tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52575292927375102422024-03-05T04:15:20.340-06:00Deus ex LibrisIn Which Our Hero Embarks On a Quest to Read the Best One Hundred Novels of All TimeClaire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.comBlogger447125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-53883189873581009512012-04-25T16:32:00.000-05:002012-04-26T07:38:25.552-05:00And that's the way it is.I'm not updating this blog anymore, for the moment, though you never know when I'll appear again to regale you with the woes of Hemingway. That said, if you've come, enjoy the archives - literature is timeless, they say, and therefore, my commentary on it must have absorbed at least a little of its gravitas. I made it to number 30 on the list.<br />
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I'll leave you, also, with links to these.<br />
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<a href="http://deusexlibrisproject.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20French%20Lieutenant%27s%20Woman">My favorite book.</a><br />
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<a href="http://deusexlibrisproject.blogspot.com/2010/08/why-dont-you-write-books-people-can.html">My least favorite book.</a>Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-60017022230094792892011-10-06T10:17:00.003-05:002011-10-06T10:31:00.027-05:00No war novel is an island.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">For Whom the Bell Tolls</span><br />Pages read: 312 - 497 (end)<br /><br />I read a lot, as you can see. That's because I read very, very fast. Because when nothing happens at all, it's easy to keep up with the plot points. (And I'm sick to death of this book.)<br /><br />A bunch of fascist soldiers attack one of the other nearby guerrilla groups, and Augustin and Robert just have to stand by and listen, because to help would mean they wouldn't be able to complete their mission. However, this means that the enemy is more than prepared for the attack that Robert's group is supposed to be supporting with the demolition of the bridge. Robert, therefore, sends a message to the general in charge of the operation to say that it should be called off. That message makes it through, but not until moments before the attack, by which time it's already too late. (Oh, the futility of war! Alas! Alack!)<br /><br />Meanwhile, Pablo betrays our friendly guerrillas by making off in the middle of the night with half the explosives and all the detonators. But it's <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">ok</span>, because he comes back in the morning, all contrite, with grenades, having changed his mind. So, they go out on their big operation, successfully blow up the bridge, and return. Half of them get killed, but there you go. They're attempting to make their escape, with Pablo's help, when Robert gets thrown off his horse and breaks his leg. It's a bad enough injury that there's no way he can make it out, so they leave him, with Maria weeping and protesting. He marshals his strength enough to stay alive and kill the next fascist that comes along, and, on the last page, we see him lying in wait for that solider, ready to kill him with his last dying breath.<br /><br />So, my mother summed it up pretty well in yesterday's comment, "The bell is tolling for all of these characters every time they witness or participate in an act that diminishes mankind." War is terrible and futile and pointless, and half the time it's all a mistake. The young and brave waste their lives by throwing them at foolish goals determined by the old and cowardly, and no one cares. Love is extinguished by the brutality of violence, and for no good reason. Robert is completely dehumanized because of the fact that, even in the moment of his own death, he plans to kill someone else. Hooray.<br /><br />I maintain that once you've read one book about war, you've read them all. This was too long and I didn't care for the style in the least. Does that make it not a good war novel? No, not really, but I'm also not sure it's a seminal work. If I hadn't already read books about war, I might feel differently, but I have, so I don't. I think the first novel I read of this nature, though, was <span style="font-style: italic;">All Quiet on the Western Front</span>, and I didn't like that either.<br /><br />It's not worthy of the list largely because it's an unnecessarily long slog and not particularly original. <span style="font-style: italic;">The Old Man and the Sea</span> is better Hemingway. Also shorter.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-16940443446664956392011-10-05T08:42:00.003-05:002011-10-06T10:31:19.757-05:00I'll show you profanity.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">For Whom the Bell Tolls</span><br />Pages read: 99 - 311<br /><br />I read yesterday, despite appearances, and just completely forgot to post. It's not like I didn't have time, either. I just didn't even think about it. At all. Because that is how boring this novel is. It's actually better that I didn't post yesterday anyway, because <span style="font-style: italic;">nothing</span> happened. No, really.<br /><br />Robert Jordan and Maria have sex. Everyone argues. We find out that <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Pilar</span> watched Pablo organize and oversee the killing of fascists in his hometown after it was taken over by rebels at the beginning of the conflict. (That was 100 pages, right there. Seriously.) The guerrillas (Man, that is a hard word to spell. I'm a good speller, but guerrilla gets me every time. It's the double r that I can't seem to remember.) pick up camp in order to move closer to the site of the bridge that needs to be blown up. Robert and Maria have sex again. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Pilar</span> is jealous of both of them and is apparently bisexual. (I'm not interpreting; it's really in there.) Pablo threatens Robert's command, but it comes to nothing when some enemy cavalry rides through and everyone switches into combat mode. Now, Robert and a fellow guerrilla named Augustin are keeping watch over the area. Also, it snows quite a bit.<br /><br />There's a lot of wistfulness about Robert and Maria's relationship (which actually seems to be pretty genuine) and how they're having the rare experience of real love, but it has to be curtailed by the necessities of warfare. There's a lot of bemoaning of killing people, as well, especially when it's brutal and vengeful, as it was with Pablo and the fascists. (They were beaten to death with flails. Lovely.) I don't understand how so little can have happened, but there you are. Robert has these long internal monologues about his life, too, and we find out that he joined the fight with the Russians as kind of a pseudo-Communist, and that he used to be a professor of Spanish in Montana. It's the same stuff Hemingway always does, which is stark prose and unrealistically straightforward, repetitive dialogue interspersed with angst-filled musings about the past.