Charles Dickens
A Tale of Two Cities
I've been reading 'A Tale of Two Cities' this week. Dickens isn't a writer, like Hardy, that I've been especially steeped in before. I read 'Hard Times' a couple of years ago, partly because I was interested in the idea of industrial aggro at the time (what an odd interest to declare for a then 19/20 year old...I probably kept it quiet.)

The novel begins with the famous contrast, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times", between London and Paris of the late eighteenth century. The evocation of Paris as a teeming metropolis, on the edge of storm and ruin, and London as a semi-pastoral scene is one that perhaps nods towards the popular historical understanding of the period of the French Revolution. Paris is on the verge of one of the most bloody and chaotic periods of its history, while London has no popular revolution to be apprehended high on the horizon.

It's fascinating reading so far. At the moment, as a now ex-literature student (for the time-being, anyway) I'm trying to plug some of the gaps in my literary knowledge; the Victorian period is one I'm really interested in, but haven't really looked at in detail since my second year of University.

Thomas Hardy
A Tragedy of Two Ambitions
Read this today in a volume of Hardy's short stories. An interesting tale of greed, betrayal, with the chilling line near the close: "To have endured the cross, despising the shame" which the younger of two brothers remembers as they reflect on the events in which they played a part which led to the death of their father.
I'm not sure what I think of Hardy as a writer; I really haven't read much before. I read most of Jude the Obscure about five years ago now, over Christmas, and enjoyed (not the right word I suppose, given how gloomy the novels are supposed to be) it. Often he is a writer seen as being somehow 'churchy', perhaps given his fairly extensive (apparently) concern with architecture.

This was a short story concerning two brothers, Joshua and Cornelius Halborough, whose drunken father squanders their inheritance on, well erm, drink. With it goes their chance of gaining entry to university, a major and almost fatal blow to their social and to a lesser extent, intellectual ambitions which had, we learn, been stirred by their late mother before she died when they were young boys.
As the brothers grow older, they struggle manfully with the task of educating themselves with the aim of rising in the church. Joshua is the main focus of the novel's concern with social prestige and advancement; his understanding of the role of the clegyman can be neatly summed up with his criteria for success in the Church given to his brother: " To succeed in the Church, people must believe in you, first of all as a gentleman, secondly as a man of means, thirdly as a scholar, fourthly as a preacher, fifthly, perhaps, as a Christian - but always first as a gentleman. " (P.60)

I suppose the alignment of religious institutions with social class, power and advancement, shorn largely of anything greatly spiritual, is the territory in which the story dwells. It's interesting for that reason - the idea of the church as being some kind of way into society was a very real concern - as shown in the text. The central dilemma comes as their father falls into a weir, and the initial instinct of the younger, less careworn and anxious brother Cornelius to save his father is challenged by his brother's deliberate hesitation. As the brothers watch their father flounder and then give up the fight against the water as he drifts into a culvert (some kind of tunnel or arch under roads) and dies, they must face the fact that their decision has cost him his life, but indirectly preserved the circumstances of their sister, whose impending marriage to a local squire would be jeopardised by the arrival of her disgraced and drunken father.

All interesting stuff!

"Fire can make a conscience clean - strike a match, we'll see"

Been listening to a lot of new music (Anberlin have introduced me to a couple of simillar bands) in the few days since I finsished my exams, and thus the year and my time at university.
It hasn't sunk in at all yet - the fact that this is it, the end. Of course there's the whole postraduate idea. Maybe that's something I'll look at doing next year, or later. But for now, I don't know what to do with myself.

That's the exciting, nerve-wracking thing.