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Author Archives: Janet Mullany

Happy May Day!

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Unite and unite and let us all unite,
For summer it is come unto day;
And whither we are going we all will unite
In the merry morning of May.

Yes, it’s May Day. No one really knows the origin of the celelebration, although it almost certainly derived from the Celtic feast Beltane.

One of the rituals associated with the holiday is maypole dancing, one of the many popular pastimes Cromwell put an end to in 1644. You see–how shall I put this delicately for you Regency ladies–quite often the top of the maypole had a suggestive shape. Although May Day customs were revived after the Restoration, maypole dancing enjoyed a massive comeback in the Victorian era, when musicologists began collecting folk songs and rituals. The decorative ribbons and flowers stayed, and the whole thing became wholesome and practiced by schoolchildren.

As part of the May ritual, the celebrations began the night before with couples disappearing into the woods to gather may (hawthorne). They’d emerge the next morning with stupid grins and armfuls of flowers. A Queen of the May would be chosen, and sometimes a King of the May.

Sometimes the Queen of the May is not a person, but a special doll that is brought out each year and paraded around the community in a shrine of flowers made out of linked hoops. In some places you can find Morris dancers.

In Padstow in Cornwall, the Padstow Oss is paraded around the town to the beat of a drum while the song I quoted at the beginning is sung. Everyone gets really drunk. The song has references to St. George, rather like a mummers play, and is probably very ancient.

You can hear the song, read all the verses, and find out more about the Padstow Oss at its website, Blue Ribbon Oss.

May Day Traditions and Customs in England and Christine O’Keeeffe’s May Day Customs sites are also great places to find out about the varied and strange May Day celebrations in England and beyond.

Have you ever joined in a May Day celebration? Or tried maypole dancing?–I have. It’s really difficult! And once you’re tangled up, there’s no going back.

And a bit of shameless self promotion: The Rules of Gentility is a finalist in the National Readers Choice Awards!

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Mozart or Beethoven?

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Following on from Elena’s post about her enviable concert experiences, one thing that has always fascinated me is how different writers (and musicians) produce.

So are you a Beethoven or a Mozart?

Here’s Mozart’s manuscript for K. 617, Adagio and Rondo for glass harmonica, flute, oboe, viola, and cello.

The glass harmonica was an instrument that plays on the principle of running your finger around the top of a wine glass to produce a beautiful humming, otherworldly sort of sound. The Metropolitan Opera used a glass harmonica for the mad scene in their recent production of Lucia di Lammermoor–here’s an article from the NY Times about it. It’s usually played on the flute since they’re aren’t that many glass harmonicas around now–or people who know how to play them. This instrument was made in 1785.

But I digress. Here’s one of Beethoven’s scores.

The point I’m trying to make (yes, there is one) is that Mozart was notorious for composing in his head and then just writing it all down; or writing the music down after he’d improvised it at a concert. So his scores, although they have a certain messiness from writing fast, tend to be very clean. Whereas Beethoven used the delete key a lot, scribbling out and, although you can’t see this here, digging his nib into the paper with splattery results–all sturm und drang.

So for the writers among us, who’s a Beethoven and who’s a Mozart?

And for everyone, did you hear the Met broadcast of Lucia? (I missed it, to my great annoyance.) And what’s your favorite instrument?

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Let’s talk about summer

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This is strictly speaking a fall event, when the UK edition of The Rules of Gentility is released by Little Black Dress UK–their first ever historical. But here’s the cover, with a whopping big typo on it because designers can’t spell. Isn’t it cute … and pink. Very pink. Girly. I like it.

And my horn-tooting over, I want to talk about summer even though it’s only April. What are your plans?

I walked from work to the Metro in gorgeous weather–sunny and in the seventies (divine intervention–the Pope is in town, with nuns leaping out of birthday cakes yesterday and forming cheerleader squads at a mass Mass in the new baseball stadium today). The cherry blossoms were giving way to azaleas, and all I could think was oh my god I don’t have any sunscreen.

That’s on the list. Plus, summer pants. I wore mine to travel to Dallas last year for Nationals and upon arrival found they had a huge hole in the butt and my luggage was lost. I kept my knees together until my suitcase arrived. And t-shirts. Why aren’t there any cotton t-shirts in nice colors anywhere this year??? For less than a small fortune, that is. Another question, why can’t I wear a cream-colored t-shirt (not that I can find one this year) without spilling something truly horrible on it within minutes which will never wash out?

So, salvage not-too-stained t-shirts from last year. Find sunhat which my daughter hates (but isn’t nearly as silly as this one) and has probably hidden somewhere. Find stain remover in travel form (I know I have one somewhere) to anticipate future food/tea disasters.

When I came home I looked at the wreck that is my front yard and decided I must get out there, even thought I have to write, because in a couple of months it will be too hot and mosquito-y to do anything.

What are your summer plans? If you’re a writer, are you attending RWA National in San Francisco this year? Are you planning a real vacation? I’m not, as far as I know, and the plans to visit My Father Who Is Not a Tree in England are on hold until I actually have some cash freed up.

Tell us about what you’ll be doing this summer–and apologies for this being so late. Blogger has been a very naughty boy today.

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Getting ready for summer

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This is strictly speaking a fall event, when the UK edition of The Rules of Gentility is released by Little Black Dress UK–their first ever historical. And here’s the cover, with a whopping big typo on it because designers can’t spell. Isn’t it cute … and pink. Very pink. Girly. I like it.

And my horn-tooting over, I want to talk about summer. What are your plans?

I know it’s only April, but I walked from work to the Metro in gorgeous weather–sunny and in the seventies (divine intervention–the Pope is in town, with nuns leaping out of birthday cakes yesterday, and forming cheerleader squads at a mass Mass in the new baseball stadium today). The cherry blossoms were giving way to azaleas, and all I could think of was oh my god I don’t have any sunscreen.

So that’s on the list. Plus, summer pants. I wore mine to travel to Dallas last year for Nationals and upon arrival found they had a huge hole in the butt

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In Praise of Bananas

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Today is the anniversary of the day in 1633 when bananas first went on sale to an amazed London public.

It’s a little-known fact that the Regency was a great banana-eating epoch, from the famed insipid banana cream pies at Almack’s to the overpriced bananas served at Vauxhall, sliced so thinly they were almost transparent. Delicate and expensive to import, bananas were a sure sign of conspicuous consumption.

As an art motif, they lost out to the gorgeously symmetrical and elegant pineapple, and although Byron mentions in several of his letters his epic work on bananas, the manuscript has sadly been lost to posterity. Wedgwood’s banana line of tableware was quickly discontinued after derogatory comments.

Gentlemen at White’s would frequently lay a banana peel on the pavement outside the famous bow window and make bets on how long it would take for someone to slip.

Beau Brummell introduced the famous banana pantaloons which were immediately banned by most hostesses for drawing room wear.

Sadly for the English, they were not blessed with such fauna as the banana slug or banana spider.

For more information on bananas, try this online museum, bananamuseum.com or join the forums at bananas.org.

Share your favorite banana story or recipe. I’m very partial to banana pancakes and fried bananas, which incorporate a lot of brown sugar and butter.

How about you?

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