Weir’s Picnic at Hanging Rock is an adaptation of Joan Lindsay’s novel about how the Valentine’s Day picnic of the Appleyard College girls ended badly. Inexplicably, two girls and a teacher disappear—and are never found. Weir and his screenwriter...
Appleseed Rectory is the site of Amis’s relentlessly unpleasant picnic that defiantly upends expectations. * The picnic is Quentin’s idea of fun for his guests, a free-wheeling and animated by alcohol and drugs. He says to his wife Celia, “I thought...
In E Fontane’s tet, Effi and her lover Major von Crampas eat at a simple wooden table behind the dunes to avoid the Baltic’s gusty winds. A servant has set a cloth with slices of cold meat, rolls, and red wine (served in delicate glasses). Fassbinder’s picnics, of...
Goldin’s is a spoof at Mickey Mouse’s expense. “CZ and Max on the Beach, Truro, MA” is a staged picnic of CZ and Max on a picnic cloth next to Mickey Mouse’s picture on the cover of The New York Times Magazine. Goldin seems to be suggesting that such outings are...
Paddington at the Seaside begins: “Today,” said Mr. Brown at breakfast one bright, summer morning, “feels like the kind of day for taking a young bear to the seaside. Hands up to all those who agree.” So, the Browns pack up the motorcar and...
Brautigan’s “I’ll Affect you Slowly” from Loading Mercury with a Pitchfork is a bit of humor. It’s about a sly attempt at seduction that may or may not have been successful. I’ll affect you slowly as if you were having a picnic in a dream. There will be...
Fowles’s notion of wrecking pleasure is an aborted picnic on the River Cherwell. Daniel Martin and Jane Mallory, two Oxford undergraduates, set out for a pleasant outing. It’s intended as an innocent date because Daniel is dating Mallory’s sister...
Simon Boulderstone, a British lieutenant, serving during the North African campaign, is among the major characters of Manning’s The Battle Lost and Won. Cutting short a leave, Boulderstone wanders, trying to regain his unit and rejoin the fighting against Rommel at El...
Manhire’s “How to Take Your Clothes Off at a Picnic” (1977), Sheet Music: Poems 1967-1982 (1996) is a humorous riff on picnic adultery: It is hardly sensuous, but having Eaten all the cold meat and tomatoes You forget to remove your trousers And instead...
Grass’s picnic in The Flounder is among the worst. Not only does he mock the accepted idea of a picnic, but he turns it topsy-turvy. It’s an ugly episode in which Sybille, aka Billie, is a variation of the Greek oracle/prophetess Sybil. According to Grass’ version,...
