All language subtitles for A Very British Romance with Lucy Worsley S01E03

af Afrikaans
ak Akan
sq Albanian
am Amharic
ar Arabic
hy Armenian
az Azerbaijani
eu Basque
be Belarusian
bem Bemba
bn Bengali
bh Bihari
bs Bosnian
br Breton
bg Bulgarian
km Cambodian
ca Catalan
chr Cherokee
ny Chichewa
zh-CN Chinese (Simplified)
zh-TW Chinese (Traditional)
co Corsican
hr Croatian
cs Czech
da Danish
nl Dutch
en English
eo Esperanto
et Estonian
ee Ewe
fo Faroese
tl Filipino
fi Finnish
fr French
fy Frisian
gaa Ga
gl Galician
ka Georgian
de German
el Greek
gn Guarani
gu Gujarati
ht Haitian Creole
ha Hausa
haw Hawaiian
iw Hebrew
hi Hindi
hu Hungarian
is Icelandic
ig Igbo
id Indonesian
ia Interlingua
ga Irish
it Italian
ja Japanese
jw Javanese
kn Kannada
kk Kazakh
rw Kinyarwanda
rn Kirundi
kg Kongo
ko Korean
kri Krio (Sierra Leone)
ku Kurdish
ckb Kurdish (Soranî)
ky Kyrgyz
lo Laothian
la Latin
lv Latvian
ln Lingala
lt Lithuanian
loz Lozi
lg Luganda
ach Luo
mk Macedonian
mg Malagasy
ms Malay
ml Malayalam
mt Maltese
mi Maori
mr Marathi
mfe Mauritian Creole
mo Moldavian
mn Mongolian
sr-ME Montenegrin
ne Nepali
pcm Nigerian Pidgin
nso Northern Sotho
no Norwegian
nn Norwegian (Nynorsk)
oc Occitan
or Oriya
om Oromo
ps Pashto
fa Persian
pl Polish
pt-BR Portuguese (Brazil)
pt-PT Portuguese (Portugal)
pa Punjabi
qu Quechua
ro Romanian
rm Romansh
nyn Runyakitara
ru Russian
gd Scots Gaelic
sr Serbian
sh Serbo-Croatian
st Sesotho
tn Setswana
crs Seychellois Creole
sn Shona
sd Sindhi
si Sinhalese
sk Slovak
sl Slovenian
so Somali
es Spanish Download
es-419 Spanish (Latin American)
su Sundanese
sw Swahili
sv Swedish
tg Tajik
ta Tamil
tt Tatar
te Telugu
th Thai
ti Tigrinya
to Tonga
lua Tshiluba
tum Tumbuka
tr Turkish
tk Turkmen
tw Twi
ug Uighur
uk Ukrainian
ur Urdu
uz Uzbek
vi Vietnamese
cy Welsh
wo Wolof
xh Xhosa
yi Yiddish
yo Yoruba
zu Zulu
Would you like to inspect the original subtitles? These are the user uploaded subtitles that are being translated: 1 00:00:06,600 --> 00:00:08,840 'In our modern world, there's something 2 00:00:08,840 --> 00:00:12,960 'we've all searched for - romantic love. 3 00:00:14,520 --> 00:00:17,000 'I've been investigating its history. 4 00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:20,200 'Seeing how the Georgians and Victorians invented 5 00:00:20,200 --> 00:00:23,080 'so many of the traditions of romance.' 6 00:00:23,080 --> 00:00:25,680 # I wish a falling star 7 00:00:25,680 --> 00:00:27,080 # Could fall forever...# 8 00:00:27,080 --> 00:00:30,320 'But the main revolution is yet to come.' 9 00:00:30,320 --> 00:00:34,560 # And sparkle through the clouds and stormy weather...# 10 00:00:34,560 --> 00:00:36,560 'When the idea of finding The One 11 00:00:36,560 --> 00:00:40,960 'would become the central focus of our desires.' 12 00:00:40,960 --> 00:00:43,360 During the first half of the 20th century, 13 00:00:43,360 --> 00:00:48,200 there was more social upheaval than at any point in history. 14 00:00:48,200 --> 00:00:51,960 And out of this turmoil came romance as we know it today. 15 00:00:52,960 --> 00:00:57,840 'As women became indispensible, their needs began to matter. 16 00:00:57,840 --> 00:01:02,160 'A new kind of fiction emerged for a new kind of woman. 17 00:01:02,160 --> 00:01:04,640 'It was racy, explicit. 18 00:01:04,640 --> 00:01:09,000 'It was devoured avidly and lived out in reality. 19 00:01:09,000 --> 00:01:13,520 'It didn't stop at boundaries of class, or sexuality. 20 00:01:13,520 --> 00:01:17,880 'This new kind of romance was based on the idea that a soulmate 21 00:01:17,880 --> 00:01:20,520 'was essential to personal fulfilment.' 22 00:01:22,320 --> 00:01:27,400 By the end of the century, romance wasn't just highly desirable, 23 00:01:27,400 --> 00:01:31,640 it had become a right, to be demanded by everybody. 24 00:01:31,640 --> 00:01:35,200 Welcome to the age of modern romance. 25 00:01:35,200 --> 00:01:37,880 # And let's never 26 00:01:37,880 --> 00:01:41,960 # Stop falling in love. # 27 00:01:47,360 --> 00:01:51,640 'It's 1917 and the Great War is at its peak.' 28 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:57,000 Millions of men have been taken away. 29 00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:00,320 Not just from home, but from a generation of women. 30 00:02:01,960 --> 00:02:04,560 The sixth formers of the Bournemouth Girls' School 31 00:02:04,560 --> 00:02:09,440 have assembled for an important address from their senior mistress. 32 00:02:09,440 --> 00:02:13,040 Girls, I have something terrible to tell you. 33 00:02:13,040 --> 00:02:17,480 Only one in ten of you can ever hope to marry. 34 00:02:17,480 --> 00:02:22,960 The men who might have married you have all been killed. 35 00:02:22,960 --> 00:02:27,840 You will have to make your way in the world as best you can. 36 00:02:32,840 --> 00:02:37,400 Sitting amongst the pupils in that classroom was Rosamund Essex. 37 00:02:37,400 --> 00:02:40,680 And years later, when she came to write her autobiography, 38 00:02:40,680 --> 00:02:43,680 she remembered what a significant moment that had been. 39 00:02:43,680 --> 00:02:49,200 "It was one of the most fateful statements of my life. 40 00:02:49,200 --> 00:02:52,880 "Quite simply, there was no-one available." 41 00:02:52,880 --> 00:02:54,880 "There would be no husband, 42 00:02:54,880 --> 00:02:58,040 "no children, no sexual outlet, 43 00:02:58,040 --> 00:03:00,520 "no natural bond of man and woman. 44 00:03:00,520 --> 00:03:03,320 "It was going to be a struggle indeed." 45 00:03:05,080 --> 00:03:07,200 And it turned out that only one in ten 46 00:03:07,200 --> 00:03:09,960 of Rosamund's classmates would get married. 47 00:03:09,960 --> 00:03:12,400 And she was among those who didn't. 48 00:03:14,400 --> 00:03:17,600 The gulf between the sexes had never been greater. 49 00:03:20,080 --> 00:03:22,040 Many of the men who had survived the war 50 00:03:22,040 --> 00:03:25,320 were physically or emotionally broken. 51 00:03:27,080 --> 00:03:31,880 A generation of so-called surplus women were left unmarried 52 00:03:31,880 --> 00:03:34,880 and were also left holding things together. 53 00:03:34,880 --> 00:03:38,120 'Romance seemed far out of reach. 54 00:03:38,120 --> 00:03:40,720 'Fortunately, help was at hand.' 55 00:03:41,840 --> 00:03:44,760 In 1919, many thousands of British women 56 00:03:44,760 --> 00:03:46,880 indulged in a little light relief. 57 00:03:46,880 --> 00:03:48,400 The Sheik. 58 00:03:48,400 --> 00:03:51,200 It was the 50 Shades of Grey of its day. 59 00:03:51,200 --> 00:03:55,200 It was a steamy, erotic, sensational tale. 60 00:03:55,200 --> 00:03:58,880 It was a must-read, whether you admitted it or not. 61 00:04:02,520 --> 00:04:04,320 'The Sheik was so successful 62 00:04:04,320 --> 00:04:07,880 'that Hollywood studios fought over the movie rights. 63 00:04:07,880 --> 00:04:12,440 'Within a couple of years, the film, starring Rudolph Valentino, 64 00:04:12,440 --> 00:04:15,240 'was breaking box-office records. 65 00:04:15,240 --> 00:04:18,760 'It offered exactly the escapist thrill that women needed. 66 00:04:20,400 --> 00:04:24,720 'A journey to a world that couldn't be further from reality. 67 00:04:24,720 --> 00:04:27,400 'So, what's it all about? Well...' 68 00:04:27,400 --> 00:04:31,240 The fiercely-independent Miss Diana Mayo 69 00:04:31,240 --> 00:04:33,960 has rejected many offers of marriage. 70 00:04:33,960 --> 00:04:37,800 She's chosen instead to go travelling in the Sahara Desert. 71 00:04:37,800 --> 00:04:40,720 But now she's been captured by the dangerous 72 00:04:40,720 --> 00:04:43,720 Sheik Ahmed Ben Hassan and his followers. 73 00:04:43,720 --> 00:04:45,400 This woman, who swore 74 00:04:45,400 --> 00:04:49,640 that she would never bow down to the authority of a man, 75 00:04:49,640 --> 00:04:52,680 is completely at the mercy of the sheik. 76 00:04:53,680 --> 00:04:56,720 Here was a physically impressive alpha male. 77 00:04:56,720 --> 00:05:01,520 A fantasy figure for women who wanted their men to be strong once again. 78 00:05:04,120 --> 00:05:07,680 "She was trapped! Powerless, defenceless. 79 00:05:07,680 --> 00:05:09,960 "And behind the heavy curtains near her 80 00:05:09,960 --> 00:05:13,400 "was the man waiting to claim what he had taken." 81 00:05:16,760 --> 00:05:20,320 "There was no help to be expected. No mercy to be hoped for. 82 00:05:20,320 --> 00:05:23,560 "She clenched her hands in anguish! 83 00:05:26,040 --> 00:05:29,440 "The flaming light of desire burning in his eyes 84 00:05:29,440 --> 00:05:31,520 "turned her sick and faint. 85 00:05:31,520 --> 00:05:33,760 "Her body throbbed with the consciousness 86 00:05:33,760 --> 00:05:36,040 "of a knowledge that appalled her. 87 00:05:36,040 --> 00:05:38,840 "She understood his purpose with horror. 88 00:05:38,840 --> 00:05:42,440 " 'Oh, you brute! You brute!' she wailed, 89 00:05:42,440 --> 00:05:46,000 "until his kisses silenced her." 90 00:05:46,000 --> 00:05:50,720 'But hang on a minute! Our hero is forcing himself upon our heroine? 91 00:05:50,720 --> 00:05:54,840 'It doesn't make for an easy read today. 92 00:05:54,840 --> 00:06:00,280 'But in 1919, this was the only way that readers could accept Diana 93 00:06:00,280 --> 00:06:04,160 'embarking on a sexual relationship without being married.' 94 00:06:07,040 --> 00:06:10,360 'And it's one that she ends up enjoying.' 95 00:06:12,600 --> 00:06:17,520 The novel celebrates female sexual desire without any guilt. 96 00:06:17,520 --> 00:06:20,720 "She lay shaking with passionate yearning, 97 00:06:20,720 --> 00:06:25,160 "hungry for the clasp of his arms. Faint with longing." 98 00:06:27,120 --> 00:06:30,160 This spicy page-turner was the debut novel 99 00:06:30,160 --> 00:06:32,640 of the wife of a pig farmer from Derbyshire. 100 00:06:34,320 --> 00:06:37,200 Edith Maude Hull, whose husband, Percy, 101 00:06:37,200 --> 00:06:40,360 had been called up at the outbreak of war. 102 00:06:40,360 --> 00:06:44,920 The bored and frustrated Edith wrote the book to distract herself 103 00:06:44,920 --> 00:06:47,040 at a time when she felt all on her own. 104 00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:50,360 And she obviously struck a chord. 105 00:06:50,360 --> 00:06:52,960 Royalties for The Sheik and her later novels 106 00:06:52,960 --> 00:06:56,200 came to the equivalent of £50 million. 