Belgravia by Julian Fellowes

by James Wallace Harris, Thursday, April 30, 2020

Anyone who loved Downton Abbey should also love the new miniseries Belgravia. Episodes are now appearing weekly on Epix. In the U.S. only three of the six episodes have been shown. However, after the second episode I was so anxious to know more I bought the audiobook of the novel Belgravia by Julian Fellowes and listened to it. I’m glad I did. The novel is beautifully written, feeling equal to reading Austen or Dickens. The first TV episodes follow the novel so closely that I imagine the rest will follow just as closely. I feel like I’ve watched the entire series with my ears, and now I will see it with my eyes.

The plot is deliciously tangled by those Victorian manners and customs I’ve previously encountered by reading 19th-century novels, but with a bit more grit, a good deal more sex, and from a darker perspective. The story follows two families sharing one tragedy, revealing class conflicts between those with aristocratic old wealth and social-climbing tradesmen with new money. Both primogeniture and men and women in service play an integral role in Belgravia. I’ve seldom encountered such a well-crafted plot — addictively complicated but not overly too much.

There’s one mystery that still intrigues me. Why does the original novel follow the miniseries so closely? It was published in 2016, years before the show. Did Julian Fellowes write the novel with a screenwriter’s skill? Did he work out the screenplay first and then wrote the novel?

I often get the feeling when reading some modern novels that their authors visualized them as movies in their heads. I don’t know if this is a good trend. I expect novels to offer content that could never be filmed. Novels are their own art form, not screenplays. And there are a few novelistic features in Belgravia the book. Even though the story moves as fast as a blockbuster movie, the third-person narrator does offer some backstory tidbits that’s not in the series. It also reveals some of the inner thoughts going on in the characters’ heads. I watched the first two episodes before reading the book, and I felt Tamsin Greig had already expressed those thoughts in her performance of Anne Trenchard, my favorite character.

I’m surprised Belgravia the miniseries didn’t appear on PBS Masterpiece, but then, it did get me to subscribe to Epix. I figure at $5.99 a month it will cost me at most $11.98 to watch the entire series — unless I get hooked on another Epix series. I already binge-watched a previous series, The War of the Worlds during a free 30-day free trial. If Epix can keep them coming I’ll keep letting them have $5.99 each month.

JWH