Tag: john buchan

Top Ten Tuesday: Best Character Names – The John Buchan Edition

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Top Ten Tuesday new

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme created by The Broke and the Bookish and now hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl.

The rules are simple:

  • Each Tuesday, Jana assigns a new topic. Create your own Top Ten list that fits that topic – putting your unique spin on it if you want.
  • Everyone is welcome to join but please link back to The Artsy Reader Girl in your own Top Ten Tuesday post.
  • Add your name to the Linky widget on that day’s post so that everyone can check out other bloggers’ lists.
  • Or if you don’t have a blog, just post your answers as a comment.

John BuchanThis week’s topic is Best Character Names.  Regular followers of this blog will know I have a real passion for the works of John Buchan so I’ve chosen some of my favourite  character names from his novels.  As I was compiling the list, I started to notice a pattern which suggests a certain line of thinking (critics might say a rather lazy line of thinking) on John Buchan’s part when creating character names.  If you have the time or inclination, try this quiz.  All the characters below can be loosely categorised as either “goodies’ or ‘baddies’.  Can you guess to which category they belong? (There are a few curve balls.) You can find the answers at the bottom of this post.

Clicking on the title will take you to the book’s description on Goodreads or to my review.  Some characters appear in more than one John Buchan book, so I’ve just shown the book in which they first appear.

Marmaduke Jopley from The Thirty-Nine Steps

Moxon Ivery from Mr. Standfast

Sandy Arbuthnot (Lord Clanroyden) from Greenmantle

Hilda von Einem from Greenmantle

John Scantlebury Blenkiron from Greenmantle

Koré Arabin from The Dancing Floor

Dickson McCunn from Huntingtower

Dominick Medina from The Three Hostages

Jacques D’Ingraville from The Courts of the Morning

Launcelot Wake from Mr. Standfast

Answers to the quiz:
‘Goodies’: Marmaduke Jopley,  Sandy Arbuthnot, Koré Arabin, John Scantlebury Blenkiron, Dickson McCunn, Launcelot Wake [the mostly solid British sounding names]

‘Baddies’: Moxon Ivery, Hilda von Einem, Jacques D’Ingraville, Dominick Medina [the foreign sounding names]

Next week’s topic: Bookish Worlds I’d Want To/Never Want To Live In

Buchan of the Month: Introducing…A Lost Lady of Old Years

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Buchan of the Month

A Lost Lady of Old Years is the fourth book in my John Buchan reading project, Buchan of the Month. To find out more about the project and my reading list for 2018, click here.  If you would like to read along with me you will be very welcome – leave a comment on this post or on my original challenge post.

What follows is an introduction to the book (no spoilers!).  A Lost Lady of Old Years is one of the few works of fiction by John Buchan I’ve not previously read and I’m really looking forward to approaching it with fresh eyes.

A Lost Lady of Old YearsA Lost Lady of Old Years was published in September 1899 by publishers, John Lane.  Buchan’s third novel, it is a historical romance set during the Jacobite rising of 1745 and written in a style reminiscent of two of Buchan’s great literary heroes, Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson. Unlike Buchan’s later adventure stories, A Lost Lady of Old Years did not appear first in serial form in the UK.  The title is drawn from Robert Browning’s poem, Waring.

Kate MacDonald describes A Lost Lady of Old Years as ‘a study of redemption from near moral collapse’ and remarks that its use of an anti-hero to drive the narrative was a departure for Buchan.    However, she feels the book’s depiction of male/female relationships shows Buchan’s limitations at this point in his writing career.   Buchan’s biographer, Janet Adam Smith describes A Lost Lady of Old Years as ‘a novel of atmosphere rather than adventure’.  It seems the novel’s creation caused Buchan a good deal of anguish, as Janet Adam Smith reports him saying ‘the Lost Lady has now reduced my hair to a silvery white’.

Certainly A Lost Lady of Old Years was not successful in financial terms.  Buchan received a 15% royalty, rising to 20% after the £100 advance he received for the book had been paid off.  Unfortunately, the book earned only £36 15s 5d of its £100 advance, probably selling no more than 500 copies between its publication and 1917.

Look out for my review of A Lost Lady of Old Years later this month.

Sources:

Kate Macdonald, John Buchan: A Companion to the Mystery Fiction (McFarland, 2009)

Janet Adam Smith, John Buchan: A Biography (OUP, 1985 [1965]), p.97, p.104