Rating: 
Summary: Adventure, Comedy, andTragedy.
Review: When I first read "Bleak House" (1853) I thought it was slow reading. When I finished it and saw how everything came together, I considered it a phenomenal masterpiece. Along with "Dombey and Son" (1848), "David Copperfield" (1850), and "Hard Times" (1854) this is a personal favorite of mine. There are very comical moments. Also there are journeys through the poor parts of London. We are also presented with chilling images as well as a murder mystery. Another well drawn part of this masterpiece is the protagonist's painful realization of her questionable birth. There is a dramatic chase through the snow and well placed dramatic irony. While this book may seem to move slow, it will get easier as you proceed.
Rating:
Summary: A precursor of symbolism
Review: When I read the first book of Dickens I must have been seven or eight. I never was into childrenÕs books and insisted on reading Oliver Twist. I also had the measles and ran a high fever, a fatal combination, especially when Fagin sends his little troopers into your dreams. My mother took away the book and my life was saved. But somehow this has affected my entire attitude when it comes to Dickens, even after full recovery. I saw nothing of his humor and everything of his depressive gloom. I wouldnÕt touch a book of his with tongs. Over the years this became a ridiculous phobia.
Then one day I made the acquaintance of a London spinster who herself could have jumped straight out of one of DickensÕ novels. You know, the bony type with a shrill laughter, but a warrior before the gin bottle. She had an uncanny eye for the idiosyncrasies and little ticks of almost each and everyone and she pointed out to me the whole collection of Dickensian characters walking past the window. These days Mr. Podsnap works on the stock exchange and his flourish still comes handy when the Dow Johnes is dropping. With the help of this good lady I have seen the PickwickÕs whole cast walking the streets in the flesh. It is a gift, and I wish I had it. I decided to have another go at Dickens.
Regardless of genre, there are two types of imaginative literature. Stand-up routines and pieces that try to convey something. Both are legitimate, but personally I prefer the latter. Coming to think of it, as a stand-up routine even ÒUlyssesÓ might actually be salvageable. Anyway, Dickens is definitely the stand-up comedian, and he and Shakespeare have this in common, that one reads them both mainly for their turn of phrase. Take away the phrasing from Shakespeare and we are left with pretty silly anecdotes and downright ludicrous nonsense. Denude Dickens of his language and the man presents himself as a pretty ordinary dime novelist.
Seriously! Can you name even one of DickensÕ novels you would read for its jaw-dropping thrills? ... Thought so. But I learned to like Dickens, because his ÒnovelsÓ are really sheer poetry, prose-poems of three decker tome size which outshine everything that any poet of the period had written, including Browning and Hopkins. None even remotely has achieved DickensÕ variety of rhythm and cadence, or matches his felicity of similes and metaphors. And ÒBleak HouseÓ is certainly a lonely peak even within DickensÕ own production. Just listen to this (make sure you are not running a fever):
Ò... , these tumbling tenements contain, by night, a swarm of misery. As, on the ruined human wretch, vermin parasites appear, so these ruined shelters have bred a crowd of foul existence that crawls in and out of gaps in walls and boards; and coils itself to sleep, in maggot numbers, where the rain drips in; and comes and goes, fetching and carrying fever, and sowing more evil in every footprint than Lord Coodle, and Sir Thomas Doodle, and the Duke of Foodle, and all the fine gentlemen in office, down to Zoodle, shall set right in five hundred years--though born expressly to do it.Ó
Disgustingly brilliant and highly symbolic! Well that is Dickens. He is one of the few epic geniuses who we gladly forgive that their style is more of a player than a conveyor. No matter which page we turn, it is always Dickens and nothing but Dickens. But what about incident and character? ShouldnÕt we expect a collection of caricatures in DaumierÕs fashion? Not in Bleak House - the ghostly cast walking the foggy streets is of flesh and blood or some other juice, but walk they do and convincingly.
Less convincing though are the incidents and concerns. The judicial system which Dickens appeared to criticize was already outdated in DickensÕ own era by at least three decades; the law suit in "Bleak House" is based on a dim memory from the authorÕs childhood. Many social issues of poverty and poor public housing touched in the book had already been taken care of by a number of reform acts. When Dickens published his novel, London had just opened to the public the first tunnels for a new underground transport system.
No, who means to read ÒBleak House,Ó in order to bolster social conscience, better turn to EngelsÕ book on the condition of the working class in Manchester, (a must read in my opinion, but not for its literary merits.) Dickens was first and foremost an artist, and a great artist. For people who like to discuss artistic styles, ÒBleak HouseÓ is something of a landmark: it introduces the era of symbolism. Not that Dickens had intended to do so - it came naturally to him to write like this, but what for him was an expression of his temperament, became for the generation after Dickens a new method, which in its extremes could take the shape of MallarmŽÕs oracular poetry.
But this was still a far cry of a distant future. Dickens is anything but oracular. A lord of the language who all his enormous powers had funneled into ÒBleak House,Ó and to such extend as we would never see again nor have seen before.
Rating:
Summary: Strangely contemporary and accessible
Review: While Jarndyce and Jarndyce is nominally the spine of the story, it really is more centered on the mystery of Esther Summerson -- perhaps the only weakness in the book. Esther's gushing first person narrative, particularly over her girlfriend Ada (in turn, perhaps the least-developed character in the book) stands in the way of the compelling and meaty narrative of the third person. I found the book surprisingly accessible and contemporary, even though it basically chronicles an old society in transition -- from coaches to railroads, aristocracy to industry, rural stasis to urban inflow.It is the characters that are so appealing, and recognizable, to me. Snagsby the hapless stationer is a Bob Newhart-type schlemiel; Mr. Bucket is the all-knowing detective 75 years before Hammett; Sir Leicester Dedlock is the pompous windbag with whom it's pointless to argue; Skimpole the jovial hypocrite moving from one victim to the next, and so on. The plot twists are frequently implausible but always enjoyable. The scenes are often cinematic and a clever balance is felt, such as the contrast between the opening befogged inertia of Chancery and the breathless climactic chase sequence. (One question -- did Esther forget her promise to tell us more of her letter?)
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