New book! We are reading Charles Dickens' Little Dorrit for our next book club meeting. Just a hint if you haven't bought it yet...it's a long one!
Next meeting is Saturday, March 20th, 5:00 PM at Sue's house. See you then (if not before then).
Where to Find Me
8 years ago
It took a marathon of reading for me to finish Musketeers in a month. I'm not sure I have it in me to do it again. Can we have a little longer for this one?
ReplyDelete200 pages down. 650 to go.... I heart Dickens' characters!!
ReplyDeleteWell, I'm certainly glad I didn't wait any longer to start this book. Visually it is quite a challenge. Add to that the fact that I'm having a hard time getting into it. Isn't it late Chapter three before we even catch a glimpse of the title character? Well, That's all I've seen of her by the end of Chapter 4. I didn't even know Little Dorrit was a female until I flipped through the book and read the caption under a picture. Guess I'm just a bit out of the loop. That first chapter is such a heap of unanswered questions, but I trust to true Dickens' style to circle back around and address each straw in the heap. I really should spend more time reading other than when I am laying down in utter exhaustion. Then I probably will be able to get more than a page or two read at a time.
ReplyDeleteI haven't even had a chance to start this book. I bought it a month ago and it has sat on my nightstand taunting me. Are we all okay with pushing out the date a little further? How about some time in April or May? Let me know your thoughts and I will reschedule.
ReplyDeleteWell, maybe you all need to stop having a life and sit around all day reading like me. :) Okay, so maybe I'm going to need a little more time to finish this book. I'm nearing page 200 and though I could easily echo Lara's "I heart Dickens' Characters" that seems like such an understatement!
ReplyDeleteKeep us posted on the new meeting date.
Please, Cindy. May would be great!
ReplyDeleteJeanine, if you watch the recent miniseries--which is spot on--you will have a so much better idea of what's going on in the book.
I'm just around 250 right now, so extending works for me. I tried to have a schedule of reading 50 pages a day starting in March 1, but I have already gotten way behind. I'm loving it though, but I think I just love Dickens by default.
ReplyDeleteI'm on for moving the date up also, though I'm off track now and reading as fast as I can. A couple observations:
ReplyDeleteFirst, that first chapter. Dickens may well resolve our wondering as to it's purpose, but I see some value in it even not knowing. Dickens spends the first three chapters describing prison. First the harshest, the two scoundrels, one of whom may well be heading to the gallows. Next he describes the travelers in quarantine. A much better setting, but still a lockup. Third he describes that prison of a house of Mrs. Clennam's. Dickens also describes the setting of London where the story begins for Dorrit as prison like - tall walls, darkness, street after street (cell after cell). It provides a basis of understanding for the life of Little Dorrit. I wonder how it will play out as we read (all the world is a prison? All of London is a prison?) or if he will use that literary device of having the story start in a prison and end in a prison.
Also, I loved, loved, loved the description of the Circumlocution Office (CO). Could he be writing for our time or what? I thought he was virtually describing the mess with handling health care reform or the "saving" of the stock market and banks by the government. Dickens is a genius in social commentary and as timeless as Shakespeare as far as I'm concerned.