Category Archives: Bookish Thoughts

August 23, 2022 · 2:21 pm

My Frustrations Upon Rereading Sense and Sensibility

I was rereading Sense and Sensibility the other day, and suddenly realized it’s not my favourite Jane Austen novel. Any Jane Austen novel is a novel of the highest quality, so to say “not my favourite Austen novel” still means I love this book. But in the past I’ve found I keep forgetting to mention this one when listing off why I love Jane Austen’s works, and now I’ve realized why. The characters are hard to connect with, the relationships aren’t as fully fleshed out as in some of her other novels, and she glosses over some frustrating male behaviours.

What do you think? Let me make my case below. When I ranked Austen’s novels in the past I think I put Sense and Sensibility fourth–here’s what I found on my latest re-read.

The Main Characters Are Hard to Connect With

Sense and Sensibility illustration, Harma-Mae Smit blog

First, all the characters have something that makes them a bit irritating. Irritating characters aren’t always bad, because flaws need to be overcome in order to have characters that develop over the course of the story. But sometimes characters with certain types of flaws are harder to read about than others. The example brought up most often in Jane Austen’s works is Fanny Price, since her passivity and quietness can be frustrating, but I think there are examples in Sense and Sensibility as well. Just like Fanny, the characters in this novel spend a lot of time just enduring.

Elinor is calm and composed throughout the novel, which is admirable except when it sometimes prevents her from taking any action, reducing her from an active character to a passive character (it’s admirable she endures, but sometimes the reader wants her to just do something). It also prevents her from having some of the emotional reactions we, as readers, would relate to. Her love, Edward, is obviously flawed, being utterly passive for most of the novel despite loving Elinor back. Marianne is active in contrast, but in a way that is often unfeeling to the characters around her and to herself as well (a point which seems to be one of Austen’s messages in this novel). She is not active in a “likable” way. And lastly, everyone respects Marianne’s match, Colonel Brandon, aside from the slightly squicky implications of him being 35 and her being 17, and the fact Marianne reminds Brandon of the girl he was in love with before (making the reader wonder if she just a replacement of her for him?) Other than that, he is unfailing kind and thoughtful throughout the novel, so I feel if Austen gave us just a little more insight into the interactions between Marianne and Colonel Brandon (other than him staring at her from afar), we could be reassured that their relationship is somewhat healthy.

I used to think I was quite like Elinor, in being very composed and unruffled on the surfaceand not necessarily wanting other people to see when they hurt me. I still do share some similarities with her. But this time upon rereading it there were several things I realized I would never do–like pretend to be friends with Lucy. There’s a large amount of social decorum I would find pointless, which probably says more about me as a modern person than it really says about Austen. But I just don’t value holding up a social convention at the expense of being honest. I have no objections against being polite, but I believe it’s possible to be polite and honest and direct (well, this may be my modernity, or it may the Dutch in me). I wouldn’t necessarily feel bad about being honest that I didn’t find Lucy’s company interesting, at least.

I also wouldn’t hold back on asking Marianne if she was engaged to her initial love, Willoughby, just because Marianne would be offended. I wouldn’t refrain from admitting I was suspicious of Willoughby, or really feel bad about being suspicious about him as Elinor seems to feel bad–I just don’t feel the same compulsion as Elinor does that I “should” think well of everyone who hasn’t absolutely proven with evidence to be a bad person. Which is fine–I read books to experience life from a different perspective. But on this rereading, it really underscored why I don’t personally approach life this way.

The characters do develop over the novel, which is why this novel is a classic and why the story as a whole holds interest. Elinor demonstrates she does have emotions, Edward learns to take action to make his life more like what will make him happy, Marianne learns to be nicer to others and take care of herself, and Colonel Brandon–well, doesn’t change, but behaves honourably until he gets his reward.  But overall this time I was struck by how uninteresting I found the four core characters of this novel. The side characters are very well fleshed out, some in a very short number of sentences (such as Mr. Palmer), which shows Austen’s ability at characterization. Their quirks lightens up the mood of the novel and keep you reading. Sometimes I felt like spending more time with some of them, which led to my reflection on what I found less than enticing about the characters I was supposed to be most interested in.

The Main Couples Could Use More Chemistry

Jane Austen ends several of her novels hastily matching up her characters, without showing an in-depth scene of how exactly the conversation went. This includes Fanny and Edmund in Mansfield Park, and Reginald and Frederica in Lady Susan. And in this novel, it’s Marianne and Colonel Brandon who get this treatment, whereas Elinor, as the primary character, has her scene with Edward fleshed out. However, Elinor and Edward’s relationship overall isn’t that fleshed out, and they spend much of the novel in different parts of the country.

Many have pointed out that Elinor and Colonel Brandon interact far more than Colonel Brandon and Marianne. These interactions demonstrate how much Colonel Brandon and Elinor could likely be a good match if they weren’t both in love with other people, and because of this I feel the novel could be improved it there were more evidence for the pairing of Elinor and Edward, and Colonel Brandon and Marianne, to counteract this impression that Colonel Brandon and Elinor could work well. Overall, it made me wonder what Elinor saw in Edward that made her hang onto her feelings for him for so long–if this had been demonstrated somewhere at the beginning of the novel when she first meets him, I would have understood it better. (It’s implied to be the fact Elinor sees the potential in Edward despite his passivity and unhappiness, which is romantic, but we as readers really struggle to see this potential that she sees in him). Most of Elinor’s interactions with Edward are deeply awkward. He’s always interacting with her under the awareness he’s engaged to another girl, and she is always holding back her deep feelings for him and wondering why he’s so awkward.

