veyispolatac96

The character of Leonie is immensely likeable (though, like Amanda in Sprig Muslin, she'd make more sense as a 15-year-old than at her stated age, which is 19). I don't quite see in her what Avon says he sees, the results of a life of terrible, constant loneliness. Avon is more problematic. Partly it's a Georgian-culture problem -- it's hard for me to distinguish between an ordinary, irresponsible nobleman of fashion and an actual rake in the old, non-playful sense of the word. We know he kidnapped Jenny Merivale as a youth, though evidently he left her marriageable; we know Jenny and her husband won't associate with him, and neither will his sister Fanny's husband, or, we take it, most people of morals, except, for some reason, Hugh Davenant. We know he's nicknamed Satanas; when he declares his love for Leonie, he makes a touching confession of having an unclean heart ... but we never really see or hear reports of specific behaviours that so much set him apart from other men of his set. (Except, I suppose, intentionally provoking a rival to suicide, but this is set up in such a way that you cheer it.) Gender assumptions (Leonie is universally admired for the frankness that comes of having been raised as a boy) and class ones (she's still recognizably a Lady, and the switched baby a peasant, despite their upbringings) are hard to ignore, and as always with gender-switch stories, I feel like the homoeroticism is raised and then hastily shoved offstage again.

2022-10-29 03:32