Flashman's Lady

In the 1966 screen adaptation of A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS, Sir Thomas More (Paul Scofield) advises his daughter Meg (Susannah York): "If (God) suffers us to come to such a case that there is no escaping, then we may stand to our tackle as best we can. And, yes Meg, then we can clamor like champions, if we have the spittle for it. But it's God's part, not our own, to bring ourselves to such a pass. Our natural business lies in escaping." One of the most endearing qualities of author George MacDonald Fraser's anti-heroic protagonist, Harry Flashman, is his natural cowardice, which he freely admits with a certain degree of pride. Flashy is an expert at escaping; More would have been impressed. In that volume of his memoirs entitled FLASHMAN'S LADY, Flashy is still young in the mid-1840s. His talent for a prudent and precipitous departure has yet to mature, as evidenced by his delayed response when beset by thugs in a dodgy section of Singapore: "I'm not proud of what happened in the next moment. Of course, I was very young and thoughtless, and my great days of instant flight and evasion were still ahead of me, but even so, with ... my native cowardice to boot, my reaction was inexcusable ... in my youthful folly and ignorance, I absolutely stood there gaping ..." The larger portion of this book's plot involves the kidnapping of Flashy's beautiful but scatterbrained wife, Elspeth, by a certain Don Solomon Haslam, a moneyed and mannered member of English high society who's not what he seems. Harry's determination to stay out of harm's way is severely taxed as he pursues Elspeth's rescue into the pirate-infested interior of Borneo, and later into Madagascar, where Flashy finds himself the slave of that island's mad and despotic queen, Ranavalona. A chief attraction of Fraser's Flashman series is the knowledge it gives the reader about historical and factual, but arcane, events and places. In FLASHMAN'S LADY, the reader is apprised of the private war against the pirates of the East Indies by the eccentric English imperialist, James Brooke, and the reign of terror perpetuated by that female Caligula of the period, Queen Ranavalona I of Madagascar. Indeed, the author's research into the latter has prompted me to place a non-fiction history of the subject on my Wish List. Deep down, I think, Flashy's personal appeal is based on the realization that he's Everyman, whether one would wish to admit it or not. Our natural preference is to escape, and it's only through blundering circumstance, good luck, or an odd quirk of fate that any one of us might, like Harry himself, be perceived a hero by our fellows.

At his best. The only fault with Flashman is that Fraser had to squeeze him into a single lifetime. Flashman of Flashman's Lady is a great place to begin the Flashman tour of the British Army during the 19th Century, the roll on the floor laughter of Frazer's characterization, the relatively accurate history that goes with this historical fiction. If you haven't read Frazer's Flashman books you are missing a great lot of evenings.

The author brings several worlds to vivid life, in this novel that links several stories into a seamless whole. I personally think that Frasier missed his calling: he should have been a sportswriter. The cricket game, with poor idiot Elspeth as the prize, is told so well that I've re-read it several times. Each of the worlds he creates, Frasier fills with such colorful characters that they are three-dimensional. The cricket game brings us Deadlius Tighe, esq., a classic scoundrel; Singapore is personified in Catchick Moses; and British imperial/missionary zeal in James Brooke. (The depiction of Brooke inspired me to read everything that I could find on this fighting seaman and colonizer.) Best of all is a villan equal to Flashy himself: Sulemann Usman. The novel gives the reader the wide world, and does it in such a way as to make it seem real, as in the eyes of a 19th century mind. A keeper that brings genuine enjoyment with every re-reading. -Lloyd A. Conway

Fraser outdoes himself in this adventure, arguably the second best in the series (after the incomparable Flashman, of course) finds Harry himself the victim of someone's lust and deviltry for a change--in the form of Suleiman Usman, a half-breed pirate who kidnaps Mrs. Flashman (bugger!) halfway around the world, leading to an epic chase involving a half-mad white rajah and a maniacal Malagasay queen. Fraser's witty prose and flawless research are irresistible; I finished the book in one day and wanted to start all over again.

This is a deeply moral book in that for the first and last time the scrapes that Flashman gets into are the result of beastliness of someone other than himself. I hope that Mr. Fraser is as good a historian as he is a novelist, as most of my knowledge of Victorian history comes from his books. Particularly worth savouring are his narratives about the White Raja and Queen Ranavalona of Madagascar; splendid, gripping stuff and all the more memorable for the author's wonderful gift for character portrayal.