Martin Fone's Blog, page 160

Covid-19 Tales (20)

The development and rollout of the Covid-19 vaccines is a remarkable scientific and logistical achievement, something to celebrate, for sure. Why not celebrate with a vaccine-themed sweet mousse?

The Sulyan family patisserie in Veresegyhaz, north east of Budapest in Hungary, has launched a range of layered mousses with colourful jelly toppings, presented in small glasses, with decorative syringes on top. Each colour of jelly represents a different Covid-19 vaccine available in the country: citrus yellow for Astra Zeneca, a slightly darker yellow for Sinopharm, matcha green for Pfizer, orange for Sputnik V, and vivid blue for Moderna.

When you turn up for your injection, you have no say in which vaccine you will be given. However, at the patisserie, confectioner Katalin Benko reported, customers are free to choose whichever one they want. And the only likely side-effect is that it will put a smile on your face.

What’s not to like?

Cantering Through Cant (30)

Many of the entries in Francis Grose’s fascinating A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785) have left me in the wood. This phrase, he informs us, means to be “bewildered, in a maze of troubles, puzzled or at a loss what course to take in any business”. To look over the wood is to ascend a pulpit to preach while to look through the wood is to stand in a pillory. A wooden ruff Norway neckcloth is a pillory and a wooden habeas is a coffin. A man who dies in prison is said to go out in a wooden habeas.

To be wrapt up in warm flannel is to be drunk with spirituous liquors whereas to be wrapt in his mother’s smock is said of someone who has great success with the ladies. To be wrapt in someone is to have a good opinion of someone or to be under their influence.

Something to avoid is Womblety Croft, said to be to the indisposition of a drunkard after a debauch, no doubt after drinking by word of mouth, out of a bottle or bowl rather than a glass.

A word pecker was one who plays upon words and a word grubber is a “vocal critic or one who uses hard words in discourse”. In case I am accused of word grubbery, I shall close this insight into the world of 18th century slang.

Death Of A Busybody

Death of a Busybody – George Bellairs

It is something of a Golden Age crime fiction trope that a picture postcard perfect English rural village is really a seething cesspit of jealousies, rivalries, rumour, gossip and the occasional murder. George Bellairs’ 1942 creation of Hilary Magna and its satellite hamlet of Hilary Parva, created when two brothers inevitably fell out, follows this long and hallowed tradition. Death of a Busybody, featuring Bellairs’ detective creation, Inspector Littlejohn, is a wonderfully light confection, so moreish that it is difficult not to devour it all in one sitting.

Published in the darkest moments of the Second World War with the reading public desperate for a piece of light entertainment that would take their minds off the horrors of their diurnal existence, this book does not disappoint. It is laced with humour, both in the dialogue and also in Bellairs’ turn of phrase. We meet a gardener bending over his spade with “a huge backside protruding like some monstrous black toadstool” and the tongue of the busybody who is done away with, Miss Tither, is likened to a weapon “which she used like a pair of bellows, fanning a spark of a whisper into a consuming fire of chatter, a holocaust of pursuing flame.” And the names of some of his characters are just wonderful, not least the Reverand Ethelred Claplady, the grocer Allnutt. and pre-empting Joseph Heller, the village even boasts a Major Crabtree who was forced to change his first name to Wilfred by an enraged sergeant major.

Then there isPC Harriwinckle. It is another trope of works like this that the humble local bobby is a lumbering oaf and a figure of fun. Indeed, Hilary’s constable is not the brightest or the fittest, being too partial for his grub, and is involved in many of the moments of comedy in the book, but he knows the area, is industrious in his own way and plays a part in solving the murder. It was gratifying to learn at the end of the book that he had earned the promotion which was his great and the summit of his ambitions.

