The Paint Detective

Inquiring readers, Patrick Baty has written a fascinating article, The Paint Detective on the methods he uses to identify and examine early paint layers.

Paint sampling, Image, Patrick Baty

These images in his account demonstrate the methods he uses to analyze the paints. First, he takes small samples, which he sets in resin and cuts through to examine under various microscopes.

Spencer House Painted Room, Gilding. Image, Patrick Baty

He carries out pigment analysis and scans the samples under the electron microscope. These actions (and more) and documentary evidence lead him to restore the colors of rooms and houses as they once were (or close to it.)

Hampton Court, Tijoy Screen, Image Patrick Baty

• Click here to read his entire article.

Read Patrick’s other posts on this blog:

• Painting a House During the Regency Era
• Invisible Green: A Favourite Colour for Georgian Landscape Buildings

Murder on the Bride’s Side by Tracy Kiely: A Review

Murder on the Bride’s Side is Tracy Kiely’s second murder mystery. I thought her debut novel, Murder at Longbourn, quite charming. Although it was set in modern times, the tie ins to Jane Austen were detailed enough to be satisfying. (In the first book, Aunt Winnie was the proprietor of the Inn at Longbourn, the heroine Elizabeth Parker turned to reading Pride and Prejudice in times of stress, a cat named Lady Catherine prowled the premises, and two friends named Bridget and Colin joined a band of murder suspects for the New Year’s festivities.)

Murder on the Bride’s Side begins where Murder at Longbourn left off. Elizabeth Parker, the heroine who helped to solve the first murder, thereby saving her aunt from being falsely accused, is a fact checker for a local Virginia paper. This explains her eye for details. As the novel opens, guests are assembling to attend Bridget and Colin’s wedding in Richmond, Virginia. Elizabeth and Peter McGowan are now an item, which must have made Aunt Winnie deliriously happy, for she practically forced Peter’s company onto Elizabeth in Murder at Longbourn.

During her spare time Elizabeth reads Sense and Sensibility, which is quoted quite often at the start of this mystery. These quotes provide a tentative connection to Jane Austen, for, unlike Tracy Kiely’s first novel, the plot of this book has not been so neatly constructed around Jane’s oeuvre, and Tracy stops quoting Sense and Sensibility early on. She quotes other books as well, each one introducing a new chapter, setting up the theme.

As guests arrive for the wedding and assemble for the rehearsal dinner and reception, the reader is introduced to each murder suspect. The victim, Roni Avery, is a suitably nasty individual whose treatment of her husband, Avery, her daughter, Megan, and the world in general is such that murdering her was quite a sensible solution.

Bridget and Colin are married and then the fun happens. As with Tracy Kiely’s first novel, the murder and its denouement are incidental to the development of the characters and their relationship to each other. Kiely’s writing style is breezy and effortless, and she has constructed a tight and entertaining mystery that leads to a satisfying conclusion. This time around the murder is not so easily solved, for she offers a side trail that a careless reader who has missed some important clues might follow.

And now we come to the tricky part of this review, for I truly enjoyed this novel. I live in Richmond, Virginia and was delighted to learn that the novel was set in my city. But the city that Tracy, a Maryland resident describes, is not one that I know. Basic mistakes were made. While going to The Tobacco Company in Shockoe Slip, Tracy has her guests park in a garage near Capitol Hill and then walk several long city blocks to the restaurant. With so many parking garages closer to this dining establishment, why would anyone want to walk through such a featureless, uninteresting part of town? The Governor’s mansion and Virginia state capitol building are not easily seen from the street and the traffic is ghastly. The cobble stone streets of East Cary Street with its trendy boutique shops, restaurants, and bars would have made a much more picturesque backdrop. Plus Tracy describes this slightly touristy, trendy-in-the-1980′s restaurant in detail, while barely mentioning the magnificent interior of the world class, historic register Jefferson Hotel several chapters later.

In this book, Tracy often arranges for people to meet “downtown”. Well, downtown Richmond is a wasteland of office buildings, banks, vacant lots, and parking garages. Major thoroughfares crisscross streets, making it hard for pedestrians to navigate towards the river, for example. The few restaurants that are making it in the financial district tend to be open only for breakfast and lunch. For entertainment and dining, Richmonders say they will meet in a specific section of town: The Fan, Cary Town, the Museum District, Church Hill, the Canal Walk, Belle Isle, Shockoe Slip, Shockoe Bottom, Libby and Grove, or the near or far West End. I am being picky, I know, but not once did I get the sense that Tracy’s characters were living and breathing in my city.

Perhaps I quibble too much, for this reviewer from The Richmond Times Dispatch was quite delighted with the book.

I give Murder on the Bride’s Side two out of three Regency fans. Will I read another Elizabeth Parker murder mystery when Tracy Kiely writes her third book? Why, yes, of course. I want to follow Peter and Elizabeth as they deepen their romance against a backdrop of murder most foul. Just not in Richmond.

More on the topic:

• My review of Murder at Longbourn
• My 2009 interview with Tracy Kiely
• Murder on the Bride’s Side is due out this week: Order it here.

Watch Inspector Lewis Online at PBS Masterpiece Mystery: The Dead of Winter

Watch the latest Inspector Lewis mystery, The Dead of Winter, on PBS’s Masterpiece Mystery site from September 6 until September 19. Click here for behind the scenes videos.

The episode opens with a shooting at a re-enactment of a battle on the grounds of Crevecoeur Hall

The curious case leads back to Crevecoeur Hall, a vast, history-rich Oxford estate, and as it happens, the setting for much of Detective Sergeant Hathaway’s (Laurence Fox) youth. Hathaway reconnects with his past – and Scarlett Mortmaigne, the daughter of the estate’s owner. But is he also consorting with a main suspect? It’s a case that threatens to expose the shortcomings and secrets of a wealthy family, cloud Hathaway’s judgment and ultimately put his relationship with Detective Inspector Lewis (Kevin Whately) in jeopardy.

