12-18-2018, 08:41 PM | #61 | |
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But it all goes to show that it's the story and its pace that is why it has survived so well. |
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12-18-2018, 09:30 PM | #62 |
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As Chauvelin? I haven't seen it, but as soon as I read your comment, I thought he would fit the bill.
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12-18-2018, 09:55 PM | #63 | |
cacoethes scribendi
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I'm a fan of the 1982 series with Anthony Andrews as Sir Percy, Jane Seymour as Marguerite, and Ian McKellen as Chauvelin. Good matches all around - or such is my memory of it, it's been many years. |
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12-18-2018, 09:56 PM | #64 |
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It was quite ubiquitous in the 1950s-60s. I remember going to see a Carry-On Gang parody of The Scarlet Pimpernel in the late 60s - Don't Lose Your Head - the lead villain was Citizen Camembert.
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12-19-2018, 06:12 AM | #65 |
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When we think of the League as noble, brave and disinterested, I think we overlook the extent to which the motives of the members of the League were self-serving, even if they weren't thieving and wenching. Orczy pays perfunctory attention to the causes of the revolution, but it's obvious her sympathies as with the League were with the dispossessed aristocrats. Sure you can argue to save the lives first, redistribute the wealth next, but it's also unarguable that the League in trying to prop up the Ancien Régime was also serving its own interest as the moneyed and powerful class in England. If they wanted to right wrongs, there surely was sufficient scope in late 18th century England, where even children could be hanged for theft.
Yeah, I know, no buckles to swash that way, but I felt like arguing that the nobility of the League was a pretty hollow construct. |
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12-19-2018, 06:17 AM | #66 |
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12-19-2018, 06:33 AM | #67 | |
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12-19-2018, 09:00 AM | #68 | |
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However, retention of the class distinctions, and gender roles, doesn't make this book stand out from the crowd. I see it pretty much the same as re-reading Tarzan books now: you have to be ready to cringe a bit, and be thankful that there are some things we have (at least partly) grown out of. |
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12-19-2018, 09:57 AM | #69 | |
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12-19-2018, 03:23 PM | #70 | |
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Ugh! I can empathise with the authors and publishers though. It seems axiomatic now that every female character must have significant agency, which clearly clashes with the reality of far too much of History. Perhaps a combination of personal values and an eye to commercial realities informs the "C21 in lace" style of historical fiction. The inclusion of modern mores may even be said to increse the "fiction" component" As for Orczy's avoiding this trend, I wonder if her very haute background helped. If her own family fled from a possible revolution less than 100 years after the one she wrote about, her aristocratic family may well have filled her childhood with stories that gave her the atmosphere of the times she later wrote about. |
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12-19-2018, 06:46 PM | #71 | ||
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But how different was it really for the aristocracy, between the setting of The Scarlet Pimpernel and when Orczy wrote it? You noted earlier that the world changed more slowly between TTM and the setting of this book, and I would include up to the period when this novel/play was written. I'm also inclined to think that the world changed most slowly for the aristocracy - even after the plebeians started cutting their heads off. As stuartjmz notes... Quote:
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12-20-2018, 06:02 AM | #72 | |
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I've also been thinking about the notion of leadership, as I thought the League had unpleasant undertones of a Fascist organization, or perhaps a religious cult, as I read it. In Dazrin's interesting link, the distinction is made between loyalty to a person and loyalty because of rank, with the implication that the first is better. I'm not so sure; we know where blind obedience to a charismatic leader can end up. As for military hierarchy, obeying orders is what soldiers do of necessity, but at least it doesn't involve giving over their minds. They can think what they like, so long as they do as they're told. |
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12-20-2018, 07:13 AM | #73 | |
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That's an interesting point about Orczy's title. I googled and found this:
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12-20-2018, 07:24 AM | #74 |
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On the matter of leadership, the League clearly revolved around Percy. He was the head daredevil, and I thought it was more like a gang of schoolboys getting up to mischief and egging each other on. Writing notes to each other, secret signs, disguised handwriting ...
I wonder what sorts of hoops they had to go through to become a fully paid up member of the League? |
12-20-2018, 07:32 AM | #75 | ||
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One of the big issues with having a charismatic leader is the inherent limit - quite literally, the lifespan of such leadership. Beyond that I think it's harder to be definite. Even democracies very often end up being about the popularity of the leadership rather than any thoughtful assessment of the principles. The military, too, have their charismatic leaders. Of course, in most of these examples they are not absolute leaders, most can be overruled in one way or another. I'd also say that this one brief book doesn't give much evidence that the 19 had given over their minds (at least, no more than we readers did by accepting any of this as possible), only their trust. And from the other side, we recently had a spate of quotes about patriotism on the quotes thread - most highlighting that this form of loyalty is often quite mindless. (Indeed, apparently "patriot" was one a derogatory or ironic term, so we may be on our way to coming full circle.) But the point being that it's just as possible to have mindless faith/loyalty in an abstract concept as in a personality. Yes, I do think charismatic individuals can be dangerous, but we humans seem built to respond to them - even, or especially, in literature; we do like to have heroes. |
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