{"id":5668,"date":"2018-07-06T23:49:25","date_gmt":"2018-07-06T13:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/?p=5668"},"modified":"2018-07-15T15:02:14","modified_gmt":"2018-07-15T05:02:14","slug":"peters-room-part-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/2018\/07\/peters-room-part-two\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Peter\u2019s Room\u2019, Part Two"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chapter Three: \u2018A Parsonage called Haworth\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, the Marlows do their Christmas shopping, but we don\u2019t find out the details of what they buy each another except for Nicola, who \u201cbought everyone sticks of sealing wax\u201d because she \u201cnever had any money when she most wanted it\u201d. Firstly, Nicola has at least eighty pounds sitting in her savings account (or in a biscuit tin under her bed, or somewhere) after selling her Boke of Falconerie<\/em>. Secondly, sealing wax<\/em>, really? Is this book actually meant to be set in the 1960s? Were most people sealing their letters with wax then? If so, I could almost understand if she bought everyone special sealing stamps carved with their initials or the Marlow coat of arms, but sealing wax is essentially candles without the wick. I did like Karen buying everyone book tokens \u201cbecause book tokens were what she always hoped everybody would have the sense to give her\u201d. I\u2019m with Karen on that.<\/p>\n

Then Christmas arrives and here is how Antonia Forest describes the most significant religious festival in England, when families across the country gather to celebrate with feasting and merriment:<\/p>\n

\u201cChristmas Day. Boxing Day.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

THAT\u2019S IT. That\u2019s the description of the Marlows\u2019 Christmas. There isn\u2019t even any mention of Captain Marlow or Giles, who presumably are at sea, not even an \u201cOh, I wish Dad were here with us for our very first Christmas at Trennels.\u201d Is it that the author, brought up in a Jewish household, didn\u2019t ever experience Christmas as a child? And then, as a adult Catholic convert, disapproved of all the pagan, non-religious bits of Christmas festivities? It just seems very peculiar to write a book about a middle-class Anglican family, set in the Christmas holidays, and ignore Christmas Day.<\/p>\n

Anyway, following their invisible Christmas, Nicola meets Patrick in the hawkhouse, where Sprog is staying during the holidays. After some initial social awkwardness (this is<\/em> Patrick, after all), they discuss the difficulties of keeping a merlin healthy during winter and Patrick assumes Nicola will be hunting this season on Buster, which makes Nicola a bit anxious as she\u2019s not a confident rider. Of course, she doesn\u2019t tell him that because she\u2019s a Marlow. Better to break your neck falling off a horse than ever admit any weakness. Also, Patrick, \u201cthat fortunate only child\u201d, refuses to let any other Marlows ride Buster and doesn\u2019t understand why Nicola might want to share her pony with her horseless siblings.<\/p>\n

Back at Trennels, Peter is still being lazy about his one chore, boot-cleaning, and when Nicola rightly gets annoyed at him about this, he gets into a physical fight with her, hurting her so badly that Doris the maid orders him to stop. Peter really is a very unpleasant child, unable to control his temper or admit he was wrong, and determined to repress any uncomfortable thoughts about his own mistakes. Nicola may be younger, but she\u2019s far more mature. They go off to meet Patrick at the Shippen, now called The Hide, where Patrick is fascinated by the old farm journals and resolves to copy out all the interesting bits about Malise the Royalist. Patrick reveals that his Merrick ancestors were also Royalists during the Civil War, because the alternative was Cromwell, who was even more anti-Catholic than Charles. But just as Patrick is about to explain what happened to Malise, they\u2019re interrupted in typically dramatic fashion by Lawrie, who has an announcement. <\/p>\n

Mrs Marlow has bought two beautiful horses! Catkin is a fifteenth birthday present for Ginty and Chocbar is for Mrs Marlow to hunt. So even though the Marlows are \u201cstupendously hard up\u201d, unable even to afford new school uniforms for the girls, they have enough money for luxuries like hunting ponies. This is because Mrs Marlow has sold the Last Ditch, a very ugly but valuable tiara inherited from a great-aunt:<\/p>\n