Hathaway is haunted by the death of a 10 year-old girl

The Dead of Winter, the second episode in the third season, opens with a melancholic Hathaway testifying in court about an atrocity commited towards a ten year old girl. He cannot shake off the image of finding her body in a water cistern. Inspector Lewis is unable to communicate with his friend, and the emotional gulf between the two partners widens. As Dr. Hobson observes caustically, “boys never let anyone in.”

"Boys never let anyone in", Laura Hobson observes

When Hathaway is called to a murder at Crevecoeur Hall, the estate where he spent the first 12 years of his life as the son of the estate manager, his past life comes tumbling back. As the story unfolds, we learn more about Hathaway’s childhood, and that he had once played with the butler (Pip Carter) another child on the estate, and young Lady Scarlett (Camilla Arfwedson), for whom he still carries a tendre and who fondly calls him “James the Just.” Her engagement to a rich man does not stop her from revealing to Hathaway how very much she still is attracted to him, but for James her confession is a painful reminder of “what might have been.” James the Just can see no reason for her preferring money over love, the choice she has made.

The script weaves in these threads of James’s former life with current events and the murder of a doctor who had visited Crevecoeur Hall. As James investigates thecrime, the current estate manager of Crevecoeur Hall, whose wife had run away 20 years ago, commits suicide.

Hathaway and Paul Hopkiss, the butler and his former childhood friend

We meet an array suspects: the lord of the manor, Augustus Mortmaigne, the Marquess of Tygon (Richard Johnson); his wife, Selina Mortmaigne (Juliet Aubrey); her brother in law, Philip (Nathaniel Parker) with whom she is having an affair. Add a valuable painting that has been altered and that might hold clues, a Jesuit priest who knows more than he lets on, and a purring cat that Inspector Lewis rescues from the dead doctor’s home, and you have a fully fleshed mystery story populated with likely suspects. As both Lewis and Hathaway pursue the killer, both come at cross purposes.

Lewis pursues his own clues in the dead Dr's office

That last statement of the quote that opens this review is a bit misleading. While Lewis becomes exasperated with Hathaway, whose surpressed longings for Scarlett have gotten in the way of his judgment, he has not come to the point of breaking off their relationship, and he makes it clear that he is content with Hathaway as a partner.

The lord of the manor and those who live on his estate have many secrets to hide

This second episode in Season 3 is better than the first – more tightly written and much darker in tone. The final scene is filled with suspense, and I did not guess the murderer until just before the major clue about corn starch was dropped. For those who have missed the episode, you can watch it online from September 6 through September 19.

• My review of Counter Culture Blues

The Jane Austen Signs of Middle Age

Jane Austen fans tend to read her books repeatedly throughout their lives.  In an article in the Guardian UK, Charlotte Higgins describes how her identity with a Jane Austen character changes with age. Here are some of her thoughts:

If you read Jane Austen more or less annually, as I have done since my late teens, you end up marking yourself against the characters. Oh reader, when I first read Pride and Prejudice I was Lydia’s age. I am about to become older than the delightful Mrs Croft in Persuasion. I still hang on to Anne Elliot, though. A tender 27 she may be, but in modern money I reckon you can give her another 10 years.

This is so true. I am starting to identify more with Mrs. Croft and Lady Russell than Anne Elliot. Charlotte Higgins goes on to say:

Persuasion is a very middle-aged novel, with its melancholic flavour and its acknowledgement that yes, you can make a grotesque mess of your life (the romance part I find much less satisfactory than the bleakly comic first three quarters of the book, essentially before one reaches Bath). It is true, however, that you can tell you are middle-aged when you start to empathise with P&P’s Mrs Bennet: with what Sir Walter Elliot would call “the rapid increase of the crow’s foot” comes a sense of sympathy with this character, written off as absurd in one’s heedless youth. At least she is trying to save her daughters from a future of poverty. And she’s certainly not getting any help from that husband of hers.

So true again. Only in recent years have I become impatient with Mr. Bennet and more sympathetic with his silly wife. I have also become more observant of Mrs. Jennings in Sense and Sensibility, of how hospitable she is, how she tries to become a matchmaker to all the unmarried ladies, and how her house is open to guest seemingly all the time. Yes, she is a silly and irritating woman, traits I could not stand when I was young (thus I could not appreciate her other than as a comic relief character), but now I rather like her positive qualities, as I do Mrs. Palmer’s. Elinor Dashwood is aware of Mrs. Palmer’s good nature and would tolerate her better if she weren’t such an unflaggingly cheerful airhead all the time.

Mrs. Jennings and Mrs. Palmer, Sense and Sensibility

As I get older I see that Lady Catherine de Bourgh is all bluster, and that her authority over Elizabeth Bennet is precisely zero. Young Lizzie is smart enough to know that, but as a 19 year-old reader, I was in awe of Lizzie’s stubborn attitude towards that lady when she stormed to Longbourn to demand Lizzie promise never to marry Mr. Darcy.

Mr. Bennet reading. Image from Jim and Ellen Moody

There are other ways that my attitude towards Jane Austen’s novels is changing. I notice how few happy marriages are portrayed. Right off the bat I can think of only the Crofts, the Gardiners, the John Knightleys, and the Musgroves. These days, I am more on the side of a pragmatic Charlotte Lucas, who has learned long ago not to look at the world through rose colored glasses, than Elizabeth, who waits for love. To be sure, she snagged her Mr. Darcy, but would Charlotte have had such an opportunity? I think not. I also see that Fanny Price’s strength of character and resolve in the face of so much bullying is a trait to admire; and that Mr. Bennet’s extensive library and unwillingness to compromise a cushy lifestyle were acquired at the expense of his family’s future financial security.

