Instead of cluttering up another perfectly nice thread, I thought I’d start a new one on this topic.
As my user name indicates, I’m a fan of the works of E.F. Benson. What I like about his Mapp and Lucia novels is the picture of upper-middle-class life in small English villages between the World Wars. So very little happens, especially in the first two Lucia novels, but the characters always make the most of what they have by following their neighbors’ activities with intense curiosity and, like opera diva Olga Bracely, the reader begins to be fascinated by all this minutia as well.
The things I enjoy most are the battles that develop from the most trivial incidents: the war of Ouija-board messages, or the one-upmanship of floral prints sewn on dresses, or Mapp’s quest for the recipe for lobster a la Riseholme. Even when some major event does occur, there still are all sorts of delightfully bizarre petty undercurrents going on beneath. For example, when Mapp and Lucia are swept out to sea on the kitchen table, the question arises of who gets custody of the table after it washes up on shore.
Then there’s Georgie Pillson, whom I just adore.
So, are there other Benson fans here who’d like to talk about it? I’d also be happy to discuss the “Mapp and Lucia” TV series.
Mapp & Lucia is one of those few programs that have been perfectly cast: Nigel Hawthorne and Prunella Scales were born to be Georgie and Miss Mapp; Geraldine McEwan as Lucia hit exactly the right note as the bright 1920s widow. Even the supporting players were thoroughly reliable, such as the actors who played Major Flint and Quaint Irene.
The BBC has struck this kind of casting gold several times: I think that Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie made the ideal Jeeves and Wooster; and I still have fond recollections of Ian Carmichael as Lord Peter Wimsey back in the 70s: “Gosh, what a Googly!” I, Claudius isn’t to be sneezed at either. I can’t read Graves’ books now without hearing Derek Jacobi’s voice as Claudius, and John Hurt as Caligula.
{cough} Maggie SMITH Maggie SMITH Maggie SMITH {cough}
Yes, Nigel and Prunella WERE terrific, weren’t they?
And I also loved Fry and Laurie and Jeeves and Wooster…when I took the kids to Stuart Little I kept thinking “WHERE do I know that guy playing the father from?”…“Oh, God, it’s BERTIE!”
And while Derek Jacobi made a fine Claudius, I still pine for the old Charles Laughton version, the epic that never was.
Don’t get me wrong – I couldn’t have enjoyed Fry and Laurie as Jeeves and Bertie any more without expiring from the experience – but Stephen Fry didn’t fit my notion of Jeeves at all: too young, insufficiently imposing, etc. I do think it was brilliant, inspired casting, and in retrospect it seems natural, but I’d be lying if I said I’d have thought of it.
Hugh Laurie, on the other hand, was absolutely born to play Bertie Wooster.
Well, Ike, if you mean that Maggie Smith in her prime could have done a better Lucia, I would agree, but I think she would have been a little too long in the tooth to pull it off in 1985. If we disregard age altogether, then how about Gertrude Lawrence?
I dunno, rackensack: I thought Fry had just the right amount of supercilious condescension. Anyone else you might see in the role (with or without Laurie)?
I’ve obviously expressed myself badly. I think Fry played Jeeves nearly pitch perfect. My point was that I’d always imagined Jeeves to be somewhat older than Bertie, and as having a certain air of, well, authority that Fry doesn’t convey by his mere appearance (though he certainly gets that note in the way he plays Jeeves). It didn’t help that Laurie’s tall enough it’s impossible for anyone to tower over him in the way I’ve always imagined Jeeves doing over Bertie (and as Fry would have over most other actors).
I see your point now, rack. Any stats? I know Fry is not unadjecent to 6 feet, Laurie must be several inches taller.
Ike, I’m gobsmacked. I had no idea–somehow my mental picture of Smith in Jean Brodie was that of a woman in her mid-forties (no doubt that’s the effect Smith was going for).
Laurie’s about 6’2". Fry is actually taller – my sources say 6’4.5". But the difference isn’t enough that Fry’s Jeeves seems a head taller than Wooster’s Bertie, as I’ve always conceived of the relative stature of the characters.
I saw the series on PBS first, and found a book at the library sometime later; it was “Make Way for Lucia,” a huge thing that contained all six novels and a Mapp short story that I haven’t seen again (I think it was called “The Male Impersonator”).
I have been hooked ever since.
Yes, I did! It encouraged me to hope I would get some response if I started this thread.
Uno, due, tre…
Which reminds me of something else I love in these novels: the combination of baby-talk and Italian that Lucia and Georgia use (when neither of them actually speaks Italian). I remember at least one instance where poor Georgia couldn’t figure out what Lucia was trying to say.
