And so thirty-one Regency romances, fifteen Kindle freebies, innumerable cups of tea and many more books later, I have finally finished this Dickens masterpiece. It took me exactly thirteen months, and I had time to read an alarming total of eighty-three books in between the start and finish of Bleak House. Why the five stars then, you ask? If it took me that long to get through it, surely it's not worth the effort?Well, it is. It's awesome. Very put-downable in my opinion though, and I will be completely honest, extremely boring in some instances. I wasn't even half-way through the first chapter that I was already feeling like Lady Dedlock.I don't know what possessed me to start reading that book during summer, when it's the perfect time for fluffy romances, popsicles and beaches, but there I was, struggling to get into dreary, smoky London streets and rainy, gloomy Chesney Wold. No wonder my sense of boredom only intensified!Do I really not have anything else to do but read this? Do I really want to commit to this tiny-printed 880 pages manuscript?Nawww, not really. Get the brain candy out, I already need it after ten pages. Why are there so many descriptions? So many details? Do I really have to sit through the effects the rain has on everybody and everything? Who are these people anyways?So, back on the shelf this door-stop went, and remained untouched for many a month, gathering up dust and cobwebs (not really, but almost!), while I escaped most of the time to Regency England, only to come out, ignoring the nagging voice that urged me to pick this back up, before plunging again and forgetting all about it.Then one morning, I finally decided that my behaviour was ridiculous, jumped out of bed, and rescued poor dusty Bleak House from its place under the bed on the shelf, and read it through in one sitting. Ha! Just kidding, but I wish, as it would have saved me so much time!! What really happened is that after taking it in small doses and getting to a point where I seriously thought of abandoning it for good, a lovely and clever friend of mine suggested I should perhaps...watch the BBC mini-series??!Heck, why not! It can't get any worse than it is now, I thought. So I watched it. And fell completely head over heels in love with it. No joke. It's THAT good. I don't blame anyone who wishes to stay away from Dickens novels, but that movie, you need to see it. Seriously, start by watching the trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_9SB...Sounds amazing, no? That's when I realized that beneath all the lavish descriptions, the long speeches, the fancy turn of phrases and the annoying characters, lay an incredible, suspenseful and thrilling story.At the heart of Bleak House is the on-going, never-ending court case of Jarndyce & Jarndyce. John Jarndyce of Bleak House is long dead, but he wrote more than one will, so nobody knows who should inherit the money. The present Mr. John Jarndyce, now residing at Bleak House, had decided to take Miss Ada Clare and Mr. Richard Carstone, two cousin orphans, under his protection. He is also their distant cousin, and a very kind, devoted and benevolent man. Along with them also comes Miss Esther Summerson; a very quiet, sensible and intelligent young woman, who shall serve as companion to Miss Clare. Miss Summerson is also an orphan, but there is a great mystery surrounding her birth. Nobody knows who her parents are, and the lady who brought her up always said that she was a disgrace. Off they all go to Bleak House, where they are to reside in peace, tranquilly awaiting the result of Jarndyce & Jarndyce. Miss Clare and Mr. Carstone have a claim in the case, and may inherit a lot of money from it. However, the case has ruined many men who'd pined all their hopes on it, and Richard is encouraged to seek a profession and make his own way in life, without waiting for the case to be solved. Meanwhile, Mr. Tulkinghorn, the lawyer, is paying a call on his most important client, the proud and respected Sir Leicester Dedlock. He and his Lady are sitting in the drawing-room and Mr. Tulkinghorn is about to read to them on the advancements in the case of J&J. Perceiving the hand-writing on one of the documents, my Lady is greatly disturbed, and so too is Mr. Tulkinghorn in seeing the effect it has on her.As soon as he is back in his office, he starts off an investigation that will prove as intriguing and mysterious as it is cruel and manipulative. Mr. Tulkinghorn, that cold, calm, menacing