The Magical Mystery Tour

A bit of Dickens is good at any time of year, but I agree that the end of the year, as we move towards the holidays, is a great time to settle down with one of his chunky novels.  While Christmas Down Under is a little different to how it is back home (not much chance of snow in Melbourne in December!), reading about winter delights from the Victorian era makes it feel a little more like home ;)

*****
One of my favourite Dickens works is his first novel, The Pickwick Papers.  Like many of his books, it was serialised in a magazine, and it was so successful that readers clamoured to get the next instalment as soon as possible.  In fact, with people making their own Pickwick Club badges, it was something of a craze, the Harry Potter or Twilight of its day - not bad for a twenty-four-old writer...

The hero of the piece is Samuel Pickwick, a retired businessman and founder of the club which bears his name.   Deciding (in the interests of social science) that he would like to observe more of English society, he creates a small sub-group for the purpose, and along with Tracy Tupman (a portly admirer of the fairer sex), Augustus Snodgrass (a self-proclaimed poet) and Nathaniel Winkle (who is reputed to excel in all sporting matters) he sets off to see the delights of life outside London.  As you can imagine, many an adventure lies in store...

The Pickwick Papers starts off as a humorous, sketch-comedy romp through the English countryside, in a style which is reminiscent of various classic works of literature.  The episodic nature reminds the reader of The Canterbury Tales or The Decameron, but it's a certain Spanish novel from which Dickens appears to have taken his inspiration in part.  At times, poor Pickwick can appear very quixotic...

...and what would the noble Don be without his faithful Sancho Panza?  Luckily, Dickens provides us with one a little into the book, and he turns out to be the best character of all.  Sam Weller is a Cockney jack-of-all-trades who is chosen by Pickwick to be his manservant, and from the very start he steals most scenes he is in.  Unsure as to his actual role, the imperturbable Weller is nevertheless very happy that he has landed on his feet:

"Well," said that suddenly-transformed individual, as he took his seat on the outside of the Eatanswill coach next morning; "I wonder whether I'm meant to be a footman, or a groom, or a gamekeeper, or a seedsman.  I looks like a sort of compo of everyone on 'em.  Never mind; there's change of air, plenty to see, and little to do; and all this suits my complaint uncommon; so long life to the Pickwicks, says I!"
p.154 (Wordsworth Editions, 2000)

The surprisingly unworldly Pickwick will have many opportunities to be grateful for the assistance of his faithful offsider before the book is done.

As the novel progresses, the tone becomes a little more serious, and a plot does eventually emerge.  Pickwick, owing to a comical misunderstanding, is sued for breach of promise by a widow who believes he has agreed to marry her, and his refusal to bow to pressure to make the issue go away leads to his enforced stay in a debtor's prison.  By this point, the comical, portly buffoon of the first few chapters has developed into a kindly, virtuous character who has the reader firmly on his side - and when you've also got the cunning Sam Weller in your corner, things are bound to turn out well in the end :)

The Pickwick Papers is interesting reading for fans of Dickens' later work as there are glimpses of later creations in its pages.  The writer's skill in inventing comic characters is already in force, shown in the figure of the conman actor Alfred Jingle (and his servant, the sly Job Trotter) and the obese (and possibly narcoleptic) house boy Joe.  Echoes of later themes are also apparent, with Dicken's obsession with the law (later seen in Bleak House and Little Dorrit) already prominent here.

In the end though, The Pickwick Papers is an entertaining book in its own right, created by a writer who was having fun finding out how to write a novel.  In terms of greatness, it pales beside some of his later works; however, its characters remain among Dickens' most popular.  By the end of the book, we are happy to concur with Sam's opinion of his master:

"And now we're upon it, I'll let you into another secret besides that," said Sam, as he paid for the beer. "I never heerd, mind you, nor read of in story books, nor see in picters, any angel in tights and gaiters - not even in spectacles, as I remember, though that may ha' been done for anythin' I know to the contrairey - but mark my vords, Job Trotter, he's a reg'lar thoroughbred angel for all that, and let me see the man as wenturs to tell me he knows a better vun." pp.597-7

In Which I See Out The Year In Style And Comfort

Alas, as the second innings** of my book blogging journey draws to a close, I am once again agonisingly short of a century, caught in the nervous nineties, set to finish on a creditable, but disappointing, 93.  Of course, my injury-enforced rest towards the end of my innings is largely responsible for this (no runners in book blogging), but I'm still happy overall with my reading in 2010.

