Trading Places - The People's Friend

My historical short story in this week's The People's Friend, Trading Places, is a slight deviation from my usual Victorian tales, though only by a few years. This one is set during the Regency era and has been inspired by the country dances that used to take place in the ballrooms. The idea came about when watching the 2020 version of Emma, starring Anya Taylor-Joy.

Fiona and Anna decide to switch places during harvest celebrations to see how different their lives are. While Fiona gets to grip with the rough tumble of a barn dance, with laughter, fiddle music and plenty of cider, Anna must make sure not to offend someone by breaking one of the many rules which constricted the Regency ballroom.

These high society parties helped form social connections and allowed unattached women to go on the hunt for a suitable match. Etiquette was highly important. Good manners are of course understandable: no leaving a dance halfway through  and swords weren't allowed in the ballroom (imagine having to avoid getting whacked by that while dancing!) Though some strange rules also involved: No snapping your fingers to the music, as that was seen as too common, not even clapping. Ladies could not dance together, but it did happen whenever the men were called away to fight, yet dancing with a man multiple times marked a woman as too familiar and tainted her reputation. Invitations would soon dry up...

A caller announced each dance. No dance could be called twice (so those who only had a dance or two perfected would be in trouble). The aim was to be graceful while closely following the bars of the music. Couples formed rows and performed complicated, well-timed figures with other pairs, known as long dances. Depending on how many pairs, these dances could take over half an hour!

Keeping up with the tempo of the music was the main objective. As there were multiple dancers, going too fast or slow could rudely wrongfoot others and lead to people dawdling about until it was their turn. Becoming too engrossed with your partner might end up ruining a carefully crafted dance.

One of the more popular dances was the Quadrille, which followed a square formation. The dance I'm partial to is the one called Kitty's Cottage. 

More about these dances can be found at: https://www.regencydances.org/

Meanwhile, at the barn dance, one person would be taking pride of place at the table: the corn dolly or corn mother. These dolls go back hundreds of years and have a pagan origin. 

It was believed a spirit lived in the wheat fields. When the wheat was cut, this spirit would lose its home just as the harvest mouse did. Forced to wander, the spirit would most likely never return and the field would become barren. To prevent this, with the final cut sheaf, a doll was made to house the spirit and be paraded around the village. Upon springtime, it would be ploughed into the field to release the spirit back into the soil. 

This style of straw craft was also used as gifts for sweethearts and called a countryman's favour. Other variations include Suffolk horseshoes, Norfolk lanterns and Cambridgeshire bells. I go into more depth about the dollies in my other short story, In Fields of Corn (The People's Friend October 8, 2016), when a young woman must make a perfect corn dolly just as all the women in her family have done each harvest. 

Even with the rise of Christianity, farming communities continued to create these vessels. The craft is still practised today and a how-to can be found at: https://www.edenproject.com/learn/for-everyone/how-to-make-a-corn-dolly