Colonel Brandon is very popular with readers and it’s not hard to see why. He’s one of the only male characters who is honourable throughout. He is incredibly likable, but the age gap between him and Marianne makes me uncomfortable in a way I guess Jane Austen wasn’t. As mentioned above, if we were given some insight into his head in a way that reassured us he appreciates Marianne for Marianne rather than an incarnation of his dead lover, it would help a lot. Marianne’s flaw is idealism, and there’s not a lot of evidence in the novel that Brandon isn’t idealizing her as she once idealized Willoughby.  I feel it would also help a lot if it was fleshed out a bit more as to why Marianne eventually fell for him, because it does feel like he was a bit of a consolation prize for her in the last paragraphs of the novel. To see her start to appreciate what everyone else admires in him would flesh out this relationship a bit, and move his position a bit deeper from “talking to Elinor while staring at Marianne” the whole time.

Frustrating Male Behaviour

Sense and Sensibility illustration, Harma-Mae Smit blog

And lastly, it’s surprising how much Austen softens and apologizes for the actions of the male characters in this book. I don’t think this struck me in my previous readings, but this time I wondered why she went as far as she did. The obvious example is Edward, whom she describes as “very wrong” first for getting secretly engaged to Lucy and then for spending time with Elinor despite his engagement, but she adds a lot of circumstances to excuse his behaviour, and makes it clear Elinor forgives him. The overall implication is somewhat that though his behaviour made people around him so miserable and put Elinor in incredibly uncomfortable situations (like having to be nice to Lucy),  he should be forgiven because he starts to take more action and stops wallowing in his misery by the end. It’s fine that Elinor forgives him–we can all be clueless. It just doesn’t feel reassuring that he wouldn’t be clueless about hurting her again later in their marriage. Her ability to hide her feelings and her willingness to think well of him even when he’s careless with her emotions, doesn’t provide much reassurance here.

The other example is Willoughby, Marianne’s first love who ghosts her and marries another woman. When I was younger I was very excited to see Willoughby’s slight redemption arc, when he shows up when Marianne is almost dying and admits to Elinor that he regrets ghosting her and will always have feelings for her. To my younger self, this was romantic. It was also interesting to see in contrast to Wickham in Pride and Prejudice, who gets no redemption and is just implied to be a scoundrel (though he isn’t punished for being a scoundrel). But now I am older I feel more surprised Austen softened his bad character, and basically made it necessary for Marianne to start feeling better to know that he had truly loved her at one point–for her to know he had some good intentions in him towards her. The second thing that is awkward is that he seduced Colonel Brandon’s ward and his defence is basically that the ward wasn’t totally innocent either. Austen positions this as lighting the blackness of his behaviour somewhat, whereas taking advantage of a very young girl in that way in inexcusable no matter how you phrase it. It may be for this reason that the scene where he admits his regret to Elinor was left out of the 1995 movie version.

I guess his regret is Austen’s way of punishing him a bit, since otherwise he doesn’t really suffer for what he does to Marianne. (And it’s true that Austen’s awful characters frequently avoid any punishment). But this regret is paired so much with lighting all the characters’ impression of his behaviour, since I guess they feel sorry for him? Perhaps it is his charm that realistically prevents the characters from judging him as harshly as he deserves, but I found it interesting that Austen even made this narrative choice.

Anyway, on this rereading I was struck that Austen even bothered to soften these male characters’ behaviours. She must have felt charitable when revising this book–more than one character’s behaviour is first described as foolish and then softened later. Some minor characters that get this are Mr. Palmer, who at first appears stuck up and later is revealed to care at least a little about Elinor and Marianne’s wellbeing when Marianne is deathly ill, and Mrs. Jennings, who is introduced as someone very vulgar but whose kindnesses to Elinor and Marianne keep the plot going and helps them out at various points. Possibly after entering her characters’ heads for the length of time it took to write this novel, Austen found she had sympathy for their points of view–who knows!

Anyway, that was my recent impression after my latest reread. Another reading might bring more things to mind–or change my mind! Let me know your thoughts below.

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March 28, 2018 · 9:21 am

Guilt When Reading Books

“Make sure you schedule a few hours a week to devote to reading.” What heavenly advice! Yet somehow the fact this was given as advice shocked me. I suddenly realized I am more used to hearing, “Stop reading and start doing something useful.” But the idea reading should be scheduled into your life feels strange and foreign to me. Reading is “fun”–this is what they repeatedly taught us in school. You’re supposed to do it because it’s fun, not because it helps you live.

Maybe this contributes to us reading books less often.

It was fair for teachers in my schooldays to try to stop me reading books, because I did read them in class, and I did neglect more productive work (like my math homework) to read. It also makes sense that teachers insist “reading is fun!” in order to get more students to read. However, somehow I internalized these messages as: reading is good but should only be done when you have nothing better to do. Which is not a problem as a kid, since you have quite a bit of free time. But as an adult, reading suddenly becomes a less justifiable activity–when in reality this is a problematic way to view reading!

I certainly still read a lot, but I mainly read a lot of articles online, and the shortness of these articles probably deceives me into thinking I’m not actually wasting much time on them. I imagine I’m briefly and efficiently informing myself. But, of course, what I’m actually doing is feeding and fueling my addiction to information. You can never read enough interesting facts on the internet. But in order to gain a deeper understanding of reality you need more than interesting facts on the internet. You need books.

In other words, I need to get past the idea that reading is not meant to be scheduled into your productive time, but only into your leisure time.

If reading is only ever done for pure leisure, the result is you never pick up a challenging read. Reading that takes work is too much to do when your brain is already over-strained and tired. You end up reading only really light novels, or popularizations of fun topics (such as hygge or Nikola Tesla). Do you want to read about the categorical imperative after a hard day’s work?

In other words, the important works–the works that have changed our civilization–never get read. We never apply ourselves to answering the questions they raise, because we don’t know what questions they raise. We never seek to face the challenges of humanity because we never justify applying ourselves to learning about them.

