Katie’s Comments (group member since Jan 28, 2017)

Katie’s comments from the The Not-So-Hypothetical Victorian Literature Course #VicLit group.

I'm curious to see how people compare the presentation of money in Our Mutual Friend and The Way We Live Now.

Our Mutual Friend, Charles Dickens - how do you all think money operates in this book?

The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope - let me know how you get on with this glorious book and I'll update my thoughts as I go!

It would be an interesting one to make a BBC TV adaptation of though - I wish one existed!

A place to discuss all your thoughts on the presentation of the small town in Cranford and Middlemarch - and to compare the two.

This is a place of spoilers (for BOTH of the books). Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on Middlemarch!

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on Cranford!

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on the city in Mary Barton and The Nether World - and to compare the two.

This is a place of spoilers (for BOTH of the books). Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on the city within George Gissing's The Nether World.

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on Elizabeth Gaskell's Mary Barton.

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

Kevin wrote: "What are the books in your next lecture? Do you think you will keep up these GoodReads discussion threads?"

Hi Kevin. The next lecture will be on 'the city' within The Nether World by George Gissing and Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell. I'll create Goodreads discussion boards if people want to chat about the books.

Hi ElleonAir. It's two books every two months (the first video went up in March, the second will go up in May). I appreciate that's not feasible for everyone - that's why the first half at least of every video is spoiler-free, so you can still "take the course" as it were without reading the books.

Yes, I love North and South a lot. I reckon there are a few incidences of 'let's just everyone get on', but for the most part, it's subtly and interestingly done. I like Mr Higgins a lot too, and Mr Thornton is probably my favourite of the male leads in Gaskell. I'm really excited to reread it in the next month.

I haven't read Nice Work though - so I'll have to look it up! Mary Barton is one of my favourite novels. I enjoyed Shirley, but it didn't feel very industrial to me.

I do agree here - Hard Times is by no means my favourite Dickens, and while I find it very interesting in terms of Dickens's social agenda, I don't think it's nearly as good as North and South as a novel. His exploration of the moral/mental effects of Industrialisation are quite interesting, and it's the book in which his philosophy and moral aims are the most complicated and the most overt, though not necessarily the most well done. Mr Bounderby is a great character and I do like Louisa. Mr James Harthouse is an interesting precursor for some of the later Dickensian heroes (he has a lot of character traits in common with Sydney Carton or Eugene Wrayburn, for example). I like Stephen and Rachael's relationship but I do find some of the treatment of their lives falls a little flat, and Dickens's doesn't really help himself with the very accented dialogue!

A place to discuss all your thoughts on North and South

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on Hard Times.

This is a place of spoilers. Beware.

A place to discuss all your thoughts on Hard Times and North and South - and to compare the two.

This is a place of spoilers (for BOTH of the books). Beware.

Kevin wrote: "Me again, I feel I am hogging the Great Expectations discussion.

When Mr Jaggers hands Pip his cheque for £500, I wondered how much that would be in today's money. Would it be like premiership fo..."

That is probably why Pip was always in debt! All those expensive books...

This website is quite useful: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/cu... (I use it when writing historical fiction to work out the incomes!) It's not entirely accurate because of the larger discrepancy in wealth means, like you say, it doesn't work for all levels of income.

It's also hard to tell because Great Expectations isn't set when it's written. I actually looked up on this reread, and as Pip always talks about Old London Bridge, that means the bulk of the book is set before the 1830s - so pre-Victorian.

Carolina wrote: "One thing that stuck out to me is that for Pip's arch to finish he has to stop being given money and start to work, while for Jane's arch to be over she has to stop working and receive money out of..."

That is a fascinating thought! As Kevin says above, I like how Jane's money allows her to marry Rochester as an equal, but it is interesting how the two novels differ in their presentation of work.

Zoe wrote: "IAmBroke wrote: "Could we discuss the urban hypothesis that Child Jane =/= Adult Jane?

Yes, we are going that deep."

Feeling really uneducated here because I've literally never heard of it. Could..."

Zoe, I have no idea what that theory is either!