DLS: The Five Red Herrings
May. 3rd, 2003 06:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
truepennyPrevious DLS posts: Concerning Lord Peter Wimsey, the Hon. Freddy Arbuthnot, Miss Katharine Alexandra Climpson, Whose Body?, Clouds of Witness, Unnatural Death, The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club 1, The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club 2, Strong Poison.
I slept v. badly last night, as witnessed by the fact that I'm awake and posting at quarter past six in the morning (bleah). So the likelihood of dazzling flashes of insight, rigorous analysis, or even basic coherence is, um, small. But I am faithful to my self-appointed task, and shall now discuss The Five Red Herrings.
I'm going to leave it to someone who actually knows something about Scotland to talk about the use of dialect in this book and whether it was judicious or injudicious.
I'm going to start with the plot, and my (no-doubt partial) list of plot goofs. Some of these were listed in my post from a couple of days ago.
1. The plot requires Ferguson to be seriously schizophrenic: he must be a man of morbidly exact mentality, but also the sort of person who could put a tube of paint in his pocket and forget about it.
2. Strachan, too, must be simultaneously cold and unflappable (when dealing with Sir Maxwell) and possessed of a hasty temper and absolutely no forethought (when confronted by Lord Peter). Perhaps he's secretly twins?
3. The story of the encounter between Gowan and Campbell just won't wash. Campbell, operating with a pair of nail-scissors, at the side of the road, in less than optimum lighting, and DRUNK, could not possibly get enough of the beard off Gowan's face for wee Helen to describe him as clean-shaven, especially since the blackness of Gowan's beard is much commented on.
4. She gets tripped up in her own timetable at least once (although this may be a copy-editing goof rather than a plot mistake). Wimsey asks Mrs. Green about the Monday morning, when in fact Campbell was killed Monday night, and the relevant morning to the inquiry is Tuesday.
5. The age of Tom Drewitt and his son, esp. in relation to Waters. (This is a problem DLS seems to fall into whenever she doesn't remind herself to think about it. Uncle Meleager, in "The Fascinating Problem of Uncle Meleager's Will," HAS to be Miss Marryat's GREAT-uncle; Mrs. Marryat is an invalid, but she can hardly be of Uncle Meleager's generation--unless Miss Marryat is an unheralded miracle of science.)
6. Why DID Mrs. Smith-Lemesurier think Monday night was the required span of the alibi?
The only one of these which seriously bothers me is the first one--which it took me until my fifth or sixth reread to notice. I think this demonstrates with painful clarity the danger of trying to write these Rube Goldberg/Heath Robinson plots with real characters; plot and character CAN exist in the same small space--I'm sure of it!--but relax your guard for even a second and plot steamrollers character or vice versa.
So, yes, flawed, and I freely admit that on rereads I skip great tracts of narrative: the entire Farren subplot, the entire Gowan subplot. Sometimes I skip the Strachan subplot and sometimes I don't. This time I did--but then, I know I was reading T5RH at WFC, so it may not have had quite enough time to sift out of my head. But I read the Waters subplot and the Graham subplot with undiminished pleasure, and I do genuinely love the entire long reconstruction--although I love it better once they stop tormenting Ferguson with it.
And I figured out, this reread, why I have a soft spot for T5RH, even though it isn't her best book and it isn't uniformly gripping. One reason is Sgt. Dalziel, who is (I think) my favorite police character in the series, and the other is Jock Graham. Jock Graham makes woefully few appearances in T5RH, and he gets my vote for Character Who Should Have Returned In A Later Book But Didn't. His conversation with Waters about painting habits may be a flagrant vox dei ex machina for DLS to get us and Peter the information she needs us to have (and, no, vox dei ex machina isn't a real critical term), but it's written so lightly and warmly and beautifully that I cannot bring myself to care.
So, there's the quick rundown of pros and cons. I'm wondering if I have anything more substantial to say, and it is occurring to me that one thing T5RH represents, and one reason it may be a little wonky in spots, is a maiden voyage, for Peter and DLS, without either Charles Parker or Miss Climpson. That, after all, is the obvious reason to transplant Peter bodily to Galloway; it explains Parker's absence from the story without having to explain it. And she does honorably stick him in (as she does in The Nine Tailors and Have His Carcase), but it's a walk-on. He's not playing Horatio to Peter's Hamlet any longer. (Miss Climpson, sadly, just vanishes, except for mentions in Gaudy Night and Busman's Honeymoon.) In terms of narrative devices, this is a transitional book, and suffers from it.
I like T5RH, but it is a fairly conventional Golden Age mystery outing, rendered memorable mostly by Peter's dialogue and by the clockwork ingenuity of the plot.
