Boden on Lash

Mr Boden's archive contains a gem:

"Herr Blogmeister, the Boden archive used to extend further - I once had a good selection from 1980, but lent them to someone many years ago and never saw them again. [Who was it? Let's track 'em down?] Anything else, not sure.... I have thousands of slides, the Pentax became the Nikon, and I continued to use this medium until CCD technology overtook the resolution of the best quality film early in this millennium.

A propos of the recent Captain Lash postings, the copy that still somehow resides on my bookshelves was the basis of the proposed stage version, fully annotated as the prototype script in a hand which I know isn't Ferris's so must presumably be Philpotts or yourself. For example, Cocky's concertina has become a recorder, and textual alterations such as "He began to rave, ripping out a - 'torrent of filthy lingua franca' (replaced by) 'Giant JP!' - that would have curdled the blood of Cora had she understood it." Maybe an important and iconic copy for the Lash aficionados - perhaps I should stick it up on eBay and let them fight amongst themselves for it!!!!

Finally, I still possess my old WHS trowels and have used them again relatively recently for their properly designed purpose - ie repointing old brickwork."

Captain Lash -- the Audio Version and the Film ...

For those of you whose curiosity has been tickled by my transcriptions of the world's worst novel, I am delighted to announce, with apologies to Julie-Ann for the delay, her publication on the web of her own audio version of this legendary volume!

You will find it at the attached link: Captain Lash, in all his glory.

Dr Ferris also reminds me to point out that he told me some months ago that, heaven help us, Captain Lash was made into film: "when recently posting the second excruciating excerpt from 'Captain Lash' on his blog Crickley Hill Man failed to reveal to his dedicated readers our startling googled discovery of the other night attesting to the existence of a silent film of 'Captain Lash' from 1929. For those who might just wish to know, this silent meisterwerk, directed by John G. Blystone and written by K. McGuinness, starred Victor McLagen, presumably as Lash. A copy is preserved for posterity, catalogued as a comedy I glad to say, in the UCLA film archives. Who would have thought it?"

Here it is at the Internet Movie Database: and here's a review from the New York Times, of all things!

But you must check out Julie-Ann's version ...

Captain Lash: instalment 3

"Oh, quit it!" counselled Cocky, reaching for the keys of his instrument of torture.  "Pipe that house-side along of her -- she's booked."  Lash halted.  A man as big as himself, a man who looked as if he had been weaned on sulphuric acid, and nurtured through his adolescence on Greek fire, a man whose arms were laden with parcels approached the white-frocked girl. Lash saw an emotion akin to terror express itself in the flower-like face.  The man pressed his load into the girl's arms, spoke harshly, and turned away, shouldering a bull-like way through the swirls of humanity.

"Come back!" pleaded Cocky.  If Lash heard, he took no heed.  Clean across the street he went, dodging the traffic miraculously, and halted.

"Sweetheart," he entreated, "I'm going your way.  Which way you going, Blondie ---?"

"A bit fresh, aren't you?" asked the girl.  But she did not appear as annoyed as Mrs Grundy would have wished her to be, either; for notwithstanding his ruggedness, Lash's magnificent self inevitably aroused admiration.

"Fresh?  Me?  Fresh as the lilies of the dell, yes," grinned the cavalier of the shovel.  "Anyhow, I'm goin' your way; which is it?"  Calmly he took possession of a load of parcels, notwithstanding her vague protests and her somewhat timid glances up and down the street.  It is doubtful whether Lash would have continued his interest in her but for the wholly forbidding appearance of her lawful companion; but the hot blood of his manhood was tingling in his veins, since danger ways a titillating spice to his adventurous soul.

"Never mind him," he declared.  "Any man that leaves a lady to hunch such a load as this, isn't rightly a man.  You lead the way." Across the street Cocky tore the stifling air to rags with the brayed strains of The Campbells Are Coming.  It was of no use -- had the clan itself appeared arrayed in full panoply of war, Captain Lash would not have been diverted from his hastily-planned course.  As he linked a spare arm under the girl's elbow, Cocky, his shoulders shrugged in resignation, followed meekly at a distance.

"Well, then, here we are, and thank you," said the incognita.

