Dear Serial Readers,
I'm also intrigued by the direct or indirect attention to education so far in this novel you've noted--Julia's comments on the Cumnor charity school in contrast to Lowood in Jane Eyre and Joshua's on Mr. Gibson's attitude toward literacy. Then there's quite a bit here about the public school educations of the two Hamley sons (perhaps in contrast to Molly's meagre education by Miss Eyre).
I must say, though, that I understood Gibson's reluctance for Molly to learn too much as pertaining to his feelings about her growing up. Perhaps because I have a seventeen year old daughter myself who is currently in the process of applying to college, I was struck by the Hamleys and Gibson wrestling with their children's increasing autonomy and departures from home. Around the time Gaskell began working on this novel, her daughter Florence married in 1863. Gaskell handles Gibson's fears about Molly leaving with terrific irony since his concern about the "calf-love" threatened by Edward Coxe compels him to send Molly away from him to Hamley, where, of course, two sons are bound to visit on holiday from school.
Gibson's uneasiness about Molly growing up and leaving him has two other parallels: Mrs. Hamley missing her sons, especially the poetic Osborne (who presumably takes after her in contrast to the outdoorsy, naturalist Roger, more like the father) and then Molly's fear at the end of this installment about the possibility of his father remarrying, an event that would necessarily affect the intimacy of this father and daughter. Rather than "Wives and Daughters" a more inclusive title would be "Parents and Children." These opening segments make evident a focus on changes in parent/child relationships as children move into adulthood. This is especially so for Molly and her father. Yes, the serpent in the Edenic garden of Molly's childhood does emerge as this installment closes with the squire considering, "To be sure, a step-mother to a girl is a different thing to a second wife to a man." How will the next one end, I wonder?
Returning to the theme of literacy, I also noted the attention to reading in these chapters--reading books (poetry, novels, scientific writing), reading human nature, and reading nature.
Characters are sorted by their reading tastes or abilities--Molly reads historical novels (Scott, in this instance), while the squire tells Molly about Roger's remarkable capacity to read natural history through nature--"his eyes are always wandering about, and see twenty things where I only see one." As a doctor, Gibson is an astute reader of nature as it affects human bodies, but (returning to my comment last time) we get the sense that he's not a sharp reader of his own feelings and motivations: "He did not want to lose the companionship of his child, in fact; but he put it to himself in quite a different way." Other observations about reading practices in these chapters?
Finally, I wanted to mention the subtitle of this novel, although I don't know if it appeared with the original magazine serialization: "An Every-Day Story." I like this accent on ongoingness, on commonness, rather than the extraordinary. I'm hoping that one of these weeks some one of us will peak at the original Cornhill appearance of these chapters to see what other everyday stories surrounded segments of the novel. I'll try to remember for next week: chapters 7-9.
Serially submerged,
Susan
Susan
3 comments:
I'm wondering about literary reputations at this point, especially with regard to two figures: Scott and Hemans. Mrs. Hamley admires her son's poetry and considers it "almost as good as Mrs. Hemans," which the narrator helpfully observes is like a Victorian claiming the poems are almost as good as Tennyson's. Is Mrs. Hamley applying a curve here, like when parents put their kids' drawings on the refrigerator? Will we find out Osborne actually is a talented poet? And what's the status of Hemans' reputation in 1866, when Gaskell is publishing this? I know she's recently been re-canonized, but was she still held in high esteem then?
Molly's fascination with Walter Scott reminds me of Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey, only she's not deluded by fantasy like Catherine is. And of course Scott wasn't considered vaguely disreputable -- quite the opposite. If I remember correctly, he was considered a magnificent novelist until around 1900 and since has been widely deprecated (though reading him this summer made me think he's due for a revival!). Does this choice of reading show Molly's good taste and sophistication?
And I'm really interested in the subtitle "An Every-Day Story," which certainly seems to describe these chapters well. There's something really interesting about a novelistic project that focuses on the ordinary. I remember, reading H. Rider Haggard's She and looking at the advertisements surrounding it in serial form, coming across an ad for Anchor Stone Building Boxes (apparently the Victorian equivalent of Legos). There was something very touching about the attention to mundane details of everyday life -- in this case, parents who wanted to make sure that their children weren't bored with Christmas presents too early. There's something fascinating to me about the attempt to make us care deeply about the complexity and interest underneath mundane, humdrum living.
I also was interested in education, and a bit sympathetic to the parents wanting their children to stay somewhat dependent! But I was most delighted that *real* scholars such as Osborne don't study *science.* Oh, no. Only relatively poor students such as his brother, Roger.
Is the Darwin character Roger, or one of Roger's friends? I look forward to meeting Roger and Osborne. Of course I'm already wondering which will be a better suitor for Molly. At first I thought Osborne was too obvious, but then I remembered the century I was reading in! But I was deceived by Trollope.
I like that the squire does stop to see things from Molly's perspective at the end of this section. I'll be interested to see how he responds to her coming interactions with his precious sons!
I paused at the provacative subtitle to the novel, too, and the way it sets up expectations for a novel that you can read "every day" (or every month over a long period of time) and that will deal with the common aspects of life. And the opening of the second installment emphasized the everyday for me--Gaskell seems to underscore through her description of Mr. Gibson's personal relationships the unlikeliness of finding an adventurous story in Hollingford! We have the scientific Lord Hollingford who is shy and reserved, the vicar who chooses to "purchase silence with a ten-pound note" (p. 39), the Squire Hamley who was not of "an adventurous race" (p. 40) and has no desire to even go to London, Mrs. Hamley who spends her life on a sofa, and absent sons. The only excitement is the relatively tame love-note to Molly from Mr. Coxe the medical apprentice. Gaskell seems to go out of her way to create a mundane setting for her "every-day" story.
Like others, I found the reading tastes of the characters interesting, and I was particularly intrigued by Mr. Gibson's use of allusions in the section with Mr. Coxe. Through his references to King Midas, Una, and Scylla and Charybdis, Mr. Gibson shows himself to be a wide reader, in addition to a scientist. He thus blends the intellectual qualities that we see split up in Obsourne and Roger Hamley. I wonder if this will be significant later on, as perhaps Molly becomes embroiled in a love plot? (I at least am hoping the narrative will go in this direction).
The title "Wives and Daughters" also emphasizes the generational aspect of the novel that Susan mentioned. I love the humorous way in which the older generation distinguishes their own youthful loves from the experiences of their children. Mr. Gibson, for example, dismisses as "calf love" the advances of his apprentice, saying to himself that Molly is much too young for them although "To be sure--poor Jeanie was not so old, and how I did love her!" (p. 48). Squire Hamley has a similar response in a conversation about his son's marriage: "Pooh! away with love! Nay my dear, we loved each other so dearly we should never have been happy with any one else; but that's a different thing. People are not like what they were when we were young. All the love now-a-days is just silly fancy, and sentimental romance, as far as I can see" (p. 57).
And then, of course, we do have the tie back to the main title of the novel in the last line of the installment (as Susan pointed out): "A stepmother to a girl (daughter) is a different thing to a second wife to a man!" (p. 75). This suggests to me that a marriage will provide the excitement that will propel the narrative forward.
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