107 00:06:56,200 --> 00:06:57,720 Ker-ching! 108 00:06:59,680 --> 00:07:02,680 The 20th century was putting the sex into romance. 109 00:07:02,680 --> 00:07:05,560 And females everywhere were lapping it up. 110 00:07:08,560 --> 00:07:10,720 EM Hull understood what women, 111 00:07:10,720 --> 00:07:14,440 both married and unmarried, wanted in the post-war years. 112 00:07:14,440 --> 00:07:18,440 Her novel was tapping into a curiosity about sex. 113 00:07:18,440 --> 00:07:20,640 A subject that had been off-limits. 114 00:07:21,800 --> 00:07:24,400 'It was also a topic that was exercising the minds 115 00:07:24,400 --> 00:07:26,880 'of Britain's scientific community, 116 00:07:26,880 --> 00:07:30,160 'where women were beginning to have an impact. 117 00:07:30,160 --> 00:07:32,880 'It was from this world of academia 118 00:07:32,880 --> 00:07:35,840 'that a new manifesto of love emerged.' 119 00:07:37,560 --> 00:07:40,040 At its heart was a radical idea. 120 00:07:40,040 --> 00:07:44,800 That romantic happiness lay in sexual satisfaction within wedlock. 121 00:07:46,000 --> 00:07:48,280 Of the marriages that had survived the Great War, 122 00:07:48,280 --> 00:07:50,120 many had been put under strain. 123 00:07:50,120 --> 00:07:52,960 This book promised to reignite them. 124 00:07:54,400 --> 00:07:57,080 "Every heart desires a mate. 125 00:07:57,080 --> 00:07:59,760 "We are incomplete in ourselves. 126 00:07:59,760 --> 00:08:03,720 "There is nothing for which the innermost spirit yearns 127 00:08:03,720 --> 00:08:06,480 "as for a sense of union with another soul." 128 00:08:08,080 --> 00:08:10,800 Behind all this flowery, romantic language 129 00:08:10,800 --> 00:08:12,600 lay a very practical purpose. 130 00:08:14,120 --> 00:08:17,320 Married Love was an out-and-out sex manual. 131 00:08:17,320 --> 00:08:19,360 It was full of really explicit detail. 132 00:08:19,360 --> 00:08:21,720 I love the fact that all this sexy stuff 133 00:08:21,720 --> 00:08:25,960 isn't coming from some exotic continental psychoanalyst, 134 00:08:25,960 --> 00:08:30,840 it was the work of a highly-respected expert in prehistoric plants. 135 00:08:32,240 --> 00:08:34,960 Dr Marie Stopes was the embodiment 136 00:08:34,960 --> 00:08:37,400 of the new emancipated woman. 137 00:08:37,400 --> 00:08:41,560 But she believed she'd suffered as a result of sex ignorance. 138 00:08:41,560 --> 00:08:45,000 'She claimed that her first husband had been impotent 139 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:47,320 'and that marriage ended in divorce. 140 00:08:47,320 --> 00:08:51,520 'So she was inspired to explore a new line of research.' 141 00:08:51,520 --> 00:08:55,200 Marie Stopes' Marriage Manual is dedicated to, 142 00:08:55,200 --> 00:08:59,560 "Young husbands, and all those who are betrothed in love". 143 00:08:59,560 --> 00:09:03,200 She set out to educate couples that having a good sex life, 144 00:09:03,200 --> 00:09:05,200 a satisfying sex life, 145 00:09:05,200 --> 00:09:08,320 was central to the physical and emotional wellbeing, 146 00:09:08,320 --> 00:09:12,760 both of the man and, here's the surprising bit, of the woman, too. 147 00:09:13,920 --> 00:09:17,640 "So complex, so profound, are woman's sex instincts 148 00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:21,360 "that in rousing them, the man is rousing her whole body and soul. 149 00:09:21,360 --> 00:09:23,960 "And this takes time. 150 00:09:23,960 --> 00:09:28,040 "More time indeed than the average husband dreams of spending upon it." 151 00:09:28,040 --> 00:09:32,760 OK, then, Marie, so, what's he actually supposed to do? 152 00:09:32,760 --> 00:09:36,520 "The kissing and the tender fondling with the lips of a woman's breasts 153 00:09:36,520 --> 00:09:39,600 "is one of the first and surest ways to make her ready 154 00:09:39,600 --> 00:09:42,680 "for complete and satisfactory union." 155 00:09:42,680 --> 00:09:44,280 Just to be absolutely clear, 156 00:09:44,280 --> 00:09:48,360 what is it that you mean by, "complete and satisfactory union"? 157 00:09:48,360 --> 00:09:52,480 "The half-swooning sense of flux which overtakes the spirit 158 00:09:52,480 --> 00:09:55,640 "in that eternal moment at the apex of rapture 159 00:09:55,640 --> 00:09:57,840 "sweeps into its flaming tides 160 00:09:57,840 --> 00:10:00,120 "the whole essence of the man and woman. 161 00:10:01,920 --> 00:10:05,160 "The heat of the contact vaporises their consciousness 162 00:10:05,160 --> 00:10:08,120 "so that it fills the whole of cosmic space." 163 00:10:09,520 --> 00:10:14,240 # Fly me to the moon and let me play among the stars. # 164 00:10:15,440 --> 00:10:17,200 'Wow! 165 00:10:17,200 --> 00:10:21,200 'The book became a massive talking point and a bestseller. 166 00:10:22,560 --> 00:10:26,960 'The scientist had succeeded in her intention to electrify the public.' 167 00:10:29,560 --> 00:10:33,280 Marie Stopes had rewritten the rules of romance. 168 00:10:33,280 --> 00:10:38,360 Traditionally, the wedding had been seen as the climax of romantic love, 169 00:10:38,360 --> 00:10:41,240 but now it was just the beginning. 170 00:10:41,240 --> 00:10:44,840 If you followed Marie Stopes' advice and had great sex, 171 00:10:44,840 --> 00:10:48,840 you could keep alive the excitement of courtship within marriage. 172 00:10:48,840 --> 00:10:53,760 She was suggesting that your spouse could be a sort of one-stop shop 173 00:10:53,760 --> 00:10:57,040 for all your emotional and physical needs. 174 00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:02,640 'It was such a powerful idea that, after publishing her book, 175 00:11:02,640 --> 00:11:05,600 'Stopes received up to 500 letters a day 176 00:11:05,600 --> 00:11:09,560 'from people desperate to know the secret to a satisfying marriage.' 177 00:11:12,760 --> 00:11:15,840 The Wellcome Library has a large collection of this correspondence 178 00:11:15,840 --> 00:11:19,720 and Leslie Hall, Senior Archivist, has agreed to show me some. 179 00:11:19,720 --> 00:11:22,280 So here is some...just some of the letters... 180 00:11:22,280 --> 00:11:24,320 Tiny sample... ..written in, to her. 181 00:11:24,320 --> 00:11:27,880 ..of the - what, something like 10,000 letters we have here. 182 00:11:27,880 --> 00:11:32,280 Golly. This is a young woman who's engaged to a young man - 183 00:11:32,280 --> 00:11:35,360 "..and during this weekend we were discussing our future 184 00:11:35,360 --> 00:11:37,440 "and my fiance revealed to me 185 00:11:37,440 --> 00:11:41,120 "that he could not reconcile himself to having children, as he felt 186 00:11:41,120 --> 00:11:44,800 "no sexual desire towards me, although he loves me exceedingly." 187 00:11:44,800 --> 00:11:48,600 Well, it's a good job she's discovered that at this stage! Yes, yes, yes 188 00:11:48,600 --> 00:11:51,720 and I think Stopes responds to that, pretty much saying, 189 00:11:51,720 --> 00:11:53,840 "I don't think you should marry him." 190 00:11:53,840 --> 00:11:56,200 "Don't do it! Run!" 191 00:11:56,200 --> 00:11:59,920 A marriage was such...this thing that people did, 192 00:11:59,920 --> 00:12:02,680 that you feel a lot of people married 193 00:12:02,680 --> 00:12:06,120 even if they didn't particularly feel sexual desire either towards 194 00:12:06,120 --> 00:12:09,560 the person they were about to marry, or at all. Yeah. 195 00:12:09,560 --> 00:12:13,040 This letter over here - he says, "My wife is now 53 years old. 196 00:12:13,040 --> 00:12:14,960 "We've been married for 14 years 197 00:12:14,960 --> 00:12:18,840 "and she has never experienced any pleasure in married life - 198 00:12:18,840 --> 00:12:20,920 "what I believe you call orgasm," 199 00:12:20,920 --> 00:12:23,760 and then he admits that "we've both done little to induce it. 200 00:12:23,760 --> 00:12:24,840 "What should we do?" 201 00:12:24,840 --> 00:12:26,800 There are lots of letters like that 202 00:12:26,800 --> 00:12:30,520 and you even get people writing to her who had completely failed 203 00:12:30,520 --> 00:12:36,280 to consummate their marriage for, you know, long periods of time, 204 00:12:36,280 --> 00:12:37,920 and saying, well, you know, 205 00:12:37,920 --> 00:12:40,680 "Is there any way we can finally achieve this?" 206 00:12:40,680 --> 00:12:43,160 Yeah. So what Marie Stopes is doing is fantastic. 207 00:12:43,160 --> 00:12:47,160 She's putting all these people in touch with their sexual selves. Exactly. Yes. 208 00:12:47,160 --> 00:12:50,320 Does that suggest to you that people at the time were desperate 209 00:12:50,320 --> 00:12:53,320 to know this sort of information, they were thirsty for it? 210 00:12:53,320 --> 00:12:54,800 Absolutely, yes, there was 211 00:12:54,800 --> 00:12:58,720 a real desire for the kind of information she was giving 212 00:12:58,720 --> 00:13:01,160 in the way that she was giving it. 213 00:13:01,160 --> 00:13:05,680 She's sort of wrapped it up in this very kind of idealistic 214 00:13:05,680 --> 00:13:09,760 marriage-focussed way that makes it very acceptable 215 00:13:09,760 --> 00:13:14,560 in a way that I think going straight to the explicit would not have done. 216 00:13:14,560 --> 00:13:18,600 Yeah. What do you think was the gift that Marie Stopes gave to couples? 217 00:13:18,600 --> 00:13:22,520 She brought, as it were, a kind of romance into marriage. 218 00:13:22,520 --> 00:13:25,240 It wasn't just the precursor to the union. 219 00:13:25,240 --> 00:13:27,840 It was embedded within marriage. 220 00:13:27,840 --> 00:13:30,520 She's opened up the genie's bottle a bit, hasn't she? 221 00:13:30,520 --> 00:13:31,600 Oh, she has, yes. 222 00:13:31,600 --> 00:13:34,680 I mean, she's saying it's good for you to experience... 223 00:13:34,680 --> 00:13:37,040 She's saying it's good and it's important 224 00:13:37,040 --> 00:13:40,120 and everybody should be having this wonderful experience. 225 00:13:40,120 --> 00:13:42,000 Of course, lots of people couldn't. 226 00:13:42,000 --> 00:13:44,440 What's going to happen? All sorts of trouble ahead. 227 00:13:44,440 --> 00:13:46,040 All sorts of trouble ahead. 228 00:13:48,760 --> 00:13:52,760 Marie Stopes had bound together romance and sexuality 229 00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:57,720 and in doing so has helped fashion the modern notion of what a soulmate could be. 230 00:14:00,440 --> 00:14:04,120 A very different writer wanted to explore similar territory 231 00:14:04,120 --> 00:14:08,760 but he wasn't going to kowtow to contemporary moral convention. 