Actually 'far-fetched' careers into 'absurd' in some episodes, even allowing for the sociologically bizarre aspect of detective serials (found as much as anyplace in the Midsommer series, where you have small towns and rural zones in the English West Country with homicide rates like inner-city slums and provincial bourgeois who take to serial killing in late middle age).

I have to disagree with you on one point. The young Morse is a pallid and tedious character. The center of things is Thursday. They've overdone the short-comings of Thursdays' superior and have yet to tackle how it was that Strange came to be promoted within the ranks ahead of Morse in later years.

One difference from the earlier serial (and Lewis) has been a reduction in emphasis on the University as a setting. There are supporting characters and (here and there) antagonists from the University, but the campus is not the focus. There are about three dozen residential colleges at Oxford and Kevin Whately said they had done episodes set on all but three in the course of the other series.

I like Fred Thursday most of all; he's a rock. The best thing about the series, to me, is that it's far removed from irony, unlike Midsomer Murders, and doesn't dwell on gruesomeness, also unlike Midsomer and most other detective shows on TV now.

I've seen a few of the Midsomer Murders series and don't recall them being very gruesome, although they were on the sordid side. I'm sure I'll eventually watch the whole series.

That's a good point about the lack of irony. So far there's been very little of political correctness. I did wonder if Morse having a romance with a black woman was realistic for the times or not. She's a charming character, but we all know the romance is doomed. I really liked that dark-haired girl he had a thing with in the first season.

Re Amazon, I really would rather not continue to assist their plan for world domination, but dang, it's so easy to click on a book or something that you want to buy.

I'm so glad you posted this. I saw the first episode of Endeavor and thought it was the only one. I really enjoyed that one. I think the Mme. Butterfly was a pretty good giveaway of the end though.

AMDG

I did wonder if Morse having a romance with a black woman was realistic for the times or not. She's a charming character, but we all know the romance is doomed. I really liked that dark-haired girl he had a thing with in the first season.

You were around in 1966. Does it seem realistic to you? In the U.S. at the time, the median age at 1st marriage for women was shy of 22. It may have been a shade higher in Britain, but I doubt the situation was radically different. As late as 1960, the share of children born out of wedlock in the U.S. was 3% (and abortion was unsafe, illegal, and rare); again, I do not imagine the situation was different in Britain. Bourgeois late 20-somethings rutting on each other certainly happened here or there, but I suspect it was strongly atypical. The Morse character never married; among his cohort, that was characteristic of about 5% of the total, and a large share of them had esoteric issues.

E.R. Braithwaite's (fictionalized) account of life in Britain ca. 1950 does not shed much light. Braithwaite's account had it that British employers were very resistant to hiring black immigrants for skilled or salaried positions and that the distinction between British and American racial attitudes at the time (in his experience) was that the British tended to be less voluble and more evasive. I believe Braithwaite did marry an English girl. By some accounts, he is still alive, though ancient.

I never link to Amazon on my blog when I recommend a book. I link to the publisher, or perhaps to a library catalogue.

What about the decadence? How did unmarried 25 year olds interact in Tuscaloosa and in Oxford in 1966?

I don't know how much of a barometer re sexual mores Philip Larkin was, but here's his "Annus Mirabilis":

Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(which was rather late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles' first LP.

Up to then there'd only been
A sort of bargaining,
A wrangle for the ring,
A shame that started at sixteen
And spread to everything.

Then all at once the quarrel sank:
Everyone felt the same,
And every life became
A brilliant breaking of the bank,
A quite unlosable game.

So life was never better than
In nineteen sixty-three
(Though just too late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles' first LP.

Re the romance with the black woman in 1966 England, did you see "To Sir with Love?" That was 1967. I would say from that that it was unlikely.

AMDG

when we first moved back to England in 1970 there was a situation comedy on TV called 'Love Thy Neighbour'. It was about a white couple's reaction to a black couple living next door to them. Of course it was *on the side* of the black couple and it was mocking the horror of the white couple, but it simply would not be shown today.

Maclin, I'm wondering if that is the same friend in his 30s that I have had that same discussion with several times. I think it would have been equally difficult for us to believe when we were in our twenties that it would be like this. Of course, the sexual revolution was going on, but who would have imagined this tedious glut of 24/7 sensuality. I mean, they are almost succeeding in making sex boring.

AMDG

He seemed to think it had always been the way it was when he was in college in the '90s, maybe not as blatant. But there really was a change.