and calculating lawyer, has caught the start of an intrigue in which its chain of events will forever change the lives of more people than originally bargained for. Everything is intertwined and suspiciously connected, and it will be layer upon layer of twists and turns before it is all resolved. In my opinion, there are two major heroines in this novel. The first, the young and courageous Esther Summerson, who is all happiness and consideration towards Mr. Jarndyce, who has done her the very great honour of making her his housekeeper. Torn between her devotion to Mr. Jarndyce, her love for the young doctor Mr. Woodcourt and her desperate desire to find the identity of her mother, Esther remains true to herself and loyal to her friends. She is kind, generous and very dependable. The second heroine is the great Lady Dedlock. She is one of the most fascinating women I have ever read about, and a great favourite of mine. Tall, graceful, once an acknowledged beauty in the long-gone days of her youth, Lady Dedlock is a model of perfect composure, deportment and manners. She appears ice-cold and impenetrable, carries herself as if she were a Queen and rarely betrays any emotion of feeling. But this great Lady has a secret, deeply buried inside her, and she suffers under its weight every day. Married for many years to the proud Sir Leicester Dedlock, she has done her best to be as good a wife to him as she can possibly be, and he in return loves her unconditionally. Though many years her senior, and a bit rough around the edges, Sir Leicester's devotion and admiration for his Lady are extremely touching. "His noble earnestness, his fidelity, his gallant shielding of her, his general conquest of his own wrong and his own pride for her sake, are simply honourable, manly and true."However, the importance he attaches to his good name and the reputation of his family are very great indeed. Lady Dedlock knows that. And the more Mr. Tulkinghorn inquires about, the more in dread she becomes of ruining the Dedlock family. When watching the mini-series, the excitement and suspense are there from the very beginning, and don't drop once until the ending. When reading the book, there are many slow parts and endless paragraphs, but with a little bit of skimming here and there, it becomes as exciting as the movie - or almost. ;) The whole thing is so intense and so genius though, that once you've past the first 250 pages or so, it becomes easier to read as the suspense grows. Many characters are hella annoying, fair warning, both in movie and book, and it is only with the fear of making a whole in my wall with the heavy brick that I didn't throw it in frustration, nor did I do anything to do the DVD since I had borrowed it from the library. But gaahhh, some of them drove me nuts!!I don't want to spoil anything (because y'all gonna go read this now, right?? Or at least watch the movie, RIGHT?? Riiiiight???), and so I will say nothing about the ending, simply that whether or not it has a HEA is entirely arguable and depends on each individual's point of view. Five stars Bleak House gets, for its sheer excellence and brilliancy, even though I was as excited as a five-year-old on Christmas morning when I turned the last page and realized it was finally over. :P :PAnd now, since my wonderful friend Becca had banned me from posting any Richard Armitage pictures until this book was finished, I cannot leave you without a few "delectables", which will hopefully not make you forget all about Bleak House so soon, because, remember, the movie is a must-see!! (And I'm talking about the 2009 mini-series with Gillian Anderson as Lady Dedlock and Anna Maxwell Martin as Miss Summerson -- I haven't seen the other version) On that note: <3 <3*oh my word he's so swoony*Many thanks to Hana, who decided to buddy-read it with me (even though she finished waaaayyyy before me) and made me watch the movie to keep me going, Tweety who encouraged me to finish it before its year-old anniversary (I didn't make it but it was a good challenge!), Becca who forbade me have anything to do with RA pictures (cruel, but served its end!) and Jaima, who suggested we should binge-read Regency romances after finishing our big books. Thank you also to all who encouraged me to push through and keep going, I am so glad I was able to finish it!! :DGroup read with the Enchanted Serenity of Classics group, buddy read with Hana and group read with the Bleak House View and Read group.
