Autumn Term, Chapters 8-10

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

This chapter title and that of chapter 7, interestingly, are ironic, unlike others in the novel.

So, we left Chapter 7 with Lois's rather candid and--one would have thought--unwise admission that she is going to go on 'pretending' that the twins just ran off; she immediately begins to reframe it as 'not particularly pretence'. But the admission has been made, cementing permanently Nicola's implacable dislike of Lois.

(Side note: Rowan is almost-sentimental about an almost-Arundel Tomb in Wade Abbas cathedral. Oh, Rowan.)

Anyone have any feelings on Nicola's lunge at Marie? Her second physical fight, after that with Pomona. I remember fighting quite often at Nicola's age, but I was a little hellcat. Nicola's habitual Job's comfort 'in x number of hours it will all be over', which nobody else finds the least bit useful, has always delighted me.

The Court of Honour itself is a great setpiece, I think, but I have no idea about its verisimilitude, having never been a Guide. Has anyone first hand experience of one of these awful occasions?

The mere notion of playing with matches seems not to prompt the universal, generic horror that it did in my childhood: it's understood as a rather foolish thing to be doing, but something that might be mitigated by stamping on them to make sure they'd gone out, for example. I remember it rather being a synonym for idiocy: maybe those gruesome 1970s and 1980s Public Information films that we watched regularly at school had some permanent effect after all.

Redmond handles her questioning appallingly, I think: she asks Nicola to give her account, then at a crucial moment in it--when the twins are alleged to have disobeyed Lois, switches to Lois, and then back to Nicola again, then calls Marie, then returns to Nicola again. I certainly don't envy Rita Calthrop having to take the minutes of that lot! It would seem to be a way virtually to ensure that stories get confused and truth gets elided, not to mention making it very tricky to determine if somebody is lying or not: even if absolutely everyone were acting in good faith, it would be difficult under those circumstances for people not to be influenced by others' narratives. It also seems not to occur to her that Lawrie's tears might be the natural result of stress rather than guilt: the poor mite is only twelve, after all. Not to give her a chance to calm down and speak seems the height of unfairness. Redmond has notably poor judgement throughout the series, and perhaps she rather favours Lois (there's another incident in End of Term which suggests so). She gives Lois a dressing down at the end of it, but makes allowances for 'lack of experience and excess of zeal' in her case when she won't do the same for a couple of 12-year olds who have only been Guides for ten minutes. Loathsome woman. Maybe others can view her in a kinder light? Lois's reaction is an interesting mixture of weakness and misguided (ahem!) determination.

Muriel Pollick's reaction--she had always wanted to see a full-dress Court of Honour, but actually didn't take any vicarious pleasure in it at all--is to me a nifty (if necessarily unconscious, as Forest intended the novel as a stand-alone at first) parallel to Miranda's delight in a damn good row. Forest does pitiless Schadenfreude rather well, I think.





I'm an unapologetic sucker for Marlow family dynamics, and I adore this chapter. We have, I think uniquely in the series, a full deck of Marlows around the breakfast table. They are a fairly ruthless family with regard to each others' feelings: it's also gloriously funny, from Peter's account of 'miming ballads' as witnessed at a friend's sister's school (and Nicola's secret agreement with him at the wetness of this activity--has anyone first-hand experience of it? It sounds gloriously batty, and I speak as someone who loves folksong and traditional balladry) through Commander Marlow's immediate concern for his wallet over matters of honour, to Karen and Rowan's sardonic commentary on 'character-building' at Kingscote. Even Giles, of whom my low opinion is a matter of noisy record, manages to appear amusing and charming in this setting: 'a lot of the orderly chaos I'm always reading the service is so good at and [...] a lot of sea in places we usually try to keep it out of.' As a child reader, I was particularly taken by the references to naval signals too rude for juvenile and feminine company (and longed to see some); I notice now that Giles and Geoff's amused fastidiousness on the matter is shortly followed by Giles swearing 'So you are by -- (what's a good salty oath?)' I'm still not sure what the oath might be that Forest so delicately preserves us from: please submit your suggestions. His perverse taste for Mickey Mouse is almost endearing too. Does anyone know, by the way, what Giles is attempting to quote: 'Never expect, young Nicola, to be sufficiently praised for your virtues, or sufficiently condoled with over-flagrant injustice; but always remember -- no, I can't imagine what it is you should always remember.' Or is he just being a pompous tosser?

