Lardy ladies in literature #1: Mrs Caroline Mortimer

Bit of a random one here for $4+ patrons!

Call it chance or chubby chaser’s intuition, but while watching the BBC’s recent adaptation of The Long Song - a novel set in the Jamaican slave uprising in 1832 - I got a sense that Caroline Mortimer, the jealous, spoilt mistress of the plantation, was supposed to be fat.

I say "supposed to be fat" because in the TV series Caroline is played by the superb but distinctly slender Hayley Atwell. Yet as I was watching it, something convinced me that book Caroline would be fat. Her mannerisms, her behaviour... it just seemed to fit. Even some of the scenes would have worked better (and certainly been more amusing) had the luckless Mrs Mortimer, known as "the missus" by the slaves, been overweight. 

I decided to get the book. The Amazon preview suggested that the author had a vivid and amusing tone, and would be worth reading even if Caroline turned out not to be fat.

In the end, I wasn’t disappointed on either count.

Twenty three at the start of the novel, Mrs Caroline Mortimer is first described as a lady of bouncing blonde curls, accustomed to “the dappled shade of an apple tree by the edge of an English lawn, where the hottest part of the day brought small beads of fragrant sweat to trespass upon her forehead." 

Having recently arrived in Caribbean, she “struggles to hold a parasol with which to protect her delicate English skin.” An early indication, perhaps, that our lady's muscles are somewhat underused. Her appetite, however, appears far more robust. We learn that Caroline has already developed a fondness for the island’s fruits and sugary preserves. Her brother, who owns the plantation, describes “watching pomegranate, paw-paw-naseberry, and sour sop being pushed into her eager mouth by her stout sticky fingers for most hours of the day.”

Stout sticky fingers... Eating most hours of the day... Promising stuff! And any worry that only healthy fare would be pushed between Caroline’s eager lips is dispelled in the next paragraph. 

"She wanted to try everything. Oh yes, everything… Bring on the duck, guinea birds and jack fish, for Mrs Caroline Mortimer was eager to nibble upon their bones.” 

That last line had me leaning forward. I could picture those aforementioned stout sticky fingers twisting a leg of duck or guinea fowl around as Caroline made approving grunts and nibbled greedily. And “nibbled”. I liked that. It suggests a dainty, almost covetous sort of gluttony; the kind one often finds amongst wealthy women.

By now the evidence was building that Caroline Mortimer was at least plump; and her plumpness was sure to be described in similarly vivid and imaginative terms. Of course, the author doesn’t (as far as we know) have a shameless fetish for chubby chicks, so I didn't expect more than a few passing references. How wrong I was. 

"[The slaves'] eyes, which Caroline thought appeared like shining marbles rolling in soot, commenced to peruse her slowly, from the bottom of her brown leather boots to the top of her fleshy blonde head. Then opening her arms wide, the tall gangly one said, ‘Come, see how broad she is!’"

But how fleshy, and how broad? Broad relative to an underfed slave? All is revealed a few pages later, when Caroline asks her brother if she might ride with him around the grounds.

“ ‘The terrain is too dangerous, and, besides, I have no horse that could possibly take your…’ he said, prudently losing into a mumble the words which referred to Caroline’s robust dimensions.”

What I like about this is that her brother's horses couldn't *possibly* take her weight. Caroline's not just too fat for all John's horses, she's obviously too fat them. The story then jumps on 6 or so years, and we find... 

“Caroline Mortimer... reclining upon her daybed, too limp from the midday heat to raise her hand to ring the bell. ‘Marguerite,’ she screeched once more, before collapsing with the effort that such bellowing demanded.”

If calling for her slave exhausts our lazy lady, it seems unlikely that the intervening years have shaved any size off her. Sure enough, this is confirmed in the next paragraph.

“The missus’s favoured punishment was to strike July sharply upon the top of the head with her shoe. Although hopping and hobbling, the missus could chase July around a room for several minutes to deliver her blow. At these times July would jump, weave and spin to avoid her. For she knew that soon the tropical heat would so exhaust that demented fatty-batty missus that she would fall upon her daybed in a faint of lifelessness. But her missus was a tricky one. Any time she might creep up upon July to deliver that blow. For a punishment left unbestowed brooded within her missus like the memory of a delicious dinner left uneaten.”

I’m not sure which I love more. The  image of Caroline's “fatty batty” wobbling as she thumps about the room with raised slipper before collapsing panting into her cushions, or the uneaten dinner metaphor. It's one of those particularly apt metaphors that feels like it's probably literally true too - though further descriptions cast doubt on the idea that Caroline Mortimer misses many meals!

“All at once her missus’s face began to span the room as she leaned in close… and her puffing cheeks were red as Scotch Bonnet pepper as July cried out for her mama once more....

“...And who but July knew how to tip a near hogshead of sugar into her missus’ morning coffee? For anything less would see her grimace with the pain of a child flayed or squeal that it was too sour… And that she required salt fish, yam and cured pork at her breakfast table… And that her back needed to be rubbed after she had drank her Epsom salts so as to release, into a belch or fart, the wind that so plagued her. Who but July could her missus call upon to pull her from the cane-bottom dining chair when, once more, it split under her ample strain?”

There’s plenty more, mostly involving July and the other slaves referring to the size of "the missus' fat batty". And when the story jumps on another six or seven years, it appears to have grown even fatter.

“Robert Godwin clasped at his arm-the one where the jacket sleeve was ripped-and staggered as he took a further step. The missus squealed like a poked pig - as if it were she that felt some pain - and pitched her fat white batty across the room to stead him. July had never seen it move so fast, nor wobble so wide.”

Those, I think, are the highlights. For me it seems a bit of a  shame that such an obviously fat woman - a woman too fat for a horse, a woman beneath whom dining chairs break - wasn't played by a fat woman in the TV series. Caroline's weight and gluttonous ways were a product and reflection of of her character. They make her more believable (even if the reference to her repeatedly breaking chairs feels a touch OTT).

At any rate, I couldn't help wondering what Caroline might have looked like if she'd been fat. So here's a pic I made of her with July (aka Marguerite), inspired by one of the passages mentioned above. I've attached some alternative versions and a different angle version too.

I hope you like them. And if you have any other fat women in literature that you think I should illustrate or comment on, please let me know!