S&S Read-Along: Ch. 23 & 24

Please note that this is the only read-along post I'll be writing this week.  I'm just too busy during Holy Week, and I suspect a lot of you are too.  We'll go back up to six chapters next week.

I've got to admit I don't have a lot to say about these two chapters.  First we have Elinor thinking about what she learned from Lucy about Edward, and then we have Elinor and Lucy discussing Lucy's situation in obliquely sly and snarky ways.  And that's that.

My annotated edition did have one really interesting thought in it that I want to share, though.  It says of Edward that "[e]ven his hesitation to choose a profession might result in part from his reluctance to take a step that, by providing him with a more regular income, would advance the day of his marriage to Lucy" (p. 255).  I had not thought of that!  Ever!  I always just thought Edward couldn't figure out what he wanted to do, but I do think this is really possible, that he's just delaying this because he can put off marrying Lucy this way.

Discussion Questions:

1.  Do you think it's possible that Edward has been delaying choosing a profession because it means he can put off marrying Lucy?

2.  If you haven't read this before, are you surprised by how much of the book revolves around monetary concerns?

That's all for this week, friends.  May you have a blessed Easter!

"Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" by J. K. Rowling

This is my favorite Harry Potter book.  It's the book that made me a real fan of the series, and it's the book that gave me my favorite character in that universe, Sirius Black.

I love this book so much, I lingered over it and made it last me for days and days instead of gobbling it down like I did the first two.  I would pause at favorite bits and savor them.  I reread my favorite page in the whole series multiple times.  I stopped and reread my favorite two chapters.  I let myself savor the story, the characters, the writing.  It was a glorious reread.

Happy times.

I was very much struck, this time, with Snape's correct assessment of Harry's character flaws.  He says, "famous Harry Potter is a law unto himself.  Let the ordinary people worry about his safety!  Famous Harry Potter goes where he wants to, with no thought for the consequences" (p. 284).  How right you are, Snape!  Harry really does think he can do just about anything, and so far, he's gotten out of some bad scrapes pretty handily that he wouldn't have really needed to get out of if he hadn't gotten himself into them in the first place.  

This is a common thing in kids books, where kids just ignore the wise adults and go their merry way and solve everything on their own by doing ridiculously dangerous things.  I'm glad Rowling addresses that issue in her series, that she shows that this is NOT a good way to go about things, especially as the series progresses.  Yes, Harry is not an ordinary boy... but he's also only a boy.  And his stubborn belief that He Knows Best does have serious consequences at times.  As Lupin says about himself and his friends at Harry's age, "We were young, thoughtless -- carried away with our own cleverness" (p. 355).  It's a dangerous business, being young and thinking you're invincible.

Part of me wants to just stop here, with a vast array of possibilities ahead for Sirius and Harry, everything hopeful and unknown.  I won't.  I'll keep rereading the series.  But I'm also going to very much enjoy the next couple of weeks before I start book four, of living in this in-between world for a bit.

(Mine from my Instagram account.)

Particularly Good Bits:

Meanwhile, in the rest of the castle, the usual magnificent Christmas decorations had been put up, despite the fact that hardly any of the students remained to enjoy them.  Thick streamers of holly and mistletoe were strung along the corridors, mysterious lights shone from inside every suit of armor, and the Great Hall was filled with its usual twelve Christmas trees, glittering with golden stars.  A powerful and delicious smell of cooking pervaded the corridors, and by Christmas Eve, it had grown so strong that even Scabbers poked his nose out of the shelter of Ron's pocket to sniff hopefully at the air (p. 222).

"What was there to be gained by fighting the most evil wizard who has ever existed?" said Black, with a terrible fury in his face.  "Only innocent lives, Peter!" (p. 375).

Black's gaunt face broke into the first true smile Harry had seen upon it.  The difference it made was startling, as though a person ten years younger were shining through the starved mask; for a moment, he was recognizable as the man who had laughed at Harry's parents' wedding (p. 379).  (That's basically my favorite paragraph in the whole series.)

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG for some rude humor, mild bad language, peril to children, discussion of executions, and the very scary Dementors.

S&S Read-Along: Ch. 21 & 22

In which Lucy Steele waltzes into our lives and drops her bomb.

Also, I feel like this cover is pretty much the most perfect match for how I felt the first time I encountered this story.  Anyone else here pop-eyed from shock?

But, you know, at least we know now why Edward has never declared his feelings for Elinor or asked her to marry him.  It's because he's been secretly engaged to this chick for four years!  The nerve of some people!

