2008-09-07
On the book
So after 150 pages, I've gotten into the disturbing parts of Jude the Obscure. He kind of ticks me off - the way he's getting into the habit of thinking poorly of himself and giving up in particular.
But it's really kind of funny too. I think when this was written, his watching his cousin from afar was supposed to be rather romantic - but these days it's rather easy to label that "stalking". That he actually meets her by her invitation is, perhaps, as much of a surprise to the reader as to Jude. (I kind of wonder if that, too, was from their great-aunt's continually backfiring attempts to keep them from meeting.) Of course, everything goes wrong for him all over the place, a lot of which is his own doing, and by now all his highest ideals are entirely on hold. The publication date's a bit late, but still (I think) well within the bounds of the Romantic Era... and everything I know about where the story's going fits that description.
The first like of the Wikipedia article is great. "Jude the Obscure is the last of Thomas Hardy's novels, begun as a magazine serial and first published in book form in 1895. The book was burnt publicly by the Bishop of Exeter in that same year."
I get the feeling that I'm going to love this story for all the wrong reasons.
But it's really kind of funny too. I think when this was written, his watching his cousin from afar was supposed to be rather romantic - but these days it's rather easy to label that "stalking". That he actually meets her by her invitation is, perhaps, as much of a surprise to the reader as to Jude. (I kind of wonder if that, too, was from their great-aunt's continually backfiring attempts to keep them from meeting.) Of course, everything goes wrong for him all over the place, a lot of which is his own doing, and by now all his highest ideals are entirely on hold. The publication date's a bit late, but still (I think) well within the bounds of the Romantic Era... and everything I know about where the story's going fits that description.
The first like of the Wikipedia article is great. "Jude the Obscure is the last of Thomas Hardy's novels, begun as a magazine serial and first published in book form in 1895. The book was burnt publicly by the Bishop of Exeter in that same year."
I get the feeling that I'm going to love this story for all the wrong reasons.
More of the book
And now Sue ticks me off even more. She is unbelieveably fickle - or perhaps just totally chaotic. In any case, while I can see why Jude adores her, I think he's TOTALLY wrong in doing so...
Very curious.
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Some 25 pages or so later, I am amused at the line "insulted Nature sometimes vindicated her rights" taken from a historical text about priests and virgins in the early Church sharing rooms.
Very curious.
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Some 25 pages or so later, I am amused at the line "insulted Nature sometimes vindicated her rights" taken from a historical text about priests and virgins in the early Church sharing rooms.