In which Charis and Sharon return from their short hiatus to talk about traaaaaiiiiinnnnssss. That’s right, this is the first of two episodes on THE FIVE RED HERRINGS! Our friend Angela Hines joined us to represent the pro-timetables point of view.
We discuss Sayers’ correspondence about the novel with her publisher, as well as how the book differs from the previous Lord Peter mysteries. We also cover the scene of the murder, discuss a depiction of marriage in THE FIVE RED HERRINGS, and get ourselves tangled up trying to distinguish which Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood version of “The Lady of Shalott” we’re respectively referring to.
This episode covers roughly the first half the novel and does not give away the whodunnit.
Download the episode 14 transcript.
Shownotes:
- Excerpts from Dorothy L. Sayers’ letters taken from THE LETTERS OF DOROTHY L. SAYERS, Vol 1: 1899-1936 (edited by Barbara Reynolds)
- It turns out that Victor Gollancz, Sayers’ UK publisher, did in fact come through with a very handsome and large map for the first edition indeed:
- We talk about the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood of Victorian painters in our discussion about Mrs. Farren, whom Peter thinks could be a figure in a painting by Edward Burne-Jones. The Lady of Shalott was such a popular subject for the PRB that it turned out we were thinking of entirely different paintings for part of our conversation! Charis was thinking of the 1888 version by John William Waterhouse. (One of three studies of The Lady of Shalott painted by Waterhouse; the other two are the 1894 “The Lady of Shalott Looking at Lancelot” and the 1915 “I Am Half Sick of Shadows”) Meanwhile, Sharon was referring to the 1905 William Holman Hunt “Lady of Shalott,” which she saw on exhibit a few years ago:
- When Peter tells Bunter his narrative style would do credit to THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO, he is referring to the 1764 Gothic novel by Horace Walpole. And Wilkie Collins was a Victorian writer of mystery fiction, whom Sayers greatly admired.