Miss Tither is the village busybody who knows everybody’s secrets and lets them know she does. She also is evangelical and supports charities that support fallen women and generally improve moral welfare. It is these two strands which combine to lead to her demise, found dead in the Vicar’s cesspool, a whimsical end which suits Bellair’s lightness of touch. Because the local force has a lot on, Littlejohn from the Yard is called in and gradually pieces together a complex puzzle involving marital indiscretions, an woman disappointed by her cousin’s deceitful behaviour, a seemingly unbreakable alibi, a piano organ that plays automated rolls of music, and bogus charitable organisations.

Although the puzzle is interesting, well plotted and the reader is kept guessing for much of the book, always the hallmarks of a good book of this genre, I was as much enchanted by the picture of wartime England that Bellairs was painting. Petrol is in such short supply that a local taxi driver has reverted to a horse and cart, land girls have been drafted in to keep the farms working and get the harvest in and labour is in short supply because so many men have been called up.

There is a strong religious undercurrent running through the tale with a village priest, an evangelical, a missionary and religious sects. Bellairs seems to have little time for the sort of recherche disputations that sects engage in to claim the moral high ground nor for those who only too readily see the faults of others but not their own.

I will certainly read more of Bellairs’ work and there is a lot of it. A bank manager by day by the name of Harold Blundell, he wrote 62 novels in his spare time, 58 as Bellairs and the remainder as Hilary Landon. If you like an undemanding but entertaining page turner, you cannot do better than this.

He Dies And Makes No Sign

He Dies and Makes No Sign – Molly Thynne

It is always a smart move to sign off leaving the audience wanting more. Published originally in 1933 and reissued for a modern readership by Dean Street Press, this is Molly Thynne’s sixth and final murder mystery and her third involving her chess-playing amateur ‘tec, Dr Constantine, and Inspector Arkwright of the Yard. In truth, it is less of a murder mystery, the culprit is easy to spot and is unmasked only two-thirds of the way through, leaving the rest of the book, where the pace quickens, to develop into a fast-paced thriller.

There is a delicious vein of humour running through the book. The formidable Duchess of Steyne, who calls in Constantine to assess the suitability of her potential daughter-in-law, Betty Anthony, against whom she has taken a dislike without seeing her, is delightfully drawn and, one can imagine, typical of her class. The pair of ju-jitsu masters are amusing additions to the storyline and play their part not only unravelling the mystery but also help Constantine escape from a tricky situation. Even when the plot is moving at pace Thynne finds time to inject humour, not least when the Duke of Steyne loses his hat.

The book’s rather odd title is a quotation from Shakespeare’s Henry VI Part 2. To give it some context, the Earl of Warwick responds, “so bad a death argues a monstrous life” to which the king replies, “forbear to judge, for we are sinners all”. The poor unfortunate who suffers so bad a death is a violinist, Julius Anthony, who disappears and is found stuffed in the nether regions of the cinema he performs at. In investigating how he died, why and who killed him, Constantine and Arkwright unearth a family secret, explaining why there are concerns about Betty Anthony’s suitability to marry into the Steyne family, nefarious goings on at the Trastevere restaurant situated in the grounds of the Steyne’s mansion, and an international drugs cartel.

Anthony seemingly has led a blameless existence, little warranting such a tragic ending. However, he has unearthed a secret which will threaten to blow the cover of what we would consider now as a front for more sinister activities. We tend to think of drug running and the liberal consumption of cocaine as a modern-day problem, but it is interesting to see how many Golden Age detective stories, at least those that I have read, feature this aspect so prominently.   

There is a welcome return for Manners, Constantine’s butler, who reprises his role in Death in the Dentist’s Chair by unearthing some valuable information from the lower orders. The rigidity of the English class system pervades the book, but does not spoil the read, simply reflecting the attitudes that pertained at the time. Instrumental in the final elements of this tale is a character who has barely featured in the story to that point. It just enhances the sense that the justice meted out is ironic and deserved, a more satisfying end than if the forces of law and order were allowed to swing into action.  

