Georgette Heyer Read online

  Georgette had included in the book most of the props, plot devices, and conflicts expected of a “cloak and sword” romance. There are enough sword-fights, gorgeous costumes, and daring escapades to entertain even the most jaded reader. Jane Aiken Hodge aptly described the book as “a young girl’s wildly romantic tale, and wildly readable,” but it is more than that. Setting aside the inevitable melodrama of the costume romance, Georgette’s first novel is a surprisingly mature work, which reveals a mastery of prose unusual in a seventeen-year-old and an ability to create characters that are sufficiently interesting and complex to give the book an extraordinary longevity. Ninety years after its initial publication The Black Moth is still in print.

  5

  Surely the writer of that must possess a lively mind?

  —Georgette Heyer

  The Black Moth sold moderately well in its first year of publication and its success encouraged Georgette to begin work on a second, far more ambitious novel. She had always been interested in history, reading widely, learning from her father, and even attending a series of history lectures given by Professor Forbes of Westminster College. She had no formal training in historical research, but her father’s teaching and her reading had given her a general understanding of how to gain a sense of a period, its key players and events. By late 1921 she was busy researching and writing her new novel. Set during the Restoration, The Great Roxhythe was to be a story of courtly love and political intrigue in the reign of Charles II (1660–1685).

  To bring it off Georgette needed, among other things, a detailed understanding of the nature and personality of King Charles II and the Prince of Orange, their courts, the intricacies of the Succession, the religious issues of the day, and the ramifications of the English Civil Wars (1642–8). Into all of this she would weave the personage of the Most Noble Marquis of Roxhythe, an entirely fictitious character whose ideas, actions, and conversation had to blend seamlessly with those of the historical past. The new novel was a more serious and in some ways less successful attempt at combining history with fiction than her first book. It was also a decided departure from the adventure and romance which had characterized The Black Moth. The Great Roxhythe is a fervently patriotic book, typical of the postwar period, in which characters say things like “nothing mattered so much as England” and “he had the hatred of the average Englishman of the time for France.” Georgette read and wrote assiduously well into 1922 and by the middle of the year was ready to deliver the manuscript to her new publisher, Hutchinson.

  It is not known why Constable published only the first of her novels. Her comments about Clause 17 in her original contract indicate that they had an option on her second and third books. Possibly her second novel was not what they expected from the author of The Black Moth. They may have decided to pass on The Great Roxhythe. Georgette had recently acquired an agent and it is also possible that he felt that a different publisher would manage her work better and had negotiated a better contract for her with Hutchinson.

  Her new agent was Leonard Parker Moore, or “L.P.” as Georgette would eventually call him. He became her agent in April 1922—six months after the publication of The Black Moth. She was nineteen and he was forty-five and a partner in the literary agency of Christy & Moore. Moore’s father was an agent and his brother Henry a novelist and Leonard himself had worked as a journalist before becoming a literary agent. He and his partner Christy (whom Georgette’s father knew) ran their business from an office in London’s Outer Temple. They were a middle-tier agency with a medium-size list which at different times included George Orwell, Carola Oman, Marco Pallis, Jane Mander, and Catherine Cookson. Georgette would remain with Christy & Moore for nearly thirty years.

  Her new contract with Hutchinson appears to have been for a two-book deal (the company’s records for this period no longer exist) with no apparent proviso for style or genre, given that her second book with them would be a modern novel. Hutchinson had scheduled The Great Roxhythe for November publication and, in keeping with her personal work ethic of discipline and professional integrity, Georgette delivered the manuscript on time and in good order. Even at nineteen she was the complete professional who, on signing a contract, would do whatever was necessary to meet her deadline.

  The Great Roxhythe came out in Britain on 10 November 1922 and in America in 1923, where Georgette had a new publisher in Small Maynard. The book was well received on both sides of the Atlantic with respectable sales and a number of good reviews. She came to dislike the novel quite early in her career, however, inscribing it “This immature, ill-fated work” on the flyleaf of her own copy. She eventually sought to have the novel suppressed—though the reasons for this drastic act of self-censorship are not entirely clear. Toward the end of her life, Georgette wrote to an American fan, who had sent a polite letter asking about Roxhythe, telling him that “this very jejune work, written when I was nineteen (and just the kind of book you’d expect from an over-ambitious teenager!) was withdrawn, at my own urgent request, from circulation years ago.” It is possible that one of the reasons for Georgette’s growing dislike of the novel arose from a shift in the public awareness of homosexual love which had evolved by the Second World War.

