Little Dorrit II: Chapters 23 - 34

[Debra Diggs]

Also, thanks Nisa for the links. I use them all the time.

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

So do I!

[Mark]

Now that we've finished the novel, the BBC adaptation is waiting for any of us who haven't seen it yet. :)

https://youtu.be/TzXMljRHfas

Not sure about country exclusions, but Amazon Prime people can watch it free. Eight hours. Great cast. (Eddie Marsan plays Mr Pancks, for example)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00f...

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

LOL Mark - I have just this minute posted about the earlier one, on our TV and films adaptations thread!

Do you prefer one over the other?

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

I need to thank Kathleen, Connie, Katy and Terris for our lovely comments. I'm so glad you all enjoyed the read, and really appreciate what you said :)

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Jenny - About kidney pie: Steak and Kidney Pie, with meat and gravy inside a shortcrust pastry shell, and served with extra gravy (meat sauce), potatoes and vegetables is a popular traditional English dish. However I'd never heard of "Kidney pie" alone, until reading of it in Flora's pie shop episode.

The Victorians seemed to eat far more meat than we do though, especially offal, and perhaps cheaper cuts. They had few vegetables :( It could be literally what it says - or perhaps it was a meat pie, but served inside a kidney-shaped dish. Or both!

[Mark]

Jean, re the adaptations - the first one I saw with Derek Jacobi was good - done in the 1980s.

But I like the longer length, more detail, and many of the characters of the 2008 one, including Claire Foy. It did win seven Emmy awards.

But Derek Jacobi and Alec Guiness are hard to top from the first one.

[Mark]

re the1980s adaptation - Also I thought the way they did it from two different viewpoints was great. When I read LD after watching that, I was expecting that plot device to be used and was disappointed.

Ha! But adaptations are just that. The recent BBC one is more faithful to the novel and I appreciate that as a Dickens fan.

[Nisa]

Bionic Jean wrote: "So do I!"

Debra wrote: "Also, thanks Nisa for the links. I use them all the time."

Jean, Debra I'm happy if they are helpful :))

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Mark - I hadn't remembered the American awards, but neither are completely successful in my opinion, (unlike the 2 excellent ones of Bleak House). But I've talked about it in more detail in the other thread.

[Mark]

OK I'll read that thread. thx.

[Judy]

I'm up to Chapter 26 now. Although the bursting of the bubble is brilliantly done, I do find it hard to believe that Arthur would really be taken in by Merdle to this extent and invest all the company's money - he has seemed so cautious and upright up to now, and so anxious to behave rightly at all times, that I just don't feel it quite goes with his character.

[Sara]

It is lauded as such a sure thing that it does not feel like gambling to Arthur (which of course it is). I don't think he could have been persuaded to do it under any circumstances had it not been that everyone from the top down wanted to get in because it was such a secure investment. How could everyone be wrong? Easily, of course.

[Judy]

I've finished now and have really enjoyed reading this great novel again. Many thanks to Jean for leading the discussion so well - I tended to dip in and out but have enjoyed following through the threads as I've reached each chapter (I'm another one using Nisa's links!)

I think all Dickens's explanation of the back story in Chapter 30 is a bit convoluted and it's hard to get my head round the legacy to Frederick's brother's youngest daughter, but it doesn't really matter - and I love the final paragraph with Arthur and Amy starting their lives together. I also love Phiz's illustration of the wedding, which includes Flora and John Chivery looking wistful at the back of the church.

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Judy - you've reached the end! I'm so pleased as now you'll be able to join in our new read tomorrow :)

Thanks for all your great contributions and kind words. As for Arthur going against his cautious instincts, I think he put a lot of trust in Pancks, as he knew what a wizard he was with money. And Pancks, with the best of motives, made it seem as though Arthur would be wilfully denying Daniel Doyce a profit, and with his mother perhaps to look after in the future ... I think Arthur just couldn't hold out against the majority view and his specialist adviser any longer.

I too think the illustrations add a lot - especially all the telling details in those by Phiz - and will be searching them out for our next read of a main novel :)

[ClaraBelle]

My copy just now came in but now it’s so many weeks late! But I’m excited to read it again, as I never finished it the first time!

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Oh my goodness ClaraBelle! Well you can still read along with all the comments, and add your own, and hopefully it will be a bit like doing it in "real time". I hope you enjoy it as much as we did :)

[Milena]

Bionic Jean wrote: "Book II: Chapter 27:

The next installment begins back in the Marshalsea Prison, where Arthur Clennam is now an inmate and no longer just a visitor:

'The Day was Sunny' - James Mahoney"

Today I read Chapter 27. I love this picture by James Mahoney. Arthur seated alone in a barren room, with his hand laying abandoned on his hand.