"Only too pleased," murmured Lash, halting at the narrow doorway.  "Did anyone ever tell you that when you smile it makes the sun look pale?"

Excuse me, but I think I'm going to be sick.  That last line reminds me of an ironic oral application to take annual leave made to me by former Detective Sergeant Roy Saunders, once of the Metropolitan Police Fraud Squad, later of the Serious Fraud Office: "Ah, good morning, Parker.  May I just say that your charm is exceeded only by your great personal beauty?"  "What do you want?"  "Day off on Thursday please."  "Get out of here."

Captain Lash - instalment 2

"Think o' Babe; fer the land's sake, think o' Babe!" pleaded Cocky. It was an argument that had succeeded when others had failed; for of them all there was just one girl in the wide Pacific who had the power to leash the giant's reckless soul. Let him stray from the fold as he might, he hived back to Babe sooner or later; and there, after arguments, his welcome was assured.

"I'm always thinkin of her," grinned Lash. "You mightn't believe it, Cocky, but it's because I'm trying to find her equal I goes huntin' the way I do. Come along, then." Cocky was happy enough where he was. Put him in front of a frothing schooner or a newly-opened bottle and he wouldn't have owned the Empress of China as his aunt.  This was the atmosphere he loved; an atmosphere compounded of choking tobacco-smoke and liquor-fumes and exotic scents that dropped from the easy-mannered dancing girls.  There was the music of the raw jungle type that inflames men's passions; and presently Cocky would be mellowed and made massive by beer to the extent of performing a solo on his concertina and, perhaps, giving an exhibition dance, which would result in much free refreshment.  Furthermore the spotlight of public favour would be trained on Cocky; and his unfortunate inferiority complex would be lulled to rest.  Sheltered under the compelling shadow of Lash, Cocky seldom had a look-in: he was one of the crowd ambitioning to be a star.

Realizing the futility of argument, he followed his captain out into the boiling streets.  "There'll be trouble come of it; mark my words, there'll be trouble," he bewailed.

"If I can find it, yes," growled Lash. "How you does it, I can't tell - women fair go crazy if you so much as give 'em a once-over!" "It's a gift," said Lash simply; "same as music or po'try. First the wenches, then the likker, then the scrappin' - then I'm happy. Hi, pipe the lass across the street."

She was a handsome girl enough, with a winning smile. Her summer frock was dainty and to the eyes of Lash she showed a tempting morsel."

It's so bad.

Phillpotts on Lash ...

Dr Phillpotts writes "I still have my copy of Captain Lash, which I think may have been the original one purchased from a Cheltenham bookstall. I also have another Frank Shaw, which I think I may have borrowed from Iain and never returned. Whoops! I did begin adapting Captain Lash for the stage, but only did part of it as a pilot. I have several hand-written copies of the script, which begins "Narrator: Chapter Eleven. Eruption!" I think we may have rehearsed it once, but it was never performed. As I recall you were to play Lash, and Ros was to play Cora."  The nation may be grateful that our plans were never carried out ...

Captain Lash returns

I really had forgotten quite how excruciating is the prose style of Captain Frank Shaw.  But eBay and the Royal mail have done their work, and a copy of Captain Lash has fallen into my hot little hands.  So here goes:

"But as he parted a motley mob of American gobs on shore-leave, and built up the foundations of half-a-dozen promising fights later on by his ruthlessness; as he overturned a couple of rickshaws, and seriously annoyed a couple of monocled military officers, the girl in question disappeared.  He returned, undaunted, to where Cocky still kept one leaf of the swing door open invitingly, what time his shocking concertina made the glaring day hideous with the strains of that warning song. [sic]

"One o'them days you'll get it right where the chicken got the axe," criticised Cocky.  "Say, look here, big man, ain't you met up with enough trouble alonger skirts?  Yer never know where you are with 'em.  Likker, yes - that lands yer comferably in quod; likewise scrappin'  - but women -no!"  Lash picked him up by his collar and swung him into the saloon; crashing down into a seat; stamped on the concertina and called hoarsely for a drink. Before it arrived he had a couple of the den's dancing girls on his knees, and as the schooners of beers slid along the table, he had the two corybantes engaged in a jealous and shrill-voiced argument.  Drinking down his liquor - and Cocky believed he heard his shipmate's throat sizzle to the cooling run - Lashed thrust a dollar apiece into the girls' ready hands, lifted them high above his head and seated them on a shelf.

