A-Z Characters that Transform: Westing and Other Aloof Heroes from Raskin's Fiction

Posts about characters who transform brings me to Ellen Raskin. 

Cool, calculating somewhat aloof heroes who see three moves ahead are quite popular in fiction. See House and House's predecessor, Sherlock Holmes. Ellen Raskin created a few notably aloof characters, such as Sam Westing in The Westing Game and Garson from The Tattooed Potato and Other Clues.

Raskin deserves credit for her aloof protagonists being full characters who transcend the archetype. She accomplishes this feat through the following writing choices:

(1) Raskin avoids omniscience. However clever, her protagonists are operating within specific parameters alongside idiosyncratic people who don't operate entirely according to plan;

(2) Raskin gives her protagonists flaws; they are idiosyncratic themselves.

The problem of the aloof hero is how easily the aloof hero can be a jerk pointing out everyone else's flaws. Although I enjoyed the early seasons of House, I felt that too often the audience was being invited to agree with House: "Yeah, isn't it stupid to have to do that petty bureaucratic stuff like fill out charts?!"

Consequently, I never felt like House learned or grew. He understood himself better.  But he never moved forward, and I eventually gave up on the show. 

In comparison, Sherlock from Elementary retains his basic personality while still trying to improve (without getting lecture-y).

Raskin's protagonists are more like Sherlock than House. Sam Westing has a sweet scene in which he waxes nostalgic (I won't give away more) and Garson is haunted by choices he made in the past. However, Garson is not allowed to wallow; he too needs to learn to move on.

I highly recommend both books, especially the second which doesn't get enough attention!

In regards to the issue of physical transformation, Westing's disguise (and subsequent reveal) are excellently done. *Spoilers.* He was in a car accident. Many of the people who would recognize him were quite young when they saw him last. His motivations--however extreme--are in keeping with the man's psychology and with the book's plot. And the person who unveils him is his equal in intelligence and self-control. His secret is safe. 

All the Ms: Marais to Marcom

Marais, Bianca: Hum If You Don’t Know the Words takes place in South Africa. The opening chapter engaged me. I don’t read much literature by South Africa authors so I’m dealing with a small sample size, but the books seem, by default, to deal with complex relationships and issues. Complexity comes with the territory, quite literally.   

Maranini, Dacia: The Silent Duchess starts out as a story about a deaf-mute girl. The description is most effective. It then turns into something from Law & Order: SUV, which means…it gets boring. 

March, Ava: “Bound to Him” is about two people (who already know each other) sleeping together: one fools the other a la Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well. I’m not sure I entirely believe it, no matter how much I like disguise tales. KJ Charles’s Seditious Affair is far more believable: a story where the men know each other but don’t know what each man does (one works for the government; the other is a radical pamphleteer) since they came together over sex and then literature, not politics. The reality is revealed early in the story. The “disguise” is less important than dealing WITH the disguise. 

Marcom, Micheline Aharonian: The Daydreaming Boy starts with a “we” passage. I’m not a fan. I’m aware that “we” is ubiquitous in academic literature. I think it is as bad as the non-attached “they,” a generalized pronoun that refers to everyone and no one. Who are these people? Who is that person? Stories are about individual people. I encounter a “we,” and I lose interest immediately. 

A-Z Characters & Transformation: C.S. Lewis's Great Flawed Character, Edmund

C.S. Lewis's Edmund has come up on several A-Z lists. Here he is again to represent a character who transforms. 

In her essay about Edmund, "King Edmund the Cute: Anatomy of a Girlhood Crush," Diane Peterfreund explains why Edmund is her favorite of the Narnian heroes. He's mine too, and I agree with Peterfreund's analysis. She points out that Edmund qualifies as a bad boy, but what makes him appealing is that he is a reformed bad boy: a bad boy who uses his bad boy past to gain insight into himself and others. 

Peterfreund points out, "Edmund...seemed [to me] to have pulled it together. He may have been somewhat graver than Peter, but he was still a cheerful guy, overall." In other words, he isn't a brooder.

Totally!

In terms of writing, Lewis's success with Edmund is three-fold:

1. Edmund's "fall" is very human. 

He isn't a sociopath. He is a normal human with normal resentment. He does betray his family--and that reality is not glossed over or excused by Lewis--but not for Big Bad, Larger-than-Life reasons. He isn't plotting to overthrow the universe. More Spike than Angel, his "fall" is human, rooted in day-to-day behavior (Lewis makes the point that Edmund has been away at a horrible school and has picked up horrible snide habits, again without excusing Edmund). Edmund's salvation is also very human. For instance--

2. Edmund retains his personality.

Edmund repents and recovers. And he gains a reputation of being wise with the ability to make level-headed judgments/assessments. 

He doesn't lose what makes him Edmund, however. In Voyage of the Dawn Treader, when talking to Eustace, he says, "You were only an ass, but I was a traitor." The tone is perfect. Edmund isn't apologetic. He isn't sappy. He isn't whining. He is matter-of-fact and even slightly sardonic. 

