onsdag 26 augusti 2015

Is this a cute banker villain that I see before me?

Wow. One thing I didn't expect to encounter in Poldark, which I've now finally started watching, was villain totty. True, at the back of the DVD cover, there's a picture of someone I thought looked quite tasty, but I didn't imagine that he would turn out to be the villain. I assumed, with my luck, that it was probably the hero's ninny of a cousin. It was not. It was George Warleggan.

I'd two reasons not to be optimistic about the baddie fare in Poldark. First, I somehow don't expect smouldering heroes of the unkempt, unshaven kind to co-exist in the same fictional universe as tip-top villains (this is probably just a prejudice - Wuthering Heights has a lot to answer for). Second, I did read some of the reviews and hype surrounding Poldark, but did anyone mention Gorgeous George? Well, "The Warleggans" - always in plural - flitted past now and again, but only to the extent that you realised that they were bankers and no great admirers of Ross Poldark, the hero. To tell the truth, I expected them to be fat, maybe with a wart or two. Well, listen to it: Warleggans. It sounds like a pair of goblins. I also assumed that their only function in the plot would be to put a few spokes in Ross's business wheels.

Instead, we have George: an absolute peach in exactly the right pale, slender, bankery way. I could watch him pensively weighing coins all day. And it's not just his looks either. The hot villain trend - which I'm surely not just imagining - will come to an end one day, so a villain-lover shouldn't become too fixated by such shallow matters as, say, well-dressed curls (though they're very welcome for all that). Unlike Pretty Ralph in Indian Summers - a show I'm constantly thinking of giving up on - Gorgeous George knuckles down to some impressive, traditional villainous plotting. He takes a keen interest in the hero's affairs, the better to be able to ruin him. He engages same hero in vaguely menacing banter and keeps his end up commendably. He's deliciously insinuating and manipulative with poor Francis, the aforementioned Poldark cousin. His motive is shadowy but not unconvincing: it's still a pleasing mystery whether he wants to force the cool kid from his school days (Ross) to finally become friends with him, or whether he has some old scores to settle (we remember what the cool kids in school were like, don't we?). Either way, it's not just business, it's personal.

The other Warleggan, incidentally, George's grumpy uncle (they seem to be quite common in 1780s Cornwall: Ross has one too) isn't a goblin either, though he continously looks fed up. His part in the plot is to bring George back to business earth when the latter becomes a little too fond of playing the gentleman. Compared to his nephew, though, Warleggan senior is a mere bit-part player.

Admittedly, it's early days, but right now - after three episodes - George looks a very promising candidate indeed for a villain crush, and the prospect of more Poldark will, I suspect, be a great comfort to me when Downton stops airing this Christmas. But how come no-one mentioned this crumpet in the Poldark features I've read?

Because, as is traditionally the case, what interests most viewers is the hero. Now, to be fair, for those who like that sort of thing, Ross Poldark is the sort of thing they like. And as smouldering heroes go, he's not half annoying as I thought he would be (if still rather annoying sometimes - well, he is the hero). Though a bit rough around the edges - designer stubble is a modern folly: I'm pretty certain it wasn't a thing in the 1780s - he's not plain rude, and perfectly able to string a sentence together without an insult in it. He does the decent thing when it's required, as a hero should but doesn't always. He also occasionally displays more rueful self-knowledge than smoulderers usually do. For instance, he's not indignant about the semi-hostility of his family. One has the feeling that Ross considers it a fair cop - they imagine that he still carries a torch for his old flame, who's now hitched to luckless Francis, and they're quite right. As for the famous scything scene, at least the commotion about it is not such a mystery as the still inexplicable Darcy Wet Shirt Business. If you fancy Ross Poldark, you'll like this scene. It just so happens I don't, much.