Thynne’s books are so good, well-written with good plotting and characterisation that it is a mystery why she stopped writing. Perhaps she had grown frustrated with the limitations of the genre. I’m looking forward to reading her other three books and am sure, over the next few years, I will be rereading them, something I rarely do.

The Dancing Bear

The Dancing Bear – Frances Faviell

Originally published in 1954, and now reissued by Dean Street Press, this was Olivia Faviell Lucas’ first foray into literature. She was better known at the time as a painter. Although it precedes her fabulous account of the Blitz, A Chelsea Concerto, The Dancing Bear recounts her experiences in post war Berlin, from 1946 to 1953, although much of the narrative is around events between 1946 and 1948. It is a harrowing read but one in which Faviell’s warmth and humanity shines through.

Faviell and her young son, John, accompanied her husband as part of the British Control Commission to Berlin. Even though she had experienced first-hand the Blitz, the scenes of destruction she found there shook her as did the desperate circumstances in which the Berliners found themselves in, scrabbling around to eke out a pitiful existence. Stampie, Faviell’s driver, is a fount of all knowledge about contemporary Berlin and ever resourceful in finding those precious items that make life bearable. The two form an impressive partnership.

Faviell constructs her narrative around a local family, the Altmanns. Whilst this approach is potentially limiting in scope, it does allow us to get to know the family better, get under their skin and understand their worries, struggles, and even ambitions through Favell’s sympathetic storytelling. It does leave a suspicion that there is some quite considerable artistic licence at play because, surely, Faviell could not have been so lucky as to hit on a family whose fortunes are so wildly different and tragic as they are portrayed in the book.

Faviell and Stampie first encounter Maria Altmann as she struggles to push a handcart through the streets. She collapses and although it is forbidden for allies to allow Germans into their cars, they drive her home. This is the entrée she requires to meet the rest of the family. Her eldest son, Kurt, has not returned from the Eastern front, Ursula “works” for the Americans and is the provider of money and goods, Lilli is a ballet dancer, and Fritz is a ne’er do well, a constant source of concern.

Tragedy stalks the family. Maria’s husband dies as does the pregnant Lilli while Ursula marries her GI, Joe, and leaves for a better life in the States while Fritz moves to the Russian sector and rise up the Communist youth movement. Maria too dies. Although the subject matter is grim, Faviell manages to inject some light and humour into her account, not least when recounting the escapades of Stampie and the love rivalry the American Joe and a close friend of the family, Max, over Ursula. We learn that while Ursula’s heart may be with Max, the harsh economic reality of her circumstances means that Joe will always win out.

As well as providing astonishing insights into the struggles of the Berliners as they face the Russian blockade, only alleviated by the Allies’ air drops, and the ever-constant fear that the Allies will abandon them to the Russians. There are two more general insights that I found fascinating; how the former members of the Hitler Youth found the organisation of the Communist party (Fritz) and the emerging right-wing factions (Max) provided them with a sense of direction and mission that had been missing since the defeat of the Further, and how the initial stand-offishness of the British alienated the Berliners, making it much harder to rebuild bridges when the official British line towards them softened.

The bear is the symbol of Berlin and the title refers to the lament of many a Berliner that they have to dance to the tunes of their invaders. Faviell’s book opened my eyes to the privations suffered by the Berliners and is a surprisingly empathetic, moving account. It is well worth a read.

The Lost Game Of Panko

The Panko Votes For Women card game completes our look at suffragette-inspired games. Named after the prominent suffragette, Emmeline Pankhurst, it was first advertised in the magazine, Votes for Women, on December 10, 1909 and was part of the Women’s Social and Political Union’s innovative commercial strategy to promote their cause and to raise vital funds.

