing bears'--which is in its turn, I suppose, Forest's meta-narratalogical commentary on story-telling, its conventions and structures.

Esther's affection for Daks? Affected, babyish or 'scarey' [sic]? Her response to her mother's pregnancy does rather suggest the last, doesn't it? An echo with Nicola's 'one would always much rather it were one of the family', too, perhaps. Flats where they don't allow babies (as opposed to flats unsuitable for)? I can imagine some restriction of the sort in 1930s service apartments, possibly, but it seems a bit peculiar in the 1970s. But maybe people know of similar rules from their own or others' experience?

Ann gets her step to prefect, and is observed in her element with the Junior Side infants. Nicola's expectation of saccharine gratitude for taking Ann's trunk tray down gets a rebuke that is both enjoyable in itself and for the equanimity with which Nicola receives it. I'm also delighted by Nicola's observation of the carpenter's filling in a gap with spare parquet. I always rather enjoy that sort of thing myself.

Miranda's continued devotion to Jan--aw! Complete with illogical wish for her to have failed but not failed her A-levels. Miranda's holiday in Venice (tempered by the realisation that it would be 'gaudy' to send Jan a gift or card alluding to it) contrasts with Jan's postcard ('written small', oh Miranda) from her Norfolk or Lincolnshire home. A Wool Cross works well for either--I like the detail that while Forest is inconsistent about which side of the Wash Jan's hometown is on she has a clear idea of what sort of country she hails from. In case anyone has missed it, here is fic, by legionseagle, exploring Jan's past, and the slight mystery that seems to surround her mother.

Comments on Wendy Tredgold's anti-semitism? Interestingly, both Wendy's implied remark about Miranda's father, and her articulated one about Miranda not knowing about the existence of Oxfam shops are tacitly supported by Nicola. Forest is characteristic in leaving it to the reader to decide whether Wendy really is anti-Semitic or whether she simply resents Miranda's wealth and (it has to be admitted) slight tendency to snobbery: the comments of hers that we hear are insinuating, but only of Miranda's wealth and privilege, not her Jewishness. There's a similar entwining of issues of class and anti-Semitism in End of Term, with the 'common little soul with the perm and the Jaguar'. Miranda is embarrassed, however, by her remark about the 'dreggy uniform dress', which draws attention to the Marlows' relative poverty. It's a very effective and understated sketch of the ways in which wealth does, and does not, map onto social privilege and status.

We see Miranda's unpleasant side in her dealings with Sandra Grigson, who is harmless if rather prolix--Miranda's putdown is startlingly vicious--if again, as Nicola is forced to admit, accurate. Miranda appears as an edgy and unsettling presence here, I think, with Nicola finding herself in agreement both with Miranda and her antagonists. The moment when Nicola wonders if her hurt at Patrick's rejection of her shows in similar ways to Sandra's by Miranda is actually painful to read. I'm mildly surprised that no-one but Sandra recognises Sara Crewe--if Cousin Jon had sisters (and perhaps even if he didn't, though it's perhaps not one that boys would be as familiar with as girls might be), there must surely be a copy of A Little Princess in the Trennels playroom, and Rose would have no trouble identifying the reference. Perhaps this is the flexible timeline coming into play, but I read A Little Princess in the 1980s, and indeed played the rat in a stage version. Burnett's novel, with its reversals of fortune and status and its emphasis on the power of imagination and storytelling, resonate subtly and slightly uncomfortably with this scene and the previous chapters.

Miranda's family, like Patrick's, has an au pair (in fact, 'one of our idiot au pairs' suggests a multiplicity, or a sequence at least, thereof). I'm not really familiar with au pairing and how it worked in practice in the 1970s--but Miranda seems to regard Elsa as a kind of servant, which I thought was very much not the idea. Anyway, it seems unlikely that Miranda has the sort of frisson with Elsa that Patrick has with Claudie, more's the pity.

The Disaster! The coughing bear! I love, 'Nicola meditated briefly on the disastrousness of being not merely rich, but an only child and never having to wear your sisters' outgrown gear.' And Miranda is notably cavalier about the garment, reflecting that ruining it will be no hardship. This passage is growling with potential coughing bears--from Miranda's anger at Wendy's 'nudging voice' to Avril's fear that chickens may come home to her roost.



I think that's enough from me for now. Over to you!

Comments

Martyrs

[liadnan]

I was just thinking about the Elizabethan Anthony Merrick not making it to canonisation because "the likely ones were put through a check-point for hi-jackers to make sure they died for nothing but the Faith" - it's quite true there was such a careful check, hence the exclusion of people like Henry Garnet SJ from the list though the depth of his involvement in the Gunpowder Plot has always been a matter of some debate; let alone Babington, Tichborne, Catesby etc.

(I've never actually managed to get my hands on a copy of The Players and the Rebels - do we learn more about it there?)

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Yes; both in the Players Boy and the Players and the Rebels.

Forest makes the Gilly Merrick (who was historically in Essex's household) a cousin of the Anthony Merrick back then, and Nicholas overhears a conversation he shouldn't while chasing a lost hawk.

