On Strange's Family and Character
Jonathan Strange's family history goes as such:
"Some thirty years before Mr Norrell arrived in London with a plan to astonish the world by restoring English magic, a gentleman named Laurence Starnge came into his inheritance. This comprised a house in an almost ruinous state, some barren lands and a mountain of debts and mortgages. These were grave ills indeed, but, thought Laurence Strange, they were nothing that the acquisition of a large sum of money might not cure; and so like many other gentleman before and after him, he made it his business to be particularly agreeable to heiresses whenever he met with any, and, being a handsome man with elegant manners and a clever way of talking, in no time at all he had captivated a Miss Erquistoune, a young Scottish lady with 900 pounds a year.
With the money Miss Erquistoune brought him, Laurence Strange repaired his house, improved his lands and repaid his debts. Soon he began to make money instead of owing it. He extended his estate and lent out money at fifteen per cent. In these and other similar pursuits he found occupation for every waking hour. He could no longer be at the trouble of shewing his bride much attention. Indeed he made it quite plain that her society and conversation were irksome to him; and she, poor thing, had a very hard time of it. Laurence Strange's estate was in Shropshire, in a retired part of the country near the Welsh border. Mrs Strange knew no one there. She was accustomed to city life, to Edinburgh balls and Edinburgh shops and the clever conversation of her Edinburgh friends; the sight of high, gloomy hills forever shrouded in Welsh rain was very dispriting. She bore with this lonely existence for five years, before dying of a chill she had caught while taking a solitary walk on those same hills in a storm.
Mr and Mrs Strange had one child who was, at the time of his mother's death, about four years of age. Mrs Strange had not been buried more than a few days when this child became the subject of a violent quarrel between Laurence Strange and his late wife's family. The Erquistounes maintained that in accordance with the terms of the marriage settlement a large part of Mrs Strange's fortune must now be put aside for her son for him to inheret at his majority. Laurence Strange - to no one's very great surprize - claimed that every penny of his wife's money was his to do with as he liked. Both parties consulted lawyers and two separate lawsuits were started, one in the Doctors Common in London and one in the Scottish courts. The two lawsuits, Strange versus Erquistoune and Erquistoune versus Strange, went on for years and during this time the very sight of his son became displeasing to Laurence Strange. It seeemed to him that the boy was like a boggy field or a copse full of diseased trees - worth money on paper but failing to yeild a good annual return. If English law had entitled Laurence Strange to sell his son and buy a better one, he probably would have done it.*
Meanwhile the Erquistounes realized that Laurence Strange had it in his power to make his son every bit unhappy as his wife had been, so Mrs Strange's brother wrote urgently to Laurence Strange suggesting that the boy spend some part of every year at his own house in Edinburgh. To Mr Erquistoune's surprize Mr Strange made no objection.**
So it was that Jonathan Strange spent half of every year of his childhood at Mr Erquistoune's house in Charlotte-square in Edinburgh, where, it is to be presumed, he learnt to hold no very high opinion of his father. There he received his early education in the company of his three cousins, Margaret, Maria and Georgiana Erquistoune.*** Edinburgh is certainly one of the most civilized cities in the world and the inhabitants are full as clever and as fond of pleasure as those of London. Whenever he was with them Mr and Mrs Erquistoune did everything they could to make him happy, hoping in this way to make up for the neglect and coldness he met with at his father's house. And so it is not to be wondered at if he grew up a little spoilt, a little fond of his own way and a little inclined to think well of himself."
*Eventually, both lawsuits were decided in favour of Laurence Strange's son.
**Upon the contrary Laurence Strange congratulated himself on avoiding paying for the boy's food and clothing for months at a time. So may a love of money make an intelligent man small-minded and ridiculous.
***Strange's biographer, John Segundus, observed on several occasions how Strange preferred the society of clever women to that of men. Life of Jonathan Strange, pub. John Murray, London, 1820.
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It should first be noted that there are certain qualities in Strange's person that change once he becomes a magician (a profession that he fell rather accidentally and haphazardly into due to a prophecy he was told about himself and Mr Norrell that he did not remember afterward). This is how Jonathan Strange is first described to us when we offically meet him:
"Jonathan Strange was a very different sort of person from his father. He was not avaricious; he was not proud; he was not ill-tempered and disagreeable. But though he had no striking vices, his virtues were perhaps almost as hard to define. At the pleasure parties of Weymouth and in the drawing-rooms of Bath he was regularly declared to be "the most charming man in the world" by the fashionable people he met there, but all that they meant by this was that he talked well, danced well, and hunted and gambled as much as a gentlemen should."
After he takes up magicianship as a profession, however, his time is spent in different ways:
"The person within the doorway was reading. He looked up as she approached, with the old, dear expression of not quite remembering where he was or what he had to do with the world outside his book."
He also spends a great deal of time playing billiards, going to important balls of government members and snarking ironically to amuse himself and his company. Quotes will be featured in another entry to give examples of this.
However, he is not idle. New magic excites him beyond reason and he is constantly trying to think it up or piece it together. And the Duke of Wellington was very good at bringing out the more intrepid and creative parts of his character. He is also a steadfast man to fight alongside, as any gentleman who served with him in the war will attest.