It took Poldark to remind me of how things usually are: generally speaking, I'm just not that into hunks, and the general public is just not that into villains. As long as Downton runs, I and a sizeable part of the costume-drama viewing audience will be singing from the same hymn sheet (I assure you I'm far from being the only Thomas fan around, as only a little irresponsible net trawling will show). Come the new year, however, and we will go our separate ways again, not having learned much by the experience. To them the scything hunks: to me the coin-weighing bankers.

onsdag 12 augusti 2015

Languid Indian (and Swedish) summers

Poor, pretty Ralph Whelan. After the first two episodes of Indian Summers (and vague recollections of the episode in the middle of the series which I saw in London) I can already guess what his Dark Secret will turn out to be, or at least what kind of a secret it is, and it will do nothing for his villain pin-up appeal. Of course, it will have something to do with his creepy obsession with his sister, butter-wouldn't-melt Alice, a good-looking young woman back in India for the first time since she was eight, when for unspecified reasons she was sent to England. In episode one, Ralph sends for their old rocking horse (with the help of a lot of Indian carriers), and it is revealed he has a photograph of Alice as a girl in his office. In episode two, Ralph sends for a piano (with the help of a lot of Indian carriers) because he remembers Alice playing on one as a child (she claims she doesn't play), and it is revealed he has an old drawing of hers in his possession. Get it yet? Creepy obsession! The Indian good guy Aarfir Dalal's love for his rebel sister is, on the other hand, entirely healthy and praiseworthy. There you go.

So, no real rich villain pickings there, then, in spite of Ralph being a looker and having two baths in as many episodes. Even discounting the whole sister thing, this villain pin-up is rather lazy when it comes to actually getting up to something villainous, or getting up to anything at all, really. Club owner Miss Cynthia (Julie Walters, getting the best part as is her due) and her Indian henchman Kaiser are far more active when it comes to mischief-making, as is sniping Sarah Raworth, who must somehow have missed out on the information that being a missionary's wife is not an easy life (hasn't she read Jane Eyre? Even Jane balked at getting hitched to a missionary). 

Is it as schematic as that, then? English man bad, Indian man good except when he's in league with English man? More or less, yes, but it could be worse. It's not as if Ralph and Co. grind the local inhabitants' faces in the dust while calling them "filthy scum". Some Indians aren't doing that badly out of the Raj, all things told. Still, we're quite obviously meant to tut at the English folks' behaviour. The political backdrop is so desultory it's boring: the case for Indian independence is so self-evident in the modern minds of the series-makers that no-one bothers to make a rousing speech explaining why it is a good thing, much less put the case for the opposition. The characters fail to grip me so far, but I think I will hang on a little longer. After all, you have to admire the chutzpah of a costume drama that dares to include a dancing-the-grizzly-bear scene post-Downton.

Cultural consumption-wise, things are a little languid at present, in the style of Indian Summers (which is why I'm reduced to write about it after only two episodes). I had a lucky reading streak a few weeks ago when I read two page turners in succession: Curtain Call by Anthony Quinn and A Tiny Bit Marvellous by Dawn French. Curtain Call looks like a crime story from the blurb, but the crime plot feels a bit tacked on: its strong points are instead the Thirties London atmosphere (it helps that the protagonists, with one exception, all have enviably arty jobs) and its quietly likeable characters - or, in the case of the outrageously egocentric theatre critic James "Jimmy" Erskine, loudly likeable. It also contains this comforting sentiment: "Entertaining people generally are [selfish]". I was expecting French's A Tiny Bit Marvellous, about the trials of the Battle family, to be over-hyped, but was won over by it, in no small part thanks to Peter a.k.a. Oscar, the precocious and affected sixteen-year-old son of the family who channels Oscar Wilde. Having been a precocious and affected teenager myself, I can testify to the portrayal of this character being spot on, as well as very funny. It's also generous in a female writer to let the safe anchor of the family be not the wife/mum Mo, who is capable of being just as immature and self-centred as her teenage children, but the decent, long-suffering husband/dad.

After this winning streak, though, things have slowed down. I'm struggling a bit with the Jenny Colgan I didn't finish during my journey, Rosie Hopkins' Sweetshop of Dreams. The formula is too close to the Little Beach Street Bakery, and honestly, who in their right mind could prefer some country backwater (with or without a sweetshop) to London? I plan to tandem-read it with a Swedish, pretty ambitious novel set in Stockholm in the Eighties. I just hope it doesn't prove to be too ambitious.

onsdag 5 augusti 2015

Why a chick-lit novel is the ideal read when travelling

I realise why people have issues with chick lit, I really do. Quite apart from the fact that there is so much of it that's very badly written, even superior chick lit feels like a very guilty pleasure indeed.