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

Patrick seems slightly dismissive of the checking for 'nothing but the Faith', but the Players books definitely endorse the distinction between Catholics loyal both to their faith and their Queen, and those who want a rebellion.

Which is not irrelevant to the 70s & after efforts of people like Hume to make Catholicism respectable.

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

I had a great deal of time for Basil Hume on most issues (we were particularly charmed by his response to an invitation to become official chaplain to the Oxford University Invade and Conquer France Society), and was disappointed to discover he'd been involved in that particular coverup at that place which we do not mention.

There is a rather wonderful moment in Patricia Finney's Gloriana's Torch (which I cannot imagine why it isn't the next Wolf Hall) where someone suggests pre-emptively interning the leading Catholic gentry (or something of that sort) to the Queen on the eve of the Armada and she Looks at them and says that she is confident her Catholic subjects will be the most English patriots of them all should Palma get a foot ashore .

Actually, if you're still collecting subjects for the general discussion, it'd might be interesting to consider the Elizabeth of the Players' novels ("We've Drake afloat and our Eliza ashore") with other depictions of Elizabeth in fiction- I read the Players books shortly after reading Trease's Cue for Treason and there's a very clear similarities with how the Queen is depicted in both books (and lesser though noticeable similarities in the depiction of Shakespeare).

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

If Patrick had gone there, Hume would still have been Abbot I think.

That's a brilliant idea for discussion - there's also the Queen as portrayed in Rosemary Sutcliff (though those are for younger children) and Elizabeth Goudge. And Traveller in Time on the Babington plot. there's also a couple I remember as much more anti-Catholic - will see if I still have them.

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

i tried to re-read Towers in the Mist (which might also do if we considered "Oxford" as a topic in its own right, given that Nicola sees it both as a physical location and a literary construct) but found...the use of ellipses...utterly distracting (Rowling has often cited Gouge's The Little White Horse as a big influence and I think...possibly...not in a good way...)

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

I remain very fond of Goudge, though I admit the ellipses can be distracting. I don't think she ever crops up as an author Nicola has read (and I can't see Nicola taking to her).

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

I am fond of Goudge myself and I don't think the ellipses are so prominent in her other work; also (another point of relevance) Towers in the Mist contains an appearance by the young Edmund Campion.

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

Yes, that's why I was thinking of her - there's quite a bit of discussion of religious issues and toleration under Elizabeth. I think Towers in the Mist was her first book, though, and it does show.

RE: Re: Martyrs

[white_hart]

The only Elizabeth I I remember in Sutcliff is in Lady in Waiting, which I think is one of her adult novels (though I admit to vastly preferring the Roman books).

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

I've got (I think) GGB editions of both the Players books as well as my hardbacks, so you're very welcome to borrow them - can try and remember to bring on Tuesday if you like.

There is indeed more about the Anthony Merrick then and what happened to him.

RE: Re: Martyrs

[liadnan]

Thanks, the Players & the Rebels would be splendid. I do possess a near mint 1st edn Faber hardback of the Player's Boy - found by chance in a box at an open-air book stall at the Netley Marsh Steam Rally some time in the late 80s and bought for 5p, my best ever coup in second-hand bookbuying, perfect dustjacket, one small library stamp and no other markings - but I haven't read it for some years.

(Pulling it off the shelf I see that the inside cover printed price of 22s has an official Faber stamp of "£1.30 net" pasted over it)

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

Will try and remember!

Not sure if this will work for anyone outside a university, btw, but this is an article summarising changes in public attitudes to Catholicism in the UK that might be interesting.

RE: Re: Martyrs

[liadnan]

Not working here I fear.
One of the many things that have slightly irritated me about the current BBC Father Brown, even transposed to the 50s, is the idea that no one would have batted an eyelid at Catholics in what has become, for no apparent reason other than trying to sell another Midsomer Murders to the US, a cotswolds village, indeed that pretty much everyone in the village would be Roman, unless they were atheist for plot purposes, and Father Brown's churchyard would be full of centuries-old headstones. But I concede this is only marginally in hailing distance of topic so I won't proceed to rant.

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Did I not manage to post my suggestion that it's set in an AU in which the Glorious Revolution failed? (Honestly, I can see Patrick's point about how the Whig view of history presents the English Reformation as inevitable, whereas it was jolly touch and go at several points.)

Re: Martyrs

[liadnan]

I don't remember that suggestion but if I have forgot I apologise - it is a more plausible answer than anything I have come up with.

Re: Martyrs

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

You have to have had the Reformation because of the priest hole and tunnel plot (incidentally, when is Mariot Chase supposed to have been built? Because the priest hole as described in TTA sounds as though it was put in from the ground up, not retrofitted) though an escape tunnel from a priest's hole which goes to the church sounds more than normally dense. But aged tombstones etc also suggest longevity of the Catholic tradition. So, therefore, Glorious Revolution, total failure.

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

I don't think we ever find out when Mariot Chase was built - or whether it's been rebuilt at any point - but am curious now. Might do some poking around tonight. Trying to remember what if anything is said in the Players books.

Re: Martyrs

[coughingbear]

Players's Boy is just the garden (though recognisably the one we see in the modern books); FL I can just find the reference to a 'beamy hall' and the armoury on the stairs.