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I still feel the heat, but you've not come back yet from Watling Street
It took all week, but I finally slept. The afternoon is full of brilliant sunshine which I am about to head out into. I am observing the boycott because I see no reason not to.
I had not re-read Tanith Lee's A Heroine of the World (1989) in at least a decade. All of the air still goes out of the tires of the second half for no obviously necessary reason, but I still enjoy the intricate jewelry of the first half and this time around discovered after a few chapters that Martin Jarvis had unexpectedly cast himself as the romantic antihero, the blond-maned, bitterly charming and compromised Thenser Zavion. I have no evidence that Lee had him in mind for the part. She was relatively open about her appropriation of actors for her characters, most famously Paul Darrow in Kill the Dead (1980), although she warned in the introduction to the 2013 reprint of that novel that "I think actually only Vivien Leigh, Elizabeth Taylor, and Jacqueline Pearce remained exactly physically like themselves throughout those several Lee novels they have adorned." But he has canonically a beautiful voice and it took no effort to hear its cast-iron crust after a harrowing duel, coolly deflecting the congratulations due a hero, "I think she thinks, quite rightly, he isn't much of one."
I am charmed that the Trials of Cato's "Bedlam Boys" (2022) establishes its lineage by opening with a distorted, recognizable sample of Steeleye Span.
I had not re-read Tanith Lee's A Heroine of the World (1989) in at least a decade. All of the air still goes out of the tires of the second half for no obviously necessary reason, but I still enjoy the intricate jewelry of the first half and this time around discovered after a few chapters that Martin Jarvis had unexpectedly cast himself as the romantic antihero, the blond-maned, bitterly charming and compromised Thenser Zavion. I have no evidence that Lee had him in mind for the part. She was relatively open about her appropriation of actors for her characters, most famously Paul Darrow in Kill the Dead (1980), although she warned in the introduction to the 2013 reprint of that novel that "I think actually only Vivien Leigh, Elizabeth Taylor, and Jacqueline Pearce remained exactly physically like themselves throughout those several Lee novels they have adorned." But he has canonically a beautiful voice and it took no effort to hear its cast-iron crust after a harrowing duel, coolly deflecting the congratulations due a hero, "I think she thinks, quite rightly, he isn't much of one."
I am charmed that the Trials of Cato's "Bedlam Boys" (2022) establishes its lineage by opening with a distorted, recognizable sample of Steeleye Span.
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I am impressed that you can catch her internal casting. I don't think I would ever pick up on that.
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<3<3<3
But of course she does! You couldn't do otherwise with her. Once she's walked into your head she would just rearrange it around her and find something fabulous to wear into the bargain.
that Martin Jarvis had unexpectedly cast himself as the romantic antihero, the blond-maned, bitterly charming and compromised Thenser Zavion.
Ha. XD These things will happen! It does sound like good casting for him, though. I would almost certainly have the same problem with a description like that. And, yeah, I'm sure you're right re. her own internal casting, but the man was around all the time she was writing being in some quite famous things and, as we all know by now, never off the radio. He could have crept in there a bit, you never know.
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I don't know for a fact in this case! I am much more confident about clocking the influence of John McEnery on her version of Mercutio in Sung in Shadow (1983). I had just discovered Martin Jarvis since last reading the novel and I heard him from about the character's second line and there we were.
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Yet another reason for me to see Blake's 7: to be able to identify Jacqueline Pearce in the works of Tanith Lee.
These things will happen! It does sound like good casting for him, though. I would almost certainly have the same problem with a description like that.
I appreciate the reinforcement! I coped by rewatching "A Present from Leipzig."
And, yeah, I'm sure you're right re. her own internal casting, but the man was around all the time she was writing being in some quite famous things and, as we all know by now, never off the radio. He could have crept in there a bit, you never know.
She did write more than once for radio, so I double-checked to see if they had ever crossed professionally, but amazingly it looks like not. He seems very much one of her types.
(You may appreciate that she cited J. B. Priestley as one of her earliest influences. It makes sense that she should end her one produced science fiction play with a theory of Time. I wish she had written more for radio and TV.)
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It's the first version I ever heard. A high school friend of mine put it on a mix CD for me under the title "Tom o' Bedlam's Song." I love the first two verses especially, which sound like they are walking out of the sixteenth century.
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Yes! They could have done the whole song in that style and it would have been spellbinding.
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For me it's the way all the patterning of the first half never goes anywhere in the second half. It makes the book feel like it's been broken across two different novels and the second is substantially more diffuse and vague and less interesting: if it was supposed to subvert its own expectations, it feels instead like it drops them. All the momentum just goes pffft.
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It produced a poem, too.
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I was thinking of "Mad Maudlin's Search for Her Tom," which was published in Star*Line in 2002 and I thought had been collected in Postcards from the Province of Hyphens, but actually seems never to have been collected anywhere. "Roadside Ballads" quotes it outright, was published in Vestal Review in 2003 and is reprinted in Singing Innocence and Experience. There isn't a third thing that I can remember.
a copy of The Fire and.... that he's weirdly obsessed with because one of his camp friends took it out of his trunk this past summer and told him it was good, and super gay.
