Patrick

[charverz.livejournal.com]

Patrick's romantic life provides a lot of scope for speculation.  The canon only provides Ginty, Claudie, and Nicola.  I'll state up front that, of the three, Nicola is obviously the best match, in my opinion.  Claudie is a non-starter, and unless Ginty gets a massive dose of maturity or Patrick goes off the deep end, we can rule Ginty out.

On the other hand, I see other possibilities.  First Rowan, for all that there's an age difference.  They certainly interact well together at the Nativity play in End of Term.  And I can see each providing the other with something each lacks - a romanticism that would be a nice break from Rowan's constant level-headedness, and a practicality that might help Patrick go somewhere in life.

The other, surprisingly enough, is Ann.  She is the only religious Marlow, and surely between low church Anglican and conservative Roman Catholic they could find some common ground. With the Anglican communion having its own turmoil, Ann might decide she doesn't want a woman vicar or blessings of same-sex unions.  One suspects that Antonia Forest would have found today's religious landscape very interesting (and would have been very happy with the new Pope).

Comments

[antfan.livejournal.com]

I'm always fairly convinced that Patrick would not end up with either Ginty or Nicola. After all AF pretty much says so in her interview with Sue Simms. But more than that, I think it's easy to forget that the whole Marlow canon covers such a tiny slice in the life of the characters - it's something like two years in all, isn't it? And during that short time all their relationships with each other are fairly fluid - as is typical of adolescents. So to start to imagine they might imagine marry each other in terms of how they feel (briefly) when they're fourteen, fifteen...I don't think AF is that kind of writer.

Jan Scott (a very sensible person) says something similar to Nicola in Cricket Term: that lifelong friendships are about as common as unicorns. She also says "when you go to university -" and doesn't finish - I think implying that although Nicola can't see beyond the world of Kingscote friendships, actually things will change hugely for her when she hits adulthood.

And then there's the way that Nicola guesses when Kay says she's getting married that it's Ronald Merrick...because he Kay danced with him a lot at Twelth Night. Nicola can't really see beyond the immediate. But actually Kay is part of a whole new world beyond Trennels (thought not for long of course ;))

So yes, I kind of agree with you...if Patrick were to marry a Marlow girl, then it wouldn't be one of his childhood sweethearts but somebody completely out of left field. So why not Ann or Rowan - hee hee - but more likely somebody completely different altogether.

Patrick and Jan Scott

[charverz.livejournal.com]

Now why didn't I think of that! Patrick and Jan Scott. There was a recent Folly AF fan fiction which has Patrick as a young solicitor (15 years on). We know Jan is planning on a career in law.

There's the motive and the opportunity...

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

This would never happen, but - Patrick/Lawrie would be hilarious.

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

I've never seen Patrick and Nicola together romantically. I've never even been sure that her feelings for him had anything romantic about them - I've always thought that she cares about his friendship in the same way that she cares about Mirandas; she is upset in Cricket Term at the thought of Miranda having traditions with someone else, just as she is upset when Patrick goes off with Ginty.
I can see Patrick and Rowan because of the proximity when both of them will be at home running neighbouring estates. However, as you say the likelihood of any of them marrying each other rather than all the new people they'll meet in the navy, nursing, at university and beyond is extremely low. I'd like to imagine Ann meeting a lovely doctor while doing VSO - in my imagination he's Scandinavian and probably a Quaker...
Nicola with her sympathy for both Edwin and Miranda's dad I can see with someone quite unlikely and non-Naval although the glamorous Naval officer is also a possibility..

[nineveh-uk.livejournal.com]

For me, there's no question that the most likely pairing is Patrick/Patrick.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Oh, I'll agree with that 100%. But some unfortunate young woman will be sacrificed to Patrick's need for an established household. A pity he's not likely to marry the equally narcissistic Ginty so that, like the Carlyles, only two people need be made miserable, rather than four.

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

Need she be unfortunate? He could end up in a useful marriage of convenience with a self-sufficient, detached character not unlike his mother.

[charverz.livejournal.com]

You do the lad a dis-service. Patrick's just a little tight in his moral joints. I see him meeting a priest (probably an ex-service padre) who will set him straight on a number of points, so that his faith will get him moving rather than tying him up in knots.

He needs to get past the fact that he's descended from a martyr.

But like the old joke maybe it will work too well and he'll become a priest!

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

This. Though Patrick / The Pre-Vatican II Church also has legs, I feel.

[charverz.livejournal.com]

ankaret, you're talking of my childhood. I was 10 when Vatican II happened.

[manda-09.livejournal.com]

I don't quite agree with Jan Scott about life-time friendships.

I'm 32, and my best mate is the same as from our school days - we met at school when we were both 13. I met my other half in our first year at uni, too.

My Dad's best mate is from his school days, too, and they are both 60!