And it is notable that Eustace tells his story to Edmund first. Edmund has a practical nature that tackles problems in a practical fashion. The cousins have one characteristic in common.

3. Edmund's repentance or restoration is something he takes seriously. 

He doesn't dwell on his mistakes but he does use them. In Prince Caspian, when the siblings are lost, Edmund takes Lucy's side on where they should go next, precisely because he once let her down.

In sum, Edmund isn't just a bad-boy-reformed. He is a consistent and believable character who has turned his life around. Lewis accomplishes this feat through entirely non-dramatic characterization. 

The Royal Who Is Really Something Else

Zahler's book The Thirteenth Princess brings up the classic archetype: the royal disguised as a servant or ordinary person.

Twain's The Prince and the Pauper, of course, tackles the royal disguised as a peasant and the peasant disguised as a royal. 

I'll focus on the royal disguised as an ordinary citizen here. 

The book retells the fairytale of the Twelve Princesses. The tale is a great one since it offers so much scope to writers. The Twelve Princesses can be heroines. They can be snobs. Their parents can be cursed. They can be tyrants. The kingdom to where the princesses go to dance can be evil, amoral, or protective. 

And everything in-between! 

Zahler makes interesting choices. For one, Zita, the thirteenth princess is being raised as a servant. I'm not providing spoilers because the book begins with Zita already knowing. In fact, everyone already knows. 

I don't entirely buy the reason for Zita being raised as a servant. I think there was a more likely reason lurking in the corners of the book (and I'm not sure why the author didn't use that reason). The king later gets upset about what neighboring kings think. A man who worries about what neighboring kings think would treat his princess daughter as a princess, not matter how much he personally fears or hates or blames her for something. 

However, the "disguise" provides motivation for Zita to take on the quest. In addition--and here I thought Zahler provided excellent insights--Zita comes to realize that her sisters are in many ways as limited as she is. When I watched Manor House, I was struck by this truth. In many ways, the servants--who did not have easy lives--had better social relationships than the "uppercrust." The single sister of the lady of the manor got so depressed at her lack of scope (she was a working woman in contemporary life) that she left. In reality, of course, she would have had other singles and charity work to occupy her. However, her reaction does dovetail with accounts of women of that time. 

The middle classes truly always have been better off: not too poor to starve; not too rich to be forced into limiting social expectations. 

Zita is a good "fly on the wall" of the fairy tale! 

This final character analysis segues quite nicely into the next A-Z List. I enjoyed covering characters so much that the next list will do the same, only this time, the characters are characters transform: that is, their true personalities are revealed either because they take off an actual disguise or because they change over time. 

The next A-Z list will go by character rather than by author. 

 

Characters as Society: Yugi Yamada

One of my favorite mangaka (an artist who writes the manga' story and draws its characters) is Yugi Yamada. One reason I like her so much is that the characters come across as real, fleshy, non-abstract. 

Another reason I like Yamada so much is that she gives her characters friends and neighbors and co-workers, who are all different types with differing personalities. That is, they are not all students or all rivals or all co-workers. One series supplies a married couple with a baby; friends who are thinking about dating; friends who are already dating and even an ex-member of the group. 

Moreover, her characters tend to interrelate, so that one character in one manga may make an appearance in another. 

What Yamada does here is quite difficult. So often, "extras" in manga or books or even movies can become confusing or so similar, they simply blur together. I have often started books where the sheer volume of names being thrown at me results in me putting the book down. 

Yamada's triumph is that her social worlds, like her characters, feel real and fleshy, and yet the main story doesn't get lost. Readers see that world through a central conflict/arc. The world was created for the characters, not the other way around. 

 Yamada's characters have full lives, which is quite attractive. 

X is for the Unknown in Murder Mysteries

In mysteries, X often stands in for the murderer. In the show Person of Interest, the unknown factor is whether the "number" (or person) is the perpetrator or the victim of a crime. Is X about to commit a crime? Suffer a crime? Should X be stopped, helped, or protected? 

Agatha Christie has her detectives argue that in order to catch the murderer, the detective must understand the victim. What type of reactions and interactions did the victim invite? In reaction, is the murderer fearful, revengeful, desperate, angry, vain...? 

And some of the best mysteries have memorable murderers. 

*Spoilers*

From the Golden Age,  

Dorothy Sayers' Whose Body delivers a fascinating and cold-hearted murderer in The Dawson Pedigree. The fretful innocence of the victim--and how readily the community accepts the death--underscores the murderess's paranoid self-protection. 

The murderer in Ngaio Marsh's Light Thickens is inconsequential since the main "character" of the book is inconsequential since the victim is also inconsequential. The main "character" of the book is the play. Final Curtain, however, places the victim center-stage; he is an aging actor after all. His ego and self-satisfaction, his demands on family and constant will-changing account for the behavior of the murderer who mirrors him. 

Josephine Tey's To Love and Be Wise, like a few of her novels, involves no murder. Supposed victim and perpetrator of the investigated crime are one and the same, and the character of that person explains the double role.

