Episode 7: THE UNPLEASANTNESS AT THE BELLONA CLUB, part 1

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon dive in to the first third of THE UNPLEASANTNESS AT THE BELLONA CLUB, the fourth Lord Peter Wimsey mystery! Join us as we talk about the book’s portrayal of generational reactions to World War I, the effect of the war on different temperaments, and unhappy marriages in the wake of the war. We also cover the many similarities between this book and UNNATURAL DEATH, insights into how Peter organizes his cases, and how Chris Evans wears really excellent sweaters in Rian Johnson’s KNIVES OUT.

This episode covers up through chapter 7 and does not spoil the whodunnit.

Download the episode transcript (prepared by Melanie Sliker)

Shownotes:

  • “This is a one-sided rivalry.” Charis sent Sharon a truly wonderful holiday card:
    A picture of Charis's holiday card, which features Charis in four panel pictures embracing balloon letters that spell out "Noel" in various poses
  • Sharon doesn’t mean to keep referencing BLEAK HOUSE, but she can’t help but think of its Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce subplot whenever she comes across an inheritance plot.
  • Sharon also brings up Paul Fussell’s THE GREAT WAR AND MODERN MEMORY again to describe the ways that World War I informed the literary Modernist movement.
  • We mention L.M. Montgomery’s RILLA OF INGLESIDE in our discussion about how the novel portrays different dispositions reacting differently to WWI.
  • Read this Buzzfeed article for more about the #ThanksforTyping meme.
  • The anecdote about Queen Elizabeth II’s dresser breaking in her shoes comes from THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN by Angela Kelly.
  • Thanks to @epaulettes on Twitter for reminding us about Rian Johnson’s KNIVES OUT as a Golden Age-esque mystery with 21st century sensibilities on race and class! (After we struggled to name one in our listener Q&A episode.)
  • Here is Sharon’s funny cover of THE UNPLEASANTNESS AT THE BELLONA CLUB, with the note about Mobil Oil Corporation sponsoring the Masterpiece Theatre presentation:
    A cover version of The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club with Sir Ian Carmichael on the cover and the note that the Masterpiece Theatre Presentation is sponsored by the Mobil Oil Corp

Episode 6.5: “The Locked Room” and Listener Q+A

~ Sharon

In this holiday episode, Charis and Sharon discuss “The Locked Room,” a Lord Peter short story that was just published for the first time in 2019. It appeared in BODIES FROM THE LIBRARY 2, edited by Tony Medawar. Special thanks to Tony Medawar and to Laura Schmidt, archivist at the Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College, for speaking with us about the background for anthology collection and the story manuscript respectively!

We also wrap up loose ends from our conversations about UNNATURAL DEATH by revisiting our talk about the racism in the book, quoting our favorite lines, and talking about the novel’s original US title. And we ring out the year by answering some questions submitted by our listeners!

Note: If you would like to remain completely unspoiled for “The Locked Room,” our discussion of the story starts at minute 19 and ends at 49:13.

Download the episode 6.5 transcript (prepared by Melanie Sliker)

The podcast logo of Sharon and Charis holding books, with Santa hats on their heads and the words "Happy Holidays!" below
(Thank you, Gabi Vicioso, for our special holiday logo!)

Shownotes:

