No3 Gin with Dorothy L. Sayers

or more specifically, Lord Peter Wimsey, who sounds like rather more fun to share a drink with than his creator might have been. 

If I had a favourite gin (it's really to soon to tell when there are so many yet to try) I would be tempted to say it's No.3 from Berry Bros & Rudd. In contrast to yesterday's gin from the City of London distillery which wasn't a London dry, this one is a London dry gin made in Holland. There's something pleasingly circular about it all.

Berry Bros & Rudd have been established at No. 3 St James since 1698, there is still a Mr Berry, and they are an institution. When I first visited, maybe 15 years ago, they didn't really do anything as vulgar as display wine (a smart looking assistant was sent to fetch bottles for your approval) but more recently that's changed (it's far less intimidating now for the casual shopper) and in 2010 they released this gin on the world.

Predictably, this being Berry Bros & Rudd, it's both very traditional and very good. They only use 6 botanicals (more is not neccesarilly better, allegedly Tanqueray only uses 4) it's a classic juniper forward gin, it's bottled at a healthy 46% abv, and everything about it - including the bottle based on an 18th century shape, and the key modelled on that for the shop parlour - is classy.

London gin is a style that isn't tied to London, there is a technical (and dryer than gin) explanation Here but I'm not sure it makes things much clearer, the idea of this one being made in Holland amuses me though, and I like to think Lord Peter would appreciate the joke. I don't doubt that he favoured Berry Bros with his custom, and I can't imagine a more fitting or elegant gin for Bunter to whip up a martini with (if only they were still around.

For me the specific book would be 'The Unpleasantness at The Bellona Club', because it's the only one of the set I haven't read, and as brand new reissued copies are in the offing (are they already out?) this might well be my plan for late Sunday afternoon.

The Nine Tailors – Dorothy L. Sayers

Or ‘As My Whimsy Takes Me’. Christina at Rochester Reader has an informal Dorothy L. Sayers challenge going on which on a more albeit sub conscious level has had as much influence on my rediscovered love of Sayers as reading ‘The Attenbury Emeralds’ did. I followed up ‘Clouds of Witness’ with ‘The Nine Tailors’ which was another Sayers that I didn't really get when I first read it, and happily remembered absolutely nothing about.

 Coming back to it years later with a warm affection for Sayers (and Whimsy) has been a treat and is a timely reminder not to dispose of books lightly. A month or so ago I would have thought I had no use for any but the books which also had Harriet in them which might have ended up expensive when I realised I was wrong.

‘The Nine Tailors’ is a curious book, as a mystery it’s not the best I’ve ever read, there are things that I don’t feel hold together brilliantly, but on the other hand, and certainly more importantly, the atmosphere is brilliant. Bleak midwinter in the Fens, a fantastic church, the sense of threat that comes with a suspicious death and any number of other details that set the scene, all underpinned by the arcane details of bell ringing. I can understand why it’s such a favourite with Sayers fans.

I can also see why critics aren’t over impressed with the bell ringing bits. They are both hypnotic and dull. The bells themselves emerge with distinct personalities as well as their own particular menace which turns out to be well earned... The information about ringing in its very dullness gives a hint of a closed world governed by arcane rules. I have also tried to find out if the method of murder is feasible, the internet is inconclusive on this point with the chances being that it’s unlikely. This doesn’t in the least matter either because it’s a really good story. There are thieves and emeralds, a couple of cases of bigamy, an absent minded but delightfully dynamic vicar, and a young woman who knows her own mind when it comes to getting an education. And of course The Bells.

The other great charm of the book is nostalgia. Presumable an inevitable part of getting older is this craving for the past. I find it vaguely disconcerting that a book written in the 1930’s reminds me of my own youth in the 1970’s, but after a day dealing with the public retreating to a world where people have impeccable manners is a delight.

(Sadly this is not the book cover I own, but it was so pretty I couldn't help but use it.)

Clouds Of Witness – Dorothy L. Sayers

It’s a rainy Sunday morning and what I should be doing is brushing up on my knowledge of distilled spirits ahead of an exam in a couple of weeks (as well as actually learning about some of the more arcane elements of cocktail making – Sunday morning however just doesn't feel like the right time for this kind of thing). Instead I'm almost entirely focused on Dorothy L. Sayers still, with a very small part of my concentration reserved for the possibility of a-nice-cup-of-tea-and-a-biscuit; proper Sunday activity I'm sure you’ll agree.

When I read Jill Paton-Walsh’s ‘The Attenbury Emeralds’ I thought I wanted more Peter and Harriet because those were the books I enjoyed most and consistently re read through my teens and onwards (reading back through Elaine Random Jottings post on ‘The Attenbury Emeralds’ from last year I see that this is a pretty common theme). What I actually wanted was more Sayers, looking at the books on my shelf I see that there are half a dozen that are falling apart with use and rather more that look suspiciously unmolested so I hauled out ‘Clouds of Witness’ in a fairly arbitrary manner and started reading. I couldn’t stop reading (and not just because I’m not interested enough in being able to identify bar tenders kit).

The thing with Sayers is that she leaves you in no doubt as to her academic credentials and proclivities – she will throw in quotations and longish chunks in French without either explanation or excuse. I imagine that she saw her audience as women like herself or like the provincial lady (and after all, who else would her audience have been but the educated middle class and middlebrow?) when I was much younger it made me want to learn more, now it makes me grateful for Google. The relationship between Harriet and Peter was fairytale enough to appeal to me in my teens; I think I was too young for the rest of the series.

