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The Radio 3 Boards > Arts Other Than Music > Literature > Charles Dickens' Bleak House
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Author Topic: Charles Dickens' Bleak House  (Read 771 times)
Turfan Fragment
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Formerly known as Chafing Dish
« Reply #30 on: 00:02:11, 17-07-2008 »
Quote from: Ian Pace on 20:59:29, 14-07-2008
Quote from: perfect wagnerite on 20:50:09, 14-07-2008
Having said that, Gradgrind and Bounderby live on, and still run call centres and contract cleaning agencies ...
Remember this chappie?



That's how I always imagined Mr Gradgrind (Boyson, as Education Minister, shared Gradgrind's views on the sole importance of 'facts' as well).
I seem to remember Gradgrind describes as having eyes that seemed to peek out from under a great stone wall that was his forehead. Does that describe this 'chappie'?
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Don Basilio
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« Reply #31 on: 12:02:45, 19-07-2008 »
Whoopee ! I finished Bleak House Friday night.  I am now reading some Ivy Compton Burnett, as an astringent and utterly unsentimental change.



Here is Richard in thrall to the deadly lawyer Mr Vholes (I have three daughters and an aged father in the Vale of Taunton to support.)

I am so glad to have encouraged you to read it A.  Remember it was published at first in monthly installments, so the original readers would have taken about 18 months to finish it, and I doubt if many of them followed the plot at the end of that time.

I once thought that as Dickens' plots were so corny, but his descriptions were wonderful, perhaps I should try his travel writing and journalism.  I did, and they were not half as gripping.  The plots are awful in themselves, but they are the washing line on which Dickens hangs out his utterly vivid situations and characters.

So I hope you enjoy it, A.
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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance
Don Basilio
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« Reply #32 on: 17:15:16, 22-07-2008 »
I'd  like to work out my reaction, as to why I find the book so good, when its corny sides (melodrama, sentimentality, lack of psychological depth) are so obvious.

The structure is unique as far as I know.  A first person narrative (with uniquely for Dickens as far as I know, a female narrator) is alternated with third person narrative, written in the present tense.  I know of no other C19 novel in the present.  It gives a curious air to the narrative - photographic and vivid but strangely detached.  Can it be said to be an omniscient narrator?

The first two chapters are both bravura set pieces in the present describing the two oppressive milieu which will dominate the book: the Court of Chancery (I copied a page above) and Chesney Wold, Sir Leicester Deadlock's gloomy country estate down in Lincolnshire.

Why these two descriptions of such oppressive worlds should be exciting is strange, but it is rather like Verdi describing a auto da fe, a storm or a heartless party, and still being incredibly exciting.

I'll think a bit more about the characters...
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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance
Don Basilio
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« Reply #33 on: 09:35:26, 30-09-2008 »
I'll just round off my blog here.

Dickens' characters are often memorable, but often thought of as grotesque and superficial.

But if he is depicting a highly oppressive world, which makes no allowance for the individual, then his minor characters display a wonderful array of survival tactics, pushing individuality far beyond mere eccentricity.

For many of them, their survival tactic is to exploit others, but Dickens still seems to enjoy their outrageousness while he exposes their hypocrisy - Mrs Jellaby with her philanthropy, Harold Skimpole playing on his charm to justify his irresponsibilty, oily Mr Chadband the preacher, Mr Bucket of the Dectective who will play with a family's children to effect the arrest of their best friend, Mr Vhoules the explotiative lawyers (to support his three daughters), Mr Kenge the illiterate rag and bones.

And those who do not exploit are liable to be exploited - ineffective Mr Snagsby, mad Miss Flite.

I never cared for Juvenile leads in any work.
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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance
pim_derks
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« Reply #34 on: 09:41:27, 30-09-2008 »
Dickens: an excellent writer to turn to in a time of financial crisis.

Trollope and Balzac are even better in this field.
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #35 on: 19:57:35, 30-09-2008 »
Quote from: Don Basilio on 09:35:26, 30-09-2008
then his minor characters display a wonderful array of survival tactics, pushing individuality far beyond mere eccentricity.


But don't you find them to be two-dimensional ciphers, in the main?  Sad
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"I was, for several months, mutely in love with a coloratura soprano, who seemed to me to have wafted straight from Paradise to the stage of the Odessa Opera-House"
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Don Basilio
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« Reply #36 on: 21:12:53, 30-09-2008 »
No!  That's just what I'm saying.  There is a whole depth of trying inadequately to come to terms with human inadequacy and tragedy implied.  It is the triumph of the human spirit, often selfish but never boring.

Dostoevsky is less fun, but the same insight is there, I suspect.
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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance
Don Basilio
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Era solo un mio sospetto
« Reply #37 on: 11:11:01, 01-10-2008 »
I;ve just read Bulgarov's The Master and Margarita, (thanks for the recommendation) and that makes its effect more through grotesque distortion than detailed analysis of character.
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To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh: a time to mourn, and a time to dance
Antheil
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« Reply #38 on: 14:15:39, 27-10-2008 »
Resurrecting the Dickens thread - did anyone see the new Andrew Davies adaptation of Little Dorrit yesterday evening?

I have never read the book so do not know the plot but I thought it was excellent, really enjoyed it, anyone got any views on it?
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Reality, sa molesworth 2, is so sordid it makes me shudder
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