The Duke de Reichleau becomes The Duke de Richleau

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Charles
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The Duke de Reichleau becomes The Duke de Richleau

Post by Charles »

In an early post [ viewtopic.php?t=8 ] I mentioned my fascination with the way DW changed the Duke’s name - in The Forbidden Territory he called him "The Duke de Reichleau", but by the time The Devil Rides Out was published just under two years later, he had changed the name to the more familiar "The Duke de Richleau".

Equally curious to me was the fact that Hutchinsons never sought to change the spelling of the Duke’s name in later editions of The Forbidden Territory – they stuck resolutely to ‘de Reichleau’. In the 1939 edition of Those Modern Musketeers for example, three of the stories feature The Duke de Richleau but The Forbidden Territory steadfastly sticks to calling its hero The Duke de Reichleau.

Even down to the Arrow editions, the same thing happens. The 1970 edition proclaims above the picture of the abacus on the front cover that it is ‘A Duke de Richleau story’, but go inside and the first line of the first chapter still begins "The Duke de Reichleau ...".

Typesetting may have been more laborious back in the 1930s, but I still find it curious. Didn’t they notice ????

Now for the main point of this post – something I should have spotted but didn’t - instead it was spotted by an eagle eyed colleague in my office when I was in transit with some rare Wheatley material and showed him a copy of ‘Crossing the Forbidden Territory’ - there is a typo in the original order form for The Forbidden Territory !

Look at the booklet ... there are some photos of it in the Humphreys Collection on page

http://www.denniswheatley.info/sams_boo ... erial1.htm

In the second illustration, you can see (just) that the third question begins "Write down the ... answers which the Duke de Reichleau gave Simon in Moscow to the following questions ...". DW must surely have written the game booklet himself, and his spelling is consistent – he uses the ‘early’ version.

Now look at the order form that is bound in with the booklet. You can see a clearer copy at

http://www.denniswheatley.info/Hutchins ... terial.htm

Line 5 of the order form clearly contains the words "in the epicurean Duke de Richleau".

The book is only just being published, and the name of its hero has already changed.

It is pure speculation of course, but I now wonder if the spelling we are all so fond of was brought about by a simple printing error when Hutchinsons printed the order form ... you would hardly mis-spell the hero's name on an order form deliberately .... maybe DW saw it, and after the initial annoyance wore off liked it, perhaps because it was more French sounding than Germanic, and decided to modify his hero's name.

Anyway, the typo is there, a typo surely it must be, and DW must have got the idea from somewhere.

As I say, it’s a theory.

Enough of my ramblings !

Best as always !
Charles
Steve Whatley
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Post by Steve Whatley »

Charles, it's strange that you should raise this, as I was re-reading the earlier posts only the other day, although that was to compare the spelling with that used in connection with the Matchbox Hispano Suiza referred to in the marketing amd merchandise topic.

Once again your eye for detail is in finest Rothwellian tradition, and the theory seems quite plausible.

Whatever the truth, I think (from speaking to fellow enthusiasts) we've all come to use a pronuncation something like 'de Rishlow' (which is putting it crudely I know, but hopefully gets the point across); had the 'Germanic' spelling been retained, we would have to pronounce (and therefore think, when reading the books) the name somewhat differently, and I don't think it would seem appropriate at all.

So 'hurrah' for the typo, or for DW's inconsistency, or wisdom, or whatever it was...[font=Courier New] [/font]
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Post by Jim »

I'm curious, though, why the inconsistency was never corrected, by DW or the Hutchinson editors, in any of the editions that followed over the years. I have the signed edition that was the first Lymington volume, and it's still 'wrong" there (while it's correct on the dust jacket). Yet this series was newly typeset, some volumes more than once! It would be interesting to see how the name is spelled in the original manuscript of Three Inquisitive People...anyone happen to have that lying about?
Charles
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Post by Charles »

Jim - I completely agree; it would be absolutely fascinating to see how DW wrote it in TIP. My suspicion is we would find 'De Reichleau'.

Like you, I find it strange they didn't correct the spelling when they re-set the type. Is it possible (surely not) they forgot the spelling was different ???

Steve - I agree - the 'French' version is a great improvement !

Best as ever !
Charles
Charles
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Post by Charles »

I was wondering how long it would take for someone to notice something curious in the latest 'Room' I've put live in 'The Museum' ...

... and the answer is not long, and that the prize for the sharpest eyes goes to our good friend across the Atlantic, Jim Devlin !

If you look closely at the first page of the manuscript of The Forbidden Territory on page http://www.denniswheatley.info/museum/r ... =6&exhib=6

you will see that 'de Richleau' is spelt 'de Richleau' ...

The mists are clearing ....