<br /><br />Also, for some reason Hemingway felt the need not to actually write any profanity in this book, but since it's a feature of many of the guerrillas' dialogue, he put it in as the actual words "unprintable," or "obscenity," or "I obscenity in the milk of your..." It's just obnoxious, frankly. If you want to swear, swear; if you don't, don't. But don't pretty it up for the censors. Where's the integrity? I don't find it endearing or indicative of the characters' speech patterns. I find it cheap as hell. Also, it's often confusing and jars you out of the narrative because it makes you stop and mentally translate back into normal swearing. Anyway, aside from the annoyance factor, it's idiocy to stop short of writing profanity, but to graphically describe people being beaten to death by flails. I'm not going to be more shocked by the word "fuck" than I am by torture and war crimes. Christ.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-33136612956906779852011-10-03T10:00:00.005-05:002011-10-06T10:31:33.739-05:00On little cat feetCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">For Whom the Bell Tolls</span><br />Pages read: 10 - 98<br /><br />So, I finally got the book - the library was totally holding out on me, and clearly had another copy. I went to get some other books on Saturday and just strolled by the shelf to check, and there it was, quietly <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Hemingwaying</span> with the other <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Hemingways</span>. Come on, library. You're supposed to <span style="font-style: italic;">want</span> people to read books.<br /><br />Our hero's name is Robert Jordan, which is amusing if you're familiar with modern fantasy novels (and one wonders if Robert Jordan chose his nom de plume because of this novel), and he seems to be American, although it's not entirely clear. Anyway, he's a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">demolitionist</span> working for the allied forces waging <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">guerrilla</span> warfare in Spain during World War II. So far, he's arrived at the rebel camp and met some people, amongst them Pablo, the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">de</span> facto commander, who's a drunk and seems to be close to turning traitor; Anselmo, an older, wise man who's fought before; and Maria, a girl rescued from prison. Pablo seems like he's eventually going to be a problem, but hasn't done anything yet. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Pilar</span>, Pablo's wife, is really in charge of the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">guerrilla</span> camp, and is keeping everything in order and Pablo in check. Honestly, they just seem to hang out, eat, and drink wine. Robert cases the strategic bridge that he's been sent to this particular area to blow up and decides it will be quite easy to set and detonate the explosives. (We're also informed through flashbacks that he has to wait for an army-initiated attack to start before he actually destroys it.) In addition, he finds himself very attracted to Maria, and they eventually sleep together. She's the initiator of the tryst, which is good, since it seems like she was raped in prison, and we'd hate for Robert to take advantage of her.<br /><br />It's pretty much really boring. I wish I could say that it was somehow changing my mind about Hemingway, but it's definitely not so far. His dialogue is bizarre and stilted, too, which the appreciators of his style will, I'm sure, put down to the fact that it's spare and unique, but makes it sound sort of like everyone's a robot. Also, watching guerrillas bicker in a cave is not my idea of a good time. I'm sure there's an important lesson about the monotony of war and the futility of plans in a time of conflict, but I am not looking forward to spending the next 600 pages learning it.<br /><br />How come there are never any six-toed cats in Hemingway's books? You'd think they might have sneaked in. I assume they're good at sneaking. What with the six toes.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-84687568843028032222011-09-19T10:40:00.001-05:002011-09-19T10:42:42.422-05:00We have the technology!Current book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />Still no copy of my book from the library. However, that said, I have been very productive on the blog lately. All posts are now tagged with the name of the book and the author's name, and the final post for each book is tagged with an assessment of whether it was worthy of the list. I'm also going to be making the list along the left side of the page into links that will give you a page of every relevant post, but I haven't gotten there yet.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-28090347379446911472011-09-15T07:26:00.003-05:002011-09-15T07:34:51.488-05:00MLA, eat your heart out.Current book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />My book has not yet been returned to the library. Come on, random person. You have like $3.50 in fines by now. Cough up the goods already.<br /><br />Regarding the Scientology expose - I've decided that I'm annoyed by the fact that there aren't citations. She's got a huge bibliography in the thing, and a bunch of notes at the end, but there aren't any superscripts to indicate where those notes might correspond to the text. Her footnotes are purely to add asides and clarification, but don't offer any sources, or at least not sources that are cited in an academic fashion. (They'll say something like, "The Church denies this.") It's lazy and it undermines the legitimacy of her research. You would think, when she spent this much time investigating the thing, she'd want it to come across as rigorous and meticulous. Apparently not. So if you, dear reader, decide to write a book that relies heavily on source material, don't be as ass - cite.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-22261749862805545752011-09-14T07:11:00.003-05:002011-09-14T07:22:48.280-05:00Ask not for whom the fines accrue...Current book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />Well, whoever was supposed to return his or her copy of <span style="font-style: italic;">For Whom the Bell Tolls</span> to the Saint Paul library by September 1st has failed to do so, even though I put a hold on it. So, needless to say, I haven't got the book yet for this next one. Amusingly, I already have the copy of <span style="font-style: italic;">Slaughterhouse-V</span> that I also put on hold. But to go out of order would be anathema, so instead I'll just wait. I hope that said delinquent will rectify the situation soon.<br /><br />In other news, I'm reading an expose of Scientology right now, and man, it is a giant cult. I always had a very suspicious view of it, but now that I'm reading details (which seem quite well researched and accurate), I'm sort of actively horrified by it. It has a lot of the important hallmarks of a cult: it promises to solve all your problems, it has a great, venerated leader, it requires you to invest a significant amount of money to learn its practices, it assigns you new ways of thinking, it punishes its initiates with isolation and physical labor for disobeying its tenets, it encourages you to cut ties with non-members, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">et</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">cetera</span>. (Also, reading that list makes me realize how many religions are characterized by at least some, if not many, of those attributes. Money, I think, tends to be the deciding factor in a cult. Well, that and building compounds. (Seriously, compounds - are they ever good?)) Anyway, it's fascinating, though I must admit to feeling a little voyeuristic reading it.