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A review by bookysue
Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe
4.0
I really liked it. It’d been a while since I’d read a classic, and the reading was breezy and interesting, with enough conflict to keep it lively, but not so much as to stress me out.
One of the main problems I had with it was the fact that it was a man writing a woman’s autobiography. Which, in and of itself might be okay, except for the fact that he consistently criticized women (under the guise of it being “our sex”) for not asserting themselves more, and for allowing men to put them in their place in society. Now, on the one hand, it’s good that a man had these feelings toward the way things were back in the 18th century. But on the other, at least in my mind, he was essentially blaming women for their lot in life, telling them it is their weakness and lack of motivation for change that keeps them stuck marrying in order to have a life, rather than making a life on their own. So, a bit hypocritical there, to me. But that was a minor point.
I also didn’t care too much for the ending – things slowed down a lot about 40 pages from the end, and I thought more action would arise, but essentially the last 40 pages were just “isn’t everything wonderful?! everything miraculously worked out perfectly!” Almost like the conflict resolution in a children’s story or fairy tale. A little over the top, I thought. I also found it difficult that there were no chapter separations or breaks in the story of any kind. I mean, this was also a love/hate thing for me: I liked that it seemed like one long oral history, due to the lack of chapter breaks, but it also made it difficult to find a good stopping point, which is hard when you read on the bus and in restaurants and between classes and in bed, as I do.
Finally, I found it strange that she discarded her children with such ease most of the time, only once making any fuss about it. And then later calling the son she had by her brother her one and only child, when she had really had like 10 by then.
I was also totally confused when I started reading it because I remember seeing the movie years and years ago, and it was NOTHING like this. They must have taken every liberty possible when adapting it into a screenplay for that film. In the movie, Robin Wright Penn was an actual whore, like men paid her for sex, and I remember Stockard Channing was her madam and kept giving her nasty customers on purpose. And she had a daughter who she desperately wanted to see but couldn't for some reason. And she stole someone else's life and became a rich woman who everyone thought was someone else...Anyway, this was NOTHING like the book. So, thanks, Hollywood. This is why I'm afraid to see the film adaptation of The Road.
One of the main problems I had with it was the fact that it was a man writing a woman’s autobiography. Which, in and of itself might be okay, except for the fact that he consistently criticized women (under the guise of it being “our sex”) for not asserting themselves more, and for allowing men to put them in their place in society. Now, on the one hand, it’s good that a man had these feelings toward the way things were back in the 18th century. But on the other, at least in my mind, he was essentially blaming women for their lot in life, telling them it is their weakness and lack of motivation for change that keeps them stuck marrying in order to have a life, rather than making a life on their own. So, a bit hypocritical there, to me. But that was a minor point.
I also didn’t care too much for the ending – things slowed down a lot about 40 pages from the end, and I thought more action would arise, but essentially the last 40 pages were just “isn’t everything wonderful?! everything miraculously worked out perfectly!” Almost like the conflict resolution in a children’s story or fairy tale. A little over the top, I thought. I also found it difficult that there were no chapter separations or breaks in the story of any kind. I mean, this was also a love/hate thing for me: I liked that it seemed like one long oral history, due to the lack of chapter breaks, but it also made it difficult to find a good stopping point, which is hard when you read on the bus and in restaurants and between classes and in bed, as I do.
Finally, I found it strange that she discarded her children with such ease most of the time, only once making any fuss about it. And then later calling the son she had by her brother her one and only child, when she had really had like 10 by then.
I was also totally confused when I started reading it because I remember seeing the movie years and years ago, and it was NOTHING like this. They must have taken every liberty possible when adapting it into a screenplay for that film. In the movie, Robin Wright Penn was an actual whore, like men paid her for sex, and I remember Stockard Channing was her madam and kept giving her nasty customers on purpose. And she had a daughter who she desperately wanted to see but couldn't for some reason. And she stole someone else's life and became a rich woman who everyone thought was someone else...Anyway, this was NOTHING like the book. So, thanks, Hollywood. This is why I'm afraid to see the film adaptation of The Road.