a personal introduction to our characters

There are some authors who are confident enough to take the gentle reader by the elbow and directly point to people and things in the first scene which require our attention. I just discovered another of these, and I'll post them in seperate messages so as not to crowd us.

The first I fell in love with was by Edna Ferber in The Girls -

"It is a question of method. Whether to rush you up to the girls pell-mell, leaving you to become acquainted as best you can; or, with elaborate slyness, to slip you so casually into their family life that they will not even glance up when you enter the room or leave it; or to present the three of them in solemn order according to age, epoch, and story."

This is from The Minister's Wooing by Harriet Beecher Stowe

“Mrs. Katy Scudder had invited Mrs. Brown, and Mrs. Jones, and Deacon Twitchel's wife to take tea with her on the afternoon of June second, A.D. 17--.
When one has a story to tell, one is always puzzled which end of it you begin at. You have a whole corps of people to introduce that you know and your reader doesn’t; and one thing so pre-supposes another, that, whichever way you turn your patchwork, the figures still seem ill-arranged. The small item which I have given will do as well as any other to begin with, as it will certainly lead you to ask, “Pray, who was Mrs. Katy Scudder?” – and this will start me systematically on my story.”

and I found this in Sentimental Tommy by J. M. Barrie

"The celebrated Tommy first comes into view on a dirty London stair, and he was in sexless garments, which were all he had, and he was five, and so though we are looking at him, we must do it sideways, lest he sit down hurriedly to hide them."

Still on the first page:

"On his way up and down the stair he often paused to sniff, but he never asked for anything; his mother had warned him against it, and he carried out her injunction with almost unnecessary spirit, declining offers before they were made, as when passing a room, whence came the smell of fried fish, he might call in, "I don't not want none of your fish," or "My mother says I don't not want the littlest bit," or wistfully, "I ain't hungry," or more wistfully still, "My mother says I ain't hungry."

Here's the one I found yesterday.

"To begin as early as possible with our hero - notice him; he is too young for the ceremony of an introduction; but you see first a cambric robe, the length two yards and a half; trimming Valenciennes; tucks thirty-four; moreover you behold a blanket, of which the ground-work is French flannel, but that is hidden by silk embroidery - some poor wretch made it wearily for the trifle of twenty dollars - for she who bought it, though extravagant, was not above making "a bargain" with the seamstress. In the folds of the blanket you may find 'something' with a soft bald head, a toothless mouth, and a wrinkled red phiz. I give you my word it is a genuine human baby six hours old. The doctor calls it a fine child, and although it resembles the supposed ancestral ape, the nurse is ready to take oath that it is the "finest infant she ever laid eyes on." Being a nurse, her veracity is unimpeachable, and we think of this new baby in the superlative ever after."

in A Million Too Much by Julia McNair Wright

Edna Ferber appears to have used the aside to the reader frequently in introducing her characters, especially in her short stories. I've got Buttered Side Down on my tbre-read soon pile, as I believe there are multiple examples there.

Meanwhile, here is the first part of the Introduction of Fanny Herself:

"Preface

It has become the fashion among novelists to introduce their hero in knee pants, their heroine in pinafore and pigtails. Time was when we were rushed up to a stalwart young man of twenty-four, who was presented as the pivot about whom the plot would revolve. Now we are led, protesting, up to a grubby urchin of five and are invited to watch him through twenty years of minutiae. In extreme cases we have been obliged to witness his evolution from swaddling clothes to dresses, from dresses to shorts (he is so often English), from shorts to Etons.
The thrill we get for our pains is when, at twenty-five, he jumps over the traces and marries the young lady we met in her cradle on page two…
…With which modest preamble you are asked to be patient with Miss Fanny Brandeis, aged thirteen. Not only must you suffer Fanny, but Fanny’s mother as well, without whom there could be no understanding Fanny. For that matter, we shouldn’t wonder if Mrs. Brandeis were to turn out the heroine in the end. She is that kind of person."

The first part of the book focuses on Fanny's mother, who is a very admirable female indeed.

I first read Fanny Herself when I was in high school (Oh, God, nearly 45 years ago??). Ran across it by accident in the school library. I really loved it and read it a couple of times that I remember. Two years ago I found it again in a Goodwill store. I still love it!

There is just not enough time to get all of the reading I want done.

"Margaret Trevennon was young and beautiful. Her faithful biographer can say no less, though aware of the possibilty that, on this account, the satiated reader of romances may make her acquaintance with a certain degree of reluctance, reflecting upon the two well-worn types - the maiden in the first flush of youth, who is so immaculately lovely as to be extremely improbable, and the maturer female, who is so strong-minded as to be wholly ineligible to romantic situations."

