Hello again, Grace, I lost track of this discussion - I´m sorry, thanks for reviving it!
I *still* think Jack was way more obvious, sincere and direct in his interaction with Diana than Maturin was (he DID have the chance to propose in the carriage scene, remember? And he did guess it was the right moment to propose. But he missed the chance, and Diana, seeing no outspoken interest and a lot of self-conflict instead, chose to have fun with Jack instead.) So obvious were the hints Jack went about dropping that the whole Admiralty and his friends knew about it, and even that master at reality denial that is Maturin knew they were already lovers, whereas Maturin never even hinted to Jack (or Sophie) he was interested in Diana, to marry her or to... er, otherwise.
Hey hey, what a great coincidence, my best friend in Spain is also a paper conservator/restaurator!! she studied in Firenze and worked for the Laurentiana and other famous archives (mainly the Santiago de Compostela cathedral) Yes, I work in Vienna for an international disarmament/peacekeeping organisation (which I dearly love, he he, I think I posted elsewhere my job description should be "glorified parrot and punching bag" :p), live in a house I built in the countryside in Hungary, I´m also a professional painter and writer too - live with my family, and am owned by a retriever. My home is regularly invaded claimed as theirs by friends from all over the world :p
Alas, I´ve seen little of Ralph Fiennes but he´s eerily fabulous (his Almássy was rather very close to truth, says Gran who knew him). Ohh, spot on about Heathcliff, I began to grok the character and sympathize with him only after I´d seen him play it so ambiguously - and wasn´t Ralph Fiennes the totally scaring climber-murderer in "Killing Me Softly", too? Also - don´t hurt me - I found his psychopath Goeth downright moving and tragic, not just boo-scary. Very few could pulled that off and he probably did that feat going even against Spielberg´s grain. I should love Fiennes to play Caligula some day. I didn´t know he´d played Darcy, too. I still like Olivier´s love-to-hate-him version best, he he, though Colin Firth is marvellous. I liked Darcy from the first glimpse we get of him; he´s my third literary love after Prince Bolkonsky and Sydney Carton (and how similar those three are at heart... self-scrutinising with zero tolerance, but so lovable and easy to relate to!).
(I´m not owning to a total infatuation with Austen and Brontë broody ooky cooky spooky characters. SO very not *g*)
Maturin is content at some point in the books? o.O Now I´m really curious how PO´B manages to do that about-turn for him convincingly. Must read faster!
Ooooh, your best friend in Spain is a conservator too??? Where does she work? That is quite a coincidence! Was she in Florence after the flood in the 60s? So many conservators had the start of their career there, including my boss. I wish I had been alive then. It must have been so exciting.
No, I didn't mean Ralph Fiennes played Darcy, but I was just mentioning other brooding characters. Who is Prince Bolkonsky? And yes, I love Sydney Carton too. *tsk* I just can't believe you don't love poor noble-hearted Stephen!
And I won't hurt you at all. Amon Goeth was amazing in "Schindler's List"! He was... human! Except a very frightening human. But he wasn't a monster. He was a man! And a man tormented in his mind, too (for instance, by his lust for the Jewish girl...) Poor Ralph Fiennes always seems to fall in love with the wrong woman, the one he can't have. (Ahem like STEPHEN.) You must see "Onegin," too!
Gran, meaning your grandmother? She knew Almasy? Wow! And Ralph Fiennes was like him? How interesting!! Did she know Almasy well?
Aww, I read about him in his Nazi costume meeting a lady who had been in Goeth's concentration camp, and while he was talking excitedly and happily about what a privilege it was to meet her, she was trembling with terror because he was so much like the real man! (And he didn't even seem to notice because he was just so excited.)
Speaking of Olivier, have you seen "Rebecca"? I love that film. I love Hitchcock, too.
She lives and works in A Coruña (province of Galicia), and she spent some years in Florence around the mid-nineties, IIRC :) Alas, well after the flood *blushes in shame at ignorance and goes a-googling* why, was it so devastating?
