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A review by stefaniacg
Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell
3.0
Well, that was disappointing.
This is not a book review, just a collection of annotations I made along the way that summarize why this reading experience wasn't great.
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Lack of subtlety: how many times can you say that Osborne is elegant and that Roger is slow?
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Mrs Gibson is an insufferable character in the worst possible way. I do not care for her, I do not find her character flaws funny or interesting, I just find it annoying. So many pages of this book seem to be dedicated to stress the same flaws of her character and it doesn't add anything to the build of her character or the story itself, it just makes the reading experience very annoying. Enough with that, I already know how she is, let's just keep going with the story.
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I'm up to 90% of the book and I have now given up any notion of reading Mrs Gibson's dialogues at full. At this point I'm so tired of knowing how contradictory and selfish she acts. I'm sure skimming her bits of dialogue won't make any difference to the narrative.
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I'm extremely disappointed with the ending.
To top it all, there were 5 instances of racist comments that ranged from observations about skin color to intellectual ability and the "savagery" of African people. It certainly helped me to remember that although victorian literature can be a bless, it was part of the cultural expression of a society that had its wealth based on colonialism and, as such, it was simply part of the colonial rhetoric.
This is not a book review, just a collection of annotations I made along the way that summarize why this reading experience wasn't great.
-
Lack of subtlety: how many times can you say that Osborne is elegant and that Roger is slow?
Spoiler
And how to make it any more clear that Roger is probably the hero here?-
Mrs Gibson is an insufferable character in the worst possible way. I do not care for her, I do not find her character flaws funny or interesting, I just find it annoying. So many pages of this book seem to be dedicated to stress the same flaws of her character and it doesn't add anything to the build of her character or the story itself, it just makes the reading experience very annoying. Enough with that, I already know how she is, let's just keep going with the story.
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I'm up to 90% of the book and I have now given up any notion of reading Mrs Gibson's dialogues at full. At this point I'm so tired of knowing how contradictory and selfish she acts. I'm sure skimming her bits of dialogue won't make any difference to the narrative.
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I'm extremely disappointed with the ending.
Spoiler
I know it was not how we were supposed to experience it, since Gaskell wasn't able to finish it properly, but I just can't help being put off by the fact that we never see Molly's knowledge of Roger's love. I did not read this book to know that they were going to be married - that was obvious since the first chapters. I read this story so I could be with Molly, so I could follow her thoughts and feelings and see her growth as a young woman. Ultimately I feel like I've been denied this. Well. Wives and daughters indeed.To top it all, there were 5 instances of racist comments that ranged from observations about skin color to intellectual ability and the "savagery" of African people. It certainly helped me to remember that although victorian literature can be a bless, it was part of the cultural expression of a society that had its wealth based on colonialism and, as such, it was simply part of the colonial rhetoric.