The Pickwick Club discussion

Dear Fellow Pickwickians (as Tristram calls us),

In the absence of our fearless but grumpy leader, I am supposed to be opening the threads for the next two weeks. So here you go, it's officially open. There how did I do?

I will start by saying (because I am supposed to start a discussion after all) that I now officially hate Jonas Chuzzlewit. Nothing Dickens can think up to do to this guy will be bad enough. A few chapters back I thought he acted so over-the-top strange when his father died that I thought he might have killed his father, I just couldn't come up with a way that he did it, he was in a different room with Pecksniff when his father died from what I remember, so I decided I must be wrong; now I'm back to thinking he is evil enough to have killed his own father somehow. I'm starting to think he'll kill his own wife too, unless she kills him first.

I saw in my edition of MC that the "Anglo-Bengalee Disinterested Loan and Life Insurance Company" of Chapter 27 which Tigg has seemed to invent for the purpose of getting rich and hopefully ruining Jonas, the company was based on a real company; the "West Sussex Assurance Company" which was fraudulently launched in 1836 by 'directors' with virtually no capital. In 1840 they absconded with 300,000 pounds amassed in insurance premiums. A Parliamentary Committee was investigating the affairs of this company and several others while Dickens was writing this novel.

OK, hopefully I am posting this correctly, so if it shows up, feel free to start discussing away. :-}

The Board
Chapter 27

Easy Shaving
Chapter 29

Oh, having your face shaved when it's covered with pimples like Bailey did in Chapter 29 sounds incredibly painful, posting that illustration just reminded me of that.

Kim wrote: "I saw in my edition of MC that the "Anglo-Bengalee Disinterested Loan and Life Insurance Company" of Chapter 27 which Tigg has seemed to invent for the purpose of getting rich and hopefully ruining Jonas, the company was based on a real company;"

Dickens did this a fair amount -- based his novels on actual events. I don't think it's a spoiler to say that the famous legal case in Bleak House was also based on an actual case, which we will probably research when we get to that book. We noted in Nicholas Nickleby that Dotheboys Hall was based on an actual school (indeed a class of schools in Northern England). Barnaby Rudge was based on actual riots and actual people. It is worth recalling, perhaps, that Dickens early in his career was a Parliamentary Reporter, so he was very familiar with current political events.

Thanks Kim for the info. I love that the suspect assurance company was based on a real one. Yes, I despise Jonas too. Poor Merry! I hope that she can be freed from his yoke somehow: alive!

Lots of hate going on in this group! [g]

First poor Pecksniff, now Jonas, both subjects of vitriol and hate.

Where's the love?

Where's the love? Well, here's a shout out (again) for the delightful Mrs. Gamp. How can you not love the line "It was a happy feature in Mrs. Gamp's twofold profession, that it gave her an interest in everything that was young as well as everything that was old." What a great description.

And then we have a Sweedlepipe who is a barber and bred birds. To top it off we have the assurance company that no doubt gave many of the 21C finest crooks their initial inspiration. The phrase of Montague that "A man can afford to be bold as brass ... when he gets gold in exchange" could be a headline for far too many stories of financial irregularity and downright cheating in today's world.

There is more evil about, isn't there. Certainly Jonas is a nasty bit of business. Indeed, he makes MC jr. almost good by comparison.

Is Dickens setting up a comparison/contrast between the newlywed pairing of Jonas and Mercy with the lovers MC jr. and Mary?

Ah, where's the love, Dickens has managed to make my love sore up to the clouds for everyone in the book compared to how I feel about Jonas. I would now even be willing to marry Pecksniff, just think of all I could bring to his life, the little surprises I would plan for him. I'd plan little surprises for Jonas too, if God would let me. :-}

I never thought Jonas and Merry would have a happy marriage, but I thought it would be a marriage of "we tolerate each other" type. There are a lot of marriages like that in books anyway, hopefully not many in real life. I assumed Jonas wanted to marry Merry because he wanted a wife he could show off in public because she was lively and pretty, although her personality would drive me crazy. And I assumed she was marrying him because that's what women did back then, got married, and he was rich and somewhat powerful; but I didn't think there would be physical violence. I unfortunately have an awful temper, although compared to the rest of my family I'm extremely mild (g) and I like to think I'd punch him back, I'd probably end up dead.