As the years roll by, my tastes and preferences for Jane’s novels are changing. Persuasion and Pride and Prejudice are running neck and neck in my favorite category. P&P used to have the field all to itself. While I loathed Mansfield Park the first time I read it, I don’t mind it so much now, and I find Emma less and less interesting and much too long . Perhaps I should lay the book aside for a few years.

Are your tastes and preferences changing towards Jane Austen’s books and characters as time goes on? How? Curious minds want to know.

A Tour Through Bath With Jane Austen

Inquiring Readers, Tony Grant has been contributing articles to Jane Austen Today for several months. Recently, Tony and his family traveled to Bath and the West Country. This is one of many posts he has written about his journey. Tony also has published several posts about his trip on this blog: Going to Bath With Jane Austen and The Servant’s Entrance to Regency Townhouses, for which he supplied the photographs. He has already contributed a post about Milsom Street for Jane Austen Today. This post about his tour through Bath was first published on Jane Austen Today, but the images caused the sidebar to be pushed out of sight, so I placed it here.

Bath Thoroughfare

Jane Austen knew Bath extremely well. Throughout Persuasion and Northanger Abbey she houses her characters in real streets and in real buildings, although she does avoid giving us the number of the house in such and such a street. The real owners and occupants might not have liked the notoriety. And today they might not like the notoriety as well. Was there such a thing as litigation in the 18th century? I’m sure there was.

Pultney Bridge

Here are some of the places that Janes characters lived in and when you go to Bath you can see them for yourself.

• Anne Elliot and her father lived in Camden Place up the hill at the top of the town.

• Lady Russel lived in Rivers Street just north of The Circus.

• Rich, Mrs Wallis lived in Marlborough Gardens on the hill leading down from the north end of The Royal Crescent.

• Catherine Moreland lived in Pultney Street, which is now called Great Pultney Street, very close to Sydney Street. I wonder if Jane saw somebody in Pultney Street that she thought, “ah, that’s Catherine Moreland.”

• The Dowager Viscountess Dalrymple lived in Laura Place at the end of Great Pultney Street and at the start of Pultney Bridge.

The meeting places and places central to both novels are Milsom Street where everybody shops. Shopping, the bain of my life. My wife and three daughters love shopping. Shopping could be their lives. In Jane’s time tooapparently. It makes me come out in a cold sweat thinking about it. The amount of standing in shops and outside of shops I’ve done.

God, I’ve suffered for shopping over the years.

Ah, that’s better. I needed that rant.

Also the Pump room. What a glorious place it is. I felt a tingle down my spine as I my wife, Abigail and myself were shown to our seats by the headwaiter and we were graciously handed the menus. A trio of musicians, cello, pianist and violinist, played sedately at one end of the room. People lined up at the water pump to imbibe Baths greatest commodity, water from the spring and we ordered tea and cakes.

Pump room window

The “pump room blend” of tea is as close as you can get to the blend of tea that Jane Austen, Catherine Morland and Anne Elliot would have drunk. The scones with clotted cream and fresh strawberry jam were exquisite. The tea was delicious and there I was with my family, in THE PUMP ROOM!!!!!!

The Pump Room

I could almost see Catherine Morland pop in to see if she could find Henry Tilney and of course take a few turns of the room to see and be seen. I knew nobody in The Pump Room just as Catherine knew nobody.

Bath Abbey

Then we had a look inside Bath Abbey. Jane seems to have not attended services at the abbey. She preferred The Octagon. This was a newly built chapel in Jane’s day. She seems to have preferred churches where the incumbent vicar had new and fresh ideas to deliver in his sermons.

Cheap Street

After Bath Abbey we walked through the passageway that leads from the churchyard opposite The Pump Rooms, called Union Passage and into Cheap Street. It is the very passage that Catherine Moreland walked through with Miss Thorpe and suddenly sees a carriage with her brother and coincidently Miss Thorpe’s brother too, the awful John Thorpe. It is their first fateful meeting.

George Street outside Edgar Buildings

We walked on up Milson Street to George Street where Edgar Buildings are situated. Edgar Buildings are where the Thorpes stayed.

25 Gay Street

From George Street we went into Gay Street and walked past number 25 where the Austens stayed for a while.

At the top of Gay Street is the magnificent, The Circus. This is a circle of the most magnificent Georgian Houses. There is a small green park in the centre of the circle in which grow four gigantic London Plains trees. They must be four or five hundred years old. Jane knew them. The portrait artist Gainsborough lived in one of these houses in The Circus for a while. Bath would have provided many opportunities to gain commissions and make money.

The Royal Crescent

From The Circus we turned down Brock Street and arrived at The Crescent at the top of the hill.

A front door at the Royal Crescent

This was the place where the elite lived. These were the largest and most expensive houses. Lords, Dukes and the very wealthy lived up here. It was also a good place to walk to get fresh air.

The back of the Crescent, each house is different

Jane mentions in her letters taking walks up to The Crescent and walking in the park and enjoying the views. Catherine Morland and Anne Elliot also walked there. There is a very good reason why Jane and her characters might want to walk here, the fresh air. If you look back over Bath you can see the beautiful city with its creamy yellow stonework In Jane’s time it would have been black. You will also notice the myriads of chimneys, which no longer spout black sooty smoke from thousands of coal fires. Coal is no longer burnt. We have clean air towns and cities nowadays. In Jane’s time the air was far from clean and the beautiful Cotswold stone became black. You can see today a building or two that have not had their surface cleaned since the clean air act was passed through parliament.

The Assembly Rooms

The Assembly Rooms, just north of The Circus, are what Jane and her characters knew as The Upper Assembly Rooms and also included the Octagon tearoom. This is where Catherine Morland met with the Thorpes.

The Lower Assembly Rooms, the original assembly rooms in Bath, where Beau Nash officiated , were situated near the abbey. They no longer exist. It was in the Lower Assembly Rooms that Catherine met Henry Tilney for the first time and fell in love.

Just to conclude, a couple of stories about Bath.