<br /><br />I'm clearly very upset that the Hemingway hasn't come in yet. I suppose I'll attempt to keep you entertained in the meantime.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-73864066445038377522011-09-13T07:19:00.010-05:002011-09-14T08:45:56.800-05:00Everybody who's anybody drinks.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span><br />Pages read: 260 - 307 (end)<br /><br />Well, I missed reporting on yesterday's antics. Let's see. Everyone drank and slept with girls.<br /><br />Sal spends a small amount of time in New York and then eventually finds Dean again, who's now married to Camille in San Francisco. (I think. Honestly, the endless, dead-end, empty relationships are getting hard to keep track of.) Anyway, he and Dean decide to go on another great road trip cross-country, leaving the pregnant Camille all alone and with no support. (Technically, she "threw them out" for staying up all night in her house drinking with strangers. There's this great scene where all of Dean's friends' wives confront him about his treatment of her, and all Sal can do is think about how wronged <span style="font-style: italic;">Dean</span> is. It's almost funny, except that instead it fills me with rage.) They drive like fucking maniacs across the country, sometimes with passengers who fear for their lives (an instinct that Kerouac mocks as dull and pedestrian of them). Eventually they get to New York, where Dean settles for a while, and then marries yet another woman, Inez. (I'm pretty sure he's actually a bigamist at this point, but there may have been divorces. It's unclear.)<br /><br />Later, Sal goes on a trip alone to Denver, but eventually Dean follows him and they decide to go to Mexico with some other random guy named Tim. They make it all the way to Mexico City, after, you guessed it, drinking and sleeping with girls (actual prostitutes, in this case, and some of them as young as 15). Sal falls ill in Mexico City with a fever, and Dean abandons him there. In the end, Sal ends up in New York and has a steady girlfriend, and Dean ends up back with Camille, miserable and penniless. Gee, I'm all broken up about it.<br /><br />I can't decide whether I like the misogyny or the utter disregard for everything that's important in life less. One could argue that those go hand in hand. I suppose I shouldn't hold Kerouac responsible for the overt, absurd sexism, since it's a product of the time, but it offends my sensibilities that he thinks everyone should be free and easy and whatever else he decides, but not women. They're either whores or shrews, apparently, and it's just blatantly unfair. At some point, they meet a friend's wife who allows him to go out at all hours, bring friends home, and treat her like she doesn't exist, and Dean has this to say about it,<br /><blockquote>"Now you see man, there's a <span style="font-style: italic;">real</span> woman for you. Never a harsh word, never a complaint, or modified; her old man can come in any hour of the night with anybody and have talks in the kitchen and drink the beer and leave any old time. This is a man, and that's his castle." (204)<br /></blockquote>Jesus Christ. It's like <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">goddamned</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Stepford</span> in here. (Also, "or modified"? What the hell does that mean?)<br /><br />I realize that I'm about to sound like the biggest square in the world, but as I mentioned in a previous post, Sal and his friends' utter disregard for all responsibility is pretty despicable. In Dean's case, leaving his pregnant wife alone and with no support is the worst crime; in Sal's, I suppose he doesn't have a reason to stay anywhere, but I'm baffled as to how wasting his money, getting smashed, and having sex with women he doesn't like is a good choice, especially since he spends all his time unhappy and fighting, or thinking about how sad America and bars and things like that are. (To be fair, he usually calls things glorious a second before he calls them sad, but there you are.) My favorite moment*, and one that I think characterizes Sal pretty well, is when he says the following to Dean.<br /><blockquote>"It's not my fault! It's not my fault!...Nothing in this lousy world is my fault, don't you see that? I don't want it to be and it can't be and it <span style="font-style: italic;">won't</span> be." (214)</blockquote>And there it is, really. That's the material point of this entire novel. Nothing is my fault and I don't care about anything. Seriously, Kerouac? You are such an asshole.<br /><br />To be fair, the writing is decent, and his voice is both immediate and convincing. I can, I suppose, fathom how some people might enjoy that about it. But honestly, it's like listening to a pompous drunk guy blather about the summer after senior year.<br /><br />Unworthy of the list. Moving on.<br /><br /><br />*Another quote that is amusing only because it proves that Kerouac is, quite possibly, insane, is on the last page. <blockquote>"...and tonight the stars'll be out, and don't you know that God is Pooh Bear?" (113) </blockquote>For Christ's sake, Jack. Masturbate on your own time.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-84730020925849782032011-09-12T17:46:00.003-05:002011-09-13T08:46:33.532-05:00A lark, a spree, it's very clear to see.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span><br />Pages read: 179 - 260<br /><br />I read today, but I also spent seven and a half hours cleaning. I'll finish tomorrow and just do a comprehensive one for the whole book. So tired now.<br /><br />There was more drinking and screwing around. Shocking.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-5519163541173087672011-09-09T13:58:00.002-05:002011-09-13T08:46:47.681-05:00Well. There it is.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span><br />Pages read: None<br /><br />Did I mention I'm not posting on Fridays? I'm not posting on Fridays.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-14457373810232818082011-09-08T07:05:00.004-05:002011-09-13T08:47:03.350-05:00A faaaaabulous new car!Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span><br />Pages read: 86 - 178<br /><br />Guess what happens in this section? If you said, "Sal gets drunk and fights with his friends," you're right! Tell the contestants what they've won!<br /><br />Sal spends some time with his Mexican...girlfriend? I'm not really what we're supposed to be calling these liaisons, but we'll go with that. Anyway, they run out of money, shockingly, and try their luck going out to the California farms to pick fruit and cotton. Predictably, Sal sucks at hard labor, and fails to make any real money, but is happy being "a man of the earth," as he says. Happy, of course, until he decides it doesn't suit him anymore. Also, Terry, the Mexican girl, picks up her son, a youngish kid, who lives with them in their farm-laborer tent city for a while. Eventually, Sal ditches Terry back with her family and goes home to New York.