It is, in fact, a nice solution to consider certain types of reading work. To consider this reading as necessary, and not just for building the practical skills that may in some way help you in your job. To consider reading as a thing that can form and shape character, and as a thing we actually should invest in in order to form and shape our own character. That this is not merely a leisure activity that is optional, but that we are justified in carving out space for this pursuit in our lives.

I almost don’t dare to schedule in directed reading in my schedule. First of all, I hardly know where I’d fit it in. Second, many great works of great writers intimidate me. However, I should be more aware of the consequences of not doing this. Of reading lightly, and assuming I am well-read.

Recently I was reading Augustine’s Confessions–a very classic work that has impacted Western civilization–and I was lying on the couch and feeling like very strange about being on that couch reading. In fact, I was even reading it in order to review it, but I still felt self-conscious. Then I realized that while I used to devour books when I was younger, I now intentionally push myself to read a physical book, and when I do sit down to read I feel like I really should be writing or cleaning my house or studying my schoolwork. Reading, as a mere input of information, feels like a sacrifice of the time you should be devoting to output. And the genius of the online world, and online reading, is that it creates the illusion you are both inputting and outputting information. You read articles in order to share them. You take in information in order to comment on it publicly. You create artistic representations of what you are doing by posting on Instagram, etc. While none of this online chatter really impacts the world greatly, your conscience doesn’t tug as much because you feel you’re using the information presented. You’re not just taking something in, but you’re offering something up to the world in return. It doesn’t matter how trivial what you offer is, you still gain the sense of accomplishment that comes by just offering it.

But this overemphasis on output–on our individual response to the information that seems to be demanded by the internet, and our culture in general–glosses over the necessity of taking the time to input good information. Our responses are expected to be instant. If something takes a long time for us to process, it has to be really, really worth it before we decide it is justifiable to set that time aside.

This year I actually took a year off to go back to school and study, and what I am learning is that to truly understand you actually need to do more than read the quick summaries of topics that float around on the internet. I thought I knew a lot about theology (my topic of study), and that some of the questions I’d fruitlessly searched for answers to probably did not have good answers, since I could not find any. However, the reality is that some of these answers were book-length, not internet-friendly listicles, and therefore I actually was justified in taking a year to study such things. In fact, I should really take a lifetime.

The job of professional scholar is not an incredibly realistic role in our current society, but we do have unimaginable access to information in our modern world. Therefore I do have the opportunity to devote a lifetime to learning, even outside of school. The hurdle that I have to get over–and perhaps you do too–is the tendency to devalue the time we spend on the couch with a book. To devalue the patience that lets the classic authors of the past speak for themselves, instead of watching YouTube summaries.

I must reorient the value I place on reading, so that the time it takes to read is not slotted into that category of “wasted time.”

 

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Ready to dive into reading again? Try my short retelling of Cinderella–is prince really such a catch for Cinderella? Prince Charming is available at Smashwords and Amazon.

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December 30, 2017 · 1:31 pm

Three Posts (and Books) Worth Reading

Blogs are supposed to end the year with a top-ten list. Looking back over my year, I realized there are a few posts whose messages really are worthwhile, but I don’t feel the necessity to list ten of them. Here are three, in the order of popularity:

You Might Relate to Mary Bennett, but You’re Not Supposed to Imitate Her
This is a post about a one-trait character showing all the reasons you shouldn’t be a one-trait character. As I said in this post, I myself have a tendency to view intelligence as my defining characteristic, but I found a remedy for that this year. Find people more intelligent than you! Let this post convince you of the necessity of being a well-rounded person.

Let the Children Grow Up–They Do in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
This post resulted from one critic complaining the professor did not hover over the children enough in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, while another critic complained the children did not grow up. First, helicopter parenting is not a good strategy to encourage children to grow up, and second, anyone who’s read the ending of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe know the children do in fact grow up.

Out of the Silent Planet Awoke My Imagination – Let It Awake Yours Too
This is a post about how I should not have enjoyed Out of the Silent Planet, but I did. It breaks some of the cardinal rules of fiction, and still manages to blow your mind.
If you’re on the fence about reading C.S. Lewis’ Space Trilogy, let this review convince you. And if you’ve read it, let me know whether you agree!

Have a wonderful New Year!

 

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July 21, 2017 · 11:53 am

The Books You Fight With

Jane Austen’s been in the news a lot lately, due to her death happening two hundred years ago. As with most occasions Austen is mentioned, discussion turns to ranking her books. Pride and Prejudice is apparently preferred by the popular vote, while Emma is lauded by the critical vote. And I have no argument with this—I’d put one or the other of those at the top myself, except—what book do I find myself meditating on the most? Which one do I wrestle with, and spend hours studying thematically and artistically? It’s not my favourite book, but it has the power to haunt my thoughts more than all the others combined. It’s Mansfield Park.

Does this mean it’s the best one?

Some books you’d never choose as your favourite, but they’re the ones with the power to haunt your thoughts. And a book with that kind of power is perhaps more genius than we want to give it credit for. So maybe we should recognize some of the books we fight with more than we do.

This is not to say these books are perfect. Often it’s some of their very flaws that cause us to wrestle with them so deeply. I, for one, will never forgive Mansfield Park for ending with the very same scandal as Pride and Prejudice (though Jane Austen is really not to be blamed—how many exciting societal events did she really have to work with for the climaxes of her novels?) Flaws are part of the reason, but not the whole reason. For instance, I fight with the protagonist’s (Fanny’s) passivity every time I read it. But I can’t shake the feeling her passiveness means something. I can’t shake the feeling this novel displays something more fundamental about Austen’s worldview than all the others. In which case, it might be some of her most important work.

And I get this feeling when I read That Hideous Strength, by C.S. Lewis as well.