Peter wrote: "To top it off we have the assurance company that no doubt gave many of the 21C finest crooks their initial inspiration. "

Well, that and Melmotte (Trollope: The Way We Live Now)

Ah to speak of love, Everyman, 'tis not an easy subject. I find it hard at times to love my friends let alone my enemies, which I am commanded to do. When it comes to Dickens's sleazy, obsequious, slimy and downright evil characters, I allow myself the luxury of spite and vitriol, even though I know that they are real people who exist in an alternative universe.

I'm still puzzling whether the slow start to MC was because Dickens didn't get a good toe hold on his ideas early, he couldn't get his characters to align properly to create interest and sparks, the American sections just fell flat on their faces, some combination of all the previously listed or it was just me. Now, given I don't think it was me [g] I'm voting for the failed American experiment followed by a misappropriation of early character interest.

I certainly think that you have a point there, Peter. I know that there are some people who discard a book if it has not grabbed their interest by 100 pages in. I think I was at least half way through before I began really to enjoy the flow and ridiculous character description that only Dickens can accomplish. Maybe it helped that it was a second time through for me and although the story was forgotten in the mists of time, I knew that it must pick up sooner or later. What a loss though, had I abandoned it at the 100 page mark!

Everyman wrote: "Peter wrote: "To top it off we have the assurance company that no doubt gave many of the 21C finest crooks their initial inspiration. "

Well, that and Melmotte (Trollope: The Way We Live Now)"

That used to be my favorite Trollope book but it is so long since I read it I don't know if it's been passed by other Trollope books by now.

Kim wrote: "I never thought Jonas and Merry would have a happy marriage, but I thought it would be a marriage of "we tolerate each other" type. There are a lot of marriages like that in books anyway, hopefull..."

One of the reasons for Merry to accept Jonas's proposal was probably the opportunity this afforded her to triumph over her sister. Rivalry between siblings can explain a lot of things. I also think that she is just quite thoughtless and had no idea of what was coming to her. In a way, she becomes a more and more likeable character, which is, although I'm repeating myself here, also reflected in the illustrations, in which she looks more and more beautiful.

Jonas's motive for choosing Merry in spite of her harsh behaviour can probably be explained by his revengeful character. Now that he is her husband, he can cast off all pretense of feeling and treat her as badly as he wants because she is practically a prisoner in his household.

Tristram wrote: "In a way, she becomes a more and more likeable character, which is, although I'm repeating myself here, also reflected in the illustrations, in which she looks more and more beautiful."

I did think she was becoming a more likeable character, but I thought maybe that was only me because I feel so sorry for her getting hit by that bully. I would feel exactly the same way if a husband was getting hit by his wife. As for the illustrations I too thought she was getting prettier, but thought maybe I was thinking that for the same reason I thought she was becoming more likable. I have to go back and look at them closer.

Tristram wrote: "One of the reasons for Merry to accept Jonas's proposal was probably the opportunity this afforded her to triumph over her sister. Rivalry between siblings can explain a lot of things."

Oh, definitely. And she certainly does score against Cherry, whose sibling response is everything Merry could have hoped for.

But for how long will Merry bask in this triumph, and for how long will she regret, very seriously regret, the almost offhand impulse that made her accept Jonas.

Kim wrote: "Tristram wrote: "In a way, she becomes a more and more likeable character, which is, although I'm repeating myself here, also reflected in the illustrations, in which she looks more and more beauti..."

As to the illustrations, just compare the illustration in Chapter 2 - Pecksniff and his two daughters slighting Tom - with Merry's illustration in Chapter 26; these two can hardly show the same woman.

You are certainly right about Mercy. Here she is from Chapter 2, the way Dickens first thought of her I suppose, then again in Chapter 26 after marrying Jonas.

Kim wrote: "You are certainly right about Mercy. Here she is from Chapter 2, the way Dickens first thought of her I suppose, then again in Chapter 26 after marrying Jonas.


"

These two illustrations certainly show a different Merry. My understanding is that Dickens was a tough taskmaster with his illustrators. If that be true, in this specific case he wanted to heighten the beauty of Merry and deepen the horror of her marriage to Jonas.

Thanks for the illustrations and the earlier commentary. I'm becoming more and more frustrated with the "convenience" of e-readers. Let's face it. What's a Dickens novel without its illustrations?