<br /><br />Some months later, during a Christmas vacation from college, in which Sal is now enrolled, his friend Dean shows up with Dean's ex-wife, Marylou. They've decided they're in love again, despite the fact that Dean has another live-in girlfriend in San Francisco named Camille. Dean inspires Sal to want to go to California again, so they head out in Dean's new car, which he drives fast and recklessly. They've also got another guy with them, Ed, who, as it turns out, left his wife on the way out to the East Coast with Dean. (And by left, I mean they actually <span style="font-style: italic;">abandoned</span> her at a motel on the road during the trip. And we're supposed to <span style="font-style: italic;">like</span> these people. Christ.) They stop in New Orleans, where Ed finds his wife, and they spend the rest of the trip running out of money, picking up hitchhikers, and fighting about everything. Eventually they get to San Francisco, where Marylou goes off with some guy and Sal decides she's a whore. This in spite of the fact that he's been propositioning her the entire way to California, and was, previously, pleased when she reciprocated. Almost as soon as they arrive in San Francisco, Sal goes back to New York.<br /><br />It's not any better. If anything, it's even more ridiculous because of the hypocrisy that's crept in. During one of their periods on the road, Sal chastises Dean, Ed, and Marylou for not getting their lives together, and tells them that they have to figure out what they're doing and have a real impact. My jaw didn't actually drop at the unintentional irony, but it was close enough. You can't have it both ways, Sal/Jack. Either freedom and the road are glorious, and you're making the most important decision of your life by abandoning all responsibility, <span style="font-style: italic;">or</span> you need to make a decision about your life and choose something to do. Not both. (I'll have some more to say about abandoning responsibility when the whole book is finished. I'm waiting to pass judgement on that one.)<br /><br />Also, Sal is just so damned presumptuous. When he's with Terry, at some point he decides he needs to make sure that no one breaks into their tent and threatens them harm because they're Mexican. He says, "They thought I was a Mexican, of course; and in a way, I am," (98). Ignoring, for a moment, the improper use of the semicolon, we'll move on to the improper appropriation of a Mexican identity. And why? Because he's "balling" a Mexican girl, whom he will leave in approximately three seconds. (All right, it's at least a couple of weeks, but still.) And this makes him a Mexican?<br /><br />It's terrible. There still haven't really been any drugs. They smoked pot once. Also, I've decided I want this book to be a satirical criticism of the lifestyle it's illustrating, and it's really, really not one.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-12545547115917231962011-09-07T07:11:00.005-05:002011-09-13T08:47:15.923-05:00No one wants a fellow with a social disease.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span><br />Pages read: 1 - 85<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Ew</span>. Just <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">ew</span>.<br /><br />So, Jack Kerouac is apparently the original hipster, and, as such, is obnoxiously irresponsible and proud of himself for it. I'd tell you what happens, but something would have to happen first. I mean, honestly, in 85 pages, the main character, Sal Paradise (Paradise? Seriously? Give me a goddamn break.), hitchhikes from New York to Los Angeles and gets drunk a lot. That's about it. He stops in Denver for a while, where he hits on girls (who are, by the way, pretty much just pieces of meat to Jack...I mean Sal...and he even refers to them as such) and fights with his friends because they're all drunk and idiotic. He proceeds to San Francisco (which he refers to as Frisco, and, though I have never been there, I cringed on behalf of all San Franciscans), where he, you guessed it, gets drunk a lot and fights with his friends. He has no money, because he's wasted it all on whiskey, basically, so he's constantly crashing with people (and by people, Jack Kerouac always means men), hitting on their girlfriends, and eventually fighting with them until he gets kicked out or leaves.<br /><br />Anyway, he also gets a job as a barracks guard for the navy, of all things, and spends some time discussing how his fellow guardsman are all terrible people with "cop minds." (And normally, I'd be on his side there, because I know what he means by that, but frankly, I was so disgusted with him at that point that I wasn't inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt.) Eventually, he leaves and goes to Los Angeles. On the bus there, he meets a Mexican woman and successfully propositions her. When they get to his hotel room in L. A., however, she accuses him of being a pimp and they have a tawdry little fight before falling into bed together, an experience that Kerouac describes as "having found the closest and most delicious thing in life together," (85), clearly indicating that he has no idea what it is to be in love with someone, if you ask me.<br /><br />Um. Wow. I hate it a lot. I'm also failing to see the redeeming value of the book (because I'm pretty sure there isn't one). I mean, I get what we're trying to say here, which is that, when you abandon all pretense of social obligation, you can choose your own path and be free to move along it. But frankly, the message so far seems to be that, in so doing, you will waste all your time and money drinking and pissing people off, and mostly you'll be sorry about it later. The narrator often regrets his decisions and is sorrowful and depressed about his circumstances and surroundings. He remarks on how awful bus stations are, no matter where you find them, for example (and you can't deny him on that one), but it's hard not to think, "Well, then go home, for Christ's sake."<br /><br />I'm sure there are a lot of people who argue for this book being original and saying something about the era that produced it, that it characterizes the desire for freedom and that it lead a whole generation of people to question, pardon my diction, the establishment. I'm sure they're right about the generation of people who paid attention to it, but that doesn't make it original, and it doesn't make it great literature. It's <span style="font-style: italic;">Tropic of Cancer</span> all over again, with fewer drugs and set in America. Original, my ass.<br /><br />Also, did I mention it's sexist? It's ridiculously sexist. The women are all either "untamed shrew[s]" or simple sex objects, and he often describes "balling" and "banging" them. I have very little patience for that sort of nonsense.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-41663819112072931792011-09-06T08:37:00.006-05:002011-09-06T21:00:20.223-05:00Boy meets fish. Boy gets fish. Boy loses fish.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">The Old Man and the Sea</span><br />Pages read: 9 - 127 (end)<br /><br />No, seriously, the post title is a good summary.