Ronald Firbank - Sorrow in Sunlight
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Arthur Annesley Ronald Firbank (1886-1926) was a British novelist. He published his first book, Odette dAntrevernes, in 1905 before going up to Cambridge. He converted to Catholicism in 1907. In 1909 he left Cambridge, without completing a degree. Living off his inheritance he travelled around Spain, Italy, the Middle East, and North Africa. His novel Valmouth (1918) is based on the activities of various people in a health resort on the West Coast of England. A musical comedy by Sandy Wilson gave the novel some popularity in the 1960s. It has several times been revived and recorded on CD. In The Flower Beneath the Foot (1923), the setting is an imaginary country which may be assumed to be somewhere in the Balkans. Sorrow in Sunlight, retitled at the suggestion of the publisher Prancing Nigger (1925) was especially successful in America. His other works include: The Princess Zoubaroff (1920), The Flower Beneath the Foot (1923), Concerning the Eccentricities of Cardinal Pirelli (1926) and The New Rythum, begun 1926; fragments published posthumously.
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Ronald Firbank
Sorrow in Sunlight
(1925)
[Alternatively entitled Prancing Nigger]
Table of Contents
I
Looking gloriously bored, Miss Miami Mouth gaped up into the boughs of a giant silk-cotton tree. In the lethargic noontide nothing stirred: all was so still, indeed, that the sound of someone snoring was clearly audible among the cane-fields far away.
After dose yams an pods an de white falernum, I dats way sleepy too, she murmured, fixing heavy somnolent eyes upon the prospect that lay before her.
Through the sun-tinged greenery shone the sea, like a floor of silver glass strewn with white sails.
Somewhere out there, fishing, must be her boy, Bamboo!
And, inconsequently, her thoughts wandered from the numerous shark-casualties of late to the mundane proclivities of her mother; for to quit the little village of Mediavilla for the capital was that dames fixed obsession.
Leave Mediavilla, leave Bamboo! The young negress fetched a sigh.
In what, she reflected, way would the family gain by entering society, and how did one enter it, at all? There would be a gathering, doubtless, of the elect (probably armed), since the best society is exclusive, and difficult to enter. And then? Did one burrow? Or charge? She had sometimes heard it said that people pushed and closing her eyes, Miss Miami Mouth sought to picture her parents, assisted by her small sister, Edna, and her brother, Charlie, forcing their way, perspiring, but triumphant, into the highest social circles of the city of Cuna-Cuna.
Across the dark savannah country the city lay, one of the chief alluring cities of the world: The Celestial city of Cuna-Cuna, Cuna, city of Mimosa, Cuna, city of Arches, Queen of the Tropics, Paradisealmost invariably travellers referred to it like that.
Oh, everything must be fantastic there, where even the very pickneys put on clothes! And Miss Miami Mouth glanced fondly down at her own plump little person, nude, but for a girdle of creepers that she would gather freshly twice a day.
It would be a shame, sho, to cover it, she murmured drowsily, caressing her body, and moved to a sudden spasm of laughter, she tittered: No! really. De ideah!
II
Silver bean-stalks, silver bean-stalks, oh h, oh h, down the long village street, from door to door, the cry repeatedly came, until the vendors voice was lost on the evening air.
In a rocking chair, before the threshold of a palm thatched cabin, a matron with broad, bland features, and a big, untidy figure, surveyed the scene with a nonchalant eye.
Beneath some tall trees, bearing flowers like flaming bells, a few staid villagers sat enjoying the rosy dusk, while, strolling towards the sea, two young men passed by with fingers intermingled.
With a slight shrug, the lady plied her fan.
As the Mother of a pair of oncoming girls, the number of ineligible young men, or confirmed bachelors around the neighbourhood was a constant source of irritation to her.
Sho, dis remoteness bore an weary me to death, she exclaimed, addressing someone through the window behind; and receiving no audible answer, she presently rose, and went within.
