The Wimsey Papers

[Doug Greene]

I have heard rumors that, after the success of THRONES, DOMINATIONS, the Sayers representatives have agreed to allow the WW2 essays, featuring the Wimseys, published in THE SPECTATOR, to be the basis of a new novel--detective I assume, though how that is to be done I cannot fathom.

Doug

[Damaris Tighe]

I just read on another website that Jill Patton Walsh was publishing another wimsey novel, and that it would come out in November. I think this is dreadful, because Walsh did a fearful rendering of Wimsey in her Thrones, Dominations.

[Keith]

The book is out now.I saw it in a bookshop.I just read the synopsis on the inside cover.By the way has anybody else read the Agatha Christie play adaptations into novels by Charles Osborne?They are just like discovering long lost originals!

[Dave]

The adaptions (Christie's) are that good? Would you have guessed they were not written by her if you hadn't already known? I would love to read more Christie's but only if they had the original flavor of a Christie novel.

[Keith]

I have read Black Coffee and Spiders Web and they are probably as good as any second tier Christie.Not up with the very best but well worthwhile especially if you havent seen the plays.I dont know if there are plans for any more.I have still to read The Unexpected Guest of which the plot looks first-rate.Incidentally there are to be more Poirot and Miss Marple adaptations for TV.
Have you seen the Seven Dials mystery on tv?.It is a very faithful adaptation.It is about 20 years old but has recently been issued on VC.There is also a video of Why Didnt They Ask Evans made at about the same time.That too is excellent but I havent got the video yet.As to the new Wimsey book I do not find the originals that enthralling.The one I have most enjoyed is Five Red Herrings which nobody else seems to rate.

[awrobins]

You should be able to get Agatha Christie's plays BLACK COFFEE and THE UNEXPECTED GUEST (the plays, not the novel adapatations) from Samuel French. At any rate, they're listed on their online catalogue at http://www.samuelfrench.com. (Also listed on this web site are her plays AFTERNOON AT THE SEASIDE, THE RATS, and THE PATIENT. I tried to order these recently but only got the first two.)

I didn't find the play SPIDER'S WEB listed, but I think I got it from Samuel French in the 1980's. Presumably it's out of print.

I looked at one of the novelisations (I think it was BLACK COFFEE) in a bookshop and wasn't impressed, but I only looked at a page or two, so it's probably unfair to judge. (Though I did know a professor once who told me he only read the first page of students' translation exams. He claimed that was enough to determine whether the student knew the language.)

[shyster]

Oh, Lordy, she's going to do another Sayers pastiche?

I can't condemn the lady's writing abilities, but would opine that she, like most modern writers, simply hasn't any idea of what a classic mystery should be. "Thrones, Dominations" was constructed from a nutmeat of original Sayers (most of which, incidentally, appears to have been thrown out) and was a psychological goulash.

I was considerably upset by the way one of my favorite tough-minded writers was treated and I do wish she wouldn't essay this again.

On a similar topic and a different style, it is entertaining to review Raymond Chandler's very few pages beginning "The Poodle Springs Story" (available in the book "Raymond Chandler Speaking") and compare them to the result by Robert Parker.

I do like Parker, but claiming the book as being by Chandler and Parker is a bad joke. Chandler had hardly started to write anything at all.

To return to the original topic, one wonders if Ms. Walsh's next work will be "based on punctuation originally used by Dorothy L. Sayers".

Originally posted by Doug Greene
I have heard rumors that, after the success of THRONES, DOMINATIONS, the Sayers representatives have agreed to allow the WW2 essays, featuring the Wimseys, published in THE SPECTATOR, to be the basis of a new novel--detective I assume, though how that is to be done I cannot fathom.

Doug

There is a new book out called "A Presumption of Death." The authors listed are Walsh and Sayers. I have it but in the large amount of books I have, I am just going to have to wait until it pops to the surface. I thought Thrones, Dominations was good. She was close to the Sayers thought and way of writing but not quite there. I believe that she will be writing quite a number of books by Sayers and Walsh.

Take care,
Irene

[George Hanbury]

I've just finished reading Presumption of Death - or rather, listening to it as a brilliantly read unabridged audiobook (by Edward Petherbridge). I enjoyed it immensely, and thought it actually better than Thrones, Dominations. A word of warning, though: it's more a Lady Harriet novel than a Lord Peter one and its strength is in its picture of people coping not only with murder but with all the changes wartime brings to a small village: shortages of food and fuel - and policemen! -; strangers (Land Army girls, airmen); spy scares; absent sons and fathers; difficulties of travel and communication. The contemporary mood is well caught, sometimes movingly (such as the increased importance of, and fear for, one's children in such fragile times) and there's no sense of hindsight in the writing - the characters really don't know who is going to win the war. The book draws on one of Sayers own short stories in Striding Folly and on what I guess are the Spectator pieces somebody's already referred to - splendid letters from the Dowager Duchess of Denver to an American friend. Don't read it expecting a great Golden Age Mystery, but enjoy familiar characters living again in a good story.
Cheers!
PS Black Coffee, etc, may have worked as plays but I find the 'new' novels unreadable - no more than barely fleshed-out stage directions. There was a hugely successful GAM mystery play called Ten minute Alibi (not a Christie) which I came across recently as a Penguin crime novelization. Same thing applied - it takes a lot of skill to make a convincing book out of a play.

[shyster]

Well, I guess I'll have to look it up.

I understand that Margery Allingham wrote a book titled "The Oaken Heart" about the tribulations of wartime life in an English country village. I've never seen a copy of Allingham's book, but it would be interesting to compare the two.

If Walsh wants to write pastiches, all very well. However, I think it inappropriate for her to put Sayers' name on the product.

[George Hanbury]

"If Walsh wants to write pastiches, all very well. However, I think it inappropriate for her to put Sayers' name on the product."

Good point! "A Lord Peter Wimsey mystery by Jill Paton Walsh" would be more reasonable, but I suspect that the publishers will want to keep flaunting the Sayers name. I suppose "Based on characters created by Dorothy L Sayers" would be a compromise, tho a bit clumsy for a book jacket.

"The Oaken Heart"
From memory, it was published in 1940 or 41 and is really about the effect on the Essex village where she lived of the build-up to war rather than the war itself. But you're right: it would make an interesting comparison - I'll try to get hold of it to re-read.
[LATER] I've just checked our local library's online catalogue and amazingly they actually have 5 copies in the county! It was reprinted in 1987.
Cheers
GH

[shyster]

As I said, I haven't found a copy of Allingham's book. I haven't actively searched for it, exdept that I check out any library or used book shelves for anything by Allingham. I suspect that this is something that may not have had an active U.S. publication since W.W. II, if then.

Apropos of nothing, I have enjoyed some books by Andrew Taylor.

[artdecodiva]

I think the Paton Walsh books fall into the area of decent pastiche. Think of all the stories of Holmes, post-Conan Doyle.

Lady Peter had a lot to cope with in her new surroundings, and I can understand why Paton Walsh has written two books about the Wimsey family.

In the same vein, the first four Carole Nelson Douglas books about Irene Adler were very enjoyable. I didn't care for the rest...more an homage to Jack the Ripper than Sherlock Holmes, in subject matter and tone.