Hi: I just finished LIAGB and loved it; I just noticed one thing which seemed to be a mistake, and was wondering if it has already been discussed--when Thursday goes into "Sense and Sensibility," she remarks that she sees a woman "in Victorian dress" walking on the lawn.
S&S was published in 1811; Victoria didn't take the throne until 1837. I don't know what Marianne's dress would be called--"Georgian"?
It reminds me a bit of the 1940s film of "Pride & Prejudice," in which the Bennet girls were all walking around in hoop skirts.

Hmm, probably Georgian... (possibly 'Regency', I guess...). Jasper could always claim it was Thursday's mistake, as she's the narrator...

Nice outbreak of pedantry though!

(And welcome to the fforum, btw)



PSD

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This is the work of an Italian narco-anarchic collective. Don't bother insulting them, they can't read English anyway.

Thanks! I think "Regency" is correct. Of course, one could say that perhaps Marianne was trying on costumes during her "down time"!

well, having worked in the movie industry for so long, perhaps Jasper was confused because of all the anachronisms usually found in films....

Hello again,
I realized that I should have introduced myself, as it's my first time posting! My name is Karen; I live in the U.S., in a suburb about 20 miles north of New York City. I'm a librarian, although I'm not working at the moment--I'm being a stay-at-home Mom to our two boys, ages 11 and 8. I thought "The Eyre Affair" and "Lost in a Good Book" were two of the best books I've read in a long time, and I'm eagerly awaiting the next in the series, which I've already pre-ordered from Amazon.uk.
Best,
Karen

A very hearty welcome to you Karen! Come on in, we like newbies around here! As Jasper says, we're "all quite mad" and we have a lot of fun. No one is ever rude and we have some very intriguing and insane conversations. Oh, and if you couldn't tell already, it's rare for a thread to stay on topic for more than 4-5 posts. That's part of our charm!

Karen,

That sounds like the kind of "bloophole" that Jasper might want to fix in a future edition. If left unchecked, it might grow into a temporal anomaly!

AAC: You've been around here a long time. Do you have a feeling for how much Jasper reads the Fforum? If one wanted to alert him to a blooper, what would be the best way to do it?

the best way is to simply email him directly. He does read the Fforum whenever he gets a chance, but he's been a VERY busy boy of late. All Fforum posts do get emailed to him because he checks for questionable content.

Of course, if you really want to get his attention, just mention "monkey ears" LOL (long story, ask Magda and Skiffle sometime! LOL)

But seriously, just send him an email. Easy-peasy. Don't be shocked if it takes a little while for him to get back to you, though. The publishers have him hopping right now!

Wow, another Librarian! We have a few round here.

Here, have a banana and welcome to the Fforum.



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There's a hole in my creativity bucket and it's all leaked out.

Karen _
Welome to the fforum. Nice save, re Marianne trying on costumes...
(If a flying helmet's OK, then why NOT Victorian garb? :-)

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"This was willed where what is willed... can get rather silly."



Post Edited (05-27-03 16:39)

AAC _
Re anachronisms in movies: That isn't just the case for costumes, either... I still remember watching a movie of 'The Secret Garden', which is set in either Edwardian or late Victorian times, which had a stately home's maidservants singing as they worked... and the song was 'Greensleeves' (and the royalties... go to Royalty :-). Admittedly that film had a foreign director, but even so...

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"This was willed where what is willed... can get rather silly."

Actually, since Greensleeves dates back to the 16th century, in theory it could have been sung any time after that without creating an anachronism.



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"I've often said that the difference between British and American SF TV series is that the British ones have three-dimensional characters and cardboard spaceships, while the Americans do it the other way around."
--Ross Smith

"Could have been" is one thing, "would have been" is another...

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This was willed where what is willed... can get rather silly."

Is that a Flanders and Swann reference . . . (And the royalties ... go to royalty)? It's a bit of an obcsure one, but I guess that's no surprise on here.

Mine's an officiolemonade.



Jesus saves; Buddha does incremental backup.

Yes, the reference was indeed to Flanders and Swann.

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"This was willed where what is willed... can get rather silly."

And here I thought it was because Greensleeves was according to some (unproven) theories composed by Henry VIII (or at least arranged based on a folk melody.)

I don't understand Simon's "would have been is another". The tune has been continuously popular for centuries, and the Greensleeves lyrics are the oldest.

[www.hymnsandcarolsofchristmas.com]

Re 'Greensleeves' _
"Continuously known (by at least some of the population at any one time)" I'll grant you, but "continuously popular" is probably over-stating the situation. It may have lasted as a "popular" tune for a while after Henry's reign, but by the period in question a lot of other songs had become popular too, and it's much (much, much....) more likely that people then would have been singing a newer one of those instead... Something from the music hall repertoire, perhaps. After all, how often does one here 'Greensleeves' being sung (instead of anything more modern) in a casual context today? Saying that because the film was set after its composition means that it being sung by people in the film's setting would have been likely would be like saying that because the film was set after ruffs were invented its male characters could have been wearing ruffs without THAT being an a anachronism: Fashions change in popular music AS WELL AS in clothing, after all... The past isn't just "another country" as the saying goes, it's a whole batch of DIFFERING "other countries"....

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"This was willed where what is willed... can get rather silly."

Sorry, but I agree with Teri and Magda here. Wearing anachronistic clothing would be an issue, but singing an old folk melody certainly wouldn't. There are many tunes that have been recorded solely through being sung by people into the twentieth century, having had no other record in printed music or otherwise. If they aren't singing them, how do you propose they were kept alive?

Comparing the clothes is a red herring, too. Fine, wearing a ruff would be an anachronism, but would wearing a buttons on the clothes be an anachronism? Of course not. Fashion may change, but that doesn't mean everything becomes unfashionable. Look at the preponderance of Mozart for mobile phone ringtones - are these anachronistic?

Greensleeves is an amazingly persistant song - it has been sung in one form or another for centuries and will continue to be so. just as Shakespeare is still performed (would a character going to a play be anachronistic just because people go to cinema more often?). 'On Ilkely Moor' is still sung all over the Ridings, despite 'more recent' songs having been written.

Finally, Music Hall was seen as entertainment for the lower classes - and singing the tunes may have annoyed the employers somewhat. Country houses were amazingly good at being anachronistic when compared to wider society at the time.

Oh, and as for the last time I heard it sung casually - a girl at the end of my road was singing it last week as she played in the garden, and it's played by virtually every ice-cream van, making it one of the best known melodies in the country. It also became a standard ballad of the West, apparently - [www.cs.rice.edu]



PSD

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This is the work of an Italian narco-anarchic collective. Don't bother insulting them, they can't read English anyway.

So, if one wanted to e-mail Jasper about the "Victorian Dress" bloophole, would one use the e-mail address on the home page?
He's probably already been contacted by many irate Janeites (of which I am not one--I love Jane, but I don't take her THAT seriously.)
Karen

yeppers, that's the one. Just send him an email. He'll probably include it in some upgrade bookplate or at least give a quick and quasi-plausible reason for it. LOL