232 00:14:10,240 --> 00:14:14,160 DH Lawrence was a romantic maverick. 233 00:14:14,160 --> 00:14:16,640 In his infamous book, Lady Chatterley's Lover, 234 00:14:16,640 --> 00:14:19,760 he rips up the rulebook of romance. 235 00:14:19,760 --> 00:14:24,320 He believes the pursuit of the perfect union shouldn't be 236 00:14:24,320 --> 00:14:27,560 constrained by marriage or by class. 237 00:14:27,560 --> 00:14:31,720 His heroine, the aristocratic Lady Constance Chatterley, 238 00:14:31,720 --> 00:14:34,880 is married, but she finds her soulmate 239 00:14:34,880 --> 00:14:37,200 in the gamekeeper Oliver Mellors. 240 00:14:37,200 --> 00:14:40,360 When they finally get together, it's explosive. 241 00:14:41,360 --> 00:14:46,120 "Her whole self quivered unconscious and alive, like plasm. 242 00:14:46,120 --> 00:14:48,200 "She could not know what it was. 243 00:14:48,200 --> 00:14:50,880 "She could not remember what it had been. 244 00:14:50,880 --> 00:14:54,800 "Only that it had been more lovely than anything ever could be." 245 00:14:54,800 --> 00:14:58,360 It's often remembered for being a steamy, sexy book 246 00:14:58,360 --> 00:15:03,520 but I think that Lady Chatterley sits squarely in the great tradition of British romance. 247 00:15:05,320 --> 00:15:08,920 And it's said to have been inspired by the real-life love affair 248 00:15:08,920 --> 00:15:11,480 of one of Lawrence's acquaintances. 249 00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:18,240 This is Lady Ottoline Morrell. 250 00:15:18,240 --> 00:15:20,760 She was a very striking-looking person. 251 00:15:20,760 --> 00:15:24,280 She had a habit of wearing red high-heeled shoes. 252 00:15:24,280 --> 00:15:27,080 Some people said that she had strong features, 253 00:15:27,080 --> 00:15:30,360 others that she looked like a horse! 254 00:15:30,360 --> 00:15:32,840 This picture in the National Portrait Gallery 255 00:15:32,840 --> 00:15:36,120 was painted by her one-time lover Augustus John. 256 00:15:37,640 --> 00:15:44,800 DH Lawrence said there was only one Ottoline and "she has moved one's imagination". 257 00:15:44,800 --> 00:15:48,680 Lady Ottoline was a ferocious socialite. 258 00:15:48,680 --> 00:15:51,960 In 1902, she'd married the MP Phillip Morrell 259 00:15:51,960 --> 00:15:57,080 but her happiness ended the minute she took off her wedding dress. 260 00:15:57,080 --> 00:16:00,040 On their wedding night, Phillip suddenly announced 261 00:16:00,040 --> 00:16:03,000 that he didn't want to have a sexual relationship with her. 262 00:16:03,000 --> 00:16:04,840 Bit of a downer! 263 00:16:04,840 --> 00:16:08,000 But just like Lady Chatterley in Lawrence's novel, 264 00:16:08,000 --> 00:16:10,880 Ottoline found comfort elsewhere. 265 00:16:10,880 --> 00:16:12,920 She had so many affairs that 266 00:16:12,920 --> 00:16:18,080 Lady Ottoline Morrell earned herself the nickname of Lady Utterly Immoral. 267 00:16:19,600 --> 00:16:23,640 But there was one affair that she kept deeply secret. 268 00:16:23,640 --> 00:16:28,160 In 1920, a young stonemason called Lionel Gomme came to carry out 269 00:16:28,160 --> 00:16:32,520 repairs at her country house, Garsington Manor. 270 00:16:32,520 --> 00:16:37,320 The aristocrat was immediately drawn to this handsome workman. 271 00:16:37,320 --> 00:16:42,200 # At last 272 00:16:44,560 --> 00:16:47,840 # My love has come along... # 273 00:16:47,840 --> 00:16:52,280 Ottoline wrote in her diary that she'd discovered this "remarkable boy". 274 00:16:52,280 --> 00:16:57,360 He was "extremely beautiful with a very intelligent face". 275 00:16:57,360 --> 00:17:00,600 But there was a problem - she was 47 years old, 276 00:17:00,600 --> 00:17:03,360 more than 20 years older than him. 277 00:17:03,360 --> 00:17:07,680 She wondered whether he would ever show the slightest interest in her. 278 00:17:09,520 --> 00:17:13,720 The sexual adventuress was reduced to a quivering schoolgirl. 279 00:17:16,080 --> 00:17:18,680 But Lionel did respond eventually 280 00:17:18,680 --> 00:17:21,080 and they embarked on a passionate affair. 281 00:17:23,440 --> 00:17:27,640 The physical side of their relationship was a revelation to her. 282 00:17:27,640 --> 00:17:32,640 She confessed that she'd never before experienced such wild sexual abandon. 283 00:17:34,640 --> 00:17:38,160 In her diary, she describes Lionel as the only man 284 00:17:38,160 --> 00:17:42,400 she had ever loved sexually AND emotionally. 285 00:17:42,400 --> 00:17:46,400 But alas, this happiness would be short-lived. 286 00:17:46,400 --> 00:17:52,000 In 1922, only two years after Ottoline first set eyes on him, 287 00:17:52,000 --> 00:17:55,200 Lionel suffered a brain haemorrhage. 288 00:17:55,200 --> 00:17:59,920 He died at her home in Oxfordshire, being cradled in her arms. 289 00:18:04,800 --> 00:18:08,960 Despite Ottoline's efforts to keep her tragic love affair secret, 290 00:18:08,960 --> 00:18:12,480 rumours of it reached Lawrence. 291 00:18:12,480 --> 00:18:17,440 His novel celebrated the idea of passion breaking free of constraint. 292 00:18:18,440 --> 00:18:23,080 But it was too much for its time, and in 1928, it was banned. 293 00:18:25,520 --> 00:18:29,320 However, other people in other places were also challenging 294 00:18:29,320 --> 00:18:30,800 romantic boundaries. 295 00:18:36,320 --> 00:18:38,600 If you knew where to look in 1920s London, 296 00:18:38,600 --> 00:18:43,240 you may have spotted a new social phenomenon - a lesbian scene. 297 00:18:43,240 --> 00:18:46,400 For centuries, there had been a male homosexual subculture, 298 00:18:46,400 --> 00:18:49,000 but now it was the turn of the ladies. 299 00:18:49,000 --> 00:18:53,600 RAGTIME PIANO MUSIC 300 00:18:53,600 --> 00:18:55,520 Women's freedom was growing 301 00:18:55,520 --> 00:18:58,280 and many were now earning their own salary. 302 00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:02,120 After work, they could be found drinking 303 00:19:02,120 --> 00:19:05,440 and letting off steam in bars and nightclubs. 304 00:19:07,240 --> 00:19:10,360 Their new independence was also reflected in a trend 305 00:19:10,360 --> 00:19:12,240 for boyish clothing and hair. 306 00:19:17,720 --> 00:19:23,640 You'd have seen plenty of androgynous-looking women in fashionable circles in the 1920s. 307 00:19:23,640 --> 00:19:26,000 For some of them, the style took hold 308 00:19:26,000 --> 00:19:29,000 because it expressed their sexuality. 309 00:19:29,000 --> 00:19:33,800 It was a visible way of turning their backs upon traditional gender roles 310 00:19:33,800 --> 00:19:37,320 and flirting with a new-found confidence. 311 00:19:37,320 --> 00:19:39,280 # Masculine women, feminine men 312 00:19:39,280 --> 00:19:41,640 # Which is the rooster, which is the hen 313 00:19:41,640 --> 00:19:45,400 # It's hard to tell 'em apart today and say... # 314 00:19:45,400 --> 00:19:47,320 Women in masculine attire 315 00:19:47,320 --> 00:19:51,040 and their partners graced the dance-floors of bohemian nightclubs 316 00:19:51,040 --> 00:19:54,400 like the Orange Tree and the Cave of Harmony. 317 00:19:56,520 --> 00:20:00,640 # Now we don't know who is who or even what's what... # 318 00:20:00,640 --> 00:20:03,360 One such couple was the novelist Radclyffe Hall 319 00:20:03,360 --> 00:20:05,280 and her partner, Una Troubridge. 320 00:20:06,960 --> 00:20:11,080 OK, I know they may not look like they're the life and soul of the party here 321 00:20:11,080 --> 00:20:13,560 but their lives were anything but glum. 322 00:20:16,240 --> 00:20:19,440 Within their social circle, they - and others like them - 323 00:20:19,440 --> 00:20:23,200 were able to conduct their relationships without drawing attention. 324 00:20:23,200 --> 00:20:27,320 But the rest of society wasn't so open-minded. 325 00:20:30,640 --> 00:20:34,840 Radclyffe Hall was tired of living a semi-secret life. 326 00:20:34,840 --> 00:20:38,600 She decided to risk her successful career as an author 327 00:20:38,600 --> 00:20:43,440 by writing a novel about what she called "sexual inversion". 328 00:20:43,440 --> 00:20:46,640 The book's title was The Well of Loneliness. 329 00:20:48,000 --> 00:20:51,680 Radclyffe Hall wanted to take things overground. 330 00:20:51,680 --> 00:20:55,520 She thought that her romance was as valid a romance as anyone else's 331 00:20:55,520 --> 00:21:00,120 and what better way to prove it than by using the form of the romantic novel? 332 00:21:01,560 --> 00:21:05,000 The book's protagonist, Stephen Gordon, has all the 333 00:21:05,000 --> 00:21:08,200 qualities you'd hope for in a romantic hero - 334 00:21:08,200 --> 00:21:13,520 expert rider, keen scholar, successful novelist 335 00:21:13,520 --> 00:21:17,040 and a war veteran with a passion for sharp suits 336 00:21:17,040 --> 00:21:19,200 and an eye for the ladies. 337 00:21:19,200 --> 00:21:22,600 There's just one difference - Stephen Gordon is a woman. 338 00:21:28,280 --> 00:21:33,360 After a series of doomed affairs, she finds romantic love with Mary, 339 00:21:33,360 --> 00:21:36,600 whom she meets while driving ambulances during the war. 340 00:21:38,640 --> 00:21:41,160 But living under society's disapproval, 341 00:21:41,160 --> 00:21:45,280 they miss having a complete and normal existence. 342 00:21:53,560 --> 00:21:56,200 Radclyffe Hall wanted to draw attention to the 343 00:21:56,200 --> 00:21:59,840 loneliness and the isolation that could be experienced 344 00:21:59,840 --> 00:22:04,120 by anyone living beyond the boundaries of heterosexuality. 345 00:22:04,120 --> 00:22:06,280 She knew that by coming out like this, 346 00:22:06,280 --> 00:22:09,360 her life would never be the same again. 347 00:22:09,360 --> 00:22:11,360 But she felt it was worth it 348 00:22:11,360 --> 00:22:14,440 to convey something of the doubt and the self-hatred 349 00:22:14,440 --> 00:22:19,000 that might be felt by these so-called sexual deviants. 350 00:22:20,560 --> 00:22:24,680 She told her publisher that her new book required complete commitment. 351 00:22:26,440 --> 00:22:28,600 Not a single word was to be altered. 352 00:22:30,320 --> 00:22:33,920 "Then Stephen took Angela into her arms, 353 00:22:33,920 --> 00:22:39,280 "and she kissed her full on the lips, as a lover. 