The End of the Road: Where does it leave us?

So.

We've read a book with 67 chapters and worth hundreds and hundreds of pages filled with paragraphs that last a page and dedicated to everything from crafty detectives, sad orphans, and mud, mud, shitloads of mud everywhere. That's a long, long road we've traveled, so where does it leave us?

Dickens spent a lot of time giving us things to think about, though without actually making us read essays upon essays of drab, wordy complaints about society. Through an immense amount of characters who represent entire ideas and philosophies, and a carefully, if not overwhelmingly, intricate plot that connect them all together, Dickens has given us something complex. Every connection, every action, every little detail, and especially the time he chooses to make certain things happen to particular people, is done for a reason and speaks about something.

So how has this book changed your perspective? Beyond plot and entertainment, Dickens ultimately had a vision that was meant to inspire some sort of change to your mindset (and mine) on society. What is it?

In partnerships:

We've examined the problems of love vs marriage and relationships for convenience through Lady Dedlock and Nemo/Captain Hawdon, Ada and Richard, and obviously between Esther and John and Alan (we've been on this book so long I feel I have a right to be on a first name basis with the characters).

How does correlate to your own life or your feelings on living for passion and real love vs supposed-realism and being a golddigger (anyone looking for sugar daddies or mamas?) Is the ending with Esther and Alan real? How would it be different if Jarndyce hadn't given them such a merry beginning?

We've seen how things like religion (or particularly religious fundamentalism) have ruined perfectly fine relationships through Ms. Barbary: she ruins the bond she had with her sister, Honoria/LD, she drove LD and Hawdon to split after making a big thing out of Esther's birth and claiming Esther died, and she ruined her own relationship with Boythorn. How else does it affect characters or our own society?


In solving problems:

What about society makes it a failed device? What makes it work? Clearly Dickens has his own ideas about it. In Law we have Bucket as the answer to law enforcement. In Tulkinhorn and Guppy to an extent, we saw law used for personal and selfish goals, and to a larger extent, Jarndyce v. Jarndyce was a device to be used to keep Chancery in such a painful limbo. Do we do the same in modern day? Do we distract or drag out pointless things to take advantage?

In altruism:

How do we help people like Jo with our resources today? Can any of us ever imagine taking in someone to help them without expecting anything in return? Do we push people along? Do we see our Pardiggles and Jellbys in modern culture? Is there any hope for the Jennys and Lizs of our day? Can we, like in chapter 8, ever truly understand people who go through that kind of existence, and, like Esther and Ada, make any kind of difference?


Anything else?

I'm writing alot and this may start to look like an essay or essay questions so I apologize. But if we haven't gotten anything out of this book, except for hopefully a good grade, then in the long run we didn't get much out of this class. This was sure as hell as a long book that wasn't very fun like other huge books (like Harry Potter for Mona) but please share anything you've picked up from the text, our conversations, or even some other form of revelation that dawned on you at the time of this semester through this story.

And, as the final blogger, I can only say that after traveling this long road, it sure as hell feels good to reach the end, rest my figurative feet for the moment, and see what new paths this road has opened up for me.

You've all been fun. Especially Team Handsome. (We're awesome, but so are you). And Prof Reitz. You rock too.

Cheers.



Masoud

Lady Dedlock: The End

So in an era of writing, where by and large, the good guys are sent through hell but get a happy ending (Esther), and the bad guys are usually just sent to hell (Tulkinghorn), My Lady Dedlock dies painfully and alone in a cemetery (convenient, I suppose). Her mean-spiritedness aside, she was not a villain in the story, yet it seems she was given one of the saddest endings in the book.

Among the graves of the departed, this cemetery is for the dishonored, the unidentified and the poor, and it is here where Esther eventually comes upon the body of her mother. She had gone to this cemetery in the hopes of finding the grave of Nemo/Hawdon, arguably the only man she truly loved.

While it was appropriate for Nemo to be buried in such a place, having Lady Dedlock die in this cemetery has more layers to it than we think. Granted, it has a certain melodramatic flare to it, dying alongside her former lover, something that is spookily romantic, and not surprising in Victorian era writing. But dying in this cemetery for the dishonored and the poor, she dies not as Lady Dedlock but as Honoria, her true self; her secrets laid bare—the affair with Nemo, the child out of wedlock. She isn't the haughty, phlorizin and self-centered woman whose regal demeanor and money kept her in the richest of circles. She is the fallen woman, dying among the wretched and the poor.

Lady Dedlock died alone believing her world to be over. She believed she was hunted for a murder she did not commit, believed Sir Leicester hated her for her secrets, for what they would do to the Dedlock name. She died horribly, and the ending wasn't happy. However, the reader is cued in on some other truths. Sir Leicester's love for her was so great he felt sorry for her. He didn't care about the Dedlock family legacy, and had forgiven her totally for her past—he loved her more than he could have expressed to her. My Lady died in pursuit of her first love, and when she was found, the first hands upon her was Esther, her daughter. So in that way, her death was perhaps more bittersweet. When she died, people mourned her, unlike Tulkinghorn whose death was probably met with a ticker-tape parade. Lady Dedlock died surrounded by the love of other people.

In that way, Dickens gave her--a flawed woman--a bittersweet end. It was sad, but she was allowed to die the woman she actually was, not the woman she pretended to be. In that way, it was a happy ending.

