Jo on Heyer

[sartorias]

Over at Tor.com today, Jo Walton talks about why she likes Georgette Heyer. Interesting discussion and comments.

Though I've rambled about Heyer and silver fork novels I still keep trying to figure out why Heyer's more upbeat romances work as well as they do. (The serious ones are really, really awful

Comments

[ramblin_phyl]

I discovered Heyer late, after I'd already immersed myself in more recently written "silver fork novles." Even though she invented the cliches by the time I read her I was bored with them and only wound my way through 2 or 3 books.

Recently I found a couple of books written contemporary to Heyer. What we'd call cozy mysteries, or romantic suspense. These are delightful, and closer to reality. Though the frail and simpering heroine got on my nerves.

[sartorias]

Frail and simpering heroines were de rigueur before silver fork novels--clear back to Evelina and before. There seemed to be an understanding that you could get away with a lot with side characters, as long as the heroine remained absolutely "pure."

(Reading Tom Jones right now, and the squire's daughter has just been introduced, with an entire chapter about her beauty and absolute purity. But this novel is really a long, funny essay about life in the middle 1700s, masquerading as a novel.)

[akirlu]

I think, and have long thought, that what Heyer did best (much though she seems to have deprecated it) was write the literary equivalent of 1930s screwball comedies. Her stories have a lightness, a frivolity about them. And though they are stories about a fantasy gentry and nobility, they quite happily take the Mickey out of members of those classes. With very few exceptions, these people are NOT idealized. They are irresponsible, or captious, or bumblers, or fops, or misers, or gambling addicts, loaded up to the eyeballs with foible and buffoonery. But these characters have a childlike freedom from real care, and the plots are fantastical, airy, insubstantial, and ultimately un-serious. Their world, as you say, is a sort of Disneyland of pretty dresses, grand manners, and high adventure. Each story is a jeweled filigree orrery, spinning along a predictable path to a foreordained conclusion. She wrote charming escapism, pure and simple. In some ways, she hits very similar notes to the works of P.G. Wodehouse, though she was

[whswhs]

Does Wodehouse make the same impression on you? The world inhabited by Bertie and Jeeves, or by the Earl of Emsworth and his clan, is surely as artificial as Heyer's, if not more so.

[sartorias]

It's a very good analogy, I think. (Even though Wodehouse doesn't lay quite as much emphasis on "Birth will always tell.")

[akirlu]

Funny, I don't perceive her as asserting that "Birth will always tell," at all, with the possible exception of the grotesque anti-semitism in Frederica. For instance, in Charity Girl, virtually everyone who has been rotten to Cherry Steane is a member of her extended family: her father, her grandfather, her aunt, have all found their own special ways to maltreat or neglect her. And yet they're all members of the upper classes. One of the few people who has shown her kindness and generosity is the mistress of her boarding school, and of that school mistress' birth we know nothing (though I think it fair to surmise that the very 'highest' it could be is impoverished low gentry, a parson's daughter or some such). In general, I see Heyer as portraying many of her 'genteel' uppercrust characters as a parcel of clowns, wasters, and scoundrels of varying degree, with the notable exception of our heroes and heroines. If most of the gentry and nobility are side characters of dubious merit, I don't think the overall message is that blood

[akirlu]

For that matter, now that I think of it, I believe one of the characters remarks that Cherry's sweet disposition must be owing to her mother (clearly not owing anything to her paternal relations) and I think we've established that Cherry's father married 'beneath' himself.

[akirlu]

Oh, meant to ask, could you elaborate on the claim that Heyer's heroes are "That Guy" in behavior?

[sartorias]

The ones with the brutal kisses and the high-handed behavior toward women. Regency Buck, Faro's Daughter as I recall have that kind of hero, though in the latter she gives as good as she gets.

[akirlu]

Hmm. Interesting. I've read the latter, but not re-read it, and I'm not sure if I've ever read the former. In general, I would characterize her heroes as being notably free from "That Guy" characteristics, especially for the time she was writing. Even when she's writing roue heroes (I just re-read Charity Girl) or big muscle-bound hunks (The Toll Gate, The Unknown Ajax) they seem to me to be remarkably respectful of women as persons and typically don't do the Gothic / Ayn Randy ravishing business at all.

[sartorias]

They vary. The ones you named, definitely. (In her hagiography of Heyer, Jane Aiken Hodge drew on a lot of Heyer's correspondence, wherein she talks about her heroes in two types, Mark I and Mark II, one being the nicer ones, the other being the cave man type.)

[estara]

Don't forget The Spanish Bride!!! - of course, Heyer was lucky in that Harry Smith had actually published his diaries so she was able to use those as the basis for the story. I think this is her strongest Napoleonic War book, personally.
I heard Harry and Juana Smith eventually ended up as Viceroys in Southafrica or something?

Off-topic but a pleasant link to share in case you haven't seen it:
http://thebooksmugglers.com/2012/03/book-review-a-posse-of-princesses-by-sherwood-smith.html

[sartorias]

I should try to reread it--I found it almost impossibly stiff and awkward when I first attempted it, ditto The Conqueror. I found the memoirs better.

Thank you for the link--that really made me smile! :-)

[estara]

The intense drama between Harry and Juana and the matter of factness of their life on the road just contrasted really well with the battle descriptions for me, especially when friends of Harry's were involved. An Infamous Army on the other hand never has really worked for me, heh ^^.

You're welcome ^^.

[desperance]

I heard Harry and Juana Smith eventually ended up as Viceroys in Southafrica or something?

He was a provincial governor. Twice. Ladysmith is actually named after Juana. (As Harrismith is named after Harry, but no one's ever heard of that.)