354 00:22:39,280 --> 00:22:42,120 "Through the long years of life that followed after, 355 00:22:42,120 --> 00:22:46,000 "Stephen was never to forget this summer when she fell quite simply and 356 00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:51,040 "naturally in love, in accordance with the dictates of her nature." 357 00:22:52,640 --> 00:22:57,800 When the novel was published in 1928, there was instant controversy. 358 00:22:57,800 --> 00:23:00,040 One particularly vicious campaign 359 00:23:00,040 --> 00:23:04,480 was orchestrated by James Douglas of the Sunday Express. 360 00:23:04,480 --> 00:23:08,800 "I", he said, "would rather give a healthy boy or a healthy girl 361 00:23:08,800 --> 00:23:11,720 "prussic acid than this novel." 362 00:23:13,920 --> 00:23:18,320 Some powerful contemporaries came springing to Radclyffe Hall's defence. 363 00:23:19,840 --> 00:23:22,760 The novelist EM Forster led the protest 364 00:23:22,760 --> 00:23:26,040 by drafting a letter in support of The Well Of Loneliness. 365 00:23:27,400 --> 00:23:31,400 Despite this, on 9th November, the book became the subject 366 00:23:31,400 --> 00:23:33,080 of an obscenity trial. 367 00:23:34,280 --> 00:23:38,760 Radclyffe Hall renewed her vow to smash "the conspiracy of silence" 368 00:23:38,760 --> 00:23:40,240 on the lesbian issue 369 00:23:40,240 --> 00:23:44,960 and to defeat censorship "on behalf of English literature". 370 00:23:44,960 --> 00:23:50,400 At the trial, Radclyffe Hall's lawyer tried to argue that there was nothing wrong with the book - 371 00:23:50,400 --> 00:23:54,360 it just showed innocent friendship between women. 372 00:23:54,360 --> 00:23:56,840 Radclyffe Hall herself was pretty furious. 373 00:23:56,840 --> 00:23:59,440 She saw this as a betrayal of her work. 374 00:24:00,440 --> 00:24:04,800 She said, "I am proud and happy to have taken up my pen 375 00:24:04,800 --> 00:24:07,600 "in defence of the persecuted." 376 00:24:07,600 --> 00:24:09,560 Like many women of her generation, 377 00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:15,440 her sexuality - lesbian or not - now formed a key part of her identity. 378 00:24:15,440 --> 00:24:17,040 She wasn't going to deny it. 379 00:24:19,040 --> 00:24:22,040 Radclyffe Hall believed that she and others like her 380 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:24,920 should not be deprived of the right to love. 381 00:24:26,680 --> 00:24:30,280 The book's only real sexual reference consisted of the words 382 00:24:30,280 --> 00:24:33,480 "and that night, they were not divided", 383 00:24:33,480 --> 00:24:35,800 But she lost her battle and it was banned. 384 00:24:36,960 --> 00:24:41,160 The establishment made sure those at the leading edge, like DH Lawrence 385 00:24:41,160 --> 00:24:46,080 and Radclyffe Hall, would have to wait to get their ideas out. 386 00:24:46,080 --> 00:24:50,600 But even in the mainstream, people were beginning to liberate themselves. 387 00:24:53,560 --> 00:24:58,080 By the 1930s, a less inhibited generation were coming of age. 388 00:24:59,920 --> 00:25:04,160 They wanted a romantic night out but with a greater level of intimacy. 389 00:25:06,120 --> 00:25:10,360 So much so that it's come to be seen as a golden age of courtship. 390 00:25:14,360 --> 00:25:18,960 The cinema offered excitement, glamour and romance. 391 00:25:18,960 --> 00:25:20,120 Ticket, please! 392 00:25:23,160 --> 00:25:27,840 But it wasn't just the escapist entertainment on screen that appealed. 393 00:25:27,840 --> 00:25:32,440 To young people, the cinema also promised a different kind of pleasure. 394 00:25:35,200 --> 00:25:38,200 Its dimmed lighting, comfortable seating 395 00:25:38,200 --> 00:25:42,200 and hidden corners provided the perfect environment for hands to 396 00:25:42,200 --> 00:25:46,160 roam and for members of the audience to get to know each other better. 397 00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:51,760 My date for this evening is cinema expert Lawrence Napper. 398 00:25:51,760 --> 00:25:54,760 What was it like for people in the 1930s, 399 00:25:54,760 --> 00:25:58,000 going into a dark room full of other people? 400 00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:01,360 Cinema's important in terms of client of courtship, partly because 401 00:26:01,360 --> 00:26:04,320 it is... it's a public space, so, you can say, well, you know, 402 00:26:04,320 --> 00:26:07,040 "I wasn't doing anything untoward. Everyone was around me. 403 00:26:07,040 --> 00:26:10,680 "They could see me," but it's also a bit private, cos it's quite dark and 404 00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:14,840 you CAN sort of get up to nefarious things without really be noticed. 405 00:26:14,840 --> 00:26:16,400 Perfect for a date, then? 406 00:26:16,400 --> 00:26:18,880 Perfect for a date, and of course, you know, 407 00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:22,040 to enhance that feeling of romance you might want from the date, 408 00:26:22,040 --> 00:26:24,880 you've got a film that's showing romantic activities, 409 00:26:24,880 --> 00:26:27,520 which is kind of encouraging ideas of romance and glamour. 410 00:26:27,520 --> 00:26:28,840 Just to get you into the mood. 411 00:26:28,840 --> 00:26:30,960 To get you into the mood, absolutely. 412 00:26:35,000 --> 00:26:40,520 British audiences were being dazzled by Hollywood's version of romance. 413 00:26:40,520 --> 00:26:44,480 Film had now replaced the novel in teaching us the rules of love. 414 00:26:46,560 --> 00:26:49,760 What's the secret of the success of a film like Top Hat? 415 00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:55,240 Well, it offers you an idea of an exciting physical encounter 416 00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:59,520 with a member of the opposite sex that is pleasurable. 417 00:26:59,520 --> 00:27:04,040 # Heaven, I'm in heaven 418 00:27:04,040 --> 00:27:09,680 # And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak... # 419 00:27:09,680 --> 00:27:12,640 And the dance, to a certain extent, is a kind of seduction 420 00:27:12,640 --> 00:27:16,360 so you get these dance sequences where at the beginning, 421 00:27:16,360 --> 00:27:18,560 she's slightly resistant, he does a few taps, 422 00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:22,240 she sort of, like, moves forward, she sort of mirrors him a bit. 423 00:27:26,760 --> 00:27:29,920 But by the end of a number like Cheek To Cheek, of course, 424 00:27:29,920 --> 00:27:32,680 she's completely submissive to him. 425 00:27:32,680 --> 00:27:35,600 She's striking poses, she's doing all those jumps, 426 00:27:35,600 --> 00:27:37,880 where actually, she is supported by him. 427 00:27:37,880 --> 00:27:39,560 She couldn't physically do them 428 00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:42,440 if he wasn't there supporting her in those dance moves. 429 00:27:42,440 --> 00:27:46,440 You can think of the dance as a kind of metaphor for sex. 430 00:27:46,440 --> 00:27:47,640 Well, totally. 431 00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:50,600 There's that bit when she swoons and she's practically dead 432 00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:52,400 and we all know what's happened there. 433 00:27:52,400 --> 00:27:55,000 Absolutely, and Cheek To Cheek absolutely does that. 434 00:27:55,000 --> 00:27:57,640 That number, you know, it builds up to climax where... 435 00:27:57,640 --> 00:27:59,840 and as you say, she's like... HE INHALES 436 00:27:59,840 --> 00:28:02,920 ..just breathing and then it's sort of, 437 00:28:02,920 --> 00:28:06,560 the climax is the end of the dance, more or less. 438 00:28:06,560 --> 00:28:10,160 People of all classes are flocking to the cinema, aren't they? They love it. 439 00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:13,280 Yes, absolutely. I mean, it's definitely something that 440 00:28:13,280 --> 00:28:16,800 appeals to people across the board. The cinema is somewhere where 441 00:28:16,800 --> 00:28:19,480 you can kind of fantasise about a different life, 442 00:28:19,480 --> 00:28:24,000 a life where romance is about having a really hot dancing partner, 443 00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:27,720 as opposed to maybe the slightly drab blokes who are knocking around... Yeah! 444 00:28:27,720 --> 00:28:29,960 ..that you actually might be able to go out with. 445 00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:33,200 Well, good luck to them. I don't think they'll find a partner that good! 446 00:28:33,200 --> 00:28:35,520 Though she went backwards and in heels, remember. 447 00:28:35,520 --> 00:28:37,160 She did go backwards and in heels 448 00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:39,640 and she was a pretty good dancer, it has to be said. 449 00:28:44,440 --> 00:28:47,960 The cinema wasn't the only place where the new codes of dating 450 00:28:47,960 --> 00:28:49,200 were being explored. 451 00:28:51,080 --> 00:28:53,240 Amid the glitz of London's West End, 452 00:28:53,240 --> 00:28:58,240 you could find another type of romantic encounter being perfected. 453 00:28:58,240 --> 00:29:00,240 # Have you seen the well-to-do 454 00:29:00,240 --> 00:29:03,360 # Up on Lennox Avenue 455 00:29:03,360 --> 00:29:05,360 # On that famous thoroughfare 456 00:29:05,360 --> 00:29:07,680 # With their noses in the air... # 457 00:29:07,680 --> 00:29:12,400 A tryst that couldn't have happened just a few decades earlier. 458 00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:14,960 It would have been completely unacceptable 459 00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:19,480 for a respectable young lady to be wined and dined all by herself by a gentleman. 460 00:29:21,200 --> 00:29:24,480 But now, glamorous new eateries were opening up 461 00:29:24,480 --> 00:29:28,440 and a table for two was the ultimate romantic date. 462 00:29:28,440 --> 00:29:32,520 # Oh, come with me and we'll attend their two bits 463 00:29:32,520 --> 00:29:36,600 # Puttin' on the Ritz. # 464 00:29:36,600 --> 00:29:41,000 Quaglino's opened its doors in 1929 465 00:29:41,000 --> 00:29:44,320 to cater for this new market of courting couples, 466 00:29:44,320 --> 00:29:47,400 and it quickly became the place to be seen. 467 00:29:49,960 --> 00:29:54,880 I'm lucky enough to be stepping out tonight with food writer James Pembroke. 