The Two Identities of a Fallen Woman

In The Home for Homeless Women, the residents are trained to adapt to the way of life of the proper Victorian woman, abandoning the unacceptable behavior they practiced while living on the streets, in order to live new lives without malice from society. To avoid constantly shifting from prostitution to prison, these women are taught to do household tasks which will ultimately prepare them for their new lives abroad: "The distinctive feature of the home established by Miss Coutts and Dickens, Urania Cottage in Shepard's Bush, was that it prepared the girls for emigration, and a new life. This solution to the twin problems of social stigma and the pulling power of known ways and old companions appealed strongly to Dickens" (Homes for Homeless Women, 124). Although these girls would learn proper etiquette and how to tend to a family, their education at the home would be useless in their own country because English society would never accept these fallen women regardless of how far they have come. In order to obtain fulfilling lives without the fear of social stigma, these women must immigrate to a foreign land, erasing their pasts. They must project images of proper, well-behaved women while disguising the identities that have shaped them into the women they are.

Similarly, Lady Dedlock, a woman with an illegitimate child from a man who is not her husband, chooses to continue sheilding her sin from the world even after she confesses to her daughter, Esther, that they are in fact mother and daughter: "I must travel my dark road alone, and it will lead me where it will. From day to day, sometimes from hour to hour, I do not see the way before my guilty feet. This is the earthly punishment I have brought upon myself. I bear it, and I hide it" (450). Instead of accepting that she, like every other human being, makes mistakes and taking responsibility for her actions, Lady Dedlock must conceal her misdeed and continue to punish herself with guilt. Likewise, the women in the home for homeless women do not demonstrate to society, after having changed their ways, that they have learned from their immoral actions. Rather, they immigrate to a foreign land and pretend to be someone else. Fallen women are forced to deny the fact they have ever fallen and consequently, they are inclined to live double lives--inwardly, as the women that have brought them where they are and outwardly, as the women society expects them to be. Through his establishment of the home for homeless women and Lady Dedlock, a fictionalized example of a fallen woman, Dickens does not encourage society to accept women who are or have been in such situations. Instead, fallen women are expected to adapt to the guidelines that have been set for females all along.

"Wretched and dishonouring creature that I am!" The Happiness Lacking in Dickens's Happy Ending for Women

It was surprising when Michie claimed that Dickens's female characters are traditionally not complicated, for it seems that there are several complicated female characters in Bleak House. Although she goes on to say that Esther is quite complicated, it seems like Lady Dedlock, coincidentally being Esther's mother, is also a complicated female character. When she admits to Esther that she is her mother, and that she must remain on "the dark road [she has] trodden for so many years," she also makes another admission that allows us to see more deeply into the soul of Lady Dedlock, the woman whom to society seems like the perfect trophy wife that always seems to be bored and haughty. She says in answering Esther's question about whether she surely wishes to remain alone, "I am resolved. I have long outbidden folly with folly, pride with pride, scorn with scorn, insolence with insolence, and have outlived many vanities with many more. I will outlive this danger, and outdie it, if I can. It has closed around me, almost as awfully as if these woods of Chesney Wold had closed around the house; but my course through it is the same. I have but one: I can have but one" (451).
It is strange that she uses the word "outbidden" in this context. How exactly has she "outbidden folly with folly" or "insolence with insolence?" There is definately a reference to her past, and how she has dealt with reactions from society, and more importantly from her sister. When she says "outbidden," is she talking about exceeding her folly with more folly? Or does she mean that she has exceeded other people's folly in her actions? Or, is she perhaps claiming that she rises above or surpasses people's expectations and counters their perceptions of her by doing things like marrying into a wealthy family? If she is making the claim that she has made mistakes in her past, and then made even worse mistakes and continues to constantly outdo herself, then is this not an indication of her making a bigger mistake now? If her folly was having a child out of wedlock, then does she outbid that folly by abandoning that child and refusing to publicly acknowledge her? That certainly seems to be the case, since Esther is one of the narrators of Bleak House, and is liked by Dickens, and meant to be liked by the readers of Bleak House, for she will eventually become a force of social change. Although Lady Dedlock's refusal to publicly acknowledge Esther may have some benefits for Esther, like not having the public brand her as a bastard child, we still get the sense that Lady Dedlock is wrong for not wanting any relationship with her daughter.
Lady Dedlock then goes on to say "I have but one: I can have but one." Here, she seems to be alluding to having only one choice. That one choice is that she must not have a relationship with Esther, and she must continue to be secretive about her past. Lady Dedlock is a complicated female figure. She struggles with having to reconcile, or refuse to reconcile, her past with her present. She claims that she is a "wretched and dishonouring creature," but has to portray herself to the public as a proud and indifferent being. She must keep the secret of her being the mother of Esther, but must live with the guilt and the pain that her child lives, but she cannot ever care for her. She must be quite strong to be able to do all of these things simultaneously, and she has been successful at doing most of these things prior to finding out that Esther is her daughter. But in all of her complications, Lady Dedlock says she has but one choice. This admission reminds me of an "Appeal to Fallen Women" and "Homes for Homeless Women." In these works by Dickens, he seems to allude to the idea that women who are "fallen" only have one choice: to get married and forget about their pasts. Dicken's seems to make it seem like this transition will be easy for the women, and will help them to achieve the happiness they were born to have. Lady Dedlock, however, seems far from attaining any happiness in her current state. Although she has achieved all that Dickens would hope that fallen women would achieve in his letter and article, she is still miserable. But why would such a complicated character merely conform to society's standards of what makes a woman happy and what a woman ought to do with her life, espcially if she is not happy? Lady Dedlock's case goes against Dickens's idealistic views on what marriage does for women, and how people should live. Perhaps women are not born to be happy, and it seems like marriage is not a means of achieving happiness, at least for the fallen woman in Dickens's novel.
Lady Dedlock's extremism in trying to cover up her shame makes her a very complicated character. Her extremism causes her to walk along the path of shame and secrecy alone, causes her misery, and also causes her to go to great lengths to conform to societal expectations on how women should live. But in her extremism, and in her being adamant on keeping her secret and continuing to maintain the Dedlock name and honor, she reveals not only the pressures of nineteenth cetury society on women, but also the need for social change. One of Dickens's overarching themes in this novel is the need for social reform. Women like Lady Dedlock should not have to be separated from their children, and should not have to live a certain way because society says they should. If Dickens truly believes that women, even fallen women, were born to be happy, and shows us that Lady Dedlock is not happy in her situation, then there must be a need to reform society's constraints on women, their freedom, and their happiness. This change might even need to extent to the products of the mistakes of fallen women, namely, people like Esther. Esther makes the claim that she "should not be punished for birth" (455), and being separated from her mother, or knowing that having any relation with her mother if she should ever want one, is impossible, obviously upsets her. So, Dickens's call for social reform would be for the benefit of these women, and the benefit of their children who are innocent of the sins of their fathers, or mothers, as Esther is.