Sheridan eloped with Elizabeth from this house

In the Crescent , about half way round, is a house with plaque that relates a very dramatic story. In 1755 Richard Brinsley Sheridan, who was a great playwright in the 18th century and wrote The Rivals and School for Scandal and who was also the owner of the Covent Garden Theatre, absconded with a young lady from the house. Her father chased them all over Europe. When they were found the father made Sheridan marry his daughter. However soon after Richard Brinsley left her in the lurch. The chase was the thing. The excitement of the chase had gone. What a cad and bounder!!!!!

Tony at Pultney Bridge

Now, a story about myself. As we walked up Gay Street towards The Circus we obviously stopped outside number 25 to look at it and photograph ourselves outside. An irate and very upset looking lady marched out of the front door next to number 25 with a bowl full of water and threw it all over my legs. I must add this does not normally happen to me. The circumstances were, that some juvenile idiot had drawn rude graffiti over the side of her white van parked outside. She was trying to clean the words off. She was obviously upset and came out to wash the side of her vehicle. Unfortunately for me, she missed. She was SO sorry. Luckily it was a warm day and my trousers dried quickly in the walk up the hill.

The Royal Crescent (top) and the Circus (Bottom with trees at center.)

One fact before I finish. Did you know that the houses in The Crescent and in The Circus are all different? They all look the same because they are the same on the outside. The builder built the fronts and sold just the fronts. The new owners had to build their own backs to their houses. Hence, if you go round behind the houses in The Crescent they all look different.

Posted by Tony Grant, London Calling

The Circulating Library in Regency Resorts

Circulating libraries in the 18th and 19th century were associated with leisure, and were found  in cities and towns with a population of 2,000 and upward. They were as much of an attraction in wealthy resorts, where people came to relax and look after their health, as in cities and small towns, like Basingstoke, where Jane Austen subscribed to Mrs. Martin’s circulating library.

In 1801, it was said that there were 1,000 circulating libraries in Britain. Book shops abounded as well, but in 1815 a 3-volume novel cost the equivalent of $100 today. Such a price placed a novel beyond the reach of most people. Worried about a second edition for Mansfield Park, Jane Austen wrote in 1814:

“People are more ready to borrow and praise, than to buy –which I cannot wonder at.”

Circulating libraries made books accessible to many more people at an affordable price.  For two guineas a year, a patron could check out two volumes. Which meant that for the price of one book, a patron could read up to 26 volumes per year.

By 1800, most copies of a novel’s edition were sold to the libraries, which were flourishing businesses to be found in every major English city and town, and which promoted the sale of books during a period when their price rose relative to the cost of living. The libraries created a market for the publishers’ product and encouraged readers to read more by charging them an annual subscription fee that would entitle them to check out a specified number of volumes at one time. – Lee Ericson, The Economy of Novel Reading

The leisurely classes had plenty of time for reading, late 18th c.

The practice of borrowing books was not a new concept in the Regency era. Records from the 17th century show that people were borrowing books from booksellers. As early as 1735, Samuel Fancourt advertised a circulating library in Salisbury for his religious books and pamphlets.

Circulating libraries attracted many patrons, even those who did not necessarily come to borrow or book or read, for they were also places for fashionable people to “hang out” and meet others.

In the resorts the circulating libraries became fashionable daytime lounges where ladies could see others and be seen, where raffles were held and games were played, and where expensive merchandise could be purchased.  - Lee Ericson, The Economy of Novel Reading

Jane Austen well knew the attractions of libraries at sea side resorts. Mrs. Whitby’s Circulating Library operated in Sanditon, and Lydia visited one in Brighton.  In her letters to Cassandra, Jane frequently mentioned circulating libraries, in particular visiting one in Southampton.

Circulating Library and Reading Room, Milsom Street, Bath. Image, Tony Grant

Circulating libraries tended to be located in a convenient location in the center of a resort. Newcomers would find out about them from guide books, such as the one in Brighton. The Royal Colonade Library advertised itself as thus:

MESSRS. WRIGHT AND SON’S ROYAL COLONADE LIBRARY, MUSIC SALOON, AND READING ROOMS.

This establishment is situated in North-street, at the corner of the New Road, and contains between seven and eight thousand volumes of History, Biography, Novels, French and Italian, and all the best Modern Publications. The Reading Room is frequented both by Ladies and Gentlemen, and is daily supplied with a profusion of London morning and evening papers, besides the French and weekly English journals, magazines, reviews, and general popular periodicals. – Brighton As It Is, 1836

In 1836, Cassandra Austen would have been familiar with the costs associated with the Royal Colonade Library’s terms of subscriptions:

Terms of subscription

By the end of the 18th century, Scarborough, a resortt located in the county of North Yorkshire, boasted several circulating libraries. The town’s population had risen to 7,067 by 1811, and one can imagine that, with the many leisurely hours available to tourists and visitors, these libraries managed a booming business.

A circulating library in Scarborough around 1818, from Poetical Sketches of Scarborough

The Poetical Sketches of Scarborough, first published in 1813, features twenty-one illustrations of humorous subjects about the many features available in the resort, including a satiric poem about the Circulating Library:

As in life’s tide by careful fate
The mind is made to circulate
Just so each watering place supplies
It’s CIRCULATING LIBRARIES:

Where charming volumes may be had
Of good indifferent and bad
And some small towns on Britain’s shore
Can boast of book shops half a score
Scarbro and with much truth may boast
Her’s good as any on our coast
AINSWORTH’S or SCAUM’S no matter which
Or WHITING’S all in learning rich
Afford a more than common measure
Of pleasant intellectual treasure

One wonders if the following publication could be checked out a Scarborough circulating library at the turn of the 19th century, for the book was written by a local schoolmaster:

A Short Grammar of The English Language. In Two Parts By John Hornsey. Schoolmaster, Scarborough.