Overwhelmed is how I would describe myself when facing the task of reducing this monumental work to a couple of paragraphs for easy consumption on the internet. Dickens manages to capture the spirit of his times on a grand canvas, doing for English literature and early Victorian society what Hugo did for the French, Tolstoy for the Russians, Goethe for the Germans. The main difference I noticed, is that Dickens focus is not on great battles that changed the course of history or larger than life heroes. He is showing the ordinary life of the little people, their struggles to make ends meet and to survive injustice, sickness and penury. More than a very successful writer of popular adventures, he is a social crusader, an early investigative journalist who is not merely observing and reporting the facts, he is editorializing from the pulpit against poverty, against lack of education and lack of mercy, against intolerance and prejudice.Bleak House sets its guns on the Chancery Court, the antiquated legal institution that was suffocated in his time under entrenched bureaucracy and graft. Dickens had direct experience of its evil ways: 'although he had won a suit against plagiarists that he had brought before Chancery in 1844, he himself had to pay the considerable sum of 700 pounds incurred in the proceedings when the plagiarists declared bankruptcy. So vexed was he by the experience that, when advised to initiate another piracy suit, he refused: 'I know of nothing that could come, even of a successful action, which would be worth the mental trouble and disturbance it would cost.' This from the introduction; in the book, Dickens gets even more radical in his comments : Being in Chancery it's being ground to bits in a slow mill; it's being roasted at a slow fire; it's being stung to death by single bees; it's being drowned by drops; it's going mad by grains. The opening chapter sets the mood for the novel: a city of lost hopes, shrouded in mists, barricaded in empty traditionss, burried under avalanches of paperwork. The famous Jarndyce & Jarndyce lawsuit has already lasted for decades and now it ensnares three young people in its mesh : Esther Summerson, the principal narrator, and two wards in the suit : Richard Carstone and Ada Clare.The plot is almost inexistent for about two-thirds of this major volume, with most of the scenes and character studies apparently unrelated and simply assembled together in a comprehensive picture of London and the countryside in early to mid 1800, from the lowest slums of the capital to the sumptuous mansions of the gentry. The cast is huge, yet easy to follow up, given Dickens main strength as a narrator : creating memorable, colourful characters using his acerbic wit and barbed arrows of sarcasm. While I had observed that almost all of these personages are static, finishing the novel in the same moral position they started (good ones remain good, bad ones remain bad, with the possible exceptions of Carstone and Leicester, and with Ada the most useless and decorative of them all), they were nevertheless jumping off the page fully formed and individualized. A comprehensive list is beyond my purpose, so here are some snapshots:Harold Skimpole: He is grown up - he is at least as old as I am - but in simplicity, and freshness, and enthusiasm, and a fine guileless inaptitude for all worldly affairs, he is a perfect child. . In another place : The butterflies are free. Mankind will surely not deny to Harold Skimpole what it concedes to the butterflies! Sir Leicester Dedlock: His family is as old as the hills, and infinitely more respectable. He has a general opinion that the world might get on without hills, but would be done up without Dedlocks. . In another place, on crossing the English Channel : The sea has no appreciation of great men, but knocks them about like the small fry. Mr. George : From rough outsides, serene and gentle influences often proceed John Jarndyce, owner of the title house and a favorite of Nabokov (who I read earlier this month) who calls him 'one of the best and kindest human beings ever described in a novel'Richard Boythorn : His lungs! - there's no simile for his lungs. Talking, laughing, or snoring, they make the beams of the house shake. Mr. Tulkinhorn, who is living in a grandiose former house of state : In those shrunken fragments of its greatness, lawyers lie like maggots in nuts. Mrs. Pardiggle : There are two classes of charitable people; one, the people who did a little and made a great deal of noise; the other, the people who did a great deal and made no noise at all. Rather than continue with this enumeration, let's get back to the social panorama. From my last quote we see Dickens took issue with false charity, with empty gestures and meaningless causes. His satirical arrows have an uncanny accuracy, yet some of them rub a modern reader the wrong way from time to time, as when he takes on Feminism : Miss Wisk informed us, with great indignation, before we sat down to breakfast, that the idea