  The Great Roxhythe is the only novel in the Heyer canon that does not have a significant male-female relationship at its center. The Marquis of Roxhythe cares for no one but his King, Charles II, while Roxhythe’s young secretary, Christopher Dart, is passionately devoted to his master. One of the turning points of the novel is Christopher’s devastating discovery that Roxhythe has deceived him and is, as he has been warned, a spy for the King. Chris’s heartbreak is palpable but his passionate laments seem more suited to a young woman betrayed by her lover than from a secretary deceived by his employer:

  “There’s no peace for me in England, and no work. Always I think of Roxhythe, longing only to see him—to hear his voice—feel his hand in mine––”…“And he does not—care as I care. It is not to be expected. Lady Fanny—I am not—complaining, but—I loved him so greatly! I trusted him so! And he tricked me. It’s—all over. I’ve to forget it all. I’ve to forget Roxhythe, and all that he meant to me. I must go right away, where I shall not be so constantly reminded of him.”… “Since I have been with—Roxhythe—he has had all my love. He has it still. There will never be another in his place. I’m such a weak fool—but—oh, Lady Frances, I want him so much!”…

  When The Great Roxhythe first appeared in 1922, this sort of conversation and the male focus of the book elicited no particular comment or criticism. In fact, the reviewer for The Times Literary Supplement complimented the author on her “neat dialogue.” By 1951, however, when the book was reprinted for the last time (against the vehement wishes of its author), it is possible that some readers may have interpreted Georgette’s youthful rendition of seventeenth-century courtly love quite differently from its author’s original intention. When Jane Aiken Hodge asked Georgette’s brother Frank whether The Great Roxhythe was intended to have a homosexual slant, he denied it, explaining that Georgette “was totally square and would have disapproved of homosexuals if she had been aware of them when writing The Great Roxhythe.”

  With Roxhythe completed by the middle of 1922, Georgette began casting about for a new project. She had ideas for several novels and by autumn had begun some preliminary work for a book about a protagonist named Smith. This was probably Sir Harry Smith, the Peninsular War soldier who later became Governor of the Cape Colony and about whom she would eventually write a book. But beginning a new historical novel meant waiting an indeterminate amount of time for her next advance and Georgette had discovered the pleasure of a publisher’s check. She had also learned that a diligent author could reap a quick return writing short stories.

  The postwar years were a golden age for short-story writers, as publishers sought to meet the demands of an increasingly literate public with an insatiable appetite for fiction. In Britain in the 1920s dozens of magazine titles were pu
blished each week, many of which depended on short stories for a large part of their content. The demand for short fiction made writing a viable occupation for numerous aspiring authors. Some of the best-known writers of the twentieth century began their careers composing short stories for periodicals such as The Happy Mag, The Red Magazine, Everywoman’s, Argosy, My Home, Good Housekeeping, Home Chat, Women’s Home Pictorial, and from 1927, one of the most prestigious of them all, Woman’s Journal. Georgette’s earliest stories appeared in the same magazines that published stories by writers such as Edgar Wallace, Richmal Crompton, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Edna Ferber, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Agatha Christie, and Leslie Charteris.

  Georgette’s first foray into short-fiction writing was a light, contemporary romance entitled “A Proposal to Cicely.” Published in The Happy Mag in September 1922, this was her first known attempt at contemporary romance. It is a readable story with some humorous dialogue and several well-drawn minor characters including a Pekinese called Chu-Chu-San and a bull-terrier named Bill: the first appearance in Georgette’s writing of the breeds of dogs which she herself had owned or loved. The story is about a young woman fed up with modern life who, having steadfastly refused the regular marriage proposals of debonair, patient Richard Spalding, goes off to the country to show him that she can manage without a man. She befriends a local farmer who completely misreads her open, friendly manner and eventually makes what she considers unwelcome, vulgar advances. Though predictable, the story is interesting for its reflection of Georgette’s youthful perceptions of class and etiquette, as well as for its portrait of Richard Spalding, with his calm demeanor and down-to-earth attitude to romance. His was the first appearance in her published fiction of the reliable, athletic hero who had so much in common with the real-life Ronald Rougier. The character type was to reappear in most of her short fiction, as well as in two of her contemporary novels and, though cast as a pragmatic, unromantic hero, he always proves the best choice for the heroine in the end.

  Reading her early short stories it seems that Georgette’s romantic ideal was not of a man who would sweep her off her feet or with whom she would fall in love at first sight. Her fictional heroes were often men prepared to wait for the heroine to know her own heart and mind. One of the consistent themes in her writing is that a successful relationship takes time and that true love requires mutual understanding and empathy and not mere physical attraction. Even in The Black Moth, where the characters and plot owe more to Baroness Orczy and Jeffery Farnol than to Jane Austen, Georgette depicted a variety of love affairs, not all of which fit the stereotype of the swashbuckling romance. In the book, love comes in several different guises and causes almost as much pain as it does happiness for a number of the characters. Although she was only seventeen when she wrote it, Georgette showed how perceptive she could be about the vagaries of love and the ways in which relationships can evolve, hearts can be broken or mended, and how love can lead individuals to change.

  The success of her first short story inspired Georgette to write a second and “The Little Lady” appeared in the Christmas edition of The Red Magazine. In some ways the story is Georgette’s most juvenile and sentimental work with its unhappy lovers and elfin-like heroine who inspires the hero to declare awkwardly that “I thought you had stepped from the pages of Jane Austen.” Despite its contemporary characters and 1920s dialogue, the story has an unusual, almost period feel to it, with a blend of old and new and a central character who does not always convince.