THE publick are much indebted to Mr Hornsey for this able and excellent compendium of English grammar. We acknowledge that we perused it with singular satisfaction; and are well persuaded that a more useful introduction to the English language cannot be placed in the hands of our youth. That this work should reach a second edition, did not excite our wonder; may it pass through many succeeding ones!- The Nichols, John.Gentleman’s Magazine, Vol 86, 1799, p 1144.

• The History of Scarborough
• The Economy of Novel Reading:Jane Austen and the Circulating Library, Lee Erickson

PBS Masterpiece Mystery: A Review of Counter Culture Blues, an Inspector Lewis Mystery

In Counter Culture Blues, the church's peaceful Sunday sermon is shattered by the sound of gun shots on the estate next door.

Counter Culture Blues, the latest Inspector Lewis mystery on PBS Masterpiece Mystery!, treats the viewer to three murders – a young boy, a rocker, and a music professor. This episode of Inspector Lewis kicks off to the third season and does not disappoint. Half the fun of mysteries set in England is witnessing the audaciousness of the characters and the entertaining display of British wit. Both are offered in abundance in this episode about aging rockers.

Richie (David Hayman) looks on as Franco (Anthony Higgins) sees Esme (Joanna Lumley) for the first time in 35 years.

The murders coincide with the reappearance of Esme Ford, the front singer of a once hugely popular 70′s rock band, Midnight Addiction. Esme was thought to have killed herself 35 years ago, but much to the shocked surprise of Ritchie Maguire, the band’s leather-faced leader, she walks back into his life, hoping to ressurrect the band and duplicate their past glory. It was Esme, the “tart with the heart”, who had been the “enchantment who held the band together.” While Richie Maguire had recently attempted a solo CD, whose master had mysteriously been wiped clean, the members of the band were living richly off the proceeds of their past glory.

Just when Inspector Lewis thinks it is safe to sit down to a nice meal, duty calls.

We first meet Inspector Lewis (Kevin Whately) at home and about to sit down to a microwave dinner, when he and Sergeant Hathaway (Laurence Fox) are called to investigate the illegal hunting of game near a church during Sunday service. The culprit is Richie, whose estate is nearby. Inspector Lewis knows the band’s history intimately, for in his youth he had been a huge fan. His surprise upon encountering Esme is as great as Richie’s, and it conjures up memories of a poster of Esme sans shirt and bra that he had purchased as a boy and hung in his room.

David Hayman as Richie Maguire

Anthony Higgins as Franco

The rockers have not aged well, and the actors who play Richie (David Hayman), Bone (Zig Byfield), Mack (Hilton McRae), and Franco (Anthony Higgins) are as craggy as Charlie Watts, Keith Richards, Mick Jagger, and Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones.

Zig Byfield as Bone

Hilton McRae as Mack

I won’t give too much of the plot away, since you can still see this episode online. This intelligent and often witty script was written by Guy Andre, who adapted the screenplay from a story by Nick Deare. The series itself is inspired by Colin Dexter’s’ Inspector Morse novels and is greatly enhanced by an excellent cast. Simon Callow portrays Vernon Oxe, the openly gay manager who claims that the band was his creation. Oxe’s sudden appearance in Oxford coincides with that of Esme Ford.

Simon Callow as Vernon Oxe (with Anthony Higgins)

Joanna Lumley as Esme is superb, but then I am biased in her favor. I will always adore Joanna for her turn as Patsy Stone, the boozing, smoking, non-eating, free-loving character of Absolutely Fabulous. I could not help but laugh at Esme’s brazen reason for sleeping with two men on the same night – to assure them that she had not forgotten either of them. My only beef with Joanna as Esme was her obvious wig, which was is not Ms Lumley’s fault. For the viewer’s sake, could they not have found a better hair piece?

Joanna Lumley as Esme

The plot of Counter Culture Blues is complicated, but still manages to hold the viewer’s interest. Sub plots abound. While they did not throw me off my scent (I figured out who the murderer was fairly early on), they added a richness and complexity to the world that Inspector Lewis and Sergeant Hathaway inhabit.

Perdita Weeks plays Kitten, a girl with a secret and from whom a secret is being kept.

Richie’s daughter, Kitten (Perdita Weeks), has mysterious dealings with a nasty young man named Peter, which gives James Hathaway (Laurence Fox) something productive to do. Hathaway is no slouch, and he is on to Peter’s sordid schemes. His confrontation of the young man are among my favorite scenes in this production.

Sergeant Hathaway interrogates creepy Peter

Peter (Harry Lloyd) shows no conscience

The mysterious death of Jason, the boy who was murdered at the gates of Richie’s mansion, and of two other charactes keep Inspector Lewis on his toes.

Jason's friend, Declan (Daniel Kaluuya) bravely helps Inspector Lewis solve why the boy was murdered.

It turns out that free-loving Richie has a wife. Helen Baxendale as Caroline is given the best line in this episode. When asked by Inspector Lewis why she disappears for weeks on end, she says she can always tell when her husband is gearing up to have another affair and she wanted to give him the necessary space. “He’s like a dog, really. Needs exercizing.”

Caroline, Helen Baxendale, takes a pragmatic view on marriage.

As usual the reader is treated to scenes in and around Oxford, always a delight, and Rebecca Front once againmakes her appearance as Chief Superintendent Jean Innocent, telling Lewis that “If my life is disagreeable, yours is going to be hell. “ Neither Lewis nor Hathaway can do their jobs without the sharp eyed skills of Drl Laura Hobson, capably played by Clare Holman. It would be lovely if she and Lewis got together, but that is my mothering gene working in overdrive.

The scenes in and around Oxford are part of the background.

Rebecca Front as Chief Superintendent Innocent is both exasperated with Inspector Lewis and in awe of his skills.

Lewis and Hathaway depend on Dr. Hobson's (Clare Holman) findings to do their work.