Amanda

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

Not Ann -- she thinks Catholicism is immoral (wouldn't lend Nicola her bike to go to Mass) and Patrick will never give it up. The very fact that she's *actually* religious, and sectarian, means that would be an irreconcilable difference. I agree with whoever said Patrick/Lawrie would be hilarious, and I can actually kind of see it, romantically! But -- as one of the readers who actually *likes* Patrick (quite a lot actually) and Nicola, I like them together -- not because it's romantic, but because I enjoy the spectacle of them enjoying each other's company, getting each other's jokes etc.

[charverz.livejournal.com]

One of my favourite passages is Patrick and Nicola sleeping in the haystack. There is something very beautiful about their friendship. No one would ever write that passage today - it would have to be sexualized.

[rekraft.livejournal.com]

Maybe it had been Patrick/Cousin Jon until then...

I've always imagined Patrick ending up with someone completely different. But what part of Patrick do you see Rowan - or Ann for that matter - being drawn to?

[coughingbear]

I don't think it's quite fair to say she thinks Catholicism is immoral. I think she (like many at the time - the first phase of ARCIC talks were taking place in the 1970s and early 1980s) may have believed that the post-Vatican II changes, and changes that had taken place in the Church of England, were bringing everyone closer and possibly moving towards reunification or at least joint communion, and disliked the idea of her sister getting interested in the older, and as she could have seen it, more divisive, forms. Though why she didn't just say, look, last time one of you lot used my bike it ended up dead in a ditch...

I agree I can't see Ann and Patrick as a couple, but actually I tend to think the fact that they are both genuinely religious might be the one thing they could develop some kind of friendship over!

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you're right -- it's the "madly trad" aspect of the Merricks' worship she doesn't like -- but that's exactly what Patrick will never give up! (Hence, his willingness to be rusticated for doing "madly trad" things at his progressive guitar-playing Catholic school.) I agree, they could have long and productive discussions about religion and how no one else in the Marlow family can understand their feelings on the subject -- it's intriguing to think about. I just don't see it going to a romantic/matrimonial sort of place, since the issue of "what to raise the kids as" would loom, I think, large -- insurmountably so.

[nzraya.livejournal.com]

and p.s. yes there are all kinds of perfectly legitimate reasons for Ann not to lend Nicola her bike! Typical of her, I suppose, that's she's perfectly willing to accept the sacrifice of seeing it wrecked in a ditch again -- just not in the name of defiance of Vatican II!

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Dead under a traction engine, iirc.

[colne-dsr.livejournal.com]

I could see Patrick marrying Nicola in a marriage of good friends, rather than lovers. Patrick has a duty to marry because of the family tradition; Nicola absolutely loves family traditions and can't fully share in the Marlow one because she's a girl.

Patrick doesn't want the responsibility of a wife like Ginty IMO, so unless he meets someone who sweeps him off his feet, he would be happy with a quiet life and a wife who has no apparent desire to change him.

Nicola, even at 14 and a half, has never had and apparently is not chasing a boyfriend per se, although she is after Patrick as a friend. And I don't necessarily see Nicola as someone who would fall head-over-heels in love with a random stranger; remember that the new man would have to compete with Patrick, the hawks, and the history of Mariot Chase. Lawrie's ambitious for better things; Nicola's happy with what she's got, and I reckon given the choice between a guaranteed comfortable life with Patrick, or the risk involved in marrying anyone else, she'd go with Patrick.

Patrick and Nicola

[charverz.livejournal.com]

I see it as something that develops. Nicola is IMO on the verge of discovering romance. I think she saw Ginty and Peter, and wonders if maybe there isn't something in it, as long as it's her and not Ginty.

She's got no religious convictions, so could easily fit in with Patrick and probably after 5-10 years of marriage becoming a Catholic [I've instructed the convert class at our church for many years, and it is a common scenario].

[antfan.livejournal.com]

No no! Nicola's going to sail round the world! please don't tie her down with PAtrick.

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

Oh, I *hope* she wouldn't have liked the current Pope. I think he's much more of a neocon than an old-fashioned conservative type.

[charverz.livejournal.com]

Certainly she (and Patrick)would approve of priests being authorized to use the Tridentine (Latin) Mass. Patrick's "old boy" wouldn't risk getting in trouble with his bishop.

It could be the springboard to Patrick feeling more a part of the Catholic Church again.

But we'll never know, will we?

[elizahonig.livejournal.com]

Surely it is Miranda who is really destined for Patrick? I'm certain that AF had this in mind, actually. Remember the way Patrick watches Miranda at the Christmas play, looking like a hawk (doesn't he say that?) and very still? Miranda was always curious about Christianity and, like AF herself, would ultimately convert from Judaism to Catholicism. It's clearly in the cards. She's strong and opinionated and although she'll take on Catholicism, she'll take it in an intellectual vein and she'll always keep Patrick from getting too full of himself. She will also insist on birth control because her job as a fiery museum curator will be important to her.

[ratfan.livejournal.com]

Not to comment on the likelihood of Patrick and Rowan per se, but the "age difference" thing is only two years, the same as between Patrick and Nicola, the other way. It always entertains me that the male is always supposed to be older! By the time Patrick is, say 18, it wouldn't matter at all, IMO.