One interesting statistic (yes, I know, an oxymoron if ever there was one) is that up until Christmas, I had a quite staggering 32-book run of new reads with not a single reread among them.  This may not be that impressive to some bloggers, but to people like me who specialise in classics, it's a phenomenal run.  However, just like the Aussie cricket team's Ashes dominance, all good things must come to an end, and what better way to break that run, and finish off the year, than with two sweet cover drives from the 19th century?  Padded up for your pleasure today, C.J.H. Dickens and J. Austen, ready to face up to pace and spin alike.  When you're quite ready...

*****

What that all means is that after a hard year of punishing literary grind, I decided to see in the festive season by spending time with a couple of old friends - namely, Great Expectations and Emma.  Dickens' novel is a wonderful, tightly-plotted Bildungsroman, narrated by its hero, Phillip 'Pip' Pirrip, in which he looks back at his childhood and youth, paying close attention to the events set in train by a chance encounter on the Kentish marshes one cold Christmas Eve.  Comic, melodramatic and powerful, Great Expectations is one of Dickens' best works, and however Oprah Winfrey decided upon this novel for her book club choice (and regardless of what you think of her and her club..), it's certainly deserving of as wide an audience as possible.

Emma, while a little narrower in scope, is also worthy of a place in the canon.  The reader accompanies the titular heroine, Miss Emma Woodhouse, through a series of seemingly trivial encounters, misunderstandings and frustrations.  As she tries to pair up all and sundry in her circle, it slowly becomes clear that she too is both the recipient of amorous addresses and the owner of a lonely heart.  Will it all end in tears, or will she be able to cut through the tangle of miscommunication to find true happiness?  Oh, come on - it's Jane Austen!

The main difference between the two novels is the point of view adopted by the writer and the effect this has on our attitude towards the main character.  Dickens uses a first-person narrative, where a presumably middle-aged Pip recounts his youthful (mis)adventures, not concealing any of his blunders and holding his many flaws and imperfections to the light.  In contrast, the third-person style utilised by Austen allows the reader to live through the experiences with Emma and, in a sense, grow with her as she matures and realises the folly of her youthful ideas.  In this sense, Emma is perhaps as much of a Bildungsroman as Great Expectations, if not more so.

It's much more interesting though to consider the similarities between the two books.  One of the more prevalent themes covered is the idea of class differences; their importance and their tendency to blind people to true values.  In his desperate desire to pull himself up and prove himself worthy of Estella, Pip begins to consider Joe and Biddy, the companions of his youth, in a rather unfavourable light and is only too eager to run away to London in an attempt to become a gentleman.  Emma, for whom class is everything and who is only too quick to dismiss people based on their background, also blunders in her dealings because of her prejudices and in doing so almost causes severe hurt to her friends - and, at times, herself.

Another similarity is in the way the writers use language to create a plot and suck the reader into believing the same things the hero(ine) does, before casually revealing a quite different truth.  On a first reading, you are sucked into seeing things from Pip and Emma's point of view, unwitting dupes in the authors' little games.  On rereading, the fun lies in analysing the text for clues as to the authors' intent; a second reading reveals cunning wordplay and an ambiguity which is only fully realised when the reader already knows what is going to happen.  I once read a quote which stated that a classic novel is one where you know what is going to happen but which you can't wait to read anyway - these two novels definitely fall into that category.

Of course, another thing Dickens and Austen have in common is their appreciation of humour in writing.  Dickens expertly captures the confused grasp a child has on their surroundings in the first scenes of Great Expectations, where Pip is at the graveyard, confusing his parents' physical appearance with the shape of their headstones, and the scene where he reencounters Herbert Pocket, and receives casual tips on etiquette (such as hints not to put his knife in his mouth and to avoid draining a wine glass so joyfully that you end up with it balancing on your nose) during a hearty dinner is a wonderfully underplayed example of Dickens' style.  With Austen, however, the humour is less obvious and lies primarily in her characters' being given enough verbal rope to metaphorically hang themselves in the eye of the reader (if that's not mixing too many metaphors!).  Nevertheless, reading Emma certainly brings its fair share of wry smiles and little giggles too.