of woman's mission lying chiefly in the narrow sphere of Home was an outrageous slander on the part of her Tyrant, Man. . I couldn't help notice that Dickens' feminine ideal (Esther) is rather bland and uninteresting in her exlusive focus on household chores and 'good deeds'.Other times, I feel as Dickens is one of our contemporaries, as he is lampooning the fashion magazines and the Hollywood star system: Fashion is Tony Jobling's weakness. To borrow yesterday's paper from the Sol's Arms of an evening, and read about the brilliant and distinguished meteors that are shooting across the fashionable sky in every direction, is unspeakable consolation to him.To know what member of what brilliant and distinguished circle accomplished the brilliant and distinguished feat of joining it yesterday, or contemplates the no less brilliant and distinguished feat of leaving it to-morrow, gives him a thrill of joy. To be informed what the Galaxy Gallery of British Beauty is about, and means to be about, and what Galaxy marriages are on the tapis, and what Galaxy rumours are in circulation, is to become acquainted with the most glorious destinies of mankind. Even the bad guys get an understanding eye for their situation, they too are victims of the broken system or of their own blindness to the evolving times. See Leicester coming face to face with a future captain of industry from the North counties : Upon my honour, upon my life, upon my reputation and principles, the floodgates of society are burst open, and the waters have - a - obliterated the landmarks of the framework of the cohesion by which things are held together! See Judy Smallweed, scion of a despicable loanshark : she never owned a doll, never heard of Cinderella, never played any game. She once or twice fell into children's company when she was about ten years old, but the children couldn't get on with Judy, and Judy couldn't get on with them. She seemed like an animal of another species, and there was instinctive repugnance on both sides. It is very doubtful whether Judy knows how to laugh. She has so rarely seen the thing done, that the probabilities are strong the other way. One of the aspects of the novel that hasn't aged very well, but that is consistent with the period and the preferences of his public is the exaggerated melodrama of some of its scenes. I have come to prefer a more stoic, 'stiff-upper-lip' atitude to the vicissitudes of fate, but I cannot quarell with the fact that Dickens had his heart in the right place. Although his favorite may be the little sweeper boy Jo, for me it was the portrait of Charley Coavinses, the child who was forced to seek employment in order to provide for her orphaned brothers: I don't know where she was going, but we saw her run, such a little, little creature, in her womanly bonnet and apron, through a covered way at the bottom of the court; and melt into the city's strife and sound, like a dewdrop in an ocean. I've mentioned the social satire and the melodrama. The third pillar supporting this edifice is the author's erudition, his impressive familiarity with a wide range of subjects. I don't usually read the notes and commentaries on my books, believing it will pull me out of the story with trivia, but, in this particular case, I recommend the annotated edition. I would have missed the many references to Scripture, Shakespeare, Greek mythologies, contemporary authors and events without this carefully compiled addendum. (like this delightful little line from Thomas Moore : 'The best of all ways, to lengthen our days, was to steal a few hours from Night, my dear! )A short final note on the electronic edition : ebooks have come of age and the functionality of the book was faultless on my iPad, with font resize, easy access to notes and commentaries and well rendered original illustrations. Barnes & Noble did a very good conversion of the original text.
What do You think about Bleak House (2006)?
Classic Literature is "sometimes" composed of boring words, made into a boring story with a boring pace, that has a boring plot, populated with boring characters playing different boring roles.Fine. This may be an exaggeration, but try getting a copy of Charles Dickens' Bleak House. It's long, it's boring, it's several hundred pages that described how "fashionable intelligence" is observed by the upper class in the eighteenth century, and how the judicial system affects every aspect of the lives of the population in the society.These two precedes over other matters. And I mean ALL OTHER MATTERS!!For what it's worth though, the book was able to systematically present the social ills in the society those days. And am thinking, it still is the case right now. With status quo given the focus of each one's prejudice. I think the book was able to present, in an [unusually:] detailed way, how it was to be like in the eighteenth century Europe. With Gossip as the main protagonist, and Heresy has got the supporting role- It's interesting! That's why am giving it a "boring" 5!!
