The Reluctant Widow and Lady Audley's Secret
Returned and re-borrowed a lot of books at the library today, and caught up with my former professor to hand back the DVD's of The Woman in White and Lady Audley's Secret. I rather enjoyed the first, even if the ending was far too modernized and Count Fosco kind of disappeared from the plot too much. but oh dear how they had changed poor Lady Audley..
First of all the complete cock-up of making her dark haired! The whole bloody point with the novel is the subversive use of the blonde angel in the house, that the Victorian ideal woman turns out to be the villainess.. And they had totally de-gayifed the story as well. Robert Audley the lazy and passive barrister was turned into an active explorer, and his rather platonic interest in his step-aunt turned into a full-bloodied almost affair. The whole interesting subtext between Robert and George was taken away, they didn't know each other from school, and George's sister Clara didn't even appear in the film, so there where no idyllic ending with a possible menage-a-trois as there is in the novel. I think I understand what they wanted to do with the film; turn Lady A into a feminist heroine, a woman who works against the stifling Victorian society etc etc.. which one can read her as in the novel too.. but WHY did they have to turn poor clever Alicia into such a wet-blanket? Her volte-face in the end was also weird.. No, I'm most displeased!!
While at SOL I met up with A&T and talked away a few hours. We discovered that the Lund Student Theatre will give a few performances of The Importance of Being Earnest in English next week, so naturally we'll have to try to get tickets. It might very possibly be a disaster, but one never knows.
Then I biked home in the dark, did some food shopping on the way , and ended up spending the evening reading The Reluctant Widow by Georgette Heyer. One of the few Heyers I hadn't read before, and even if it wasn't perfect there were some perfect moments in it. I loved her sneaky ways with the uber-foppish Francis Cheviot, who turns out to have a LOT in common with Byerly Vorryter from the Vorkosigan saga!! What a great character, and with so very grayish morals. Actually, I think Francis is rather more sinister than Byerly, but they really come from the same type. -( I miss Byerly, and I hope we're lucky and somebody writes an Byerly/Ivan story for yuletide this year)
I think neither of the two main characters, Elinor and Carlyon, really come to life in the story, but I can't quite pinpoint why. The younger brother, Nicky, is really staple Heyer, and he works so well, as does his dog! Elinor is mostly really annoyed with Carlyon, and naturally that makes for the perfect romance? And Carlyon is such a good older brother, at least everyone else say so all the time, and he fixes every scrape, but I still don't really CARE about him, not like with Heyer's other heroes.. Why? Still, it was great fun and a slightly sub-par Heyer is still better than so much else.
First of all the complete cock-up of making her dark haired! The whole bloody point with the novel is the subversive use of the blonde angel in the house, that the Victorian ideal woman turns out to be the villainess.. And they had totally de-gayifed the story as well. Robert Audley the lazy and passive barrister was turned into an active explorer, and his rather platonic interest in his step-aunt turned into a full-bloodied almost affair. The whole interesting subtext between Robert and George was taken away, they didn't know each other from school, and George's sister Clara didn't even appear in the film, so there where no idyllic ending with a possible menage-a-trois as there is in the novel. I think I understand what they wanted to do with the film; turn Lady A into a feminist heroine, a woman who works against the stifling Victorian society etc etc.. which one can read her as in the novel too.. but WHY did they have to turn poor clever Alicia into such a wet-blanket? Her volte-face in the end was also weird.. No, I'm most displeased!!
While at SOL I met up with A&T and talked away a few hours. We discovered that the Lund Student Theatre will give a few performances of The Importance of Being Earnest in English next week, so naturally we'll have to try to get tickets. It might very possibly be a disaster, but one never knows.
Then I biked home in the dark, did some food shopping on the way , and ended up spending the evening reading The Reluctant Widow by Georgette Heyer. One of the few Heyers I hadn't read before, and even if it wasn't perfect there were some perfect moments in it. I loved her sneaky ways with the uber-foppish Francis Cheviot, who turns out to have a LOT in common with Byerly Vorryter from the Vorkosigan saga!! What a great character, and with so very grayish morals. Actually, I think Francis is rather more sinister than Byerly, but they really come from the same type. -( I miss Byerly, and I hope we're lucky and somebody writes an Byerly/Ivan story for yuletide this year)
I think neither of the two main characters, Elinor and Carlyon, really come to life in the story, but I can't quite pinpoint why. The younger brother, Nicky, is really staple Heyer, and he works so well, as does his dog! Elinor is mostly really annoyed with Carlyon, and naturally that makes for the perfect romance? And Carlyon is such a good older brother, at least everyone else say so all the time, and he fixes every scrape, but I still don't really CARE about him, not like with Heyer's other heroes.. Why? Still, it was great fun and a slightly sub-par Heyer is still better than so much else.