Black Lamb

August 2014 in Black Lamb

Volume 12, Number 8 — August 2014

August 1st, 2014

The All-England Issue

In this special themed issue, John M. Daniel writes about an unpublished historical novel, Willikins Rex. In Not like us, Terry Ross elucidates a few differences between English and Americans. Elizabeth Fournier examines English mourning rituals in Headstones. In Imaginary England, Toby Tompkins thanks the old country for its rich literature. Four books are reviewed by writers Brad Bigelow, Sharon Harrigan, and M.A. Orthofer. Authors Percy Bysshe Shelley and Walter Scott are added to our gallery of Honorary Black Lambs. Bridge columnist Trixie Barkis offers new maneuvers of interest. Our delicious monthly lamb recipe is for Lamb Chops Stuffed with Chicken Livers. Advice columnist Millicent Marshall answers readers’ questions. And Professor Avram Kahn presents another tricky Black Lamb Word Puzzle.

Posted by: The Editors
Category: All England Issue, Month summaries | Link to this Entry

The All-England Issue

Including the fascinating story of Willikins Rex

August 1st, 2014

BY JOHN M. DANIEL

During the summer of 1961 I worked for an antiquarian bookstore in Dallas. While I was there the store acquired a Book of Common Prayer inscribed by Caroline of Brunswick to her ward, William Austin, dated Christmas 1805, Montague House, Blackheath. The store manager sent me downtown to the public library to research these people in order to put a price on this book.

What I uncovered allowed us to charge $100, which was cheap, I thought. A hundred bucks bought a lot of book back then, but this one had a royal signature and included a special prayer for the King’s health, which was touch and go at the time, to the grief of his adoring subjects and the annoyance of his heir, who was impatient for the old man to get on with the business of dying.

Who were these people? The King was George III (pictured), who had lost his American colonies in 1776 and who was now mad as a hatter. The heir was George, Prince of Wales, the promiscuous, over-eating scoundrel who would eventually become Prince Regent and finally King George IV. Caroline Amelia Elizabeth of Brunswick was the Prince’s first cousin as well as his wife, and the person he hated most in all the world. William Austin was Caroline’s darling child, whom she adopted in 1802, when he was three months old. Little “Willikins” lived and traveled with Princess Caroline until she died in 1821.

I typed up a one-page paper relating these facts, and it was displayed in a glass case next to the book. That one page was the first of hundreds of pages I wrote about Caroline and Willikins, off and on over the next twenty years. It turned into a novel of love and hatred, insanity and cunning intrigue, manners and scandal. Fortunately for my career, my novel, Willikins Rex, never got published. I had no business attempting a historical novel, but I enjoyed the writing and the research. Along the way I bought every book I could find about Caroline and George, many of which were deliciously opinionated one way or the other about the twenty-five-year royal squabble. At this point I don’t remember how much of my novel came from research and how much I made up. I told the story from the point of view of William Austin, who was a child, and bonkers at that.

Here are a few things that really happened.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by: The Editors
Category: All England Issue, Daniel | Link to this Entry