Esther and Lady Deadlock must be Mother and Daughter ... They're Both Lame

So in the last installment we finally get to see Lady Deadlock admit that she is in fact Esther's mother, and to be honest it was not very interesting. We read all throughout the book about Esther's curiosity towards her parents and when she finds out she has a very dull reaction. at the start of the novel she is very meek but as the book progresses she has been a bit more opinionated and vocal about her feelings and i wanted her to get upset with Lady Deadlock. It might not really be in her nature to do so but it would have been interesting to have them fight a bit. instead Esther tells Deadlock that she still has love for her even after she is told that she and her mother can't have a relationship. Esther's reaction to the news is as though she knew it all along.

Lady Deadlock annoyed me too. I can understand her being upset at the fact that she had a child that she didn't know was alive but if you're not going to try to have a relationship with her, what difference does it really make? when reading the chapter i felt as though Lady deadlock was overacting to compensate for the lack of presence in Esther's life. as though Esther would feel better about still not having a mother if she cried her eyes out. i was actually waiting for Lady Deadlock to spontaniously combust (which I am determined to prove), she suddenly had this burst of emotion and i wasn't sure what to expect. I mean if she keeps this secret bottle up any longer she might just do so.

But seriously i think that Lady Deadlock chose that time to tell Esther because she had been through so much with her sickness and her temporary blindness that it would have just been rude not to sprinkle some good news in there somewhere. she was probably feeling bad for Esther and thought that telling her she was her mother and then that she didn't want anything to do with her was going to make Esther feel better.

While Esther has a new outlook on life now after surviving her sickness i think everyone feels bad for her. She is scarred all over her face and it doesn't seem like people can handle it. she has spent so much time focusing on her that the scars on her face serve as a reminder that she needs to focus on herself. i mean after those kids were commenting on how awful she looks now, who wouldn't feel bad for her? Even Guppy gave up on her, their engagement was not all that real but it's called off after she gets sick and looks like a mess, it sounds weird to me...

The Evolution of Esther, Krook's Death and More

We are now officially over the half-way mark on Bleak House and Esther has grown quite a bit. Esther has matured and begun to find herself, when sickness struck her. For a while we were left unsure of whether Esther would regain her sight, and when she did we were then left with the fact that Esther had been scarred. Her comment on Charley changed and disfigured looks is a window into Esther's own feelings when she is later afflicted.

The theme of watching and looking-glasses/mirrors was prevalent with not only Esther's brief blindness, but Charley's removal of the mirrors from the rooms so that Esther could not see herself, as well as Mrs. Woodcourt's visit at the beginning of the installment where she makes the fortune of "...it is that you will marry some one, very rich and very worthy, much older -- five-and-twenty years perhaps -- than yourself. And you will be an excellent wife, and much beloved..." (p.367) This fortune mirrors that of Lady Dedlock's marry to Sir Leicester, but also hints at a possible relationship between Esther and John Jarndyce. Which could explain Jarndyce's reaction to being called "Father." More speculation can be made about the interactions of Esther and John Jarndyce as opposed to Esther and Richard or Esther and Guppy.

Esther has sometimes been noted as being unreliable and contradictory. With the final passage we read in class of the installment as well as the great pains Esther takes to keep Ada from becoming sick along with not seeing Esther, we can deduce that Esther does care about looks. As we had said previously, Esther is protecting her own looks by protecting Ada's. Esther's relief that Alan Woodcourt had not professed his love as it would break both their hearts now if Esther had to write to Alan about disfigurement, now brings into question Guppy's response to how Esther now looks. Would Guppy still pursue Esther? Guppy seems to be in love with Esther, but how far will that love go now?

There is also the suspicious events of not only Krook going up in flames along with the blackmail material that Guppy was about to show Lady Dedlock, but Esther contracting smallpox from Charley who had gotten it from Jo. Now, there is very little tying Esther and Lady Dedlock together. Whatever Guppy had to say on the matter is now just hearsay. Jo has been an unreliable witness before and quite possibly dead. The only connection left may lay with Mr. George or even Mr. Bagnet who knew of Captain Hawdon before Nemo, and may hold writing samples that everyone is after. And with the Smallweeds now being connected with Krook through Mrs. Smallweeds, their hold over people is spreading and bringing further corruption.