Facepalm.

I suspect the War and the generality of military service for unmarried men born between 1904 and 1939 had an effect. I do wonder if the tendency to sort women into categories that you'd consider for courting and those you sought to shag was much more local to my father's contemporaries than is commonly acknowledged. One of my mother's friends offered that the signature of her contemporaries was "we were all doing the same things at the same time". Early marriage, 3-4 children &c. My mother belonged for decades to a club that had about twenty members and met monthly. All but about two married in their early 20s and all but one had children. One married in her late 20s and was employed as a salaried technician for all but about four years during the period running from 1956 to 1986, first for General Electric and then the University of Rochester. She never really said what the deal was for working girls ca. 1960 (when she was 26 years old). She separated from her husband in 1972 and I'm fairly sure there was no one from that time until her death (not an uncommon fate for middle-aged divorcees).

One contemporary of this crew gave me a precis of her dealings with her husband's paramours in that era. She'd collar them and give them a dressing down in some public place (a skeet field in one case, a department store in another). She said the embarrassment would do the trick. It stopped working around about 1968.

As a huge Morse fan (I've watched the entire series twice, and own it on DVD), I'd have to say that the draw for me is based just as much on the characters as on the stories. Thaw and Whately are so good in their roles, and Morse is such a great character, that to me that makes up for the odd faulty plot line.

bookfinder.com includes a lot of alternatives to Amazon, many of them at lower prices, esp. if you're looking for used books.

"I mean, they are almost succeeding in making sex boring."

I think they have succeeded.

"I had a conversation recently with a friend in his 30s who had trouble believing me when I said there really was a big change in sexual mores between roughly the beginning and end of the 1960s. He seemed to think it had always been the way it was when he was in college in the '90s, just maybe not as blatant. But there really was a change."

That's tragic. Tragic that he doesn't realise it was actually different. I know it was different b/c I spent a lot of time listening to my elders reminisce in general (not discussing sexual matters per se) and it was just a very different vibe.

I saw something similar with no fault divorce (sorry to bring up this tedious topic again). I started school in 1975 - the year no fault divorce was legislated in Oz - and at that time most of the kids were from intact families. Only two had divorced parents that I knew of - in a class of about 30-35.

By 1987 (my final year in school) there had been a few more casualties. In the late 80's and early 90's there was a positive explosion of divorce amongst our circle of friends and acquaintances. All 3 of my grandparent's children (born in the 40's) had divorced or separated by 1989. So tragic.

And the other seismic shift has been with smoking. In the 70's it seemed like everyone over 21 (or maybe 16!) smoked at least socially. Most had a full addiction. That changed in about two decades?

I have this marvelous home made movie of my parents' wedding - entirely after the Mass as I doubt filming was permitted in the Church. Everyone is standing around outside in their Sunday best - the ladies in hats and gloves, but mostly in skirts or dresses to knee length. There they all are drinking and smoking all over the place. I think it's hilarious!

Yes, you've mentioned Homicide before, and I've been meaning to put it on my Netflix list. If it's not already there. By the way, I've watched several episodes of Luther, which you also recommended. It is good, though to my taste not as good as some others in this line. It's a little too dark for my wife's taste--that running subplot with the female psycho--but I'm sure I will eventually watch it all.

At the moment we are three episodes into a four-episode series called Hidden, which is pretty gripping. We happened across it semi-accidentally, looking for something that was no more than an hour long. A lawyer with some bad stuff in his past trying to dig into that and finding that it's connected with a political conspiracy to take over the U.K. Not real believable but an effective thriller.

That's less jarring than the problems with the plot and characterization. Too many strands of spaghetti.

Re: Luther, I think it's the performances, esp. Elba's, that really put the thing over the top. The plots, while interesting, are not anything extraordinary, I'd say. But Elba is just so good, and Luther such an interesting character...

I've seen Hidden at the library and have been tempted to give it a go. This Broadchurch that I'm currently watching is outstanding all the way around.

Warning: Contains Spoilers

But I still find it enjoyable.

Cannot argue with you there, but at the end we were screwing up our brow trying to figure out just who he had been arrested for killing and what the man's role in the whole mess was. (Evidently there had been a corrupt police investigation in 1955 but which of the four police officers involved did what or why was never answered). The secretary to the dispatched local pol appearing out of nowhere and curing the bad cop with a dose of lead was another jarring and arbitrary moment (and why had she been working for the skeezy bastard all those years if he'd molested her?). That a youngster on the periphery of this chum circle just happens to work in Morse's office is another plot device. (Then it hits you that Oxfordshire then and now likely does not have a dozen homicides in a year and four of them and two attempts occur in this sequence of events).