Just like with Mansfield Park, among the people that know such a book exists, opinions are divided between those who highly dislike the novel, and those who love it. It was while discovering my brain was stuck in a loop pondering the message of this book, actually, that I realized the books we fight with might have more power over our thoughts than the ones we love.

Because we love easy-to-understand. We love comforting concepts. But the ideas we may need to grapple with are not always easy or comforting.

For example, I need to consider whether passivity and helplessness, as Fanny shows in Mansfield Park, does have value. Despite my modern context screaming at me about the value of assertiveness and standing up for yourself, I need to not despise Fanny for not being ‘modern’ in this way.

When it comes to That Hideous Strength, I need to accept it’s not going to feed me comforting ideas that I really like, as the first book in the trilogy did (Out of the Silent Planet). Sure, I may have issues with some of the plot, and the time spent with unlikable characters, and the possibly ludicrous events that happen. But what I may be avoiding thinking about by doing this is how much some of these unlikable characters resemble me. Or worse—how I’d like some of the unlikable protagonists to be squashed like a bug because they remind me of unlikable people I personally know—but the novel shows them grace. So I should maybe do so too.

I’d go into the plot more but this book is so obscure for a C.S. Lewis book that I don’t know how many of you will have heard of it. I’ll just say check it out if you like his work. My brain thinks about it more than all my other favourite parts of the Space Trilogy.

So start appreciating those books you fight with. They’re at least as powerful as your favourites.

Drop me a line below about which books these are for you!

 

 

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April 18, 2017 · 11:35 am

Let the Children Grow Up–They Do in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

‘Neglectful’ was the word tossed around by one reviewer of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Apparently the Professor was neglectful of the children he’d taken into his house during the bombings of WWII, letting them run through his house on their own and not over-scheduling every minute of their day with dance class, extra tutoring, or athletics.

Let’s leave aside the fact that a bachelor professor who appears to be entirely unused to children decides, out of the kindness of his heart, to shelter a group of four children seeking refuge from the bombing of London. Such a man might not be exactly up-to-date on the recent recommendations of the mommy blogs, nor might he think it harmful for children to just take care of themselves for some hours of the day (as children used to do in decades past). Let’s leave all that aside and look at how the children in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe are actually allowed to grow up in this book.

Now that our society has invented the idea of childhood (and this is not a bad thing), we have created a very specific, protected idea of what childhood should be. However, in order to grow up children have to eventually step outside of this safe, protected bubble. You might even let them blunder through your house and through a half-forgotten wardrobe that sometimes is a portal to another very dangerous and magical world.

In other words, they become independent and make their own decisions.

It’s very interesting that one well-known criticism of Narnia is that the children don’t grow up–or at least, not in the right way.

“The idea of keeping childhood alive forever and ever and regretting the passage into adulthood—whether it’s a gentle, rose-tinged regret or a passionate, full-blooded hatred, as it is in Lewis—is simply wrong,” the famously outspoken critic of Narnia, Philip Pullman said once in an interview in The New Yorker. His own series, His Dark Materials, attempts to rectify this by having his protagonist grow up and awaken to her own sexuality at the end. Now, as far as I can tell, the children don’t embark on any sexual relationships in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, but I don’t think this is the only valid marker of growing up. They do grow up.

And this is why I loved this book. At the end, they actually get to live out their whole lives in Narnia–become kings and queens and put into practice everything the story taught them up to then. So often as a child I’d read fiction where the characters went back in time, or went to another world, and learned something, but they never got to use it in that world. They always had to come back. They always remained children. The reader never fully saw the consequences of the story’s ideas.

And besides the ending of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which so satisfyingly lets the children have a life in the world they helped to save, they have to ‘do’ things throughout the book.

I, who was raised in the safe, coddled confines of ‘be careful!’ ‘safety first!’ and ‘accidents are always preventable!’ was astonished to read about Peter picking up his sword when Susan is attacked by the wolf, and to read Aslan saying, “Back! Let the prince win his spurs!”–just after Aslan finished telling Peter about how he must become king one day. My heart was in my mouth–they weren’t actually going to let Peter do something, were they? Of course he would want to rescue his sister, but there must be some more experienced, more adult character around that should save her.

But no, if Peter is to be a king one day he must shoulder the responsibilities of adulthood himself.

Here we come to another controversial aspect–the children fight in the story. Now, we could point to the times, and argue that children in history had very different lives than they have today, and nobody at the time thought it at all odd. We could point out that Lewis lived through WWI, when very young teenagers died by the thousands in the trenches. We could point to the fact the story is set in WWII, when ‘fighting the enemy’–physically fighting, and not with economic sanctions or making a show of army exercises on a country’s borders–was viewed positively. But really what it comes down to is allowing the children to learn that not everything in life comes easily, or without a struggle. The villain won’t helpfully toss himself off the cliff for them. They must act.

This is not to say violence is glorified here–the children don’t especially like fighting. But they certainly have to back up their beliefs with their deeds.

Now, there may be books where children must grow up even more than the children do in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. They may have to, say, face a thousand more deaths of close friends, and watch graphically described gore pass in front of them. You could certainly imagine a ‘grittier’ children’s book than Narnia, even if you’d hesitate to actually give such a book to a child. I’m just arguing this was the first time I read a children’s book that showed me how to go beyond childhood. It showed me the good and bad in the challenge of growing up.

Millennials, a group of which I am a member, are frequently derided as a group that doesn’t know how to grow up. And I obviously can’t point to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a guide that taught me how to grow up–of the typical markers of adulthood (marriage, children, house, career), I can only possibly point to career as an objective marker of the level of adulthood I’ve achieved. Reading literature in this vein is not a cure-all for the ‘millennial problem’ (and I’ve read His Dark Materials too, lest you argue that series would’ve helped me more). However, children need a vision of adulthood to aspire to. They need to read different ways of shouldering the responsibility of living. And if we only present fiction where parents and guardians are not ‘neglectful,’ and hover over children just as much as parents and guardians actually do nowadays in real life, we’d hold back the whole process.