The identity of the murderer is somewhat obvious, but the ending is satisfying nevertheless. Joanna Lumley is entertaining as ever and this episode is worth watching for her performance alone. If you want to see the series again, it will be shown online at this link starting August 30 and through September 12. The other episodes scheduled for Season III are:

• The Dead of Winter, September 5
• Dark Matter, September 12
• Your Sudden Death Question, September 19
• Falling Darkness, September 26

Needless to say, it is going to be a great September of Sundays with Inspector Lewis at PBS!

In My Book Review Queue: Pride and Prejudice: An Annotated Edition

The new annotated edition of Pride and Prejudice by Patricia Meyer Spacks, a professor of English, Emerita, at the University of Virginia, is so beautiful a book, so lush to the touch and rich with beautiful color images and scholarly insights, that I cannot wait to spend the weekend reading it.

Pride and Prejudice: An Annotated Edition is substantially different from the 2007 Annotated Pride and Prejudice by David Shapard, a trade paperback. At $35, this hard cover book will make the perfect gift for the Jane Austen lover in your life. Click here to read more about it. Look for my review soon.

Going to Bath with Jane Austen

Panorama of Bath from Beechen Cliff, 1824, Harvey Wood

Inquiring Readers, Tony Grant, who lives in London, teaches, and acts as occasional tour guide, has been contributing articles to Jane Austen Today for several months. Recently, Tony and his family traveled to Bath and the West Country. This is one of many posts he has written about his journey. Tony also has his own blog, London Calling.

The Paragon from Travelpod

On Wednesday 6th May 1801 Jane wrote to Cassandra, from a house positioned on a hill half way up a road called, The Paragon, in Bath. It was her uncle and aunt’s, the Leigh Perrots, home. Her aunt was her mother’s sister. Jane and her mother and father had just arrived, just moved in and were getting settled into their rooms.

“ My dear Cassandra,

I have the pleasure of writing from my own room up two pairs of stairs, with everything very comfortable about me. Our journey here was perfectly free from accident or Event; we changed horses at the end of every stage, & paid almost at every turnpike;- we had charming weather, hardly any dust,& were exceedingly agreeable, as we did not speak above once in every three miles.- between Luggershall & Everley we made our grand meal…….”

Jane had arrived in Bath after a journey of about 50 miles from Steventon, her home.

Wood engraving of Steventon Rectory

She sounds excited and thrilled by the new experience for instance she has ,” my own room.” But perhaps she was trying to put a brave face on it, be positive and put the negatives to the back of her mind.

Claire Tomlin reminds us,

“ The decision by Mr and Mrs Austen to leave their home of over thirty years, taking their children with them, came as a complete surprise to her; in effect, a twenty fifth birthday surprise, in December 1800. Not a word had been said to anyone in advance of the decision.”

Jane had spent all her life in Steventon a quiet country village near Basingstoke in Hampshire. She knew the families who lived in the great houses and many were her friends. She knew the villagers of Steventon very well. It was the source of her imagination and she had developed her own intimate writing habits there. Her world , in a sense was turned upside down and she was being wrenched from this intimate, close world that she was comfortable in, to that of a bustling town, but not just any town.

The Bath Medley, the Pump Room, detail on a fan, 1735

Bath was the centre of Georgian ,”FUN.” Here people came for the medicinal benefits of the waters, dancing, parading in the streets in their finest clothes, drinking tea, and taking rides and walks out into the nearby countryside. It was a place to rest, to be seen and to meet new people. Many families brought their unmarried daughters here to find eligible spouses.

Dancing, Rowlandson, The Comforts of Bath

Bath was a magnet for the wealthy and comfortable middle classes who came and went with the season. It was a fluctuating population. Friendships could be brief. It was a hot house for relationships. Whether The Reverend George Austen had it in mind to find suitors for his two unmarried daughters, as part of his plan, is not certain. Jane however was definitely out of her comfort zone. She was a very astute judge of characters and she would not like much of the ostentatious show of Bath. People who went to Bath for the season behaved differently. Strangers were thrown together in a mix of fun and gaiety. Moral codes were loosened. You get a very strong sense of this in the description of Catherine Morelands first experiences of Bath in Northanger Abbey.

Comforts of Bath, The Pump Room, Rowlandson

To get to Bath from Steventon over the fifty mile journey, Jane took, she passed through many picturesque and beautiful villages and towns. Those places are still there today.

Overton, Andover, Weyhill, Ludgershall, Eveleigh, where the Austens stopped to take tea and rest, Upavon, crossing the River Avon at this point, Conock and Devizes where they probably rested again before the final stretch to Bath. Devizes is a bustling town today, traffic and shoppers, many small businesses, churches and chapels and still many magnificent Georgian buildings. Take away the cars, and dress the people differently and Devizes would still be very familiar to Jane. It still has very much of its Georgian character but it is a modern 21st century town too.Like modern day England, Devizes is a layer cake of history. There are bits from every era and it has and does thrive in all of them.

Strolling through Sydney Gardens

When I went to Bath this time I came in from a slightly different direction to Janes journey there in 1801. I came the south east, travelling from Stonehenge in Wiltshire. This road comes from high up in the hills to the south of Bath and the first sight of the city is from a steep, tree lined, Beckford Road which reaches Bath stretching along next to Sydney Gardens. It was a great pleasure and very exciting to come across, almost immediately on reaching Bath, number 4 Sydney Place, which was one of the houses Jane and her family rented.

Georgian terraced houses along the London Road, Bath

Jane entered Bath by way of the London Road which sweeps in from the east and curves across the top of the bend in the River Avon which borders the southern part of the City of Bath.The London Road leads straight to The Paragon, the road in which her aunt and uncle, The Leigh Perrots, lived and where Jane and her mother and father were to live until they found their own residence. Bath has not expanded in modern times much south of the river partly because of the steep hills there.

