Wuthering Heights
Mrs. Dalloway
The Guy Not Taken
Good in Bed
Stardust
I finished the last three in two weeks...
Wuthering Heights: When I first started reading this I thought instantly of Lily and Snape. A dark young man and a beautiful young lady grow up together and have a strong connection to each other. Then a really handsome and well to do guy moves into the neighborhood and the beautiful girl marries him. Then she dies, leaving a child behind, then the guy dies, and the dark young man is left pinning for his love and treating the child badly. So very much like Snape in the Harry Potter Series.
Except Heathcliff makes Severus Snape look well adjusted. Heathcliff had some SERIOUS ISSUES.
A brief comparison:
Appearance: I think Heathcliff is hotter. Snape I imagine was kind of skinny and sallow. Heathcliff had some meat on his bones and a bad boy scowl that would have appealed to some ladies. I don't know what their noses or eyebrows looked like, but I wouldn't have gone for either one.
Vocabulary: Here, Snape is definitely more civilized. Heathcliff swears like a sailor. They do share the ability to insult their true love's child-by-another-man (especially since the child looks like the father...just sayin').
Morals: Heathcliff has no morals. I am not surprised that those around him think he is beyond human. He is violent, he digs up graves, and he is in no way hospitable. He drives people to ruin and is vengeful.
For quite sometime I thought of Snape as a very foul little man. He constantly insults Harry (what did Harry ever do to him?) and generally belittles students (which I do take issue with). However, the only time Snape was violent was when Harry fished around in Snape's memories and Snape threw a couple of spells at him. Snape is some what dubious in his morals when he asks Voldemort to save Lily and not the rest of her family. But, he makes up for it by doing his darnedest to protect the-boy-whose-very-presence-causes-him-to-simultaneously-remember-his-childhood-friend-and childhood-enemy.
I never thought I would think well of Snape, but both Deathly Hallows and Wuthering Heights have forced me to conclude that he was really not THAT bad. He was bitter, he was sneaky, and he had his own motivations that he never revealed to anyone (except Dumbledore and Harry) -- but he wasn't as bad as Heathcliff.
Which brings me to a couple of interesting thoughts. First of all, the oldest cousin (the one who should have inherited the estate if Heathcliff hadn't gotten his father drunk and gambled it from him) looked like Catherine (H's true love -- more like true obsession) or at least HAD CATHERINE'S EYES! Ahem!
Hello, Harry had Lily's eyes! But Heathcliff, from what I could tell, was sort of nice to this boy and was trying to toughen him up much in the way Heathcliff was reared. My question is: why couldn't Snape be that nice to Harry? I think it was the same reason Heathcliff couldn't be nice to Catherine's daughter: she looked too much like her father. But, as some Harry Potter fans have wondered, would Snape have been nice to Lily's child if he or she had looked like Lily? I think so -- it seemed that Heathcliff couldn't help it and he's totally off his rocker. Snape, who is a smidgen more reasonable, would not have been immune either.
Overall, Wuthering Heights was AWFUL -- it made me so mad at times, and not the good mad where I start yelling at the book or throw it across the room. But, I wanted half the people to attack Heathcliff with a shovel or an embroidery hoop depending on who they were -- I even imagined a scene where Nelly and Cathy attack Heathcliff by standing at the door with a poker and some upholstery. Sadly, this never happened.
As I read on, it just got worse, and worse, and worse...and the ending was sort of lame. If I had to like a Bronte novel, I guess it would be Jane Eyre because at least I could wrap my head around the character's motivations there. I could not understand the people in Wuthering Heights. The one part I did like was the crazy groundskeeper with the very thick accent and how it was written (a possible inspiration for a Hagrid?).
{A funny side note as I was editing this post -- from my profile you know I cannot spell. So, I could not spell Heathcliff and was too lazy to look it up. So I just typed whatever, like "Heithsliff" or "Heithclif" or, my favorite "Heithclifee". Hee :D Then I finally looked it up and spelled it properly.}
Mrs. Dalloway: I bought a copy of the book on May 26th (or thereabouts) -- it took me about a MONTH to finish it and the book is only 3/4 of an inch thick. I think it was more coherent than Faulkner, but just as difficult to follow. I sometimes liked bouncing around into different character's heads, but sometimes it just made it difficult to keep track of who it was and I had to go back and re-read it.
I liked it - kinda. It was a hearty read and I didn't always understand what was happening. I did like how Woolf captured post-war trauma in a person. I think it very accurate how difficult it would be to come home after war. The Iliad with its crazy metaphors sometimes alludes to this, but the chaos of the thoughts of someone traumatized by war -- it can get to you. She did some wonderful writing there.
