#lord peter wimsey

[thesarahshay]

[aceredshirt13]

if there's one thing about classic literary detectives it's that they are not conventionally attractive. doyle told sidney paget to stop drawing holmes so pretty. christie was like "let me introduce you to this short pudgy balding man who is retirement age and i hate him." sayers compares wimsey to maggots on literally the FIRST PAGE

i love it. i love them. stop casting hot people in these roles. we need our detectives to be Charmingly Weird-Looking

[fromthedeskofcripslock]

This really ought to top every “Best Opening Lines,” list. The 21st century reading public is sleeping on Dorothy L Sayers.

(Have His Carcase 1932)

[dickensianenglishbulldog]

Father Brown: Beneath the foolish-seeming exterior there lies an analytical, supremely sympathetic man.

Lord Peter Wimsey: Beneath the foolish-seeming exterior there lies an analytical, supremely sympathetic man. Beneath him there lies another very silly man, except this one reads Donne.

[elodieunderglass]

Friend and I were pondering the curious specificities of the Permitted Aristo

[wormtimenow]

Harriet Walter as Harriet Vane my beloved

[mywingsareonwheels]

All of the comparisons with Poirot etc. are valid, especially considering the Agatha Christie influences on both Knives Out and (especially) Glass Onion, but actually the Golden Age detective Benoit Blanc most reminds me of is Lord Peter Wimsey. Especially with the epic obfuscating chattiness/stupidity. Blanc turns up his Southern Hokeyness to eleven when he wants people to underestimate him; Wimsey turns up his Upper-Class Twit, for the same reasons and in the same way. (And in both cases it’s a play on their own real mannerisms and accent, but they deploy it as a shield and a weapon.) Both are epically courteous, polite, and friendly, but you Do Not Want To Piss Them Off by being horrifying.

Also if anyone wants to write a backstory for Benoit/Philip in which Benoit saves Philip from a false accusation of murder and Philip spends years unsure whether he wants to get together with this man who saved him because gratitude is a terrifying burden, etc... omg I would read the fuck out of that. :D

[leojurand]

funny thing about me reading all of peter wimsey and adoring it: i don't like mysteries. and this series didn't change my mind! i still didn't care much about the crime-solving in these books. that's not why i read them. i decided to try the series despite the genre because i always saw sayers's name mentioned at the same time as dunnett's, so i had to at least try. and what kept me going was the great writing and peter himself.

sayers had a gift for writing witty dialogue. if i had to think of an author who's on the same level as her when it comes to that, i would struggle. and you kinda need to be a master at writing witty dialogue if you have a main character like peter winsey. peter!! i think, while reading the series and talking about it on twitter, my most common reaction: peter my best friend :). one of the most lovable and maybe the most delightful protagonist i've ever had the pleasure of reading about.

i didn't always feel 100% connected to him. one of the things i dislike about mystery fiction is that (in my opinion) it's very episodic and so there's no overarching plot, and the characterization doesn't really take center stage. ask me about one favourite peter moment from bellona club or nine tailors and i could not tell you.

but the thing about this series is, it does end up having a sort of overarching plot that sees it's main characters grow and change and kinda gets them out of the "mystery of the week" formula that i think can make characterization stagnant. and that's the harriet vane storyline.

i can't tell how much better harriet makes peter (and i don't need to tell you because if you've read it, you know). seeing peter from the outside, or from the inside but in this situation that changes his priorities so much, was so good. their banter, their chemistry, their misunderstanding, the way harriet perceives peter, from her repressed feelings to her protectiveness and unconditional love. all of it makes peter a much more compelling character. not to say he wasn't before, because i adored peter from book 2 onwards. but harriet always brought the best in him.

i could say a million things more, but tl;dr is sayers has become one of my all time favourite authors, i will never forget peter wimsey, and i'm both incredibly happy to have read this series and so sad that it's over. now what :')

[gwydpolls]

Lucian's Library 3

Feel free to suggest never written books you wish you could read.

Option slightly shaved to fit the format.

[thesarahshay]

[dickensianenglishbulldog]

[skyriderwednesday]

Names that really aren't common enough for an author to use twice for unrelated characters:

Jabez (Doyle, in 'The Red-Headed League' and 'The Three Students')

Gotobed (Sayers, in 'Unnatural Death' and 'The Nine Tailors')

[v-as-in-victor]

Got a question about Lord Peter Wimsey

Please spread this because it's applicable to about five people and I would like to find all of them.

[talkingpiffle]

"Either as Captain O'Shea or the vengeful Earl, John Emery was a fine young romantic actor. He had style and eloquence and was completely at ease in costume drama. In July of the same year [1937] I was to see him as Lord Peter Wimsey in Busman's Honeymoon at the Westport County Playhouse in Connecticut. As is the custom in summer theaters, his engagement was for only a week. He'd had but a week of rehearsal, yet he gave a deft and amusing performance. At the time I was living in a rented house on Long Island Sound, ten miles from Westport. It boasted a swimming pool and free liquor. There I held open house for the likes of Anna May Wong, Clifton Webb, Estelle Winwood, Vincent Price, Louisa Carpenter and a lot of other friends, overloaded with leisure.

"I got a sizzling crush on John on seeing his Wimsey. After the performance I went back to see him. Would he care to spend the week end with me? John readily agreed. I found him intelligent, amusing and exceptionally good-looking. He had good manners and seemed a good listener. This last marked him a rare bird in the set in which I traveled.

"But when John asked me to marry him, I looked upon his offer as an impertinence. Wasn't he getting presumptuous on short acquaintance?"

--Tallulah Bankhead on meeting her husband John Emery, from Tallulah: My Autobiography (Ch. 10)

Newlyweds John Emery and Tallulah Bankhead, September 1937 (x)