Okay, so, I had to explain this to my husband, because he started singing that bit from The Phantom of the Opera where Raoul wonders, "Why is it secret?  What have we to hide?"  (It's been stuck in my head ever since, so it might as well be stuck in yours too.)  I figured maybe I ought to explain it here too, in case anyone else is wondering.  This is kind of a huge part of the plot, so I'm just going to dig into it.  If you know all this already, well, skim ahead to the discussion questions.

The reason people would get secretly engaged at this point in history is if one or both of them had parents who would object.  Which is totally the case here.  Mrs. Ferrars, Edward's mom, is a very ambitious woman.  We've already heard Edward talk about how she wants him to have some kind of fashionable, high-profile profession, and all he wants is to be a minister living quietly in the country somewhere.  And Fanny Dashwood, Edward's sister, warned Mrs. Dashwood that her mother has high hopes for Edward to marry someone with a good fortune of high social standing.  Elinor doesn't have either of those, and neither does Lucy Steele.  

So if, four years ago when Lucy was 19 (which is how old Elinor is now) and Edward was presumably only 18 or 19 himself, Edward and Lucy fancied themselves in love, they would get engaged secretly and not reveal their engagement until both sets of parents were more amenable to the idea, at which time they could ask their parents for permission and make the engagement public.

And why would Edward not want to do that right away?  Because his mother has the power to disinherit him and leave the family fortune to his younger brother Robert.  Which would leave Edward penniless.  And Edward, the dear boy, is just a little bit fond of living well at his mother's expense and not having to choose a profession yet.  Not only that, but Lucy is pretty obviously attached to the idea of marrying a rich husband, so she doesn't want to make the engagement public until she's sure Edward won't lose his inheritance.

Now, the trouble with secret engagements is that either party can just disavow them, or break them with little real ramification.  A public engagement is a kind of safeguard against either party backing out without the other party's consent -- the more people who know about an engagement, the more people will hold you to it.  This is why Elinor and her mom were so shocked that Marianne and Willoughby were behaving as if they were engaged, but not announcing an engagement -- neither of them really had any reason to keep it secret.

Also, by the rules of the day, since the man was the one who asked the woman to marry him, then the woman was the only one with the real power to break the engagement.  A man could ask a woman to end their engagement, but if she wanted to hold him to it, he was stuck.  Or he could break it and be considered dishonorable and disgraced.  This was a safeguard for women, who had very little real power over their own lives except in the choice of whether or not to accept a proposal and whether or not to allow an engagement to lead to marriage.  

So.  Somehow or other, Lucy got Edward to propose to her, four years ago.  She's holding onto that engagement because it's her ticket to the big-time.  She's obviously from a lower class than the Dashwoods, who are the wife and daughters of a gentleman, and undoubtedly poorer than the Ferrars, who are rich and landed gentry.  If she can marry that much higher up the social ladder, not only is she going to have a really nice life, but she can probably pass some of financial assistance on to her family, and maybe even help her old maid of a sister live a comfortable life too.  Lucy has hitched her wagon to a star, and she knows it.  

BUT.  Obviously, Lucy has heard about Elinor.  Her secret fiance has been noticeably attentive to a woman much closer to himself in class, intelligence, personality, and so on.  Elinor is competition, and Lucy won't stand for that.  So she pretends to need a confidante and an advisor in order to inform Elinor of Edward's secret engagement so Elinor will back off.  She hasn't been educated very well, but she is clever, and she is very, very devious, isn't she?  By swearing Elinor to secrecy, she's keeping Elinor from making this engagement public or telling Mrs. Ferrars about it somehow.  But she's also making her own position more secure because now, if Edward tries to break the engagement or disavow it, she can call on Elinor to witness that she knew about it.

Poor Edward is stuck with this conniving viper for a fiancee, and poor Elinor is stuck with this secret knowledge that the man she loves (and who, she is convinced, loves her) is not free to be with her.  Ugh!  And we thought Marianne's love life was a mess!

Discussion Questions:

1.  Marianne refuses to tell polite lies, and would rather be rudely silent than have to say things she doesn't mean.  Which do you prefer doing?

2.  What do you think of Edward at this point?  Was he leading Elinor on?  

"The Winter King" by Christine Cohen

Wow.  This book hit me a lot harder than I was expecting.  I went into it thinking, "Okay, a fantasy winter story for early teens could be fun" and came out thinking, "That was so intense and illuminating!"