Seriousness does break in: Rowan is persuaded to give an account of the match row, which reveals her capable of some unpleasantness herself; Ann realises just how low Lois has sunk in her mendacity; the family push the twins a bit too far in their teasing of them--and here it is Nicola, rather than Lawrie, who breaks. That interests me: Lawrie is susceptible to humiliation at school, perhaps, but feels secure and cosseted as the baby of the family even when she is teased? Whereas Nicola has prickly pride even at home? Or that Nicola has bottled her feelings successfully after each humiliation, where Lawrie has already got it all out of her system?

Finally, Giles makes his own error in judgement of character and tone in encouraging the twins to be 'bad'. I'd be really interested to hear how people who read the novels as children read his tone back then. I remember knowing that he wasn't serious (as I think even Nicola truly does), but still being angry with him for his unfairness in chapter 13.





In which we get a glimpse of how the A and B forms regard Third Remove, and are introduced to Miranda West, who later becomes a close friend of Nicola's in particular, but is here only a haughty antagonist.

Tim is cured of her desire for favouritism as Headmistress's Niece in a rather nice, complex and ironic way, I think: it isn't just a case of 'getting what you wish for' being unexpectedly unsettling--it's that what works on Keith is an appeal to her rather levelling sense of egalitarianism: she softens notably at the idea that Third Remove have been treated dismissively by the rest of the Thirds.



Another rather epic post. I'm sure there's lots I've missed nonetheless, do feel free to raise topics in the comments.

Comments

[occasionalhope.livejournal.com]

I like the filmgoing and the way Lawrie effectively announces her acting ambitions without anyone taking it the least bit seriously. (And if it wasn't for this bit, I would always think of Lawrie as going to become a solely stage actress.)

Nicola feels things quite as strongly as Lawrie, but I think Lawrie's easy weeping acts as an escape valve which N lacks.

I don't think Giles's age is ever given, but he can't really be more than 19/20 here given that everyone else is so very (too in some cases) close in age). Reading it as a child he seemed significantly older to me - thanks to being seen through Nicola's eyes?.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

One of the things I rather like about Autumn Term is that it was never originally intended to be part of a series, so Forest presumably felt free to add little character details without thinking of how she might develop them. Seeing which ones she does develop (and the ones she ignores/forgets) is fascinating to me.

No, we never get Giles's age. He's a lieutenant (I always think of him as a sublieutenant at this point, but Nicola, when she meets him in Port Wade, says 'the other lieutenant', and I don't think that's something Nicola would get wrong.) I believe you have to be 20 to be a sub even, so he might be 21 or even older. (The tag 'mrs marlow's obstetric record' in this comm has some fascinating discussions about the sometimes unlikely gaps between Marlow births, but perhaps Geoff Marlow had a distant posting between Giles and Karen.) He's always seemed about 19 going on 45 to me, but he's clearly in his way just as prone to flaps as Karen or Lawrie.

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

Yes, I've always assumed that Giles/Karen is the only significant gap in that very unlikely family, making Giles early twenties to Karen's 17. Which might explain his lordly air of entitlement: being the precious only son for five years and them being supplanted, not just by one or two siblings, but by a never-ending succession of them, would keep a therapist in smoked salmon for years (not that a Mk 1 Marlow* would ever unburden itself to a therapist, of course).

*mk 1 Marlows: Geoff, Giles, Rowan, Nick. And Jon. Peter would like to be, but isn't.
Mk 2: Ginty, Peter, Lawrie. Ann has schooled herself to be Mk 2, but is fundamentally Mk 1.