468 00:29:54,880 --> 00:29:56,440 There's your friend, the maitre d'. 469 00:29:56,440 --> 00:29:58,880 Exactly. Maitre d'! 470 00:29:58,880 --> 00:30:01,200 Perfect. 471 00:30:01,200 --> 00:30:03,160 Very good. 472 00:30:03,160 --> 00:30:04,520 Now, let's get some champagne. 473 00:30:04,520 --> 00:30:06,200 Excuse me! Champagne. 474 00:30:06,200 --> 00:30:08,320 Ah, here we go. Wahey! 475 00:30:09,720 --> 00:30:13,640 I guess that this was a pretty intimate new situation that men 476 00:30:13,640 --> 00:30:15,280 and women would find each other in? 477 00:30:15,280 --> 00:30:18,920 Absolutely. I think there was also a great ritual about it. 478 00:30:18,920 --> 00:30:22,200 They'd all seen the big screen, they'd seen their film stars 479 00:30:22,200 --> 00:30:25,280 descending on a table, they'd seen a man pull up a chair. 480 00:30:25,280 --> 00:30:28,320 They knew how to do it. They'd seen this in action. Mmm. 481 00:30:28,320 --> 00:30:30,960 And also, restaurants were dimly lit. Yes. 482 00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:34,080 You also had a very sexy waiter which made you feel better. SHE LAUGHS 483 00:30:34,080 --> 00:30:39,040 and he'd definitely, definitely not be English. So the chaperone, your old maiden aunt, has turned into... 484 00:30:39,040 --> 00:30:40,560 Turned into... ..a sexy young man. 485 00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:43,000 ..has basically turned into a very sexy Italian. 486 00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,800 It's amazing to think that this is the first time that men 487 00:30:45,800 --> 00:30:47,680 and women are sort of going out 488 00:30:47,680 --> 00:30:50,960 and eating in each other's company on a really widespread scale. 489 00:30:50,960 --> 00:30:53,960 It's not that long ago, is it? No, it's not at all. Not at all. 490 00:30:53,960 --> 00:30:56,640 Going out alone with a man in a restaurant 491 00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:58,800 really would have been a risque thing to do, 492 00:30:58,800 --> 00:31:01,400 a certain type of woman would have done that. Yes. 493 00:31:01,400 --> 00:31:04,360 They certainly wouldn't walk into a restaurant until basically 494 00:31:04,360 --> 00:31:07,400 after the First World War. They just wouldn't, in any way alone. 495 00:31:07,400 --> 00:31:09,840 It was disreputable. Absolutely, disreputable. 496 00:31:09,840 --> 00:31:13,000 Some pretty loose characters in there and it was known for that. 497 00:31:13,000 --> 00:31:15,440 How would a date work in the 1930s? You would ask me? 498 00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:18,800 I would ask you and then we'd either meet for cocktails somewhere, 499 00:31:18,800 --> 00:31:23,800 or we'd meet at the restaurant, but what's different from nowadays is we wouldn't probably look at menus. 500 00:31:23,800 --> 00:31:26,360 I would have rung ahead and I would have chosen the menu 501 00:31:26,360 --> 00:31:30,440 with the maitre d' and I'd probably try and find out if you didn't like fish or anything, 502 00:31:30,440 --> 00:31:35,000 but everyone ate everything then, there were no allergies, so you kept going and collapsed if necessary. 503 00:31:35,000 --> 00:31:38,200 They'd start with caviar, a typical menu would start with caviar. 504 00:31:38,200 --> 00:31:42,840 They'd then move on to turtle soup... Turtle soup? Turtle soup. 505 00:31:42,840 --> 00:31:45,360 Wow! Left over from the sort of Georgian era. 506 00:31:45,360 --> 00:31:49,080 And then they'd have a salmon mousse and then, which is 507 00:31:49,080 --> 00:31:52,360 still on the menu now, supreme de volaille. Chicken supreme. 508 00:31:52,360 --> 00:31:55,040 This is it. This is it. Absolutely, same thing. 509 00:31:55,040 --> 00:31:58,120 And then after that, they would even have a little asparagus salad 510 00:31:58,120 --> 00:32:02,040 and after that, a little light pudding and some frivolites, 511 00:32:02,040 --> 00:32:05,200 so little petit fours or cakes or something. Frivolities. Frivolites. 512 00:32:05,200 --> 00:32:07,320 Exactly. I would have chosen the wines. 513 00:32:07,320 --> 00:32:11,560 Probably a different wine with every course. And wine was cheap. 514 00:32:11,560 --> 00:32:15,280 My goodness! So going out was not that expensive, across the board. 515 00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:19,120 It's a lot more expensive today, as a proportion of people's incomes. 516 00:32:19,120 --> 00:32:22,160 Massively more expensive. 150 times more expensive... Wow! Yeah. 517 00:32:22,160 --> 00:32:25,120 Absolutely. And it was always the men that paid. Always. 518 00:32:25,120 --> 00:32:28,680 It would have always been. This is why people in the novels of the 1930s are going out 519 00:32:28,680 --> 00:32:31,320 the whole time, they can afford to do it. Absolutely. 520 00:32:31,320 --> 00:32:34,160 When it came to - let's go out tonight, love, the flicks was 521 00:32:34,160 --> 00:32:36,880 all very well, but what they really wanted was a bit of glamour. 522 00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:39,400 They'd seen on the flicks people eating in restaurants, 523 00:32:39,400 --> 00:32:41,720 it was the breakthrough and it was very widespread. 524 00:32:41,720 --> 00:32:44,560 Obviously Quaglino's was for the rich, definitely, 525 00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:47,520 but all over Soho, there were tonnes of little cheap restaurant, 526 00:32:47,520 --> 00:32:50,880 for two and six, serving five course dinners, so there was a major 527 00:32:50,880 --> 00:32:54,560 restaurant boom, cos basically people wanted to party. It was the jazz mania. 528 00:32:54,560 --> 00:32:57,120 It was dancing, music, and it was wild times. 529 00:32:58,720 --> 00:33:02,080 But the party looked set to end in 1939, 530 00:33:02,080 --> 00:33:04,280 as another war broke out. 531 00:33:06,480 --> 00:33:10,480 Britain experienced mass casualties on home soil for the first time. 532 00:33:11,760 --> 00:33:15,120 You didn't have to be on the frontline to be at risk of death. 533 00:33:17,400 --> 00:33:21,600 The bombs brought fear, but also a strange kind of thrill, 534 00:33:21,600 --> 00:33:24,520 as the danger drew people together. 535 00:33:24,520 --> 00:33:27,640 BOMBS EXPLODE 536 00:33:27,640 --> 00:33:29,720 One young woman who wrote frankly 537 00:33:29,720 --> 00:33:33,320 about her experiences during the Blitz was Joan Wyndham. 538 00:33:34,440 --> 00:33:39,520 Huddled in her air raid shelter, Joan wrote secretly and obsessively 539 00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:44,800 about the strange but exhilarating times that she was living through. 540 00:33:44,800 --> 00:33:47,080 "The war," she remembered later, 541 00:33:47,080 --> 00:33:51,480 "was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me. 542 00:33:51,480 --> 00:33:54,680 "One never knew what one was going to lose first - 543 00:33:54,680 --> 00:33:56,720 "one's life or one's virginity." 544 00:33:58,600 --> 00:34:01,720 In her memoirs, Joan candidly details her social 545 00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,920 and sexual encounters throughout the war. 546 00:34:07,960 --> 00:34:12,200 "I can't help feeling that each moment may be my last." 547 00:34:12,200 --> 00:34:13,680 EXPLOSIONS 548 00:34:13,680 --> 00:34:16,960 "And as the opposite of death is life, I think 549 00:34:16,960 --> 00:34:19,560 "that I shall get seduced by Rupert tomorrow. 550 00:34:22,040 --> 00:34:25,480 "After lunch, we laid down and tried to sleep, 551 00:34:25,480 --> 00:34:27,280 "but there was another air raid. 552 00:34:28,600 --> 00:34:31,520 "Then Rupert finally put his hand under my jersey, took 553 00:34:31,520 --> 00:34:35,920 "hold of my right breast and said, 'Do you still want to be seduced?' 554 00:34:35,920 --> 00:34:38,120 " 'Yes,' I said." 555 00:34:39,480 --> 00:34:41,960 # Put your arms around me, honey 556 00:34:41,960 --> 00:34:44,480 # Hold me tight... # 557 00:34:44,480 --> 00:34:48,240 And it wasn't just Joan who succumbed to war aphrodisia. 558 00:34:49,960 --> 00:34:53,680 As one British housewife put it, "We were not really immoral. 559 00:34:53,680 --> 00:34:56,320 "There was a war on." 560 00:34:56,320 --> 00:34:59,680 Sexual restraint was suspended for the duration. 561 00:35:02,000 --> 00:35:06,440 As the blackout came, London became one vast double bed. 562 00:35:06,440 --> 00:35:09,440 That's how the writer Quentin Crisp described 563 00:35:09,440 --> 00:35:13,520 the lowering of sexual standards in the Second World War. 564 00:35:13,520 --> 00:35:16,440 There was the feeling that you might die tomorrow. 565 00:35:16,440 --> 00:35:18,480 There is the adrenalin of the air raids 566 00:35:18,480 --> 00:35:22,040 and then there was the cover of the darkness itself. 567 00:35:22,040 --> 00:35:25,880 All these things encouraged some people to lose their inhibitions, 568 00:35:25,880 --> 00:35:27,520 along with their underwear. 569 00:35:28,680 --> 00:35:33,400 But the war didn't just allow for snatched moments of sexual intimacy. 570 00:35:33,400 --> 00:35:37,240 Women discovered other forms of freedom that they'd previously 571 00:35:37,240 --> 00:35:39,600 been denied. 572 00:35:39,600 --> 00:35:45,000 In 1941, Joan Wyndham joined up with the Women's Auxiliary Air Force. 573 00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:48,120 Well, you were living on equal terms with men, 574 00:35:48,120 --> 00:35:51,840 you were working with them, you were treated as an equal, totally. 575 00:35:51,840 --> 00:35:55,160 And because you were doing your bit, you could go out 576 00:35:55,160 --> 00:35:56,680 and not feel guilty. 577 00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:58,640 She quickly rose through the ranks 578 00:35:58,640 --> 00:36:02,360 and ended up stationed here at Bentley Priory in Hertfordshire. 579 00:36:04,360 --> 00:36:08,800 In Love Is Blue, she describes her first day. 580 00:36:08,800 --> 00:36:14,680 "Well, here I am an officer and life is absolutely the cat's whiskers. 581 00:36:14,680 --> 00:36:18,320 "When I walked into the officers' mess, I nearly died of shock. 