All in all, there aren't many better ways to close out the reading year than with a couple of old friends, and I was very glad to catch up with Pip and Emma again, and spend a week or so strolling around Little Britain and the Kentish marshes, or paying my respects at Hartfield and Donwell Abbey.  Before, I finish though, there is perhaps one final (and it does pertain to the books' respective endings) crucial difference between their fates.  Pip's future remains a little uncertain, but - being a gentleman - the world is his oyster, and the possibilities are almost endless.  Emma, on the other hand, while ostensibly happier at the end of her novel, has effectively run her race; we can be fairly sure as to what the future will bring.  A sobering thought as to gender differences in the 19th century to send you on your way...

***** 
** The first of a number of cricket-related puns in this introduction - many of you will know why :)

85 - 'David Copperfield' by Charles Dickens

This year has seen a return (for me) to reading Dickens after a fair absence, and it would be fair to say that I've had mixed impressions so far. After being amazed (again) by 'Bleak House', partially disappointed by 'A Tale of Two Cities' and thoroughly let down by 'Oliver Twist', I was looking for a right-rollicking read to restore my faith in the master Victorian novellist. Thankfully, 'David Copperfield was that book.

I was persuaded to buy it after reading Nick Hornby's review in his book 'The Polysyllabic Spree' earlier this year, and it has lain dormant for the past few months, waiting for me to take a break from my Japanese, German and Russian novels. Hornby's love of a single scene, totally unimportant in the progress of the story but given three or four pages by Dickens, a scene which other authors would have skipped over in a couple of sentences, attracted me to the book, which I thought I hadn't read before (having now read it, I suspect that I had read it a long, long time ago but had forgotten all about it).

'David Copperfield' is the book Dickens himself described as his favourite, and well it might be as it is heavily influenced by the author's own life experiences. A young boy overcomes a rocky start to life, caused by difficult family circumstances and financial hardship, and starts to earn his place in the world. After dabbling in law and reporting political speeches, he finally becomes a successful writer. Sound familiar?

Of course, what happens to David himself is not the key to the book. The wonder of 'David Copperfield' consists in the amazing descriptions of the people he meets along the way, among them some of the most memorable characters in English literature. One of these is Mr. Micawber, a noble pauper much given to writing letters (and running up debts), a man who is permanently unemployed but always convinced that something good is just around the corner, indulged and supported by his long-suffering and ever-supportive wife. Another is Mr. Dick, a weak-minded gentleman who, saved by David's aunt from being locked up in an asylum, charms everyone with his simplicity and astounds all and sundry by his ability to see solutions and unite warring parties where 'normal' people are unable to see the wood for the trees (just don't mention King Charles...).

However, the most memorable character in the book is the ever 'umble Uriah Heep, a creature described so meticulously and horribly that the reader's skin crawls whenever his name makes its slimy way onto the page. The working class lawyer's clerk, who attaches himself to his employer in his misfortunes like a parasite, acts like a slow-moving cloud on a sunny day; gradually, but surely, his false servility and slimy obsequiessness cast a shadow over the happiness of the other characters, poisoning the happiness of David's friends as - HEEP! plots his dastardly revenge on the upper classes. Don't worry, this is Dickens...

'David Copperfield' is a fairly long book (my copy was around 750 pages), and this broad canvas allows Dickens to work at his best, spreading the story thinly over the framework of the pages so that he is able to colour in the gaps with characterisation and humorous asides. The part quoted by Hornby is a typical example; rather than just allowing the wandering David to sell off his jacket and be on his merry way, Dickens puts a wild, half-crazed pawnbroker in his path, forcing little David to wait outside the shop while the eccentric owner attempts to persuade him to accept a lower price, always adding the nonsense word 'Garoo!' to his utterances. Believe me, it's surreal.

The length of the story also allows us to follow a wide cast of personages and build our opinions of their characters as we go. This is important as one of the main ideas of the work is the fallibility of first impressions and the need to get to know someone intimately before making assumptions about their worth. Aunt Betsy, Mr. Dick, Mr. Micawber and Miss Moucher all rise in the reader's estimation as the story progresses while characters such as Steerforth and Littimer lose their initial lustre as we learn more about them. Naturally, some characters, whether good or bad, are exactly what they seem at first glance...

Finally, the book is about family. Although David never knew his father, and loses his mother early on in life, in reality he is surrounded by a group of people who love him and help him through the difficult periods of his life. As people come into his life and assist him in his path through Dickens' Bildungsroman, they become part of his family and often connect with David's other acquaintances. Peggotty, Traddles, Agnes and all the rest eventually form an extended family group which does more for David than a nuclear family ever could.

I know that up there in the northern hemisphere it's the start of winter and that you all need something to get you through the abysmal weather and the long nights. Might I suggest a nice warm room, a comfy chair, a cup of tea and 'David Copperfield'? You won't regret it.

