Comments | talking_piffle: Strong Poison

shinyopals in talking_piffle

Strong Poison - 9-12

Jul 19, 2010 14:31

Strong Poison - chapters 9-12

WHERE WE LEFT OFF: THE POLICE HAVE FOUND SOMETHING making Peter dance and his ex-girlfriend mope. What a professional and unbiased detective he is in this case.

Summary

Bunter: Good day, ladies.
Mrs Pettican (cook) and Hannah Westlock (maid): ♥ ♥ ♥ Crumpets?
Me: BUNTER ♥ ♥ ♥ :D
Bunter: I can also cook. Now, let’s ( Read more... )

summary, strong poison

Comments 28

antisoppist July 19 2010, 19:42:53 UTC

Yes, Barbara is the one discussed at length in the biography by Uncle Paul Delagardie. She was 17 and Peter fell in love with her in his last year at Oxford. "He treated that girl as if she was made of gossamer, and me as a hardened old monster of depravity who had made him unfit to touch her delicate purity". This is because Uncle Paul saw to Peter's sex education when he was 17 by fixing him up with courtesans in Paris.

World War I starts, Peter joins up, releases Barbara from the engagement in case he comes back mutilated and comes back on leave to find her married to "a hard-bitten rake of a Major Somebody" who she had nursed. Cue determination to get himself killed at the front. Fortunately for us he ends up a major with a D.S.O. instead, oh and a nervous breakdown.

shinyopals July 20 2010, 00:01:20 UTC

This is because Uncle Paul saw to Peter's sex education when he was 17 by fixing him up with courtesans in Paris.

*Blinks* REALLY? What book was that in? Not that I doubt it (Uncle Paul, after all), I just missed the reference/implication altogether.

*Pats Peter*

antisoppist July 20 2010, 08:27:44 UTC

*Blinks* REALLY? What book was that in?The Biographical Note mainly, plus hints throughout the books ( ... )

nineveh_uk July 20 2010, 21:05:15 UTC

I do wonder which royalty (I feel that being related to Helen would explain a lot about Phil the Greek).

nineveh_uk July 19 2010, 19:50:49 UTC

Re. Bunter, I like the casserole discussion, myself.

I do like the Peter and Mary discussion, and Peter's suggesting that M ask Parker to marry her (alas stymied by his rather old-fashioned attitudes. Let us hope she converts him to the merits of pyjamas for women. Possibly by wearing very unattractive nighties. "Here and now I cast off my pyjamas forever!"). It's nice to see Peter and Mary getting on, both finding life a bit unsatisfactory - we know P doesn't like Denver, but I'd not noticed before that Mary arrives only at the last possible minute - and commiserating tactfully.

abbybanks July 19 2010, 20:44:05 UTC

If nothing else then I'd love that Bunter conversation for the bit where he channels Peter & gets his piffle on,

"I’ve seen diamond necklaces and fur coats that should have been labelled Wages of Sin if deeds done in the dark were to be proclaimed upon the house-tops, Mrs. Pettican. And there are families that hold their heads high that wouldn’t ever have existed but for some king or other taking his amusements on the wrong side of the blanket as the old saying goes."

O BUNTER NEVER CHANGE ♥ ♥ ♥

nineveh_uk July 19 2010, 20:46:39 UTC

Mervyn Bunter: never afraid to disparage his employers in the interests of justice. (And also, like Peter, good at talking about sex in code.)

shinyopals July 20 2010, 00:06:26 UTC

XD That bit cracks me up almost as much as the time in Whose Body? where Peter wants some info from someone's manservant ans Bunter implies things while pretending to steal the port and cigars. ♥

Thread 5

crimedoc1 July 25 2010, 03:49:46 UTC

The whole Bunter with the cook and the maid scene is one of my total favorites! They BOTH like him.... come back on my day off. No, mine! LOL ( ... )

soniag July 26 2010, 13:16:11 UTC

Here's my trifling contribution to the discussion of nosebags. I'm in Oxford this summer and just saw this sign today:

( ... )

rosathome August 2 2010, 16:24:26 UTC

That restaurant has been called that for at least 20 years in my memory and I suspect much longer than that, so I wouldn't take it as evidence of current terminology.

soniag August 2 2010, 16:36:31 UTC

I just thought it was a fun sighting that seemed to indicate the word is still in the public consciousness around here. I wasn't posting it as evidence that people still use the term in everyday conversation. :(

thomasbull July 31 2010, 13:10:45 UTC

“Barbara celarent darii ferio baralipton.”

This is the first of four lines of a mnemonic for syllogisms of categorical logic. The vowels distinguish between four kinds of proposition:

(A) Universal and affirmative
(E) Universal and negative
(I) Particular and affirmative
(O) Particular and negative

(The affirmative kinds are assigned to the first two vowels of affirmo, Latin for "to affirm". The negative kinds are assigned to the first two vowels of nego, Latin for "to deny ( ... )