It’s an incredible cast. I often wish that someone would do the first three novels–Queen Lucia, Lucia in London, and Miss Mapp–but I don’t know if they’d manage to put together such a perfect group of people again.
The only casting quibble I have is with Olga Bracely, who’s played by such a big, brassy woman. I’ve always imagined her as a willowy, flapper type.
Also, what’s fun about the series is that it was filmed in Rye (real-life Tilling). I was in England for a couple of weeks last year and spent a few days in Rye just before I came home. I watched my videotapes while everything was still fresh in my memory; if you know where the actors really are in a scene, and where they’re supposed to be, none of it makes geographical sense. Most of it was filmed around the church square, and the house that stands in for Mallards is on the street at the very top of the hill, behind where the real Mallards (Lamb House) is.
The nice thing about Rye is that, once you’ve read the books, you know right where you are even if you’ve never been there before. You can stand at the top of the street by the front door of Lamb House and the wall where the garden room used to be (it was destroyed in an air raid during WWII), and say: “That one’s Major Benjy’s house, and the Wyses live down that way…” The church is off to your right and Georgie’s cottage, with the crooked chimney, is still there.
I love Lucia (although not as much as my sister does), but I always had kind of a beef with EFB about Olga Bracely. I think that character is left over from his “Dido” books, someone who gets a free ride of unquestioned adorableness because Benson himself thinks she’s so great. Rank favoritism.
Have you read other EFB novels? Paying Guests and Mrs. Ames are fun, but I think you’d really enjoy (if you don’t know it already) Secret Lives, where the novelist Susan Leg (from Trouble for Lucia) is introduced.
I’ve read most of his ghost stories, but don’t have them around the house so I’ll have to go on memory. I think “Mrs. Amworth” is the only one I have at hand; I’ll look at it tonight.
Is “Caterpillars” the one where a man watches these huge, claw-footed caterpillars swarm into a friend’s room in the middle of the night? (shudder) Very creepy.
“Negotium Perambulans”–If it’s the story I’m thinking of, about an ancient something that hangs around a churchyard, I also remember it as extremely spooky.
I haven’t read any of the non-M&L novels except for Dodo, which I don’t recall I liked very much (it was about 10 years ago, so I couldn’t give a coherent reason why I didn’t like it at this point). I’ll look for Secret Lives.
I’ve ordered it. It’ll be 2 to 6 weeks for delivery, so we’ll have to come back to this later if you’re still interested.
I re-read “Mrs. Amworth” last night as well as, “The Room in the Tower,” which turned up in another anthology I have. Both stories feature a vampire woman, but each is creepy in a different way.
Mrs. Amworth seems like such a nice lady, expressing tender concern for her victim and offering to bring him nourishing soup; except for some hovering outside windows at night, she doesn’t do anything overtly menacing–just quietly goes about her business of draining people of their blood. It’s a very subtle, understated horror.
Julia Stone of “The Room in the Tower” is more obviously evil. This story is more gruesome too, what with the bleeding portrait and the coffin filled with blood, but it’s also got some nice, spooky touches: the recurring dream that changes over the years, so that the narrator keeps up with the Stone family via his dream-visits to their house; Mrs. Stone’s coffin not staying in the ground; the repeated phrase, “I have given you the room in the tower,” even after Mrs. Stone is dead.
How kind of you to bring the subject up. Ah, how you all chivy me and weary me to death with these occasions, but never worry about that.
I’ll be happy to perform. Dear Georgie will turn the pages for me, and all I ask is a very subdued lighting during the the Moonlight Sonata. The first movement is enough, don’t you think? The other movements are so busy and far too agitato for such a simple evening of po di musica among friends.
Ah, some gooseberry fool? Mmm. Simply delicious. Yes, I do think I like it made this way. The tartness is refreshing for a change, isn’t it? No I won’t have any more thank you. I must make some gooseberry fool for you some time using my family’s recipe. Sublimely sweet, you know!
Miss Mapp - from your naughty face I know what you’re going to ask about - you’re going to ask for that Lobster Riseholme recipe again aren’t you? - why isn’t that quaint Irene? Must dash, au reservoir…
Thanks for mentioning it. A BIG fan, introduced by my delightful aunt.
I always liked the scene that night that Georgie and Lucia were staying at a hotel in adjoining rooms. The tension and suspense! And the relief when each worked out what the other was thinking.
Welcome to this place Miss Mapp. It is not a village as you will have gathered. A quick revision of *Lucia In London *may help you acclimatise.
We are thinking of having a SDMB pageant at the end of the year - Noblewomen of History. Joan of Arc is still to be cast. And poor dear Diva has her heart set on that role.
I do intend to come back to this thread, if anyone else is interested in carrying on. Perhaps this weekend, once I re-compose my thoughts into a more Mappish frame of mind.