I look forward to hearing all about your 'touch of the sun' moment..... it really does sound extremely exciting....I confirm I have had many 'mad moments' but alas, not the 'touch of the sun'....... I be praying tonight that the sun does infact come out one of these days to at least improve my odds
There are not enough permissable words to describe him on this thread..
I remember on my first reading, thinking that Ross and Demelza were settling down together and they would be 'the ideal couple', whilst George and Elizabeth grew ever more at loggerheads. Good old WG - lulling us into a false sense of security! No basking in contentment for the main characters!
So, did Demelza really fall for Hugh - or was she spurred on because she had suspicions that Ross was seeing Elizabeth again? I think she certainly had some feelings for him, but just when her marriage was at its most calm and stable why on earth did she allow him such liberties? Perhaps it was just a mad moment - a touch of the sun - haven't we all had those?
In the later books it is surprising that Ross can look back on that time as being of little importance - perhaps he believed Demelza would never actually be unfaithful. I suppose time is a great healer. Thank goodness he never found out; that would have been a stormy scene.
Incidentally, about the article below - I never realised that Poldark's Cornwall and Poldark Country were different publications. No doubt everyone else has both of them, but it was news to me. Thanks, Bella, for posting it here.
Hugh...! He would fit nicely in the list I have in my kitchen of people who are - how shall I put this politely? - are far too impressed with themselves!
When meeting someone of that nature - my (perverse) nature always dislikes them, come what may. After all they have all the audience they need.
Hugh did think he could have Demelza - and he was right. What suprprises me is that she let him. Was it just that there was the added picquancy of his health problem? Or that when (at that stage) he returned to sea he would be gone for possibly years? I felt his character (and his appeal to Demelza) wasn't helped by his foppish portrayal in the TV series - which was so at odds with our riding booted friend !
lol, what annoys me the most about the storyline is the way Hugh presumes Demelza is for the taking from the minute he meets her.....way too cocky for my liking.
Bella, im not sure why he wrote that storyline. I suppose it was difficult to know what to do with Ross and Demelza once Ross's feelings for Elizabeth had been resolved, that could not have been resurrected so i guess WG felt any new disturbance to their harmonious relationship had to come from Demelza though why she couldnt have just spent all their money on shoes and clothes is beyond me!!
I agree Char.....Demelza loved her husband deeply. I wonder why Winston decided that she was to become unfaithful.....maybe after writing of Ross's infidelity with Elizabeth, having felt Demelza's pain he was very cross with Ross always wanted him to have a taste of his own medicine?
I agree Dwight! there is a definite difference in the writing but i suppose as you point out, that is inevitable given the twenty year gap and the changes that occured during that time in popular literature.
I also prefer the first four books but still thoroughly enjoy the later ones, the only storyline i have a problem with is Demelzas infidelity, still dont believe she would ever ever ever have been unfaithful to Ross! especially not at that time...
Thanks so much for that Bella, as always, just dropped everything to read the article, and found it both interesting and illuminative. I suppose in some ways as time moved on, WG moved on as well, just as we all do/have done.
For me, much as I enjoy immersing myself in the Poldark world, particularly with the snippets of edited out text which keep re-appearing from the early novels, it is those early novels which to me are the essence of Poldark. The world changed, and oh boy, did it change, between 1953 & 1973, WG changed, and to some extent so did his Poldarks. I wonder how different the world of Poldark would have been had he carried on writing in the 1950s to "discover what had happened to his characters after that Christmas night in 1793", rather than asking himself the question in 1973. We'll never know the answer to that question of course. That the storylines would have been different is probably not in question, but his twenty year interregnum certainly seems to have changed the direction of the storytelling, and not necessarily for the better.
