Bleak House (Penguin Classics)

Rating:
Summary: Step back in time, '1984-Orwell'-1840's Dickens style
Review: Ada Clair and Richard Carstone come to live as wards of John Jarndyce at Bleak House, a manor in the English country side. Their governess is Esther Summerston, an orphan, who in the course of the novel gets three proposals of marriage. Quite an accomplishment for a modest unassuming Victorian maiden. One prospective suitor is a bit pesky, another too old and the third, well...you can imagine how perplexing this attention can all be for mild mannered Esther. As Richard Carstone matriculates to his majority he and Ada come to profess their love for one another. At the same time, Richard becomes preoccupied with a contested will, the infamous Jarndyce v Jarndyce which has wended its way through chancery for...could it be...decades? His zeal to win is reinforced by spendthrift man-child Harold Skimpole and a lawyer named Boythorn. Oh, there is intrigue aplenty here. Another lawyer seems to thrive on putting the screws to folks. Barrister Talkinghorn brings down the arrogant Lady Deadlock with his discovery of a child born out of wedlock. Instrumental in the unraveling of her mystery is a poor street urchin, Little Jo, whose life and fate are the stuff of nightmares. The mistreatment he receives make me shudder. Well, Dickens has in Bleak House quite a study in greed, primarily the greed of lawyers whose fees dry up the goods when petitioners come to chancery. It is a somber slow paced book well crafted and rewarding to the patient 21st century reader. For the instant, just add water types, skim the book, skip the slow laborious places...

Rating:
Summary: Nothing bleak about this...
Review: After years without picking up a novel by Dickens (memories of starchy classes at school), I decided to plunge into "Bleak House", a novel that had been sitting on my bookshelf for about ten years, waiting to be read. Although I found it heavy going at first, mainly because the style is so unfamiliar to modern readers, after about ten pages I was swept up and carried off, unable to put the hefty tome down until I had finished it. This book is a definite classic. The sheer scope of the tale, the wit of the satire (which could still be applied to many legal proceedings today) and the believable characters gripped me up until the magnificent conclusion. One particularly striking thing is the "cinematic" aspect of certain chapters as they switch between different angles, building up to a pitch that leaves the reader breathless. I can't recommend "Bleak House" too highly. And I won't wait so long before reading more Dickens novels.

Rating:
Summary: Magnificent House.
Review: This is the second book by Dickens I have read so far, but it will not be the last. "Bleak House" is long, tightly plotted, wonderfully descriptive, and full of memorable characters. Dickens has written a vast story centered on the Jarndyce inheritance, and masterly manages the switches between third person omniscient narrator and first person limited narrator. His main character Esther never quite convinces me of her all-around goodness, but the novel is so well-written that I just took Esther as she was described and ran along with the story. In this book a poor boy (Jo) will be literally chased from places of refuge and thus provide Dickens with one of his most powerful ways to indict a system that was particularly cruel to children. Mr. Skimpole, pretending not to be interested in money; Mr. Jarndyce, generous and good; Richard, stupid and blind; the memorable Dedlocks, and My Lady Dedlock's secret being uncovered by the sinister Mr. Tulkinghorn; Mrs. Jellyby and her telescopic philanthropy; the Ironmaster described in Chapter 28, presenting quite a different view of industralization than that shown by Dickens in his next work, "Hard Times." Here is a veritable cosmos of people, neighbors, friends, enemies, lovers, rivals, sinners, and saints, and Dickens proves himself a true master at describing their lives and the environment they dwell in. There are landmark chapters: Chapter One must be the best description of a dismal city under attack by dismal weather and tightly tied by perfectly dismal laws, where the Lord Chancellor sits eternally in Lincoln's Inn Hall. Chapter 32 has one of the eeriest scenes ever written, with suspicious smoke, greasy and reeking, as a prelude to a grisly discovery. Chapter 47 is when Jo cannot "move along" anymore. This Norton Critical is perhaps the best edition of "Bleak House" so far: the footnotes help a lot, and the two Introductions are key to understanding the Law system at the time the action takes place, plus Dickens' interest in this particular topic. To round everything off, read also the criticism of our contemporaries, as well as that of Dickens' time. "Bleak House" is a long, complex novel that opens a window for us to another world. It is never boring and, appearances to the contrary, is not bleak. Enjoy.