Up next, the first post on Have His Carcase! (I'm excited, even if nobody else is.)
---
WORKS CITED
Sayers, Dorothy L. The Five Red Herrings. 1931. New York: Perennial Library-Harper & Row, Publishers, 1986.
I slept v. badly last night, as witnessed by the fact that I'm awake and posting at quarter past six in the morning (bleah). So the likelihood of dazzling flashes of insight, rigorous analysis, or even basic coherence is, um, small. But I am faithful to my self-appointed task, and shall now discuss The Five Red Herrings.
I'm going to leave it to someone who actually knows something about Scotland to talk about the use of dialect in this book and whether it was judicious or injudicious.
I'm going to start with the plot, and my (no-doubt partial) list of plot goofs. Some of these were listed in my post from a couple of days ago.
1. The plot requires Ferguson to be seriously schizophrenic: he must be a man of morbidly exact mentality, but also the sort of person who could put a tube of paint in his pocket and forget about it.
2. Strachan, too, must be simultaneously cold and unflappable (when dealing with Sir Maxwell) and possessed of a hasty temper and absolutely no forethought (when confronted by Lord Peter). Perhaps he's secretly twins?
3. The story of the encounter between Gowan and Campbell just won't wash. Campbell, operating with a pair of nail-scissors, at the side of the road, in less than optimum lighting, and DRUNK, could not possibly get enough of the beard off Gowan's face for wee Helen to describe him as clean-shaven, especially since the blackness of Gowan's beard is much commented on.
4. She gets tripped up in her own timetable at least once (although this may be a copy-editing goof rather than a plot mistake). Wimsey asks Mrs. Green about the Monday morning, when in fact Campbell was killed Monday night, and the relevant morning to the inquiry is Tuesday.
5. The age of Tom Drewitt and his son, esp. in relation to Waters. (This is a problem DLS seems to fall into whenever she doesn't remind herself to think about it. Uncle Meleager, in "The Fascinating Problem of Uncle Meleager's Will," HAS to be Miss Marryat's GREAT-uncle; Mrs. Marryat is an invalid, but she can hardly be of Uncle Meleager's generation--unless Miss Marryat is an unheralded miracle of science.)
6. Why DID Mrs. Smith-Lemesurier think Monday night was the required span of the alibi?
The only one of these which seriously bothers me is the first one--which it took me until my fifth or sixth reread to notice. I think this demonstrates with painful clarity the danger of trying to write these Rube Goldberg/Heath Robinson plots with real characters; plot and character CAN exist in the same small space--I'm sure of it!--but relax your guard for even a second and plot steamrollers character or vice versa.
So, yes, flawed, and I freely admit that on rereads I skip great tracts of narrative: the entire Farren subplot, the entire Gowan subplot. Sometimes I skip the Strachan subplot and sometimes I don't. This time I did--but then, I know I was reading T5RH at WFC, so it may not have had quite enough time to sift out of my head. But I read the Waters subplot and the Graham subplot with undiminished pleasure, and I do genuinely love the entire long reconstruction--although I love it better once they stop tormenting Ferguson with it.
And I figured out, this reread, why I have a soft spot for T5RH, even though it isn't her best book and it isn't uniformly gripping. One reason is Sgt. Dalziel, who is (I think) my favorite police character in the series, and the other is Jock Graham. Jock Graham makes woefully few appearances in T5RH, and he gets my vote for Character Who Should Have Returned In A Later Book But Didn't. His conversation with Waters about painting habits may be a flagrant vox dei ex machina for DLS to get us and Peter the information she needs us to have (and, no, vox dei ex machina isn't a real critical term), but it's written so lightly and warmly and beautifully that I cannot bring myself to care.
So, there's the quick rundown of pros and cons. I'm wondering if I have anything more substantial to say, and it is occurring to me that one thing T5RH represents, and one reason it may be a little wonky in spots, is a maiden voyage, for Peter and DLS, without either Charles Parker or Miss Climpson. That, after all, is the obvious reason to transplant Peter bodily to Galloway; it explains Parker's absence from the story without having to explain it. And she does honorably stick him in (as she does in The Nine Tailors and Have His Carcase), but it's a walk-on. He's not playing Horatio to Peter's Hamlet any longer. (Miss Climpson, sadly, just vanishes, except for mentions in Gaudy Night and Busman's Honeymoon.) In terms of narrative devices, this is a transitional book, and suffers from it.
I like T5RH, but it is a fairly conventional Golden Age mystery outing, rendered memorable mostly by Peter's dialogue and by the clockwork ingenuity of the plot.