Old - Lower - Assembly Rooms

So there is an excited tone in Janes first letter from The Paragon. The excitement doesn’t last. Her aunt and uncle being residents in Bath, they at least know people to introduce Jane to. Unlike Catherine Moreland who meets nobody and knows no one at first. But what terrible people? Or is Jane just having a bout of sour grapes? Within weeks Jane is writing to Cassandra her comments about Bath acquaintances.

Wednesday 13th may 1801 writing to Cassandra

“I cannot anyhow continue to find people agreeable; I respect Mrs Chamberlayne for doing her hair well, but cannot feel a more tender sentiment.”

Mrs Chamberlayne is picked out for more effort. Jane tries to find something in common, tries to see if a new friendship can blossom.

Friday 22nd May 1801

“The friendship between Mrs Chamberlayne & me which you predicted has already taken place, for we shake hands whenever we meet Our grand walk to Weston was again fixed for yesterday & was accomplished in a very striking manner; Everyone of the party declined it under some pretence or other except our two selves, & we therefore had a tete a tete, but that we should equally have had after the first two yards, had half the inhabitants of Bath set off with us.- It would have amused you to see our progress;-we went up by Sion Hill, and returned across the fields,- in climbing a hill Mrs Chamberlayne is very capital; I could with diffuculty keep pace with her- yet would not flinch for the world.- On plain ground I was quite her equal- and so we posted away under a fine hot sun, She without any parasol or any shade to her hat, stopping for nothing ,& crossing the churchyard at Weston with as much expedition as if we were afraid of being buried alive.-After seeing what she is equal to, I cannot help feeling a regard for her.-As to agreeableness, she is much like other people.”

There is something final about this relationship as though it’s not going far, in two phrases, “The friendship between Mrs Chamberlayne & me which you predicted has already taken place,…..” and , “As to agreeableness, she is much like other people.”

Regency Bath

Jane uses the past tense already about the relationship with Mrs Chamberlayne and she finally concludes that she is much like other people. Nothing is going to happen here. Jane was a very guarded person, certainly didn’t suffer fools gladly, gave people a chance and discarded them for their mediocrity. Jane obviously needed something else in a relationship. Already she wasn’t in the mood for Bath.

Candle Snuffer, image Tony Grant

In the same letter she mentions house hunting. They have been looking at houses amongst Green Park Buildings. Green Park Buildings are situated near the river at the bottom of the town. They were obviously prone to flooding.

“ our views on GP building seem all at an end; the observations of the damps still remaining the offices of an house which has only been vacated a week, with reports of discontented families& putrid fevers have given the coup de grace.”

Nowadays the river near Green Park Buildings has high banks to prevent flooding and has been canalised. One of the main car parks, where we actually parked is near there. Also Bath Railway Station and The University of Bath is situated nearby these days.

For all this dire and damning report the Austens did move into Green Park Buildings. It could not have been very pleasant. Perhaps they thought their stay in The Paragon was prolonged enough and anything had to be taken.

Much of Jane’s remaining letters from Bath have some discussion about finding accommodation. The contracts on these houses seem to have been short term. Maybe this was because Bath was a seasonal place. People generally came for short periods of time. If you really wanted to live there permanently you would have to buy. Perhaps the Austens could not afford to do that. It begs the question, did Mr and Mrs Austen really think through their move to Bath carefully enough?

25 Gay Street, image Tony Grant

After Green Park Buildings the next set of letters come from number 25 Gay Street, just a few houses up the hill from The Jane Austen Centre. It is a dental practioners office today. The letters from Gay Street are the last from an address in Bath. However we also know that Jane lived at number 4 Sydney Street, a new house at the time overlooking a grand house which is now the Holburn Museum and its grounds, Sydney Park. This is by far one of the more pleasant situations Jane lived in.

Jane’s father died in a house in Trim Street not far from Queen Square and Gay Street. So another move had had to take place. In five years Jane had lived in at least five different house all providing differing qualities of living.

Side Street, Bath, image by Tony Grant

You can find this reflected in the two novels that concern themselves most with Bath, Persuasion and Northanger Abbey. In Persuasion Anne Elliot finds an old school friend, Mrs Smith, living in poor circumstances.

“Her accommodations were limited to a noisy parlour , and a dark bedroom behind, with no possibility of moving from one to the otherwithiout assistancewhich there was only one servant in the house to affordand she never quitted the house but to be conveyed into the warm bath.”

Mrs Smith’s accommodation was in Westgate Buildings not far from the Pump Room. Mrs Smith’s husband had died leaving her almost penniless but because of her health the warm bath treatment was seen as a cure. Her life was certainly not one of fun and frivolity. It seems, like in any city and town today, in the 18th century, the poor and destitute and the wealthy are not far from each other. Anne Elliot seems to prefer the company of Mrs Smith rather than the fripperies that Bath had to offer. She knows the right people and could have fun if she wanted to. Anne Elliot can see the two sides of Bath.

Side view of Bath Abbey, image Tony Grant

Jane Austen knew Bath extremely well. Throughout Persuasion and Northanger Abbey she houses her characters in real streets and in real buildings, although she does avoid giving us the number of the house in such and such a street. The real owners and occupants might not have liked the notoriety. And today they might not like the notoriety as well. Was there such a thing as litigation in the 18th century? I’m sure there was.

More About the Topic

• Watch a 5-minute video of Jane Austen Leaves Steventon for Bath at this link.
• Bath Archives: Record Office
• Jane Austen and Bath: Jim and Ellen Moody
• Beechen Cliff, the Arts and Natural Surroundings
• The Lower Assembly Rooms and Bath Society
• Public Bathing in Bath, Georgian Style

Cheap Street with hills in the distance, image from Tony Grant

A Glimpse of Jane Austen: Anna Lefroy’s Recollections

Even rarer than a first edition of a Jane Austen novel are images taken of her during her short lifetime. A small watercolor by her sister Cassandra has been reworked over the centuries to make Jane look more attractive. Another watercolor image taken of Jane’s backside as she sits in the grass, a dark silhouette, a small watercolor by James Stanier Clark, and a portrait of Jane at 14 (the validity of the latter two are in question) are all that we have to go by. Verbal descriptions of Jane Austen are also quite rare, and some seem to contradict each other, a few relatives and friends thinking her quite pretty and others declaring that her looks were rather ordinary.