[Milena]

Sara wrote: "I do feel sorry for John and I must say I am glad he has opened Arthur's eyes to Amy's feelings. I he ever indicates to her that the feeling is mutual, she will accept him in any condition she happens to find him in. In fact, if all her money is not lost, she would gladly give it all to clear his debt."

I have the same feelings for John, Sara: I’m sorry for him, but finally Arthur opened his eyes.
Now I’m thinking about Mr Dorrit and his intention to benefit “by the advice of that wonderful man (Mr Merdle) in the disposal of his fortune”. How it sounds funny that sentence to me now!
I keep my finger crossed, and I hope that all Amy’s money is not lost.

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Mila - I almost feel like reading this again along with you, even though I finished it so recently :)

I agree about Young John Chivery, and always feel so sorry for him. He is such a kind, honourable person.

This illustrations by James Mahoney vary quite a bit in quality, I think. He isn't the greatest draughtman in the world ... but when he gets it right, they are superb. I agree, this is one such :)

Ah, that "wonder of the world". He can do no wrong :)

[Sean]

*Dickens’ 1851-7 novels are said to be the darker ones, and in Little Dorrit the reader can be forgiven for taking ‘dark’ literally as well as in the figurative sense

For example, throughout the whole of the text in Little Dorrit, there’s something in excess of 100 references to ‘dark’ and its modifications ‘darker’, ‘darkness’, etc, as with ‘shadow’, and ‘cry’. But fewer than 100 references to ‘laugh(ed ter ing)

Hardly a passage goes by without some kind of ‘darkness’ or lurking ‘shadow’. So: "a grave dark man of forty", "Dark and miserable as ever", "lying idle in the dark to rust", "Dull and dark he found it", "The dark mystery", "down into the dark valley of the prison", "resume his own darker place.", "over the darker side of her character", "on the darker road of life?", "the darkest savage creeps out of his hole", " he was oftener in its darkest places ", "saw a moving shadow among the street lamps", "shadow of uneasy observation", "the shadow of the Marshalsea wall", "peopled with ugly old shadows", "striving with the prison shadows.", "The sly shadows which seemed to dart out of hiding""Gowan had fallen like a shadow."

And much of the ‘laugh(ing)(ed) is sinister, too:

Rigaud in chapter 1

“When Monsieur Rigaud laughed, a change took place in his face, that was more remarkable than prepossessing. His moustache went up under his nose, and his nose came down over his moustache, in a very sinister and cruel manner.” (only Dickens can make us believe that moustaches can be ‘sinister and cruel’)

Or as his alias Blandois in chapter 30

“But Mr Blandois, smiting him in a friendly manner on the back, only laughed”

We even get a laugh from him as Lagnier in chapter 11

“Monsieur Lagnier laughed; and having given it a squeeze [Baptist’s hand], tossed it up and let it go.”

However, there are some unusual laughs, as in chapter 20:

“The parrot had broken into a violent fit of laughter …”

In chapter 13 Panks blows off a sound that occurs to Clennam to be Panks’ ‘way of laughing’

And the most unusual laugh has to be that of Baptist from chapter 25

“Laugh!” echoed Mr Pancks. ”He looks to me as if every tooth in his head was always laughing.”

In spite of all the ‘dark’ references, Little Dorrit is rife with comedy, don’t you think?

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

These are great observations Sean - thank you so much for sharing them. I agree completely. Charles Dickens has the ability to make me smile or laugh even in the midst of tragedy, and I don't know any other author who can do that :)

[Sean]

I like how Dickens moves from a main or omniscient narrator to multi-narrators throughout Little Dorrit.

However, for me (and this is nothing more or less than my humble opinion), I think it takes too long for Dickens to use this literary device. The delay in using this style could be down to the fact that the novels were in serial form, in which case the story wouldn’t necessarily seem so protracted before we get to the real psychology of some of the characters.



With the exception of the omniscient narrator, the others are female - well, actually, I may be wrong here. I tend to assume that the main narrator is male, but that’s not necessarily so, it’s just that when reading the novel I’m at a disadvantage of having read several bios of Dickens, and can’t help relating some of the themes to his own experience - but should this preclude me from accepting that the main narrator could also be female?

Obviously the main narrator has the widest scope of stylistics; humour, satire and irony (this trio is forever present in Dickens) which are at their height when narrating the morals of individuals (Murdle’s), or the failings of society, including ‘lower’ society aping ‘higher’ society, as in chapter 25 where the chief butler resigns the ‘Seals of Office’, and particularly the Department of Circumlocution: ‘How Not To Do It’; . The main narrator’s able to make us see the trio in a single word or phrase: bossom, bar, banker or a more creative form of this synecdoche as in: the benevolent ‘shining bald head with long grey hair at its sides and back, like floss silk or spun glass’ (Casby)

The first stylistic change in tone comes about in chapter 24 with Amy’s fairy tale told to Maggy - her tale is really about unrequited (hers) love and is serious - but Dickens still manages to inject a bit of humour through Maggy’s punctuated interventions: ‘Almost as good as a hospital. Only there ain’t no Chicking in it.’ A further secondary narrative is given in chapter 11 by Amy in her missive to Clennam, which in general is sad and certainly devoid of any humour (no Maggy to the rescue, here), and relate her dreams: needlework, Marshalsea, faces…. It’s no less effective for its apparent lack of humour, it’s as though Dickens is, at last, making a transition from story to psychology.