-Across the Chasm by Julia Magruder

Then of course there is Dickens, in A Christmas Carol, "Marley was dead, to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge's name was good upon 'Change for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a doornail."

Sorry, that's just one of my favorite character introductions ever. :)

>9 MrsLee: That is one of my favourite quotes from A Christmas Carol. Along with the discourse on the relative deadness of doornails that follows.

In spite of the title, The Honorable Peter Stirling begins with a description of Mr. Pierce:

"Mr. Pierce was talking. Mr. Pierce was generally talking. From the day that his proud mamma had given him a sweetmeat for a very inarticulate "goo" which she translated into "papa," Mr. Pierce had found speech profitable."

The entire first chapter goes on for quite a while in this vein, and gives the entire text of an extemporaneous speech he gives on romance in the modern world. It is one of his listeners who finally mentions the prosaic Peter Stirling, who has detached himself from this cosmopolitan group to pace off some animal energy.

In a newly published novel, The Ten Thousand Doors of January:

"I ought to introduce Mr. Locke properly; he'd hate to wander into the story in such a casual, slantwise way. Allow me to present Mr. William Cornelious Locke, self-made not-quite-billionaire..."

I won't type the entire paragraph. I'm just impressed at this old technique being utilized by a young author.

>12 2wonderY: I had already decided to wishlist the book after this post, but more certain than ever now. Have mercy with the BBs already!

>13 haydninvienna: **shrug** **smirk** Harrow is certainly worth noticing. I hope to meet her. She is a friend of my daughter.

Chapter 1: the house on the brae

...
Into this humble abode I would take any one who cares to accompany me. But you must not come in a contemptuous mood, thinking that the poor are but a stage removed from beasts of burden, as some cruel writers of these days say; nor will I have you turn over with your foot the shabby horse-hair chairs that Leeby kept so speckless, and Hendry weaved for years to buy, and Jess so loved to look upon.

A Window in Thrums

I am really enjoying reading the posts on this thread. >9 MrsLee:'s introduction of Jacob Marley reminds me of a "rule" from John Gall's Systemantics: The Underground Text of Systems Lore.

"Things are as they are reported."

>16 pgmcc: That's the weirdest BB near-miss that I've suffered from you, Peter.

>17 haydninvienna: And I was sucked in by his current read - It Was the Best of Sentences

>18 2wonderY: Peter is even more dangerous than you. (Yes, I bought and read The Ten Thousand Doors of January, and it was as good as I had been led to believe.)

I am sorry that the first thing you should hear about the children should be that they did not care about their Aunt Enid, but this was unfortunately the case. And if you think this was not nice of them I can only remind you that you do not know their Aunt Enid.

- Wet Magic

It's a bit long to quote all of it, but Mary Poppins starts by describing the street ("If you want to find Cherry Tree Lane..."), the house ("If you are looking for Number Seventeen") and then the family:

But Mr. Banks who owns it, said to Mrs. Banks that she could have either a nice, clean, comfortable house or four children. But not both, for he couldn't afford it.

And after Mrs. Banks had given the matter some consideration she came to the conclusion that she would rather have Jane, who was the eldest, and Michael who came next, and John and Barbara, who were Twins and came last of all. So it was settled, and that was how the Banks family came to live at Number Seventeen, with Mrs. Brill to cook for them, and Ellen to lay the tables, and Robertson Ay to cut the lawn and clean the knives and polish the shoes and, as Mr. Banks always said, "to waste his time and my money."

>21 merrystar: Love it! How did I make it through childhood without reading Mary Poppins? Or am I just so doddering that I've forgotten?

>5 2wonderY: Just wanted to let you know that I am grateful to you for introducing me to this book! I couldn't remember why the preface seemed so familiar and now I know.

>23 MissWatson: Ferber is so worth going back to. I haven’t been able to get my daughter to try her yet.

>24 2wonderY: And today, with the internet, it is so easy to check up on her fashion references!

>24 2wonderY: I've got One Basket, a short story compilation that I have loved since junior high, but I have never tackled a complete Edna Ferber novel. I need to fix that.

Margaret Craven's stories in The Home Front remind me a lot of Edna, as well. That's one I'd like to revisit, too--my copy was (literally) gone with the wind in our tornadic adventure some years back.

>26 gmathis: I am currently reading Fanny herself and enjoying it very much. I'm also learning much about the retail trade!

> Thanks for putting that on my radar!

>27 MissWatson: I'll be reading Fanny Herself this month, too.

Edna Ferber is the June Author of the Month here:

https://www.librarything.com/topic/349888#