"Bags me be the one who fell in love wth Hitler and shot herself."

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

I've been reading the Mitford sisters' letters recently and was struck by how easily - but how weirdly - Peter's Room could have featured Mitfords rather than Brontës,with Ginty fancying herself as one of the more glamorous sisters, and even Peter being vaguely aware of who they were ("for after all, it's not easy to achieve complete ignorance of the Mitford sisters" or words to that effect).  It would have made for a very different story, but one with lots of strangely similar stuff about family loyalties vs poltical convictions.

Comments

[sollersuk.livejournal.com]

Good grief. I don't know what you're on, but I want some!

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

You going to write it for us? Might be rather fun to do....

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

I'm a completely hopeless writer, sadly. Will happily cede copyright, though ;-)

[bookwormsarah.livejournal.com]

Oh, someone has to wrote this, please...

[promethea100.livejournal.com]

What a terrific idea! I think Ginty would want to be Jessica and elope romantically to war with Esmond/Patrick. But then he'd actually want to be someone based on Unity and she'd think, oh well, at least I can do the anguished sister torn between loyalty and principle bit. Oh, and you've even got a scene for him of someone shooting themselves, too. Nicola could be Nancy and have the unrequited love for the Frenchman, until she gets bored with it. And Karen comes in and says all that imaginary language and feuding, what a waste of intelligence, and Ann says she likes Debo best because of the gardens ...

[richenda.livejournal.com]

Giggling wildly at the idea of Patrick as Esmond!
Even funnier as Nancy's version of his character, falling for ?Lavemder?

[nicolap.livejournal.com]

Ginty for Unity!

[richenda.livejournal.com]

Oh that's much more likely!

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

Oh, but I think Peter is Unity - his talent for picking the wrong friends coming to the fore.

[richenda.livejournal.com]

Do you see it as "wrong" friends? Isn't it more that he sees things in people that aren't obvious to other people? Even the traitor has his good points, I'd say.

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

His friends when he was you were crap, though, weren't they? "All quite horrid in their various ways" according to the authorial voice.

[richenda.livejournal.com]

I haven't access to the book at present, but am quite sure that you are quoting correctly. However, I'm not sure that I'm convinced about the "authorial voice".
I think that Forest has a very delicate line in irony, along with her gift for expressing the varying points of view of her characters, and I'm not convinced that there is an authoritative ( ha!) authorial voice.
I'd need to read again the passage, of course, to argue this point fully - and to find other examples - but my guess is that the author might at this point be expressing other points of view (e.g. FAMILY)than her own.

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

This is just an utterly brilliant conceit.

[ex-lizzzar998.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting thought, although the social disadvantage experienced by the Brontes, as educated and intelligent but without a clear position ( implied in the discussion) obviously was not experienced by the Mitfords - U however barmy their behaviour.

[elizahonig.livejournal.com]

So, Ann must be the one we all forget--Pamela--who marries an ordinary person and stays out of the public eye. But who gets to marry a Duke and spend the rest of her life writing gracious little books about Chatsworth? Surely in fact this would have to be Ginty. And the twins should be the political polar opposites, Lawrie having a good time with Hitler (though she wouldn't think through the implications or consequences very carefully, and would never shoot herself for politics) and Nicola eloping with a dashing rebel cousin. Rowan should be Nancy, writing slightly sarcastic novels about the whole crew. Of course, this leaves only Kay to be Diana, which seems pretty unlikely. Will have to rethink the cast.