The Suspect by Claude Amery

Thanks to The National Gallery of Art

Title: The Suspect 

Author: Claude Amery

Publisher: not known 

Source book: Thrones, Dominions by Dorothy L Sayers & Jill Paton Walsh ( Lord Peter Wimsey follow on series #1)

Claude Amery begins his career with a well received volume of poetry; The Forked Plague (about fat bald men making love in brothels - in a very complicated verse form with inner rhymes.) He then writes The Suspect, a play which attracts the attention of Rosamund Harwell; a very beautiful woman with stunning red hair who is flattered by Amery’s passionate attentions. Rosamund’s husband is a theatrical angel (he invests money in plays), and is persuaded to back The Suspect.

I’m not going to tell you why The Suspect is eventually produced by quite a different management, but it is a great success and Amery has a long career as a playwright.

Also mentioned in Thrones, Dominions are several other plays: Distinguished Gathering, The Brazen Serpent, and Dance until Dawn (probably not the 2014 book about vampires) in which Miss Gloria Tallant was due to star… until she disappeared, but we are not given an author for them. And Gee Up, Edward by Mr Clandon. Unfortunately due to the death of George V and the succession of Edward VIII this play, which was days away from opening, has to be put on hold. Remember, this is the 1930s. 

And Lord Peter Whimsy’s nephew Jerry is discovered outside Hatchards (a famous London bookshop) where he has just bought a copy of Modern Aircraft, A Manual for Trainee Pilots. Jerry goes on to join the RAF so I can see he would find this a useful book. I just can’t quite believe that Hatchards would stock it.

Thanks to The Smithsonian American Art Museum