Sewell played Seth Starkadder in Cold Comfort Farm, the wonderful 1995 film made from the Stella Gibbons novel of the same name, published in 1932. It is hilarious and a special treat for British movie fans, if you love the Merchant Ivory films and their like. Poor Rufus, he doesn’t like the “pretty face” type of roles, but he is SO good at them.
Pride & Prejudice & Zombies
In Seth Grahame-Smith’s Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Jane Austen’s classic tale of the tangled relationships between lovers from different social classes in 19th century England was updated by the addition of an army of zombies. As if this (and sea monsters) weren’t enough, now they’re making a film version of the tale, with Natalie Portman both producing and starring as Elizabeth Bennett. The film, currently in production, is slated for release in 2011.
On the Shelf – Sugar: A Bittersweet History
Sugar: A Bittersweet History (April $29.95) by Elizabeth Abbot. This social history includes sugar’s roles in the international slave trade and the fast-food revolution. I haven’t read it yet, but it sounds fascinating.
From the publisher:
Sugar: A Bittersweet History is a compelling and surprising look at the sweet commodity, from how it Africanized the cane fields of the Caribbean to how it fueled the Industrial Revolution and jump-started the fast-food revolution. The book explores the hidden stories behind this sweet product, revealing how powerful American interests deposed Queen Lili’uokalani of Hawaii, how Hitler tried to ensure a steady supply of beet sugar when enemies threatened to cut off Germany’s supply of overseas cane sugar, and how South Africa established a domestic ethanol industry in the wake of anti-apartheid sugar embargoes. The book follows the history of sugar to the present day, showing how sugar made eating on the run socially acceptable and played an integral role in today’s fast food culture and obesity epidemic. Impressively researched and commandingly written, Sugar will forever change perceptions of this sweet treat.
More Praise for Sugar from Booklist:
“Sugar is the opiate of the people, lulling forgetfulness and forgiveness of its history of slavery, exploitation, rotting teeth, and depletion of the land. Abbott traces the history of sugar cane from Polynesia to India to the New World, particularly the Caribbean and the American South. Early chapters focus on the history of sugar as a spice, medicine, and aphrodisiac and its transformation from a luxury item for the rich, including gluttonous Queen Catherine, to sweet solace for common people, delivering calories and a boost during the Industrial Revolution. Abbott also details the dark side of the sweet sugar cane, brutal slavery, the subject of a boycott in the abolitionist movement led by William Wilberforce. She ends with the diaspora of sugar production and labor exploitation in the modern age, from the struggle to dominate Hawaii to the geopolitics of Coca Cola and other purveyors of sugary treats. Readers will never again be able to casually sweeten tea or eat sweets without considering the long and fascinating history of sugar.”
“”Fascinating… epic in ambition… there is much to savor in Sugar.” – Wall Street Journal
The Angela Thirkell Society Meets in Madison, WI
Victoria here, off to Madison, Wisconsin, in a few days for the meeting of the North American organization of the Angela Thirkell Society. At right, a drawing of Ms. Thirkell (1890 – 1961) by John Singer Sargent, 1918.
The Conference (August 13-15, 2010) will center on the theme
“Upstairs/Downstairs.” Included will be a collection of cars of Thirkell’s period (1930’s-50’s), speakers on Thirkell’s novels, and a gala costume banquet. For more information, click here.
Above, a portrait of Thirkell in later life.
Here are two typical examples of Angela Thirkell’s style of humor, both taken from Love Among the Ruins, published in 1948, and set in Barsetshire of of the same period.
“…she went off to one of those sham organizations that are called by their initials, only no one knows what the initials stand for.”
“It was the P.E.U.G.I.,” said Mrs. Birkett. “Pan-European Union for General Interference…”
Speaking of Scotland…”Though this description of what was evidently heaven was of a very sketchy nature, such was Mr. Belton’s enthusiasm and so pleasing his confidence in his hearers that they all felt deeply nostalgic for Scotland, which most of them had never visited.”
To conclude, here a few excerpts from an essay in the New York Times of January 4, 2008, entitled “Life, Love and the Pleasures of Literature in Barsetshire” by Verlyn Klinkenborg.
“When I first came upon Thirkell, nearly 30 years ago, she seemed like a diverting minor writer. Minor now seems too slight a word to me for
the purveyor of such major pleasures. … Thirkell has often been called nostalgic because she is describing a kind of life — English county life — that was vanishing even as her books were appearing. Yet there is nothing nostalgic or sentimental in her tone… You read her, laughing, and want to do your best to protect her characters from any reality but their own.”
I concur.
Results of the "Althorp Attic Sale" Christie's, London
It seems as though Earl Spencer has been cleaning the tat out of his attics, and oh, what tat it is. Here are just a few of the items sold last month at Christie’s Auction Room, King Street, London.
Mrs. Dora Jordan (1761-1816), mistress of William IV. Acquired at a sale of her effects by Frances Isabella, Lady Clinton (d. 1875) who placed it in the Dining Room at 28 St. James’s Place. By descent to her niece Lady Sarah Spencer (1838-1919) and by descent to Albert Edward John, 7th Earl Spencer (1892-1975), by whom removed to Althorp, Northamptonshire, in 1923.
Silver-mounted tapering Doccia porcelain étui of round section, the porcelain body decorated with antique scenes moulded in relief, the cover decorated with sea shells and rocaille in relief, within hinged brown fitted leather case; together with, another porcelain étui of round section mounted in gilt-metal, the porcelain body decorated with painted flowers; together with, another gilt-metal mounted porcelain étui of oval section, the porcelain body and lid decorated with foliage and masks, centred with circular cartouches containing bows and arrows, the cover cartouche painted with ‘Souvenir’ and, on the body, with ‘d’amitié’, gilt borders and swags to both cover and base, together with, another gilt-metal mounted enamel étui of rounded reeded body decorated with diamond pattern with a flower depicted at the centre of each (4)
The later arms on the doors are those Spencer accoll with Spencer impaling Baring for Charles, 6th Earl Spencer, K.G., (1857-1922) and his wife Margaret (d.1906), daughter of Edward, 1st Baron Revelstoke, whom he married in 1887. These arms were possibly applied for the coronation of King George V on 22 June 1911, at which Earl Spencer presided as Lord Chamberlain.
The initial is almost certainly that of Edward John Spencer, Viscount Althorp and later 7th Earl Spencer.