Category: Regency

Ladies in Waiting Part Deux

Updated on February 16, 2013 by Amanda McCabe/Laurel McKee

Since I found so much interesting info (interesting to me, anyway!) on the lives of Georgian ladies-in-waiting, I decided to do a Part Two this week, continuing from last Monday.

The Countess of Harcourt became a Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Charlotte in 1784, and she also became one of the Queen’s few friends, staying with her until her (Charlotte’s) death in 1818. Lady H. recalled one occasion when she said to the Queen, “I should like to tell YOU something, but pray promise never to let the QUEEN know it.” The Queen laughed and answered, “Oh, no, SHE can have no business with what passes between us in our private unreserved conversation.” But these lighthearted moments were an exception in what was considered a very dull Court indeed.

The Queen would receive at Court only women of unblemished reputation, “proscribing from her society all females of bankrupt or even ambiguous character” (Anne Somerset, from “Ladies in Waiting”). I don’t think ladies of, shall we say, a more risky disposition could care too much about this exclusion. The Court was no longer a center of fashion, as it had once been, since the values espoused by the King and Queen were so far from those set by the leaders of fashion.

The Court was also bound by rigid, uncomfortable etiquette. Fanny Burney, the novelist and sometime lady-in-waiting, wrote after first visiting Court, “In the first place you must not cough…In the second place you must not sneeze. In the third place, you must not, upon any account, stir either hand or foot. If, by chance, a black pin runs into your head, you must not take it out. If the pain is very great you must be sure to bear it without wincing; if it brings the tears into your eyes, you must not wipe them off…”

Other rules include one forbidding anyone to initiate a conversation with the King or Queen, or to eat in their presence. Ladies could not leave the Queen’s presence of their own accord, and when they did leave they had to back smoothly out of the room (with a train!). No one could sit in the Queen’s presence, even if faint or pregnant.

Of course, their duties could have been worse. The Ladies of the Bedchamber didn’t have to wait on the Queen at meals or assist with her toilette, aside from ceremonial; duties such as fastening her necklace. There were six of these ladies, drawn from the highest reaches of Society, each on call for two months of the year, usually only for formal occasions. The more day-to-day duties were now divided between the two Keepers of the Robes and their assistants, the wardrobe women (a whole ‘nother article, I think!). Ladies of the Bedchamber were paid 500 pounds a year (rather unfairly, the hardworking Keepers got only 200, but they did have free accomadations). Though the King and Queen were always eager to reduce their domestic budget, the Queen, despite a reputation for parsimony, would never permit savings at the expense of her ladies. She even fought the Government’s efforts to reorganize financial arrangements in 1812, condemning their proposed cuts as “shabby.”

Now, last week I asked if YOU would make a good lady-in-waiting. This week I wonder would your own heroine (or the heroine of your favorite books) do well at Court? Or would they be too rebellious? 🙂

Posted in Regency, Research | Tagged ladies in waiting | 5 Replies

A Night at the Opera

Updated on February 13, 2013 by Janet Mullany

I do big chunks of writing on Saturday afternoons. That’s when the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts live, and I find it interesting that opera, or the human voice, helps me write. Most of the music I listen to when I write is vocal, for reasons I can’t quite fathom–sure, opera has all that passion and over-the-top emotion, and it’s all about love, jealousy, revenge, murder, and dying twice in a sack.

I find, too, that real, hardcore opera fans are rather like trad regency fans in their enthusiasm and encyclopaedic knowledge. Just listen to the half-time, sorry, intermission quiz at the Met, where a panel of experts answer opera trivia questions.

So what was a visit to the opera like in the regency period? First, you got value for money. An evening at the opera was l-o-n-g, though not in the sense of Ring Cycle long. It wasn’t entirely about the music, although people cared passionately about particular singers and might pause in their card-playing, drinking, or socializing to listen to a popular aria. Then as now, operas featured fabulous costumes and great sets and stage effects.

The major London theater for opera was The King’s Theatre, Haymarket, renamed Her Majesty’s Theatre (its current name) in 1837 when Victoria came to the throne. Like most historic London theaters, it burned down regularly during its history, and the Regency-era version, the second on the site, opened in 1791. It was the venue for the London premiers of many of Mozart’s operas.

A popular star was Giuseppe Naldi, seen here as Figaro in The Marriage of Figaro, which made its London debut in 1812 (although the opera had had an amateur performance in 1810 and its tunes were already well known–the Coldstream Guards had adopted Non piu andrai, one of the opera’s greatest hits, as its slow march in 1787). Naldi, not apparently a terrific singer but popular for his acting and warm personality, was something of a Mozart comic specialist, appearing as Leporello in Don Giovanni (which debuted at the King’s Theatre in 1816) and Papageno in The Magic Flute.

Sadly the King’s Theatre burned down again in 1867, but the Royal Opera Arcade, built behind the theater by John Nash and George Reston in 1816-1818 still survives.

But back to my original topic. What do you like to listen to when you write, or read? Do you have books you associate with particular music? Favorite London theaters, operas, great performances…?

Posted in Music, Regency, Research, Writing | Tagged Giuseppe Naldi, opera, Regency opera | 4 Replies

Forgotten Regency

Updated on February 13, 2013 by Laurie Bishop

It seems puzzling to me that the English Regency period is so neglected in popular culture. Certainly it has been celebrated in the movies based on Jane Austen’s books, and there are also the modern Regency romances to consider. But I can rarely find the English Regency represented in other forms, while the Victorian era is everywhere.