Agatha Christie's Evil Under the Sun focuses almost entirely on the clever murdering couple. They attract all the notice. Christie, however, links their personalities to the victim's ultimately naive nature. She appears a slinky, manipulative tease, but she is actually, as Poirot states, "The eternal victim." 

None of the victims deserves being murdered.  The above writers were thankfully not disposed to excusing cruel and violent behavior. 

However, nearly all of them spend time presenting their victims and murderers as members of various networks from family to career: networks that evoke a strong and memorable response. Marsh indulged the most in random or pointless and tawdry murders (that is, realistic murders). But those random, pointless, tawdry victims and murderers are far less memorable. 

A classic murder, it appears, requires a definitive X.  

T.H. White and What Makes a King-to-Be

In my novella, The Wolf Boy Returns from Space, my king-to-be is more a young Alexander the Great than, say, Harry Potter. That is, he has a cold, observant, ambitious side even as a teen. He knows he has plans. 

T.H. White's Wart, however, is supposed to be a great king not for ambition but because he is good. 

So what is Wart like? 

One of the most interesting characteristics White gives Wart in his frankly medieval if anachronistic England is that he doesn't put himself forward. About Kay, the narrator states, "[He was] one of those people who would be neither a follower nor a leader, but only an aspiring heart, impatient in the failing body which imprisoned it." 

Wart, however, "admired Kay and was a born follower. He was a hero-worshipper."

These qualities may seem odd ones for a incipient king, especially in our current "stand up and defend your label!" society. 

The movie is a disappointment--

the best action sequences are

missing--but Wart's character

is fairly accurate.

In T.H. White's hands, however, Wart as follower makes him pure boy.  He is curious, courageous, quick-witted, quick-on-his-feet, engaged with everything he does. He loves things with his whole heart. His greatest trait, of which he is almost entirely unaware, is his empathy. He understands and loves Kay, so he begs Merlyn for an adventure for Kay. He eventually earns Kay's "honest love." 

Wart loves the glory of jousts and worries about the combatants being hurt. He begs a boon for Wat but also, ultimately, lets Wat and Dog Boy alone to do their own thing.

Wart's leadership qualities here dovetail with T.H. White's treatment of Robin W(H)ood. Of all the social/political orders Wart encounters, Robin W(H)ood's independent band are the most efficient, the happiest, and the most self-supporting. 

In sum, the Wart doesn't want to push others around. In one of the most touching passages of The Sword in the Stone, Wart tells Merlyn that as a knight, he would take on his responsibilities alone. 

He muses (he isn't bragging), "I would pray to God to let me encounter all the evil in the world in my own person, so that if I conquered there should be none [of the evil] left, while if I was defeated, it would be I who would suffer for it." 

Merlyn chides him for being "presumptuous" and unrealistic. Besides, nobody would let Wart do what he wishes. 

"I could ask," said the Wart. 

"You could ask," repeated Merlyn. 

Characters That Don't Change: Verne's Adventurers

It is a given in classical narration that the main characters will undergo some type of change. They will grow and develop and rejoice or despair and sink into disillusionment. They are occupants of Dante's circles, products of what they strove to become in the mortal realm. 

I more or less agree with the need for characters to change. 

There are, however, characters who remain entirely what the author established them to be. Verne's characters fall into this category. 

I write elsewhere how Jules Verne and H.G. Wells represent the two sides of the sci-fi genre. Verne belongs to the older side which focused on the world and discoveries around the characters. Wells, a decade after Verne's Journey, uses a modern approach with War of the Worlds, not only through first-person narration but through a detailed examination of the narrator's emotional state. Verne does not require this type of internal investigation. 

When Verne is put to film, however, the need for character change quite literally enters the picture. The Brendan Fraser version of Journey to the Center of the Earth provides a character searching for his parents and then having to deal with their loss. The 1959 version provides a villain and a romance as the main character, Lindenbrook played by James Mason, becomes more and more disheveled. 

Nearly every 20,000 Leagues' version stresses the choice Aronnax has to make between Ned and Nemo; in fairness to Verne, that choice is given space within the book; it just isn't as important as all the *wow* stuff Nemo drives his submarine through and around. 

The differences indicate several points: 

(1) film goers are products of a modern age that wants character development; we want more than simply a series of images or visual extravaganzas; 

(2) a liking for extravaganza lingers, however; a film that introduces us to an amazing world goes a long way to satisfying our desires--Jackson's Tolkien's films are some of the few I went to the theater to watch (rather than waiting for the DVDs) since I wanted to SEE big Middle-Earth; 

(3) nevertheless, a film requires story in a way that a book does not; I suggest one reason the book does not is not because people don't want characters to grow and change but because reading between the lines enables readers to identify characters with stories and personalities beyond what shows up on the page. 

Static characters have their place. Generally speaking, current writers need to know how to give characters weaknesses over which to stumble or conquer. But not all plots have made the same requirement because not all plots have had the same purpose. 

When is a Bad Character Too Bad?

Literature Devil points out that Stan Lee deliberately

made Tony Stark someone his readers would dislike.