—Lowed
"The few words that I have to add to what I have written, are soon penned; then I, and the unknown friend to whom I write, will part for ever. Not without much dear remembrance on my side. Not without some, I hope, on his or hers." p.985This is Dickens in 1853 writing to his reader through Esther as he brings to a close what I and just about everyone on my GR friends list acknowledge as Dickens' finest, most memorable novel.Dang, but it holds up well – whether 160 years since publication or the 25ish since I first read it. I will not let so much time elapse before my next re-read.My overall impression mere hours after turning the last page is that this novel is about the imperative of kindness. Concrete, tangible, purposeful acts of compassion to counter a world where the hope of justice is futile and where charity is arrogantly misapplied or applied with a colonial sledgehammer and too far afield to do any good for anyone who really needs it."There were two classes of charitable people: one, the people who did a little and made a great deal of noise; the other, the people who did a great deal and made no noise at all."Dickens' rage against those he sees as parasites (embodied here by lawyers), sucking dry the bodies that feed them, feels very contemporary. Yet this theme - while paramount and obvious, and the one I identified with most 25+ years ago - is set against its more subtle opposite: kindness and compassion, embodied in the Allan Woodcourts and Mr. Jarndyces of the novel (the latter of whom makes a specific issue to defer and evade acknowledgement of or gratitude for his charity).The counterweight of the many and varied acts of kindness and compassion set against scenes of great tragedy and sadness give this novel its extraordinary balance, sweep and power. It seems to me that what Dickens is saying and showing us is that kindness is the real heart and soul of justice, the emotional context for it not just the intellectual construct. He is saying, I think, that raging against the machine - seductive as that is, especially for the young! - is a less effective antidote to injustice than is acting with kindness and compassion. The former is the intellectual response, the professional one. The latter is for all the rest of us, who go about our lives every day the best we can.You can get sucked in, as Richard Carson does, to a system that will ultimately destroy you - a system that will, like those who live off of it, self-combust in a puff of inconsequential smoke without you having done much of anything to hasten that process along.Or you can just try to do the best you can with what you've got: "strive ... to be industrious, contented, and kind-hearted, and to do some good to some one, and win some love to myself if I could," as our almost insufferably optimistic but ultimately endearing heroine, Esther, does.These characters' many, many acts of kindness -- not just the obvious ones of Esther and Mr. Jarndyce, but the small and more subtle ones(view spoiler)[ such as Mr. Bucket's steady, diligent attempt to save Lady Dedlock; George's care for Phil, and his and Phil's care in turn of Jo; Sir Leicester's immediate, unquestioning forgiveness of his wife; Liz returning the favour of bringing medicine to Jo, as he had to her; and pretty much every scene Allan Woodcourt is in; plus so many more! (hide spoiler)]
—Jennifer (aka EM)
Bleak House: Charles Dickens on Fog and Fossils"The wheels of justice turn slowly but grind exceedingly fine. Issue One, Bleak House, March, 1852Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of this review or whether that station shall be held by another will depend upon the lines on this page. For, you see, although I was not born a lawyer I became one.I would beg the reader's attention to hold a moment. For, as Charles Lamb has told us, "Lawyers, I suppose, were children once." I was--an innocent one, too. And it was with that degree of innocence I embarked upon an education in the law with the intent to see justice done. I had great expectations of it.However, to my shock, which led to a general state of appall, I discovered that not all those who obtain the license to practice law seek what is right, but an end that serves to line their wallets. Their clients were but a means to that end. Thank Providence those of that rank were in the great minority.At one time those of our profession were considered not merely lawyers, but counselors, meaning that a meeting of the minds was a better outcome than long and bitter litigation, where costs mounted, the ire between the parties increased, and I understood the meaning of the old adage which serves as an epigraph to these lines. The wheels of justice ground so slowly and so finely and the final ruling was obtained, there was nothing left to fight over.Now, Charles Dickens understood just how slowly and finely the wheels of justice turned. During the