Imperfect as it is, it's still an awfully good show. And we're lucky it was even made because Morse's creator, Colin Dexter, was so set against anyone other than John Thaw playing Morse that he's got a clause in his will banning anyone else from doing the part.

That caused a problem for Endeavour's producer, who says it took four years to persuade Dexter to back the new show:

“I convinced him, saying the clause in his will wasn’t because he was worried about someone playing a 27-year-old Morse; he just didn’t want anyone competing with John Thaw,” she said. “He believes John was perfect for the part.”

More here.

In contrast, Mobile, Alabama, has a population roughly 25% greater than that of Oxford, but a homicide rate of two to three dozen per year.

Oh man. Memphis is something over 3 times as big as Mobile and had 150 homocides last year.

AMDG

I think I've read that Memphis has one of the highest murder rates in the country.

I read something along those lines, too, Paul. In fact I think London has actually passed NY and other American cities in overall crime, though we're still well ahead of most European countries in gun violence. Naturally.

The Lonely Revolution

http://www.crisismagazine.com/2014/hearts-restless

It would appear that Mobile and seven adjacent suburbs have a homicide rate which bounces around 15 per 100,000. That's quite high. It's around 8 per 100,000 where I grew up. In the nine counties in Downstate New York, it's below 5 per 100,000.

Just read that review, Grumpy. Sounds worth seeing. Looks worth seeing, too--here's a direct link to the trailer:

http://everlastinghills.org/trailer/

I'm currently reading Gregg Allman's autobiography and the contrast with what Esolen says really strikes me. Sex is absolutely pure hedonism for GA, at least at this fairly early point in the story (just before the formation of the ABB), and I sort of doubt it's going to change much.

Doing some interpolating and making some educated guesses, I'd wager your slum neighborhoods have a population of about 90,000 and that they have about 35 homicides within them in a typical year. The experience of New York since 1993 suggests that slum homicide rates of 13 per 100,000 are achievable goals. You need smart tactics and boots on the ground, though.

While trying to figure out if I could watch the first season of Endeavour online for free (Yes, on Amazon Prime), I saw that BBC is doing Death at Pemberley in October. I'm thinking that it might be better than the book.

AMDG

I bought episode 1 of Broad church on amazon the minute I read Robs comment

Your estimate sounds about right, Art, if you're talking about Mobile. I didn't bother to save the reference but in verifying my memory about the typical rate earlier (yesterday?) I ran across a chart that had the homicide rate per 100,000 over the past ten years or so ranging from a low of 14 or 15 to a high of...twice that, maybe? I do remember that the lows were atypical. Whether any sort of police work short of something close to martial law could keep it low, I don't have any idea.

I don't know if AMM looks like EB or not, but she is a good actress. Janet, don't get mad, but: The Bletchley Circle. She's in it.

Yes. I'm sorry.

I don't know about Anna Maxwell Martin not being pretty enough to play Elizabeth Bennett. In Pride and Prejudice, Mr. Darcy was mostly taken with her "fine eyes," and I think AMM fills the bill in that regard. Much more so than the glamorous Keira Knightley did in the latest movie version of Pride and Prejudice.

Just watched the first episode of Broadchurch. Thanks for the recommendation.

"Just watched the first episode of Broadchurch. Thanks for the recommendation."

I found it very addicting. One night I watched 3 episodes back to back!

Just watched the first 3 episodes of Broadchurch back-to-back. It was superb.

We also watched the first season of Endeavour and I really enjoyed it, but I'm afraid that now it has to wait for BC. My only problem with Endeavour is that I'm afraid that by watching it before I've seen all the John Thaw episodes, I'm missing a lot of those aha! moments that you get in The Magician's Nephew when you read Narnia in the right order.

AMDG

AMDG

I didn't even know that about Strange. I don't remember him even from the 5 or 6 that we've watched recently.

So, Thursday isn't in the originals at all?

Looking for pictures of Strange on Google, I see that they've taken a couple of shots of the young Morse in the same positions as some older pictures. Also, looking at the way Morse stands and sits in the older pictures, you can really see how they've mimicked that.