Literature Devil discusses "Can a Racist be a Hero?"

One problem with this question, of course, is that racism can be personal and chronologically relative. In Quantum Leap, Sam gets upset when the child of the man he is currently representing uses a racial epithet. He has a visceral negative reaction, but the boy doesn't perceive the term as loaded and certainly isn't evil. In one of Jackie North's novels, protagonists react negatively to the main character using a proper term according to OUR time. To the people of the past,  however, his comment appears the product of prejudice.

Literature Devil's point is not that language is not the best guide to determining goodness or badness. Rather, characters who struggle against their own weaknesses are more interesting than characters who are already perfect. The video is well-worth watching. It concentrates on the need to create character-driven drama in which characters struggle.

I, however, am more interested in the bigger issue: How much weakness and bad behavior will readers/viewers tolerate? When does the hero stop being complex and start becoming awful?

From the "T" author list is Josephine Tey's Alan Grant. Grant is not an entirely likable guy, and that characterization doesn't appear to be a mistake. At one point, in The Singing Sands, Tey has Grant entirely miss the fact that his cousin has tried to set him up with a very nice, intelligent, and level-headed woman. He is a little narrow-minded in various matters, having certain blind-spots. Yet he is a decent investigator. 

I like Grant in part because he isn't broody, and I find the unending number of broody British detectives rather exhausting, mostly because their broodiness is NOT presented as a weakness. A better example of another good, flawed detective is Poirot, whose real flaw behind all the idiosyncrasies--his lack of humility--is what makes him memorable.

The line for when readers start to dislike a character can be quite personal. Overall, I suggest that too-bad-to-be-liked characters don't care about the harm caused to others and never acknowledge the harm. As with King John and Richard III and Edmund from King Lear, courageous if conniving kings and sons can actually be somewhat likable or, at least, interesting. But a lack of self-awareness crosses the line. Spike as Spike was always more likable than Angel as Angelus.   

And the bad behavior doesn't have to be extreme.  

So a character with massive self-doubt can be relatable. A character with massive self-doubt who turns the entire world on end to serve the character's needs is not, especially if that character remains convinced "but my needs DO outweigh all others' needs." 

A rogue like Nick is likable and defendable--he's never really going to hurt anyone, and he faces his choices. A rogue like Wickham--who never stops playacting and grifting others--is not. 

Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe: Objectivity as True Kindness

Many people have attempted to capture Nero Wolfe's personality. Among them are William Conrad, Francesco Pannofino, and Maury Chaukin. 

William Conrad plays Nero as a gruff guy with a heart of gold and even a sentimental streak. I'm not sure Conrad is capable of playing someone like Wolfe any other way, even if the director demanded otherwise. I watched Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe with Conrad's personality in mind and quite enjoyed the early episodes. However, I never entirely warmed to Lee Horsley as Archie. 

Jake and the Fatman is more or less the same relationship in modern (for the time) L.A. (then Hawaii, then L.A. again). I consider Jake and the Fatman more accurate to the Nero Wolfe universe, especially Jake as Archie: the raw, hands-on, physical guy who exhibits both respect and a certain irreverence for "the Fatman." 

Francesco Pannofino and Pietro Sermonti in the MHZ Nero Wolfe have decent chemistry as Nero and Archie. Pannofino also plays Wolfe as having a heart of gold, but the heart of gold is more buried than with Conrad. I quite like the MHZ production, in part because I love the house and also because the chef, as in the A&E production, is given equal screen time. Nero Wolfe's household is replicated, not merely his personality and cases.

However, Maury Chaykin--directed by Timothy Hutton--captures the Nero Wolfe of the books best. Wolfe is not (merely) a gruff smart guy. And he is not a snarky, one-liner quip machine (see Sherlock and House). He is passionate and romantic, stating at one point that he gained weight to inure himself to that side of his character. 

More than anything else, he has a underlying belief system that makes him appear cold and uncaring but is, in truth, inexorably honest and right. He is more like Sherlock from Elementary, who points out to Kitty that letting people pay for crimes they didn't commit--however emotionally satisfying--is not in the long run good for anyone, including society. 

Ethics is the reason Wolfe refuses to let the spoiled heiress simply park herself in his home. He has let plenty of young women park themselves in his home when needs warranted. But Wolfe doesn't lie or play games or forget the long-term consequences of any act. He tells her the truth, even though he could have massaged the situation to give emotional satisfaction and still claim an award.

He exhibits true respect for principles. To Debra Monk, playing the wife of a murdered man, he states, "[The woman who got killed] is the one who asked for your promise. So the responsibility [for that promise and her death] was hers." He relieves the burden on the wife's mind--he later honors the dead woman's purpose in requesting the promise.

Again, the behavior may seem uncaring. But in fact, it is ultimately more fair, honorable, and human than any outsized emotional response. 

Archie--more impulsive than Wolfe--often disagrees with his boss. Overall, however, he is more likely to see things from Wolfe's point of view than not. In a Venn diagram of life, they see life through the same honorable lens. 

