Greg S’s Reviews > Vanity Fair > Status Update

This sounds awful, not alluring. — “He would say it was a warm evening, or ask his partner to take an ice, with a tone as sad and confidential as if he were breaking her mother's death to her…”

Too quit or not quit this book. Although this contributes to George Osborns’s already terrible character. — “…idea of a union with the latter appear doubly ludicrous and odious. Carriages and opera-boxes, thought he; fancy being seen in them by the side of such a mahogany charmer as that!”

What the hell, Thackeray? — “…a slave-owner they say—connected with the Cannibal Islands in some way or other…”

Alright, take it easy, Thackeray. — “…crazed almost with misfortune and raving with senile anger.”

A small aside from me, I’m reading about the nickname “Boney” and how the English used Bonaparte as the boogeyman to threaten their children. Like this lullaby telling a child to stop crying or else Bonaparte will hear them and “limb from limb, will tear you,/just as pussy tears a mouse.”

I did not notice earier than Thackeray wrote an aside how Malaria and Yellow Fever drove out England from the West Indies. — No mention of the Hatian rebellion and victory, I noticed.

Nope. Not a good metaphor. — “He saw a slave before him in that simple yielding faithful creature…”

Hm. I know the focus is on the man and the wife’s faith in him, blah blah. But how awful for Mrs. Sedley — “When he sank back into his seat, it was the wife that took the office of consoler. She took his trembling hand…”

Well, I’m glad I’m a little familiar with the French revolution so that I may understand some of these references. Good luck, high school students!

When was this book written? 1848? And Thackeray is already playing with narrative and starting the chapter in the middle of the action?