Another entry in my Flappers with Swords blog tour: I talk about how my love of costume drama has fed my fantasy fiction in Where Costumes Collide over at Fangtastic Fiction

This one slayed me – I had seen hints of the Normal Girl/Other Girls phenomenon on Tumblr, but it made no sense to me out of context. Enter the Mary Sue to explain it to me – hooray! I love the way that this story documents the way that one person’s attempt to parody the representation of women was misunderstood, then reclaimed, and had a massive fandom build around it, all in about 48 hours. Inspector Spacetime, eat your heart out.

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Thrown into a tizzy at the lack of new Downton Abbey in my life, I fell back on one of my favourite costume drama stories of all time, by listening to the audio dramatisation of The Forsyte Saga. The down side of Audible is that there is often little/misleading information on the as to the source of the material – I guessed this was a radio production, and also that it wasn’t produced at ALL in 2010 as the copyright info suggested, thanks to the presence of Sir Michael Hordern (died fifteen years ago), Dirk Bogarde (died ten years ago) and an unrecognisably young Amanda Redman as Fleur. I eventually pinned it down as this 1990 production, which at the time was the most expensive radio series ever made. My favourite bit of the article is where Dirk Bogarde came in thinking his role as Galsworthy (the author and narrator) would just involve a bit of “topping and tailing” but it turned out to be a major performance. He is lovely in it. I adore Galsworthy’s prose, which I think is third only to Austen’s and Pratchett’s for sophisticated, dry observational humour, and it was nice that despite it being a dramatisation, an awful lot of the original text appeared.

As a side note, why is it with so many major radio dramatisations of big classic books and serials such as this, there are so few of fantasy novels? I know there’s a well-regarded audio dramatisation of Lord of the Rings, but surely the serial and substantial nature of epic fantasy, as well as the incredible popularity of some series and authors, PLUS the crazy expense of adapting them to visual media like film or TV, would make them ideal for audio? I find it interesting that there’s such a strong history of science fiction in radio/audio plays, from Hitchhiker’s Guide and Earthsearch all the way through to today’s Big Finish. I first encountered Asimov’s Foundation through a radio play… so where are the radio dramatisations of Pratchett and Gaiman and David Eddings and Mercedes Lackey and… okay, let’s scrub the Americans as they don’t have the cultural history of modern radio drama like the Brits, but where is the 24 part radio serial of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, or Lord Dunsany or HARRY POTTER?

Ahem, anyway.

I love the Forsyte Saga. Like, crazy, adoring love. I first discovered it through the 2002 TV adaptation with Damien Lewis and Rupert Graves, then read the books at least twice through, then got hold of the epic black and white “TV event” version from the 60′s, thanks to my university library. Finding another fully dramatised version was a delight, especially as it turned out to be a very good one. Old Jolyon was played by Sir Michael Hordern, an actor I came to through many classic British movies, notably A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum. Young Jolyon, who is my favourite and my best, was played by Anton Lesser, who also won my heart as Falco in the audio dramatisations of Lindsey Davis’ novels. Diana Quick is a gentle and affecting Irene, Alan Howard is a suitably creepy and horrifically compelling Soames, and when she finally turns up, Amanda Redman captures the caprice of Fleur with that perfect balance of adorable and oh-I-want-to-slap-her.

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It’s amazing how fast it returns. A week of writing 1000 words a day, and it’s already feeling a lot easier, both to sit down at the computer, and to stay there for the full 1000 words without getting all twitchy and restless. The book is coming easier, and I’ve solved some major problems with it that had been bugging me for a while. Funny how writing a book actually makes the book, you know, get written. It’s a foolproof method, really.

Jem’s speech, which had been lagging behind her climbing, hugging and animal impressionistic skills, has recently been coming on in leaps and bounds. She has two two-word phrases now, ‘more toast’ and ‘Doctorrrrooo’ (generally while pointing at any pictures of well dressed Englishmen). We have also discovered that ‘jam’ and ‘yum’ are indistinguishable terms. Her favourite so far is quince jelly.

The cutest thing in the universe may very well be when I ask whether the girls want cereal or toast for breakfast, Raeli says ‘both!’ and Jem echoes, ‘bofe!’ These are the things which do not last, and need to be pinned down in memory.

Also this week I have inhaled the entirety of Downton Abbey, thanks to the encouragement of @zeft as well as the rest of the internet.

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Does anyone remember the British TV series Nanny, starring Wendy Craig, from the early 80′s? It follows a 1930′s nanny through her first year after graduation. She’s a divorced woman (scandalous!), a mature age student, and has been utterly spoiled by an introduction to Freud and other theories of psychology. Also, it turns out there are many handsome gentlemen with nanny complexes, who have to be beaten off with a stick! I bought the Season 1 DVD set on a whim a few months back, when ordering Sarah Jane from the UK, and have been wallowing delightedly in it this week.

Yes, it is all starched uniforms, nursery teas and horrid, horrid children. Plus, of course, a treatise on the many ways that everyone, from the upper crust through the middle clarses to the slum-dwellers, can all be appalling and inadequate parents. It’s 1980′s BBC drama, so everything is awfully slow and precise, and the outdoor sequences are all a bit lopsided. But it’s just so sweet and tidy, and it’s a good thing I’m indulging in it this month, because come April I’m going to have to go back to the bloodthirsty politics, fight scenes and excessive snogging of the Creature Court trilogy, and this would kill all those instincts dead.

There’s also the fun BBC drama game of spotting actors from other shows. So far I’ve spotted Portia from Rumpole of the Bailey and a very babycakes Gonch from Grange Hill. Nanny Gray also had a doomed romance with Count Grendel from the Androids of Tara (really, she should have known it wouldn’t work out).

Everyone dressed so nicely in the 1930′s! And when Nanny speaks sternly to you, even if you’re a little rotter of a child, you damn well do what she says! (so tempted now to go hunting Upstairs Downstairs and The House of Elliott DVDs)