Give the kids some space. Let them grow up.

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March 31, 2017 · 12:30 pm

You Might Relate to Mary Bennett, but You’re Not Supposed to Imitate Her

The novels and letters of Jane Austen (1906) (14596328597)Mary Bennett gets a lot of good press. In Pride and Prejudice, she’s one of heroine Elizabeth Bennett’s three younger sisters, and she’s described as the bookish one. Maybe because readers of Pride and Prejudice tend to be bookish as well, we tend to feel the story overlooks her, and write multiple blog posts and articles and sequel novels bemoaning this. This is in spite of the plentiful evidence Jane Austen herself did not like her. Despite her being bookish, Austen did not mean to point to her as a character that we should imitate.

This is astonishing, as the bookish girl is a pretty strong stereotype for female heroines by now—just think of Belle in Beauty and the Beast, Hermione in Harry Potter, and Jane Eyre. All of them readers, some a bit know-it-all, but all with a heart of gold. The character of Mary Bennett is swimming directly against the current in this matter.

And readers relate to Mary Bennett—we know what it feels like to be ‘plainer’ than those around us, to feel less intelligent even though we’re desperately trying to appear smart, to be more than just a background character in someone else’s story. Who can’t relate to wanting some distinction of your own, even if it’s not beauty? We like books about bookish characters proving themselves because we’re reassured that our bookishness will not be our undoing, and that someday those that laugh at us in real life will agree our bookishness has value. But Jane Austen does not give us that satisfaction with Mary.

Evidence of dissatisfaction with Mary’s story can easily be found. Both The Guardian and The Atlantic wrote articles last summer about the proliferation of sequels about Miss Mary Bennett (including The Independence Of Miss Mary Bennet, The Forgotten Sister: Mary Bennet’s Pride and Prejudice, The Pursuit of Mary Bennet: A Pride and Prejudice Novel, and of course, one called There’s Something About Mary, Bennett.) Many, many authors have seen potential in her character, and clearly many readers want to read about that potential.

So what are Mary Bennett’s faults, according to Jane Austen?

It’s not that she’s bookish and plain. It’s that she appears to read only in order to lecture others about what she’s read. She appears to practice music only in order to draw attention to herself with it. As a result, neither her speeches on the books she reads nor her performances on the piano avoid sounding ‘affected.’

“Mary had neither genius nor taste; and though vanity had given her application, it had given her likewise a pedantic air and conceited manner, which would have injured a higher degree of excellence than she had reached.”

And despite in other places defending the reading of books and applying oneself to improving oneself, Austen never vindicates these aspects of Mary. She really doesn’t do much with her character plot-wise, and appears to argue her way of being is just as ‘silly’ as Kitty and Lydia’s way of living. Mary does not get a character arc or much development at all. She has no romantic events come her way either.

I don’t think Jane Austen was against bookish girls. I don’t think she was subtly fighting against education for women, or against women having an opinion. I think she had a more complex idea here.

In reality, what Jane Austen is trying to show is how one trait, overemphasized and over-developed, can be ridiculous. You can’t have a personality that relies on only one characteristic—you need to develop your whole personality.

It’s kind of amazing how, despite all of Mary’s deficiencies in beauty and intelligence, her self-absorption is still derided as vanity by Austen. This is an important point! We like to think if we haven’t been given all the advantages other people have, we’re protected from vanity. We’re given a free pass to focus on ourselves, because after all, we aren’t as advantaged as everyone else. People should recognize and encourage us in what we do have.

However, this very lack of humility can prevent improvement in the areas we might have relative strength in! It’s Mary’s air of condescension and pedantry that makes her sisters dislike her speeches more—no one likes to be talked down to. Her piano-playing, while better than some, is less pleasant to listen to because of how conceited she makes it sound—she all-too-aware she is more skilled than Elizabeth. Her vanity in these things prevents her from using her gifts in a way that would actually give pleasure to other people (as Elizabeth proves you can give some pleasure to a listener even without being the best piano-player ever). And her vanity likely prevents her from even seeing the ways her gifts fall short of what she thinks they are. She doesn’t improve in the areas of attitude and mannerisms because she doesn’t think she needs to.

Does this mean she deserves to be laughed at by her sisters, or shamed by Mr. Bennett at the Netherfield ball? Of course not. I think Mr. Bennett’s treatment of her, in particular, is meant to short his shortcomings as a father and his insensitivity to what might improve his daughters’ characters. As he has with his wife, he’s basically given up on them, and endures their silliness instead. Now, if Mary actually is meant to have a character arc, perhaps one of Elizabeth’s or Jane’s attempts to rein in their younger sister’s vanities would sink in. As it is, we as readers as only left with the impression her vanity leaves on us, with the implication it is a warning—do not get so consumed in creating your own space for your own gifts that you blind yourself to how useless they are to anyone outside yourself. This is basically the opposite of every ‘find yourself’ novel released today.

So perhaps for us bookish types, we can take the message that there’s nothing wrong with being bookish, but it’s our attitude to others as a result of that can be the problem. Even if others don’t understand us, it doesn’t give us justification to feel superior to them. Even if we are actually better in one area than someone else we know, rubbing that in everyone’s faces will not help anyone else, and can even be destructive to ourselves. And I don’t mean this to lecture everyone else–I know I am prone to rely on my own intelligence and knowledge as my number one characteristics when relating to other people.

But then again, this is not meant to be the main message of the novel—Mary is merely one of dozens of Austen side-characters that demonstrate how one over-developed characteristic renders one ridiculous. It’s Darcy and Elizabeth who get character arcs, and who change throughout the novel. Austen uses their story to tell her message. Though if you look at how Austen takes down her main character’s characteristics of ‘pride’ and ‘prejudice,’ maybe Mary Bennett’s characterization does support the overall theme of the novel after all.

