Within my garden wall.

ғᴀɴᴅᴏᴍʟᴇss  𝙀𝙙𝙜𝙖𝙧  𝙃𝙤𝙥𝙠𝙞𝙣𝙨 𝑇𝐻𝐸 𝐻𝑂𝑃𝐾𝐼𝑁𝑆 𝑀𝐴𝑁𝑈𝑆𝐶𝑅𝐼𝑃𝑇 ▍A record of his memories

[mrhopkns]

"I shall write by night… because I can no longer sleep through these ghastly, moonless chasms." ...▍

𝐌𝐑𝐇𝐎𝐏𝐊𝐍𝐒 | The record of a world's end. | Here lies the daily record of Edgar Hopkins: Retired member of the National Lunar Society, Amateur Poultry Breeder, and a man who simply wishes for the world to remain as orderly as his garden. A chronicle of the quiet life before the moon fell, and the desperate dignity of the man who survived to tell of it. From the tranquil lanes of his beloved village to the silence of the abyss, this is a study in human persistence - and perhaps a bit of stubbornness........................................................................................................

Independent & Selective Roleplay blog for Edgar Hopkins of R.C. Sheriff's sci-fi novel "𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐨𝐩𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐬 𝐌𝐚𝐧𝐮𝐬𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐩𝐭" (1939). Divergent but canon-compliant for the most part, and verse-heavy. A Note on writing style: In keeping with the nature of the novel as closely as possible, all interactions will be penned in the first person. This blog serves as Edgar’s personal record. As such, I write from his eyes and his heart alone. | Grieved, cried about and strongly loved by Linny. 36. Female. | This blog also serves as a homage to R.C. Sheriff and his fantastic writing.

▍𝐆𝐔𝐈𝐃𝐄𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐒. — ABOUT. — QUOTES. — EDITS. — HIS JOURNAL

[aurora-rph]

reblog this if you're fine with your mutuals sending you asks unprompted

[mrhopkns]

July 15th ; 5.08 pm

A calamity has befallen Beadle. For three consecutive days, the sun has beaten down upon the Hampshire countryside with a vulgar, almost continental ferocity. It is currently 29 degrees in the shade of my veranda, and I am quite convinced that if this persists, the village will simply dissolve into a puddle of melted tarmac and frustration.

Naturally, the local populace is handling the crisis with their customary lack of foresight. I encountered Evans on the lane this morning, sweating profusely into his waistcoat, and suggested that a collective effort to water the parched hedgerows might avert a local agricultural disaster. He merely muttered something entirely unintelligible about his turnips and slouched off. The man’s staggering indifference to the finer points of rural preservation never ceases to amaze me. If the village is reduced to a scorched wasteland, he will have only his own lethargy to thank.

But my chief anxiety (and indeed, a matter of national aesthetic import) concerns the poultry houses. It is one thing for the human residents of Beadle to suffer the consequences of their own inadequate ventilation, but it is quite another for my prize-winning stock to endure such indignities.

The Bantams are looking distinctly un-aristocratic. They are sitting about with their wings drooped and their beaks agape, panting in a manner that I can only describe as deeply middle-class...

Broodie is causing me the gravest concern. I found her this afternoon slumped in the nesting box, looking less like a prospective Best-in-Show at the upcoming Autumn Exhibition and more like a discarded feather duster. Her comb, usually a triumphant and regal crimson, has taken on a dangerously lethargic pink hue.

I immediately took steps. I dispatched my maid to the kitchen to fetch a block of ice from the icebox, which I intended to wrap in flannel and place strategically in the coop. She looked at me as though I had asked her to sacrifice her own savings, grumbling about "wasting good ice on a bird." I was forced to remind her, with a great deal of upper lip, that Broodie is not merely a "bird," but an elite specimen of avian perfection whose lineage vastly eclipses that of anyone currently drinking at the Plough and Harrow.

