Mad Blood Stirring: Simon Mayo

Friday, 30 December 2022

10:31

I finished this at 3am today - it took me a long time to get into it &, having got to almost the middle of the book,  I desperately wanted to finish it to figure out why Mayo wrote it.

 

Why it exists, imo: 

1. To point out that history is written by the victors, not the vanquished.

2. To highlight the effects of deeply entrenched racism in the forces - particularly in stories coming out of 19thC USA, and how they affected behaviours in the UK.

3. To situate Dartmoor and the prison in the early 19th C.  Dickens was writing in mid-century.  Arthur Conan Doyle The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902) in late 19th C - early 20thC.

4. To flex Mayo's research into the period.

 

What I liked about the book:

The richness and mixture of history and literature.

The humour in what could be very black stories.

 

What I didn't like:

The constant reference to Parcere Subjectis without ever referencing the context of the quotation.  I was really irritated about this - I found myself thinking: He's going to mention it now … and he never did.