[cleodoxa.livejournal.com]

I read Autumn Term in my childhood and then as an adult spent some time looking at descriptions of the rest of the books longingly before finally sorting out some inter-library loans, and the thing that struck me at that stage as being different about the first one was Lawrie. I was a little taken aback by Lawrie being described in the kind of terms Lawrie tends to be described in, because at this stage I think there's much less difference between her and Nicola. Nicola isn't so distinctly the centre of the series, and Lawrie isn't so distinctly less capable than Nicola. Forest didn't reinvent Lawrie entirely, but I feel she's not the gloriously convincing babyish cowardly unempathetic talented fantasist she is in the rest of the books.

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

One of the things I like about these chapters is the way Lawrie's acting ability is being signposted. She shines at the Guide Enrollment, she manages to look pale and wan before the Court of Honour, she 'mimes convincingly' and she tries to explain to the unheeding Giles and Nicola that it would be interesting to act the female villain in the film. It's all part of AF's skill in creating characters with the deftest of touches.

[elktheory.livejournal.com]

Yes, I love this aspect of the book. I vividly remember reading Autumn Term the first time and chuckling over Captain Marlow's comment ("one good lady bursts into paeans of joy and says that Nicola 'mimes with enthusiasm.' Lawrie, on the other hand, 'mimes convincingly.' I wonder what the subtle difference is?"). And then when Lawrie's acting talent is fully revealed later in the book, I recalled that moment and realized that AF was giving us clues all along. I think it was one of the first times I really understood how a writer can lay clues for the reader to pick up and how part of the joy of reading involves piecing together these clues.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

I rather like Giles in this bit - he's making up phrases to amuse Nicola, I think. So he has no idea of a salty oath (that he'd use at the table!), and is expecting Nicola to quote Hornblower at him. Ditto he's making up what sounds like an impressive bit of guidance that could have been translated from Latin but actually is off the top of his head. Goes along with the sea in wrong places humour.

Redmond was the sort of teacher I recognised when I read the book being the same age as the twins - she might think she was being fair but it always looked to pupils that they were being picked on unfairly, and in this case you can see upon re-reading that she really is unfair. Had enough of all those Marlows, I suspect. The whole guide hike/court of honour chapter was so gruelling for me to read that I always skipped those chapters on re-reading until over 25 years later!

[serriadh.livejournal.com]

Reading this first as an adult, I could see both that she was incredibly unfair, but also had some sneaking sympathy for her not being as fair-minded as she might about yet more of those bloody Marlows. Particularly as Ann's really the only one who seems to really fit the school spirit (despite Karen being Head Girl).

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

I think Mrs Redmond is in the difficult situation teachers find themselves in when they have to work out what has happened based on conflicting accounts from two or more pupils. While trying to be fair she ends up being terribly unfair. What she could have done in this situation is ask Jill or Terry to describe what had happened - without Lois or the twins being present of course. But that would not have fitted with the Kingscote ethos of honesty etc. So all she can go on is her knowledge of the pupils involved. Lois has presumably been reliable as a Guide up to this point, but Redmond must know about the netball row which showed Lois up as someone who would exaggerate/ evade the truth, if not tell an outright lie. And she knows Nicola stopped the train on her way to Kingscote - an impulsive, reckless, irresponsible act; after that it would be easy to believe Nicola capable of playing with matches in a farmyard. Nicola may have thought it was obvious that she wouldn't have played with matches in a farmyard but it wouldn't have seemed that obvious to anyone else.
It occurred to me for the first time how much the whole hike disaster is really Lawrie's fault. It's her idea to take extra matches, her idea to run across the farm (Nicola resignedly supports her if she wants to be helpful) and it's Lawrie's matches that fall out of her bag - possibly not packed properly? And Nicola, rather nobly, or perhaps showing twinly solidarity doesn't seem to hold it against her at all - apart from one unsaid comment about Lawrie being cracked on Lois.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

Oh, I always read the bit in brackets as Forest's censorship of Giles's actual salty oath rather than Giles being self-reflexive. I agree, this is as tolerable as he gets, and there is a touch of Lord Uxbridge's leg in his cool acknowledgement that, why, yes he could have been drowned, but he'll be fine after a quick nap. There is a possibility that Giles is the sort of person who's good in a real life-and-death crisis but crappy when it comes to minor everyday upsets. Hard to tell, given we don't really see him again till Run Away Home, in which he is first insufferable, then unconscious.

