Every heart to love will come, but like a refugee

[sovay]

Happy Labor Day! The sunprints were a hit with my niece and the twins. Ferns, maple leaves, red clover, yew twigs, asters, cookie cutters, iris leaves, scissors, and unidentified wildflowers were all involved. I did an elm leaf.



1. Thanks to konstantya's indispensable studies of vintage crime and romance pulp, I have been made aware of one of the more impressive radiations of the Scarlet Pimpernel through pulp literature, by which I do not mean the periodic recollection of pop culture that the public persona of Bruce Wayne is canonically a himbo, but everything about the character of Lace Flowers, the daintily monikered hero of Beth Farrell's "Lady Snob" (1936). Not only is he fair-haired and willowy and so effetely English that he goes around with one brow quizzically arched as though he's wearing a monocle, he has violet eyes and a face to match his exquisite taste in clothes and doesn't contradict the heroine when she calls him a sissy. She detests his whimsical smile, his lazy conceit, his sheer prettiness, and yet she can't help observing that even as he flutters inconsequentially around her father's nightclub, charming the debutantes and knowing far too much about roses, he moves like a panther and his slender hands are strong as surprising steel. In the dangerous situation which provides the scaffolding of the plot, he's unruffled and resourceful, which does not stop him from talking nonsense all the while he's doing something useful. Inevitably she begins to wonder, "Did every man have another man behind his mask?" and then if she'll ever be allowed to catch more than a glimpse of the Lace who exists beyond his guise of "a silver-tongued trifler without a thought above nonsense." I constellated him in a zeptosecond with Wimsey and Campion, I haven't a clue if Farrell did. Tragically, the story appears to be a one-off. I demand at least fic.

2. Gayle Hunnicutt has died. I don't think I ever saw her in more than two roles, but since one of them was a susceptible, tenacious witness to the paranormal in The Legend of Hell House (1973) and the other was the definitive Irene Adler in the Granada Sherlock Holmes' "A Scandal in Bohemia" (1984), I will miss her.

3. I had not previously known there was an Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages, but their offerings include Haketia and Judeo-Greek.

John Farrow and Richard Fleischer's His Kind of Woman (1951) was famously messed about with by Howard Hughes to the point where after a year of shooting and re-shooting and re-reshooting Vincent Price threw an anniversary party on set, which spatch and I knew when we decided to watch it last night, but we did not realize that its amiably wacky brand of south-of-the-border noir would escalate to such a pitch of WTF Guignol that by the middle of the third act we were calling it Alan Swann vs. the Melbourne Method and found ourselves quoting Mel Brooks in The Muppet Movie (1979) at one late-breaking development of totally unforeshadowed mad science. We were already saying the title in Animal's voice. Mitchum and Jane Russell are magnificent as usual; the movie itself is gorgeously shot, inventively staged, and n-v-t-s bananas. In the long run it may have been a good thing that Hughes kept building extra sets because Price probably ate most of them.

Comments

[sartorias]

If there is not fit about Lace Flowers, THERE SHOULD BE.

[theseatheseatheopensea]

Your subject line made me smile--I don't know that specific version, but that's a beautiful song!

And those sunprints look so cool!

OMG, Lace Flowers, what a name! XD I'm definitely going to check out that story, thank you for the recommendation!

I distinctively remember writing in my (paper) journal, some time in the 90s, about "The Legend of Hell house". I'm not really good with horror stuff, but this one really impressed me--Gayle Hunnicutt was definitely memorable, and I also liked Pamela Franklin and Roddy McDowall.

[nineweaving]

Those sunprints are beautiful.

Not to mention Kivruli and Judeo-Provençal.

Nine

[aurumcalendula]

Sunprints are so fun!

[pameladean]

I like all the sunprints, but the elm leaf is perfect.

[sholio]

I downloaded the Lace Flowers story and read it this evening and enjoyed it a lot! It is indeed tragic that there wasn't an entire series of Lace Flowers detective novels.

[anna_wing]

I want to do sun-prints now!

The only Jewish languages I knew of were Yiddish, and Ladino, the latter of which I discovered when I went to a concert by the brilliant Brazilian Sefaradi singer Fortuna some twenty-five years ago. But thinking about it of course there had to have been a lot more, given the spread of the Jewish diaspora.

https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Fortuna_(Brazilian_singer)

[rydra_wong]

3. I had not previously known there was an Oxford School of Rare Jewish Languages, but their offerings include Haketia and Judeo-Greek.

It looks like they're fairly new, given the mention of "our Impact Report covering the OSRJL’s inaugural year, 2021-22".

And their classes are free and taught over Zoom!

[konstantya]

First off, I always love some sun prints, and those are delightful. <3

Second, so happy to see you spreading the Lace Flowers love! And yes, I would ADORE fic. I don't think I'm necessarily the person for the job, but please, someone, take up this challenge.

[asakiyume]

Lady Snob sounds like a lot of fun! And I like your elm leaf and the fern. Ferns are always so rewarding.

And I had NO IDEA about all those Jewish languages! Excellent!

[selkie]

What does one get oneself if one finally makes it into Oxford, more or less?

I hate that your summer was delayed, but you seem to be having it now and I’m extremely glad.