Miss Marjoribanks 10 (chaps 33-36, Nov. 1865)

Dear Serial Readers,

This installment has more than a glimpse of Lucilla's interiority. I was especially taken with the momentous scene where Cavendish comes up to her in the street (chap 34) and the sense of anger and regret on each respective side that this match cannot come off. Here we learn that Lucilla's heart "fluttered" more than once, as Cavendish is on the brink of some kind of proposal or love confession. But propriety makes her follow on the course she's established, and she tells her favorite imposter (and brother of the mimic) that she hopes he marries Barbara. All this happens with her throat contracting, her heart fluttering, and with many explicit and pregnant "pauses" in her performance of this scene. And then afterward, the sense of a lost opportunity--Lucilla "a little sad in the solitude of her genius" with her unappreciated sacrifice. That she might have married Cavendish after all and rally to the great challenge of being a political wife--a "position which pleased her imagination, and suited her energies, and did not go against her heart," but instead she acts according to social laws that dictate she must marry within or above her class. Cavendish reminds me of some of Trollope's struggling heroes, Johnny Eames (whom some of us have met in these screen-pages) or even Phineas Finn--created *after* this novel. If only Lucilla could've been Cavendish's Madam Max!

Instead we have Lucilla's self-renunciation of a marriage (and not only is Cavendish the most popular man in Carlingford, he is with this reader too), much like Rose, the little Preraphaelite, forced to give up her "Career" for domestic duties. I can't help but feel "a little sad" and also marvel that Oliphant links the relative sacrifices of these young women, including Barbara, with her gorgeous voice and fiery passions, whose disappointment in love motivates her to turn to governessing.

Otherwise, I have been thinking about the staginess of these scenes, especially those that take place in the Marjoribanks drawing room, like the Archdeacon's encounter with Mrs. Mortimer, under the watchful eye of Lucilla as director, who has set up this reunion, and then goes on to provide all the necessary props for the wedding. But the walking scene with Cavendish gives the hint that perhaps her social artwork, genius that she has for it, does leave something to be desired.

I was intrigued by the final chapter, a reflexive commentary on the progress of the story and the shift to the second phase of Lucilla's career--"amid mists of discouragement, and in an entire absence of all that was calculated to stimulate and exhilarate..." Oliphant's realism indeed, especially on the subject of women's careers--whether the artist class of Grove Street or the elites of Grange Lane.
The strong chord of this segment seems about women's wasted talents and surrendered desires. Not just a "little" sad.

For next time, chaps. 37-39 for installment 11--only four more after this (15 in all).
Recommendations for the next serial? I had suggested Eliot's first fiction, "Scenes of Clerical Life," but am eager for other suggestions!

Serially sad,
Susan

Miss Marjoribanks 9 (Oct. 1865--chaps 29-32)

Dear Serial Readers,

I loved the "outsourced" review Josh provided--and I thought the description of Oliphant could also apply to Lucilla herself. And I agree about the slapstick elements--I found so many scenes hilarious--like Cavendish's bad luck of sitting at the dinner table directly under the lamp so that the Archdeacon immediately recognized him. And Lucilla, whose sharp vision sees the calamity about to happen,drops her fan into her pyramid-shaped dinner napkin! And then all the mistaken assumptions about Lucilla and Cavendish, from Mrs Chiley or others watching her. AND, like last time, those allusions to "Them," or, as Mrs Chiley puts it, "everybody knows men are great fools where women are concerned." I don't think I've encountered another Victorian novelist this funny with the exception of Dickens--but, as I've said before, the Oliphantine humor is so different.

What struck me this time is the narrowness of the canvas here--that all the action of the novel is basically across two streets in Carlingford--the class-inflected neighborhoods of Grange Lane and Grove Street, and a few select homes within each. Not much traveling about this novel, but so much action, so much tempest in a drawing-room! And for all the suspense set up for the last installment (as TK said, "I wonder what will happen next!"), the playing out of the Cavendish Unveiled plot is quite drawn out. Now we have to wait for the next segment to see if Lucilla's best-laid plans to hitch Mrs. Mortimer with the Archdeacon (motivated by her desire to foil her father's leaning toward the widow who wants to disappear), will come off. And whether Cavendish will marry Barbara Lake after all, now that Lucilla has confirmed his class fall. The plot moves slowly, and not much happens, and yet the novel is oddly engrossing. As others have commented, this seems a different animal altogether from the familiar fare of Victorian domestic fiction, an alternative realism.

Despite the anxiety about this particular Thursday Evening, as it faintly registers through Lucilla's body (although her pulse remains calm!), her self-possession as hostess extraordinaire is still delightfully reassuring. She is a social artist, and what's also quite remarkable is her zest--her "genius"--for this. And so this installment propels us forward to more drawing-room suspense orchestrated by Lucilla: "her lofty energies went on unwearied to overrule and guide the crisis which was to decide so many people's fate." Is this humor in hyperbole?

Next time, chaps 33-36.

Serially salivating,
Serial Susan