Sayers's Characters, including Villains, in the Golden Age of Mysteries

The Golden Age mysteries often get compared to each other. 

Comparisons seem to be how humans survive (Is that dark alley safe or unsafe? Is that person a stranger or friend?). Consequently, I think that comparisons are often inevitable. 

However, I think the impulse should be fought. Or at least monitored. It is completely unnecessary to consider Christie better than Sayers or Sayers better than Christie or Marsh better than either of them. I've read all three. I enjoy all three. I'm not going to stop enjoying all three. 

I think where comparisons get interesting is not deciding who is better or worse. I think comparisons get interesting in examining how the writers differ.

Marsh, who worked in the theatre, wrote characters from the perspective of a playwright: where they stand in a scene, how they look, how they move. 

Christie distilled human characteristics into brief and very relatable portraits. 

Sayers creates individuals within context. 

One of my favorite Sayers' character is Charles Parker. In Unnatural Death, Sayers describes him as "one of those methodical painstaking people whom the world can ill spare." In many ways, Parker is like Bell from Elementary: a guy who looks at an issue from as many sides as possible. AND does the hard work of collecting the requisite information. He also has the masterful ability to be unafraid and unimpressed by Wimsey. He isn't tactless or revolutionary but he also isn't a sycophant. If he thinks Peter is behaving pompously, he says so. 

Sayers's villains also have a quality that I think most villains have (and the reason villains who confess when faced with THE TRUTH never entirely convince me). They think themselves justified. Even the most evil of her villains, from Unnatural Death, is entirely normal on the surface. That villain's world has narrowed to MY rights, MY needs, MY desired outcome. 

In fact, like C.S. Lewis, Sayers conveys the normality of the villainous behavior, so the villain of Murder Must Advertise is NOT, as Wimsey recognizes, the Big Bad. He is too impulsive; too easily caught in dumb behavior. He got away with the murder initially because it was put down to an accident. But he was never going to get away with much for long. 

Sayers understood the stories and justifications that heroes and villains tell themselves. 

Shakespeare Characters: Never Quite What One Expects

I've lately come to appreciate how good Shakespeare truly is. I've always been a fan--but not because of his Great Genius or all the other labels people throw at approved-of writers. 

"Nothing new under the sun" applies to Shakespeare. I don't think Shakespeare is so great because he broke boundaries or transcended expectations blah blah blah. I think he is so great because he used archetypes and tropes in a way that captured human experience and human interest. He was the Agatha Christie of the playwright's world. He put things in the best order. He distilled a fundamental attitude or experience within a single character or scene. His writing is energetic and layered because he allowed it to be--likely, to allow for different actors to play various parts. 

(In some future post, I would point out the potential creativity and discipline of writing for money.) 

Here, I will point out that Shakespeare created lasting characters. They are archetypes, many times, but they are something more because they so exactly capture an archetype and then offer something on top of the archetype. 

Nuttiest play you will ever see.

Kate isn't just a shrew. She has her own personality and wit and ways of looking at the universe. Petruchio is her match, not her overlord. Likewise, Shylock and Falstaff have their own individualized and personalized backgrounds. The twins in Comedy of Errors are distinct. The relationships in Hamlet are believably dysfunctional because the characters come across as recognizable and real people. 

Even characters that I have ignored in the past--such as Henry VI--have something-extra that makes them not simply labels who stand on the stage and react to things. They have usable substance. 

Take Cymbeline, a play Shakespeare may not have written but obviously borrowed from him. Cymbeline feels like Shakespeare (or someone) took all his prior characters--including husbands and wives who feel jealousy--and threw them into a play alongside a bunch of his prior tropes. The play includes (I'm not kidding) kidnapped brothers grown to manhood living in the wilderness (Wales), Roman senators wandering around Briton trying to get tribute, an evil stepmother and an evil prince, and people continually running off to (again, I'm serious) Milford Haven (in Wales). The whole thing sounds like a Greek tragedy set in Swansea or Staten Island. 

I can't help but wonder if Shakespeare was badgered by his shareholders into writing a play and said, "Fine! You want a play?! Here's all my ideas in a single script--I'll trot them out one after another."

Or, since Shakespeare wasn't adverse to making money, he said, "Sure! Let's trot out all my best ideas and make a bundle!" 

The point here: only someone that good in the first place could do what Shakespeare or someone else did: use what they already had to make something that doesn't totally fall apart. 

The Character Between the Lines: Pamela

When I wrote my tribute to Richardson's Pamela, I had to take a character, Pamela, who appears a simpering goody-two-shoes and make her likable. I also had to give her an internal arc, which is infinitely more useful to building a character than having the character do lots and lots of stuff. 

Luckily, I was able to find clues in Pamela to the person Pamela might be behind the letters and the front she puts forward. 

Pamela herself is not always amusing. The text's humor arises from the quick-fire exchanges between Pamela and Mr. B. Like Bones and Booth, Nick and Nora, Pamela and Mr. B thrive on playing off each others' words. (One reason the second book is markedly less successful than the first is that in the second book, Pamela and Mr. B are reduced to fighting and making up rather than verbally sparring.)