Selling at two shillings and published by Peter Gurney Ltd, the game consisted of a pack of forty-eight cards, each featuring a caricature of leading figures involved in both sides of the suffragette struggle and scenes of involving suffragettes and the forces of oppression aka the police. Each was drawn by Edward Tennyson Reed, a prominent English political cartoonist well known for his work for the magazine, Punch. They are wonderful pieces of work laced with humour. As the game’s advertisement gushes, “not only is each picture in itself an interesting memento but the game produces intense excitement without the slightest hint of bitterness”.

This claim may seem a little over the top as the game was a card game akin to rummy, pitting supporters and opponents of the suffrage cause against each other. There were eight sets of six cards, grouped by the following slogans, which presumably, were commonly heard during the campaign; “Fourteen Days!, Votes for Women, Toot! Toot! Toot!, Law! Law! Law!, Gaol! Gaol! Gaol!, Help! Help! Help!, Turn ‘Em Out!, and Pank! Pank! Pank!”. Each card had a purple back, one of the colours favoured by the suffragettes.

The object of the game was to collect all of the six cards in a set, the first player to do so being the winner. Simplicity itself, but you can imagine that it was a game that was played more than once. What is more interesting is the psychology behind it, spreading the suffrage message into homes where the master may not have been supportive of the idea but might have turned a blind eye to a seemingly innocent game.

To this end, Reed’s illustrations deserve closer scrutiny. Take one of the Gaol! Gaol! Gaol! Cards. it depicts a suffragette in her prison uniform refusing a tray of food proffered by her gaoler. A sign on the back wall reads “Holloway Restaurant” and below it the slogan “Faim de siècle”, a play on fin de siècle. It is tempting to think that the prisoner is Wallace Dunlop, jailed for printing an extract from the bill of rights in the House of Commons. She was the first to refuse all food, initiating what became one of the suffragettes’ most successful tactics, the hunger strike. At a glance, the card just portrays what seems to have been a common scene, a suffragette refusing food, but there are more subtle messages being portrayed.

More of these games seemed to have survived, perhaps because of its convenient size and the quality of the illustrations on the cards, and shed a fascinating insight on the struggles and tactics deployed in Edwardian England.     

Tribute Of The Week

When you lose a loved one, what do you do with their ashes? This is often a perplexing problem and involves difficult decisions.

John Hinkle from Illinois was an avid ten-pin bowler and when he died in July 2016, his son, also called John, decided that a fitting tribute would be to fill a bowling ball with some of his father’s ashes. It took him over four years to find someone who would fulfil this rather strange wish.

On April 12th this year, he was ready to use the ball, boasting to his family that he would shoot a 300 with it. Despite his father’s prowess, the nearest he had come to the score was a 299.

Sure enough, first time out John Junior recorded a score of 300. There must have been something special about that bowling ball.

Duel Of The Week

Called the battle of the Joshes, it started out from pandemic boredom. At a loose end, Josh Swain, a college student from Tucson, Arizona, began to send messages on social media to others who shared his name, challenging them to a duel. Don’t you just hate those sort of people?

Instead of ignoring this bizarre and random message, many a Josh Swain rose to the challenge. A venue was selected, at random – it turned out to be Air Park in Nebraska – and several hundreds turned up to view the event.

Proceedings started with a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors between the Josh Swain from Arizona and another Josh Swain, from Nebraska, for the right to be the true Josh Swain. The winner was Josh Swain, the Arizona one.

Then the duelling started, open to anyone whose first name was Josh. The weapon of choice was a pool noodle, one of those cylindrical pieces of buoyant polyethylene foam. The winner of that competition was 4-year-old Josh Vinson from Lincoln, dubbed as “Little Josh” and he was duly crowned with a crown from Burger King.

After all that joshing the Joshes departed. The power of social media, eh?

Cantering Through Cant (29)

Welch rabbit, as it was known in Francis Grose’s time, was bread and cheese roasted, according to his A Classical Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue (1785). The Welsh, he notes, are so fond of cheese that “in cases of difficulty their midwives apply a piece of toasted cheese to the ianua vitae to attract and entice the young Taffy, who on smelling it makes most vigorous efforts to come forth”.   

