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Stephen Hegedus
(last edited Jun 05, 2012 08:38AM)
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Jun 05, 2012 08:38AM
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I've had people ask me what my favourite Dickens novel is, but I find it's an impossible question to answer. There are some I like more than others, but is there one that defines all the reasons I like him? Nope. What about you guys?
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Read some more and get back to me. Oliver Twist at the very least!
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That and Dickens mostly wrote seriealised stories in magazines - if the public (or a friend) didn't like a story development he'd drop/alter it on the fly.I actually haven't read much Dickens, though I believe I've seen most of them on the BBC. Got put off by my school trying to make me read Great Expectations and never got past chapter 8. Since then I've read Oliver Twist (funny but a little too sickly sweet in places, am glad most film/tv adaptations cut the Rose character) and all of his ghost stories except A Christmas Carol (some good, some bad, most somewhere in between, but he does try to do interesting things rather than go for straight up horror each time). So am hoping I'll be more receptive to appreciating Great Expectations once I finally get my copy. Gunna have to cram in my reading to the last couple of weeks of the month though - postage is being slooow.
Louise wrote: "That and Dickens mostly wrote seriealised stories in magazines..."You got it. It terms of length, I believe at the time authors were payed per word. The more they wrote, the more they were payed. The example my Lit. teacher always used was The Fall of the House of Usher. The descriptions are ridiculously detailed. Part of the reason was the payment. That theory lacks too much romance for me though.
I love Dickens, but I would be hard pressed to name a favorite. I have read a fair number, but there are still many left to go. I can say, though, that my least favorite was The Old Curiosity Shop. It's a bit too melodramatic for me, especially when it gets to the end. I don't dislike it, though - there are still lots of great characters and plot points, and Quilp is a great villain.
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I'm new here, so this is one of my first comments.I noticed the comments about Dickens and Poe being paid by the word and wanted to interject. People frequently make this assertion about Dickens, but this is the first time I've heard it about Poe. I'm a university professor, and I specialize in Poe, who overlaps quite a lot with Dickens and hung out with him when the latter visited the States the first time.
Anyway, that Dickens--and Poe and others--were paid by the word is a common misconception that has been passed along for decades. Dickens was paid by installment but not by the word. There's some discussion of this at the Dickens project: http://dickens.ucsc.edu/resources/faq...
Poe is a slightly different story but still was not paid by the word and often actually received no payment for a story. For example, Poe edited Burton's Gentleman's Magazine when "The Fall of the House of Usher" appeared in it, and they could not afford to pay authors much if anything for their work. Poe wrote most of the pieces in that issue, even though he didn't sign most and used a pen name on others, and he received no payment outside of what he received as the editor of the magazine (about $10 a week).
This is one of my passions. I could talk about Poe and his contemporaries all day:)
Robin wrote: "Anyway, that Dickens--and Poe and others--were paid by the word is a common misconception that has been passed along for decades. Dickens was paid by installment but not by the word. "Thank you, thank you, thank you. That's one of my pet peeves too. I didn't know that about Poe though, so thanks for that too! I really need to read more Poe, I think. Everything I have read so far I've loved but somehow I've never got round to picking up his complete works off the bookshelf.
Oh, sorry. By complete works I just meant the big anthology with all his poems/short stories in I have sitting on my bookshelf.
Rida wrote: "Ohhh, thanks for clearing that up, you guys (this right here is why I love GR :P). But Robin, that's so sad! Poe was a genius! Though true, horror stories in the Victorian era were probably like ..."
I just wanted to say that I love your characterization of heavy metal! It really made me laugh, mostly because it's spot on. Even my friends look at me like I'm crazy some times when I blast some angry metal after a frustrating day.
What, only freaks like heavy metal? Uh-oh....
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Yes, for example, Alice Cooper and Black Sabbath.
I love Black Sabbath. I've only heard a few songs by Alice Cooper. I like to balance metal with some "old time rock 'n roll" as Bob Seger would say.
I'm gonna stir the crazy pot and ask you guys how you feel about this, http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2012...
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What?! It's so fake, it's ridiculous. Why could they not just leave it to our imagination? Big let down.
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Agreed. It's like they took the images out of my head, beat them against a rock a few times until they were deadened and then used them as the foundation for this park. Sigh.
Haha, Dickens World. My big sister actually lives near there so I already have half-formed plans to visit sometime, just for giggles.I actually don't think the idea is too bad - there's a great outdoor museum in North England where they've taken apart genuine Victorian buildings due to be demolished, piece by piece, and then put them back together to form a 'new' Victorian town for people to explore. However this just looks painfully fake and very very gimicky. If I do go I'll be sure to write up a report and take some photos for you all though!