  • This is Sharon’s “very lurid 1960s cover” of UNNATURAL DEATH:
    Picture of a very bright green cover of UNNATURAL DEATH with a dead female body and a small dog on the cover
  • The “lovely new covers” that Charis and Sharon are both slowly collecting are from Hodder & Stoughton.
  • Artist Cathie Bleck illustrated the mass market paperback covers for HarperTorch’s Lord Peter series in the early 2000s. This is her cover for UNNATURAL DEATH:
  • “That doesn’t make sense!” We are still very puzzled by this particular cover:
    A cover of UNNATURAL DEATH with a figure on a bed and blood surrounding her head on the pillow
    (We will also be posting more UNNATURAL DEATH covers on our Instagram!)
  • Here’s the transcript of Charis’s conversation w/ Tony Medawar.
  • We both adore A.S. Byatt’s POSSESSION, wherein the plot is kicked off by a researcher finding an uncatalogued letter in a library archive.
  • Charis brings up the following Sayers’ quote from ARE WOMEN HUMAN? in our discussion: “A man once asked me… how I managed in my books to write such natural conversation between men when they were by themselves. Was I, by any chance, a member of a large, mixed family with a lot of male friends? I replied that, on the contrary, I was an only child and had practically never seen or spoken to any men of my own age till I was about twenty-five. ‘Well,’ said the man, ‘I shouldn’t have expected a woman (meaning me) to have been able to make it so convincing.’ I replied that I had coped with this difficult problem by making my men talk, as far as possible, like ordinary human beings. This aspect of the matter seemed to surprise the other speaker; he said no more, but took it away to chew it over. One of these days it may quite likely occur to him that women, as well as men, when left to themselves, talk very much like human beings also.”
  • In “The Locked Room,” Peter compares Mrs. Deerhurst in his mind to Amelia Sedley from Thackeray’s VANITY FAIR and Cleopatra.
  • In response to a listener question about mysteries that replicate the feel of Christie and Sayers with fewer problematic bits, Sharon and Charis were both a bit stumped. But Sharon does recommend TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG by Connie Willis. We also bring up Garth Nix’s SABRIEL in response to a reader question.

Episode 6: UNNATURAL DEATH, part 2

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon discuss the second half of UNNATURAL DEATH. We reveal the whoddunnit right away and chat about how difficult it is to talk around the culprit when it comes to this book. This episode revisits our conversations on spinsters, lesbianism, and the detective’s moral responsibility in light of later revelations in the book. We also boggle at the over-abundance of murders in this novel and have a lengthy discussion on how to deal with casual racism in the literature we love.

*Content note: UNNATURAL DEATH contains several instances of a racial slur. We do not use the word ourselves in our discussion, but we do talk about its appearance and context in this episode.

Download the episode 6 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • “He for God only, she for God in him”; Miss Climpson’s priest is referencing the unequal relationship between Adam and Eve in Milton’s PARADISE LOST (Book 4, line 297).
  • Charis’s robot vacuum Bunter is adorable and most helpful!
The robot vacuum (labeled "Bunter") that Charis mentions in this episode about UNNATURAL DEATH

Episode 5: UNNATURAL DEATH, part 1

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon discuss UNNATURAL DEATH, the third Lord Peter Wimsey mystery. We talk about how Lord Peter learns of this “crime of crimes,” where a murder doesn’t seem to have been committed at all. We also cover the issue of “surplus women” in the early 20th century, the prominence of spinsters in the book, the introduction of a favorite character, the novel’s portrayal of lesbians, and what happens when the detective’s actions cause an innocent person’s death. We also give a much-needed update about #justiceforBunter!

This episode covers up through chapter 10 of UNNATURAL DEATH and does not reveal the whodunnit.

