Poldark

[Sunnymeg]

Is anyone else looking forward to this? It is going to be shown on Sunday nights once the present series of 'Call the Midwife' has finished.

I loved the original series even though the story did stray from the books a bit. I wonder how this one will go. I understand Robin Ellis has a bit part in the new version as the Reverend Halse.

In the context of the time shagging female servants really wasn't considered scandalous. Not even by the servants themselves. Marrying someone you didn't love really wasn't a shitty thing to do either. It was very much the norm'. Marrying for love is really very much a modern concept.

You really shouldn't apply 20th and 21st century concepts to 18th century people/relationships.

I get what your saying WordSmyth, but given his feelings and the mores of the time that you describe, why did he feel he had to marry her?

I think they should now remake ALL the classics with AT in ALL OF THEM! Pride and Prejudice, Wuthering Heights, Gone with the Wind, Pretty Woman < faints >, Grease, Saturday Night Fever, Star Wars, Nine and a Half Weeks...< spontaneously combusts >

But am I wrong???

Nooooo!

< leaves thread to go have cold shower >

And...I think we've solved the problem as to who should take over from Jeremy Clarkson on Top Gear! I don't give a fuck about cars but he sure could make me care about 'flappy paddles'...

but as it goes Poldark was set in the 1780s and Jane Eyre is set around 1840, so they're not actually that far apart

Don't agree with this Twinkles- do we have the same attitudes as the 1970s? People only lived short lives so possibly there were greater changes then.

Jane Eyre 'lived' in QVic's reign.

Poor Demelza! Does he come to love her in the books, despite his feelings for Elizabeth?

How many books are there? I fancied reading it but there seem like soooo many. Are they self-contained or do you need to read the whole lot?

AWholelottaNosey - you are not wrong, you are a genius. I would buy all over again any of the classics to watch (drool over) AT being broody/swarthy/F.I.T. Who was it earlier on thread who said 'mmm.. swarthy ?

But Idris Elba should do Top Gear, he's a car nut/did similar fast cars one off & it would nail that racist right wing rubbish/piss of JC ! Simples. And more drooling opportunities for Mumsnetters.

Thank you! I thought it was pretty genius too! But why can't we have them both? ( with lots of contrived situations where they have to take their shirts off...)

Oh reverse sexual objectification is sooo much fun!

I don't think Poldark stands up to comparison with Jane Eyre in more ways than one. Poldark is essentially just historical fluff isn't it?

It's not literature, that's true, but it's not 'fluff' either - it's very well written (& researched).

Much later on in the books the story gets into rotten boroughs & the slave trade (amongst other things)

Actually you could argue that Jane Eyre is really chick lit fluff. Except she wears a crinoline rather than Marc Jacobs.

Starts off a lonely waif, struggles through. Ends up in big house in the country with sexy, scowling hero. Debacle. He's married. Runs away in confusion. Very helpfully bumps into long long cousins. A proposal of marriage and the chance to travel abroad.

But at last minute returns to her true love who has now seen the error of his ways and marries her and they live happily ever after in rural bliss.

Jane Green/Catherine Alliot/Katie Fforde eat your hearts out.

You could argue that Jane Eyre was chick lit, but it would be bollocks and woefully ignorant of the development of Eng lit.

As to the droit de seigneur - social customs and ethics are two completely different things. It was customary for masters to shag servants, but it was never ethical - particularly given the consequences for the women and their families. Few offspring of such unions were accepted in the society of their fathers - generally they were for ever 'bastards'. If they were accepted, they were unlikely to become heirs.

The 1780s were much like the 1840s in that respect, particularly in remote countryside where the feudal structure of society hadn't changed much.

Just found out that was Robin Ellis playing the judge in the courtroom scene.

How many books are there? I fancied reading it but there seem like soooo many. Are they self-contained or do you need to read the whole lot?

Lucas, there are 12 in total. I am not sure you could read that out of sequence but you could certainly only read, say, the first 4. Winston Graham wrote the first 4 in the 1940s and 50s but did not write any more until the 70s so those first 4 certainly stand alone. As the books go on, they become less about Ross, Demelza, Elizabeth etc and more about related characters (not yet shown in the tv series) and, as time goes on, even about the next generation.

That should have said 'I am not sure you could read them out of sequence...

Yeah, but norah, surely we're closer to the 1970s than to a hundred years ago!

I did find it a bit rushed. But I agree that him marrying her is partly his way of rebelling, not just about love.

What's the situation with her dad in the books? Because she looks as if she's young enough she's still legally her dad's responsibility, so is it possible the marriage is actually protecting her in that sense?

I don't think this is the same thing as droit de seigneur (which is a fictional law, not a real one). I agree shagging the maid would be seen as faintly unethical but not absolutely awful - but I don't think the power imbalance would change so much in marriage, would it? He's not under any illusion that if he marries her, she'll be more equal to him, I don't think?

I've just started reading the first book and struggled to keep going tbh. But have got the the wedding and now it's flowing a lot better. I'd def recommend the book as it answers a lot of the questions. Hopefully the next episode will follow as its done a good job so far I think.

Jeanne There's an interesting narrator comment in the first book just after Ross and Demelza are married: I'm paraphrasing as I don't have the book to hand, but it's along the lines of his not seeing Demelza as his equal despite being married to her. I took that as a moral rather than a legal point of view but it's interesting that it's even touched on really.

Actually, thinking about it, I'm doubting whether it's the first or second book, now.

It's definitely in there somewhere.

lady, I've just bought the books, inspired by this thread.

But I'll look for it.

I wouldn't call comparing Jane Eyre to chick lit bollocks. The plot follows a very similar path to much of the wish fulfilment chick lit novels of today.

Except you'd have to substitute Mr Rochester for a glowering local antiques dealer or vet etc.

I think Ross marries Demelza for many reasons. Elizabeth is lost to him, doubly so now she has had a child. There are no other women of his classocally that he can tolerate. Even if a woman of his own class was attractive to him he realises that she wouldn't be suited to the rustic life at Nampara. A lady wouldn't kill chickens or sweep floors. Financially he can't afford a wife of his own class.

In marrying Demelza he gets sex and his floors swept at no extra cost. Plus having just lectured the local judge on being so callous and dismissive of the plight of the local peasants he'd be a towering hypocrite to then go home and casually shag Demelza just because she was available.