David Copperfield in Bed

I finished David Copperfield this morning as children ran up and down the stairs in the courtyard making horrible noises with a bubble-blowing gun--I think the noises were maybe supposed to sound like a space ray or something. I think they were American children. David Copperfield himself ends up with some children at the end, which we knew would happen because he had a daughter wearing a ring (see last post) and everything is wrapped up in a kind of tedious way. I am pretty down on poor David! But as I said, all this stuff that you kind of thought had been basically wrapped up already had to get wrapped again, as if it were going to be mailed to a faraway country, which I suppose it was. The Colonies pop up at the end: everyone is successful in Australia! That was fun. And there was one character, Mr Mell(s?), who had not been dealt with in the general double- and triple-wrapping up, and he was sort of wrapped up, thank goodness. That was a relief to me. The last sight we got of Uriah Heep was certainly a little bit chilling and a little bit funny, which is what you want out of Uriah Heep. The love plot was pretty boring and stupid, but was managed in such a way that it was at least somewhat emotionally plausible, for a Dickens novel. But I think that, while Our Mutual Friend didn't seem too long to me at all, David Copperfield did. That extra 15% or so may have come from Dickens not wanting to let go of his favorite character ever, but I found it as tiresome, if not more tiresome, than the end of Lord of the Rings.


Speaking of the detail about the daughter's ring: I forgot to mention in my last post that it reminds me a lot of this part of The Bell Jar that I've written about before (not on this blog)--Esther is describing the swag she got from her magazine internship, and she's like, "I got this sunglasses case with a green plastic starfish on it. The other day I cut off the starfish and gave it to the baby to play with." I think it's the only clue we get in the whole novel about what Esther's life is like after the bell jar lifts. It's interesting that it's a domestic, maternal detail--showing us that she's "normal" now and doesn't have to be embarrassed at the OB-GYN anymore, and presumably met some kind of normal husband-type to have sex with who isn't Irwin or whoever--but that we don't get any details about how she's now a famous novelist, like we do in David Copperfield. I actually think in The Bell Jar it's a pretty classy, subtle detail; the ring detail in DC is similar, but ultimately less subtle and less tantalizing because we eventually find out where the daughter comes from, and even find out the names of some daughters she could potentially be. So there's less of a sense that you're penetrating into some mysterious, alluring future, a future beyond the fourth wall, through a glass darkly, etc., a future that the narrative in general doesn't want you to know about. A forbidden peek! Or a clever sleight-of-hand to lend the account verisimilitude. 


So, what next? I fear I am already a little sick of Victorian novels (after only three of them!). Surfeiting, the appetite may sicken, and so die! I guess that explains why I kept running into die-hard Victorianists in the hallways at school who, even though they were reading amusing and delightful novels, looked decidedly green about the gills if you mentioned George Eliot or Anthony Trollope. Perhaps I'll take another poetry break and look at The Princess (which might be intolerable!), or introduce a modernism break and read To the Lighthouse, which I think is about going on family vacations? and so might be appropriate for my last couple of days in Italy with my mom.