NOVEMBER READ - SPOILERS - The Nine Tailors

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NOVEMBER READ - SPOILERS - The Nine Tailors

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1Morphidae
Nov 2, 2013, 8:56 am

Spoil away!

2hfglen
Editado: Nov 2, 2013, 9:16 am

fyi:

For non-Latinists: res angusta = a narrow thing

Here is a ring of Kent Treble Bob Major.

3Helenliz
Nov 2, 2013, 10:27 am

As a bell ringer, this book divides opinion. There are those who can't get over the technical imperfections of the description of the ringing and then there are those who can sort of shrug that off and just let the story flow. I'm the later - I married the former. But we still have 2 copies of it on the bookshelf.

I imagine the same thing applies to anyone who reads about their hobby/area of interest in fiction. You know more about the subject than the author and the general reader, so are able to pick up the areas of simplification or misrepresentation. Personally I can let the issues with the ringing take second place to the story, while accepting that it's a fair representation of ringing to a non-specialist audience.

Terminology: we'd refer to a ring of bells (not a peal of bells). They are described by either note or the weight of the tenor (heaviest bell) in units of cwt (hundredweights - 1 hundredweight is 8 stone or 112 pounds). In the book, the tenor, Tailor Paul, is given as 41 cwt - that's over 2 tonnes.

Each ringer rings one bell, but it is very rare nowadays for each ringer to ring the same bell for every piece of ringing. The ringing team is frequently inexcess of the number of bells, so you sit out some pieces of ringing over the course of a practice night. They may have a favourite, but the way each bell is a certain person's have long passed.

A touch is a short piece of ringing, a peal is when each bell rings in its turn a minimum of 5040 times. so in message 2, we'd typicaly say here is a touch of Kent Treble Bob Major*, not a ring. In the book this is described at taking ~ 3 hours, but for a 41 cwt ring of eight a peal of major would be 3&3/4 hrs, rather than 3.

But, as I said, for the non specialist it is a good introduction to the manner in which chuchbellringing in undertaken and it makes for a pretty intriguing story as well. Give me a shout if there's any other questions.

* actually no- we wouldn't it's a bliddy awful thing to ring and I'm very pleased it's gone out of fashion.

4MrsLee
Nov 2, 2013, 3:28 pm

Awful as it may be to ring, it is delightful to listen to, the bells sound very happy, although I wonder if I would feel the same if I listened for 3 and 3/4 hours! :)

5Meredy
Nov 6, 2013, 9:18 pm

One of the things that surprised me on this reread after so many years is how little this book actually shows us of Lord Peter's personality. And we see almost nothing at all of Bunter. I guess it was assumed that by this time (eleventh book in the series) both characters were very familiar to an audience of regulars. But I'm wondering how I ever got started with this book--or, rather, what brought me back for the rest of the series. Both Wimsey and Bunter seem very flat.

Detective Parker isn't even introduced at all. He's just suddenly there, without any indication of a connection with the principals.

From my present vantage point, this strikes me as odd.

6SylviaC
Nov 6, 2013, 10:33 pm

I had always assumed that it was one of the early books, because it showed so little depth to Lord Peter's character. Although I was intrigued the contrast between the callousness of his response to the discovery of the body and the many indications of his overall kindness and decency.

And I agree that Parker's appearance with no background information was odd.

7MrsLee
Nov 7, 2013, 1:18 am

I thought it a nice touch, and an insight into Lord Peter, when he was talking with Hilary in the graveyard and helping her work through feeling odd about the way she sees things. Wimsey (and all the nurses, policemen and doctors I know) have a way of removing themselves emotionally from a dead body. That frequently involves dark humor. It is a survival technique which I imagine he had to develop when he was in the trenches during the war. When it gets personal is when you have to deal with the living.

8MrsLee
Nov 10, 2013, 4:37 pm

Finished reading this again. I love the way Sayers begins each chapter with a quote. For those who are new to Wimsey, it is definitely lacking in the Parker and Bunter aspect of the stories. Neither of them has much of a role in this, whereas they play huge parts in Lord Peter's life in some of the other novels. This one also isn't dwelling on much of Lord Peter's personal angst's. I believe in the timeline of the books, he is still wooing (unsuccessfully) Harriet Vane.

9tardis
Nov 13, 2013, 1:44 pm

Still in the process of reading this. It has been such a long time since I last read it that I had forgotten many of the fine details, although the overall plot is familiar. When I want a Wimsey comfort-read, I tend to go for Gaudy Night (which I do not recommend unless you have read the previous books that feature Harriet Vane, because the resolution won't feel right unless you know their relationship from the start).

The first thing I noticed about The Nine Tailors is that I need to acquire a new copy - mine is a 1964 paperback and in sad shape! I hope it wasn't me who used all that masking tape to hold loose pages in and reinforce the cover - a real botch job. I don't recall doing it, but that doesn't mean anything.

I love the way Sayers writes. Her use of language, the way she doesn't talk down to the audience. For me, her characters (even the minor ones) feel very real. Possibly because I have read the whole series more than once so I don't see any of them in isolation anymore, I didn't find the sudden appearance of Parker odd - who else would Wimsey go to at Scotland Yard? I also noticed no lack of depth to Peter or Bunter, but again, I know them well of old.