Oh my, who is Prince Bolkonsky? Drop everything you´re reading and start "War And Peace". If Prince Andrei Bolkonsky doesn´t break your heart by page six (and then again, repeatedly, in about almost every scene he´s in), then I´ll eat my fangs. If you like brooding, insightful noble, intriguing, doomed, nearly otherwordly characters he´ll be irresistible (just remember I saw him first :p)
Haven´t seen Onegin, if it the movie which you´re referring to... just seeing the opera in St Pete and then walking down the same strees and bridges was such a shattering emo experience; although, if the movie was filmed *there*, I´ll just have to see it.
Yes, Grandmother knew him and his family from meeting socially so often (when he wasn´t abroad fleeing from cuckolded husbands, that is :p), and she said Fiennes´ way of playing him was about the only bearable thing about that movie.
He actually was so much like Goeth? *is getting seriously freaked out now*
I LOVE Rebecca the movie and the book! Can´t say the same about the musical, though... maybe it´s the crappy non-music (the kind of elevator music without even a catchy tune to it), although the visuals are stunning. It´s an original Vienna production which opened just two months ago in the Raimundtheater, Uwe Kroger plays Max and Susan Rivava-Dumas is fantastic as Mrs Danvers.
"Rebecca" is a musical??? How bizarre!! But then... do you like "Turn of the Screw," the Henry James novella? There's a Britten opera of it, and I like it quite a lot. (It's not one of his best operas, but I still like it. It does manage to capture some of the terrifying ambiguity of the story. Britten is good at ambiguity.) So if they can make an opera of "Turn of the Screw," I suppose they can make a musical of "Rebecca." And I adore the Daphne du Maurier book too!
Hee, and most of the music I love best has no tune to it, so maybe I'd like this musical of which you speak. I can't remember, have you heard "Billy Budd"? Hmm, probably not, because I think only weeboopiper and esteven have.
Wow, so did your Grandmother like Almasy? Was he handsome and suave and brooding and remarkably intelligent?
I ADORE The Turn Of The Screw, both the James novella and the opera by Britten!! It was filmed by the BBC, I think, can´t remember the singers but it was a very naturalistic approach, and the governess´ dress, which as snow-white at the beginning, developed a kind of growing, creeping black ivy lace border that gradually took over her whole dress and at the end it was black, and she looked indeed like death. Very lovely and scary fairytale!
Of course I know Billy Budd. My stepdad sang Vere once, many years ago. Every time they play it in Vienna I try to go see it, it´s *such* a good production.
According to Gran, he was short, awkward, unpredictable and very sarcastic, but he seemed to have that je ne sais quoi which drew women to him (or rather, made other men believe he was a chick magnet and thus made them jealous!) And he seems to have been intelligent enough to hide his smarts in society...
*adores icons twice as much for that reason alone*
Did you like Melville´s story, and do you like "Peter Grimes" as well?
My, comparing Dah Aviator with Maturin... *g* basket case, he he (although funnily enough I can imagine Fiennes-Almásy playing Maturin - most probably truer to book canon than Bettany did).
I did like Melville's story, and I love Peter Grimes too. And do you know Gloriana, Britten's opera about Queen Elizabeth? It's so perfect for him to have written a Renaissance opera! So suitable.
Well I do adore some of the same things in both men - movie Almasy and Maturin. I love that they're so knowledgeable, and both speak so many languages, and both blend so effortlessly with native cultures and local peoples, and both are passionate about knowledge and learning... Sigh.
Have you seen Fiennes in 'Quiz Show'? I love him in that movie too - again, because he's so knowledgeable and intelligent! He plays Shakespeare quote guessing games with his father!!! &hearts
And when I said Stephen was content (at least, more than Fiennes' characters usually are), I meant that he usually accepts and even expects his sad events, even if he hates them. Onegin, and Almasy, Heathcliff, and certainly Goeth refuse to accept unpleasant circumstances, even the things they can't change. (And they're more recklessly unkind.) That's all I meant. (But I have heard that he gets more content and happy as the series progresses. I'm only on book 5 right now.)