A few years ago I became interested in collecting figurines. I wanted to find porcelain ladies dressed in Regency fashion. I have found a few, but for the most part current collectable “lady figurines” are of the Victorian era. The same goes for collectable dolls. The odd thing is that if a Regency figurine or doll appears on the market there is a high interest in it—if my experiences on eBay are of any significance. Believe me, you need your Big Girl panties on (or Big Boy boxers) if you are going to join the bidding!

Another area that demonstrates the popularity of the English Regency and the French Empire period is old fashion prints. Again, the most sought after seem to be those of the English Regency/French Empire era. There are many listings of Victorian fashion plates, but as far as I have been able to see, it is the Regency era prints that generate the most interest.

But still, the Victorian era rules in promotion. Romantic decorating? Magazines seem to equate romantic with Victorian. If a photo of a room with Empire influences is shown, I usually miss seeing a mention of the era. Often the antiques used in a room otherwise decorated in Victorian style are pieces that were also used in the Regency period—Queen Anne, Hepplewhite, Chippendale, and even Regency style.

I admit that this is all my unstudied opinion, and I know the English Regency was short—but it seems to me that there is more interest in it than marketers realize. It is more than our traditional Regency romance novels that seem to be overlooked by those in the business of deciding what we want to buy and bringing it to market.

Opinions?

Laurie
LORD RYBURN’S APPRENTICE
Signet, January 2006

Posted in Regency, Research | Tagged Regency | 3 Replies

Go With The Floe

Updated on February 13, 2013 by megan

Over the past few weeks, my fellow Riskies have discussed research, historical accuracy, and how nitpicky is too nitpicky (or not), as well as how easy it is to get swept away by research. I am in the middle of writing a Regency-set historical, and am having some of the same problems, but from another angle: I don’t want to do the research.

It’s not that I’m not interested, because I am terribly interested in all the stuff I should be researching, it’s just that time is at a premium, and any time spent away from writing is . . . time spent away from writing. I already have a procrastination issue, I know how easy it would be for me to dive in to do the required research, not to surface for several weeks. Since I don’t plot in advance, and I always forget to take notes when inspiration strikes, I panic at the thought I might lose a thread of the plot, or a really good idea for the next conflict. Time spent away from the writing–well, you get the idea.

In my opinion, the best historical romances are those that are imbued with the whole world of the time period, not necessarily the ones that reveal the most knowledge. My favorites are those that only show the tip of the research iceberg–going with the floe, so to speak. I feel fairly confident I get the historical tone right in my writing, but I know I have fallen down on the research job (my dad is my research partner, and he put in all the work on A Singular Lady, but I did not double-check his notes when it came to titles and special licenses, my two most egregious errors. Definitely my bad, sorry Dad).

Right now I have to spend some time finding answers to some of these questions:

What were people who came from the Ottoman Empire called during the Regency? Turks? Ottos? Footstools?

What were relations like between the Ottoman Empire and England during the Regency? Did the government take any official stand on the Ottoman Empire’s holding of Greece?

What was banking like? The stock market? (I read A Conspiracy of Paper, but that is about sixty years too early, and I don’t recall the details, just that it was a good story).

If there was a public ruckus, who came in to break it up and haul the miscreants off to be punished?

Could a man unbutton a lady’s gown if he were standing in front of her? And if he could, could he do it with one hand?

What did practicers of The Fancy (boxing) wear to practice?

And now? I have stalled enough. Before I get back to writing, I have to–darn it–go do the research.

Megan
www.meganframpton.com

Posted in Regency, Research, Writing | Tagged historical accuracy | 10 Replies

Round and about the weather

Updated on February 13, 2013 by Janet Mullany

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Originally this was going to be a post about weather during the Regency weather, something I was determined to blog about before the official arrival of spring, although here (near Washington DC) it’s warm and sunny and daffodils are blooming. I did however do some digressions, some of which turned out to be more interesting.

England in Jane Austen’s time was in the grip of a minor Ice Age that had begun in medieval times and lasted up until the mid-nineteenth century–hence the snowy cold winters of A Christmas Carol and the Pickwick Papers. It was cold enough for the river Thames to freeze over completely, which it did for several months in some particularly cold years. In the sixteenth century Henry VIII traveled from London to Greenwich along the Thames by sleigh. What better opportunity for the enterprising merchants of London to set up shop on the river, thus creating Frost Fairs, the most famous of which (featured in Orlando by Virginia Woolf) was held in 1608.

The Frost Fair of 1814 was the last of its kind, and featured an elephant being led across the ice near Blackfriars Bridge (according to one source I found), donkey rides, and the roasting of a whole sheep on the ice. People had to pay to see the sheep roasted and then pay for a portion of “Lapland Sheep.” Nine printing presses churned out souvenir items. This fair only lasted four days until a thaw set in.

The weather, of course, is always a safe conversation topic–particularly if the man of your dreams has appeared unexpectedly:

But it was then too late, and with a countenance meaning to be open, she sat down again and talked of the weather.

That’s Elinor, from Sense and Sensibility, whose keen sense of the appropriate phrase gives her a certain affinity with Jim’s aunt in A Child’s Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas:

And when the firemen turned off the hose and were standing in the wet, smoky room, Jim’s Aunt, Miss Prothero, came downstairs and peered in at them. Jim and I waited, very quietly, to hear what she would say to them. She said the right thing, always. She looked at the three tall firemen in their shining helmets, standing among the smoke and cinders and dissolving snowballs, and she said, “Would you like anything to read?”

I have to mention a couple of fascinating sites I came across while trying to find a good Jane Austen quote about the weather (the one I was originally looking for, about a stupendously cold snap in London, is in Emma, I think). There is for your edification, a site with a search function for Sense and Sensibility, and other books too, Tilneys and Trap-doors, and that site also includes the Henry Tilney Fan Site–yes, the man who knows how to wash muslin. Who would’ve thought it.