Mommy, the author's making another Oxbridge comedy reference!
Well, it was inevitable. Allow me to explain why I keep making these references, though:
Londinium is essentially set in the 1960s cleverly disguised as the 1860s. That's not to be taken literally, of course, but there are actually a lot of similarities between the two periods (recreational drug usage, pop stars - the Victorian ones sang opera - and even a free love movement that had started in the Regency era), so I play around with it a lot. In book three, I drop references to Twiggy and the Beatles, but until we get there, most of the references are to 1960s British comedy.
It started accidentally. About two years into work on the book, I discovered that Basil and Dustin, my leading men, shared a remarkable amount of characteristics with Peter Cook and Dudley Moore respectively (right down to Basil and Peter both being prefects at boarding school and other little things like that). That started the ball rolling, and I began dropping the occasional reference to their identities in, like in chapter six of Londinium when Dustin says, "Sometimes I just think funny things," which is a line from Arthur, or all the instances in which Basil makes Dustin laugh when he shouldn't. I couldn't stop there, and so Robert and Nigel became Morecambe and Wise for one scene in Mamucium, in which Robert (without breaking the fourth wall) yells, "Arsenal!" when Nigel coughs.
So what's the new reference? Well, Basil has some friends from Eton who went to university at either Oxford or Cambridge. As everyone who knows me knows, the 1960s school of Oxbridge comedians fascinates me and was a big influence on my writing. I respect that comedy because it respects my intelligence. The first example of the kids who went to university in the '50s and realized they were horribly funny is the stage show Beyond the Fringe, which is easily one of the funniest and smartest things I've ever seen in my life. (For those who don't know, it starred, in alphabetical order, Alan Bennett, Peter Cook, Jonathan Miller and Dudley Moore.) It set off the satire boom of the early 1960s, which continued with shows like TW3, but that didn't last very long. Most of the satirists went off to do other things (David Frost of TW3 made other shows, like The Frost Report, and would go on to interview Richard Nixon and make him admit his role in the Watergate scandal). A few managed to continue with comedy, namely Cook and Moore (Not Only...But Also is a thing of genius, and there are few things more amusing to me than watching Peter corpse Dudley). But out of the world of Oxbridge comedy rose one of the most internationally famous comedy troupes in history.
Yes, that's right. Monty Python.
So, you're wondering how I managed to do this, considering that the Victorians are stereotyped as being nowhere near silly enough to do anything even remotely like what the Pythons did. Well, absurdism in comedy actually started with the Victorians through nonsense verse, like that written by Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll. Thus, the Victorians are inadvertently responsible for The Goon Show, Not Only...But Also and, of course, Monty Python's Flying Circus. (You can thank them if you like. I'm sure it'll boost Dustin's ego, not that he has much of one.) Anyhow, let me give you the lowdown on Basil's Etonian friends and enemies and their university educations.
Oxford
Basil Remington (Exeter College)
William Conrad (Brasenose College)
Algernon Huddleston (Merton College)
Norval Larkin (Christ Church)
Cambridge
Robert Sheldon (St. John's College)
Edward Griswold (Downing College)
Quinby Perch (King's College)
Reginald Prescott (Corpus Christi College)
Montgomery Houghton (Peterhouse College)
Some London Ragged School (with a classical music education from Molhook Marinus)
Dustin Thatcher (not that he and Basil were aware of each other until 1863)
Okay, ignore the last one. I was being sarcastic. Also, I should note that Monty Houghton never tried to be funny and that Robert is a few years younger than Basil and never met him at Eton, even though they were there at the same time. Anyhow, here's how they divided up.
Basil, after several years of writing satirical memoirs about his teachers at Eton (whilst he was still at Eton) and performing the fake Shakespearian play Much Ado About Neighthing (which was about one of his teachers at Eton, who he and his friends were convinced was in love with his horse and had a sexual relationship with her), took some time off to start his financial career. He went on, as we all know, to form a double act with Dustin Thatcher and eventually resumed writing.
William and Algernon continued to work together. Algernon purchased a West End theatre and built up a company of Oxonians and Cantabrigians, many of whom he had initially met at Eton. William took a day job as a stockbroker, but he illustrated all the company's advertisements and wrote scripts for them. Algernon's company consisted of many of the men listed above:
The Huddleston Players
Algernon Huddleston (who actually named the company after his grandfather, not himself)
William Conrad
Norval Larkin
Edward Griswold
Quinby Perch
Reginald Prescott
Note the fact that there are six of them, one of whom is an illustrator. Although William isn't a token American, the point gets across.
Robert Sheldon met Basil Remington because they worked at the same bank. He eventually formed a double act with Basil's brother, Nigel, who also went to Oxford (Worcester College), although he is not on the list above.
And, of course, Monty Houghton became a supervillain. Good for him.
So there you have it. My lovely little reference for the day. I made a lot of progress today, I think.