Anna Lefroy

In 1864, Anna Lefroy, Jane Austen’s niece and James Edward Austen-Leigh’s sister, wrote her memories of Aunt Jane in a letter for Edward’s memoir. She apologized that her recollections were so shadowy and that she was unable to grasp anything of substance. She did recall that Jane and Cassandra wore pattens when they walked between Dean and Steventon in “wintry weather through the sloppy lanes”. Pattens, or shoe coverings that protected delicate shoes, were worn by gentlewomen at that time, but they would soon go out of fashion. Anna also described Jane as having a tall and elegant figure, and a “quick firm step,” an observation that she shared with others.

Anna goes on to relate one particularly sweet family story of a 7 year-old Jane and her 3 year-old brother Charles greeting Cassandra, who was returning from a visit with Dr. and Mrs. Cooper at Bath. Jane and Charles had toddled down the lane “as far as New Down to meet the chaise, & have the pleasure of riding home in it.” While the popular perception was that Jane and Cassandra were inseparable, they spent a great deal of time apart.

Young Cassandra frequently visited the Coopers in Bath, and as an adult became a regular guest at Godmersham, her brother Edward’s estate. She was a favorite with the family there, but the young Godmersham children were not quite as fond of Jane. This was not the case with the Jane’s other nieces and nephews, all of whom liked her exceedingly as a playfellow and a teller of stories. In her letter, Anna bemoaned the loss of Jane’s verbal stories, those “happy tales of invention” that she wove out of nothing.

Jane’s niece wrote this observation about her aunt’s image:

“Her complexion of that rather rare sort which seems the peculiar property of light brunettes. A mottled skin, not fair, but perfectly clear & healthy in hue; the fine naturally curling hair, neither light nor dark; the bright hazel eyes to match, & the rather small but well shaped nose.”

Anna concludes, as Cassandra’s portrait attests, that Jane failed to be a decidedly handsome woman. Seventeen years younger than Jane, one wonders if Anna was thinking of an older, more mature Jane, the one who had taken to wearing caps at all times, rather than a younger and prettier Jane with bright sparkling eyes and full round cheeks.

Other posts on this blog about Jane’s image and character sit below:

• A glimpse of Jane Austen: Fanny Knight’s  recollection of her aunt Jane
• A glimpse of Jane Austen at Work
• My Take: Jane Austen’s Image
• Jane’s Visage: A Pretty Lively Girl With Grace and Style
• What Did Jane Austen Look Like?

Le Faye, Deirdre. Anna Lefroy’s Original Memories of Jane Austen. The Review of English Studies, New Series, Oxford University Press, Vol 39, #155 (Aug, 1988), pp 417-421.

Louis Bazalgette: The Prince Regent’s Tailor

Jean Louis Bazalgette, the Prince Regent's tailor

Most of the known accounts published about George, Prince of Wales, and his profligate spending on clothes and luxury items say that his main tailor was John Weston. It is also said that under the influence of young Beau Brummel he patronized other London tailors such as Meyer, and Schweitzer and Davidson. Steven Parissien, in his very interesting book ‘George IV, Inspiration of the Regency’ has a whole chapter entitled ‘Clothing & Militaria’ which lists tailors, bootmakers etc. used by the Prince.

The name of the unknown man who was the Prince’s tailor for 32 years – Louis Bazalgette – shows up in none of these sources. He appears to have started quietly supplying the Prince with all manner of clothes in great quantities in about 1780, and carried on making most of his clothes until at least 1795.

A dandy and his tailor

In 1794, the sixteen-year-old Brummel attracted the interest of the Prince, who under his influence began slowly to change his style of dress, so that by 1795 Bazalgette was making less of the gaudy outfits of which Prinny had been so fond. However, Louis continued to make most of the Prince’s uniforms, and the livery for his servants, until at least 1806.

Louis was the great-great-great-great-grandfather of Charles Bazalgette (r), who is writing his life story. The book contains a great deal of new material; as a foretaste, Charles has started a blog which can be accessed at this blog - http://chasbaz.posterous.com/

The Servant’s Entrance to Regency Townhouses

Tony Grant at 3 Queen Square, down the road from the Jane Austen Centre

Tony Grant, who writes posts for Jane Austen Today and London Calling, stands above the “area”, the servants entrance that sits below ground and in front of town houses built during the Georgian and Regency eras. A wrough-iron fence separated the upper level from the lower basement level, which was sunk partly below the street. Windows in the work areas gave the servants a view of the people walking along the sidewalks.

Wherever these town houses were built, servants and delivery people used the lower entrance. The “area” also contained a coal vault used for storage.

The "area", or the way down to the servant's quarters

A collier unloaded coal from a cart directly into the coal vault. This practice prevented dirty coal sacks from being dragged through the house. Coal was dumped down a chute via a coal hole. The coal would then be used for fires or the kitchen stove. (Gaelen Foley)  The design of the coal hatch, which was locked from the inside, would vary from house to house. Coal holes were in use from the early 1800s to the middle 1900s, when the Clean Air Act made the burning of coal illegal. (Knowledge of London)

Coal hole, Bath, England

So much coal was burned in 19th century London (in 1800 over one million London residents were burning soft coal) that “winter fogs” became common.

An 1873 coal-smoke saturated fog, thicker and more persistent than natural fog, hovered over the city of days. As we now know from subsequent epidemiological findings, the fog caused 268 deaths from bronchitis. Another fog in 1879 lasted from November to March, four long months of sunshineless gloom. (London’s Historic “Pea Soupers”)