Armadale (finis)
I finished reading Armadale a little over a year after I began to read it. One reason why the novel took so long to read was that the tutee who got me interested in it spoiled the ending for me.
“The villainess gets hanged,” she let out after I’d asked her to say no more about the plot.
Happily, months later, I can report that my tutee got it wrong. The villainess doesn’t get hanged. I don’t know how my tutee got that idea.
You can all rest assured that that’s not how the book ends.
On the other hand, it was rather dreary for me, plowing ahead after the 600-page mark, expecting the villainess to get hanged but never reaching any such scene.
Armadale has its moments but is nowhere near as exciting as The Woman in White, which I read a decade ago, largely under the influence of jet lag. That book is still vivid in my memory, even chilling.
Armadale’s best characters are supporting ones: professionals such as lawyers, doctors, and private detectives who are called upon by the major characters to give expert advice, which they bestow elegantly and dramatically, with garnishes of delicious condescension. Oh, how they must suffer fools!
Among the major characters, the villainess, Lydia Gwilt, has the best literary reputation; but I prefer the anguished Ozias Midwinter. What a name! And what a backstory he has – as a child, he was a gypsy’s ward and had to sleep out on the open road, earning his livelihood by giving pathetic performances with dancing dogs. There is more than a little of the grotesque about Midwinter, and yet he behaves as quite the noblest person in the book.
Another of the book’s welcome qualities is its evocation of place. Key scenes occur in these locations: a sanitorium in Germany’s Black Forest; a ship, sinking in the Caribbean; a quiet village in Somerset; the Isle of Man, and a ship, sinking off its coast; the towns and wilds of Norfolk; crowded London; murderous Naples; a yacht, sinking in the Adriatic; and a mysterious medical house in Hampstead, worthy of being investigated by Sherlock Holmes. One comes away from the book having played the tourist.
I usually read only one old British novel at a time. I might try a short one next – Castle Rackrent or Vathek – and then another long one, such as Barchester Towers, Villette, or Wuthering Heights.
Suggestions?
“The villainess gets hanged,” she let out after I’d asked her to say no more about the plot.
Happily, months later, I can report that my tutee got it wrong. The villainess doesn’t get hanged. I don’t know how my tutee got that idea.
You can all rest assured that that’s not how the book ends.
On the other hand, it was rather dreary for me, plowing ahead after the 600-page mark, expecting the villainess to get hanged but never reaching any such scene.
Armadale has its moments but is nowhere near as exciting as The Woman in White, which I read a decade ago, largely under the influence of jet lag. That book is still vivid in my memory, even chilling.
Armadale’s best characters are supporting ones: professionals such as lawyers, doctors, and private detectives who are called upon by the major characters to give expert advice, which they bestow elegantly and dramatically, with garnishes of delicious condescension. Oh, how they must suffer fools!
Among the major characters, the villainess, Lydia Gwilt, has the best literary reputation; but I prefer the anguished Ozias Midwinter. What a name! And what a backstory he has – as a child, he was a gypsy’s ward and had to sleep out on the open road, earning his livelihood by giving pathetic performances with dancing dogs. There is more than a little of the grotesque about Midwinter, and yet he behaves as quite the noblest person in the book.
Another of the book’s welcome qualities is its evocation of place. Key scenes occur in these locations: a sanitorium in Germany’s Black Forest; a ship, sinking in the Caribbean; a quiet village in Somerset; the Isle of Man, and a ship, sinking off its coast; the towns and wilds of Norfolk; crowded London; murderous Naples; a yacht, sinking in the Adriatic; and a mysterious medical house in Hampstead, worthy of being investigated by Sherlock Holmes. One comes away from the book having played the tourist.
I usually read only one old British novel at a time. I might try a short one next – Castle Rackrent or Vathek – and then another long one, such as Barchester Towers, Villette, or Wuthering Heights.
Suggestions?