Good Books, Men, and Poetry

Dear Professor J, 

An invitation to meander? Bless your heart.

"Men are more interesting in books than they are in real life." This may be my favorite quote from the book, but it does seem unfair to compare ordinary men one knows in real life to Heathcliff  and Mr. Darcy! I loved the character of Isola Pribby. So wise and ridiculous at the same time. "Reading good books ruins you for enjoying bad ones." How true that is!

Juliet's comments on her failed first marriage amused me. HIS trophies replacing HER books? Clearly the union was doomed from that moment. But then later to think that if she'd let him store her books in the basement they would have all been saved when her building was bombed, what painful irony.

Ah yes, the doctor, Elizabeth, and Dawsey. I felt for the doctor whose actions revealed his character. People are not their governments, or leaders, or powerful sweeping movements. How the good doctor must have wanted everyone to understand who he really was apart from his nationality. Apart from war. The whole world may seem to be going to hell at any particular moment, but can things ever really be hopeless as long as there are people who hold onto who they are, their courage and kindness, the way Elizabeth did until the very end?

You are so right about the complexity of the characters. I loved Eben Ramsey's introductory letter to Juliet, so full of quotes that expose that very thing:

"There are things I like to do of an evening, but for my livelihood, I fish."

"Do you know the sentence of (Shakespeare's) I admire most? It is 'The bright day is done, and we are for the dark."

"Days were grey with hard work and evenings were black with boredom."

Not a bad sentence for a fisherman, had Shakespeare taken hold by the time he wrote it or did he adore The Bard because he instinctively recognized a well turned phrase? Then there is this which summed up so much of the book and the characters: 

"We clung to our books and to our friends; they reminded us that we had another part to us"

Several of your quotes were from the, ahem...delightful Miss Addison in her letter where she also says: "...the so-called Literary Society is a scandal. There are those of true culture and breeding here in Guernsey, and they will take no part in this charade (even if invited)."  How badly she must have wanted an invitation she could have had the pleasure of refusing! I loved her closing, "Yours in Christian Consternation and Concern,"  I'm guessing heavy on the consternation, light on the Christian concern. ;)

I meant to comment last time on your mention of the farmer, Clovis, learning poetry to win a lady's heart. I don't know if men need to pay more attention to poetry, but I found it charming that he said about his rival suitor "That's no way to talk about a lady, and I knew right then he didn't want the Widow Hubert for her own self, the way I did."

The fact that he wanted her "for her own self" I thought that was the real poetry.

I'll close with this cable from Sidney to Juliet:

NO BLOOD, NO BOOKS, NO POKER CHIPS. JUST KEEP SENDING LONG LETTERS TO ENTERTAIN US. :)