Back to Black: Jilly Cooper's glorious villain rides again
Hold on to your saddles: Jilly Cooper – the queen of the rural romance – is back. The British author who, in the 1980s and 1990s gave us the frisky and wildly popular novels Riders, Rivals and Polo (all glamour, material excess and small-town snobbery) has, after a lengthly foray into other subject matter, finally returned to the world we know and love her for – horseriding. In her latest book, Jump!, it’s National Hunt racing and the story of a widow who finds a talented but injured filly that she nurses back to health.
Let’s be honest, though; it’s not really the horses we care about. Instead, it’s the return of a certain blond cad. A man who, thanks to his withering witticisms and rogue-ish ways, set thousands of female pulses racing as he charmed his way around Rutshire (the fictional county in which the books are set).
Just mention the name Rupert Campbell-Black to any young woman and be prepared for plenty of breathless swooning.
Just mention the name Rupert Campbell-Black to any young woman and be prepared for plenty of breathless swooning.
Far from a knight in shining armour, Rupert is dangerous. He’s arrogant, rude, misogynistic and uncaring. In fact, consider other great romantic figures in fiction, and a pattern starts to form: Mr Rochester? Lying toad. Mr Darcy? Emotional cripple. Edward Cullen? Controlling, and, frankly, creepy. In real life these characters would have most sensible women running for the hills. Yet confined within a book’s pages, they are strangely alluring. Perhaps it is their inaccessibility (the person who, on a blog dedicated to listing one’s favourite fictional crushes plumped for Hazel from Watership Down will know all about that). Or perhaps it’s what happens when reality is tossed aside in favour of imagination.
But while many of the great romantic figures in fiction would make for poor company, there’s no denying their charisma. Here is our list of the top 10, from high-brow to chick lit.
But while many of the great romantic figures in fiction would make for poor company, there’s no denying their charisma. Here is our list of the top 10, from high-brow to chick lit.
Heathcliff
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (1847)
If you thought Rochester was tormented then brace yourself for Heathcliff, the central character of Emily Brontë’s only novel, set on the windswept Yorkshire moors. Yes, he morphs into a vindictive, vengeful tyrant in the book’s second half, but that level of passion deserves respect. And who doesn’t love an underdog? Plucked off the streets of Liverpool as a child by the benevolent Mr Earnshaw, his love for the privileged Catherine is passionate, boundless and, unfortunately, doomed. And the part where he calls her name from the window of Wuthering Heights into the howling Yorkshire gale? You’d have to be a robot not to feel something.
If you thought Rochester was tormented then brace yourself for Heathcliff, the central character of Emily Brontë’s only novel, set on the windswept Yorkshire moors. Yes, he morphs into a vindictive, vengeful tyrant in the book’s second half, but that level of passion deserves respect. And who doesn’t love an underdog? Plucked off the streets of Liverpool as a child by the benevolent Mr Earnshaw, his love for the privileged Catherine is passionate, boundless and, unfortunately, doomed. And the part where he calls her name from the window of Wuthering Heights into the howling Yorkshire gale? You’d have to be a robot not to feel something.
Edward Cullen
The Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer (2005 - 2008)
Sparkly and unusually pale because he is, to all intents and purposes, dead, our vampire friend wouldn’t, on paper, make the ideal boyfriend. And yet to Bella Swan, and millions of Twi-hards across the world, Edward is perfect. Perhaps it’s his old-fashioned, chivalrous charm (he is more than 100 years old), or his unwavering devotion to Bella that has him creeping into her bedroom at night to watch her sleep. Either way, it is enough to override his less appealing characteristics; such as his appetite for blood; his cold-as-marble body or his aforementioned penchant for, er stalking.
Sparkly and unusually pale because he is, to all intents and purposes, dead, our vampire friend wouldn’t, on paper, make the ideal boyfriend. And yet to Bella Swan, and millions of Twi-hards across the world, Edward is perfect. Perhaps it’s his old-fashioned, chivalrous charm (he is more than 100 years old), or his unwavering devotion to Bella that has him creeping into her bedroom at night to watch her sleep. Either way, it is enough to override his less appealing characteristics; such as his appetite for blood; his cold-as-marble body or his aforementioned penchant for, er stalking.
Source for rest
xoxo
Carrie
0 comments:
Post a Comment