Bleak House. Chapters 6-8

The lesson is aimed at teaching you to determine the value of separate episodes and to find immediate sensual details, as well as more abstract metaphorical images that enable the author to produce the effect he sought.

1.As you know, his episodes of a narrative are roughly (and very approximately) classified into the so-called “plot incidents” and “character incidents”. The former make the story march on, while the latter contribute to the study of human nature. Some episodes may have both functions.

Does the classification satisfy you? Characterize the episodes with: a) Mrs. Pardiggle; b) Mr. Guppy’s proposal; c) any other episode. Provide your arguments. Formulate them in a compressed but expressive manner.

2.Outside the context of the whole narrative, the chapters under discussion present a series of seemingly discontented episodes, not yet cemented, in the reader’s eye, by the author’s general conception. Thus, in the first episode (Ch. 6), Mr. Jarndyce gives a warm welcome to his young wards. In the second, Mr.Skimpole, “a mere child in practical matters”, gets arrested for debt and “kindly” gives Esther and Richard a chance to exercise their generosity.

Name, in the like manner, the other episodes presented in Chapters 6-11 (sum up each of them in a terse phrase, so as to reflect the author’s attitude to the events and the people).

3.One of the strangest paradoxes in the artistry of Dickens is that this most verbose of all writers was also superb at providing the illuminating phrase which is so full of meaning. Dickens is a great master of sensual detail which enable the reader to be an immediate observer (“Her voice impressed my fancy as if it had a kind of spectacles on it, too” – p.110). But sometimes the illuminating phrase does not present an immediate sensual image, but an abstract metaphor, summarizing the author’s attitude to a person or institution. (“… There are many good and true people in it /the world of fashion/. But the evil of it is that it is a world wrapped up in too much jeweller’s cotton and fine wool…” – p.14)

Supply examples of both kinds of images (immediate sensual details and summarizing abstract metaphors), with more emphasis on the first type, because they occur much more frequently and because it is sensual details that make a character alive. (See, for instance, the description of Sir Lawrence Boynton on pp.124-128, etc. etc.)

4.Some critics believe that Dickens’ comic characters fall into two groups: those of pure humour, like Mr. Pickwick or Florence’s maid Susan, and those of savage comedy, like Mr. Slumkey or Mrs. Pipchin, who may terrify and seem monstrous, for all the contempt and ridicule poured upon them.

Which of the characters you have met so far can be viewed comically? Do they fall easily and naturally into the above-given classification? Explain.You are welcome to offer a more elaborate classification of Dickens’ characters, whether comic or not.

5. Try to find a phrase or a set of phrases from each chapter that, in a certain way, sums up the whole chapter or its central episode and can thus serve as a kind of epigraph. Comment upon your choice.

6. If the novel were coming out in serials and you were to illustrate each part, what would you depict on the cover of the serial containing the chapters (or just one of the chapters) you have read for today? Mind that the picture on the cover is expected to render more than it says, metaphorically or metonymically.

Date: 2015-12-17; view: 950