  After the ready acceptance of her short stories by The Red and The Happy magazines Georgette decided to try her hand at detective fiction. In March 1923 “Linckes’ Great Case” appeared in The Detective Magazine. It was touted as a thrilling tale of how “A mysterious leakage of Cabinet documents and the trust of a very charming young person gave Linckes the chance of his life.” This first effort in the detective-thriller genre is not a good example of Georgette’s writing. Transparent plotting, stilted dialogue, and an obvious ending make it probably the worst story she ever wrote. Only in its romantic moments does it really come to life and she did not repeat the experiment.

  Instead, Georgette returned to the contemporary romance genre for her next three short stories. Between them, “The Bulldog and the Beast,” “Acting on Impulse,” and “Whose Fault Was It?” demonstrate just how quickly she could pen the humorous, lighthearted love-story. But she could also write tragedy and in 1923 a short historical romance simply entitled “Love” became her sole publication in Sovereign Magazine. It remains the only romantic story she ever wrote that tells of the bitterness of love’s sacrifice and ends, not with the happy union of two lovers, but with their separation and lifelong sadness.

  These early publications are an interesting reflection of the young Georgette’s romantic ideals. They demonstrate a depth of thinking about love that must be considered unusual in such a young writer. Her skill as a storyteller and the ease with which she produced new material are also apparent. Despite changes in period or genre her style remains consistently readable and she is able to bring even the most mundane subject to life. Georgette had the storyteller’s gift from the beginning, and even in her least successful books and short stories, where the plotting may lack pace and the dialogue is not always convincing, she never fails to engage her reader’s interest and hold it to the last sentence.

  Between September 1922 and November 1923 Georgette had at least seven stories published in various London magazines.2 She had no illusions about the literary quality of the pieces but the money was good and she benefited from the discipline of having to structure each tale within a word limit. In the autumn of 1923 she told her agent that “If Mr. Shand likes my story he must be mad. But, of course, if he really does want it he must pay for it! What are you going to ask for it? I’m getting horribly mercenary!” She was learning her craft in those early years and in many ways the short stories and one or two of the early novels represent her juvenilia. Georgette later decided that all but one of her early short stories (which had been published in translation) were best forgotten and she excluded them from her personal catalogue of her publications.

  Georgette enjoyed having a personal income, especially after her father found work and she no longer needed to add her literary earnings to the family coffers. Earlier that year George had returned to his position as Appeals Secretary at King’s College Hospital with a salary which had not only eased the financial strain of earlier years but also enabled him to buy a house (they had always rented previously). No. 5 Ridgway Place in Wimbledon was an attractive, three-story Victorian terrace house at the top of the hill, just two doors from the Oakhill Academy where Georgette had first gone to school (the houses in Ridgway Place were renumbered after 1925 and the original no. 5 which the Heyers owned became no. 67). It was in their new home that over the next two years she continued to follow her literary whims, writing often, and always with an eye to publication.

  Georgette was remarkably single-minded about her writing. It was never a question of whether she could write, but rather a question of what she would write. She was brimming with story ideas and her magazine writing had not stopped her producing novels. As well as working on “Smith” through 1922 she had also begun an entirely new manuscript, about which she wrote enthusiastically to her agent. The as yet unnamed book was a return to the style and period of her first novel. In January 1923 Georgette sent her agent a copy of The Black Moth which she wanted him to read as an introduction to the new manuscript. As she explained to Moore:

  Here is The Black Moth—a very juvenile effort. I do hope you’ll like it. At the risk of earning a dubious headshake from you, I will tell you that some time ago I began a sequel to it, which one day I shall wish to publish. The sequel is naturally a much better book than The Moth itself, and is designed to catch the public’s taste. I have also tried to arrange it that anyone who reads it need not first read The Moth. It deals with my priceless villain, and ends awfully happily.

  Sh
e was excited about the new novel’s possibilities and proudly told Moore that “Dad is as enthusiastic over it as he is over Smith—more so, in fact.” The manuscript was not yet finished but she assured him “it will be one day.”

  Georgette was unusually confident for such a young writer. She never seems to have doubted her ability to produce salable works. The new manuscript was intended to be quite different from the more somber Roxhythe. It had an original heroine and a fast-paced adventure story that would hold the reader’s attention. She had a clear plan for the book’s eventual publication, which she outlined to Moore: “I’d like to make a success, then to get The Moth out of Constable’s hands and to induce another publisher to reprint in a cheaper edition, and lastly to bring out the sequel!” Soon after writing this she put the unnamed and nearly completed eighteenth-century romance aside—although it remained in her mind and was an obvious influence on her next published book.

  2 It seems probable that Georgette published more than this but the actual number may only be discovered by trawling the magazines themselves, many of which do not have indexes and must be searched page by page. The main repositories of likely magazines are the collections at the British Library, St. Pancras, and the Newspaper Library at Colindale in England where some titles exist in hard copy and others on microfilm. I have searched over three thousand individual magazines to discover nine previously unknown Georgette Heyer short stories. I believe that there are others yet to be found.