Week 1 of "The Ladies of Grace Adieu" readalong: the title story
It's not too late to join Susanna Clarke "The Ladies of Grace Adieu" readalong! Last week we read and discussed the first story in the collection, "The Ladies of Grace Adieu". I liked it better than I expected, because it turned out that Jonathan Strange plays a major part in it. And even Norrell is there for a small bit. And the two magicians have a paragraph's worth of conversation, which I can't stop chewing on. I realize it is not the point of the story, but I can't help it. But that's just me.
The main characters are three women magicians, who exist despite the fact that officially they are not supposed to. The official stance of English magic, represented by Norrell, is that women can't be magicians. But since they live in the countryside, these ladies fly under the radar. When Jonathan and Arabella Strange come to visit Arabella's brother Henry Woodhope (who lives in the same village), it becomes like a reunion of the JSAMN crew, plus three new, interesting female characters! (Well, not quite a reunion, since the story is set sometime during the years of Strange and Norrell's collaboration.) All these people collide in various ways and have interesting interactions. That's as much as I can say without spoiling it.
The plot and the resolution of this story are kind of low-key, without surprising twists, but what I liked the most was the fanficky inspiration it lit under me. I wanted to see the whole crew together - Strange, Norrell (in my imagination he would totally go with Strange and Arabella to visit Henry - he hated to travel, but he also hated being away from Jonathan; and surely Jonathan can't be so long without someone to discuss magic with?) and the three lady magicians - teaching magic to each other, collaborating and inventing all sorts of interesting magical methods. The women's magic had to be very different than the official English magic that Strange and Norrell learned from books. The ladies of Grace Adieu did not have access to magic books, so they had to invent their own spells, I would think. So much possibility for collaboration, rivalry, conflict, and new discoveries.
There is one point where Henry asks Strange not to do magic in the house. So I can imagine JS and GN sneaking off into the fields, and finding out that somebody else is casting spells there - namely, the three ladies, who, too, thought this could be a convenient place for magical practice. Their spells clash with each other. Et cetera. The possibilities are endless.
The LOGA stories were written before "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell", but the JSAMN characters in it appear fully-formed and canonical. For example, Jonathan Strange is full of confidence (some might say arrogance), but also possesses a curious mind and does not mind to have his ego taken down a notch.