58 - 'Oliver Twist' by Charles Dickens

Let's get it out in the open: I was not hugely impressed with this book. Before all you Dickensians flee for the exit, screaming in anguish, please let me explain my reasons; just like Fagin and the gang, I deserve a fair trial...

First things first. 'Oliver Twist' is, as most people in the western world are well aware, the tale of a boy who survives hardship in the form of life in the workhouse, a rough apprenticeship and a spell in a gang of thieves (none of whom, at any point, comes even close to bursting into song). Oliver Twist, the character, however, is a weak, uninteresting boy who actually takes up a lot less of the novel than you would expect from his prominent billing. He is more an excuse for Dickens to rant and rave, in pantomime fashion, about the iniquities of the laws governing the treatment of the Victorian poor than an actual, fully-rounded person.

Oliver is also (and this really annoys me) goodness incarnate. How else could you explain the fact that a young boy who has been abused his whole life and brought (dragged) up grudgingly by the authorities is able to resist the temptation of crime and the degrading behaviour of everyone he meets? If you or I (heaven forbid) had been subject to the same kind of woeful upbringing that Oliver undergoes, I guarantee that we would have been out on the streets of London snatching wallets and handkerchieves to our hearts' content - or, at least until we got caught. However, Oliver, sickly, saccharine-sweet Oliver, is so horrifed by the sight of such felonious behaviour that he quivers at the knees. Rubbish.

Many of the other characters in the book are also relatively boring. The whole array of personages from the right side of town, undoubtedly mirror images of the people actually reading the book in its original serialisation, are fairly sketchily drawn and are hard to remember on completion of the book; in fact, I'm hard pressed to recall many of their names, and I only finished it this morning...

However, perhaps the main reason I have for not really liking this book is not so much what it is as what it's not. It's not Dostoyevsky; it's not 'The Brothers Karamazov'. Having just finished the afore-mentioned Russian classic, anything was bound to suffer a little in comparison, but 'Oliver Twist', with its tweeness, and beautifully sanitised view of suffering, comes off especially badly against the stark, bare and bloody representation of life in Dostoyevsky's work. Who could care about Oliver after reading the fate of Dmitri, Ivan and Alyosha? How could such anodyne lovers as Harry and Rose(?) compare to Dmitri and Grushenka?

Of course, the book does have one redeeming feature, and that is the depiction of the darker side of the story. Bill Sikes, as nasty a piece of work as you're likely to find in literature, curses and threatens his way through the novel until his murderous betrayal and subsequent flight and descent into the darkest bowels of London. His persona looms so large that, by the bitter end, even his companion thieves are terrified by him and turn away from his gaze. The critics who accused Dickens of glamourising crime (and who would have been very smug if they had lived to see the stage version with the Artful Dodger singing and prancing around) were certainly off-target regarding Mr. Sikes.

And then there was Fagin. Not requiring more than one name to dominate the book, the 'dirty old Jew' is the personification of evil, the devil incarnate, spinning a web of sin and attracting young innocents like flies in order to corrupt and feast upon their souls. The longer the story goes on, the more we are drawn into his world, and the more complex the webs of intrigue surrounding him become. All is brought to a climax by his trial, surrounded by a packed house of baying spectators, vultures thirsting for the old criminal's blood...

...wish he'd got off.

In the introduction to my edition, the editor remarked that 'Oliver Twist' is notable for being an early, flawed work of a great writer, which is as close to saying that it's not that good as a paid review is going to get. I'm afraid that's not good enough for me; when the end of the reading year (same as the normal one) comes around, there's a good chance that this book will feature in my 'Hall of Shame', not what I would have expected from a work by the great Victorian novellist. Consider yourself... well and truly underwhelmed.

15 - 'A Tale of Two Cities' by Charles Dickens

'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...'. Well, at least old Charles was half right. An era where any embittered scumbag with a grudge and a loud mouth could get you a night in jail and a date with Madame Guillotine (Gillette has nothing on the close shave this woman gave), was probably not a nice time to be around. 'A Tale of Two Cities' is set in the time of the French Revolution and gives a short taste of what it was like to be alive (or not) at this pivotal historical event. This is one of the problems with the book.