The typical chick-lit set-up does little for women's lib. The heroine is usually a ditzy twentysomething, accident-prone but warm and spontaneous. Her spontaneity gets her into all sorts of scrapes, which in the course of the book she will have to find her way out of. These heroines aren't thick, exactly, but the intelligence they have is of the "emotional intelligence" kind. They have an instinct about what people will feel and how they will react, which sometimes gives them the edge vis-à-vis their love interests. The love interests in question are mostly the dependable breadwinner type - in fact, noticeably often they are successful business men who, once they're caught, will be able to provide their girl with a comfortable shopping-filled life style. (Not that the girls ever think along those lines - no, it's true love that guides them.) If only Austen knew what she started with Mr Darcy. The downside of the successful businessman love interest is, as with Darcy, that he tends to be emotionally reticent, stiff even. When the businessman boyfriend gets angry, there's seldom a shouting match: instead he bottles up his anger and gets fiercely icy. It's a good thing, then, that the sparkly heroine can teach him to let his hair down and get in touch with his feelings. It's reminiscent of the song "Something's Gotta Give", except neither the hero nor his impeccable heart are "old". However, the hero tends to be ages more mature than the heroine, who is perfectly capable of behaving like a seven-year old.

Haven't we come further than this - must women still be the warm, emotional yang to the men's cold, reasonable yin (or is it the other way around)? Granted, chick-lit heroines are partly excused by their youth, but even so. Also, other stereotypes abound in this genre - think, for instance, of the heroine's GBF (Gay Best Friend - not to be confused with Big Friendly Giant) who is unfailingly queeny. I dare say there must be gay men who are slightly scruffy car mechanics with a bit of a beer belly, who would rather listen to Bruce Springsteen than opera and rather do anything than go on a fashion shopping spree, but you won't find them in chick lit. To be fair, the queeny GBF is dramatically useful, which I think is partly why this stereotype is so tenacious. Fun, waspish comments, which would sound iffy coming from the warm-hearted heroine, can be given to him, as can a running commentary of the available male talent.

So why bother with chick lit? Because when it's done well, it can be enjoyable, witty escapism. And there are some situations where you need escapism more than others. I swear by a Sophie Kinsella (chick-lit gold class) for getting you through a day of travel, especially by plane. Any airport visit is full of stress factors, not least because of all the self service which is mandatory nowadays, and where you have to do amateurishly and swearingly what trained staff used to do smoothly and professionally - check in, scan your passport, attach luggage tags, drop off the luggage, sometimes even scan the luggage tags you have somehow or other managed to attach (mind you, I'm not saying that the cut in price may not be worth it - just). Then there are the security checks, some of them provokingly pointless (when will they finally lift the liquid ban which everyone agrees is nonsense?), and this in an environment where you must not at any price be provoked into stupid jokes or outbursts. Throughout, there are the stop-go queues (bag drop, security, passport control, boarding) and, last but not least, the other passengers who offer a fairly large range of distractions. What is needed is something that will calm your nerves and put you in a friendly semi-trance while not taxing your brains or your emotions too much - chick lit, in short. I tried a Jenny Colgan on a return journey recently, but she proved too homespun - there has to be metropolitan glitz (London or New York, preferably) in travel-reading chick lit novels, not idyllic countryside with wise yokels. On the airport, I purchased Kinsella's I've Got Your Number instead - just the ticket.

Don't be tempted to go for something just that little bit more ambitious - like "hen lit" with more mature heroines and more serious problems. You'll need something light and airy as a soufflé. Even Kinsella writing a bit more seriously under her own name Madeleine Wickham proved a little less than satisfactory for me on the out journey. Reading matter full of glamour, shopping, jokes and mating games in pleasing surroundings will make you a more agreeable travelling companion, so grab a glittery chick lit novel for your hand luggage - you will be hard pressed to find a better excuse for reading one, and a good excuse is needed.