"Some thirty years before Mr Norrell arrived in London with a plan to astonish the world by restoring English magic, a gentleman named Laurence Starnge came into his inheritance. This comprised a house in an almost ruinous state, some barren lands and a mountain of debts and mortgages. These were grave ills indeed, but, thought Laurence Strange, they were nothing that the acquisition of a large sum of money might not cure; and so like many other gentleman before and after him, he made it his business to be particularly agreeable to heiresses whenever he met with any, and, being a handsome man with elegant manners and a clever way of talking, in no time at all he had captivated a Miss Erquistoune, a young Scottish lady with 900 pounds a year.
With the money Miss Erquistoune brought him, Laurence Strange repaired his house, improved his lands and repaid his debts. Soon he began to make money instead of owing it. He extended his estate and lent out money at fifteen per cent. In these and other similar pursuits he found occupation for every waking hour. He could no longer be at the trouble of shewing his bride much attention. Indeed he made it quite plain that her society and conversation were irksome to him; and she, poor thing, had a very hard time of it. Laurence Strange's estate was in Shropshire, in a retired part of the country near the Welsh border. Mrs Strange knew no one there. She was accustomed to city life, to Edinburgh balls and Edinburgh shops and the clever conversation of her Edinburgh friends; the sight of high, gloomy hills forever shrouded in Welsh rain was very dispriting. She bore with this lonely existence for five years, before dying of a chill she had caught while taking a solitary walk on those same hills in a storm.
Mr and Mrs Strange had one child who was, at the time of his mother's death, about four years of age. Mrs Strange had not been buried more than a few days when this child became the subject of a violent quarrel between Laurence Strange and his late wife's family. The Erquistounes maintained that in accordance with the terms of the marriage settlement a large part of Mrs Strange's fortune must now be put aside for her son for him to inheret at his majority. Laurence Strange - to no one's very great surprize - claimed that every penny of his wife's money was his to do with as he liked. Both parties consulted lawyers and two separate lawsuits were started, one in the Doctors Common in London and one in the Scottish courts. The two lawsuits, Strange versus Erquistoune and Erquistoune versus Strange, went on for years and during this time the very sight of his son became displeasing to Laurence Strange. It seeemed to him that the boy was like a boggy field or a copse full of diseased trees - worth money on paper but failing to yeild a good annual return. If English law had entitled Laurence Strange to sell his son and buy a better one, he probably would have done it.*
Meanwhile the Erquistounes realized that Laurence Strange had it in his power to make his son every bit unhappy as his wife had been, so Mrs Strange's brother wrote urgently to Laurence Strange suggesting that the boy spend some part of every year at his own house in Edinburgh. To Mr Erquistoune's surprize Mr Strange made no objection.**
So it was that Jonathan Strange spent half of every year of his childhood at Mr Erquistoune's house in Charlotte-square in Edinburgh, where, it is to be presumed, he learnt to hold no very high opinion of his father. There he received his early education in the company of his three cousins, Margaret, Maria and Georgiana Erquistoune.*** Edinburgh is certainly one of the most civilized cities in the world and the inhabitants are full as clever and as fond of pleasure as those of London. Whenever he was with them Mr and Mrs Erquistoune did everything they could to make him happy, hoping in this way to make up for the neglect and coldness he met with at his father's house. And so it is not to be wondered at if he grew up a little spoilt, a little fond of his own way and a little inclined to think well of himself."
*Eventually, both lawsuits were decided in favour of Laurence Strange's son.
**Upon the contrary Laurence Strange congratulated himself on avoiding paying for the boy's food and clothing for months at a time. So may a love of money make an intelligent man small-minded and ridiculous.
***Strange's biographer, John Segundus, observed on several occasions how Strange preferred the society of clever women to that of men. Life of Jonathan Strange, pub. John Murray, London, 1820.
---
It should first be noted that there are certain qualities in Strange's person that change once he becomes a magician (a profession that he fell rather accidentally and haphazardly into due to a prophecy he was told about himself and Mr Norrell that he did not remember afterward). This is how Jonathan Strange is first described to us when we offically meet him:
"Jonathan Strange was a very different sort of person from his father. He was not avaricious; he was not proud; he was not ill-tempered and disagreeable. But though he had no striking vices, his virtues were perhaps almost as hard to define. At the pleasure parties of Weymouth and in the drawing-rooms of Bath he was regularly declared to be "the most charming man in the world" by the fashionable people he met there, but all that they meant by this was that he talked well, danced well, and hunted and gambled as much as a gentlemen should."
After he takes up magicianship as a profession, however, his time is spent in different ways:
"The person within the doorway was reading. He looked up as she approached, with the old, dear expression of not quite remembering where he was or what he had to do with the world outside his book."
He also spends a great deal of time playing billiards, going to important balls of government members and snarking ironically to amuse himself and his company. Quotes will be featured in another entry to give examples of this.
However, he is not idle. New magic excites him beyond reason and he is constantly trying to think it up or piece it together. And the Duke of Wellington was very good at bringing out the more intrepid and creative parts of his character. He is also a steadfast man to fight alongside, as any gentleman who served with him in the war will attest.