Hmm... it´s one thing accepting, another expecting them, and you´re right there that a part of him always seems to brace itself for the worst almost with masochistic glee... it´s why I call him defeatist, and that´s such an anti-Spanish trait, maybe that´s at the root of my deep dislike for him.
The only times I grokked him better was when he´s fighting and ENJOYING the challenge - like when he´s dragging himself around the deck of the Surprise, learning to walk again. That is your Spanish-Catalan hombre, as I know and like them ;)
I´m halfway through book five now, too! (and have had Mum hide the book somewhere til June, because I have to ace a hard test then and I don´t want to be distracted from studying... tee hee, shouldn´t even read Aubreyad character discussions at all!)
Oh but come now, there can't be a personality type that fits the ENTIRE Spanish nation! I think one of the first Spanish people I knew was a girl online in a depression forum with me. :P
I *still* think Jack was way more obvious, sincere and direct in his interaction with Diana than Maturin was (he DID have the chance to propose in the carriage scene, remember? And he did guess it was the right moment to propose. But he missed the chance, and Diana, seeing no outspoken interest and a lot of self-conflict instead, chose to have fun with Jack instead.) So obvious were the hints Jack went about dropping that the whole Admiralty and his friends knew about it, and even that master at reality denial that is Maturin knew they were already lovers, whereas Maturin never even hinted to Jack (or Sophie) he was interested in Diana, to marry her or to... er, otherwise.
Hey hey, what a great coincidence, my best friend in Spain is also a paper conservator/restaurator!! she studied in Firenze and worked for the Laurentiana and other famous archives (mainly the Santiago de Compostela cathedral) Yes, I work in Vienna for an international disarmament/peacekeeping organisation (which I dearly love, he he, I think I posted elsewhere my job description should be "glorified parrot and punching bag" :p), live in a house I built in the countryside in Hungary, I´m also a professional painter and writer too - live with my family, and am owned by a retriever. My home is regularly invaded claimed as theirs by friends from all over the world :p
Alas, I´ve seen little of Ralph Fiennes but he´s eerily fabulous (his Almássy was rather very close to truth, says Gran who knew him). Ohh, spot on about Heathcliff, I began to grok the character and sympathize with him only after I´d seen him play it so ambiguously - and wasn´t Ralph Fiennes the totally scaring climber-murderer in "Killing Me Softly", too? Also - don´t hurt me - I found his psychopath Goeth downright moving and tragic, not just boo-scary. Very few could pulled that off and he probably did that feat going even against Spielberg´s grain. I should love Fiennes to play Caligula some day. I didn´t know he´d played Darcy, too. I still like Olivier´s love-to-hate-him version best, he he, though Colin Firth is marvellous. I liked Darcy from the first glimpse we get of him; he´s my third literary love after Prince Bolkonsky and Sydney Carton (and how similar those three are at heart... self-scrutinising with zero tolerance, but so lovable and easy to relate to!).
(I´m not owning to a total infatuation with Austen and Brontë broody ooky cooky spooky characters. SO very not *g*)
Maturin is content at some point in the books? o.O Now I´m really curious how PO´B manages to do that about-turn for him convincingly. Must read faster!
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No, I didn't mean Ralph Fiennes played Darcy, but I was just mentioning other brooding characters. Who is Prince Bolkonsky? And yes, I love Sydney Carton too. *tsk* I just can't believe you don't love poor noble-hearted Stephen!
And I won't hurt you at all. Amon Goeth was amazing in "Schindler's List"! He was... human! Except a very frightening human. But he wasn't a monster. He was a man! And a man tormented in his mind, too (for instance, by his lust for the Jewish girl...) Poor Ralph Fiennes always seems to fall in love with the wrong woman, the one he can't have. (Ahem like STEPHEN.) You must see "Onegin," too!
