Where the Boys Are: At Their Tailors!

Thanks to everyone who’s commented so far on Cotillion by Georgette Heyer! I understand we should expect a few more comments over the weekend—bring them on! The more the merrier!

One of the things that struck me about our hero Freddy Standen is his exquisite taste in clothes. He wasn’t the only young man to pick lint off his lapel or gasp at a wrinkled cravat. Many men spent long hours at their tailors then longer hours with their valets getting dressed and undressed and redressed. Prince George was even rumored to have gone to the home of fashion leader Beau Brummel just to watch how he picked his clothes for the day!

Freddy mentions two of the premier tailors of the day: Weston and Stulz. Between the two, they likely dressed most of the nineteenth century gentlemen with any pretense to fashion. Not much is known about Weston, but Stulz was a German tailor who grew to some fame in his native Karlsruhe (which happens to be the hometown of my husband’s family) before moving to London. He amassed a fortune and gave it away to charities. When he retired in 1820, he was granted a German barony and died Baron Stulz.

One of the items Heyer mentions for her gentlemen are many-caped greatcoats. These were outerwear that went over your usual coat when you were going to be out in the elements. They mimicked the coats worn by the mail coach drivers, who had achieved something like celebrity status in the nineteenth century. The picture here shows one with two capes. Heyer mentions Jack wearing one with sixteen capes. I’m guessing that was a calculated exaggeration, because I can’t see how you could possibly fit sixteen layers on this thing and not look like a grizzly bear!

One of the reasons Kitty is counted a credit to Freddy’s family is that she listens to him in matters of fashion. Could you love a man who was more interested in the latest styles than you were?

The Young Bluestockings discuss Cotillion by Georgette Heyer

Well, how did you like it?

I thought this book would be perfect for discussion on Nineteenteen for a couple of reasons.

• The heroine, Kitty Charing, is one of Heyer’s ingenue heroines, very young but certainly not lacking in spunk. She’s never been to London, so we get to view the city and the Season through her eyes. We get a mini-course on the amusements of fashionable London—Almack’s, the Egyptian Hall in Bullock’s Museum, the Elgin Marbles (didn’t you love the bit in Chapter 11 where Freddy complains about them to his father?)—and not-so-fashionable London—shopping at Grafton House and public masquerade balls at the Opera House and Pantheon.


• We get a look at the manners and etiquette around courtship and marriage of the time (a word of warning here—though Heyer frequently uses the device, engagement announcements were NOT published in the newspapers—only marriages were.)


• We get bad boys of a couple of different stripes in Jack and Camille, and of course the difference between true gentlemen and not-so-true ones in Jack and Freddy.

Ah, Freddy. Some Heyer aficionados have speculated that Heyer was poking fun at herself and her previous books by having the unpromising Freddy as her romantic lead in this book…but I'm not so sure. To me Freddy is a representation of how love can transform a person: he goes from being rather foolish and dim-witted, if gentlemanly, at the beginning, and ends up being the one to solve, gently and with a minimum of fuss, all the tangles Kitty has wrought upon her friends’ (and her own) affairs. Freddy’s father Lord Legerwood is a fascinated witness to the changes Freddy goes through, saying to Kitty, “I like Freddy’s engagement very well, you know. It has done him a great deal of good.” When Freddy tells Kitty at the end of the book, “…Thought you was in love with him [Jack]. Don’t mind telling you it was as much as I could do to keep a still tongue in my head when he asked you to marry him. What I mean is, like you to have everything you want. Wished it was me, and not Jack, that’s all,” it’s terribly romantic, despite Freddy’s characteristically telegraph-like delivery. After Freddy’s not very prepossessing first appearance in Chapter 3, Heyer begins almost immediately after his and Kitty’s engagement to drop clues that he may be hero material after all: first we see even his self-important cousin Lord Biddenden follows his lead in fashion...then we see his kind heart as he cleverly figures out how to bankroll Kitty’s wardrobe without embarrassing her…then we see how well-liked he is in society because of his perfect manners and deportment…and onward through the book until, at the end, he truly is a hero. I think he’s probably one of Heyer’s best-drawn romantic leads.

And what wonderful characters—clueless Meg and her terrible color sense (oh, the lilac gown!), the ravishing but equally clueless Olivia and her awful mother, the sardonic but kindly Lord Legerwood. I especially enjoyed the few scenes between Lord Legerwood and Freddy, showing Lord L.’s growing respect for his firstborn.

The book does have flaws. Poor Dolph got a little monotonous, though of course that was the point…I think it might have been nice to somehow show how living quietly in the country with his horses made him much better able to function coherently, to contrast with his confusion in town. And not to cross too far into applying today’s sensibilities to the past, but at times I couldn’t help squirming a little at how a character with intellectual challenges was depicted…except that the fact he could live a happy, productive life in the right atmosphere was an important plot point. The pacing was a little slow at first—the beginning chapters set at Arnside House rather dragged, I thought, though Mr. Penicuik and Miss Fishguard were both delightfully awful in their own ways. But the action picked up once it moved to London, and simmered pretty nicely after that.