582 00:36:18,320 --> 00:36:22,160 "It was all chintz sofas and roaring log fires. 583 00:36:22,160 --> 00:36:27,080 "And a suave blond said, "Hello, Wyndham. How about a gin and lime?" 584 00:36:27,080 --> 00:36:31,160 "The food is wonderful, the booze flows in abundance 585 00:36:31,160 --> 00:36:37,640 "and my fellow officers are fairly glamorous and a gay, wild lot." 586 00:36:37,640 --> 00:36:42,000 This luxurious atmosphere provided plenty of exciting encounters 587 00:36:42,000 --> 00:36:45,800 with the opposite sex. Here, at Bentley Priory, 588 00:36:45,800 --> 00:36:50,680 what mattered was that women were playing their part to win the war. 589 00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:55,440 What they got up to in their private lives just wasn't a priority. 590 00:36:55,440 --> 00:36:58,920 The authorities were content to turn a blind eye. 591 00:36:58,920 --> 00:37:02,680 You'd meet a man and you'd have a passionate affair with him 592 00:37:02,680 --> 00:37:06,000 and then he'd be posted or he might even be killed. 593 00:37:06,000 --> 00:37:08,080 Thank God, that never happened to me. 594 00:37:08,080 --> 00:37:12,800 And so, being normal, you know, healthy girls, in six months' time, 595 00:37:12,800 --> 00:37:16,240 we'd move on and find somebody else. 596 00:37:16,240 --> 00:37:20,520 Joan Wyndham is fascinating because her memoirs, in some ways, 597 00:37:20,520 --> 00:37:23,480 show the Second World War as a sort of trial run 598 00:37:23,480 --> 00:37:27,480 for the kind of relationships that we think of as belonging 599 00:37:27,480 --> 00:37:30,360 to much later in the 20th century. 600 00:37:30,360 --> 00:37:34,000 That permissive, let it all hang out behaviour of the 601 00:37:34,000 --> 00:37:37,720 '60s' generation was in fact pioneered by their parents. 602 00:37:40,120 --> 00:37:43,920 This new emphasis on living life to the full put increasing 603 00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:46,120 pressure on existing relationships. 604 00:37:47,680 --> 00:37:52,040 And during the war, marriages broke down in record numbers. 605 00:37:53,080 --> 00:37:55,760 The divorce rate multiplied by ten. 606 00:37:57,520 --> 00:38:00,560 Even though the laws surrounding divorce 607 00:38:00,560 --> 00:38:02,720 remained extremely restrictive. 608 00:38:04,120 --> 00:38:07,600 Even when both parties wanted a divorce, it wasn't 609 00:38:07,600 --> 00:38:09,600 that easy to get one. 610 00:38:09,600 --> 00:38:14,880 The law did allow for divorce on the grounds of insanity or desertion, 611 00:38:14,880 --> 00:38:17,280 but that was very rarely granted. 612 00:38:17,280 --> 00:38:21,480 The quickest way to get a divorce was to go for adultery, 613 00:38:21,480 --> 00:38:24,520 but how did you go about proving you'd committed adultery 614 00:38:24,520 --> 00:38:27,760 if either you hadn't or you didn't really want to. 615 00:38:27,760 --> 00:38:29,880 Well, luckily, 616 00:38:29,880 --> 00:38:33,160 a novel had come out that took you through the whole process. 617 00:38:33,160 --> 00:38:36,480 It was the perfect how to guide. 618 00:38:36,480 --> 00:38:40,960 Holy Deadlock focussed on a couple who were desperate to divorce, but 619 00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:44,840 had to go to extraordinary lengths to convince a court that the 620 00:38:44,840 --> 00:38:47,200 husband had been unfaithful. 621 00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:49,680 Even though he hadn't. 622 00:38:49,680 --> 00:38:54,520 If collusion was suspected, their divorce would not be granted. 623 00:38:54,520 --> 00:38:58,720 The author, AP Herbert, wanted to highlight the absurdity 624 00:38:58,720 --> 00:39:02,840 of a law that kept unhappy couples shackled together for life. 625 00:39:02,840 --> 00:39:07,200 And he did this by detailing a practice that became 626 00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:09,680 known as the Brighton Quickie. 627 00:39:09,680 --> 00:39:12,920 One member of the couple, usually the man, would take part 628 00:39:12,920 --> 00:39:17,280 in a staged incident of adultery with a professional co-respondent. 629 00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:24,840 As the book says, "As a rule, the gentleman takes a lady to a hotel, 630 00:39:24,840 --> 00:39:30,120 "Brighton or some such place, and he enters her in the book as his wife. 631 00:39:30,120 --> 00:39:32,000 "He shares a room with her 632 00:39:32,000 --> 00:39:36,440 "and then he sends the bill to his actual wife back at home." 633 00:39:36,440 --> 00:39:40,480 The success of the whole thing depends upon the real wife's 634 00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:44,640 agent being able to present watertight evidence that her 635 00:39:44,640 --> 00:39:46,760 husband had been unfaithful. 636 00:39:51,120 --> 00:39:54,840 Thanks to the novel, this pantomime became even more common. 637 00:39:56,120 --> 00:40:01,480 And by the 1940s, it had acquired its own cast of key characters who 638 00:40:01,480 --> 00:40:05,000 could later be relied upon as solid witnesses in court. 639 00:40:06,600 --> 00:40:10,240 # I've got my eyes on you 640 00:40:10,240 --> 00:40:14,600 # So best beware where you roam 641 00:40:16,160 --> 00:40:21,080 # I've got my eyes on you 642 00:40:21,080 --> 00:40:26,600 # So don't stray too far from home.... # 643 00:40:26,600 --> 00:40:31,240 Firstly, there was the private detective. 644 00:40:31,240 --> 00:40:34,600 The husband would hire a detective to observe the couple 645 00:40:34,600 --> 00:40:36,600 going in to the hotel together. 646 00:40:36,600 --> 00:40:40,000 He might also follow them around the town and hope to catch them 647 00:40:40,000 --> 00:40:42,000 having a kiss. 648 00:40:44,560 --> 00:40:48,800 Then, there was the hotel manager... Ah, hello. 649 00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:52,280 Will you be Mr and Mrs Smith? That's right. Please, come on in. 650 00:40:55,240 --> 00:40:58,560 ..who would usually want a fee for his or her cooperation. 651 00:41:04,880 --> 00:41:09,240 And lastly and most importantly, there was the chambermaid, whose job 652 00:41:09,240 --> 00:41:11,760 it was to discover the couple in bed 653 00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:14,880 and be willing to testify to the fact in court. 654 00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:16,480 I have seen you! 655 00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,760 The Brighton Quickie might have had all the ingredients of a classic 656 00:41:25,760 --> 00:41:30,960 farce, but it was the only way for many couples to obtain a divorce. 657 00:41:30,960 --> 00:41:34,440 For Lorraine Ferguson's parents, it enabled them 658 00:41:34,440 --> 00:41:37,080 to start a new life together. 659 00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:40,160 Lorraine, tell me a bit about this wartime romance. 660 00:41:40,160 --> 00:41:44,800 Well, my parents met in Austria at the end of the Second World War. 661 00:41:44,800 --> 00:41:47,280 He was a surgeon and she was a nurse. 662 00:41:47,280 --> 00:41:50,240 And they spent four amazing months together in Austria 663 00:41:50,240 --> 00:41:53,160 before he was demobbed about eight months before her. 664 00:41:53,160 --> 00:41:54,960 And so during those eight months, 665 00:41:54,960 --> 00:41:57,240 they wrote these letters to each other. 666 00:41:57,240 --> 00:42:00,520 They more than wrote! They exchanged hundreds of letters, didn't they? 667 00:42:00,520 --> 00:42:05,920 There are almost 300 letters here. My mother gave them to me before she died and they wrote every day, 668 00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:10,960 sometimes twice a day. So, here, she's writing to him, "forces overseas", 669 00:42:10,960 --> 00:42:13,520 it says, and he's back at home in Shropshire. 670 00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:17,320 Yes, and you can see that she's kissed the back of the envelope. 671 00:42:17,320 --> 00:42:20,840 There's lipstick! Look at that! Sealed with a loving kiss. Mwah! 672 00:42:20,840 --> 00:42:22,560 That's beautiful. 673 00:42:22,560 --> 00:42:26,040 But there was one major problem with this romance, wasn't there? 674 00:42:26,040 --> 00:42:29,520 My father had married before he went abroad, 675 00:42:29,520 --> 00:42:31,800 as a lot of people did in the war. 676 00:42:31,800 --> 00:42:34,720 He married literally two weeks before he was stationed abroad and 677 00:42:34,720 --> 00:42:36,520 when he did come back on leave, 678 00:42:36,520 --> 00:42:41,680 his first wife had actually met somebody else. Oh, dear. 679 00:42:41,680 --> 00:42:44,560 So by the time he met my mother, the marriage, 680 00:42:44,560 --> 00:42:47,680 as far as both parties were concerned, was over. 681 00:42:47,680 --> 00:42:50,200 What's to be done? A Brighton Quickie! That's right. 682 00:42:50,200 --> 00:42:51,960 That's exactly what had to be done. 683 00:42:51,960 --> 00:42:54,520 So obviously he's read the book Holy Deadlock, 684 00:42:54,520 --> 00:42:56,960 because he mentions it in this letter here, 685 00:42:56,960 --> 00:43:00,240 where he says, "Have you ever read Holy Deadlock?" 686 00:43:00,240 --> 00:43:03,800 It's exactly what he's got to do, he's got to provide evidence. 687 00:43:03,800 --> 00:43:07,880 He didn't want to sue his first wife for divorce, because that would have 688 00:43:07,880 --> 00:43:11,040 been very shaming for her, so he had to create 689 00:43:11,040 --> 00:43:14,600 an adulterous situation so that she could sue him. 690 00:43:14,600 --> 00:43:17,280 He did the gentlemanly thing. He did indeed, yes. 691 00:43:17,280 --> 00:43:19,920 But of course he couldn't do that with the woman he loved. 692 00:43:19,920 --> 00:43:23,280 Because that would have dragged her into the divorce courts. Precisely. 693 00:43:23,280 --> 00:43:25,840 So how did he go about it then? 694 00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:28,040 He says here, "To my mother, 695 00:43:28,040 --> 00:43:29,600 "if I picked up a common tart, 696 00:43:29,600 --> 00:43:33,520 "she'd immediately have suspected something if I didn't sleep with her. 697 00:43:33,520 --> 00:43:35,840 "If I failed to oblige, she'd smell a rat. 698 00:43:35,840 --> 00:43:39,720 "If I did, I'd probably need a large course of penicillin." 