dira | What Maisie Knew: the homeworkening.

So I may have posted one time--or more than one time if you follow me on Tumblr--about this movie that Alexander Skarsgard made that has not been released yet, but which is already dear to my heart, called What Maisie Knew.

So--this trailer and a couple of other YouTube vids from production comprising an actual fandom for me for a while there--I went to the library and checked out the actual Victorian novel What Maisie Knew to see whether I could guess any important features of the movie plot from it (or to back up my conclusion, derived from reading a Wikipedia summary and watching the trailer a couple dozen times, that there really wouldn't be a lot of correlation).

So I think that this bit, featuring a probably nine- or ten-year-old Maisie and her frumpy-but-reliable governess Mrs. Wix discussing Sir Claude (the analog to ASkars' stepdad character in the movie, who is named Lincoln instead)... I think this bit will probably not translate very directly:

It brought them face to face with the idea of the inconvenience suffered by any lady who marries a gentleman producing on other ladies the charming effect of Sir Claude. That such ladies wouldn't be able to help falling in love with him was a reflexion naturally irritating to his wife. One day when some accident, some crash of a banged door or some scurry of a scared maid, had rendered this truth particularly vivid, Maisie, receptive and profound, suddenly said to her companion: "And you, my dear, are you in love with him too?"

Even her profundity had left a margin for a laugh; so she was a trifle startled by the solemn promptitude with which Mrs. Wix plumped out: "Over head and ears. I've never, since you ask me, been so far gone."

This boldness had none the less no effect of deterrence for her when, a few days later—it was because several had elapsed without a visit from Sir Claude—her governess turned the tables. "May I ask you, miss, if you are?" Mrs. Wix brought it out, she could see, with hesitation, but clearly intending a joke. "Why rather!" the child made answer, as if in surprise at not having long ago seemed sufficiently to commit herself; on which her friend gave a sigh of apparent satisfaction. It might in fact have expressed positive relief. Everything was as it should be.

...Not least because movie!Maisie probably stays six the whole time and I don't think the governess character exists as such. But maybe also because it would be a tiiiiiny bit weird for her to be proclaiming herself in love with her stepfather.

Although, now that I think of it, there is that bit in the trailer where Maisie's mother says something dismissive to Lincoln about how he doesn't need to make Maisie fall in love with him, so I guess it's there in a way.

Okay, so maybe it winds up in the movie in a way--but really the thing that struck me about that bit was the delightful (if, you know, a bit weird when addressed to one's stepfather or employer) fangirlishness of Mrs. Wix and Maisie's relationships with Sir Claude--in an earlier scene they have this little spat over who gets to keep a photograph of him, which is happily settled when they're once again in the same household and can keep it on the mantelpiece in the schoolroom where they can both admire it. ♥