Download the episode 5 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • To learn more about the public discourse around “surplus women” in the wake of WWI, listen to this excellent SHEDUNNIT podcast episode.
  • Biographical details about Sayers’ life and marriage are taken from DOROTHY L. SAYERS: HER LIFE AND SOUL (Barbara Reynolds)
  • More about Gilbert Frankau, whom Charis suspects DLS and UNNATURAL DEATH of jabbing at in chapter 3.
  • “That greatest of literary spinsters, Miss Bates.” Sharon is referring to a chatty spinster character from Jane Austen’s EMMA. This excellent article describes Miss Bates’ patterns of speech and lays out the narrative purpose her dialogue serves.
  • Correction: An astute listener wrote in to inform us that Miss Climpson is not, in fact, Roman Catholic, but rather Anglo-Catholic, from the branch of Anglicanism that emphasizes the denomination’s Catholic roots rather than its Protestant ones. We apologize for misspeaking!
  • Agatha Christie’s spinster detective, Miss Marple, first appears in “The Tuesday Night Club,” a short story published in 1927.
  • “They’re lesbians, Harold”; we actually slightly misspoke in referring to this meme. (It’s actually “Harold, they’re lesbians.”)
  • This is the Wikipedia article about REGIMENT OF WOMEN, the 1917 novel by Clemence Dane that Miss Climpson mentions in her letter and that Charis brings up in this episode.
  • Charis’ brother mentions “La Carmagnole,” a song associated with the French Revolution, in his reaction to WHOSE BODY? and its depiction of Lord Peter.
  • The comically clumsy sketch of the room set up for the will signing from Sharon’s book:
A very rough sketch of a room with a person in a bed, a mirror, and a screen hiding two witnesses from the eyeline of the person in the bed

Episode 4: CLOUDS OF WITNESS, part 2

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon catch up after several life disruptions to discuss the second half of CLOUDS OF WITNESS. We cover the idea of mysteries as “convalescent literature,” the novel’s treatment of national stereotypes, power imbalances in romantic relationships, and the detective’s family life. We also talk about why you should never go out onto the moors without your hat.

This episode reveals the whodunnit of CLOUDS OF WITNESS.

(An alert for our listeners: this episode contains the sound effect of a rifle firing. If you wish to avoid hearing it, skip past minute :50.)

Download the episode 4 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • In our conversation about cozy mysteries as “convalescent literature,” Charis references SHEDUNNIT, a podcast on Golden Age mysteries by Caroline Crampton, and this episode from THE ALLUSIONIST podcast about novels of convalescence.
  • “I guess MANON LESCAUT was a very popular opera during this period.” If you, like Sharon, were baffled by this reference, you also can find out everything there is to know about it in this article.
  • “There’s a bit of George Wickham in [Cathcart]”; Sharon is referring, of course, to that great Jane Austen villain from PRIDE AND PREJUDICE.
  • We talk at great length in this episode about THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (Arthur Conan Doyle) as both a precursor text and an inspiration for several plot points in CLOUDS OF WITNESS. And yes, Charis and Sharon remembered correctly that a character does in fact die on the moors in that novel.
  • For more on the song “On Ilkla Moor Baht’at,” see this Wikipedia article and give this recording a listen.
  • At minute 49, Charis paraphrases this quote from the Sayers short story “The Haunted Policeman”: “True to his class and training, he [Lord Peter] turned naturally in moments of emotion to the company of the common man. Indeed, when the recent domestic crisis had threatened to destroy his nerve, he had headed for the butler’s pantry with the swift instinct of the homing pigeon. There, they had treated him with great humanity, and allowed him to clean the silver.”
  • Sharon owes a great deal of the postcolonial theory she uses in the analysis about the description of Mrs. Grimethorpe to Edward Said’s masterful ORIENTALISM. In referring to the Victorian tradition of a love triangle that involves an Englishman choosing between an Englishwoman and a Jewish woman, Sharon is thinking specifically of IVANHOE. Walter Pater’s description of the Mona Lisa comes from his STUDIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE RENAISSANCE.
  • Hugh Kenner describes the phenomenon of the narrative voice shifting to mimic a specific character’s vocabulary and diction in JOYCE’S VOICES.
  • Sharon brings up THE NOVEL AND THE POLICE (D.A. Miller) in our discussion about how much we learn about Peter’s family in this book. THE NOVEL AND THE POLICE analyzes Victorian novels through a Foucauldian lens and theorizes that the professional detective always enters the novel as a public intrusion on private domestic space.
  • When we recorded this podcast episode, Charis was also reading THE MOONSTONE (Wilkie Collins), as assigned to her by Sharon in our first CLOUDS OF WITNESS episode. (Sharon has not yet completed her homework from that episode.) We also mention THE WOMAN IN WHITE (also by Collins) and Charles Dickens’ BLEAK HOUSE and A CHRISTMAS CAROL in our tangent about why Charis doesn’t like Dickens.
  • Sharon had recently read THICK: AND OTHER ESSAYS (Tressie McMillan Cottom) when we recorded this episode. She’s delighted that THICK has since been named a National Book Award finalist for 2019 and thinks everyone should read it.