How ironic is it that Krook/Lord Chancellor has become the Wind that sometimes upsets Jarndyce to enter the Growlery?

Also, to watch out for is the handkerchief that Esther had laid on Jenny's dead child several installments back. It makes a brief mention by Miss Flite who relays the story from Jenny that a "lady with a veil" took the "handkerchief away with her as a little keepsake, merely because" it belonged the Esther. (p.438) Is Esther right that the lady was Caddy? Or can we guess that it's Lady Dedlock who took the handkerchief?

And there is Mrs. Rouncewell crossing paths with Mr. George and Mr. Bagnet outside of Tulkinghorn's office, and of course Mr. George had been so occupied over something else that he hadn't turned around until Mrs. Rouncewell had left despite the fact that Mr. Bagnet and Mrs. Rouncewell had conversed on the fact that she had a son that was a soldier. Did Mr. George know and recognize her, and thus had been hiding? Or was it truly a coincidence that he had been distracted?

Combustion?

I want to start off by saying that Caddy's wedding could have been summed up in no more than 3 sentences. After 400 pages I understand that Mrs. Jellyby is a really huge mess due to her philanthropist work. Esther spend too much time narrating her wedding. It was the same scene as the one when we first meet them, just under different circumstances. Congrats Caddy!

Mrs. Woodcourt is an evil manipulator. I felt so bad for Esther when she said her son's kindness towards women were just him being nice, and ALL of them took it as something else. Poor Esther, this lady just went over there to ruin Esther's kind heart. I really like Mr. Woodcourt, I hope this lady dissapears some where and Esther and him can reunit and start a passionate romance. But now Esther is DISFIGURED!

Before I comment on this desease, WHERE IS JO??? This better not be his ending, but with Charley and Esther almost dying I dont know what could have happened to him in such a bad state.
I wonder how bad Esther looks now, because im pretty sure she was as good looking as her mother, since everyone seems to think they look so much alike. She should have had more confidence in herself, and stop looking so much at Ada. Im also pretty sure Esther was better looking than her. Im glad both Charley and Esther are better, I knew Esther couldn't die in the middle of the book, but I was a little nervous for Charley. I think she is some one to admire.

Now on to Krook... how bad does some one need to be inside to explode in such a way? I wonder what Krook found in those letters that led to his explosion. Maybe everyone was underestemating him, and he did teach himself how to read. I would love to read those letters because it sounds like the information is JUICY!
The Smallweeds, Mr. Turkinhorn, and Lady Deadlock are all conspiring something together. This novel is getting really interesting. I hope more people explode...Mrs.Woodcourt, Lady Deadlock, her lawyer, and Mr. Skimpole.

Could LAdy Dedlock be Esther's mother or aunt?

The whole time I’m reading this book, one of the things I want to know is who Esther’s actual parents are. I sympathize with Esther greatly because of her having such a sad and horrible childhood, where she did not know who her mother and father was and her birthday being “the most melancholy day at home, in the whole year” (p.18). She had no one who gave her motherly care and the little bit she received from Rachael is not enough to satisfy a child’s hunger for love and affection as growing up. I felt bad about how her godmother neglected her and the time she told Esther that she was a “disgrace” to her mother, which was probably traumatic for Esther. This being said, after reading chapter 18, I’m 98% sure that Lady Dedlock is either Esther’s actual mother (I’m not very sure about who Esther’s father is because more clues and information are needed) or she is Esther’s aunt (the other two percent I’m not sure because we have yet to meet more characters).
Mr. Guppy seeing the portrait of Lady Dedlock, on chapter 7, was the first time I had a feeling she was somehow related to Esther. Lady Dedlock probably resembled Esther and Mr. Guppy who never saw Lady Dedlock, but saw Esther before, was fascinated about how much Esther and Lady Dedlock looked alike hence later on he became completely infatuated with Esther (stalking her and wanting to marry her). The second example that shows why Lady Dedlock is Esther’s mother or is related to Esther is when Esther finally sees Lady Dedlock in the church. After she sees her, Esther gets the same frightening reaction she use to have when she used to be around her godmother. Lady Dedlock also had the similar voice of Esther’s godmother which reminded Esther of her godmother. The third example is when John Jarndyce and Lady Dedlock were speaking about Lady Dedlock’s sister who was also John Jarndyce’s friend. The fact that Lady Dedlock had a sister who was also a good friend of John Jarndyce is another clue that Esther and Lady Dedlock are related.
To me it seems like Lady Dedlock probably has two sisters, one being Esther’s godmother, the other who is Esther’s actual mother, but whatever the case is, Esther and Lady Dedlock are related by blood. Lady Dedlock always being so miserable and her life show that her past is what makes her sad. She is probably sad all the time because she thinks about her mistake (or her sister’s mistake) for abandoning (Esther). Do you guys think that there will be other characters who are more likely to be Esther’s mother? Or does everyone think that Lady Dedlock is Esther’s mother or aunt?

Mudless: The Smallweed Family

(This is a late blog entry, Professor please be merciful!)

The Smallweeds are one of the dysfunctional groups of people that Dickens introduces us to. Through the eyes of the Dickensian narrator we are shown an image of people that, like most of London, have been swept under the rug and are living lives that closely resemble those of savages. The Smallweeds are an exceptionally dysfunctional and poor family. Their household is comprised of nothing but turmoil, with random acts of violence; a collision of everything negative in London, all under one roof.