\u201cAll financial crises for years had been solved simply, it seemed, by knowing the Last Ditch was there if needed. And now it was gone. They were out in the cold.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Well, they\u2019d better not complain about being poor at any stage in the future, that\u2019s all I\u2019m saying.<\/p>\n

Rowan offers to lend Peter her horse for hunting, so Lawrie throws a tantrum because everyone has a pony except for her. The other thing that happens is that Patrick discovers his mother is right and that Ginty is the beauty of the Marlow family. And then Patrick and Ginty bond over their mutual love of horses and hunting, even though last summer, Ginty had \u201cmade a proper huha about being an anti-blood-sporter\u201d and she\u2019s only hunted twice in her life. Peter, brooding about this, remembers Lieutenant Foley disparaging \u201cthat useful social and examination-room accomplishment of making a pint of knowledge fill a hogshead of ignorance\u201d and then he hastily tries to repress any memory of Foley. I\u2019m glad I\u2019m reading the books in order because it\u2019s useful to know here exactly how badly Foley betrayed Peter. Peter trusted Foley as a teacher and Navy officer, and Foley not only turned out to be a traitor but was willing to see Peter and his siblings murdered by Nazis. So it’s understandable Peter doesn’t want to think about Foley, but on the other hand, Peter seems determined not to learn anything from previous experiences.<\/p>\n

Then Nicola arrives with the news that it\u2019s snowing and the phone line is down and the children light the fire (the chimney is miraculously free of soot and dead birds) and they roast potatoes and chestnuts while the three dogs lie \u201ccurled up in one exquisite lump of warmth, Daks a dark blot against the paler coats of the other two\u201d. I would hope Nicola is writing to Esther to give her regular updates on Daks, but there\u2019s no mention of this.<\/p>\n

This is a very<\/em> long chapter.<\/p>\n

Eventually the children grow bored and Ginty comes up with the idea of \u201cpretend games\u201d like the Bront\u00ebs. She explains how Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne invented two countries called Gondal and Angria and developed elaborate stories about them. Ginty is doing a school project on this and thinks Emily is \u201cabsolutely stupendous to have written poems about quite imaginary people so that for ages everyone thinks it\u2019s true\u201d and she must have been beautiful because she was \u201csuch a terrific person\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nicola, \u201cwho avoided poetry\u201d, asks sensible questions like \u201cWhy couldn\u2019t she be terrific and<\/em> ugly?\u201d and Peter is shocked that Emily was still play-acting Gondal when she was twenty-eight (\u201cBut that\u2019s ancient!\u201d). It\u2019s Lawrie who says, \u201cWhy couldn\u2019t we<\/em> have a Gondal?\u201d So they plan their story, despite some scepticism from Nicola.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m going to write their character names here so I don\u2019t get confused. There are four Palladian Guards:<\/p>\n

Patrick is Rupert Almeda.
\nGinty is Crispian de Samara.
\nPeter is Malise Douglas.
\nNicola is Nicholas Brenzaida.<\/p>\n

Lawrie is the young King, Jason Exina.
\nPatrick is also playing the evil Regent, My Lord of Alcona.<\/p>\n

Next, Chapter Four: Dispatches to Angora: 1<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter Three: \u2018A Parsonage called Haworth\u2019 So, the Marlows do their Christmas shopping, but we don\u2019t find out the details of what they buy each another except for Nicola, who \u201cbought everyone sticks of sealing wax\u201d because she \u201cnever had any money when she most wanted it\u201d. Firstly, Nicola has at least eighty pounds sitting … Continue reading \u2018Peter\u2019s Room\u2019, Part Two<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,6,11],"tags":[25],"class_list":["post-5668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1950s-and-1960s","category-books","category-young-adult","tag-antonia-forest"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5668"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5698,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5668\/revisions\/5698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michellecooper-writer.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}