The story was first published in weekly instalments in Dickens' periodical, 'All the Year Round'. Although it was later published in eight monthly parts, and then in a hard-back edition, most people at the time read the book in its serialised form. This format led to a very concise result, condensing forty-odd years (some of them among the most dramatic in human history) into just under 400 pages. There is a sense of the ferocity of the revolutionary years, but we miss out on a lot of the events necessary for a complete understanding of the time. Of course, when the book was written, this was unnecessary as the events were still (for some people at least) within living memory; for the modern reader, it seems a bit rushed, especially having read Dickens' door-stop novels such as 'Bleak House'.

It's important to point out, however, that there are still many good things about this book. the typical Dickensian characterisation is there, and Jerry Cruncher and Madame Defarge are wonderfully executed personalities (even if one wants to put people under the ground while the other just wants to get them back up again). The scenes in Paris, while a little contracted, make you feel as if you are at the Bastille, or La Place de la Guillotine; you can see the squalor and rancour of Saint-Antoine.

The book is saved, in my opinion, not just by the above bright spots, but by the sacrifice made by Sydney Carton. When I first read this book (a long time ago), it didn't dawn on me until the end exactly how the tale would unfold. Having read it again with this knowledge of events, the denouement was just as powerful, if not even more moving, having been foreshadowed by all the actions leading up to the tragic end. Being able to make such a sacrifice for love, Carton makes Darnay look transparent in comparison. Perhaps Lucy chose the wrong bloke after all...

When I first read 'A Tale of Two Cities', it was one of my favourite Dickens novels; however, after this re-reading, I'm not so sure. The content matter was made to be turned into an epic (and has been, many times); I don't think this book quite reaches those heights. It may well be a case of great expectations (sorry...), but I had some hard times (sorry again...) with this story. So far in 2009, I've read two books by Dickens, one brilliant, one not-so great; I've got 'Oliver Twist' waiting on my bookshelf, so I'll give that a go sometime soon and let that be the decider!

In short? Good book, great start, memorable ending - it's just a shame that there wasn't more in between. Definitely not the best of times for Mr. Dickens (OK, I'll just stop now).

8 - 'Bleak House' by Charles Dickens

In 'Oliver Twist', Dickens had already coined the phrase 'The law is an ass', but it is 'Bleak House' which shows the English legal system of the early-nineteenth century in all its assinine glory, ears and all. The story of a corrupt and unethical system, mercilessly bleeding dry those whom it supposes to represent, is the major concern of this great, sprawling novel, which takes in Dickens' usual London haunts, as well as drawing in other strands from outside the metropolis into the great imperial capital. Just as Mr. Tulliver in George Eliot's 'Mill on the Floss' learns that nothing good comes from going to law, those pitiful characters who get too closely involved with the cases in the Court of Chancery are likewise sucked dry and ground down, some even to the point of death.

If you've never read Dickens, the first few pages, or chapters, may leave you wondering what all the fuss is about. The writing is sensational, ironic, comic, and may leave you with impressions of a holiday read rather than classic literature (and you wouldn't be wrong - Dickens was a kind of pop star of his day, with his books released in installments and his public readings continuing almost until his death); however, the more you read, the more you get sucked in to the plot; and the plot, as is common in Victorian literature, is a good one.

To hold the reader's attention for almost 1000 pages by weaving mutiple plot strands together so skilfully that the resolutions do not appear contrived or over-coincidental takes a masterly control of the narrative, but it is the vast host of characters, of course, where Dickens shows his genius. The vile Smallweeds, the vagabond street sweeper, Jo (who don't know nothink), the half insane Miss Flite, the charming and mercurial Inspector Bucket; these characters, primarily conceived to support the main protagonists, steal the show thanks to their being so well drawn (as befits the creations of a man whose first popular work was entitled 'Sketches by Boz'). That the reader is able to follow the story and identify (or not...) with the people involved in it is further testimony to Dickens' talent. I won't spoil the enjoyment by revealing any of the plot, but I can say with great confidence that you'll guess many of the twists and turns, be slightly surprised by one or two and be floored by at least one (I never saw it coming!).

Coming back to Dickens after a long, long absence, filled as it was with books by Eliot, James, Hardy, Conrad and Lawrence, I was slightly worried that his rollercoaster novels would appear bland and inconsequential next to the works of the great masters of psychological literature. Thankfully, that was never going to happen. While Dickens cannot compare to the aforementioned authors when it comes to what's going on inside the mind, he blows them out of the water when it comes to reflecting the world around him. There's a reason why we still talk of Dickensian settings and characters; you don't get your own adjective for nothing (or nothink).