I have an un-Muriel-like propensity to Schadenfreude and always rather enjoyed that chapter. I had a teacher just like Redmond, actually. She disliked me intensely, having concluded (erroneously) that I was a child of cosseted privilege, and kept making snide comments about it. It was quite crushing, at thirteen, though I'm rather amused by it now; often she was so far off the mark that it took me a while to work out that she was talking about me. The fact of my being an only child seem to be a particular irritant, as if I could somehow have induced my parents to be more fertile if only I'd put the effort in. She was big on effort and baffling, character-building rewards and punishments that she never revealed the rationale behind.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

Interesting - I was also an only child and not good at picking up how to interact with children versus adults (think Mary-Lou Trelawney in the first couple Chalet books she's in), and around half my teachers were like that, clearly thinking I was in some way morally deficient and inadequate but never explaining why I was in the wrong; the other 50% of teachers thought I was great.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm certainly no fan of Miss Redmond, but I do think that when she says "That's a silly excuse; no one gives an order unless they mean it," she's got a point; if Lois was "only saying No for show", as Lawrie puts it, why did she send Marie after them? The impression the book gives (to me at least) is that Lois decides (too late) that keeping the Patrol together and arriving late is the lesser of two evils, not "Well, it's useful that they've taken the short-cut, but I'd better make it look like I disapprove".

ARB.

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

I think the phrase didn't have currency until much later than the period in which Autumn Term was written, but I think what Lois is up to is a mixture of "plausible deniability" and dither. I think it does start off (mostly) as her changing her mind, but it turns into plausible deniability later on.

[biskybat.livejournal.com]

Ann talks about the court of honour as if she had been actually present. Did AF forget that she'd been asked to leave almost as soon as it was underway?

I find it odd that the Marlow parents didn't seem to have been informed that the twins had been suspended from Guides, even if Miss Keith does like to keep school and Guides separate. And I would have liked a passing reference to the train incident. Geoff Marlow would have paid the fine and might have referred to it when he asked if he were going to receive a bill for the damaged hayrick.

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

I read it as Ann just having put everything together at that moment: presumably the twins were rather tight-lipped about what happened at the Court of Honour while they were still at school, but when they tell the story at home, followed by Rowan's about Lois's behaviour over the match, it suddenly occurs to her in what ways the Court of Honour was unfair and partial, causing her in her distraction to abuse household fixtures rather.

I suppose that it was so close to half term that a note about the Guides suspension was included with the report? It is Geoff who raises it, 'casually', natch. And maybe the bill for the communication cord is what causes Geoff's immediate financial rather than moral concern: you could read his 'before we go any further, tell me this. Am I going to get a bill for the damage?' as 'we've already had one of those this term, not another within six weeks, surely?'

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

As a child I did get that Giles was joking (sucking in his cheeks to hide his grin) and the example he gives of breaking bounds at night to go to the circus is obviously over the top but I was furious on Nicola's behalf when she was only doing what he had told her to do and he turned out not to have meant it. Well furious and embarrassed at her having been made to feel a fool.

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

I read the school stories, PR and RMF at the exact age Nicola and Lawrie were supposed to be in the books. Partly because of that I rather slavishly followed Nicola's POV throughout the books. (For this reason it wasn't until I was an adult that I appreciated Ann's character.) It was obvious to me that Giles was joking, and I assumed it was obvious to Nicola. And it never occurred to me to think it was unfair of him to be cross with her when she turns up at Port Wade (but that's a discussion for later on.) I do wonder now though if Nicola was taking him seriously? Clearly Lawrie sees that he's joking - he's having us on, she says. But when Nicola says 'He's not, are you?' is she playing along with the joke or does she really think that he's serious?