Cora's family has fallen into hard times ever since her father died while ice fishing.  Shunned by many villagers who think they're cursed, Cora's widowed mother and her three siblings struggle for basic necessities like food and socks.

The village is watched over by a remote deity called the Winter King.  Cora blames him for her father's death and her family's struggles.  When a coughing sickness strikes the village, Cora becomes determined to confront the Winter King.  When she finally does, she learns more than she could have ever expected and brings true peace not only to her own heart, but to the lives of her whole village.

This book started a little slowly, but it built steadily until I was totally gripped by Cora's fight to find a way to save her family and understand her god.  It can be read as an allegory for the Protestant Reformation, with sacred texts and the truth they hold being withheld from the common people, but also as simply a coming-of-age story of a determined young woman trying to make sense of her world with too little guidance.  I'm labeling it as Christian fiction, but it's not overtly Christian, only allegorically so.

Oh, and before you start comparing the "coughing sickness" to Covid-19 too strongly -- this book was published in 2019, before the virus was in our public consciousness here in the US.  So that's totally a coincidence.

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It: PG-13 for a man who presses his attentions on a woman he has power over, some scary moments with monsters, descriptions of death, and a few kisses between young adults.  No bad language, no racy content, no gory violence.

This is my 14th book read from my TBR shelves for #TheUnreadShelfProject2021.

S&S Read-Along: Ch. 19 & 20

Oh my goodness, the Palmers crack me up so much!  Do they make you laugh?  I was chuckling aloud several times during these two chapters.  I absolutely love how Charlotte is so determined to be happy and cheerful, and how successful she is at it.  She's not very intelligent, but she is a ray of sunshine, and I could hug her for that.

(Randomly, is this not one of the weirdest covers I have found yet?  I bet it was made in the '70s.  All '70s book covers are bizarre.)

It's very nice of the Palmers to arrive and cheer us all up after Edward's melancholy departure.  I never noticed before how much Edward's leaving mirrors Willoughby's -- both are sad about having to leave, and leave behind many questions about their behavior.  Elinor tried to convince her mother and sister not to keep excusing Willoughby's more inexplicable actions... and now she's finding all kinds of excuses for Edward's fluctuating attentions.  This does round out her character nicely, showing that she's not infallible.  

Of course, Edward has been a lot more circumspect in his behavior.  In fact, he's kind of the reverse image of Willoughby -- Willoughby was much too uninhibited, and Edward is too inhibited.  I think Austen is pointing out here that a middle ground is much better than one extreme or the other, rather like she does with Marianne being too little in control of her emotions, and Elinor sometimes too much.  

Speaking of Edward, all through his discussion of his lack of any kind of useful thing to do with his time, I kept thinking what a blessing work is.  We tend to moan and groan about work, but it's actually a blessing from God that keeps us from the emotional and physical idleness that can make us dissatisfied, even get us into trouble.  Idle young men with no need to earn their keep, like Willoughby and Edward, certainly can get themselves (and others) into an awful lot of trouble that could have been avoided if they just had something to do to occupy themselves. 

Lastly, I love Elinor's observation of Mr. Palmer that he is wishing for "distinction" that made him turn up his nose at absolutely everyone and everything.  "It was the desire of appearing superior to other people" (p. 212) that made him decide he disliked everything, not an actual fault in those things.  I was just discussing this with my bff last night, how we can't understand people who go around looking for reasons to dislike things or people, or who seem like they can't be happy unless they find something to be offended by.  It certainly sounds like a miserable way to live your life.  I really do think a lot of people have the idea that if they tell everyone how much they don't like something, it will make them seem intelligent and discerning, so they find flaws and faults in every movie, book, author, acquaintance, painting, whatever.  And it really just makes them seem petty and arrogant.  I often struggle to be patient with people like that, I'm afraid.  I often just want to roll my eyes at them and say, "Get over yourself already.  Allow yourself to enjoy things and admit it!"

Er, sorry for the little rant there.  I was just pleased to find something in our reading today that addressed that!.

Discussion Questions:

1.  Elinor thinks that Mr. Palmer's realization that he married a very silly woman has made him kind of crabby, but "she knew this kind of blunder was too common for any sensible man to be lastingly hurt by it" (p. 212).  Can you think of any other instances in Austen's books where a sensible man has married a very silly woman?  Has it hurt them?