Episode 3.5: THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY with Mo Moulton

~ Sharon

Welcome to a very special episode of As My Wimsey Takes Me! In this episode, historian Mo Moulton joins us to talk about their new book THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY: HOW DOROTHY L. SAYERS AND HER OXFORD CIRCLE REMADE THE WORLD FOR WOMEN. Mo tells us about the amazing individuals who made up the Mutual Admiration Society, their lives and accomplishments, and how this friendship influenced Sayers as a thinker and an author.

THE MUTUAL ADMIRATION SOCIETY is now available for purchase in the US and UK. Additionally, Mo will be on tour promoting the book. You can find more information about tour dates and locations on their website and in the graphic below:

Download the episode 3.5 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • “The Pound circle and the Hogarth Press“; Sharon’s referring to the wide-ranging influence of Ezra Pound and Leonard and Virginia Woolf during the Modernist period. Ezra Pound was a poet and editor who propelled writers like T.S. Eliot, James Joyce, and H.D. into the public eye. Leonard and Virginia Woolf, in addition to being accomplished critics and authors in their own right, also ran a literary press that shaped the Modernist canon through its publications.
  • Sexton Blake was a popular pulp detective fiction character during the era of Dorothy L. Sayers and the MAS.
  • ARE WOMEN HUMAN? is Sayers’ treatise on the essential personhood of women, originally delivered as a talk to a women’s society in 1938.
  • “RIP The Toast”; The Toast was one of the funniest and most feminist sites on the Internet until it shut down in 2016. Here’s a link to all of Mo Moulton’s writing for The Toast.
  • “RIP Readerville”; Readerville was the forum of readers, for and by readers, that was a formative part of Charis’ and Sharon’s “growing up on the Internet.” See this interview with founder Karen Templer and this New York Times article for more about Readerville.
  • Mo recounts the story of the “most beautiful and encouraging lemon” that Marjorie Barber sent to DLS in this lovely Toast article. Sharon has likewise treasured this most beautiful and encouraging lemon watercolor that Charis painted and mailed to her during a particularly difficult time:
A vivid watercolor of a lemon on a branch, surrounded by green leaves

About Mo: Dr. Mo Moulton is a historian of 20th century Britain and Ireland, interested in gender, sexuality, and colonialism/postcolonialism. They work as a Senior Lecturer in the History Department at the University of Birmingham, where they are the Director of the Modern British Studies Centre. Moulton earned their PhD from Brown University and spent several years working in the History & Literature program at Harvard University.

You can find Mo on Twitter @hammock_tussock and at their website, momoulton.com.

Episode 3: CLOUDS OF WITNESS, part 1

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon discuss the first half of CLOUDS OF WITNESS, wherein Peter must defend his brother, the Duke of Denver, after the latter is accused of murdering their sister’s fiancé.

We cover British vs. American detective fiction traditions and what CLOUDS OF WITNESS owes to the Victorian country house mystery. We also talk about Sharon’s theory of epigraphs, depictions of marriage in the novel, options (or lack thereof) for independent women in the 1920s, and what a mystery with Charles Parker as the protagonist might look like.

This episode covers up through chapter 8 of the book and does not spoil the whodunnit.

(An alert for our listeners: this episode contains the sound effect of a rifle firing. If you wish to avoid hearing it, skip past minute 1:10.)