This is not a complaint at all (quite the opposite!) but I do notice the lack of swearing, and by the standards of modern fiction, Nobby Cranton is very well-spoken for a crook :)

I'm fairly close to done - may have further comments later.

10MrsLee
Nov 14, 2013, 12:08 am

I didn't mean that Parker and Bunter lacked depth in this tale, I meant that they lacked stage time. I love them, and miss them, but then, this story isn't about them, so it is reasonable.

I adore Mr. Venables and have met him in various incarnations through my life, both in male and female form. Whenever I have a newsy, distracted, chatty guest at the hotel, I give them the nickname of Mr. Venables. A couple of weeks we had a guest from Canada, with a sort of British accent, who most certainly was descended from Mr. Venables. I didn't have the nerve to ask him if he was a vicar though.

It always makes me very sorry that Hillary's parents died without much introduction, because I think I would have liked them very much. Even that intractable woman who owned the emeralds seemed like a fun character to read about. I've met her at the hotel, too.

I think that Sayers is a master of "not" saying things, and yet her readers know exactly what she is aiming for. I'm thinking of Nobby, and Lord Peter's reaction to the bottle washing incident among other implied things.

11fuzzi
Editado: Nov 18, 2013, 11:25 am

(9) tardis, I like your post/commentary. :)

Now that I've reread the book, I need to do two things:

1. Rewatch the BBC production with Ian Carmichael (found it on DVD this year!)

2. Start reading the series over again

I was introduced to the Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries as a young teen, through the BBC productions that were being rebroadcast on Masterpiece Theatre (see here: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071024/). I think I finally found and read most if not all the books about Wimsey.

12streamsong
Nov 19, 2013, 11:00 am

Thanks for posting that, fuzzi. Looks like they're available on Netflix, so I added The Nine Tailors to my queue.

This is my first Sayers and I would like to read more, too.

13fuzzi
Editado: Nov 19, 2013, 12:22 pm

:)

The only mystery I recall reading before I discovered the Wimsey books was And Then There Were None, after I saw the movie "Ten Little Indians" on television. As usual, the book was much better than the movie, and I still have my original copy of the book.

Since then I've discovered Stuart Kaminsky and, recently, Spencer Quinn's Bernie & Chet books. I also read some of the Koko books by Lilian Jackson Brown, but after I read about 8, I'd had enough.

The best of the bunch, imo, is the Holmes and Russell books by Laurie R. King. I own them all except Pirate King.

14Morphidae
Dic 5, 2013, 4:35 pm

Finally got to my micro-review:

While I liked the laid back story-telling and I found the characters amusing at times, some things drove me batty. The style of dialogue was irritating. A character would go off on paragraphs of a monologue. You'd know that they were responding to someone, but you'd only get one side of a conversation. Or they'd be rambling to themselves. There was a lot of change-ringing terminology with no explanation of what the terms all meant. Lastly, the mystery was so convoluted, there was no way for you to figure it out yourself. It had to be handed to you on a platter. Then they killed off one of the main players for what seems to be no reason. It was a decent read but I'm not so sure I'd read another Sayer based on this book.

6 out of 10 stars

15SylviaC
Dic 5, 2013, 5:50 pm

Funny how tastes vary, isn't it? I think its one of the best books I've ever read. If you do ever decide to try another Sayers, you might prefer something more straightforward, like The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, or some of her short stories.

16fuzzi
Dic 5, 2013, 8:55 pm

(14) While I liked the laid back story-telling and I found the characters amusing at times, some things drove me batty. ...

Like the bell named "Batty"? ;)

It is funny, SylviaC. I really enjoy the LPW books, yet the acclaimed Poirot leaves me cold...

17SylviaC
Editado: Dic 5, 2013, 9:59 pm

Poirot irritates me, but I like Miss Marple.

ETA: And Lord Peter Wimsey is sexy.

18NorthernStar
Dic 6, 2013, 12:28 am

I re-read this recently - enjoyed it, and intend to re-read all my Sayers in the next few months. It had some great passages, although I didn't enjoy it as much as I remembered - I may not have been in the right mood.

19Best_Astro
Dic 6, 2013, 1:26 am

Este usuario ha sido eliminado por spam.

20Best_Astro
Dic 6, 2013, 1:27 am

Este usuario ha sido eliminado por spam.

21SylviaC
Dic 6, 2013, 8:22 am

Hmm, do you suppose that spam was brought on by fuzzi saying Poirot leaves her cold, by me using the "s word" about Lord Peter, or by NorthernStar not being in the right mood?

22Morphidae
Dic 6, 2013, 8:38 am

Has to be the "s word."

23fuzzi
Dic 6, 2013, 12:39 pm

Let's see if it happens again:

sexy
sexy
sexy SylviaC

24SylviaC
Dic 6, 2013, 1:08 pm

Why, thank you, fuzzi!

25NorthernStar
Dic 6, 2013, 2:48 pm

:)

26fuzzi
Dic 6, 2013, 7:42 pm

:D

27maggie1944
Dic 8, 2013, 5:57 pm

(-;

28fuzzi
Editado: Feb 10, 2014, 12:29 pm

It's interesting, reading how the British government is handling flooding, while recalling the political morass described in The Nine Tailors.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/10/us-britain-politics-flooding-idUSBREA1...