<br /><br />All right, all right, there may be a <span style="font-style: italic;">few</span> more details, but not many. Let's see. Santiago is an old, weathered Cuban fisherman (one might call him an old salt, if one were inclined toward nautical terminology) who hasn't caught a fish in eighty-five days. He is friends with a boy, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Manolin</span> (who, honestly, I'm not sure is actually <span style="font-style: italic;">named</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Manolin</span>; he may just be called that. (You missed the parentheses, didn't you? It's <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">ok</span>. You don't have to say. I know.)), who once fished with him as an apprentice, but who now fishes with a different boat due to Santiago's bad luck.<br /><br />So, anyway, Santiago goes out fishing alone on the eighty-fifth day, and he hooks a marlin. The fish is enormous, and it tows him far out into the Gulf, while he muses upon his life and his relationship with the sea. For several days, the fish pulls him, and he thinks about the fact that he loves and respects the sea and the fish, but also wants to triumph over the fish by killing him. Santiago also contemplates his left hand a great deal, which cramps up on him and doesn't work properly, as well as the fact that he was born to be a fisherman and feels that it's his calling. (He's got a whole thing about baseball and Joe DiMaggio, too, which frankly, seemed somewhat irrelevant.)<br /><br />He finally fights the fish in, injuring his hands (and possibly his internal organs) badly in the process, and harpoons it, killing it; he ties it to his little boat, towing it alongside because of the fact that it's fully two feet longer than the boat itself. Making his way back to Havana, Santiago is set upon by sharks, and, though he fights and kills many of them with his harpoon and his bare hands, they manage to eat the entire fish, skeleton excepted, before he can make it back. Upon his return, he is greeted and nursed by <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Manolin</span>, who weeps for his loss of the fish that everyone can see was the most magnificent ever caught. It's unclear whether he dies at the end, but signs point to his imminent demise.<br /><br />It's funny, actually, that the back of the book in the edition that I have says that this is a story about "personal triumph won from loss." I just don't know, Scribner, if I can agree with that. It's more, as my husband said this morning, about loss in the face of personal triumph, when you get down to it. Not to go all allegorical, but the fish is clearly representative of something here. (Man, also, what is it with giant sea animals and symbolism? Eat your heart out, Herman Melville.) Is it the great tragedy that is life itself? Hemingway has a real glory-worship thing, and there's nothing, it seems, that he likes more than killing large animals as a manifestation of that glory. So, I'd say that the hunting of the fish is supposed to represent all that is good and noble in man, in that it is a sort of simultaneous respect and love for, but also dominance of, nature (and therefore the world).<br /><br />However, if that's true, then the subsequent destruction of the fish must represent the futility of that search for glory. After all, Santiago fought so hard and so long for the fish only to lose all that he had gained. Certainly he is still covered in glory, in a way, because both he and his comrades know that he caught the greatest marlin they'd ever seen, but in the end, he has nothing to show for it but sorrow and regret. He even says, after it becomes obvious that the whole fish is going to be eaten by sharks, that he never should have come out so far and that he broke his own luck by dooming both himself and the marlin to destruction. The waste, as he sees it, of the fish's carcass is the waste of his own life and his own fate as a fisherman, and it is the hunt for the great glory of the catch that brought them both to that waste.<br /><br />A lot of people agree more with the Scribner interpretation, which is that the great glory of the fight with the marlin dignifies and ennobles Santiago, proving that it's the fight that's important, and that, even in defeat, glory lives on. Frankly, I just don't know about that. I think there's an indication of that, since, as I said, Santiago retains his glory, but there's a pretty melancholy cast to the whole thing, what with the loss of the fish and Santiago's injuries. The fact that something breaks inside him and he coughs up blood near the end of the book is a pretty dire indicator to me. Then again, he finishes the novel dreaming of his happy youth, so who knows?<br /><br />It's a pretty good book, regardless of the fact that I don't like Hemingway. You have to admire the style, as well, which is stark and matter-of-fact, but also evocative. He was one of the first to write this way, and <span style="font-style: italic;">The Old Man and the Sea</span> is a particularly good example of the clean spareness of his prose. (Probably because it's a later novel.) It also helps that this particular book doesn't have any war or woman-beating in it, which are things Hemingway likes to put into his books, I've noticed. Anyway, I'm not sure that it's worthy of the list. We'll call it borderline.<br /><br />Also, this book reminds me vaguely of <span style="font-style: italic;">The Pearl</span>, by Steinbeck, and I'm not sure why. The prose is similar, I think. It could also be the setting, but I suppose it's mostly the fact that they're both about the endless pursuit of something that is, in the end, ruinous to your life. The themes aren't really the same, but they're tangential to each other, which just makes me think that you could arrange a college topics course about stories of the consuming need to conquer and own. Oh, wait. We just call that Western literature. (Zing!)Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-52569245902763363232011-07-14T14:27:00.002-05:002011-09-19T10:40:36.502-05:00Hemingway...not that trashyCurrent book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />I've decided I'll be back after Labor Day. It lets me continue to procrastinate, but does actually put an end date on it. Also, at that point I'll have a job with lots of computer downtime, so it'll work out well. Until then, go read trashy summer books.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-13436044431425057202011-03-17T14:29:00.003-05:002011-09-19T10:40:28.165-05:00I actually do have all day.Current book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />I realize that I'm a complete delinquent, just so everyone's aware. It's already more than halfway through March, my schedule has certainly cleared up, and yet, still, I am not reading Hemingway. This is because I have no desire to read Hemingway, and since I am not, technically, obligated to do so, I haven't. Clearly I need an incentive, so you, loyal readers, will have to provide me with one.<br /><br />I'll just wait right here.