The dictionary is full of quaint customs, many of which can rebound to the detriment of the participants. One such was whip the cock. Popular at wakes, fairs and horse races in Leicestershire, a cock was tied or fastened into a basket and half a dozen carters would be blindfolded and armed with their whips. They would be placed around the hat containing the cockerel and then spun round a few times. The object of the exercise is for one of them to strike the hat with their whip and make the cock cry out, an achievement that wins them the bird. However, in reality, Grose observes, what happens is that the participants are so disorientated that they set about whipping each other.

We are familiar with the use of white feather as a symbol of cowardice. Grose attributes its usage to an allusion to “a game cock, where having a white feather is a proof that he is not of the true game breed”. Another form of insult was to call someone a winter’s day, short and dirty. Insults seemed much more inventive in those days.

Haysmith’s Spiced Apple and Ginger Flavour Gin

The Gin Act of 1751 was a rather draconian and effective response to the social evils that the excessive consumption of bootlegged alcoholic spirits was responsible for. So effective was it that outlawed small scale gin distilleries for over 250 years. The law was eventually challenged by Messrs Sam Galsworthy, Fairfax Hall and Jared Brown, the founders of Sipsmiths, and in 2009 the law was changed allowing small-batch distillers to operate once more. Fittingly, the first copper-pot distillery to take advantage of the law change was Sipsmith.    

The floodgates were opened and the ginaissance has gone from strength to strength. Interestingly, if you survey the market it has split into three very broad categories. The first is the truly small-scale distiller, often started by a gin enthusiast whose passion for the spirit encourages them to experiment with a blend of botanicals that eventually becomes something vaguely potable or to resurrect an old gin recipe that has existed in the family or is associated with the area in which they operate. Often these brands start out as a statement of love and commitment before encountering and sometimes adapting to the realities of commercial life.

Often the problem with many of these gins is that there is insufficient information on the labelling to allow the potential consumer to make an informed choice as to the likely taste and so paying in excess of £30 for a bottle seems rather a punt unless you have tasted it before or are adventurous in your taste of spirits.

Then there are the large gin manufacturers who have risen to the challenge of the burgeoning number of small, independent gin distillers by upping their game and launching a wider range of styles, while leveraging their existing market reputation. They also have snapped up some of the more successful independents. Ironically, Sipsmith, who could fairly claim to have started the 21st century gin craze off, were bought by Beam Suntory in December 2016 for £50m.

The third strand is the supermarket chains who have jumped on the bandwagon offering botanical infused gins to their shoppers at often less than half the price that a similar product would cost from an independent. Aldi have perfected this approach to a tee and, in all fairness, their gins are impressive, often scooping awards in gin competitions and festivals. Aldi’s MO seems to be to label their spirits with cod names that sound to the uninitiated as though they have come from a small distiller. One such is Haysmith’s.

The gin to fall under the spotlight this week is Haysmith’s Spiced Apple and Ginger Flavour Gin, which comes in a stumpy bottle with a broad shoulder, a small neck ad topped with a cork stopper. The labelling at the front has an artist’s impression of a spray of botanicals with apples and ginger roots to the fore, in case you don’t get the idea. The back of the label, in white print which gets successively more difficult to read as the contents reduce, tells me that the spirit provides “an elegantly smooth and complex taste…best described as mouthwatering notes of juicy red apple, complex hints of fiery ginger spice finishing with the classic flavour of juniper”.

The spirit is pale brown in colour, reminiscent of apple juice and to the nose it has a very distinctive aroma of apple and ginger. In the mouth it is very appley and the ginger is pronounced, although not unpleasantly so. It is well balanced with a strong spicey aftertaste but the juniper is not as pronounced as I would have liked. If you like flavoured gins and looking for a winter warmer that will not burn a hole in your pocket, you could do worse than this.

Until the next time, cheers!