What was Lord Darlington trying to ask Mr. Stevens to tell his Godson?
-
chrisbedford — 16 years ago(November 08, 2009 07:16 AM)
Interesting that Lord Darlington thought that his son didn't have a clue about sex
Godson.
Remember this was the thirties - the most frightfully repressive society, not far different from the Georgian times it inherited most of its characteristics from. Young people were
expected
to be ignorant of sex until their wedding night or at least, until pre-marriage "counselling" sessions would reveal the awful truth to them, but they were very definitely supposed to be virgins until married. Hence Lord D asking Stevens if he knew the facts of life - since Stevens was unmarried, it might not unreasonably be supposed that he would be uninformed about procreation.
And I'm sure there were probably a great number of people in his situation who really were ignorant, although the thought makes me shudder! -
Sandor_Szavost — 16 years ago(January 11, 2010 07:50 AM)
By the 1930's, for the most part, women were still expected to keep their virginity until marriage, but not men. Unmarried men would often visit prostitutes or have love affairs, and society would not disapprove of such things. And sexual attitudes towards women were changing too by the thirties. Single women could go out on dates unchaperoned, they could go to bars, and sexual relations before or outside marriage, if found out, no longer meant the female would be considered a "fallen woman" and thus shunned from society. Also, among the nobility, rules about sex were not as strict as for middle class people.
~Don't you want to go where the rainbow ends?~ -
cyninbend-149-610489 — 10 years ago(January 23, 2016 03:23 AM)
Many women were sexually active thenif we can trust movies like Design For Living, and how famous actresses lived. Not just in Hollywood but throughout EuropeParis, Berlinwhereve sophisticated people lived. It seems artists and performers led libertine lives while small towns everywhere enforced much stricter rules.
-
fentress — 15 years ago(April 16, 2010 03:33 PM)
I think you're probably right in the technical sense. Cardinal probably did already know something about sex. Perhaps he already had sex. But I think in that society it was the proper thing for someone like Lord D to engage in the custom of
acting as if
a young unmarried man wouldn't know about sex. It was the picture of life people wanted to believe. Plus, in Darlington's mind it might have been a virtuous act for him to presume that Cardinal had led a sexually pure life. -
Trax-3 — 11 years ago(January 10, 2015 07:58 PM)
Godson.
Remember this was the thirties - the most frightfully repressive society, not far different from the Georgian times it inherited most of its characteristics from. Young people were expected to be ignorant of sex until their wedding night or at least, until pre-marriage "counselling" sessions would reveal the awful truth to them, but they were very definitely supposed to be virgins until married. Hence Lord D asking Stevens if he knew the facts of life - since Stevens was unmarried, it might not unreasonably be supposed that he would be uninformed about procreation.
This is nonsense, this is 30s. Roaring 20s are a recent memory. Lord Darlington is just hopelessly out of touch with times and reality. -
movie-viking — 11 years ago(April 18, 2014 11:40 PM)
Lord Darlington (poor dear confused man!) actually must have thought his grown godson did not know about sexand asks the butler Stevens to talk to him.
(You would have thought the godson was a 10 year old boy
not a mature man!)
Shows how cluelessand out of touch with reality both Lord Darlingtonand his butler Stevens were! Both were honorable but politically and personally adrift!