Pamela is the perfect straight-woman.

The following scene from The World According to Mr. B, recounted by Pamela in Letter XVI, shows how Pamela will take hold of Mr. B's words to support her own argument.

I’d stopped by Mrs. Jervis’s parlor to tell her my travel plans to Lincolnshire where our family’s original estate is located. She was interviewing a farmer’s daughter; I didn’t want to disturb them, so I went to the back parlor and rang for Mrs. Jervis.

"Is your visitor Farmer Nichols or Farmer Brady’s daughter?" I asked when she arrived.

She laughed. "If your honor won’t be angry, I will introduce her, for I think she outdoes our Pamela."

And she brought in Pamela dressed in plain muslin with a black silk kerchief and a straw hat on her head.

A country miss, in fact. Pamela is no fool; she knows clothes make the station.

I got up and came around the oak writing desk. "You are far prettier than your sister Pamela," I said.

"I am Pamela," she told me with a quick upwards glance.

"Impossible," I said. "I can be free with you," and I kissed her lightly on the lips.

She bolted out of the room. Mrs. Jervis clucked.

"What’s she up to?" I said.

"It’s her new wardrobe. She’s been collecting odds and ends over the last week or so."

Damn Pamela and her practicality.

"Get in here," I yelled towards the door, and Pamela sidled in, scowling. "This is pure hypocrisy," I said, waving my hand at the country dress. Pamela didn’t want the life that dress represented.

"I’ve been in disguise ever since your mother brought me here. These clothes are more suitable to my degree."

I was leaning against the desk, my face almost level with Pamela’s. We studied each other, and I noted her set lips and dark, unhappy eyes.

"Oh, Pamela," I said and drew her into my arms.

She didn’t struggle—not this time. "You have to leave," I said to her hair, "only I don’t want that." She tensed instantly, but I strengthened my hold, and she relaxed again, her cheek against my waistcoat. Poor Pamela sent off in disgrace to a life that would sap her dry.

I let her go and addressed Mrs. Jervis. "I’ll submit myself to this hussy for a fortnight and then send her to my sister. Do you hear what I say, statue?"

And Pamela muttered, "I might be in danger from her ladyship’s nephew."

Never imagine that Pamela’s memory is bad. [Mr. B earlier resisted sending Pamela to his sister because of the nephew.]

"Damned impertinence," I said.

"What have I done that you treat me worse than if I robbed you?"

I almost laughed then because whatever was between me and Pamela was very much like being robbed—of sense or self-preservation.

She wasn’t done. "Why should you demean yourself to notice me? Why should I suffer more than others?"

"You have distinguished yourself above the common servant," I said. She couldn’t have it both ways—she couldn’t write and read and befriend Mrs. Jervis and then want me to treat her like a scullery maid. "Didn’t my good mother desire I take care of you?"

She muttered. I took her chin and forced it up, and she said, nearly spitting, "My good lady did not desire your care to extend to the summer-house and dressing room."

The latter part of the argument is described thus in the original text:

Do you hear, Mrs. Jervis, cried he again, how pertly I am interrogated by this saucy slut? Why, sauce-box, says he, did not my good mother desire me to take care of you? And have you not been always distinguished by me, above a common servant? And does your ingratitude upbraid me for this?

I said something mutteringly, and he vowed he would hear it. I begged excuse; but he insisted upon it. Why, then, said I, if your honour must know, I said, That my good lady did not desire your care to extend to the summer-house, and her dressing-room.

Which brings me to the issue of Pamela's "sauciness." (She is described this way more than any other.) The word sounds coy and playful and when I first started working on my novella, I was confused by the disparity between Pamela's acerbic comments, Mr. B's reactions, and references to her as some kind of giggling flirt.

However, in the second book, Pamela writes a letter to Lady Danvers in which she describes her personality: I am naturally of a saucy temper: and with all my appearance of meekness and humility, can resent, and sting too, when I think myself provoked.

In this context, "saucy" clearly does not denote pleasant flirting but rather sarcastic zingers. This is far more in keeping with Pamela's personality as delineated by Richardson in the first novel. Although Pamela is often portrayed by anti-Pamelites as leading Mr. B on, she is actually fighting to preserve her own space with the best tool available: her quick wit.

She could hardly anticipate Mr. B would get a huge kick out of verbal sparring!

Pamela didn’t want me to read the letters; she was worried I would be offended by their bluntness. I couldn’t imagine Pamela could be blunter to the page than she was to my face, and I told her to have more confidence in me. I wanted the honest Pamela, not the Pamela who spoke round and round and round a topic, hiding her thoughts and motives.

"I have read many of your barbed reflections," I said. "And yet I’ve never upbraided you on that score." Not very often, at least.

"As long as you remember I wrote the truth from my heart," she said, "and that I had the right to defy this forced and illegal restraint."

"You have a powerful advocate in me," I said and went to my library to read.