"'Taint the gettin', it's the huntin'" he averred.  "Come along, little runt: let's hunt!""

It brings it all back: you can, I hope, see why nightly reading episodes became de rigueur: I can already feel the frisson of fascinated horror as one waits for the next bizarre mangled phrase ...  more soon.

Another lashing, this time from beyond the seas ...

"Dear C-H-M,

Many, many years ago my friend and I obtained copies of a book which seemed harmless enough, even quite amusing, at the time. But now I've found out that may not be the case, and my copy is in storage. I've checked the official list of items prohibited for storage by my employer and pornography, propaganda, subversive material or items of great value are not permitted.  What should I do?

Worried of Little Britain"

Dear Worried,

I must unmask you, I'm afraid, and remind you that you told me you were running adult literacy centres for the Army in Cyprus. Surely your duty is clear: book it out of storage and use it as course - should that be coarse - material for our boys? The all-action boddice-ripping yarn packed with fighting will surely appeal to their puckish sense of fun?

C-H-M.

Ferris lashes back:

Julie-Ann's post about Captain Frank Shaw's extraordinary literary talent seems to have hit the Ferris mark.

"Well, 'stap me vitals', as I believe the stoker (was he called Corky?), 'the cavalier of the shovel', at one point exclaims in the Crickley cult book 'Captain Lash'.  Fancy Julie-Ann remembering this book after all these years.  [She's doing a bit more than remembering it - she's recording it for those who've been deprived of it thus far in their lives! Ed.] My copy and copies of some four or five other books by Captain Frank H. Shaw are in a box somewhere in the loft here in Selly Oak and haven't been looked at for some time.  The original copy of 'Captain Lash' came either from a charity shop in Cheltenham or, more likely, from Alan Hancox's marvellous and greatly-missed secondhand bookshop at the end of the Promenade. Who acquired it first, I cannot remember, but I know a number of us eventually had copies, as it was a regular fixture in charity shops in those days, along with books by Hall Caine, Rumer Godden and Storm Jameson. Am I right in thinking that Chris Phillpotts adapted 'Captain Lash' as a play that was performed at Ullenwood one year or is this a figment of my fevered imagination?"

Captain Lash! Julie-Ann brings the memories flooding back ...

Julie-Ann Morrison sends the following gem, which absolutely made my day:

"One of my abiding memories of Crickley is a load of us sitting in the dorm after drinking copious quantities of Weston's listening to that nice Mr Ferris reading us Captain Lash! I remember we were only allowed one chapter per night, and it was such a wonderful book that I went straight after that year's dig and found a copy in a second hand book shop and have treasured it ever since.

In fact I buy copies for other people. I am in the process of recording said book for a blog and will let you know when I get that sorted. I have since sourced other books by the same author - Captain Frank Shaw, including the amazing 'Gay Sea Road'. They were written between the wars and the language was obviously perfectly fine then, but now the opportunity for double entendre is positively delicious! I think the following excerpt may both remind those of us who were there, and give a flavour to those who were not fortunate enough to be amongst those read to......

'Say' said Lash 'Isn't there anyone here who can fight?' There was no one animate enough to reply. Cora, crouched under the wilted piano, sobbed hysterically and tried to abuse him, but his gentle touch on her face had played havoc with the best bridge work of a pacific dentist, and she could only gulp incoherencies.'

Ah, happy days!!!"

How on earth could I have let Captain Lash slip from my memory and my life? It's possibly the worst written book I've ever had the privilege to lay hands on and I have a broad grin on my face as I type this. I tried, a few times, reading passages out loud but was unable to contain the mirth or accompanying tears. I remember being absolutely in stitches listening to the Ferris rendition which was without equal in the county, or, doubtless, throughout the land.

I can't wait for Julie-Ann to post 'Captain Lash - the audio book'. I bet Ferris is still having a periodic chuckle over his copy. Where's my eBay password got to?

Update - I have a bid in at 99p - will anyone fight me for it? I also see that it's Amazon UK's 1,346,579th Best Seller at the time of posting ... I think there may be some competition in July for who gets to declaim the best passages ...