folks,
any comments on our book? I find Pip to be very brave; I find Miss Havisham to be very strange. I know this is the seminal moment in pip's climb up the ladder, but, isn't Miss Havisham a bit too fantastic?
Thoughts?
daddio
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I am truly enjoying the book, good reading of the past, young ones should take note of the struggles. grandma Barb
ReplyDeleteI've always thought Havisham was wildly believable ---- cruel and eccentric, but believable, a wealthy and bitter old woman intent on getting some revenge on the world. Seems quite possible that such a person would be real.
ReplyDeleteMr. T.: Did you check your email yet 4 them interview queries I sent you?
ReplyDeleteGrandma Barb: I agree with you about telling them young childrens to take note of them struggles. These kids these days is spoiled rotten! When I was just knee high to a grasshopper, all my mama gave me to play with is a wooden stick and a ball of aluminum foil. And I made do with it! Nowsadays, these childrens got they high-tech Atari computations, Ring Pops, and J. Lo Barbie dolls.
Rondell, I enjoyed your response, but I can tell you are young a these kids.I think I have figured out who you are, I could be wrong, that happens a lot. grandma Barb
ReplyDeleteJohn - Did you issue an official invitation to Jane to join your book club? No news of one on the homefront.
ReplyDeleteLove, Jeff
in dicken's mind and world havisham seems to be the woman scorned having evolved to vengeful monster. estella, the siren to lure one to the vengeance.
ReplyDeletebrilliant white with all its promise turned sickly yellow. putrefaction. death.
not sure we should not be feeling fortunate on behalf of the groom who left havisham at the alter. he was apparently more fearful than greedy. her wealth in that period must have been astounding.
joe seems to be well-adjusted. if not well-wifed. what is going on between she (joe's wife/pip's sister) and uncle pumblechook? sorry, ladies, but is he doing her? wretched woman, anyway.
bob cratchet's wife is the wife to have. right? had to change-up to another dicken's masterpiece to locate a positive dicken's female type. bob cratchet's wife and scrooge's young girlfriend both. good women.
there is quality to pip's character. he endures the intrusiveness, the false piety, and hypocrisy of the adults (excepting joe).
given that some children today have so much more than children of pip's time, might we expect them to be more grateful? no, we might not. to do so would be for hope to triumph over experience.
on the other hand, children seem to grow out of the ingratitude. or grow into a greater awareness. alex is 17. he is not there yet. jeff (24) and eric (21) are there. they show gratitude. respect. alex's attitudes are still those of a boy. i love him immensely. and can accept those attitudes as something he will overcome.
i am listening to great expectations via mp3. i listen while shoveling snow.
Ooh Joel! You had a mouthful to say didn't ya?! You musta been holdin yo tungue for a spell! N-E-ways, I had that lil' Junebug read to me that Greatly Expected book everybody been goin' on about. Now Rondell's opinion is this: that Pip an okay kid and all. But Rondell woulda busted he behind if he took one of my Christmas pies like he do Mrs. Joe. I don't care who he feedin' it to. That right there's grounds for dismissal. Ain't nobody come between a pie and Rondell.
ReplyDeleteRondell, are you calling me long-winded? you are in good company. brother jeff has called me out for talking too much on other people's blogs.
ReplyDeletewhen the muse hits, what is one to do? ignore her? surely not.
mom, this morning you commented you were saddened by pip's treatment of joe. your comment popped up in my head a minute ago and it struck me that maybe dickens intended the reader to feel pip's pain on that very point. it seems reasonable that, if this is what we feel on reading a book, that feeling may have been the author's purpose.
pip is in a way eating from the fruit of knowledge. estella tempted him through her scorn. pricked his insecurities and caused him to see himself as common. caused him to get entangled in the mythical self.
in the same way that eve was tempted, failed and with adam expelled from the garden of eden, pip has panicked at the sight of his own insignificance and, ultimately, his unconscious rejection of the bliss which was his eden, the emotional security and relative comfortable isolation of his sister and joe's home.
his sister and her husband, joe, offered security and love, of a sort. as a younger boy knowing only the world existing within the walls of their home, he lived a blissful life. not knowing and perhaps only dreaming of the world outside and the dangers, risks and, later we hope, the positive joys that exist in the big world.
we see the story thru pip's eyes. an older pip, who already knows the end of the story recounts it to us. he speaks of his behaviors towards joe with regret. from the earliest mentioning of joe it is clear that joe is his refuge. joe cannot stop his wife's shrill tirades and harsh treatment of pip. but he gives pip a perspective that makes her bearable. even caring to a degree. he tells pip to ignore her bad parts and look to her good ones.
pip's unaccounted wealth is the big wild card. without it, maybe he would have matured into a comfortable sense of being common. the wealth took him further down the delusional path that he was superior to the likes of his sister and joe.
he followed the siren. he abandoned joe. abandoned his innocence. lived in pain. and later learned from it. or so it seems.
your sentiment may go to the heart of dicken's purpose.
This is Sunday a.m., I just found these comments. Good book report, I believe you are correct Joe, how about Jeff and John, any reports from you put on some other space that I havn't found yet, Mom
ReplyDeleteMom,
ReplyDeleteI'm still reading. Pip is getting a bit uppity.
jt
pip is getting worse with his shabby thoughts toward his benefactor; he better become more down on the street.
ReplyDeletedaddio