Eyre Affair
Mar. 10th, 2006 01:32 amI can't remember where this was recommended to me, but I liked the idea enough to try it. It's another comic fantasy, though like many it didn't quite grab me in the end. ("In fact, the secret agency is kind of incompetant" is only funny so many times.)
But there were some wonderful touches in the premise. Imagine a world where literature has the importance, say, intoxicants have here. Vending machines recites verses of Shakespeare for small change. Fake original manuscripts are a big problem. Cheap knockoffs of famous books are raided from criminal warehouses.
Baconists, an organisation doubting the authorship of Shakespeare's plays, have a status something like Jehova's Witnesses[1] and something like recent communists[2]. Lots of little touches like this, make me feel very comfortable in the world.
The novels it bases itself off are slightly Martin Chuzzelwit and mainly Jane Eyre. It shows enough love for it that I feel inspired to try it.
[1] "Excuse me, ma'am, have you ever wondered who really wrote shakespeare's plays? Is the Shakespeare in Stratford even the same person as the playwright in London? Why does no-one in Stratford seem to have any notion of his literary success?"
"But then why does the Stratford Shakespeare mention the London Shakespeare's colleagues in his will?"
"I was hoping you wouldn't know that."
[2] "Steady on. It's not illegal"
"More's the pity."
But there were some wonderful touches in the premise. Imagine a world where literature has the importance, say, intoxicants have here. Vending machines recites verses of Shakespeare for small change. Fake original manuscripts are a big problem. Cheap knockoffs of famous books are raided from criminal warehouses.
Baconists, an organisation doubting the authorship of Shakespeare's plays, have a status something like Jehova's Witnesses[1] and something like recent communists[2]. Lots of little touches like this, make me feel very comfortable in the world.
The novels it bases itself off are slightly Martin Chuzzelwit and mainly Jane Eyre. It shows enough love for it that I feel inspired to try it.
[1] "Excuse me, ma'am, have you ever wondered who really wrote shakespeare's plays? Is the Shakespeare in Stratford even the same person as the playwright in London? Why does no-one in Stratford seem to have any notion of his literary success?"
"But then why does the Stratford Shakespeare mention the London Shakespeare's colleagues in his will?"
"I was hoping you wouldn't know that."
[2] "Steady on. It's not illegal"
"More's the pity."