699 00:43:39,720 --> 00:43:43,080 So obviously, whoever you asked, even if you paid them, 700 00:43:43,080 --> 00:43:47,160 they may well give the game away if they felt like it. 701 00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:49,680 Because it was breaking... They were being used to enable 702 00:43:49,680 --> 00:43:52,320 the breaking of the law, weren't they? It was a subterfuge 703 00:43:52,320 --> 00:43:54,960 that was going to be produced as a legal document. 704 00:43:54,960 --> 00:43:58,440 But then to this delight, his sister Margaret, 705 00:43:58,440 --> 00:44:02,360 who is in with the theatre set, 706 00:44:02,360 --> 00:44:05,600 has a friend who will do the deed with him. 707 00:44:05,600 --> 00:44:08,600 But not really do the deed. Pretend to do the deed. 708 00:44:08,600 --> 00:44:11,520 And there's a lovely bit later on in the letter where he says that 709 00:44:11,520 --> 00:44:14,600 "she was a lovely person but not nearly as pretty as you, darling." 710 00:44:14,600 --> 00:44:16,720 Oh, good, so she won't be jealous. 711 00:44:16,720 --> 00:44:19,680 They didn't even hold hands, he assured my mother. 712 00:44:19,680 --> 00:44:24,400 It's very funny to think of all these people running rings around the law, isn't it? 713 00:44:24,400 --> 00:44:26,240 It's quite said that they have to do it. 714 00:44:26,240 --> 00:44:28,480 They felt it was sad, didn't they? Yes, they did. 715 00:44:28,480 --> 00:44:30,680 They felt it was sordid and unpleasant 716 00:44:30,680 --> 00:44:33,280 and I think uncomfortable for them. 717 00:44:33,280 --> 00:44:36,280 That more, I think, than sad. 718 00:44:38,160 --> 00:44:40,160 There was a happy ever after, wasn't there? 719 00:44:40,160 --> 00:44:41,440 Yes, there certainly was. 720 00:44:41,440 --> 00:44:44,080 In March 1947, they were finally able to get married. 721 00:44:47,040 --> 00:44:51,120 The war had ignited all sorts of volcanic passions. 722 00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:55,080 It gave a glimpse of what was to come in the 1960s. 723 00:44:55,080 --> 00:44:56,960 But in the post-war years, 724 00:44:56,960 --> 00:45:00,280 a lot of people were keen to hold back the tide. 725 00:45:00,280 --> 00:45:03,160 They'd had enough of cheap and dirty sex 726 00:45:03,160 --> 00:45:06,160 and they were ready to re-embrace romance. 727 00:45:09,000 --> 00:45:11,920 A new morally conservative mood took hold, 728 00:45:11,920 --> 00:45:15,880 and by the 1950s, "we'd never had it so romantic." 729 00:45:17,520 --> 00:45:23,280 More people tied the knot than ever before or since, and at younger ages. 730 00:45:23,280 --> 00:45:28,440 Commitment, it seems, was the perfect antidote to the horror of war. 731 00:45:29,720 --> 00:45:31,080 It was at this point 732 00:45:31,080 --> 00:45:35,280 that our most potent expression of romance was invented. 733 00:45:35,280 --> 00:45:41,000 # Under Orion's starry sky 734 00:45:41,000 --> 00:45:44,920 # I lie in the moonlit garden 735 00:45:44,920 --> 00:45:49,000 # Wondering where to cast my eye 736 00:45:49,000 --> 00:45:51,800 # For all that I see is heaven... # 737 00:45:51,800 --> 00:45:55,200 The De Beers corporation realised that there might be a market 738 00:45:55,200 --> 00:45:57,800 for something symbolising permanence. 739 00:45:57,800 --> 00:45:59,960 Something indestructible. 740 00:45:59,960 --> 00:46:02,640 So they came up with an advertising campaign 741 00:46:02,640 --> 00:46:07,120 with the most fantastic slogan - "A Diamond is Forever." 742 00:46:07,120 --> 00:46:09,440 And in doing this, they created 743 00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:15,160 the 20th century's most enduring and most sparkly love token. 744 00:46:15,160 --> 00:46:20,280 The diamond engagement ring was a strictly post-war phenomenon. 745 00:46:20,280 --> 00:46:24,000 Jewellery expert John Benjamin is fascinated 746 00:46:24,000 --> 00:46:26,720 by how quickly the idea took hold. 747 00:46:26,720 --> 00:46:30,640 This advert is produced by De Beers. 748 00:46:30,640 --> 00:46:32,560 It dates from the 1940s, 749 00:46:32,560 --> 00:46:36,560 and the campaign, "A diamond is forever," it started in America, did it? 750 00:46:36,560 --> 00:46:39,120 It did, and it was a brilliant strapline, 751 00:46:39,120 --> 00:46:42,360 because it just tapped in with all the subliminal issues 752 00:46:42,360 --> 00:46:45,720 of what a diamond represents, 753 00:46:45,720 --> 00:46:49,960 and also what your marriage will therefore represent. 754 00:46:49,960 --> 00:46:54,680 If you buy a diamond, it means that your marriage will last 755 00:46:54,680 --> 00:46:58,600 for the rest of time as well, so it was very clever in that respect. 756 00:46:58,600 --> 00:47:01,160 Very quickly, certainly by the end of the '40s 757 00:47:01,160 --> 00:47:02,680 and the start of the 1950s, 758 00:47:02,680 --> 00:47:05,880 diamond jewellery becomes the must-have item. 759 00:47:05,880 --> 00:47:08,440 So this all looks very aspirational, but down here it says, 760 00:47:08,440 --> 00:47:11,640 "your diamond ring need not be costly." 761 00:47:11,640 --> 00:47:14,160 Quite right too. At that time, in the late '40s and '50s, 762 00:47:14,160 --> 00:47:18,120 when people got married, they had no money. 763 00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:22,680 And it's worth showing this diamond ring because this is the perfect way 764 00:47:22,680 --> 00:47:25,360 that diamonds are being set in those days. 765 00:47:25,360 --> 00:47:27,120 OK, let's look at that. 766 00:47:27,120 --> 00:47:30,880 Absolutely teeny-weeny little diamond chips. 767 00:47:30,880 --> 00:47:32,360 Where is the diamond even? 768 00:47:32,360 --> 00:47:36,720 It twinkles in the heart of the setting. 769 00:47:36,720 --> 00:47:39,760 By carving the setting, you somehow make the setting 770 00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:42,800 look like part of the diamond, and that gives a sense, 771 00:47:42,800 --> 00:47:45,400 "Ooh, I've got a bigger diamond." I like that! 772 00:47:45,400 --> 00:47:47,880 It works, it works, because at first sight you think 773 00:47:47,880 --> 00:47:49,920 those are three diamonds, but they're not. 774 00:47:49,920 --> 00:47:53,160 They're three teeny-tiny diamonds. Teeny-tiny little stones. 775 00:47:53,160 --> 00:47:55,560 I feel really fond of the tiny diamond ring now. 776 00:47:55,560 --> 00:47:59,800 I feel like this was a real purchase made with feeling by somebody. 777 00:47:59,800 --> 00:48:03,880 The diamond ring tapped into a need to establish 778 00:48:03,880 --> 00:48:06,400 a more stable world. 779 00:48:06,400 --> 00:48:09,640 People wanted to believe in the power of love again, 780 00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:13,400 and so they reached for the romance novel. 781 00:48:13,400 --> 00:48:16,640 There'd been a return to the origins of the genre, 782 00:48:16,640 --> 00:48:21,120 as regency romances filled the best-seller lists. 783 00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:26,760 One author in particular made it her business to satisfy this desire. 784 00:48:26,760 --> 00:48:29,720 She clocked up more than a billion sales. 785 00:48:29,720 --> 00:48:32,520 She was British history's most prolific author, 786 00:48:32,520 --> 00:48:35,520 publishing 723 books 787 00:48:35,520 --> 00:48:38,960 and writing them at a speed of one a fortnight. 788 00:48:38,960 --> 00:48:41,360 I think it's fair to say that nobody else 789 00:48:41,360 --> 00:48:46,560 as precisely perfected the formula for a successful romantic novel. 790 00:48:46,560 --> 00:48:51,720 Of course, I'm talking about the indomitable Barbara Cartland. 791 00:48:53,200 --> 00:48:55,720 # I'll take romance 792 00:48:55,720 --> 00:49:00,080 # While my heart is young and eager to fly 793 00:49:00,080 --> 00:49:03,120 # I'll give my heart a try 794 00:49:03,120 --> 00:49:04,880 # I'll take romance. # 795 00:49:04,880 --> 00:49:08,640 Love is this thing that happens to everybody at one time in their life. 796 00:49:08,640 --> 00:49:12,920 I write about the moment when everybody has stars in their eyes. 797 00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:17,520 She dictated book after book to an army of secretaries... 798 00:49:17,520 --> 00:49:19,560 "Am I interrupting?" he said. 799 00:49:19,560 --> 00:49:24,400 A little hesitating voice replied, "No, I'm alone." 800 00:49:24,400 --> 00:49:27,160 "Why are you not at the dance?" he asked. 801 00:49:27,160 --> 00:49:29,320 "I had no partner," she answered. 802 00:49:29,320 --> 00:49:33,640 ..and created a brand that reflected the morals of an earlier age. 803 00:49:34,920 --> 00:49:36,760 Her characters inhabit a world 804 00:49:36,760 --> 00:49:40,760 that pre-dates the sexual excesses of the Second World War. 805 00:49:40,760 --> 00:49:44,080 It's inhabited by wenches and rakes, 806 00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:49,480 by impetuous duchesses and by dastardly dukes, 807 00:49:49,480 --> 00:49:53,000 and there's the occasional guest appearance by the Prince of Wales. 808 00:49:55,560 --> 00:49:59,600 The historical setting wasn't just a style decision. 809 00:49:59,600 --> 00:50:04,960 Barbara Cartland really wanted to turn back the clock. 810 00:50:07,080 --> 00:50:09,240 Born at the start of the 20th century, 811 00:50:09,240 --> 00:50:13,880 she'd personally experienced much of its social upheaval. 812 00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:19,640 She saw her mother widowed and lost two brothers as a result of war. 813 00:50:21,360 --> 00:50:24,480 And her first marriage ended in divorce, 814 00:50:24,480 --> 00:50:26,760 attracting lurid newspaper articles 815 00:50:26,760 --> 00:50:31,320 because to its charges and counter-charges of infidelity. 816 00:50:31,320 --> 00:50:35,680 Despite all this, she retained her belief in romance, 817 00:50:35,680 --> 00:50:40,160 although she found it increasingly lacking in the modern world. 818 00:50:42,040 --> 00:50:46,080 Society had moved on and she felt it had gone too far. 819 00:50:49,160 --> 00:50:51,840 There was less and less restraint. 820 00:50:51,840 --> 00:50:54,920 The sexual freedom glimpsed during the war 821 00:50:54,920 --> 00:50:58,800 had now fully exploded into the mainstream. 