What about you? Do you find yourself with a lot of sympathy for Mary Bennett, or do you find her tiresome (as her sisters did)? Was Jane Austen too harsh on her?

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March 7, 2017 · 1:07 pm

Out of the Silent Planet Awoke My Imagination – Let It Awake Yours Too

C.S. Lewis, by Paulina Van Vliet. All rights reserved.

C.S. Lewis, by Paulina Van Vliet. All rights reserved.

I’ve been meaning to read Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis for a long time, ever since I discovered Lewis really did write fiction besides the Chronicles of Narnia. Now that I have I can’t resist blogging about it, because it excited me so much to find out how good it was. I rarely review books here, but some books are worth it, and if you’ve been looking for a worthwhile book I’ll write down some things to consider with this one.

Out of the Silent Planet always sounded like such an intriguing title, but I probably haven’t touched it till now because it’s sci-fi. Also, you hear so much less about it than the Chronicles, so you assume it can’t be quite as highly regarded. And after a brief survey of the internet writings on it, I think opinion on this book is a little more divided. But those who love it really love it, and now I’m one of them.

Basically, in this book a professor, Elwin Ransom, gets kidnapped and taken to another planet, Malacandra. The book actually has many reasons to inspire dislike, or a more tepid reception, including its out-of-date science and scientific errors, its theological ideas sprinkled throughout, and some weaknesses in story construction. I’ll first list all the irritations and dislikes I had while reading (skipping over any scientific discussion, as I know very little about scientific beliefs at the time), and then I’ll explain what blew me away.

I shall attempt to talk about it without spoiling too much of it, and obviously will not bring in any of the rest of the trilogy, since I haven’t read them yet.

The Bad:

It was incredibly difficult to get into the story. There is nothing especially compelling about Ransom as a character—you don’t start chapter one and immediately get excited you get to follow this character for the rest of the story. I picked it up several times without making it through the first chapter. I ended it without a real strong idea of what the guy was like. You don’t get any sense of his life outside the events of the story. Is he motivated to escape Malacandra and get back to his life as a professor on earth? Does he have any human relationships he’s missing? What brought him to the point where he decided to take a walking tour? He doesn’t seem to have any internal struggles, other than the small character arc of overcoming his fear-based response to everything.

The rest of the characters are somewhat caricatures too. There’s a scientist whose sole focus is human progress, and whose speeches mainly consist of his ideas of human progress. There’s another bad guy who’s solely driven by greed. There’s a lot of ‘good’ characters who don’t change throughout the novel, because they’re good already.

Yes, there were a few points where I was reading it that I thought to myself—can this really be C.S. Lewis? This is a very poorly constructed novel! People must just read it out of loyalty to him!

On top of the rest of these flaws take the very limited and slow amount of action this novel contains. There’s certainly conflict—why was Ransom kidnapped? Can he escape? Can he find food and drink on this new planet? Etc., etc. But most issues just sort of resolve themselves without Ransom having to fight too much for them. The climax, in the worst light, could be seen as everything in the story just easily resolving themselves.

 

The Good:

The first part where I suddenly found myself being drawn into the story was during Ransom’s philosophizing on the spaceship during the journey to Malacandra. And I HATE philosophy, so it’s shocking for me to say the philosophy in this book are some of the best parts of the story. But it’s true.

These parts are written very beautifully, which is no surprise considering Lewis was a very adept writer. They confront our stereotypical ideas of space travel and ever so subtly turn them inside-out. Is space empty? Are aliens inferior to humans? Are aliens hostile to humans? What do you think?

About halfway through I would have described it as an excellent philosophical treatise with a story tacked on. But the plot kept turning, and despite the characters being somewhat motivation-less and wooden, there were several emotional moments that absolutely hit home. I was surprised to discover I really did care about what happened to them.

There’s some incredible descriptions in here as well. Lewis does what many authors forget to do (in the books I’ve read, anyway), and grounds his perspective in his character so deeply that the reader sees what the character sees. For example, when getting off the spaceship Ransom is initially unsure which colours are ground, which as water, which are trees, etc. Which is absolutely true—if you don’t have any context for figuring out a new location, you are confused at first! Just think about getting out of a different subway station and being completely unsure which street is which. Lewis also does not immediately have Ransom realize the spaceship he travels to Malacandra in is shaped like a sphere–he first describes the odd shape of the room from Ransom’s perspective, and the slow realization that the shape is due to the spaceship’s overall spherical shape. Few authors do this–they immediately have the characters perceive they’re on another planet and describe it, or on a spaceship and describe it, without exploring the process of realization that occurs in a character’s head. There’s more than one passage like this, and these ground the story in reality in a strong way.

So, after good philosophy and unique descriptions, this book also hinges on languages in a way that excites me as a person who loves words. Ransom does not have a ‘universal translator,’ but actually has to learn the alien language. Then he has to translate some ‘Earth’ ideas into this alien language, which is an ever-so-subtle device to explore some of the ideas we take for granted. It’s lovely, lovely. You’d never see this in a blockbuster movie, but it drives the action in such a different way than you’d expect.

Lastly, this book made me realize how long it’s been since I read a book that really thrilled my imagination. I didn’t think C.S. Lewis could pull it off and really bring the story together in a satisfying way, because I’ve gotten so good at predicting with the first few chapters of a novel how bad the novel is going to be. I’ve also had far too many promising novels fade away into gibberish and frustration. It’s so wonderful to discover you’re actually in the hand of an author you can trust–an author who writes well and plots well and will not disappoint you even in a story with weaknesses. My imagination was so fired up this week, and it was a shock to discover I’d forgotten what that felt like.