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-58981387747061107722011-01-10T09:59:00.004-06:002011-09-19T10:40:20.417-05:00In like a lionCurrent book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br />It turns out that I'm going to have to take a longer hiatus than I thought. I have a different job until the end of February, and it's simply not conducive to writing long posts about what I've read. Rather than half-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">assing</span> it and feeling rushed, I'm going to wait until the job is finished to read literature again. Also? I could kind of use a break from the classics. Especially the classics I'm not choosing myself and that, frankly, I'm sort of starting to hate. These list authors. I just don't know. If you preview what's coming up next, you'll notice that in the remaining 32 books there are <span style="font-style: italic;">four</span> Hemingway novels. Four? Really? And that's not even counting the one I already read. Do you really think that Hemingway wrote <span style="font-style: italic;">five</span> of the 100 greatest novels of all time, list-makers? Well, I'm just not buying it.<br /><br />Anyway, I may pop in from time to time and write about other things I'm reading, but I will be back to regular posting at the beginning of March.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-90031602805840290932010-12-20T08:54:00.002-06:002011-09-19T10:40:11.179-05:00Soon it will be Christmas dayCurrent book: <span>None</span><br />Pages read: None<br /><br />It's Christmas break from literature time. You may expect me back in the new year.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-86726549589794229802010-12-16T18:24:00.003-06:002011-09-19T10:39:51.256-05:00Look at his little face!Current book: None<br />Pages read: None<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Ok</span>, so instead of starting <span style="font-style: italic;">On the Road</span>, I just kept reading the copy of <span style="font-style: italic;">Call of the Wild</span> that I have, because it also includes <span style="font-style: italic;">White Fang</span>. So, mostly, I read about the antics of an adorable wolf puppy.<br />I am not ashamed.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-79488862899495818062010-12-15T11:11:00.004-06:002011-09-19T10:39:27.351-05:00Man's best friendCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">The Call of the Wild</span><br />Pages read: 40 - 81 (end)<br /><br />Wow. Short. This might be the shortest book so far. It's kind of a weird edition, so the pages are really wide, but still.<br /><br />After Buck becomes team leader, the team completes their run to Dawson, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Alsaka</span>, in record time. They're immediately sent out on another, however, which is both virtually unprecedented and very tough on the dogs and the men. By the time they return from the round-trip journey, they've traveled 1800 miles in three weeks, and the dogs are virtually spent. Since the Canadian government has no use for tired, injured dogs, they're sold to a worthless party of two men and a woman (Hal, Charles, and Mercedes) who have no idea what they're doing in Alaska. The men overload the sled and buy dogs with no experience, and Mercedes is an obnoxious citified idiot, so their trip turns into a fiasco. They end up using up the food rations halfway through the journey, which means they run the dogs starving for the rest of it. By the time they reach the frozen river they have to cross in order to finish their trip, half the team is dead and the rest nearly so. Before they cross the river, they meet a man named John Thornton camping at the water's edge. Buck, sensing that the ice on the river is rotten, lies down in the traces and refuses to rise. Hal tries to beat him to death, but John Thornton steps in and stops him. The sled goes on without Buck and crashes through the ice, killing everyone. (We're not sad. Well, a little for the dogs.)<br /><br />John Thornton becomes Buck's new master, and one to whom he gives his whole self, heart and soul. Buck regains his strength and becomes an amazing specimen, both of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">dogdom</span> and loyalty to his master. He saves Thornton's life in a bar brawl, wins him 1600 dollars by proving he can pull a sledge with a thousand-pound load, and rescues him from whitewater rapids. When Thornton and several other men venture into the wild to look for gold, Buck enjoys the trip immensely, feeling more and more drawn to the wilderness. He stays with Thornton, but hunts his own game, ranges far and wide, and bonds with a wolf. One day, returning to camp, he finds that Thornton and his friends have been killed by Indians. He attacks and scatters the Indians, killing some of them, and, after mourning Thornton, joins a wolf pack, becomes its leader, and roams free and wild for the rest of his days.<br /><br />Well, my impressions from the first post are pretty much the same. Thematically, there's the sense that the wilderness calls to something in all of us, man or beast, and has a purifying effect on our needs and emotions. Impulses are stripped down to their raw form; the needs to eat and to fight are foremost at all times. There is also the sense, though, that the humanizing element of love, in this case Buck's for John Thornton, is the only thing that can ever override that urge to satisfy need. Buck stayed with Thornton until Thornton was gone, and even after he died, returned to the spot where he was killed each year to hold vigil. The point is not that the call of the wild is overwhelming and all-controlling, but it is a powerful force that sways us all and can be overcome only by love and loyalty.<br /><br />Also, the scene where Buck has to pull the thousand-pound sledge is one of the most compelling moments in my experience of literature. I actually said, "Come on, Buck!" out loud. I was alone in the workout room, so it's all good, but really! Way to go, Jack London! (Also, it reminded me of <span style="font-style: italic;">Stone Fox</span>, which, if you haven't read, you should. But be prepared to cry.)<br /><br />Superb. Any book that makes me cheer out loud for the main character I'll call worthy of the list. In seriousness, though, I'm impressed at the depths that London plumbs in what seems, on the surface, to be a simple adventure story.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-3140949541486837092010-12-14T09:15:00.003-06:002011-09-19T10:39:07.180-05:00And puppies! Lots of puppies!Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">The Call of the Wild</span><br />Pages read: 1 - 40<br /><br />Oh, man. This book is awesome. I don't mean to sound too much like a 12-year-old boy here, but come on - the thrilling tale of a courageous dog sent into the harsh wilderness of the frozen Yukon, fighting it out against the men and savage dogs who will destroy him if he gives them half a chance? Excellent.<br /><br />Buck, our heroic half-St. Bernard, half Scotch-shepherd, lives on a sunny California plantation, but is sold by his master's servant to pay off a gambling debt. He's beaten and shipped cross-country for several days with no food or water, until, finally let out of the crate, he's nearly mad with thirst and rage. His new owner, however, beats him until he at least gives the appearance of obedience, though his heart is still defiant. He learns that the only way to survive is to be constantly on the defensive, but also ready to fight for what he wants and needs. He's sold again, this time to a man who procures dogs for the Canadian government's sled teams, and is broken to the harness and educated in team-driving. Soon he learns that the leader of his team is a dog named Spitz, but the two don't get along. After weeks of fighting and badgering each other, they have it out in the snow, and Buck kills Spitz. Afterward, he becomes the leader of the team, which is passed into the hands of the mail service. Buck is a good team leader, but secretly rejoices more in the fresh outside air and the wilderness than he does in working for men.