[charlie-ego.livejournal.com]

I read Commander Marlow's preoccupation with his wallet as somewhat intentional -- by focusing on something concrete and practical, he deflected attention from the emotional side of the incident -- and in fact Nicola manages to be a lot more collected when he asks her to describe it. Although I guess the problem with this theory is that if he had been on the hook for monetary damages, it might have been even more traumatic for the twins, so maybe not. (Also, I believe he only shows up about twice in AT, which is the only one I've read. Is his character fleshed out more in other books? I'll be interested to see...)

I love Rowan a lot. I really like how she's tried very hard not to describe the row with Lois because she knows she's biased about it -- and then is talked into it anyway.

[learnsslowly.livejournal.com]

Commander Marlow, except then he Captain Marlow, appears in Falconer's Lure and has one scene in it that really stuck in my head.

[learnsslowly.livejournal.com]

Sorry, "is" before "he".

[jackmerlin.livejournal.com]

I find I view Lois and Marie quite differently after the Court of Honour even though they have both been the 'villains'. Marie tells an outright whopper of a lie which, if believed by Redmond, makes the twins behaviour seem far worse (ignoring instructions to come back) and will therefore cause them to be in worse trouble. Lois, on the other hand, doesn't tell an actual lie as such, she chooses not to mention that the twins were trying to be helpful and make up for lost time, but she must have expected them to say that themselves and was lucky that they didn't. So, in theory, Marie's behaviour is worse and yet the main feeling I have for her is pity. Is her behaviour more excusable because it was motivated by fear and cowardice? Whereas Lois had no real reason not to tell the truth, she wasn't going to pass her hike now anyway. Also, Lois is older and in a position of authority so her behaviour should be better. Or is it because, as I think Nicola says a lot later in the book, Marie is a wet drip who can't help it, whereas Lois can and should help it?

[(Anonymous)]

It's in End of Term, when they learn that Marie will be joining them in Lower IV A: "It was true she had every reason to dislike Marie as vividly as Lois Sanger, but somehow she didn't - perhaps because of a vague feeling that Marie was a grubby wet drip who couldn't help it, whereas Lois was far from grubby or drippish and could help it very well."

ARB.

[highfantastical.livejournal.com]

Gosh, I always forget in between how harrowing the Court of Honour is. I tend to think of Autumn Term as not really containing the impressive set pieces of several later books (am I right in thinking I can't give examples here because of spoilers? I do have several in mind), for all its manifest superiority to school stories in general, but actually I think one of the key differences might be that although AF's talent for character is already there in spades, it's really the developed painting of atmosphere, and symbolic (rather than primarily clever and/or character-revealing) allusion, that comes in later. So as a set-piece dealing in character dynamics, the C of H is excellent (well, excellently awful!), but it possibly doesn't resonate aesthetically in the mind, long term, the way that some of the intentionally (I think) saturated, emotive, heightened scenes in later books do. I could just be describing my own reaction, of course.

(Hi! Here via oursin, having unwisely unfollowed trennels a while back when it seemed that discussions had waned to nothing. Glad to see the Renaissance.)

[intrepid--fox.livejournal.com]

I'd say there are two major set pieces in Autumn Term (as opposed to either MatT or FL) and I find both just as powerful as many of the later ones, even if they're not up there with the very best. (That could be an interesting topic after the readthrough: which are the very best set-piece scenes in the series, and why?) I'd be interested in more of your thoughts around symbilic as opposed to clever/character-revealing allusion, as I wasn't sure what sort of thing you're retiring to there.

[mainerobin.livejournal.com]

Coming in a bit late to the party here, but I love the Operation Nelson chapter. I'm right there with Nick imagining the glories of getting away from the silliness of school, and the tension of sneaking out of school and her relief on the train. And then her joy of just being out and alone and walking along the quayside having a grand time.

Until she realizes she's missed Giles, and then, more mortifying, runs into him after all. I'm glad AF skips through that part very quickly, because it would be hard to listen to Giles chewing Nick out when she already feels so badly.

I am so pleased she makes it home safely without a row. She's had a trying enough day as it is.