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Got those "Downton's out" blues? Here's a couple of cures.
Published: 2/21/2012 12:15 PM
Last Modified: 2/23/2012 10:06 AM


Jeeves (Stephen Fry) attends to Bertie Wooster (Hugh Laurie) as he enjoys the sea air, in this scene from "Jeeves and Wooster."

My esteemed colleague Kim Brown has already addressed the despair some are feeling, now that the second season of "Downton Abbey" has ended.

And though suggesting to true fans that they look elsewhere for a fix of between-the-wars drama and intrigue may be akin to offering a rubber bone to a starving dog, we shall in any case offer a suggestion or two for entertainment of a similar sort to see you through these Maggie Smith-free months.

The obvious suggestion is, of course, to lay hands on the DVDs of the first two seasons of "Downton Abbey." Another would be to check out the work that brought "Downton Abbey" creator Julian Fellowes to prominence: Robert Altman's film "Gosford Park," which has the added bonus of the wonderfully astringent presence of Maggie Smith, along with a host of Great Britain's top actors and actresses in a murder mystery as only Robert Altman could envision it.

Not as widely known, but out there somewhere, is "The Shooting Party" -- either in the form of Isobel Coalgate's excellent award-winning novel, or in the 1985 film adaptation starring James Mason and Edward Fox. Set during a house party in 1913, Coalgate's novel and the film closely adapted from it possess an elegiac atmosphere -- that sense of a great impending change and the human characters about to caught completely unawares when it comes.

The mother-and-son writing team that goes by the pen name Charles Todd has been producing a series of highly praised detective novels set in the years immediately after World War I. The novels about Inspector Ian Rutledge follow this veteran of "The Great War" as he returns to his civilian work as a police officer -- while dealing with trauma of his wartime experiences, embodied in the mocking voice of Hamish, a soldier who died under Rutledge's command and now haunts Rutledge's every thought.

A new series by Charles Todd features Bess Crawford, a nurse during the war -- the first novel to feature her, "A Duty to the Dead," begins with the sinking of the Brittanic, the sister ship of the Titanic that sank in the Mediterranean after being converted to hospital use.

The English novelist Robert Goddard's "In Pale Battalions" is set during and after World War I and, like all his books, is a well-written, densely plotted, twist-filled story of suspense and betrayal. And unlike some of the plot lines in "Downton Abbey," everything in a Robert Goddard novel is there for a reason. (Caveat lector: Goddard's novels can become addictive. Fortunately, he's written more than 20, and they are getting to be easier to find in the U.S.)

Jacqueline Winspear's series about Maisie Dobbs might be seen as a possible life for that maid in the first season who dreamed of becoming a secretary. Maisie begins as a maid in a country house and becomes the owner of her own private detective agency.

And, if you are looking for a break from drama of all sorts, there are always the stories and novels of P.G. Wodehouse, almost all of them set in this kind of hermetically sealed Edwardian Age, when butlers knew everything and aristocrats were as flighty as dandelion seeds in a summer's breeze. If the visual is more your speed, the "Jeeves and Wooster" series that starred Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry is available on DVD.




Reader Comments 1 Total
48554 (12 months ago)
In your article about Downton Abbey, you have managed to scramble information about suggested reading. Ian Rankin is the author of the books about Inspector Jon Rebus who is shadowed by his former (and dead) sergeant
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ARTS

James D. Watts Jr. has lived in Oklahoma for most his life, even though he still has people saying to him, "Don't sound like you're from around these parts." A University of Oklahoma Phi Beta Kappa graduate, Watts has received the Governor Arts Award, Harwelden Award and the National Conference of Christians and Jews Beth Macklin Award for his writing. Before coming to the Tulsa World, Watts worked for the Tulsa Tribune.

Contact him at (918) 581-8478.

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