<br /><br />There you go, then. Superficially, of course, it's an adventure story, and a fast-paced, exciting one at that. Underneath, however, it's a story about men as much as dogs. Dogs aren't the only ones who have to change the way they behave in survival situations, yes, but more important than that is the fact that men squabble over power, nip at each other until they're driven mad with rage, and eventually fight one another for supremacy at the cost of lives. To his credit, London never overtly says anything of the kind, but it's not hard to find it below the surface.<br /><br />Books about animals are always actually about people. It's a great literary truth.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-55936540592866856682010-12-13T10:16:00.004-06:002011-09-19T10:38:51.040-05:00Maintiens le droitCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">The Call of the Wild</span><br />Pages read: None<br /><br />Haven't had a chance to start this one yet, thought I'm quite looking forward to it. I actually haven't read it, which is odd, considering it's so often assigned in school. Judging by the fact that I used to love <span style="font-style: italic;">Silver Chief: Dog of the North</span>, I'll probably enjoy it.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-32740351306323231172010-12-10T14:18:00.006-06:002011-09-19T10:38:27.596-05:00Like a memory long since pastCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">To the Lighthouse</span><br />Pages read: 144 - 242 (end)<br /><br />Well, Woolf went ahead and shocked the hell out of me by moving the story forward ten years in a few pages. She narrates the passage of time from the perspective of the house (not in its voice, but simply as though you were in it), detailing the slow decay and empty seasons it witnesses in the Ramsey family's absence. During the decade-long gap, Mrs. Ramsey dies, as well as two of the Ramsey children.<br /><br />When the family returns, it is with Lily <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Briscoe</span> and Augustus Carmichael, but no one else. Mr. Ramsey decides he must take a trip to the lighthouse with James and Cam (the youngest daughter of the family). The two children are ambivalent, but Mr. Ramsey is obsessed with the idea. They go, and Lily stays on the beach, painting. On the trip to the lighthouse, James steers the boat and Mr. Ramsey reads a book. When they finally reach the island, Mr. Ramsey praises <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">James's</span> steering, and Cam regards it as an important moment - one for which James has been waiting a long time. Mr. Ramsey is triumphant at the lighthouse, and Lily, back on the beach, successfully finishes her painting with one distinctive stroke through its center.<br /><br />Huh. That was not what I expected. I'm struggling with what the lighthouse is really supposed to represent now. The idea of success and happiness may still hold true, but it's odd, then, that Cam and James had no interest in it. Maybe it's something closer to a sense of achievement, of being finished with what life has to offer. Mr. Ramsey is desperately in need of validation all the time, so that would make sense for him. James needs Mr. Ramsey's validation, too, but is happy to get it during the journey, and doesn't need to have achieved all of his goals yet, since he is still a young man. It would mesh with Lily's contemplation of the lighthouse as well; she thinks that she knows when the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Ramseys</span> reach the lighthouse, and that's the moment when she finishes her painting. It is also the moment when she realizes she is content to be alone with herself and not to seek out a husband. It's not as though it has to be that black and white and only represent one thing, but it seems to be something along those lines.<br /><br />In addition to that, there's sort of a sense that no one has really reached their true goals, since both Mr. Ramsey's and Lily's lives are clouded by the fear of failure, and James has hardly gotten started. The lighthouse, then, is a sort of unattainable ivory tower - even when James reaches it, he realizes it doesn't seem the same as when he was a child, and therefore he will never really be able to get to the place it used to be. Much as Mr. Ramsey and Lily can never rest assured that their work will make them immortal (though Lily reconciles herself to that fact upon finishing her painting), no one can truly reach the ideal, far-away beacon of the lighthouse because of the fact that it becomes a different object when one arrives at it. (Is this making sense? Shit is getting existential, is all I'm saying.) So, in addition to contentment and achievement, it has the melancholy air of the loss of what can never even be had.<br /><br />Ok, Virginia Woolf. You have made me think about this for a considerable amount of time and I am still unsure of what it means. I am also, however, convinced of the importance of understanding it. This one is definitely worthy of the list.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-69311714892708191312010-12-09T09:59:00.003-06:002011-09-19T10:38:03.817-05:00Full speed aheadCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">To the Lighthouse</span><br />Pages read: 70 - 144<br /><br />All right. I have considerably more patience to write today. In true Virginia Woolf form, there aren't a lot of plot events occurring, but there is a lot of internal thought that's being communicated for each of the characters.<br /><br />The setting is a vacation house on the Isle of Skye, where Mr. and Mrs. Ramsey and their eight children are on holiday, along with a group of friends and acquaintances. Mr. Ramsey is a famous writer of philosophy who struggles with everyday interactions and has a tendency to become agitated when he doubts his own genius. Mrs. Ramsey spends most of her time looking after (read: worrying about) her children, but also invests a lot of her energy in facilitating smooth and pleasant social interactions amongst her guests. Also along is Lily <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Briscoe</span>, an unmarried thirty-something who fancies herself a painter. Mrs. Ramsey longs for Lily to marry another guest, William <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Bankes</span>, but the two aren't interested in the match. Paul <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Rayley</span>, a young gentleman, is, however, in love with Minta Doyle, who is, frankly, obnoxiously <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">ditzy</span>, and Mrs. Ramsey is also interested in their match. To round out the party, we have a pedantic, defensive scholar and disciple, Charles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Tansley</span>, and a slightly crazed opium addict, Augustus Carmichael.