On the whole, Cotillion is one of my top five Heyers, along with The Grand Sophy, Frederica, The Unknown Ajax, and Arabella. How about you? Did you find any of the Regency references or vocabulary confusing, or was it on the whole pretty readable? If this was your first Heyer, do you think you'll read more?

Discussion is now open!

Keeping Track of the Little Things

First Little Thing: I'm back from the Teen Book Festival in Rochester, NY...and it was truly an amazing event. Picture 2500 or so book-crazy teens...yeah! I gave three workshops with Alisa Libby (that's us at right) on historical fiction for teens...and we didn't get a single repeat question. Those were some seriously smart kids, and it was an honor to meet them. As well as fun!

Love the cake they served us at dinner!

Second Little Thing: Don't forget that on June 8 we'll be opening our discussion of Georgette Heyer's Cotillion. Have you found a copy and plunged into Kitty's and Freddy's London escapades yet? I'm very much looking forward to this Young Bluestockings meeting!

Third Little Thing: Regina and I have been tossing around the idea of having a future Young Bluestockings meeting center on a film instead of a book, particularly one of the recent releases set in the 19th century like Bright Star or The Young Victoria. Any thoughts? Is this something you might enjoy?


Fourth Little Thing: Having to keep track of little things is not a modern phenomenon. The young (and not so young) ladies of the 19th century, who didn't always have pockets in their dresses, had a delightfully practical and decorative way of keeping at hand all the little things one might need over the course of the day, like a notepad and pencil, or scissors, or needles, or stamps, or penknife, or pillbox, or smelling salts, or buttonhook, or thimble-case, or keys, or...well, you get my drift. It was called a chatelaine.

The section at top contained either a pin or a clip so that the chatelaine could be pinned to a dress or clipped onto a belt, and then whatever little tools were preferred could be suspended from the multiple chains. Chatelaines could be workmanlike--a pair of scissors and a needlecase hung from a ribbon--or works of jeweler's art
like these.

Fifth Little Thing: Well, it isn't at all little...in fact, it's pretty big...but you'll have to wait until Regina tells you about it later this week because (a) I'm a dreadful tease and (b) I'm very happy about it.

How do you keep track of the little things in your life?

Bloody Jack, Jane Austen's Brothers, and Future Reading

Well, I have to say that I agree with Publisher's Weekly, which called Bloody Jack "a rattling good read."

I have to agree with a lot of the posters from last week that at times, it did go a bit over the top...but mostly I was just so absorbed in the story that I was able to suspend any twinges of doubt...and absorbed by the details of 18th/19th century shipboard life that Mr. Meyer included. I didn't mind Jacky's character lapses, either, chiefly because as a writer I (a) find flawed characters are more interesting and (b) think that being flawed gives them the opportunity to grow. I'm curious about Jacky's further adventures in Boston, and whether she'll stay in that girls' school. :)

On a slightly different note...Regina mentioned that two of Jane Austen's brothers went to sea, which helps account for her very positive portrayal of Navy men in Persuasion. Frances (also called Frank, 1774-1865) and Charles (1779-1852) both prospered in the Navy. They attended the Royal Naval College as boys; Frank headed off to sea at 15 and rose rapidly through the ranks. He served throughout the Napoleonic Wars and just missed fighting at the Battle of Trafalgar; eventually he rose to the position of Admiral of the Fleet. Charles followed behind his brother, but saw much action and was by all accounts a remarkably brave officer. It was Charles who, with prize money he received from helping to capture an enemy ship, bought topaz crosses for his sisters Jane and Cassandra (that's them in the picture above. Notice the crosses Jane and Lizzy wear in the A&E Pride and Prejudice mini-series? I always thought this a delightful touch.) He rose to the rank of Rear-Admiral.

Now, concerning future Young Bluestockings Book Club meetings... Our next meeting will take place on Tuesday, June 8, when I'll be presenting one of my favorite Georgette Heyer books, Cotillion. It's recently been re-released by Sourcebooks in trade paperback format. From the back cover:

A most unusual hero

Freddy is immensely rich, of course, and not bad-looking, but he's mild-mannered, a bit hapless--not anything like his virile, handsome, rakish cousin Jack...

A heroine in a difficult situation

Young Kitty Charing stands to inherit a vast fortune from her irascible and eccentric guardian--provided she marries one of his great-nephews...

A sham betrothal

No sooner does Kitty arrive in London than the race for her hand begins, but between confirmed rakes and bumbling affections, Kitty needs a daring scheme.

Cotillion covers a lot of familiar themes I thought it would be interesting to discuss here on Nineteenteen: courtship and marriage, inheritance, fashion, and bad boys versus good ones. It's quietly funny and surprisingly moving. But I hope, if you choose to join us, that as you read it you'll think a little bit about how historical fiction is sometimes as much about the time in which it's written as it is about the past.

We hope you'll join us then!