Gran, meaning your grandmother? She knew Almasy? Wow! And Ralph Fiennes was like him? How interesting!! Did she know Almasy well?
Aww, I read about him in his Nazi costume meeting a lady who had been in Goeth's concentration camp, and while he was talking excitedly and happily about what a privilege it was to meet her, she was trembling with terror because he was so much like the real man! (And he didn't even seem to notice because he was just so excited.)
Speaking of Olivier, have you seen "Rebecca"? I love that film. I love Hitchcock, too.
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Oh my, who is Prince Bolkonsky? Drop everything you´re reading and start "War And Peace". If Prince Andrei Bolkonsky doesn´t break your heart by page six (and then again, repeatedly, in about almost every scene he´s in), then I´ll eat my fangs. If you like brooding, insightful noble, intriguing, doomed, nearly otherwordly characters he´ll be irresistible (just remember I saw him first :p)
Haven´t seen Onegin, if it the movie which you´re referring to... just seeing the opera in St Pete and then walking down the same strees and bridges was such a shattering emo experience; although, if the movie was filmed *there*, I´ll just have to see it.
Yes, Grandmother knew him and his family from meeting socially so often (when he wasn´t abroad fleeing from cuckolded husbands, that is :p), and she said Fiennes´ way of playing him was about the only bearable thing about that movie.
He actually was so much like Goeth? *is getting seriously freaked out now*
I LOVE Rebecca the movie and the book! Can´t say the same about the musical, though... maybe it´s the crappy non-music (the kind of elevator music without even a catchy tune to it), although the visuals are stunning. It´s an original Vienna production which opened just two months ago in the Raimundtheater, Uwe Kroger plays Max and Susan Rivava-Dumas is fantastic as Mrs Danvers.
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Hee, and most of the music I love best has no tune to it, so maybe I'd like this musical of which you speak. I can't remember, have you heard "Billy Budd"? Hmm, probably not, because I think only weeboopiper and esteven have.
Wow, so did your Grandmother like Almasy? Was he handsome and suave and brooding and remarkably intelligent?
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Of course I know Billy Budd. My stepdad sang Vere once, many years ago. Every time they play it in Vienna I try to go see it, it´s *such* a good production.
According to Gran, he was short, awkward, unpredictable and very sarcastic, but he seemed to have that je ne sais quoi which drew women to him (or rather, made other men believe he was a chick magnet and thus made them jealous!) And he seems to have been intelligent enough to hide his smarts in society...
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Wow, Almasy sounds like quite a character. Haha, that description (minus the chick magnet) sounds like Stephen!
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Did you like Melville´s story, and do you like "Peter Grimes" as well?
My, comparing Dah Aviator with Maturin... *g* basket case, he he (although funnily enough I can imagine Fiennes-Almásy playing Maturin - most probably truer to book canon than Bettany did).
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Well I do adore some of the same things in both men - movie Almasy and Maturin. I love that they're so knowledgeable, and both speak so many languages, and both blend so effortlessly with native cultures and local peoples, and both are passionate about knowledge and learning... Sigh.
Have you seen Fiennes in 'Quiz Show'? I love him in that movie too - again, because he's so knowledgeable and intelligent! He plays Shakespeare quote guessing games with his father!!! &hearts
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The only times I grokked him better was when he´s fighting and ENJOYING the challenge - like when he´s dragging himself around the deck of the Surprise, learning to walk again. That is your Spanish-Catalan hombre, as I know and like them ;)
I´m halfway through book five now, too! (and have had Mum hide the book somewhere til June, because I have to ace a hard test then and I don´t want to be distracted from studying... tee hee, shouldn´t even read Aubreyad character discussions at all!)
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Oh but come now, there can't be a personality type that fits the ENTIRE Spanish nation! I think one of the first Spanish people I knew was a girl online in a depression forum with me. :P
Grokked?
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