The packet contained not only Pamela’s letters to her parents but letters from Williams [a clergyman who proposed to Pamela] and drafts of Pamela’s letters to him. I glowered over them. Pamela had certainly pled her case to Williams most affectingly, and he had definitely presented himself as more a romantic than disinterested savior.

"Do you find I encouraged his proposal?" Pamela said when I called her down and taxed her about her "love letters."

I didn’t, but, "What about the letters before these?" I said. The ones I had started nearly two weeks after I sent Pamela to Lincolnshire. I knew from Mrs. Jewkes that Pamela and Williams began corresponding immediately after her arrival.

"My father has them."

I remembered then that Mrs. Jewkes believed Pamela had given Williams a packet to send to her parents. Mrs. Jewkes had tried to retrieve it by arranging an attack on the poor man. I would not have condoned such a crude scheme, especially since it failed in its purpose.

"I want to read everything you’ve written," I said. "You create a pretty tale of romance around your troubles."

She raised her chin. "You jeer at my misfortunes."

"Considering the liberties you take with my character," I said, brandishing the letters, "I’d say we are equally outspoken."

"I would not have taken liberties if you had not given me cause. The cause, sir, comes before the effect." Pamela’s voice gets quite steely when she’s riled. I held back a smile.

"You chop logic very prettily. What the deuce do men go to school for?"

"You wouldn’t mock me if I were dull."

"I wouldn’t love you half so well," I pointed out.

She flushed. "I’d be better off married to a plough-boy," she told the worn rug, which she knew and I knew wasn’t true.

"One of us fox-hunters would still have found you," I said. I hoped I would have found her. I couldn’t imagine never having met Pamela. "What about the most recent letters, the ones after these? Are they on your person?" And when she remained silent, "You know criminals who don’t confess are tortured."

"Torture is not used in England," she retorted.

"Oh, my torture will fit the crime," I said. "I’m going to strip you, Pamela." I crossed to her and began to slowly untie the lace handkerchief that masked her bosom. She gazed at me, open-mouth, and for a heart-stopping moment, I thought she wouldn’t stop me. But she slapped my hand and darted backwards.

"You’ll give me the letters?" I said.

"Yes," she said and fled.

The underlying sexual threat is the one area where Pamela is not completely comfortable. The rather remarkable thing about Richardson is that despite the sententiousness of much of the text, he was a great observer of human nature. When Pamela actually does behave her age (and isn't acting a spokesperson for Richardson), she behaves that age with utter believability. Like many a teenage girl, she can be ironic and sarcastic and sardonic and, frankly, rather obnoxious--but, when placed in a setting outside her knowledge, she will get bewildered and scared.

Unfortunately, Richardson didn't have the consistency of characterization that would place him at the forefront of English novelists (and I'm not sure he cared), but he definitely had the skill to create strong--and witty--characters.

 

Quinn's Colin Bridgerton: Imperfect Yet Lovable

My comments are based on the book, not the Netflix show. I watched the first two Bridgerton seasons and enjoyed them. And I will likely watch the later seasons if they ever show up in the library. But I don't have enough interest that I would pick up another streaming service right now. 

Romancing Mr. Bridgerton is one of my favorite Quinn books, in part because it is about writing. In fact, I use a passage from the book to teach description to my students, specifically the passage about sensory adjectives and similes when Penelope discusses Colin's diary with him. 

Both Penelope and Colin are strong characters. I am praising Colin here because Quinn makes him imperfect yet entirely lovable and that achievement is admirable. 

Colin is the third oldest son. He travels quite a lot, being somewhat at loose ends as was typical of young men of that time period and class--those whose parents weren't pushing them towards the military or church. He is whimsical and kind-hearted. He also carries about him a kind of observer's distance. He gets on well with his family yet he seems to hold onto the role of outsider. 

When he discovers Penelope's secret--that she is writing columns under a pseudonym for a society page--he is at first alarmed. He is also jealous.

My image of Colin--personality-wise.

Penelope won't give up her craft, and she treats it and refers to it as a craft. She has been writing the pieces for years and has steadily honed her skills. The pieces are lightweight but as anyone who has tried comedy writing versus drama writing can attest, comedy writing is infinitely more difficult. Short, pithy, and memorable is not the easiest style to pull off. 

And Colin--a travel writer without an audience and at loose ends--covets what she has accomplished. He has to acknowledge how he feels before he can move forward in a relationship with a woman that he finds captivating. 

I think Quinn wisely has Penelope and Colin interested in different types of writing. Penelope is basically a journalist and commentator while Colin is more of a travel writer, Gerald Durrell-style. They can encourage each other rather than compete directly with each other for commissions and fans. 

The Brassy Female Character: Peck's Blossom Culp as a Standard Current Writers Should Aim For

One of the more annoying things about trends is that readers/viewers/critics tend to behave as if nothing has ever happened before, such as--

Behaving as if no writer before 2020 wrote strong female characters.

Peck's Blossom Culp proves that assumption utterly wrong (so does Shakespeare, but Shakespeare comes with more baggage). 