Best wishes as always !
Charles
Garry Holmes
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Post by Garry Holmes »

Which suggests that the 'Reichleau' spelling was the fault of the original Hutchinson editor. Given the speed at which the book was reprinted, there was obviously no time for the mistake to be corrected. You know, it's entirely possible that neither Wheatley or the Hutchinson team ever noticed the difference in spelling between this and the rest of the novels. Fascinating!
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Post by Jim »

All this marvelous speculation reduced to a mere typesetter's error?

How disappointing... :(
Alan
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Post by Alan »

Well, I'm sticking to the fact he changed it because he later wanted a particular numerological value for the name in "The Devil Rides Out"...
Jim
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Post by Jim »

If you look at the newest addition to The Museum, you will see that DW has plainly written “de Reichleauâ€￾ in the manuscript of The Devil Rides Out, but the Daily Mail has “De Richleauâ€￾ in the serial version!
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Post by Jim »

And the confusion continues!

I recently got a newer copy of Curtain of Fear, complete with dust jacket, to replace my older, worn copy. There's a blurb in the beginning of this 1953 book (duplicated on the dust jacket) which says, in part:

Unlike those old favourites the Duke de Reichleau and Gregory Sallust--of whose doings Mr. Wheatley hopes to produce further chronicles in due course--its hero is no born adventurer.

It's also interesting to note that Black August and Contraband are not listed with the Gregory Sallust war thrillers in the list of DW's novels. (The other two Sallust books had not yet been published.) I'd never noticed this before, but checking other volumes I see this was the standard listing--as if acknowledging that there were two chronologies at work in that series...which actually makes sense.
Garry Holmes
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Post by Garry Holmes »

Well, I can understand BLACK AUGUST being a separate continuity, but surely CONTRABAND is, in effect, the first Sallust book (with the last one being WHITE WITCH OF THE SOUTH SEAS rather than BLACK AUGUST). Mind you, I have seen DEVIL RIDES OUT and STRANGE CONFLICT listed in the Black Magic section rather than the De Richleau/Reichleau section.

As an aside, do you think that we could agree on some sort of shorthand version of the book titles, as Sherlock Holmes fans do? It would save a lot of typing!
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Post by ericmocata »

This is slightly off-topic, but related to the comments about the grouping of various titles, such as including some of the De Richleau novels under the black magic heading. It has always bugged me that The Ka of Gifford Hillary is always included in that group since it is not a black magic story. It has been a good while since I read it, but I remember there being not even one brief scene that featured any black magic. There is some occultism, but that's not quite the same thing. I guess they just liked to generalize.

As for not making the change of spelling in later editions, I would guess Wheatley didn't see any reason to change it. I think he was always more concerned with whatever book he was working on at the time. And if he wasn't concerned about it, I doubt Hutchinson would be either. Either that or he might have viewed either spelling as valid, but preferred De Richleau.
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Post by Jim »

ericmocata wrote:This is slightly off-topic, but related to the comments about the grouping of various titles, such as including some of the De Richleau novels under the black magic heading. It has always bugged me that The Ka of Gifford Hillary is always included in that group since it is not a black magic story. There is some occultism, but that's not quite the same thing. I guess they just liked to generalize.
Yes, it's a shorthand way of identifying those books for readers. (The Irish Witch is an historical novel no matter what other trappings it's dressed in.) At least in DW's Wikipedia entry, "Black Magic" is used accurately, and the Occult stories are listed that way.
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Post by ericmocata »

You're absolutely correct about The Irish Witch. The black magic element in that book is a mere subplot. I wonder if he just added it just to have another occult book. They Used Dark Forces is the other that bugs me a bit in that regard. I enjoyed it, but with the exception of one scene, there is no black magic in that one either (and even that scene is a bit debatable). It's all dealing with astrology, which is occultism, sure, but not black magic. I would say there is just as much black magic in Rape of Venice, but that one has never been called a black magic story, to my knowledge. I don't suppose it matters these days. Maybe I am just nitpicking. It doesn't matter, anyhow, because I haven't disliked any of his books that I have read so far, though some are obviously better than others.

That's enough of my topic derailing.
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Post by Garry Holmes »

ericmocata wrote: They Used Dark Forces is the other that bugs me a bit in that regard. I enjoyed it, but with the exception of one scene, there is no black magic in that one either (and even that scene is a bit debatable). It's all dealing with astrology, which is occultism, sure, but not black magic. I would say there is just as much black magic in Rape of Venice, but that one has never been called a black magic story, to my knowledge.

That's enough of my topic derailing.
But not mine!

TUDF is a book that I have in hardback, and the slip-cover asks something like 'Did the Nazi's use Black Magic?' Well, not according to this book. The 'They' of the title is, of course, Gregory and Malacou. I love the book, but the advertising does rather suggest that it's going to be about high-ranking Nazis worshipping Satan. It's something of a con. We know that the publishers changed Wheatley's titles a few times. Was the ambivalent title their idea, designed to cash in on renewed interest in the War, as well as a taste for horror which was being fed by Hammer films at the time?
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