One of the first scenes introduces us to Grandmother and Grandfather Smallweed; we are notified immediately that the grandmother is not dealing with a full deck, and the grandfather does not comprehend this, and “immediately throws the cushion at her…the effect of this jaculation is twofold” (pg. 259). It goes on to explain that not only did he inflict harm on the grandmother, but the exertion from his thrust of the pillow causes him to fall back into the chair himself, hinting that his violence towards his wife hurts him as much as it does her. It’s as if Dickens wanted to show the reader that the grandmother’s madness and the grandfather’s violence was in no way worse than one another, but when you put them together it made them both worse than they would be individually.

The children are no better; they are painted by Dickens to be seemingly oblivious to the conditions that surround them, engulfed in their own Smallweed world. The little girl Judy has never known the company of a doll, and has only played with other children a couple of times, both of which ended with her being alienated from them. It is described that it is “very doubtful whether Judy knows how to laugh” (pg.260) and she herself is described as seeming “like an animal of another species” (pg. 259). Another child, Bart, is essentially being taught by his grandfather to be a freeloader of sorts. As soon as Bart makes his entrance into the home he is greeted by his grandfather who asks him how dinner with his friend went, congratulating him for “dining at his expense” (pg. 261). Bart is encouraged to “live at [his friend’s] expense” as much as he can and to “take warning by his foolish example. That’s the use of such a friend. The only use you can put him to” (pg. 261). From a young age Bart is taught to manipulate people.

While this portrayal of the family is brief, it captures a bit of what Dickens was laying out for us, and also what he didn’t lay out. Nothing about this family is optimistic in the slightest, their neighborhood is “ill-favoured and ill-savoured” (pg. 257); and the family complement this. All of this, and yet the presence of mud is absent. All of mud’s characteristics, the darkness and depravity that have accompanied it throughout the entire book, are all there without mud as their harbinger. Most of the descriptions about the characters and the neighborhood that they reside in are corroborated by other descriptions of deplorable conditions in the book. The difference with the Smallweeds is that Dickens did not feel the need to show Mud in his description of the family, it was as if he was showing the reader that the family dynamic could founder in London without mud to accompany it. Somehow this family is special in a way, which is why their house is shown as being tucked away in a dark corner, away from everyone else. I believe that there may be some type of subtext implanted here; Dickens is trying to show the reader the true darkness, the true underbelly of London.

Characters and Things in Bleak House Which Seem Confusing

Esther as everyone can see is a caring and loving person and that is why we know she can make friends and that everyone will like her. What puzzles me though is why does Richard want Esther to move in with him and Ada when they get married. I wonder if there is kind of a love triangle going on. I wonder if Richard has any kinds of feelings for Esther. I also wonder if Richard is trying to say that Esther would not find some one to love and when she has to move out of Jarndyce house that she would not have a place to stay? or does he mean that Ada and himself really wants their friend to live with them because of how motherly she is?


Something else that confuses me is Jo's significance in this story. We all know that Jo seems to be just a boy who is poor and gets money from a man named Nemo who was found died and from other people for giving out information. We also know that Jo is the person who shows a mysterious woman around but if Jo is such a no body (like it seems in the text) then why does his character show up so much in Bleak House. I'm wondering could Jo be related to the Jarndyce case in anyway or related to any of the more wealthy characters in the story? Jo also always claim not to know anything but he is asked about what seems like everything from his connection to Nemo to the mysterious lady's identity, but why is that? Is it because he does know everything but does not want to say anything? or does he really not know anything at all?


Another character that seem to be confusing is Richard. Richard seems not to know exactly what he really want to do with his life. He even kept changing his mind about what he wanted to study from being a doctor to being a lawyer then wanting to join the military. If Richard can not make up his mind about what he wants to do in life how do we expect him to make up his mind about his love life. Richard claims to be in love with Ada and want to marry her but I wonder if Richard will eventually change his mind about wanting to be with Ada just like he does with his future? I also wonder if Richard would change his mind about wanting Esther to move in with Ada and himself?


The last character which will be mentioned and seems confusing is Lady Deadlock. She seem to be in a loveless marriage because of how dull and unhappy she is portrayed in the book. I wonder why she would not just leave her husband so that she could end up being happier. Another thing is that it seems as if she is the woman who wants Jo to show her where Nemo was (even though it is not stated) because it just so happens that she disappears when the lady appears to Jo. Also Jo recognizes her maids clothes but not her maids rings or voice. So I'm thinking that Lady Deadlock dressed in her maids clothes to disguise herself. Jo also seen the mysterious lady's fancy rings and Lady Deadlock owns a lot of fancy jewelry including rings. What I would like to find out is if Lady Deadlock is the mysterious woman and if she is why is she so concerned about the places where Nemo lived, died, and was buried?

