Hyacinth: a note on sources

Hyacinth is built from a patchwork of references and influences. When it was originally published as an online serial the references were included in each chapter. I’ll try to detail them all here. 

• Keeping Up Appearances (1990-1995), TV series written by Roy Clarke.

• Especially Heinous: 272 Views of Law & Order SVU (2013), novella by Carmen Maria Machado. The format was an inspiration for Hyacinth. The bell motif around Mr White is a reference to this work.

• Young Hyacinth (2015), One-off TV special written by Roy Clarke (page 13, 31 et al.).

• Equus (1973), play written by Peter Schaffer (page 19, 27 et al.).

• The Blue Boy (c.1770), painting by Thomas Gainsborough (page 37).

• Thomas Gainsborough (1903) by Lord Ronald Sutherland Gower. Gower cites a lecture by Sir Joshua Reynolds, President of the Royal Academy, saying that painters should never use too much blue in the foreground if they want to create a work that is ‘splendid and harmonious’.

• A Garden For All Seasons (1991), book published by Reader’s Digest (page 57).

• Mind Your Manors (1997), an unproduced spinoff TV series written by Roy Clarke which would have put seen Onslow, Daisy and Rose inherit a mansion (page 61).

• Blue Boy (1974-2007), a gay softcore (later hardcore) magazine (page 71, second printing onwards).

• The Story of the Vivian Girls (date unknown), novel by Henry Darger (page 71).

• The Garden (1991), installation by Paul McCarthy (page 73).

• The Talmud (c. 200 CE), text of Rabbinic Judaism — the Guf, the Treasury of Souls and Lailah the angel of conception and pregnancy come from here (page 101).

• Frankenstein (1818), novel by Mary Shelley (page 107).