Good for his friend whom I realize you meant he met at camp! I'm glad Eli is enjoying it.
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Thank you! I would still like a refund on much of the state of my body. Possibly by sleeping more I could obtain one.
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I don't know! I have not seen Blake's 7 and therefore know her mostly from gifsets and random film appearances, which is not conducive to locating her in descriptions on the page! I would love for someone to be able to tell me. When Lee writes that she gave Paul Darrow a supporting role in Sung in Shadow (1983), at least I feel comfortable identifying him as Valentius Montargo.
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I can't do it the other way round, because I've never quite been able to get into Tanith Lee's books - a combination of them being hard to get hold of and some of those I have being too horror-adjacent for me, so it makes it too much of a lottery to risk paying to track them down unless I'm more confident of which ones, and of course, it's been so hard to read at all this last decade and a half. I should at least keep an eye out more now that it is getting easier, because I do love both her B7 eps; they're so beautifully weird. I'm sure I'd identify Jacqueline Pearce though! (I've never used her, because one does not lightly put Servalan in something, and though I have seen her in other things, she will of course always be Servalan to me.)
I appreciate the reinforcement! I coped by rewatching "A Present from Leipzig."
Always a good thing to rewatch anyway! Btw, the current Classic Who reactor that I keep talking about will be onto Varos next week, so I'm very curious to see what she makes of it.
She did write more than once for radio, so I double-checked to see if they had ever crossed professionally, but amazingly it looks like not. He seems very much one of her types.
Oh, that's cool! I laughed aloud when I saw that it had Paul Darrow in it. That's B7 fandom for you all over. She just got to cast him for real. XD
You may appreciate that she cited J. B. Priestley as one of her earliest influences. It makes sense that she should end her one produced science fiction play with a theory of Time. I wish she had written more for radio and TV.
Oh, interesting. And me too!
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I don't know their band name origin story! I got them from a vid.
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:) Not twice in same river, etc., but it does seem possible! It sucks that conventional (good-quality) sleep advice makes everything sound so blandly easy.
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Thank you!
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Understood. She was one of my formative writers. I spent much of college casually hunting her back catalogue out of used book stores. I can't believe she's been dead since 2015.
I should at least keep an eye out more now that it is getting easier, because I do love both her B7 eps; they're so beautifully weird.
I've wanted to see her B7 episodes for over a quarter of a century! I should just watch them and catch up with the rest of the series when and as I can. I could possibly tell you then which of her stories they resemble.
Btw, the current Classic Who reactor that I keep talking about will be onto Varos next week, so I'm very curious to see what she makes of it.
Please keep me posted. I should hope they will imprint on Martin Jarvis.
Oh, that's cool! I laughed aloud when I saw that it had Paul Darrow in it. That's B7 fandom for you all over. She just got to cast him for real.
The audio quality sounds as though it was taped off the air through a sponge, but he's terrific in it.
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<3
I really loved one book of hers, so she's one of those authors I definitely will try more of when and if it becomes easier for me.
I've wanted to see her B7 episodes for over a quarter of a century! I should just watch them and catch up with the rest of the series when and as I can. I could possibly tell you then which of her stories they resemble.
Oh, that's weird! I was convinced we'd had a conversation about you watching them both at some point a year or so ago, Sarcophagus first, and then Sand. And then were going to, or did watch "The Way Back." Which, clearly not, then, but I can't think who else I was having that conversation with! Maybe I dreamed it. (I have done that before and not quite realised because it was something very typical like this. Or of course, it's a Time thing, in which case, you are going to enjoy them both, but fail to get very far with the series. omg, if I did, I'm having words with my subconscious!!)
Please keep me posted. I should hope they will imprint on Martin Jarvis.
I will!
The audio quality sounds as though it was taped off the air through a sponge, but he's terrific in it.
You probably need that filter for stopping him eating the microphone. XD (I've listened to all of Kaldor City! I know!! XD)
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Which one?
(I have done that before and not quite realised because it was something very typical like this. Or of course, it's a Time thing, in which case, you are going to enjoy them both, but fail to get very far with the series. omg, if I did, I'm having words with my subconscious!!)
If it's a Time thing, I don't think it's foreclosed. It's probably just strongest that I watched any B7 at all.
[edit] On that note, have some burninated Peter Cushing sketches.
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That's even better than I had imagined.
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Oh, someone worked it out for me a while ago, and I've forgotten again. I think it may have been Wolf Tower or one of that series, but it's very hazy.
If it's a Time thing, I don't think it's foreclosed. It's probably just strongest that I watched any B7 at all.
I've been trying to think if I could have had that conversation with someone else, but my best conclusion is that probably we were talking about the Tanith Lee episodes one time, and then I dreamed a plausible sequel conversation. I'm sure it's not really a time thing! And I hope that should you try, you have more luck with the series itself, but obv I am biased because B7 is one of my all-time fandom faves. (I need a rewatch, but I got stopped in the last one because people (i.e. Jacqueline Pearce and Paul Darrow) kept dying when I was trying to watch "Rumours of Death" and I couldn't go on, but it's also far too good an episode to skip.)
Those Peter Cushing sketches are wonderful!