Thoughts on Esther's parents

This is one of the biggest mysteries surrounding Bleak House, who are Esther's parents? Now as we're getting deeper in the book I feel like the mystery is slowly unraveling. I feel this because of everything that's been happening in the past installments. For example, in chapter 17, when Esther and Mr. Jarndyce were speaking about her past and how all she remembers from her early childhood is that she is "her mother's disgrace." This conversation leads to Mr. Jarndyce revealing some little information that he knows, which is that nine years ago he "received a letter from a lady[...] It told me of a child, an orphan girl just twelve years old [...]"(pg113)

This was how Mr. Jarndyce came to know Esther and he felt obligated to take her under his care since it is in his nature to do so, or was it because of something more than just that?. Further through their conversation he said "I saw my ward oftener than she same and I always knew she was beloved useful and happy. she repays me twenty-thousand-fold, and twenty more to that, every hour in every day!" speaking about Esther in which she replied "And oftener still she blesses the Guardian who is a Father to her!" The word Father is key here because of the way that Mr. Jarndyce reacts to it as soon as he hears it. It's as if it stirred him or caught him by surprise because "At the word Father" Esther "saw his former trouble come into his face. He subdued it before but it was gone in an instant; but it had been there, and it had come so swiftly upon my words that I felt as if they had given him a shock" It seems like Jarndyce asked himself in his head "does she know?"

The way Mr. Jarndyce acted was strange, and I'm gonna put it out there, maybe he is her father? And maybe he doesn't want her to know just yet. I say I would rather want him to be her father than other potential parents such as Nemo; because for starters Nemo is dead and Jarndyce is not. I would also say that Esther and Mr. Jarndyce have one thing in common, and that's dealing with emotions. Mr. Jarndyce has to go into the Growlery in order to deal with them if not he runs away and as for Esther, she has trouble dealing with them when it comes to her own feelings. I hope all you agree because we all know that Esther doesn't exactly share every detail about herself when she feels self-conscious.

So that's what I have to say on that, and as for a potential Mother for Esther, I say it may not be Lady Dedlock but the possibility is still out there. We just have to find out as we read on.

Is John Jarndyce a real Guardian?

John Jarndyce told Esther to call him Guardian but not to Richard and Ada. (there was a reason for that) In the installment that we have read, In chapter 17, pp. 212-213, John Jarndyce tells Esther what he knows about her and her history. He tells her a BS story about a letter he receives from a woman caring for a child and that if she dies before the child becomes a women John should take care of that child. (this is why he wants her to call him Guardian). What is hard for me to understand is why a man that gets a letter from a woman about an orphan girl decides to take care of the orphan after the woman dies without a woman in his life to show the orphan girl some guidance. Another thing is why would a woman write to a man about an orphan unless the orphan is related to the man. There is more to the story about Esther and her real parents. Personally, I believe that John Jarndyce should have told Esther the truth about her history and the truth about the letter (if the letter does exist). John Jarndyce is not being the Guardian that he should be to Esther, Esther wants to know about her parents and where she came from and he is holding that back from her which is not fair. (Second thought, John Jarndyce is not a guardian at all to Esther because he is not helping with anything, all he did was make her a housekeeper while he help Richard find a profession and support Ada and Richard on their incest love. Now what good will that make Esther if she learns how to be a housekeeper.)

John Jarndyce is holding something back from Esther, what do you think that is? and Do you guys believe that John Jarndyce did the right or wrong thing on not telling her the truth about her history?

ahhmmm.. Please Do Not hate me

XI. “ Our Beloved brother”(Dickensian narrator)

This is the chapter following the finding of Nemo (Nimrod) by Mr Tulkinghorn at Nemo’s apartment after his death. The chapter deals with the crud factors of being a loner in the sense that no one really know who Nemo is other than a little boy, Jo, whom he occasionally gives to, the only thing that the by can state is that “He wos wery good to me, he wos!”(138). The importance of this chapter I believe is to give us some information on how this character is important and vital to the story by giving his DEATH AN ENTIRE CHAPTER! But since he has no ties( as of yet at least) to any important characters yet we can not draw the line of how important he is just yet. The inquisitive nature of certain characters lead me to believe so and so does his appearance in an early and the concerns of others in later chapters.

XII. ”On The Watch” (Dickensian narrator)

p145 Mockery of the court, to show how big of a joke it has become and how it has became a nuisance among the people because of its bureaucracy .p149 Mr. Tulkinghorn presented Nemo’s death to Sir Leicester and Lady Deadlock and it brought fourth an awkward vibe in the room that leads to the factor that Nemo must be important.

idk what to make of this but yea:

“ Mr. Tulkinghorn, we remember your existence when you are not here to remind us of it by your presence . We bestow a fragment of our minds upon you, sir, you see!” 147 Sir Leicester .Why?

**This chapter just gives me abrupt confused feelings of WTH!

XIII. Esther’s Narrative (Esther, Duh?)

Richard is confused and wishes to go into military service specifically Navy but then was suggested the army and did not dislike the idea. I believe he simply wanted to situate himself into a life where he feels he accomplishes something with his life after talking it over with Boythorn and Jarndyce he found himself selecting the occupation of a surgeon which was way off the original mark of being in the military. Through a connection with Mr Kenge’s cousin who is a surgeon Richard finds himself being his student later on. The nature of Richard’s choice may grow from a need to be able to stand on his own two feet and declare that he can stand alone (or with ada,lol).

pg154 Esther is being stalked by her beloved friend, Mr. Guppy, who is at every event that she is at. Esther states he has “ a general feebleness about him” which makes her uneasy, and does not allow her to focus on the plays that she attends. She is scared to tell anyone because she meant to mean him no harm but she wanted him to leave her alone. the reason that she may not be able to do anything normal may be that she does not know how to react to the opposite sex, we do not have any evidence leading in the other way telling us about her having any intimate relationships, although she does tend to be in everybody else’s relationships (i.e Richard and Ada, Prince and Caddy).

