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Grex > Books > #77: The Mysterious Quote - Fall 1998 Edition | |
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| Author |
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| 25 new of 207 responses total. |
remmers
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response 57 of 207:
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Oct 27 13:28 UTC 1998 |
Intriguing quote. Female narrator, obviously a servant. The "Master" is
someone who spends time in a laboratory. Seems British, 19th century.
I'd rule out Dracula because I don't think it had a female narrator. I'd
probably have guessed R.L. Stevenson if senna hadn't beaten me to it.
As a backup, I'll guess William Wilkie Collins, although I think that's
less likely than Stevenson.
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rywfol
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response 58 of 207:
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Oct 27 13:40 UTC 1998 |
Mary Shelley, perhaps?
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remmers
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response 59 of 207:
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Oct 27 13:42 UTC 1998 |
Hm, could be Shelley, but she was early 19th century, and the passage
has a later feel to it.
Actually, now that I think about it, this may be from Stevenson's _Dr
Jekyll and Mr Hyde_. There *was* a film a couple of years ago based on
that, told from a servant woman's point of view (she was played by Julia
Roberts). Haven't read the book though.
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mcnally
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response 60 of 207:
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Oct 27 16:58 UTC 1998 |
The film was called "Mary Reilly".
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punky
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response 61 of 207:
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Oct 27 19:26 UTC 1998 |
is it frankenstein by any chance ? I guess, as always, I am wrong!!!
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orinoco
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response 62 of 207:
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Oct 28 20:53 UTC 1998 |
I think the book _Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde_ is narrated by a friend of Jekyll's,
but it's been awhile since I've read it.
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sekari
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response 63 of 207:
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Oct 29 20:37 UTC 1998 |
A segment of Dracula was narrated by mina.
Frankenstein was Narrated by the Sea Captain, Frankenstien, and the Monster.
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde was written from the point
of view of Mr. Utterson, the lawyer. With two post mortum narrations by
Dr. Lanyon and Dr. Jekyll.
The piece that my quote comes from has been mentioned, but not in it's literary
form, and I don't think it was mentioned as an actual guess. I thought if
I waited a day or two someone would guess it officially or something.
The quote is from 'Mary Reilly', written by Valerie Martin in 1990.
I am not sure who won this one. remmers made the first reference to it,
and mcnally named it. I'll let someone else sort it out.
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kaifiyat
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response 64 of 207:
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Nov 1 05:03 UTC 1998 |
Ok! this is my first stint, and i haven't read the rules quite thoroughly ..
so please do NOT accuse me of cheating .. here's a sitter ...the opening lines
of which book are
'Last night I dreamt of Manderley again.'
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mcnally
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response 65 of 207:
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Nov 1 07:16 UTC 1998 |
That's from "Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier..
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mcnally
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response 66 of 207:
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Nov 1 07:21 UTC 1998 |
re #64: but the rules of the game are that you have to correctly
enter the last person's question before you get a turn to
post your own quote.
re #63: hmmm.. since you haven't seen fit to decide I'll cede
to remmers if he wants it. if he doesn't, I've got an
amusing book handy which should be quote-worthy..
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sjones
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response 67 of 207:
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Nov 1 12:50 UTC 1998 |
oh, terrific; i finally find out where everyone is (isn't blundering
around enjoyable?) and you're politely holding the door open for each
other - i think mcnally should go ahead, and consider the du maurier
quote as an accidental tie-breaker...
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remmers
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response 68 of 207:
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Nov 2 04:52 UTC 1998 |
That viewpoint is quite okay with me. I cede to McNally and look
forward to his quite.
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remmers
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response 69 of 207:
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Nov 2 04:56 UTC 1998 |
(However, I should point out that the goal is always to identify
the *author*, and neither McNally nor I did that. Identifying the
work is neither necessary nor sufficient.)
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sjones
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response 70 of 207:
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Nov 2 10:13 UTC 1998 |
sorry if i'm just blundering around and getting in the way here (while
everybody waits patiently for a quote) but i don't suppose any of you
know if there was ever an answer to maeve's quote at the end of the
summer? i've only just stumbled across it, and i've chewed my
fingernails down to about mid-forearm by now being frustrated by it...