Up next, the first post on Have His Carcase! (I'm excited, even if nobody else is.)
---
WORKS CITED
Sayers, Dorothy L. The Five Red Herrings. 1931. New York: Perennial Library-Harper & Row, Publishers, 1986.
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no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 07:47 am (UTC)On dialect, "imph'm" is now generally written "mmm" or "mm'hm" or something like that. With that caveat I think she does OK, considering the thing to be worth doing, which I don't.
(And Kirkcudbright is pronounced Kur-coo-bree", without which knowledge this would be a different novel for me...)
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 08:03 am (UTC)Is THAT how Kirkcudbright is pronounced? Oh dear. No wonder she's making fun of the London telephone operator--and now that joke makes sense. Thank you. I shall have to train myself to remember that. *makes note in front cover of v. battered copy of T5RH (all damage inflicted by current owner and her habit of carrying paperback books about with her in her purse), along with notes on the Christian names of Miss Selby (Margaret) and Miss Cochran (Mary)*
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 07:50 am (UTC)Well, I'm excited. I've always been very fond of HHC, but everyone else seems to hate it. I'm curious to see what you'll say about it.
I've been greatly enjoying all these DLS posts. In fact, they've inspired me to re-read several of the novels, which is always a good thing.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 07:57 am (UTC)I'm glad you're enjoying my essaylets.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 07:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 08:09 am (UTC)Oh, yeah, baby. Jock Graham is sex on a stick.
I want to see him played by a younger Sean Connery. Or Viggo Mortensen. ... *ponders* Yes, I think Viggo would do nicely.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 09:02 am (UTC)I'd also like to be counted as a third person who loves HHC.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 09:22 am (UTC)Umm... there are people who don't love HHC?? This sort of surprise, I suppose, is what comes of not discussing books with people. I've read HHC as often as Gaudy Night. In fact, I was going to skip it and move on to something less familiar, but now I need to go see if I can figure out why people might not like it!
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 11:16 am (UTC)In the first place, I just feel HHC "smells of the lamp". The whole huge great baggy monster of plot, which depends on wild coincidences (including the fortuitous friendship of Mrs M. with the vicar's wife), improbable alliances, opawue motives and everyone being relied upon to act like a total idiot to ensure the whole thing works.
The scenes between Harriet and Peter are mainly good, and there is a strong sense of place even though (to a sailor) the fact that it can't be pinned to a particular bit of coastline and various weird liberties are taken with tidal heights is a little disorienting (it has the "feel" of Devon near Salcombe/Start Point, but the tides are apparently based on Bristol).
I don't like the way the police operate to personify stolid lack of imagionation with occasional flashes of idiocy.
As ever in Sayers, the written dialogue grates and the local yokels are positively infuriating.
The murderers are overelaborating things they don't need to over-elaborate - a three-week imposture just to get hold of the murder weapon is bad enough, but using a murder weapon which is itself a limited edition? What's wrong with Woolworths, for heavens sake? Or Darlings?
I could go on, but this isn't the place.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 11:29 am (UTC)Written dialect?
no subject
Date: 2003-05-03 11:47 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-05-07 07:09 am (UTC)I think there are plenty of legitimate criticisms of HHC, but that the tides would be wrong if it were specifically set in Devon, when in fact it is kept blurred but for "south coast", is rather unfair.
no subject
Date: 2003-05-07 02:11 pm (UTC)I've no idea how you got to that conclusion from my comments about HHC. But if it makes you happy, why should I interfere with your innocent pleasures?
But my concern about the tides isn't that the tides are "wrong" for Devon, but that the tides at Bristol are idiosyncratic in a major way (they have the highest tidal range of anywhere in Britain except the Channel Isles). So by "borrowing" the Bristol tide table to get a generic "South Coast" feel DLS commits - to someone who's interested in tides - a solecism akin to a writer trying to get the feel for the weather in a non-specified Canadian city somewhere near the Great Lakes, borrowing the weather stats for Vancouver to do it with.
I've got much more extensive criticisms of HHC than that. Beginning with why do a murder in broad daylight in a location which can be seen for miles around?
dialect
Date: 2003-05-17 04:55 pm (UTC)Re: dialect
Date: 2004-04-27 10:19 am (UTC)There's a nice example on the Net somewhere where Robert Louis Stevenson's wonderful ghost story "Thrawn Janet", which is entirely in Scots except for its brief prologue, is respelled in modern standard Scots. It's probably a little harder for the monoglot English-speaker to read than it was before, but I find it manageable, and I don't speak Scots.
But in general you are right: no American says "vurry" for "very" that I have ever heard.