In Conclusion:

What is really interesting about super-good books, and the one thing I love about them, is how so many of them do not follow the advice writers are constantly being given today. I can’t imagine any publisher publishing this book nowadays. It starts off soooooooooooo slow—just a guy walking through the back lanes of England. It has such wooden characters, characters without real character arcs. It takes sooooooooo long for any sort of action to occur, and the action that does occur fails to create much suspense. Why would a publisher take it on?

But yet—you care about these wooden characters! Somehow by the middle the shocking thing that happens affects you emotionally. You even feel pity and some sympathy for the bad guys at the end. And the climax and ending is somehow satisfying, even though a reader could so easily feel cheated if these events were not well-written.

I think, despite the good behind teaching writers how to better their craft, we sometimes risk making all writing exactly the same. We could be overlooking the next C.S. Lewis by insisting on being dropped into the middle of the action. And I do not say this under any delusions that I am the next C.S. Lewis who should not be ignored, because I know there’s so much about character and plot that I need to keep on learning about until the end of the my writing days. But stories can somehow, some way, work without these things. Our confidence in our knowledge about what is ‘good’ storytelling may be far too similar to our confidence in the progress of history and the idea we’re superior to civilizations that have come before us. We’re missing the context. We unknowingly blind ourselves to what they can teach us.

However, to conclude this review–Out of the Silent Planet will likely not change anyone’s mind about C.S. Lewis. If you dislike his philosophizing and general outlook on life, you won’t find this book any different. If you dislike his neat and logical prose, you’ll find that here as well. Even if you love C.S. Lewis because of the Chronicles of Narnia, you may find this one a little ‘weirder.’ But if you love inventive settings that inspire you to think about the world in new ways, give this one a shot. It’s worth it.

 

 

Have you read Out of the Silent Planet, and if so, what did you think?

 

Related Book Reviews of Out of the Silent Planet:

While writing this post I discovered there were not a lot of people writing about the Space Trilogy, so I thought I’d link to a few good reviews I came across here.

The Silent Planet of C.S. Lewis – why this book counts as good classic sci-fi despite having angels in it.

The Cosmic Trilogy 1: Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis – a deeper review of the books as a whole.

Out of the Silent Planet – a comparison with Gulliver’s Travels that I didn’t notice myself.

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March 4, 2017 · 10:16 am

A Few Classics That Are Not Hard to Read

Classics are usually heavy reading. Even if they’re short, the language is unfamiliar enough that they take a long time to get through. But every once in a while you find one that surprises you, and here are three that surprised me.

Note: I’m not including any classics described as ‘children’s literature’ in this list.

'Around the World in Eighty Days' by Neuville and Benett 22
Around the World in Eighty Days, by Jules Verne

I just really enjoyed the very punctual and methodical Phileas Fogg racing around the world with his comic French servant, Passepartout. They get into preposterous adventures of all sorts, some of which strain believability but are incredibly fun to read. It gives a wonderful picture of travel before airplanes were invented, with railroads and steamboats. Verne is known as a science fiction author, but this was a contemporary novel for him—and so for us it’s a nice view in on the past. Also, I loved the sudden revelation of Fogg’s tender side in the end.

As a side note, Jules Verne’s novels have historically received poor English translations, which led him to have a higher reputation in his native France than in the English-speaking world. This is the only sample of his work I’ve read, but I quite enjoyed him. In addition, I’ve noticed publishers give this novel nonsensical cover pages – one edition had a hot air balloon, but hot air balloons failed to appear in the story. Another recent edition has a daredevil racing in an old-fashioned car, but this does not happen in the novel either.

A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens

This remains the only Dickens novel I’ve read cover to cover. It’s short, so Dickens’ verbosity won’t put you off. The plot is easy enough to follow. I actually read it because I knew nothing about the plot and wanted to find out what this Christmas carol business everyone always went on about at Christmastime was all about, but I’ve reread it since without boredom. I’ve heard complaints about the opening paragraphs, where Dickens goes on about different types of nails and why the doornail should not be considered the ‘deadest’ type of nail out there, but personally I found it humorous. If you find it tedious, it’s a short novel, so it’s soon over and the rest of the plot begins!

Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen

This was my introduction to Jane Austen, and I still believe it’s the easiest one to start with (though none of her novels are too difficult for the modern reader, aside from the formality of the language). This novel gets right into the action and humor, with Mr. Bingley arriving in town and Mrs. Bennett nagging her husband to go meet him. It does not start with family history, like Sense and Sensibility, Emma, and Mansfield Park. The heroine is lively enough that it’s not a chore to follow her through the story, and the story is shorter than Emma. There’s a few lulls in action, but overall it’s a very satisfying romance and shows off Austen’s talent very well.

 

 

These are my recommendations—your mileage may vary! After all, I thought Lord of the Rings and The Iliad were surprisingly easy to get into, and I know many people who didn’t. And I just struggle with Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, while others just love them. But if you’re meaning to read a few novels that have stood the test of time, these are a few places to start!

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February 8, 2016 · 2:52 pm

Do People Fall in Love Out of Gratitude?

What’s going on here? A romance novel is seriously making the hero fall for a girl simply because she adored him first?

quotables button“[T]hough Henry was now sincerely attached to her, though he felt and delighted in all the excellencies of her character and truly loved her society, I must confess that his affection originated in nothing better than gratitude, or, in other words, that a persuasion of her partiality for him had been the only cause of giving her a serious thought. It is a new circumstance in romance, I acknowledge, and dreadfully derogatory of an heroine’s dignity; but if it be as new in common life, the credit of a wild imagination will at least be all my own.”

– Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

Shouldn’t there be something grander? Shouldn’t she have been the prettiest girl in the room, and he couldn’t keep his eyes off her? (But in real life, there’s always someone prettier). Shouldn’t he have somehow found her absolutely unique? (But everyone blurs together until we take the time to get to know them.) Shouldn’t she have hidden her feelings until he’d fallen good and hard for her? (But Jane Austen knew this didn’t work– “Few of us who have heart enough to be really in love without encouragement.”)

Northanger Abbey is perhaps Jane Austen’s attempt to inject a little ‘realism’ into novels–most deliberately in her attempts to spoof Gothic novels by showing how the spooky can be very ordinary (mysterious papers turn out to be a laundry list, a mean-spirited man turns out to be driven by greed rather than remorse or guilt)–but perhaps also in her handling of the romance between the central characters, Henry and Catharine. He falls in love with her because she was in love with him! He falls in love out of gratitude!

But this is realistic! Who doesn’t find their opinion of someone improving because we know they like us? I’ve experienced it myself, when people have straight-up told me they enjoy hanging out with me, I find myself wanting to hang out with them more. Because they told me they like me, it takes the pressure off. I don’t have to wonder what they think about me being myself. I know, so I can just be myself. And focus on getting to know them more and more.

It’s a way for one person to distinguish themselves from the sea of other people in the world–this person is memorable because this person admires me. Why waste time on people who don’t like you, when you know someone does?

And gratitude? It is gratifying to hear someone thinks we’re clever–or pretty–or funny – or adventurous. It feels so good it leaves us wide open to manipulating flattery. We can be manipulated into suddenly thinking so very highly of someone who flatters us, and not admit that’s the reason why we suddenly think so well of them. (I can’t help but add a side-note: It’s almost more insidious when people flatter things we’re very proud of instead– “what a nice family you have,” “what wonderful people are your friends,” “your church is really amazing…”)

But when the admiration is genuine! It’s almost a relief to hear someone sincerely believes one of our strengths is actually a strength. And there comes the gratitude–and increased liking–and increased friendship–and maybe love…

Now, is this a sure-fire recipe for making friends, or falling in love? Sadly, no.

The terrible thing about letting someone know how much you like them is finding out your feelings don’t make them like you more. This is why we so rarely tell anyone how we feel! They don’t feel good that you like them, they feel pressured and afraid you expect something from them, and so they pull back. So despite trying to strengthen your relationship by sharing your admiration, you actually end up driving the person away.

Now, maybe this is not as common as we all believe. Maybe we truly all would have a thousand more healthy relationships if we just were honest about our admiration. In fact, we probably would, because people are far less likely to reject us than our negative brains want us to believe. However, it’s reality that people do react negatively. People you make an effort for do disappear. People you fall in love with don’t fall for you. The stronger your admiration for another person is, the more painful it is when it’s clearly not mutual.

So I’m not saying go out and tell everyone how you feel all the time. The risk is very great. The pain is nasty when everything goes wrong-side-up. You can’t predict the results of your honesty.

But honest admiration can result in something wonderful, even in this non-fictional world. So in the end it’s worth it to weigh the risks and open yourself up to this possibility.

 

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February 7, 2015 · 8:51 am

When a Hurricane of Clichés Equals a Great Movie

Today, I’m going to talk about Casablanca. If you want to know more about why I care about Casablanca, check out my previous post, ‘Writing Reality – Or Escaping It‘.

quotables button“Thus Casablanca is not just one film. It is many films, an anthology… And this is the reason it works, in spite of aesthetic theories and theories of film making…Two clichés make us laugh. A hundred clichés move us. For we sense dimly that the clichés are talking among themselves, and celebrating a reunion.”

– Umberto Eco (Travels in Hyperreality, and “Casablanca, or, The Clichés are Having a Ball”)

For years, filmmakers hungered to know what made Casablanca a classic. If they could just crack the formula – figure out what made people instantly love it so much – they could crank out sure-fire hits over and over. After all, on the surface, there’s not much to recommend Casablanca above your average movie. It’s a very clichéd plot – a love triangle, a sacrifice, a clear antagonist, a damsel in distress. The characters are walking stereotypes. The character arcs have all been done a thousand times before (even in 1942, when this movie was made).

If there was a key to filmmaking—or writing in general, which is what I care about most of all—wouldn’t that be nice? A magic key unlocking the secrets of what makes stories work? But there isn’t. There’s no magic key – only magic. The magic that happens when, in this case, the right combination of actors, characterization, plot and tired clichés combine.

I shouldn’t have enjoyed Casablanca. You’d think by now, seventy or so years after its release, the plot would’ve been spoiled for me. It should be like those people who watched the Lord of the Rings movies and wondered why it used every fantasy stereotype in the book, when it reality it’s merely because Lord of the Rings INVENTED those stereotypes (except in this case it’s romance stereotypes, and Casablanca didn’t invent them but merely inspired the continual recycling of these old tropes). I saw the end coming from a mile away. Also, it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve picked up something everyone told me was a classic, and hated it (see Romeo and Juliet, and Wuthering Heights).

However, I did love it. Like I said, there was magic.

And I love the quote I pasted above, because it shows how conventional wisdom about stories falls short – how in this particular case not an avoidance of clichés but a hurricane of clichés is what makes the movie. Casablanca breaks an accepted, basic rule of stories. But then again, every piece of true art is flawed.

Will lightning strike again if you use a hurricane of clichés? Or is Casablanca merely lightning in a bottle? There’s no way to say, except that creating art involves risk-taking and bravery. Sometimes that means breaking new ground. And sometimes that means risking doing what everyone else tells you is overdone.

The genius comes in telling what situation calls for which.

And if your striving eventually comes up with a story that works – a story that speaks to something inside humanity, and satisfies something in our cores – well, then your work has been touched by that magic.

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Looking for some more romantic reads? Check out my short novellas, Is He Prince Charming? and Paris in Clichés. Or sign up for my author newsletter.

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