822 00:50:58,800 --> 00:51:01,480 Explicit sex now seemed to be everywhere, 823 00:51:01,480 --> 00:51:04,120 much to Barbara Cartland's distress. 824 00:51:04,120 --> 00:51:06,880 We don't have to have all this terrible promiscuousness. 825 00:51:06,880 --> 00:51:09,800 I'm so sick of naked bodies and hairy chests rolling about on beds. 826 00:51:09,800 --> 00:51:13,400 I mean, it really does... I think it's so revolting and so unromantic. 827 00:51:13,400 --> 00:51:16,800 If you have a lovely dream about yourself, you may be half-naked. 828 00:51:16,800 --> 00:51:20,080 The man is always in full regimentals with his spurs, you know. 829 00:51:20,080 --> 00:51:23,400 Looking glorious and romantic and exciting! 830 00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:27,400 Why we should have to have the men naked, 831 00:51:27,400 --> 00:51:29,040 who does it attract? Not women. 832 00:51:30,240 --> 00:51:33,880 Barbara Cartland was almost evangelical in her mission 833 00:51:33,880 --> 00:51:36,880 to take the actual sex out of romance. 834 00:51:36,880 --> 00:51:39,680 She always left the couple at the bedroom door 835 00:51:39,680 --> 00:51:41,960 on their wedding night. 836 00:51:41,960 --> 00:51:45,480 But the hero and heroine were allowed a first kiss 837 00:51:45,480 --> 00:51:48,040 and that could be pretty special. 838 00:51:48,040 --> 00:51:52,200 "She felt a sudden flame shoot through her body. 839 00:51:52,200 --> 00:51:55,240 "She felt her lips respond to his 840 00:51:55,240 --> 00:51:59,080 "and knew that this was a love which would never alter or grow less. 841 00:51:59,080 --> 00:52:03,480 "She felt him draw her closer still until they were one, indivisible - 842 00:52:03,480 --> 00:52:07,640 "one heart, one soul, one love for all eternity." 843 00:52:09,360 --> 00:52:11,440 Goodness, if that's just the first kiss, 844 00:52:11,440 --> 00:52:14,000 imagine what was going on behind that bedroom door. 845 00:52:16,320 --> 00:52:21,080 Passionate stuff! No wonder she had such devoted readers! 846 00:52:22,760 --> 00:52:25,840 In the 1970s, Barbara Cartland and her fans 847 00:52:25,840 --> 00:52:29,320 were also able to get their fix of romance elsewhere, 848 00:52:29,320 --> 00:52:32,840 as television adaptations of classic love stories 849 00:52:32,840 --> 00:52:34,520 burst onto our screens. 850 00:52:36,800 --> 00:52:39,240 The most popular of them featured the work 851 00:52:39,240 --> 00:52:42,280 of that real queen of British romance, Jane Austen. 852 00:52:42,280 --> 00:52:46,920 The authors of romantic fiction had originally used 853 00:52:46,920 --> 00:52:51,520 their writing to examine the reality of life in their own time. 854 00:52:51,520 --> 00:52:56,040 But now they were providing escapism for people who felt that romance 855 00:52:56,040 --> 00:52:59,160 was missing from modern life. 856 00:52:59,160 --> 00:53:01,680 It's a love affair that's lasted. 857 00:53:01,680 --> 00:53:05,720 When it comes to romance, we seem to prefer our heroes and heroines 858 00:53:05,720 --> 00:53:08,440 in crinolines and breeches, 859 00:53:08,440 --> 00:53:09,760 and I'm no exception. 860 00:53:11,240 --> 00:53:15,240 When I was a teenager in the 1980s, there was one film 861 00:53:15,240 --> 00:53:17,680 that I watched again and again. 862 00:53:17,680 --> 00:53:22,320 It was the Merchant Ivory adaptation of A Room with a View. 863 00:53:22,320 --> 00:53:25,680 I loved it, partly because the heroine was called Lucy 864 00:53:25,680 --> 00:53:30,320 and had great hair, but mainly because of one particular scene. 865 00:53:32,760 --> 00:53:36,200 The pivotal point in the poppy field. 866 00:53:36,200 --> 00:53:37,960 The beautiful setting 867 00:53:37,960 --> 00:53:42,000 and the surging Puccini give you a great big gush of emotion. 868 00:53:43,640 --> 00:53:46,680 When George kisses Lucy so masterfully, 869 00:53:46,680 --> 00:53:49,760 you know at once that they are soulmates. 870 00:53:49,760 --> 00:53:52,560 Passion will eventually conquer all. 871 00:53:54,000 --> 00:53:56,320 As a schoolgirl living in Nottingham, 872 00:53:56,320 --> 00:53:59,600 this was the most romantic thing that I could imagine. 873 00:54:03,720 --> 00:54:05,000 For one moment, 874 00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:09,360 the characters break through the rigid rules that govern society 875 00:54:09,360 --> 00:54:11,280 at the turn of the 20th century. 876 00:54:11,280 --> 00:54:14,240 There are no interfering chaperones, 877 00:54:14,240 --> 00:54:17,000 there's no consciousness of class. 878 00:54:17,000 --> 00:54:21,000 These are barriers to love that my generation has never had to face, 879 00:54:21,000 --> 00:54:25,840 but they're the classic ingredients of romantic period drama, 880 00:54:25,840 --> 00:54:27,680 and we love it! 881 00:54:29,720 --> 00:54:32,680 But there was one barrier that did remain intact 882 00:54:32,680 --> 00:54:36,080 throughout the 20th century. 883 00:54:36,080 --> 00:54:39,640 It was the focus of the novel that the producer/director team 884 00:54:39,640 --> 00:54:44,040 Merchant Ivory chose as their follow up to A Room with a View. 885 00:54:44,040 --> 00:54:47,880 It was another adaptation of an EM Forster novel. 886 00:54:49,600 --> 00:54:53,760 Maurice is radically different from A Room with a View. 887 00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:58,000 It's still a passionate romance, but this time it's between men. 888 00:54:58,000 --> 00:55:02,400 Without a doubt, this was EM Forster's most intensely personal work. 889 00:55:03,840 --> 00:55:06,720 It's a homosexual coming-of-age novel, 890 00:55:06,720 --> 00:55:08,440 and just like Lady Chatterley, 891 00:55:08,440 --> 00:55:11,800 the protagonist's in love with a working man. 892 00:55:11,800 --> 00:55:15,960 "He loved men and had always loved them. 893 00:55:15,960 --> 00:55:19,560 "He longed to mingle his being with theirs." 894 00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:25,680 The novel was so controversial that it was only published in 1971, 895 00:55:25,680 --> 00:55:27,960 nearly 60 years after it was written. 896 00:55:30,400 --> 00:55:33,640 Like Maurice, the main character, Forster was gay, 897 00:55:33,640 --> 00:55:37,760 and he deliberately suppressed his own book during his lifetime. 898 00:55:39,120 --> 00:55:42,800 He knew that while homosexuality remained illegal, 899 00:55:42,800 --> 00:55:45,920 a novel with a happy ending for two men in love 900 00:55:45,920 --> 00:55:47,680 would not be tolerated. 901 00:55:48,920 --> 00:55:52,160 At one point, Maurice expresses his loneliness, 902 00:55:52,160 --> 00:55:56,320 doubting that he will ever find lasting love. 903 00:55:56,320 --> 00:55:58,880 "I suppose such a thing," he says, 904 00:55:58,880 --> 00:56:02,160 "can't really happen outside sleep." 905 00:56:05,720 --> 00:56:10,080 At the end, Forster's hero does get it together with Scudder, 906 00:56:10,080 --> 00:56:12,720 the gamekeeper, his soulmate, 907 00:56:12,720 --> 00:56:17,080 but even so, it's a happy ending tinged with sadness. 908 00:56:19,560 --> 00:56:23,200 The couple will be forced to live apart from society. 909 00:56:25,200 --> 00:56:29,720 A self-imposed exile, which means they have given up everything for love. 910 00:56:31,200 --> 00:56:34,240 Maurice and Scudder may have been united in love, 911 00:56:34,240 --> 00:56:37,560 but unlike couples in traditional romantic fiction, 912 00:56:37,560 --> 00:56:41,440 they were denied the happy ending of a wedding. 913 00:56:41,440 --> 00:56:45,520 Even as the restrictions fell away during the 20th century, 914 00:56:45,520 --> 00:56:49,520 marriage between two men was as impossible in the '80s, 915 00:56:49,520 --> 00:56:53,000 when the film came out, as it had been when the book was written 916 00:56:53,000 --> 00:56:55,120 in Edwardian Britain. 917 00:56:56,440 --> 00:57:00,320 The gay rights movement had been active since the 1960s, 918 00:57:00,320 --> 00:57:05,280 and in the 21st century, it focused on this goal of equal marriage. 919 00:57:07,480 --> 00:57:10,040 When it was finally made legal in the UK, 920 00:57:10,040 --> 00:57:14,480 it was with the sense that everybody has the right to choose a life-partner. 921 00:57:15,800 --> 00:57:18,160 A human-rights based approach to love 922 00:57:18,160 --> 00:57:20,800 is an awfully long way from where we started, 923 00:57:20,800 --> 00:57:24,760 when romance seemed mainly to be about property interests. 924 00:57:24,760 --> 00:57:28,920 It would have been hard for EM Forster to imagine it, 925 00:57:28,920 --> 00:57:31,640 but 100 years after he wrote his novel, 926 00:57:31,640 --> 00:57:35,000 his heroes would no longer be social outcasts. 927 00:57:35,000 --> 00:57:37,680 They too could settle down and get married. 928 00:57:39,600 --> 00:57:41,320 For me, this change has happened 929 00:57:41,320 --> 00:57:45,600 because of the overwhelming importance we now place on romantic love. 930 00:57:48,840 --> 00:57:52,680 That idea that you should share your life with a special someone 931 00:57:52,680 --> 00:57:56,360 is essential to our notions of self-fulfilment. 932 00:57:59,080 --> 00:58:02,160 Over three centuries, romance has taken us 933 00:58:02,160 --> 00:58:06,440 from being a nation where courtship was rigidly controlled... 934 00:58:08,920 --> 00:58:13,600 ..to a country where everybody has the right to choose a soulmate, 935 00:58:13,600 --> 00:58:15,600 no matter who they are. 936 00:58:17,400 --> 00:58:20,680 Isn't it nice that the story of British romance 937 00:58:20,680 --> 00:58:23,840 really does have a happy ending? 938 00:58:25,080 --> 00:58:29,240 # We got love power 939 00:58:29,240 --> 00:58:32,400 # It's the greatest power of them all 940 00:58:32,400 --> 00:58:36,960 # We got love power 941 00:58:36,960 --> 00:58:40,040 # And together we can't fall 942 00:58:40,040 --> 00:58:42,920 # Sometimes we're up 943 00:58:42,920 --> 00:58:45,080 # Sometimes we're down 944 00:58:45,080 --> 00:58:49,040 # But our feet are always on the ground 945 00:58:49,040 --> 00:58:51,040 # We always laugh 946 00:58:51,040 --> 00:58:53,120 # Don't have to cry 947 00:58:53,120 --> 00:58:56,960 # And this is the reason why. # 129930

Can't find what you're looking for?
Get subtitles in any language from opensubtitles.com, and translate them here.