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remmers
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response 71 of 207:
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Nov 2 13:18 UTC 1998 |
Sorry, dunno. (And I should have typed "quote" not "quite" in resp:68)
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sjones
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response 72 of 207:
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Nov 2 15:31 UTC 1998 |
well, i did wonder about asking if you'd meant to say 'that viewpoint is
quote okay with me' but it seemed dangerously close to being facetious,
especially since i've only just stuck my head above the water around
here... oh well, with a little luck maeve'll be in here at some point,
and might be kind enough to put me out of my misery...
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sekari
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response 73 of 207:
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Nov 2 21:05 UTC 1998 |
I was aware that the author had not been named, and I am awre that I jumped the
gun a bit. My reasoning was that if I mentioned or alluded that it was Mary
Reilly, then it would have just been a race to look it up. If I didn't mention
it, then people would have kept on guessing and it would have moved away from
Mary Reilly. I did wait a few days. If I made a mistake, I apologise.
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remmers
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response 74 of 207:
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Nov 3 02:18 UTC 1998 |
Nah, what you did was reasonable. I just wanted to remind folks that
this is an author-guessing game primarily.
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maeve
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response 75 of 207:
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Nov 3 16:21 UTC 1998 |
er which quote of mine was that? I think I had two or possably three,
they were, 'The Worm Orouboros', 'Rebecca' and 'Gaudy Night' does that
help any?
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sjones
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response 76 of 207:
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Nov 4 13:00 UTC 1998 |
brilliant! you've no idea how pleased i am to see you! it was: When
I opened my eyes we were by a bend in the road, and a peasant girl in a
black shawl waved to us; I can see her now, her dusty skirt, her
gleaming, friendly smile, and in a second we had passed the bend and
could see her no more. Already she belonged to the past, she was only a
memory.
or at least that was the end of it - and ye gods, i don't know either of
those (rebecca being the exception)! hey ho; here was me thinking it
sounded familiar...<hollow laugh>...
so which, please please, and authors?...)
...thank-you!
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jiffer
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response 77 of 207:
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Nov 4 19:40 UTC 1998 |
E M Forrester?
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mcnally
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response 78 of 207:
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Nov 5 07:57 UTC 1998 |
OK, new quote as promised:
"Orwell -- and let us never forget that he was an Eton boy
from a fairly privileged background -- regarded the labouring
classes the way we might regard Yap Islanders, as a strange
but interesting anthropological phenomenon. In 'Wigan Pier' he
records how one of the great panic moments of his boyhood years
was when he found himself in the company of a group of working
men and thought he would have to dring from a bottle they were
passing round. Ever since I read this I've had my doubts about
old George frankly. Certainly he makes the working class of
the 1930s seem disgustingly filthy, but in fact every piece of
evidence I've ever seen shows that most of them were almost
obsessively dedicated to cleanliness. My own father-in-law
grew up in an environment of starkest poverty and used to tell
the most appalling stories of deprivation -- you know the kind
of thing: father killed in a factory accident, thirty-seven
brothers and sisters, nothing for tea but lichen broth and a
piece of roofing slate except on Sundays when they might trade
in a child for a penny's worth of rotten parsnips, and all that
sort of thing. And *his* father-in-law, a Yorkshireman, used to
tell even more appalling stories of hopping 47 miles to school
because he only had one boot and subsisting on a diet of stale
buns and snot butties. 'But,' they would both invariably add,
'we were always clean and the house was always spotless.'"
Beware of jumping to incorrect conclusions..
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remmers
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response 79 of 207:
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Nov 5 11:30 UTC 1998 |
Interesting quote. The spelling of "labouring" suggests that the author
is not American. (But maybe that's an "incorrect conclusion" that I
should beware of jumping to.)
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sjones
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response 80 of 207:
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Nov 5 14:01 UTC 1998 |
it does sound very english - but too light-hearted to be serious
biography... love that hopping 47 miles bit. the father-in-law
reference leads me to wonder if it might be bill bryson, and something
like notes from a small island?
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mcnally
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response 81 of 207:
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Nov 5 17:21 UTC 1998 |
Indeed. Good guess.. I thought that one might be a bit easy
(especially since I mentioned the book in the "what have you
read lately?" item in the books conference) so I tried to choose
a misleading passage.
sjones has correctly identified both the author and the book.
I'd recommend "Notes From a Small Island" -- it's a humorous
account of a writer's last trip through Britain before moving
back to the USA, after having spent (seven?) years there..
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