It’s the same with Miss Wade’s, the other narrator, who’s real story takes its beginning in chapter 20, and comes to fruition in chapter 21 with the reading of the papers she handed to Clennam . There’s no humour in her story, but plenty of psychology, and for all her so called failings, I think her character now has real depth.



Logically, Amy Dorrit will have her story, after all she is the eponymous heroine, but why Miss Wade? Why this woman, the woman who had the ‘misfortune of not being a fool’? Is Dickens portraying her as some kind of pathological femme fatele who, Fagin-like, recruits malleable orphans into believing that acts of kindness from men are schemes that should be rejected?

This manifestation of ‘self-tormenting’ and loathing seems to me a characteristic that Dickens portrays in women when they’ve been rejected in love (as with Rosa Dartle, Wade’s near parallel).

And I think Dickens attacks women on a second front in Little Dorrit with his portray of Maria Beadnell as Flora - she may not herself have seen it that way, but he really was sticking the boot in, in both appearance and her wits. Spurned or spurner, it doesn’t seem to matter with Dickens, the culprit was obviously woman - (view spoiler)[at least Bradley Headstone was prepared to go out and commit a good old fashioned murder in the name of love (hide spoiler)]

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Hi Sean,

Gosh what a lot to ponder here! Actually the only novel which has a female narrator is Bleak House, which alternates between Esther Summerson and an omniscient narrator throughout. There are reasons for this, which we may discuss when we come to that novel ...

Perhaps in Little Dorrit you are thinking of Amy herself, and there are certainly letters from her, but otherwise she is not the narrator. We do sometimes see things from her point of view though, especially in the second book.

The main narrator’s able to make us see the trio in a single word or phrase: bossom, bar, banker.. Yes I particularly like that too :) It's actually Charles Dickens's own voice coming in there, in a very witty and sarcastic chapter - pure Dickens! Nobody else could have written this so exuberantly.

Also none of the characters would have the wit to see and express the word-play - it's not in their nature. But it is very much in Charles Dickens's playful nature. So you could say is is the author's personal voice, but not omniscient. Neither is it a "separate" author's voice adopted for the sake of this novel - it's just him! :D

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

"There’s no humour in her story, but plenty of psychology, and for all her so called failings, I think her character now has real depth."

Miss Wade is one of Charles Dickens's most intriguing characters, and as you say, a great character study. Yes, we see her "diary", but is is reliable? Did she write it for herself - or as she says, to give someone in case it proved to be useful. We cannot accept is as completely candid, but her own view of herself in certain moods. She certainly has similarities to Rosa Dartle in David Copperfield - good choice - but Charles Dickens gives her more depth.

"I think Dickens attacks women on a second front in Little Dorrit with his portray of Maria Beadnell as Flora ... he really was sticking the boot in, in both appearance and her wits."

Flora is written true to how he latterly felt about Maria Beadnell. Yes, she witters on appallingly, but there is intelligence there - she is clearly well read - and perspicacity, Plus her actions are always kind. She is a positive force for good in the novel - and essential to influence the story, much as (view spoiler)[Miss Mowcher (hide spoiler)] does in David Copperfield.

Yes, it's a little spiteful of him ... but this is superficial. I personally like the way that Charles Dickens does not always associate good and morally upright traits with attractive people! So what if Flora Finching gossips and is fat? I like her :) I like Aunt Betsey in David Copperfield too.

[Bionic Jean, "Dickens Duchess"]

Spurned or spurner, it doesn’t seem to matter with Dickens, the culprit was obviously woman I think this is a little unfair!

(Please put your final sentence under a spoiler tag by the way!!) Edit - thank you!

Some readers criticise Charles Dickens for making his females too innocent, which is almost the opposite! I think the fact is that he was a Victorian writer, and thus reflecting both the society and (largely) the attitudes of his time. Individuals in any society, and at any time, who are disappointed in love react in different ways, but sometimes their gender, and place in society, dictates what options they then have.

In (view spoiler)[Our Mutual Friend, Bradley Headstone is an incredibly complex character psychologically. I feel great sympathy for him, although in the end he is not portrayed that way.

Whole books could be written about him - or Miss Wade! (hide spoiler)]

Great comment :) I look forward to you joining in with our next group read of a novel, Sean :)

[Curt]

I like Little Dorrit. Some of the language inspired me in writing the second novel in my Scrooge and Cratchit, Detective series.
God bless Charles Dickens.