2.  Does anyone here actually believe Col. Brandon would ever have married Charlotte (Jennings) Palmer?

S&S Read-Along: Ch. 17 & 18

I love how much we get to learn about Edward Ferrars in these two chapters!  Like that he knows how to make Elinor laugh.  We finally get to hear him say more than a sentence or two, and I don't know about you, but I am charmed.  I had forgotten that he's actually kind of sarcastic!  But also kind.  He mocks Marianne about her devotion to Romantic ideals about scenery and the outdoors, but not in a mean way.  His is a self-deprecating sort of sarcasm -- he insists he just doesn't know enough about Romantic sensibilities to please her with his descriptions of scenery and so on, but at the same time, he actually shows that he has a pretty detailed knowledge of such things.

And he makes Elinor laugh.  Which is awesome.

And I love this description of himself:  "I never wish to offend, but I am so foolishly shy, that I often seem negligent, when I am only kept back by my natural aukwardness [sic]" (p. 178).  That sounds exactly like me.  I am shy and socially awkward, and so often will either say the wrong thing at the wrong moment, or not say anything and make the other person feel awkward.  I am extremely bad at small talk, especially with people I don't know well.  I will sit there thinking, "I should say something!  I should ask them a question!  What can we talk about now?  I am failing at this conversation thing again!" and just... hate on myself inside.  Ugh.  Naturally awkward and foolishly shy, that's me.

Oh, and I have totally been told I'm not shy, I'm reserved.  I think the person who said that meant that being reserved was better than just being shy, but it struck me the opposite.  I don't want people to think I'm reserved, I want them to think I'm nice!  Quiet, but nice!  Argh!  Edward, I feel your pain.

The whole thing with that ring he's wearing is very mysterious though, eh?  And he's embarrassed by it -- very different from Willoughby, who would probably be singing little songs about how on the first day of Christmas, his true love gave to him a lock of hair to wear in a ring so everyone could see it all the time.

I had to laugh aloud over this line:  "With the assistance of his mother-in-law, Sir John was not long in discovering that the name of Ferrars began with an F" (p. 188).  Like, my dude, what OTHER letter would it begin with?  Cracked me up.

Discussion Questions:

1.  Would you rather be called shy or reserved?  Have you ever been called either one?

2.  Do you identify with the idea of buying multiple copies of favorite books just to give them a good home?  (I have totally felt the urge to buy books I dearly love and already own at yard sales or thrift stores because then I would know they will be properly appreciated.  It's a weird urge, but very real.)

"The Scarlet Pimpernel" by Baroness Orczy

WHY did I wait this long to read this delightful book?  I absolutely loved this jolly story of derring-do.  It's escapist fiction at its finest -- no one in this story really takes their grave danger too seriously, and you never doubt for a minute that the Scarlet Pimpernel will triumph.  The fun is in finding out how.

I watched the 1934 movie starring Leslie Howard close to twenty years ago, and the 1982 miniseries starring Anthony Andrews much more recently than that, so I knew the basic story (and the real identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel) already.  But most of the plot had kind of faded from my memory, so that was fresh and exciting for me.  By the last ten chapters or so, I was on tenterhooks to see how it would all get resolved.  In fact, I did my housework extra-fast so I could finish it :-)  And that's just what I want from an adventure novel!

I took a class in college on the French Revolution, so I know that Orczy doesn't particularly cling to facts in this -- hundreds of heads weren't actually getting chopped off every single day, and so on.  But the atmosphere of fear and antagonism was very, very real, and I think she got the emotional truths just right.

After I finished the book, I read the introduction in my MacMillan Collector's Library edition, and it annoyed me so much.  The intro was written by Hilary Mantel, and it is snide, holier-than-thou, and seems to entirely miss the point of this book being about people using their wits and talents in the service of others.  Mantel's whole attitude grated on me so much, I've deleted her books from my to-read lists.  I was especially vexed by her missing what I believe Orczy's point was in the part where she repeatedly describes a Jewish man as being despised, degraded, cringing away from other people, and so on -- Orczy constantly talks about how the French people are despising them, reviling them, and behaving very racistly toward this Jewish man.  I think she's making a point here about the horribleness of her villains, NOT trying to say that Jewish people are despicable, degraded, or animal-like.

Anyway, I definitely recommend this book, just not that introduction ;-)

Particularly Good Bits:

The rest is silence! -- silence and joy for those who had endured so much suffering, yet found at last a great and lasting happiness (p. 315).  (Awww, it's a Hamlet quotation!)

If This was a Movie, I Would Rate It:  PG for some scenes of peril and violence.

This is my 17th book read and reviewed for my 3rd Classics Club list and my 13th read off my TBR shelves for #TheUnreadShelfProject2021