<br /><br />I won't reel off the names of the eight children, but the one we're most concerned with is the youngest boy, James, upon whom Mrs. Ramsey dotes, and who desperately wants to visit the nearby lighthouse (hence the title). Mrs. Ramsey promises him he can go when the weather is fine, since the trip requires a boat, and there's a steady thread, through the story, of his hope for fine weather, her indulgence of it, and Mr. Ramsey's pessimism about the next day being stormy and wet.<br /><br />The first half of the book takes place over the course of an afternoon and largely features conversation between Lily and William and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Ramseys</span> and Charles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Tansley</span>, during which we learn the facets of their characters I've already mentioned. Toward the end of the afternoon, Minta and Paul go off the the beach with two of the younger <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Ramseys</span> and come back engaged. There's also a long scene of the evening's dinner, during which Mrs. Ramsey thinks about how obsessed her husband is with his work, Mr. Ramsey thinks about how obsessed his wife is with social convention, Charles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Tansley</span> thinks about how stupid everyone is, and Lily thinks about her paintings. At the close of the section, Mrs. Ramsey puts the children to bed and she and Mr. Ramsey sit up together, considering, but not discussing, their relationship.<br /><br />There are some interesting themes, the most prevalent of which is probably the difference between one's inward and outward selves at any given moment. The complexity of the thoughts of each character and the careful description of them in contrast to his or her actions portrays the starkness of that difference and implies that the outward self is simply a social veneer. I'm not entirely sure it's supposed to be a negative judgment, however, since there are some characters who would be better off if they were more successful at maintaining that veneer. The second theme that jumps out at me is, I must admit, Oedipal in nature. James Ramsey clearly resents his father for using up his mother's attention, and wishes to have her all to himself. His father also represents realism and a harsh, uncompromising view of the world, while his mother promises both optimism and comfort, giving him even more motivation for valuing one over the other.<br /><br />We'll see what happens with the lighthouse, which is obviously a central symbol, probably representing success and happiness (which explains why Mr. Ramsey is so pessimistic about reaching it, seeing as that's all he can think about and feels that it's out of his reach). There are a lot of ways the ending could go, but my guess is that Woolf will make it characteristically inconclusive.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-75435897219329993042010-12-08T11:24:00.002-06:002011-09-19T10:37:43.678-05:00Do not pass go.Current book: <span style="font-style: italic;">To the Lighthouse</span><br />Pages read: 3 - 70<br /><br />You know, I'm just not feeling writing about literature today. Rather than writing a half-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">assed</span> post about a pretty good book, I'm going to wait until tomorrow and hope I'm in a better mood for it.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5257529292737510242.post-89806047922917483502010-12-07T08:51:00.003-06:002011-09-19T10:37:32.300-05:00For better or worseCurrent book: <span style="font-style: italic;">The Portrait of a Lady</span><br />Pages read: 500 - 591 (end)<br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Ok</span>, I'm finally done! (muted cheering) This is even the last book by Henry James, which, frankly...<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">yay</span>.<br /><br />Gilbert just gets worse after <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">everyone's</span> gone, especially since he realizes that Isabel's been working against his interests in the matter of Pansy's marriage. In retaliation, he sends Pansy away to the convent where she spent much of her youth. A couple of months later, Isabel receives a telegram from Henrietta telling her that Ralph is dying and requesting her presence. Isabel wants to go see him in England, of course, but Gilbert forbids it because he's a vindictive asshole. She discusses the matter with Gilbert's sister, who, though silly, has been a friend. Gilbert's sister reveals (I guess by way of comfort? It's kind of unclear.) that Pansy is actually Gilbert and Madame Merle's illegitimate daughter, not the child of a first marriage as Isabel had previously thought. Madame Merle and Gilbert are, in fact, still having an affair. Gilbert's sister also tells Isabel that Madame Merle persuaded Gilbert to marry Isabel because of her money and the fact that Isabel would be able to provide for and act as a mother to Pansy.<br /><br />Isabel takes this information as permission to disobey her husband and go to England. She visits Pansy on the way out of the country and asks her to come on the journey, but Pansy, though torn, refuses out of obedience to her father. She also begs Isabel to come back some day. Isabel makes it to England and watches Ralph die. She realizes that she loves him and wishes she would have married him, but clearly it's too late. Afterward, Caspar proposes that she come with him to America and he'll help her to escape Gilbert and her unhappy marriage. She considers it, and almost does so, but in the end, decides against it and departs for Rome without saying goodbye.<br /><br />Huh. It actually ended up a lot more sympathetic to Isabel than I thought it would. As I've mentioned, James tends to go all cautionary-tale on his young heroines and make it out like they're responsible for their own miseries. To some extent, Isabel <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> responsible for her own misery in that she could have chosen a better husband earlier on, but was stopped by her need for freedom. At the same time, though, Gilbert Osmund is clearly a punishment that far exceeds the crime. James must, therefore, be remarking upon the fact that women are powerless in their marriages, and that the level of control their husbands have can be absurd.<br /><br />I'm a little unclear, though, on what the point of Isabel's going back to Rome at the close of the novel is really supposed to be. She seems to go back out of a sense of duty, to both Pansy and to the conventions of society, but I don't know why it is that that duty outweighs every shred of her personal happiness. She passes up the chance to go with Caspar in order to return to certain misery. It's true that she doesn't love Caspar, so perhaps things wouldn't improve, but it would be worth a shot considering the emotional abuse she would be escaping.<br /><br />I don't know that it's worthy of the list. It's not bad, but I think there are other books that might communicate the same idea from the time period just as well. It seems sort of unremarkable. <span style="font-style: italic;">Daisy Miller</span> is more compelling, I'd say, and also not 600 pages long.Claire Dawsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06133898311730467349noreply@blogger.com0