AMDG

The character Morse was born around 1940 in both televised versions; Strange was presented as a close contemporary; Lewis is presented as having been born around 1958 in the televised version; they reconceptualized him as a younger man for the series and Colin Dexter supposedly said that Kevin Whately's Lewis was more to his liking than the one he'd imagined for the books.

The actors in question were born in 1942, 1927, and 1951 respectively. What strikes you about John Thaw in the early episodes is what an old looking 45 he was.

The character Fred Thursday was not in the original series (though may have been drawn from the books). He is presented as having first joined the police force in 1938 (and returned to it after the war) so might be approaching 50 during the years the newer series takes place guessing he left school at 16 and worked at other occupations for a few years 'ere passing the police examinations. The standard retirement age in Britain, but one assumes the police retirement age was and is earlier. The writers of the Prime Suspect series, who aspired to a versimilitude Morse lacks, had her character joining the police force at age 17 and retiring at age 54.

We watched the first Prime Suspect, and it was years before I could even look at Helen Mirren. It was creepy. It had that, I-have-to-go-take-a-bath-now feeling.

I can imagine Endeavour becoming that forceful because he's already stand so firm if he thinks something is right--or wrong.

AMDG

Hmm, around 45 would have been my guess for her age. Maybe it's precisely the white hair that makes him look older than that.

Ach.

http://www.jacksonfeild.com/resources/Dorothy%20Weiss%20.jpg

--

Dang, it's frustrating being here in NZ -- PBS won't let me watch that interview video, says: "We're sorry, but this video is not available in your region due to right restrictions." Happens to me all the time.

Who is Dorothy Weiss? Or is that just an illustration of dowdy

No one I know.

Just a minor example of someone spending money to look worse than she might have if she hadn't. I've seen worse examples. Looking at my mother's high school yearbook, there was a definite decline in taste re women's grooming between 1948 and 1966. Womens' eyewear seems to have been in decline from the Depression, reaching its pit with the cat's eye glasses common ca. 1966. Men's eyewear reached it's pit with the hideous oversized lenses of the 1970s (a proper accoutrement to the ugliest clothes and worst haircuts in human history).

My mother loved her time at the beauty parlor, which is I suppose why she went every week. I have photographs of her from 1948 or thereabouts where her hair was trimmed and just past shoulder length and nothing was done to it; she never wore it that way again and it never looked better. The reading glasses she was prescribed in 1952 were the handsomest pair she ever owned. My father managed to find an agreeable pair of glasses ca. 1975, but somehow it was beyond my mother.

I show up at Mass and see the same phenomenon among the women the next set of cohorts down from my mother. The awful hair, ugly glasses, ugly ensembles. The women of the postwar cohorts generally do not compare well to their elders as human beings, but they do understand that less is more. (Unfortunately, the men of these vintages are all wandering around in windbreakers and baseball caps, something my father never would have done).

I think I'm off topic.

I think the big change that happened in women's hairstyles at some point was treating the hair as a material for sculptural composition rather than letting it be hair.

Well, that's been going on as far back as we have any pictorial representation--and not just with women.

AMDG

In olden days they were limited by not having hairspray. Or maybe they just painted and glued it.

Or indeed this.

So, I have watched two episodes of Bletchley Circle (and left our heroine in a very horrible situation indeed), Endeavour through the first episode of the second series, and all of Broadchurch.

I enjoyed them all, I thought Broadchurch was very good, although there were a couple of places where it was less than perfect, and they did one thing which I really wish they had not done, but I don't want to talk about it until Maclin gets to see it. There was one rather pleasant surprise there too. I wish it wasn't going to be so long until season 2 arrives.

AMDG

Paul - I just went to that link. That was great!

"I thought Broadchurch was very good, although there were a couple of places where it was less than perfect, and they did one thing which I really wish they had not done...There was one rather pleasant surprise there too."

That will be an interesting discussion. All in all I thought it was nearly flawless, definitely one of the best things of its sort that I've seen. I wonder if your "pleasant surprise" is the same as mine? And I can't think what that "one thing" might be!

All will be revealed.

AMDG

Broadchurch was broadcast on New Zealand television a couple of months ago. I started out really liking it, but it was shown over several Sunday nights with NZ TV's usual many and frequent commercial breaks, which made it seem especially drawn out and broke the dramatic spell.

Do you know there's an American TV remake called Gracepoint, starring the same male lead? Weird.