Beautiful People - Christopher

pinterest board: the soldier's cross

The title of this blog post is rather absurd, as readers of The Soldier's Cross will have noticed.  However, this round of Georgie and Sky's "Beautiful People" meme is focused on villains and, since characters from TSC show up around here but rarely, I decided to introduce Christopher.  For those of you who are not aware of what Beautiful People is or how it works, here's a summary for you:

...What is Beautiful People? Beautiful People is a monthly blog event created by Georgie Penn and Sky. It's designed to help you get to know more about your character by asking questions about them. It's simple: every month Sky and Georgie post 10 questions, and you answer them on your blog with your character of choice. To learn more, check out their blogs!

And with that squared away, I introduce you to the villain of The Soldier's Cross:

christopher

1. What is his motive?

Ambition, to some extent, but primarily straight-up greed.  The son of a merchant, landless, and with much too little money, he seeks a higher position and the increased funds that would come with it.  He does not passionately hate his vagrant lifestyle - indeed, he is rather fond of it - but it certainly doesn't provide him with much money to spend.

2. What is he prepared to do to get what he wants?

Christopher prefers manipulation to a trial of brute strength.  Up against Fiona, he will go that route; but against anyone who has the ability to stand and face him, he takes a roundabout path to his own ends.

3. Is he evil to the core, or simply misunderstood?

I don't go in for "misunderstood"; it smacks of that Deist saying that every man has a "spark of the Divine" in him and is "basically good."  Christopher is basically bad.  He is perhaps not so evil as he could be, but given an opportunity I'm sure he would fulfill all expectations in that respect.

4. What was his past like? What about his childhood? Was there one defining moment that made him embrace his evil ways? 

Christopher and his sister Leah grew up in comfort, though not in luxury.  As the only son, a great deal of pressure was put on Christopher by his father to succeed him in trade; Christopher, however, wanted the life of the nobility's sons, who had even more comfort with less work.   There was no single moment in which his heart was blackened, etc., but with his father's death he found it expedient to drop the charade of being a respectful son and get to work making his fortune.

5. Now that he is evil, has he turned his back on everyone, or is there still someone in his life that he cares for?

He had a passing affection for his mother and would sometimes correct his behavior for a few days in a row after she rebuked him, but her early death only served to convince him that the good die young, so why be good?  His father he cordially hated; his sister he regards as his queen - not in the affectionate sense, however; merely in the chessboard analogy.  She is his best means of bringing about a checkmate, and for that reason, and that reason only, he keeps her safe. 

6. Does he like hugs? 

I really couldn't hazard an answer to this question.  

7. Is he plagued by something?

Not that he ever told me; but then, he would be unlikely to do so.  

8. Who are they more similar to: Gollum or Maleficent? 

A slinking beast or a woman...  That's a difficult choice.  Gollum is more cowardly, so I tend toward him; but Maleficent is more impressively evil, so that tilts me back in her direction.  I'll say Maleficent.  

9. If your villain could have his choice of transportation what would it be? 

His own coach, highly gilded and lined on the inside with scarlet; his choice of horse would be three bays and a black, just for the element of surprise.  The difficult part would be whether to drive himself or to have a servant do it.

10. If you met your villain in the street, how afraid would you be? Is he evil enough to kill his creator?

 If I met him on the street, I would pepper-spray him.  And then run.

Whimsy

Last night I finished Jean Webster's novel Daddy-Long-Legs.  Not for the first time, of course: I've read it perhaps half a dozen times over as many years, and yet it never fails to leave me happy at the end.  Like Jane Austen, Daddy-Long-Legs is a comfort read.  Whenever I am blue, and whatever I'm supposed to be reading isn't cutting it, it is usually a choice between Pride & Prejudice, Emma, or Daddy-Long-Legs.  (Not Mansfield Park: I love that book, but I'm sure it gets my blood pressure up.)  This time it was The Shield Ring that, in true Sutcliff style, was just too emotionally investing, and Daddy-Long-Legs came off the shelf.

The book is not difficult, or mind-stretching, but it is the sort of book that makes life seem brighter by portraying it with zest.  It picks up all the little details and spins them into a gossamer story - appropriately gloomy in some places, for it wouldn't be as cheery in the other parts if there were not at least some grey bits.  Everything is touched with whimsy, much more, perhaps, than real life has from day to day; but maybe that in itself is what makes the book so darling.  It characterizes the momentary, simple (and sometimes profound) pleasures we encounter that feel too good to be true.  They don't usually last long in all their vibrant glory and I don't think it possible to have them constantly (I wouldn't want to confuse these things with joy proper, which ought to be a steady characteristic of our lives); there are many times of struggle, of grief, of worry and stress and hardship where such brilliantly happy moments are rare or nonexistent.  But, like candy or a vacation, they are very pleasant during those once-in-a-whiles when they come.

daddy-long-legs

"P.S. It's raining cats and dogs tonight.  Two puppies and a kitten have just landed on the window-sill."

"College opens in two weeks and I shall be glad to begin work again.  I have worked quite a lot this summer though - six short stories and seven poems.  Those I sent to the magazines all came back with the most courteous promptitude.  But I don't mind.  It's good practice.  Master Jervie read them - he brought in the mail, so I couldn't help his knowing - and he said they were dreadful.  They showed that I didn't have the slightest idea of what I was talking about.  (Master Jervie doesn't let politeness interfere with truth.)"

"The accompanying illustration is hereby reproduced for the first time.  It looks like a spider on the end of a string, but it isn't at all; it's a picture of me learning to swim in the tank in the gymnasium.  The instructor hooks a rope into a ring in the back of my belt, and runs it through a pulley in the ceiling.  It would be a beautiful system if one had perfect confidence in the probity of one's instructor.  I'm always afraid, though, that she will let the rope get slack, so I keep one anxious eye on her and swim with the other, and with this divided interest I do not make the progress that I otherwise might."

"We're reading Marie Bashkirtseff's journal.  Isn't it amazing?  Listen to this: 'Last night I was seized by a fit of despair that found utterance in moans, and that finally drove me to throw the dining-room clock into the sea.'  It makes me almost hope I'm not a genius; they must be very wearing to have about - and awfully destructive to the furniture."

So you see, I always feel happier after I've read a few of Judy Abbott's letters to Daddy-Long-Legs-Smith than I was when first I picked up the book; maybe that has something to do with the cloth binding.  Somehow cloth binding makes the story even better.  And now, with that comfort book finished, I've begun A.A. Milne's The Red House Mystery.  It's amusing to see his typical Winnie-the-Pooh style carry over into a whodunit.

what are some of your comfort reads?