I appreciated the silly rhymes, the slang, and indeed all Lord Peter’s affectations. I liked the aspirational element of the books as well – soft carpets, silks and velvets, Russian leather, crepe de chine underwear and fine wines (though one mention of Chateau d’Yquem has sent me off on a little research mission of my own to see if Sayers actually understood what she was talking about or not – I really can’t help myself) but mystery aside a lot in the rest of the books was over my head. This time round I enjoyed the whole of ‘Clouds of Witness’ in a way I was incapable of twenty plus years ago – for good and bad; the affectations are no longer as amusing but the inter war world is far more fascinating. The huge bonus here is that instead of pinning unrealistic expectations on a new book by a different author I have a sizable chunk of actual Sayers that I can work my way through to all intents and purposes for the first time.

Plot wise it’s a dead body in a country house with the likely culprits being the sleuths brother or sister which leads to an investigation that dashes from Yorkshire to London then Paris and New York in a very unlikely (but entertaining manner). I think the final courtroom scenes are the best – brother’s life hanging in the balance as we wait for Peter to fly back across the Atlantic with something vital to the case - all in the teeth of a rising storm (it’s 1924 – I think) so this is quite an undertaking and Sayers really builds the tension beautifully. Having her policeman buy a camisole for his elder sister in Paris has a touch of comic brilliance about it, and for menace there is Lord Peter putting pressure on a witness to come forward knowing quite well that if she does her husband will probably kill her (I don’t think that scene would really have sunk in first read round for me) which makes the nervous breakdowns at the end of each case feel far more inevitable.

The Attenbury Emeralds – Jill Paton-Walsh

First things first – it’s only fair under the circumstances to give some context to the depth of my affection for Dorothy L. Sayers, especially the books with Harriet and Peter. Going back through the mists of time to 1987 and the BBC series that ran ‘Strong Poison’, ‘Have His Carcase’ and ‘Gaudy Night’, I fell completely in love with Miss Sayers creations getting the books just as soon as I could. I was 13, it was Dorothy L. Sayers who made me determined to go to university (Oxford naturally, although my mother favoured Cambridge because she felt it had better tea shops, and I ended up in Aberdeen which suited me so well I didn’t notice the tea shops or lack thereof). It was also Dorothy who instilled in me a desire for silk pyjamas, my own library, and a flat decorated in soothing shades of grey.

As you’ve probably guessed I read these books at an impressionable age and they didn’t fail to make an impression. The non Harriet novels not so much but every 13 year old girl (presumably) likes a love story and a feisty heroine. When Jill Paton-Walsh completed Sayers unfinished novel ‘Thrones, Dominations’ I really couldn’t tell the difference between the two writers and was happy to accept this new addition to the canon. I don’t think I’ve read the second book Paton-Walsh wrote (‘A Presumption of Death’) but (and it was almost certainly the mention of emeralds in the title) I quite fancied reading this one despite my oft mentioned distrust of writers taking on other peoples characters.

Unfortunately ‘The Attenbury Emeralds’ released my inner pedant (never on a very tight leash anyway), and once you start picking holes everything starts to unravel. It wasn’t a plotting problem – a mystery solved, unsolved, and resolved is what it says on the cover and what it does in the book. The original case of the Attenbury Emeralds is one of Lord Peter’s first and here he’s telling the story to Harriet, now 30 years later the emeralds new owner needs to prove their provenance which turns out to be no simple matter.

My problem with the book comes down to the never explain, never apologise principle. Frequently bad advice but when it comes to recreating the past (or much loved characters) it should be the rule to live by (says I). I imagine that the majority of people buying this book – especially in hardback – are doing it because they already know Sayers’ books. We’re already familiar with Peter’s back story and shell shock issues, bringing it up again didn’t feel natural. Neither did all the explanations about the aristocracy ostensibly for Harriet’s benefit; the fascination for a title has never gone away, not even in detective fiction as Elizabeth George’s inspector Lynley shows.

After that mentions of Elizabeth David’s new book and the upcoming festival of Britain jarred a little because they didn’t feel like part of the flow of the plot. However the biggest sticking point was over manners and mannerisms. Everybody seemed so keen to apologise for being upper class, the oldest Whimsy boy calls Bunter (Lord Peter’s man) Mervyn but I can’t believe that an Eton educated child would ever exhibit such a breach of etiquette in his father’s house, or show Labour tendencies, or... but I won’t harp on in this vein because you either let these details bother you (as I sadly do) or you don’t.

In the end what it comes down to is probably this. Dorothy L. Sayers was clearly more than a little bit in love with her Lord Peter, and I like to think that Harriet is more than a little bit of Sayers. There is a chemistry in those books that was and is irresistible to me. Jill Patton-Walsh clearly has a great deal of affection for Harriet and Peter but I feel she treats them like slightly elderly relations who can’t be trusted not to say something outrageously un pc.

However I enjoyed getting slightly annoyed by what I saw as inconsistencies almost as much as I would have appreciated a production I regarded as flawless, and I’ll be looking out for Jill Paton-Walsh’s other books to see what she’s like on her own ground as well as going back (again) to Miss Sayers so all’s well that ends well...