Blossom Culp is a fantastic female character in four of Peck's books. Though she appears in an earlier book, the first book primarily about Blossom is Ghosts I Have Been, whose plot has a link to the Titanic! She is exceedingly proactive--she scares boys to stop them tipping over a privy. She defends another girl on the playground. She helps her mentor, Miss Dabney, to out-maneuver a shyster spiritualist. She gains the ability to see ghosts and ends up traveling to England where she poses in Madam Tussauds.

So Blossom Culp is a great character but she does interesting things. She is also great because she has personality.  

In comparison, the scriptwriters of The War of the Rohirrim apparently consider their main female character to be preferable to all other LOTR female characters because she is "complex." I guess "complex" means "does a lot of things with confidence after a brief pause." 

But in truth, the main female character of The War of the Rohirrim is boring. 

Blossom is not boring. Like Agatha Christie's nurse in Murder in Mesopotamia, she is observant and somewhat blunt. Christie's nurse is more tactful. But both characters have a brassy good-nature that precludes cynicism (cynical narrators can be enticing--they can also get a bit wearisome like the Genie constantly breaking the fourth wall). They are intelligent about human nature  at a practical everyday level. 

Blossom Culp is younger than Christie's nurse, of course, being about twelve in the first book. She is also adventurous, tough, smart and clever (the two traits are not synonymous) and human. She is kind. She isn't perfect. She has her weaknesses, one of them being the next-door neighbor boy, Alexander. Consequently, she is well-rounded, especially since she has a sense of humor with a pragmatic view of life:

"I was never threatened with imprisonment after the first hour or so." 

"I could have done better, and I might have done worse. But that's true of life in general."

The Voice of Characters: Cadfael and Others

Patrick Tull

I remark in an earlier post that one issue with books-to-movies is when the character doesn't match the image in one's head. Although I am a big fan of Sir Derek Jacobi, I don't really see him as Cadfael. I like the early Cadfael series anyway. But I never forget that I'm watching Sir Derek Jacobi. 

A related topic here is when someone SOUNDS like the character. The first Ellis Peters' books I listened to were read by Patrick Tull. He isn't one my favorite readers since I like readers who read at a fairly steady clip, and Tull lingers on words. But the voice--oh, my!--was perfect, exactly how I imagined Cadfael would sound. Stephen Thorne was the second reader I encountered, and he is quite good both as Cadfael and as a well-paced reader. I "see" Cadfael through their voices.

Stephen Thorne

Ian Carmichael is the same. His voice, that is. I will occasionally watch the Wimsey TV movies starring Carmichael, but I can never not wince a little: he doesn't match Sayers' description of Peter Wimsey or my own image of Peter Wimsey at all.

And yet, he TOTALLY gets Wimsey. His voice is perfect. 

In reverse, I think David Suchet is perfect as Poirot in the series, but I don't like him as a reader. (I far prefer Hugh Fraser.) Likewise, Barbara Rosenblat as Mrs. Pollifax makes her sound about two decades older than she is in the books, which is just odd. 

Good reading is a skill. And a good reader makes a difference. Voice can be as much a "character" as any other part of an actor. 

The Scarlet Pimpernel: Do Spies Make Good Spouses?

Anthony Andrews' Scarlet Pimpernel is carried to a huge extent by Jane Seymour's vibrant beauty and Anthony Andrews' exceptional skill at exuding bravado and insouciance. Unlike the book, the film's story starts with the courtship, and the question immediately arises: Why would a sharp-witted actress marry a seemingly shallow idiot, if not for his money?

Without abandoning the character's vapid cover, Anthony Andrews manages to give Sir Percy a hint of something deeper when he is around Marguerite. He is boisterously happy to woo her and lets her believe that there is, in fact, "more" there.

 

When they marry and he comes to believe that she sent a family to the guillotine, he retreats entirely behind his adopted persona. Marguerite rightly perceives him as hiding from her. But the lover is still there.

 

This double or, rather, triple face is only possible because Andrews is that good. He manages to give Percy an aura of sincerity no matter what he is doing. When Marguerite complains that she can't confide in him, he is truly upset. He manages to convey that underneath all the frippery and shifting attitudes, a base personality remains.

 

Generally speaking, however, I don't buy it. The history of spies reads like the history of die-hard grifters. Le Carre's version of spies--and for that matter, Andrew Robinson's Garak in Deep Space Nine--is much closer to the truth. In one episode of Deep Space Nine, Garak keeps telling stories to the doctor, as if he were four or five different people: soldier, friend, traitor, exile. All of them are true. All of them are lies. 

 

The slipperiness of an entire personality being constantly in "code" doesn't bode well for a relationship. Though it may be true that one person can never totally understand another, the sheer bewilderment of a person never being one thing--no base personality--would make it difficult to go forward with that person...

 

Unless, of course, the lover LIKES being in love with a chimera.

 

Loid [using Crunchyroll's spelling] and Yo are exceptions here, of course, since they are decent, family people who just happen (oops!) to be a spy and assassin rather than a spy and assassin who are trying to pretend to be decent people.