I have now rigged up a makeshift canopy over Broodie’s run using my second-best linen sheets and have been personally administering droplets of chilled water to her beak via a fountain-pen filler. She pecked my thumb quite sharply on the third application, which I choose to take as a reassuring sign of returning vigor.

If this intolerable heatwave does not break by Friday, I shall be forced to move Broodie into the morning room. I am well aware of what the vicar will say if he catches wind of it, but the National Lunar Society has taught me that true science requires bold action in the face of atmospheric anomalies. I will not have my finest breeding line undone by a bit of excessive sunshine.

[mrhopkns]

Since everything is rationed in Edgar's universe, given it's the aftermath of the second world war, soap is scarce. Which, to someone with as big of an OCD brain as Edgar, can be quite the challenge. Especially when he works with his chickens. He feels the urge to wash his hands every time he leaves the coop.

[oldwinesoul]

I don't know what it means to love people halfway, it's not in my nature. My affections are always excessive.

// Jane Austen

[witzbold]

With a significant portion of the RP community now over 40 (as a millennial these people are the ones I'm looking up to for they introduced me to Roleplay in the late 90s), normalizing and uplifting older muses is more important than ever. Reject the narrative that worth and desirability belong solely to the young. Let's diversify our writing. Reblog if you stand for mature muses (40+).

[mrhopkns]

Every time I read THM I am scarred by how funny it is when you start reading it and how dark it gets after you've read half of it. You get so used to Edgar being a little ignorant, upper-lipped and quite funny man only to get your heart broken.

Like, I can not find any argument whatsoever to hate on him. Not if you really bother to read in-between the lines whenever he talks about himself. It is so clear to me why he behaved the way he did and that beneath the surface was a lonely man who just looked for constancy and love.

And who was completely stripped off it due to natural catastrophe and human greed.

[mrhopkns]

5:48 p.m.

Broodie has been seized once more by the maternal urge.

When she wishes to sit, the entire British Empire could not move her. Her determination is a lesson to us all. However, her choice of "brood" this season has tested the limits of mother nature plenty. Although I have to assume this isn't an isolated fact and will with utmost certainty happen again next year.

It began on Tuesday. Upon entering the coop to offer her a choice mash, I found her missing from her standard nesting box. Instead, she had commandeered the corner of the tool shed. There she sat, puffed to twice her natural size, eyes gleaming with fierce devotion, clucking like a frantic clockwork toy.

Beneath her fluffed feathers? My left brogue.

Not a clutch of eggs. Not even a stray duck egg. A solid, double-soled, size-nine leather shoe. I attempted to reason with her. I pointed out that the leather was entirely impervious to her body heat. I explained that no matter how fiercely she sat, she would never hatch a pair of Oxfords. But she responded by pecking my thumb with the force of a small pneumatic drill.

By Thursday, she had expanded her empire. Finding the brogue insufficient for her grand ambitions, she had somehow rolled a large, smooth granite river pebble into the nest. Yesterday, she added a stray cricket ball left behind by young Higgins.

It is a ludicrous spectacle. She sits there, a tiny, feathered monarch, spread-eagled over a shoe, a boulder, and a lump of cork, looking for all the world as though she expects to birth a small, macadamized highway.

And yet... dash it all, I cannot help but find it utterly amusing of sorts.

I stood in the shed for a full ten minutes this morning, absolutely helpless with laughter. My handkerchief was entirely soaked! To see this minuscule creature glaring at me with the absolute certainty that, with just enough determination, that cricket ball will chip open and tweet... well, it is a magnificent sort of madness. It is the old British bulldog spirit, packaged in eight ounces of feathers.

I have decided to leave her to it. One cannot break such a splendidly obstinate heart. If the apocalypse comes tomorrow, I am quite certain Broodie will still be sitting in that shed, fiercely warming my left shoe, waiting for the leather to chirp.

[mrhopkns]

5:10 p.m.

A most distressing breach of domestic discipline occurred this afternoon. It has left me quite shaken. I am typing this with my left hand. My right hand is currently bandaged in linen.

