Mehhheheheheh!

Sleep tight all.

You’ll be fine, tucked up under the covers - just as long as you don’t hear a carrump carrump MEHHHH!

Don’t get me wrong, I thought there was a lot in this story, I liked the writing, I just felt it was knocked on the head by the ending.

Of course not, but there’s scant difference between the two in this story. Green Tea offers enough material for the reader to draw disparate conclusions {Hesselius’ agenda at the end of his account, eg, is fairly clear}

It’s a fair cop! Benson is no LeFanu - I’ll happily give you that. He is what he is, and what he is is pretty interesting in its own right - though (patently) lacking the sophistication and (for want of a better word) genius of LeFanu.

I may be straining to demonstrate a carefully crafted narrative ambiguity here (Devil’s advocate!) but I still maintain there’s (much) more to this than the basic “Don’t overstep proper bounds” plot elements may seem to suggest.

I’m not suggesting that (”in story”) narrative ambiguity should mask a (genuine)lack of narrative clarity or ambition.

Of course not, but there’s scant difference between the two in this story. Green Tea offers enough material for the reader to draw disparate conclusions {Hesselius’ agenda at the end of his account, eg, is fairly clear}. I just don’t se the raw materials to make that fruitful here.

Hey, has anyone written anything? I’d love to see what you’re coming up with. I forced myself to have some ideas but I suspect they are terrible bilge.

Only scraps and fragments that are, most likely, “terrible bilge” too.

I have volumes of (spooky) poetry from my early days that I could throw at ya but they’re full of the usual pretentious cack and arse of youth! Not fun (or good).

I don’t see much material here to take us beyond some inchoate ambiguity - “Then again, that may not be how it happened.”

That’s true (in a way). Viewed from that perspective it leads to a pretty underwhelming dead end that even the laziest hack could manage to construct.

I’m not suggesting that (”in story”) narrative ambiguity should mask a (genuine)lack of narrative clarity or ambition.

Having said that, I don’t know about Darcy’s lack of agenda. On a few occasions his stolid “Englishness” is commented on. Combine this with the villagers’ (stated) folk beliefs and you might not have an account that is free from “interference”.

Goats and monkeys. What next. Evil shellfish?

Hey, has anyone written anything? I’d love to see what you’re coming up with. I forced myself to have some ideas but I suspect they are terrible bilge.

I must go. I’m hoping to bake for the Green party fundraiser in Leopardstown Racecourse on Sunday. Ironic, as I’ll be using fossil fuel to bake my buns. So I have to work out prices and see if they’ll bite! And v sleepy - finished up last batch of corrections at three am last night. Yawn!

Thanks for the fun, I like the story.

It gives you what it gives you in all such tales - a doubt about narrative authority. Benson, I’m sure, would have realised this.

I don’t see much material here to take us beyond some inchoate ambiguity - “Then again, that may not be how it happened.” There are no other possibilities or agendas hinted at, so all we have to pin this ambiguity on is that some of the story came from the villagers, and most of it from Darcy, who appears to have no agenda of his own. I think Benson would have known how to use that ambiguity more effectively.

Edit, and he did it again.

Har! And with that, I withdraw. Time for sleep and dreams of bleating laughter and nature’s “sweet embrace”. Gulp…

Thanks lads and lassies. Enjoyed it.

‘Night.