***Notable female Mrs. Badger, her greatest accomplishment is marrying 3 men that were “great”, that does not sound good in any context that one may try to put it in but is glorified, why?

Then the obvious is stated between Richard and Ada to Esther by Ada and she tells her how she is in love with Richard. Clearly Esther already knew as she has stated before that they “shared the greatest of secrets”, Esther wishes them to live happy and wishes to be the maid of honor. p 162 Mr Jarndyce is told of the relationship and he does not want to tell them that their love is not wrong and that he is only “friend and distant kinsman”. he is trying to maintain a close relationship with them by not denying them the chance to be together yet he condoles it in order to allow them to stay close to him so that he does not lose their trust and maybe affection as an elder who they can trust.

XIV. Deportment (Esther)

I love this quote by Esther, “I was to be made happy forever and a day”

Besides that caddy jellyby comes back on the scene to provide Esther with information that has to do with her hardships and that of those which her family shares against her mother whom is bleeding them to the poor house. Caddy is engaged to Prince Turveydrop who is the opposite of everything her mother wants Mr Quale, and she believes through him she can escape her life which she believed is damned because she considers herself a slave to her mother . The older Turveydrop, prince’s father, is a complete d---he and has this ultimately dooming façade of “deportment" that embodies his horrid persona.

On page 180 also name the Miss Flite’s names for her birds “ Hope, Youth, Peace, Rest, Life, Dust, Ashes, Waste, Want, Ruin, Despair, Madness, Death, Cunning, Folly, Words, Wigs, Rags, Sheepskin, Plunder, Precedent, Jargon, Gammon, and Spinach” and s there was a reference to them and the cat earlier in the early chapters this could reference the chancery and what it gives and takes away.

181-182 Krook’s unwillingness to learn to read and write from someone else may not so much that he does not want to be taught wrong but instead be told that he was wrong, admitting to something that awful already makes him a target for ridicule being taunted for it would be even worse.

182 reference by surgeon that Krook was almost always drunk.(interesting I believe)

XV. BELL Yard (Esther)

mr skimpole gets into a rant of three children(Tom Emma, Charolette), the Coavinses, who are left to there own antics because of the passing of their father. Jarndyce is in a panicked frenzy and goes them immediately upon arrival he cannot help ask but why people do not help them and it is because her father was a follerer and she is a child. then a man goes into a rant about how he was in the courts and it has taken his life away and how the children and for the children’s misfortune and his he blames the individual workers of “that system”. all in all after Jarndyce’s inquiry with the children he leaves them alone because he some how sees this as being fit for them....

im not done yet...

The Dickenzian in Esther

In our earlier readings of the book we understand Dickens to be an arrogant narrator while Esther was more humble and easier to relate to. Some may appeciate the imagery and descriptiveness that is offered by Dickens for it provides a visual view of what is taking place. Others admire how Esther is able to form a closer relationship with the reader and allow them to experience the plot first hand.
However, as we continue to read and meet new people we can see a new approach in Esther's descriptions. She seems to be developing a new found confidence. In her descriptions we can see that she is more critical and judgmental of the other characters. Why do you think she is becoming more bold? Could it be because of her maturing? I personnally am a fan of this judgemental Esther. She is still the Esther we all know, love and can relate to but now with a bit of edge. I wonder if this Esther will further develop as the book progresses.

Law writer spoken of on page 55 ...

ok this law writter spoken of by miss. flite who sells his soul to the devil that is NEMO!! he has more importance then you ALLL THINK!!!!

Chapters 8-10: Esther’s new names; who is a better mother; Nemo; narrators.

While reading the selection for this week I took a lot of notes and these are the most interesting of them.

P. 90. “This was the beginning of my being called Old Woman, and Little Old Woman, and Cobweb, and Mrs. Shipton, and Mother Hubbard, and Dame Durden, and so many other names of that sort, that my own name soon became quite lost among them.” What do you think about this? Are they appropriate, degrading, anything? From the foot note we learn that these names refer to ‘folklore mother figures’. She is a mother like figure in this book but is it all she is? What do you think about her name being lost? Is she loosing her identity now that she will no longer be called by her real name but by one of these nicknames?

From all the women we see in this selection, who is a better mother? Mrs. Jellyby and Mrs. Pardiggle are like the anti-heroes, the bad mothers, bad women. Esther is portrayed as the opposite of that, the hero. She is the embodiment of Dickens’ version of what a woman/mother should be like. What about Jenny? What about the woman that came to comfort Jenny? Which side, do you think they belong on? Are they good mothers, bad mothers, somewhere in between, etc? Personally I think that Jenny, even though she is poor and her home and family are not in a good condition, is considered to be a good mother by Dickens. At the very least I think she is a better mother than Mrs. Jellyby and Mrs. Pardiggle. I think that Dickens is showing us a scale of what kinds of mothers exist. Mrs. Jellyby completely ignores her family and her kids, its like she carries them for nine months and once they are out they are on their own. Mrs. Pardiggle is a bit more involved with the kids but still ignores their desires, its as if she only sees to their basic needs and the rest of her time, energy and everything including the children’s allowances, are devoted to the causes. I think Jenny should be somewhere higher on the ladder than the previous two but I do not think Dickens intended her to be as good as Esther. Isn’t it curious that the only woman that does not have kids is the best mother?

Who do you thing Nemo really is? Who killed Nemo? Why is he even called Nemo (no one)? Remember some chapters ago Lady Dedlock saw legal papers with his hand writing and fainted? What kind of history do they have? Mr. Guppy recognized a painting of a younger Lady Dedlock when he visited her house. Could the painting have reminded him of Esther? Could Nemo and Lady Dedlock be Esther’s biological parents?

