This is very belatedly in a response to a question someone asked when I or Jane Lockwood was guest blogging (and before I forget, you can enter Pam Rosenthal’s contest to win a copy of Jane’s book Forbidden Shores–the dirty one with the bodiceripper cover). The question was, who would I invite to dinner if I could have anyone from any time?

Great question, and it opens up all sorts of possibilities. As far as real people go, I’d like to invite Brummell, Byron, and Jane Austen, and watch her have fun with them both, possibly aided and abetted by Harriet Wilson. I think I’d serve shish kebabs… definitely something on skewers, to be followed by raspberries.

If you open it up to fictional characters, you could have a lot of fun mixing and matching characters–the Miss Dashwoods meet Toad of Toad Hall, for instance. The Bennett sisters enjoy rat pie and chips with the Watch of Ank-Morporkh, while one of Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler’s sausages has a profound effect (but not the usual one) on Proust. Sir Walter Elliot and Mr. Micawber dine (on food bought on credit, cooked and served by servants who haven’t been paid in months) and discuss matters of economy.

What do you think? Who would you invite to your literary (or otherwise) feast, and what sort of food and drink would you serve? Which characters would you like to mix and match for a dinner party?