Writing Performances
Writing Performances: The Stages of Dorothy L. Sayers Crystal Downing
WRITING PERFORMANCES Crystal Downing, 2004 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2004 978-1-4039-6452-6 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. First published 2004 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 and Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, England RG21 6XS Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE MACMILLAN is the global academic imprint of the Palgrave Macmillan division of St. Martin s Press, LLC and of Palgrave Macmillan Ltd. Macmillan is a registered trademark in the United States, United Kingdom and other countries. Palgrave is a registered trademark in the European Union and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-73248-7 ISBN 978-1-137-12261-2 (ebook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-12261-2 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Downing, Crystal Writing performances : the stages of Dorothy L. Sayers / Crystal Downing. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Sayers, Dorothy L. (Dorothy Leigh), 1893 1957 Criticism and interpretation. 2. Detective and mystery stories, English History and criticism. 3. Women and literature England History 20th century. 4. Wimsey, Peter, Lord (Fictitious character) 5. Modernism (Literature) England. 6. Autobiography in literature. 7. Self in literature. I. Title. PR6037.A95Z647 2004 813.52 dc22 2003070738 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: August 2004 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Transferred to Digital Printing in 2009
For David, with the mind of a maker
C ontents List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Permissions Abbreviations ix xi xiii xv Setting the Stage: An Introduction 1 1 The Performance Begins Her(e): The Auto/biographical Sayers 15 2 Identifying Gender(ed) Performances 35 3 The Performance Builds: Sayers s Architectural Imagination 67 4 Minding the Performance: Sayers s Literary Criticism 89 5 The Performing Word: Sayers s Unorthodox Orthodoxy 111 6 Begin Here: For the End(s) of the Performance 139 Encore: A Conclusion 155 Notes 161 Works Cited 179 Index 193
L ist of I llustrations Figure 2.1 Figure 2.2 Figures 2.3 and 3.1 Possibly performing in Coriolanus at the Godolphin school (Courtesy of The Marion E. Wade Center) 37 Performing Athos at Bluntisham Rectory (Courtesy of The Marion E. Wade Center) 38 Performing Hugh Percy Allen at Somerville College (Courtesy of The Marion E. Wade Center) 39 Figure 3.2 The Author in Front of Bluntisham Rectory 72
A cknowledgments Writing Performances: The Stages of Dorothy L. Sayers was made possible by the institutional support of Messiah College, which provided me with an early sabbatical to write the first draft, a Scholar Chair to finish the project, and a grant to visit Sayers sites in England. The college also funded three student interns to help with final preparations of the manuscript; Rachel Petersen and twins Rebecca and Ruth Brown were invaluable, their careful attention to detail making this a better book. Finally, the Messiah College English Department allowed me to take advantage of the intelligence and good nature of work study student Janel Atlas, who provided both editorial and moral support. Also crucial to my writing performance has been the Marion E. Wade Center of Wheaton College, which awarded me the Clyde S. Kilby Research Grant for 2001. The staff at the Wade have been gracious and supportive, not only allowing me to quote unpublished Sayers documents I discovered in their reading room, but also making available the photographs of Sayers that grace this book. There are many specific individuals who have helped shape the thought that has gone into Writing Performances, but two in particular deserve special attention. First is Barbara Luton, who gave me Whose Body?, my first Lord Peter Wimsey novel, and then insisted that I get my own body into graduate school. Next is my most astute reader and best friend, David C. Downing, whose trips to the Wade Center for research on C. S. Lewis provided me with the motivation to study C. S. Lewis s friend. Janice Brown, author of The Seven Deadly Sins in the Work of Dorothy L. Sayers, deserves accolades for a Sayers conference, replete with a full production of Busman s Honeymoon, that she organized on the campus of Grove City College in Pennsylvania (October 2000). There I met Laura Simmons, who sent me a copy of Sayers s essay Sacred Plays, and whose forthcoming book on Sayers s theology I look forward to reading. At the conference I was especially enriched
xii A cknowledgments by the company and conversation of Flora Armetta, who, I suspect, will write her own book on Sayers someday. I also wish to thank my colleagues at Messiah College, who have contributed to an intellectually stimulating and personally encouraging environment. Two in particular have left their mark on this book: theater historian Valerie Smith, who introduced me to performance studies, and church historian Douglas Jacobsen, who introduced me to Radical Orthodoxy and other important constructs energizing my performance. No less important are sculptor Ted Prescott and painter Cathy Prescott, whose joy and insight during numerous lengthy conversations about creativity, theology, sometimes Sayers, more often C. S. Lewis, and too often postmodernism, infused this project with love.
P ermissions Permission has been granted by David Higham Associates to quote various extracts from the poems, plays, and prose of Dorothy L. Sayers (Sayers/05.08.03). Permission has been granted by The Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College to quote from their holdings of unpublished letters by Dorothy L. Sayers. Permission has been granted to quote Mikhail Bakhtin from: Art and Answerability: Early Philosophical Essays by M. M. Bakhtin, edited by Michael Holquist and Vadim Liapunov, translation and notes by Vadim Liapunov, Copyright 1990. Courtesy of the University of Texas Press; The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M. M. Bakhtin, edited by Michael Holquist, translated by Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist, Copyright 1981. Courtesy of the University of Texas Press; Toward a Philosophy of the Act by M. M. Bakhtin, translated by Vadim Liapunov, edited by Vadim Liapunov and Michael Holquist, Copyright 1993. Courtesy of the University of Texas Press.
A bbreviations for F requently Q uoted W orks by S ayers, with O riginal P ublication D ate Cat Cat o Mary (unfinished fictional autobiography) 2002 Creed Creed or Chaos? (essays) 1949 Death Unnatural Death (Lord Peter Wimsey novel) 1927 Doc The Documents in the Case (a detective novel) 1930 EC My Edwardian Childhood (unfinished memoir) 2002 Further Futher Papers on Dante (essays) 1957 Gaudy Gaudy Night (Lord Peter Wimsey novel) 1935 GN Gaudy Night (essay) 1937 Ltrs 1 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers. Vol. 1 1995 Ltrs 2 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers. Vol. 2 1997 Ltrs 3 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers. Vol. 3 1998 Ltrs 4 The Letters of Dorothy L. Sayers. Vol. 4 2000 King The Man Born to Be King (radio play cycle) 1943 Mind The Mind of the Maker (literary theory) 1941 Search The Poetry of Search and the Poetry of Statement (essays) 1963 Whimsical The Whimsical Christian (essays) 1978 Zeal The Zeal of Thy House (play) 1937