The culprit is none other than Miss Broodie. She is my otherwise exemplary prize bantam hen as you may know. One expects a certain natural maternal instinct from the poultry world. However, today Broodie displayed an insolence that borders on the revolutionary.

The incident unfolded exactly at three o'clock:

I entered the coop to secure her morning clutch.

I spoke to her in my customary soothing tones.

I extended my hand with the utmost gentleness.

Without warning, the creature transformed. She became a feathered fury. She delivered three rapid, highly synchronized pecks to my knuckles. It was a calculated assault.

I was utterly flabbergasted. I immediately reminded her of the premium corn she enjoys at my expense. I also reminded her of her protected status in the poultry run. My lecture on gratitude fell on entirely deaf ears. She merely ruffled her feathers and glared at me with an eye completely devoid of remorse.

The eggs remain under her. It is quite impossible to negotiate with a bird in that frame of mind. I shall have to enlist the vicar's help tomorrow. Or perhaps I will wear my heavy gardening gloves. A deeply unsettling day.

[mrhopkns]

Apologies for the absence. I shall return very soon. :-)

If anyone would like to plot, feel free to come to my IMs

[mrhopkns]

4:45 p.m.

The afternoon is drawing to a close. I have taken up my position upon the upturned modern crate in the corner of the breeding house. It is quite the only spot in the entire parish where a gentleman may secure an hour of undisturbed contemplation.

Broodie is currently conducting herself with the most dreadful lack of manners. She has monopolised the prime nesting box in the lower tier. When the other birds approached to fulfill their own afternoon duties she raised her hackles and delivered several sharp pecks. She is a fascinating specimen of a Bantam but her regard for the communal spirit is sadly lacking. Watching her churlish display brought about a most unexpected wave of reminiscence. The politics of the poultry yard differ very little from those of human society.

The scene recalled most vividly my initial term at the preparatory school. I was a remarkably small lad. I possessed none of the robust qualities that schoolmasters seem to prize so highly. I was in fact very like that timid little grey hen currently sheltering beneath the water trough. The other boys made it entirely clear that my presence was an inconvenience. They formed their exclusive circles upon the playing fields. Whenever I chanced to approach they would fall into an immediate silence. Or they would move across the lawn with an air of deliberate purpose.

Youthful creatures are capable of an astonishing degree of cruelty. They possess a sharp instinct for anyone who deviates from the standard pattern. They took great offense at my preference for the library over the football field. I recall standing against the red brick wall of the pavilion. My starched collar felt uncomfortably tight. I kept my hands buried deep within my trouser pockets simply to conceal their trembling. I had brought along my collection of stag beetles to show them. I fully expected they would find the mandibles of interest. They merely jeered and walked away.

Naturally one learns the absolute necessity of maintaining a stiff upper lip. My late father was most particular upon that point of British character. One does not make a scene. One does not permit the world to see that its slights have found their mark. You merely adopt a more rigid posture. You fix your gaze upon the clouds. You persuade yourself that solitude was your original preference.

The years have advanced. I am now a man of independent means and established position. I have my estate. I have my prize birds. Broodie has carried the day. The rival hens have retreated to the grass outside. She remains entirely solitary in her conquest. She appears immensely satisfied with her isolation. I suppose I have achieved a similar state of affairs. I have secured my quiet corner. No one can displace me now.

[mrhopkns]

2:34 a.m.

A morning of mixed blessings, though generally satisfactory.

I spent the early hours in the orchard attending to Broodie. It is quite apparent to anyone with a trained eye why she took the Champion Ribbon at Winchester last season. Her plumage possesses a gloss that the local amateurs (most notably Mr. Finch, whose clumsy attempts at breeding Bantam are a local embarrassment) can only dream of replicating.

I noted a slight irregularity in her left wattle this morning. It is nothing that a careful application of vaseline cannot remedy, but it does require my personal supervision. One simply cannot leave these delicate tasks to the boy from the village. His hands are far too rough, and his intellect is, I fear, entirely unsuited to the nuances of poultry management.