time Mr. Dickens wrote Bleak House the Court of Chancery had become the scene of many a case for which the parties waited for a ruling for literally years. Quite an odd court it was. It was the court of jurisdiction for the appointment of guardians for minors, the care of the mentally infirm, and the administration of wills and estates. Now the matter of its jurisdiction was not odd, you understand. It was the manner in which jurisdiction was exercised.You see, there was no testimony of witnesses. None! All proceedings were based on the affidavits of the parties and any witnesses material to the matter. You would be quite correct in thinking that in most occurrences, the witnesses were not the mutual friends of the respective parties.Then there was the matter of all those affidavits having to be copied. Hand copied. Oh, the parties had to pay for those, too, whether they gave a fig for them or not. Then, of course, the case in hand had to be docketed. Well. You can imagine how many a Chancery Clerk supplemented income by accepting, uhm, gratuities, shall we say, to set down the matter to be heard.Dickens was such a brilliant man, capable of producing the most wonderful allusions and metaphors. Ah, the opening of the novel, in the fog, the structure of the Inns of Court appearing as some teetering fossil of a Megalosaurus. Oh, yes. Dickens knew of what he wrote. After all, that was the first dinosaur discovered. And where should it be dug up but in England in 1676. It would only take the dunderheads another hundred and fifty years to name it. It means "giant lizard." Lets see-1676 plus 150. That would make it, why, 1826. Young Dickens would have been fourteen. But I cannot do it justice. Why just look at it.“LONDON. Michaelmas Term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As much mud in the streets as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill. Smoke lowering down from chimney-pots, making a soft black drizzle, with flakes of soot in it as big as full-grown snow-flakes — gone into mourning, one might imagine, for the death of the sun. Dogs, undistinguishable in mire. Horses, scarcely better; splashed to their very blinkers. Foot passengers, jostling one another’s umbrellas in a general infection of ill-temper, and losing their foot-hold at street-corners, where tens of thousands of other foot passengers have been slipping and sliding since the day broke (if the day ever broke), adding new deposits to the crust upon crust of mud, sticking at those points tenaciously to the pavement, and accumulating at compound interest. Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls defiled among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city. Fog on the Essex marshes, fog on the Kentish heights. Fog creeping into the cabooses of collier-brigs; fog lying out on the yards, and hovering in the rigging of great ships; fog drooping on the gunwales of barges and small boats. Fog in the eyes and throats of ancient Greenwich pensioners, wheezing by the firesides of their wards; fog in the stem and bowl of the afternoon pipe of the wrathful skipper, down in his close cabin; fog cruelly pinching the toes and fingers of his shivering little ’prentice boy on deck. Chance people on the bridges peeping over the parapets into a nether sky of fog, with fog all round them, as if they were up in a balloon, and hanging in the misty clouds. Gas looming through the fog in divers places in the streets, much as the sun may, from the spongey fields, be seen to loom by husbandman and ploughboy. Most of the shops lighted two hours before their time — as the gas seems to know, for it has a haggard and unwilling look. The raw afternoon is rawest, and the dense fog is densest, and the muddy streets are muddiest near that leaden-headed old obstruction, appropriate ornament for the threshold of a leaden-headed old corporation, Temple Bar. And hard by Temple Bar, in Lincoln’s Inn Hall, at the very heart of the fog, sits the Lord High Chancellor in his High Court of Chancery.”Sublime. It is simply sublime.But, if I might be allowed to digress a bit. Consider the man. Has it occurred to you, dear reader, how many English novelists there were when Charles Dickens became a publishing sensation in 1836 with The Pickwick Papers? Well, there were none. He was it. Here he is as we are accustomed to seeing him. No, of course, he's not smiling. One did not smile in Victorian photographs. Ah, but he did laugh. A lot. He loved theatrics and performing as an actor. He was known to walk every street in London, sometimes twenty-five miles a day. His children tell us he would return home to write. They would witness him mugging in the mirror, making strange faces, speaking in different voices. In the process he brought every level of English society to every level of English society through his writing.To be continued...After all, it is a Dickens review.
—Mike
