Martin Chuzzlewit
by Charles Dickens | Literature & Fiction | This book has not been rated.
ISBN: 9780192834614 Global Overview for this book
ISBN: 9780192834614 Global Overview for this book
This book is in a Controlled Release!
1 journaler for this copy...
Purchased for BBC. We're going from one of Dickens' best known to one of his least. I'm excited to read this one as the person, Martin, is mentioned a lot in the Thursday Next books, and I'm looking forward to getting to know him as Dickens intended.
I have FINALLY finished! I'm honestly not sure I even want to bother writing a book review, as I don't really want to spend another minute on this book. But ...
First, I have to mention that everyone else at BBC gave up on this. We couldn't even watch the miniseries! I think we watched about 20 minutes of it, and never could start it up again. We joked that we had proof no one else had read it either -- there are no Spark OR Cliff notes available on this book!
That said, I have to say that part of what made it so tortuous to slog through is that for the majority of the book, there are almost no sympathetic characters. For a while, I thought the hero would be Mr. Pecksniff (although his name should have given it away, really), until I read this: When Mr. Pecksniff and the two young ladies got into the heavy coach at the end of the lane, they found it empty, which was a great comfort; particularly as the outside was quite full and the passengers looked very frosty. For as Mr. Pecksniff justly observed -- when he and his daughters had burrowed their feet deep in the straw, wrapped themselves to the chin, and pulled up both windows -- it is always satisfactory to feel, in keen weather, that many other people are not as warm as you are. ... "For" (he observed), "if every one were warm and well-fed, we should lose the satisfaction of admiring the fortitude with which certain conditions of men bear cold and hunger. And if we were no better off than anybody else, what would become of our sense of gratitude; which ... is one of the holiest feelings of our common nature." Another reason not to like Mr. Pecksniff -- he's always falling down ... and in a most undignified manner. I just didn't get him at all.
There's a scene at Mrs. Todgers', where the Pecksniff girls are talking about Pinch, that totally reminds me of the scene in White Christmas when the men learn that "Freckle-Face Haynes, the dog-faced boy" has the nerve to have sisters: "The notion of a Miss Pinch presuming to exist at all is sufficient to kill one, but to see her -- oh my stars!"
Lest it sound like I hated the entire thing and the writing too, I have to say that the writing is -- at times -- downright brilliant. Dickens has a way with words (although not necessarily 716 pages' worth of them) that is definitely amusing. A short example: "He was up before day-break, and came upon the Park with the morning, which was clad in the least engaging of the three hundred and sixty-five dresses in the wardrobe of the year." I also loved that Mark Tapley introduced himself as "Mr. Co.". Cute!
Mr. Dickens is definitely a book lover, for which I like him better, and this description isn't all too different from how I feel about the Barnes & Noble website lately: That whiff of russia leather, too, and all those rows on rows of volumes, neatly ranged within -- what happiness did they suggest! And in the window were the spick-and-span new works from London, with the title-pages, and sometimes even the first page of the first chapter, laid wide open: tempting unwary men to begin to read the book, and then, in the impossibility of turning over, to rush blindly in, and buy it! Well, you can see: Dickens "gets" bookstores.
Certainly I came to like a few people by the end (thank goodness!), but there were too many characters and too many unloveable characters in this book. I really couldn't understand why Mrs. Gamp is even in the book, for example. And it's just way too long and meandering. It seemed like Dickens wrote 5 extra pages for every paragraph of substance. Perhaps because this was originally a serial in the paper? I don't know. A warning to other readers: you must read this in HUGE chunks of time, or you'll never get through it. Seriously, don't sit down to attempt any part of this book without a good 2-hour undistracted window each time -- preferably 4. Once you've passed the 7/8ths mark, you'll find that you're actually interested in the story and want to finish it, but it takes a long time to get there.
First, I have to mention that everyone else at BBC gave up on this. We couldn't even watch the miniseries! I think we watched about 20 minutes of it, and never could start it up again. We joked that we had proof no one else had read it either -- there are no Spark OR Cliff notes available on this book!
That said, I have to say that part of what made it so tortuous to slog through is that for the majority of the book, there are almost no sympathetic characters. For a while, I thought the hero would be Mr. Pecksniff (although his name should have given it away, really), until I read this: When Mr. Pecksniff and the two young ladies got into the heavy coach at the end of the lane, they found it empty, which was a great comfort; particularly as the outside was quite full and the passengers looked very frosty. For as Mr. Pecksniff justly observed -- when he and his daughters had burrowed their feet deep in the straw, wrapped themselves to the chin, and pulled up both windows -- it is always satisfactory to feel, in keen weather, that many other people are not as warm as you are. ... "For" (he observed), "if every one were warm and well-fed, we should lose the satisfaction of admiring the fortitude with which certain conditions of men bear cold and hunger. And if we were no better off than anybody else, what would become of our sense of gratitude; which ... is one of the holiest feelings of our common nature." Another reason not to like Mr. Pecksniff -- he's always falling down ... and in a most undignified manner. I just didn't get him at all.
There's a scene at Mrs. Todgers', where the Pecksniff girls are talking about Pinch, that totally reminds me of the scene in White Christmas when the men learn that "Freckle-Face Haynes, the dog-faced boy" has the nerve to have sisters: "The notion of a Miss Pinch presuming to exist at all is sufficient to kill one, but to see her -- oh my stars!"
Lest it sound like I hated the entire thing and the writing too, I have to say that the writing is -- at times -- downright brilliant. Dickens has a way with words (although not necessarily 716 pages' worth of them) that is definitely amusing. A short example: "He was up before day-break, and came upon the Park with the morning, which was clad in the least engaging of the three hundred and sixty-five dresses in the wardrobe of the year." I also loved that Mark Tapley introduced himself as "Mr. Co.". Cute!
Mr. Dickens is definitely a book lover, for which I like him better, and this description isn't all too different from how I feel about the Barnes & Noble website lately: That whiff of russia leather, too, and all those rows on rows of volumes, neatly ranged within -- what happiness did they suggest! And in the window were the spick-and-span new works from London, with the title-pages, and sometimes even the first page of the first chapter, laid wide open: tempting unwary men to begin to read the book, and then, in the impossibility of turning over, to rush blindly in, and buy it! Well, you can see: Dickens "gets" bookstores.
Certainly I came to like a few people by the end (thank goodness!), but there were too many characters and too many unloveable characters in this book. I really couldn't understand why Mrs. Gamp is even in the book, for example. And it's just way too long and meandering. It seemed like Dickens wrote 5 extra pages for every paragraph of substance. Perhaps because this was originally a serial in the paper? I don't know. A warning to other readers: you must read this in HUGE chunks of time, or you'll never get through it. Seriously, don't sit down to attempt any part of this book without a good 2-hour undistracted window each time -- preferably 4. Once you've passed the 7/8ths mark, you'll find that you're actually interested in the story and want to finish it, but it takes a long time to get there.
Releasing to the local thrift shop. If you are new to BookCrossing and find this book and this site; welcome! Enjoy the site, the book and hopefully the BookCrossing community. I hope you'll join BookCrossing (doesn't cost anything to join!) and if you do, please consider using any previous reader of this book, or me, Antof9, as the member who referred you. Either way, I hope you'll journal so all the previous and future readers can track this book's journey. Thanks, and Happy Crossing!