Download the episode 3 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • “The Simple Art of Murder”; Raymond Chandler’s essay on British detective fiction (in which we think he was quite unfair to Sayers). Spoiler alert, the essay does give away the murder method for BUSMAN’S HONEYMOON, so don’t read it if you’d like to be surprised!
  • We reference Edgar Allan Poe as the progenitor of the detective story with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” and “The Purloined Letter” (full texts in the links).
  • “Love a good diagram!”; The floorplan of Riddlesdale Lodge from the book:
Picture of the floorplan of Riddlesdale Lodge
  • “She’s really like the Maris Crane of the Denver family”; Sharon is referring to the American sitcom FRASIER, in which there’s a running joke that the character of Maris Crane (also immensely unpleasant and whom none of her in-laws like) is never shown onscreen because the descriptions of her are so ridiculous.
  • We reference THE MOONSTONE and THE WOMAN IN WHITE, two novels by 19th-century writer Wilkie Collins, in our discussion of influences for CLOUDS OF WITNESS. Charis’ homework from this episode is to read THE MOONSTONE and see if she thinks Rachel Verinder is a model for Mary Wimsey.
  • We also briefly touch on THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (Arthur Conan Doyle) as another literary reference for the novel.
  • New Zealand writer Ngaio Marsh is considered one of the Golden Age “Queens of Crime” (along with Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers). Sharon’s homework from this episode is to read some of Marsh’s Inspector Alleyn novels and see if he reminds her of Parker.
  • We touch on how the title of CLOUDS OF WITNESS is a reference to the Biblical book of Hebrews, chapters 11 and 12.

Episode 2: WHOSE BODY?, part 2

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon discuss the second half of WHOSE BODY? We cover shellshock, literary Modernism, the novel’s experimentation with narrative form, and Sayers’ interest in theology, vocation, and social responsibility. Additionally, we reveal the culprit, our favorite lines, and what else we were reading at the time we recorded this episode!

Download the episode 2 transcript.

Shownotes:

  • The Tumblr post about Poirot that Charis loves is this one.
  • Sharon mentions THE COUNTRY AND THE CITY (Raymond Williams) in relation to our discussion on the false binary in literature between pastoral and urban spaces.
  • The Sherlock Holmes story that Charis brings up in relation to secrets in the countryside is “The Adventure of the Copper Beeches” (full text available online here).
  • In the discussion on Modernism, Sharon references THE GREAT WAR AND MODERN MEMORY (Paul Fussell), an influential book of literary criticism. Fussell’s thesis is that the trauma of WWI necessitated the changes in poetic language and narrative representation that gave rise to Modernist forms. Sharon also very cheekily brings up Virginia Woolf’s claim that “in or about December, 1910, human nature changed,” from Woolf’s essay titled “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” (full text available online here).
  • Sharon’s example of the type of formal experimentation most closely associated with Modernism is ULYSSES (James Joyce).
  • When we recorded this podcast, Sharon was also reading MAGIC FOR LIARS (Sarah Gailey), wherein a non-magical PI is hired to investigate a murder at a magic school.
  • Charis was reading THE FOREST UNSEEN (David George Haskell) and NIGHT WATCH (Terry Pratchett) when we recorded this podcast. THE FOREST UNSEEN chronicles Haskell’s year of observing one square meter of an old-growth Tennessee forest over the course of a year. NIGHT WATCH is a Discworld novel that also deals with themes of justice and social responsibility.

Episode 1: WHOSE BODY?, part 1

~ Sharon

In which Charis and Sharon discuss WHOSE BODY? as an introduction to the Lord Peter series, the uncomfortable anti-Semitism contained in the book, some biographical details about Sayers’ life, and how hideously underpaid Bunter is.

This episode covers up to chapter 7 of the book and does not spoil the whodunnit.

Download the episode 1 transcript.

Shownotes:

via GIPHY
[caption: the character Lucille Bluth, who is extremely wealthy, asks earnestly, “I mean, it’s one banana, Michael. What could it cost? 10 dollars?”]