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sophia_sol) wrote2014-11-06 06:42 pm
sophia_sol) wrote2014-11-06 06:42 pm
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, by Anne Bronte
I began reading this book back in April - seven months ago. I KNOW. I read the first two thirds or so of it at that time and really enjoyed it but I found I couldn't keep reading it because the depiction of the abusive relationship Helen is in was too realistic feeling and I couldn't handle it.
So I put it aside, intending to pick it up again in a few days. It was not a few days. But huzzah, it turned out to have worked eventually. Seven months was enough distance! Of course, by this point I had to read the wiki plot summary to remind myself of what had happened in the parts I'd already read because it'd been too long....
At any rate. This is a really good book! That I am not able to talk about with a great deal of coherency because only the latter part of the book is fresh in my mind!
But I can tell you this much:
a) Helen is super great and I love her. The entire book should have been from her perspective instead of just the diary portion and the bits of letters from her. I mean really the story is about HER, not about Gilbert, so why we have to follow so much of the story from Gilbert's pov is just ugh.
b) I really dislike Gilbert. He is arrogant and high-handed and selfish and judgy and jumps to conclusions and I JUST DON'T KNOW WHAT HELEN SEES IN HIM. So reading the Gilbert sections of the book were full of me going OH GILBERT NO. At least he seems generally willing to listen to what Helen says and to act accordingly, so he's not entirely a lost cause?
c) wowww that is entirely too many names beginning with H for one book. It took me a long time to get them all sorted.
d) speaking of all the H dudes, wow is Hargrave ever a model depiction of a capital-letter Nice Guy. He just LOVES Helen and is treating her SO WELL and has REFORMED HIS BEHAVIOUR ON HER BEHALF and NOBODY ELSE CARES ABOUT HER and really she has NO EXCUSE for not being willing to have sex with him, because he LOVES her and she couldn't possibly be so terrible as to reject him when he's done SO MUCH for her. Ugh he's the worst. (No. Huntingdon's the worst. But Hargrave gives him a run for his money.)
e) I find it extremely hilarious that despite the upfront manner in which the book discusses many awful things, whatever it is about that governess is too dreadful to outright mention. Like, I'm nearly positive that the only thing going on there is that Huntingdon hires her basically entirely in order to have a live-in mistress? But I don't know why that would be too shocking to be explicit about when the book WAS pretty explicit about the fact that Huntingdon was getting it on all the time with Lady Lowborough when she was visiting.
f) I like that Helen has a number of friendships that are important to her and are good avenues of support for her in their various ways - Rachel, and Milicent, and Esther. I am far more interested in these friendships than in the Helen/Gilbert relationship.
So I put it aside, intending to pick it up again in a few days. It was not a few days. But huzzah, it turned out to have worked eventually. Seven months was enough distance! Of course, by this point I had to read the wiki plot summary to remind myself of what had happened in the parts I'd already read because it'd been too long....
At any rate. This is a really good book! That I am not able to talk about with a great deal of coherency because only the latter part of the book is fresh in my mind!
But I can tell you this much:
a) Helen is super great and I love her. The entire book should have been from her perspective instead of just the diary portion and the bits of letters from her. I mean really the story is about HER, not about Gilbert, so why we have to follow so much of the story from Gilbert's pov is just ugh.
b) I really dislike Gilbert. He is arrogant and high-handed and selfish and judgy and jumps to conclusions and I JUST DON'T KNOW WHAT HELEN SEES IN HIM. So reading the Gilbert sections of the book were full of me going OH GILBERT NO. At least he seems generally willing to listen to what Helen says and to act accordingly, so he's not entirely a lost cause?
c) wowww that is entirely too many names beginning with H for one book. It took me a long time to get them all sorted.
d) speaking of all the H dudes, wow is Hargrave ever a model depiction of a capital-letter Nice Guy. He just LOVES Helen and is treating her SO WELL and has REFORMED HIS BEHAVIOUR ON HER BEHALF and NOBODY ELSE CARES ABOUT HER and really she has NO EXCUSE for not being willing to have sex with him, because he LOVES her and she couldn't possibly be so terrible as to reject him when he's done SO MUCH for her. Ugh he's the worst. (No. Huntingdon's the worst. But Hargrave gives him a run for his money.)
e) I find it extremely hilarious that despite the upfront manner in which the book discusses many awful things, whatever it is about that governess is too dreadful to outright mention. Like, I'm nearly positive that the only thing going on there is that Huntingdon hires her basically entirely in order to have a live-in mistress? But I don't know why that would be too shocking to be explicit about when the book WAS pretty explicit about the fact that Huntingdon was getting it on all the time with Lady Lowborough when she was visiting.
f) I like that Helen has a number of friendships that are important to her and are good avenues of support for her in their various ways - Rachel, and Milicent, and Esther. I am far more interested in these friendships than in the Helen/Gilbert relationship.
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(maybe someday I should finish Wuthering Heights. It's very well written but BY GOSH that book is filled with so many unsympathetic characters and I just couldn't take it any longer.)
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(Honestly my favorite part of Wuthering Heights is the frame story with Heathcliff's frame story houseguest who's just like '...what? People in this house did ... what? NO I would not like to marry into this family and take Cathy Jr. away from all this, WHY would I want that, YOU'RE ALL HORRIFYING.')