History Literature / ColdComfortFarm

* ThePigpen: Rennet, the "one who looks like she jumped in a well." Often because she ''has''.

* CrustyCaretaker

-->'Curtains?' she asked, vacantly lifting her magnificent head. 'Child, child, it is many years since such trifles broke across the web of my solitude.'

* HeartwarmingOrphan: Averted. Recently-orphaned Flora may bring happiness into the lives of the Starkadders, but not through any sweetness of temper. "On the whole I dislike my fellow-beings,' she says. "I find them so difficult to understand. But I have a tidy mind, and untidy lives irritate me."

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Reuben, who's extremely suspicious of and hostile towards Flora until he's persuaded that she's not interested in taking over the running of the farm - whereupon he becomes friendly and helpful. [[spoiler: He even proposes marriage to her and is fine with her turning him down, since he's not really in love with her, just fond of her.]]

* PurpleProse: Parodied. Occasionally, the novel features absurdly verbose, turgid descriptions of "golden orbs" and "engorged hills", which are [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] by having ''star-ratings'' in the margins according to how purple the prose gets. In the film, Miss Poste is responsible for writing them (using pastoral novels as a guide).

* StatusQuoIsGod: Complete with mantra: "There have always been Starkadders at Cold Comfort farm."
** Flora kicks this to the curb however, persuading pretty much all but one of the Starkadders to pursue more fulfilling lives elsewhere.
* TallDarkAndHandsome: Parodied with Seth, who knows he's this but who isn't interested in having the local girls swoon over him. [[spoiler: It's because he's a secret [[TheMovieBuff movie buff]] whose dream is to be a Hollywood film star. Flora makes it happen.]]

* SheCleansUpNicely: Elfine.

* And presiding over the lot, the matriarch Aunt Ada Doom, who never leaves her bedroom, who threatens to go mad if any of her family should leave the farm, and who once 'saw something nasty in the woodshed.'

* AbhorrentAdmirer: Mr. Mybug to Flora. She is not taken with his opinions on sexuality or attempts to "prove" that the Brontes' novels were written by their brother.

* AdaptationalPersonalityChange: Flora, a bit. In the novel she can come off as a snobbish, shallow girl out to mooch off her relatives rather than support herself, and she seems to regard the Starkadders as if they were a science experiment. In the film she starts out a bit like this, but by the end she's genuinely invested in the Starkadders' happiness as people, not as a project.

-->'''Judith:''' Cur. Coward! Liar! Libertine! Who were you with last night? Moll at the mill or Violet at the vicarage? Or Ivy, perhaps, at the ironmongery? Seth--my son... do you want to break my heart?
-->'''Seth:''' Yes.

* CoolBigSis: Mrs. Smiling to Flora. Sort of. Flora to Elfine.

** "THERE-WILL-BE-NO-BUTTER-IN-HELL!"

* {{Hunk}}: Seth.

* KissingCousins: Flora and Charles Fairford.

* NoodleIncident: The "something nasty in the woodshed", and the mysterious wrong done to Flora's father (the most we learn is that a [[spoiler: goat]] was involved somehow), and what her "rights" are.
** Flora accuses Aunt Ada of more or less making up the woodshed story as leverage over her family.

* PrettyInMink: Elfine has a short fur cape. [[spoiler:Aunt Doom wears a fur trimmed coat, in the style of Queen Mary, when she goes on a trip.]]

* And presiding over the lot, the matriarch Aunt Doom, who never leaves her bedroom, who threatens to go mad if any of her family should leave the farm, and who once 'saw something nasty in the woodshed.'

* AngstWhatAngst: Flora doesn't mourn her parents much, [[JustifiedTrope because they spent most of the time traveling and she barely knew them]].

* SpiritedYoungLady: Flora is a fine example.

A [[TheFilmOfTheBook film adaptation]] was released in 1995, directed by John Schlesinger, with a script by Sir Malcolm Bradbury, and starring Creator/KateBeckinsale as Flora, with Creator/JoannaLumley, Eileen Atkins, Rufus Sewell, and Creator/IanMcKellen also heading the cast.

A [[TheFilmOfTheBook film adaptation]] was released in 1995, directed by John Schlesinger and starring Creator/KateBeckinsale, Creator/JoannaLumley, Eileen Atkins, Rufus Sewell, and Creator/IanMcKellen.

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!!Tropes include:

There is a 1995 film directed by John Schlesinger, with a script by Sir Malcolm Bradbury, starring Kate Beckinsale as Flora

Tropes include:

A comic novel by Stella Gibbons, first published in 1932, which parodies the doom-laden rural novels of the time. The immediate inspiration for, and targets of, Gibbons's satire were the novels of Mary Webb and Sheila Kaye-Smith (which deserve it... try one), but she also pokes fun at more redoubtable figures such as D.H. Lawrence, Thomas Hardy and the Brontës. At the same time she has a good laugh at Vogue-reading London socialites, while mocking the genre in which a young orphan girl brings joy and happiness to the lives of all around her. Jane Austen is the novel's presiding spirit, and ''Mansfield Park'' provides the epigraph: 'Let other pens dwell on guilt and misery.'

''"We are not like other folk, maybe, but there have always been Starkadders at Cold Comfort..."''

They include:

** Seth initially makes a move toward Flora, although the implication seems to be that Seth will pursuit ''any'' woman, cousin or not.

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* GenreSavvy: Flora.

* RuleOfCool: The film contains an inspiring maxim from Jane Austen, "What a pleasant life might be had in this world by a handsome, sensible old lady of good fortune, blessed with a sound constitution and a firm will," which in fact is a complete fabrication. The quotation was made up by Malcolm Bradbury.

** In the film, ThePigpen Rennet is washed in a cattle-trough as part of the spring-cleaning, and subsequently catches the lovelorn eye of the farm's new master.

* HeartwarmingOrphan: Averted. Flora may bring happiness into the lives of the Starkadders, but not through any sweetness of temper. "On the whole I dislike my fellow-beings,' she says. "I find them so difficult to understand. But I have a tidy mind, and untidy lives irritate me."