And the Sally Seton stuff - woo! Clarissa was quite the make-out mogul, was she not?!
The one question I have after all of this is: is Elizabeth's, Clarissa's child, father Richard (Clarissa's husband) or Peter (other dude Clarrisa could have loved, or at least married)?
The daughter is said to have a dark quality about her, dark, Oriental eyes. Peter was said to be half-Indian and he and Clarissa spent some time in a wine cellar in their youth (this is what I understood). And a nurse remarked that the Dalloway's are usually fair...I don't know what larger impact this question could have on the whole of the novel, but it is just a question I had.
The Guy Not Taken and Good in Bed: These books are both by Jennifer Weiner, who writes intelligent chick lit. Or at least this is what I tell myself. But seriously, I think Weiner has a amazing style and ideas. Her characters are captivating. My hubby asked me if Good in Bed was all about sex (he looked worried) and I told him some of the plot. After telling him about Cannie almost losing her baby and getting an emergency hysterectomy because her ex-boyfriend's crazy girlfriend shoved her, he said "So, did she sue them?" with that angry glint in his eye and curl of lip that I occasionally see when he is super mad.
He is such a Hufflepuff. Seriously: a strong sense of justice and a hard worker. I am definitely a Ravenclaw (creative, a bit loopy -- think Luna Lovegood, and a fussy know-it all) with Hufflepuff leanings (I have a strong sense of justice too, but I am WAY too lazy).
So, Weiner's characters and plots can draw a reader in, but more over she has a way of articulating what it is that people feel when they love and especially when they divorce (her parents, like mine, divorced in her late teens). Good in Bed hit hard on the abandonment issues (I know I was really hard on my father after his affair and the divorce, but he is WAY better and more loving than Cannie's dad), but The Guy Not Taken was even more of an exploration. She said that writing was like her therapy. I agree -- I write to soothe my mind and the many thoughts that churn therein.
Good in Bed was especially nice because she chose as her protagonist a woman who is intelligent but not confident about herself due to her perceptions of her appearance.
In other words, she thinks she is fat.
All women, at some time or another, have cared far too much about their appearance. But unlike Bridget Jones, Cannie is tall and has lots of curves and some curves that shouldn't be there. So it is justifiable to say that the protagonist is plus sized.
I always think I am fat - well, I didn't when I weighed 110 pounds which is where I should be. However, I should not be 103 or even 90 pounds which is where I was after a lot of fasting and working out. And while diet and exercise did help, I actually had cancer at the time. That would make anyone lose weight and keep it off...the problem is you KEEP losing weight (which is when I got REALLY worried).
But, it is really easy for people to dismiss your concerns when you are five feet tall. Yep, I have smaller bones and everything APPEARS small -- but when you wear a 32D and have cellulite, you certainly don't FEEL small. I weighed myself at the gym the other day -- 122 pounds!!! I have not been this heavy since junior year of college! And even then I was 118! I know my metabolism is slowing and gravity is setting in -- but I SERIOUSLY need to lose some weight (did I mention my mom was recently diagnosed with diabetes and I am scared out of my wits now...).
Still, I have not the issues of women who are taller who also are well endowed and have cellulite. I am short and therefore can be cute. They are taller and are labelled "fat chick" and other hurtful things. Cannie must come to terms with her body type and who she is apart from her body. And, moreover, find people who do not CARE what she looks like and love her.
Stardust: I saw the movie on an airplane or train -- it was fun. The book was not too different except for the ending (the movie was much more Hollywood, obviously).
It was a very well written and very funny fairy tale. I loved it. I love books like these -- a little break from reality but still a sense of humanity in the characters and plot of the book.
The only thing I did not like was the lack of development of Tristan and the Star's relationship, how they fell in love, etc. I was not looking for that Hollywood glance/touch/inappropriate-sexual-liaison, but some more of them working together in their journey so that they develop a friendship that turns into love. Tristan takes care of the star and the star just sits around -- girl didn't even help when he got turned into a door mouse. But, other than that, I really enjoyed the novel. I will have to look for other stuff by Neil Gaiman.
Ahh...but now I feel compelled to write (and not just blog entries) and read some more. I want to polish up a little story I have about Snape and Lily's friendship (it is pretty cute) and I also have this other story I want to get out about Snape in Death Eater mode. But my mom is coming soon and I won't have a lot of time to write...
I sort of started Crime and Punishment (to get me in a Snape-writing mood) but I started re-reading Sense and Sensibility (because I think one should take all things in moderation). I think I will keep switching between the two of them to get a criminal mind set paired with some English sentiment. Maybe I should just read Montemorency - except it is for young adults and I have already read it.
*sigh*
I am off to cook.
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