It was the hour when, fortified by a siesta, Mrs. Ahmadou Mouth was wont to approach her husband on general household affairs, and to discuss, in particular, the question of their removal to the town; for, with the celebration of their Pearl-wedding, close at hand, the opportunity to make the announcement of a change of residence to their guests, ought not, she believed, to be missed.
We leave Mediavilla for de education ob my daughters, she would say; or, perhaps: We go to Cuna-Cuna, for de finishing ob mes filles!
But, unfortunately, the reluctance of Mr. Mouth to forsake his Home seemed to increase from day to day.
She found him asleep, bolt upright, his head gently nodding, beneath a straw-hat beautifully browned.
Say, nigger, lub, she murmured, brushing her hand featheringly along his knee, say, nigger, lub, I gotta go!
It was the tender prelude to the storm.
Evasive (and but half-awake), he warned her. Let me alone; Ahm thinkin.
Prancing Nigger, now come on!
Ahm thinkin.
Tell me what for dis procrastination? Exasperated, she gripped his arm.
But for all reply, Mr. Mouth drew a volume of revival hymns towards him, and turned on his wife his back.
You ought to sae o you-self, sho, sh caustically commented, crossing to the window.
The wafted odours of the cotton trees without oppressed the air. In the deepening twilight, the rising moonmist, already obscured the street.
Dis placee not healthy. Dat damp! Should my daughters go off into a decline she apprehensively murmured, as her husband started softly to sing.
For ebber wid de Lord!
Amen; so let it be
Life from de dead is in dat word
Tis immortality.
If its de meting-house dats de obstruction, dair are odders, too, in Cuna-Cuna, she observed.
How often hab I bid you nebba to mention dat modern Sodom in de hearing ob my presence!
De Debil frequent de village, fo dat matter, besides de town.
Sho nuff.
But yestiddy, dat po silly negress Ottalie was seduced again in a Mango track; an dats de third time!
Heah in de body pent,
Absent from Him I roam
Yet nightly pitch my movin tent
A days march nearer home.
Prancing Nigger, from dis indifference to your fambly, be careful lest you do arouse the vials ob de Lords wrath!
Yet nightly pitch he was beginning again, in a more subdued key, but the tones of his wife arrested him.
Prancing Nigger, lemme say sumptin more! Mrs. Mouth took a long sighing breath: In dis dark jungle my lil jewel Edna, I feah, will wilt away
Wha gib you cause to speak like dat?
I was tellin my fortune lately wid de cards, she reticently made reply, insinuating, by her half-turned eyes, that more disclosures of an ominous nature concerning others besides her daughter had been revealed to her as well.
Lordey Lord; what is it den you want?
I want a Villa with a watercloset flinging wiles to the winds, it was a cry from the heart.
De Lord hab pity on dese vanities an innovations!
In town, you must rememba, often de houses are far away from de parks;de city, in dat respect, not like heah.
Say nothin more! De widow ob my po brudder Willie, across de glen, she warn me I ought nebba to listen to you.
Who care for a common woman, dat only read de Negro World, an nebba see anyting else! she swelled.
Mr. Mouth turned conciliatingly.
To-morrow me arrange for de victuals for our ebenin at Home!
Good, bery fine, she murmured, acknowledging through the window the cordial good-night of a few late labourers, returning from the fields, each with a bundle of sugar-cane poised upon the head.
As soon as marnin dawn me take dis bizniz in hand.
Only pramas, nigger darlin, she cajoled, dat durin de course ob de reception, you make a lil speech to inform de neighbours ob our gwine away bery soon, for de sake of de education ob our girls.
Ah shan pramas nothing.
I could do wid a change too, honey, after my last miscarriage.
Change come wid our dissolution, he assured her, quite soon enuff!
Bah, she murmured, rubbing her cheek to his: we set out on our journey sho in de season ob Novemba.
To which with asperity he replied: Not for two Revolutions! and rising brusquely, strode solemnly from the room.
Hey-ho-day, she yawned, starting a wheezy gramophone, and sinking down upon his empty chair; and she was lost in ball-room fancies (whirling in the arms of some blonde young foreigner) when she caught sight of her daughters reflection in the glass.
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