As to the question of which narrator I liked better my answer is Esther. She talks to us like her equals, the same way she talked to her doll. The Dickensian narrator, on the other hand, talks down to us. I understand him trying to make a point, but saying something once or twice is enough for me to understand what someone is trying to say. He tells us the same thing, by restating the question, ten times or more. As if he thinks that if he does not say something over and over, and over, and over again, we are so dense that, we will not understand.

Good Luck,

ILONA

My Blog Post for Chapter 8-9?-and maybe 10? = ]

Hiiii guys, fyi this blog post is early, it is meant for this Tuesday coming up but I had a thought so instead of waiting I am posting it now because I have my ipod and no paper so I am doing this via ipod touch.

Chapter 8 for me primarily (not really sure about anyone else) put in my mind more question about what is Esther's point when it comes to the Jarndyce v. Jarndyce case and family. Besides Esther being happy about her role as a sort of "housewife" kind of girl, (not saying that she is married, just pointing out that she enjoys the demands of keeping up a house and keeping track of Ada & Richard. Who by far seemly fall in love with each other in chapter 9. BTW(by the way) they are cousins (side note in case anyone missed that detail from previous chapters.)

But I digress, and return my focus back to Esther and her connection to Jarndyce and Jarndyce. Esther has a very unusual relation to Mr. Jarndyce as we discussed in class. This connection was more or less about how Esther feels for Mr. Jarndyce (she can relate to him and how he feels about expressing feelings in general.) Even though we discussed that Mr. Jarndyce is "mysterious and doesn't share information about his self, I feel that-that is a relation in which Esther knows well. This personality disorder might not just be a coincidence that both Esther and Mr. Jarndyce share.

This made me think further than Esther and Mr. Jarndyce having a professional relationship. From what I recall when reading, Esther had found out about a 'will' through Mr. Jarndyce and Mr. Jarndyce happens to be a very peculiar character. Who I believe would not tell just anyone any information. I am not saying that Esther and Mr. Jarndyce are in love or anything of a romantic nature. The fact that Mr. Jarndyce wants Esther to call him "Guardian" leaves a lot to be desired and I guess would be probably something that we should account for and pay attention to. We have to wait and see how their relationship either grows into something meaningful to the story or is just my personal thoughts.

*Also which is a side note we are introduced to another crazy mother character, Mrs. Pardiggle who cares not about her own children (just like another familiar crazy mother Mrs. Jellyby) who also enjoys charity and caring about charitable affairs rather than her own children.

Night Bloggers = ]

The Character of Bleak House

Dickens is famous for his characters. From A Christmas Carol's Scrooge to Bucket (the detective who later polices the pages of Bleak House), many people who have never read Dickens recognize his characters. Dickens creates such vivid descriptions of places that they, too, almost seem like characters. Are they? In this post, I'll ponder whether or not Bleak House, the place, should actually be considered a character in the novel.

We first meet it in the following description: "It was one of those delightfully irregular houses where you go up and down steps out of one room into another, and where you come upon more rooms when you think you have seen all there are, and where there is a bountiful provision of little halls and passages, and where you find still older cottage-rooms in unexpected places, with lattice windows and green growth pressing through them" (62). The point here is that a house is really just a collection of individual rooms and that, sometimes, the connections between them(like unexpected passageways and staircases) are not obvious at first. In many ways this is like a serialized novel -- it is a collection of individual parts and you have to do the work of making manifest those connections. The house is like a maze in which the furnishings are "old-fashioned rather than old" and "agreed in nothing but their perfect neatness" (63). Dickens's point here seems to be that at first glance Bleak House is, potentially, an mismatched mess but because of the good spirit of the home and its owner, John Jarndyce, it is a pleasing chaos. There is even a fire already burning in Esther's room.

So maybe Bleak House is some kind of microcosm of the city -- a winding, irregular place made up of countless, odd places (the many rooms) and random objects (a "Native-Hinoo chair", a picture of the death of Captain Cook) . The challenge is to make connections. Is Esther, given the housekeeping keys, the Mayor of this city? And does she have what it takes to keep the chaos and all its irregular parts in harmony?

Why might it be important that Dickens, given his social reform agenda, makes a connection between peoples' characters and the characters of the places in which they live? What is the relationship between environment and character? Where else do you see Dickens exploring that in the first two installments?

You Made It! So Now What?

If you are reading this, then you successfully followed the prompts and joined our class blog. In this space, we will try to resist the novel's invitation to think about everything at once. We will focus here on the individual characters who inhabit the world of Bleak House and the sometimes curious connections between them. Every week 1-2 students will be in charge of "posting" (that's what I'm doing now) about a particular character central to the installment(s) we are reading that week. You can write about any aspect of that character's representation that you wish; we just want to stay character-focused since it is as easy to lose touch with people in this novel as it is in a real city. Students who are not posting that week will have to comment on one of the posts.
As a trial run, this week I'd like for you to comment on this post by writing a sentence or two about what you are finding difficult about "getting into" Bleak House. If you are commenting after a few people have written, you can feel free to comment on their comments -- indeed, you can commiserate if you find the same thing difficult, or you can offer a solution to their troubles. It is perfectly acceptable in the blog world to talk specifically to one another (just be respectful). As we try to make connections between characters in the text, we will also try to make connections to one another here in the blogosphere.