The tranquility of the afternoon was, however, quite nearly ruined.

Tea was served five minutes late upon my return. I spoke to my maid about the clock in the kitchen. A household cannot function efficiently if time is treated as a mere suggestion. She looked aggrieved, but discipline must be maintained, even in the smallest matters. Have I been too harsh?

[mrhopkns]

8:59 p.m.

I have been forced this morning to endure an irritation of the most malicious sort. Upon preparing for my morning constitutional through the village, I discovered that the new pair of mohair boot-laces supplied by Mr. Finch at the drapery are short by a full three inches. Preposterous!

The consequence of this standardless manufacturing was immediately apparent. I was left with the choice of either binding my ankles with a knot so tight as to restrict all healthy circulation, or leaving a pathetic, stunted bow that untied itself three times before I had even reached the rectory gate. To walk through Bindle with one's laces trailing in the mud is a degradation I refuse to invite.

When I remonstrated with Finch, the man had the audacity to suggest I had threaded them too wide. The insolence of the modern tradesman is rapidly becoming a blight upon the nation. I informed him quite flatly that as a member of the British Lunar Society, I am entirely capable of calculating the geometric requirements of a standard seven-eyelet walking boot!!!

I have spent the afternoon correcting the deficit with a length of sturdy twine from the poultry shed. It looks abominably crude, but it holds. If the British Empire is to collapse, I am convinced it will not be from external foes, but from this insidious decline in the quality of haberdashery.

[mournfulroses]

Albert Camus, from a letter to María Casares featured in Correspondance, 1944-1959

[mrhopkns]

The manuscript begins with a flashback to the year of 1945, when Edgar still used to live a rather calm and serene life in Beadle. His actual writing (said manuscript) starts seven years later, after the cataclysm, while he's residing in the ruins of Notting Hill (stuck and helplessly aware of slowly starving to death). Meanwhile he tries to desperately preserve his memories for the future generations (should there be any).

In the story the moon collides with earth on May 3rd 1946, 1 year after Edgar's story begins (he quite literally prepares all of us for the inevitable doomsday for first half of the book *Still sighing heavily about it all as I reflect on it*). So Edgar's writing takes place around 1952/1953.

Sudden realization: I've aged up Edgar 1 whole year. He's only 46 when the story begins. Not 47. Oops.

[mrhopkns]

In the novel, Edgar often mentions the patchwork of hedgegrows in the landscape of Beadle (Beadle being a fictitious little village - the smallest of them all - located in Hampshire, though it could be any place, really, as long as the country offers a similar type of geography). This is how his home would have looked like from above. It wasn't just a place to live at. It was his domain.

[mrhopkns]

Starter for @ntrgyn

The Wednesday market has become a gauntlet of inefficiency, hasn't it?

I spotted her near the produce, and despite my intention to finish my errands with haste, I found myself coming to a halt at her side. She is, I have observed, one of the few people in Beadle who doesn't look as though they have just been unearthed from a peat bog, which makes her a tolerable conversationalist for a man of my standing.

"Ah, good morning," I remarked, leaning slightly on my cane while gesturing vaguely toward a pile of particularly bruised apples. "I see you are brave enough to tackle the stalls today. I have just spent ten minutes explaining to Mrs. Higgins that her scales are tipped in favor of the house, so to speak. She didn't take it well. One would think a retired schoolmaster's grasp of mathematics would be respected, but alas, the spirit of commerce is a grubby thing." There was but a fraction of a smile on my face I suppose, though I doubt anyone could have picked up on that.

"I do hope you aren't planning on buying the eggs from the stall by the gate. I know my poultry, as you well know, and those hens are living in conditions that can only be described as chaotic. If you require something truly fresh for your larder, you really ought to stop by my gate later this afternoon. I might be persuaded to part with a half-dozen from my own prize-winners, provided you don't tell the rest of the village. I simply couldn't handle a queue at my front door."