The Big Read III: A Tale of Two Cities -- Charles Dickens Book the Second: The Golden Thread, Chapters 10-12

Chapter Ten:  Two Promises
In which Darnay Has A Talk with Doctor Manette about his feelings for Lucie.

• Another year has passed.  I hadn't realized that this book took place over such a long span of time.
• Mr. Perfect Darnay is a go-getter, teaching and tutoring and translating (elegantly, fo course).  I'm sure that eventually, Miss Manette will keep a very lovely home for him.  (Because regardless of how much Sydney Carton lounges around and moons at her, it's just not going to happen.  Right?  Right.)  I shouldn't be so snarky about Charles and Lucie, but they remind me of another very bland couple -- Ivanhoe and Rowena.  SNOOZE.  Characters who are completely GOOD are rarely very INTERESTING.
• Then again, did Darnay off the Marquis?  That would be interesting and not snooze-worthy at all.
• This made me like him, though:  "He had expected labour, and he found it, and did it, and made the best of it."  And I loved the idea of him as a "tolerated smuggler who drove a contraband trade in European languages".
• He's in love with Lucie Manette.  Well, freaking DUH.  Sweet, dear, compassionate, tender, etc., etc., BIZ-ARF*. 
• This:

...the assassination at the deserted chateau far away beyond the heaving water, and the long, long dusty roads--the solid stone chateau which had itself become the mere mist of a dream--had been done a year...

Really makes it sound as if he did it.  Is Mr. Charles Darnay actually a killer?  Could his soppy nature all be an act?  Could he secretly be a vigilante?  Oh, PUH-LEASE let it be so!

• He's so perfectly honorable:

"I understand equally well, that a word from her father in any suitor's favour, would outweigh herself and all the world.  For which reason, Doctor Manette," said Darnay, modestly but firmly, "I would not ask that word to save my life."

I really should like him more.

• Ooo.  Was Mr. Darnay going to tell Doctor Manette who his family is and/or about his uncle? 
• The image of Doctor Manette going back to his room and working on his shoes is a good one.  Not a nice one, as it's totally depressing and sad, but it's certainly effective.

Chapter Eleven:  A Companion Picture
In which Sydney starts out wasted and then proceeds to get wasted-er.

• Poor old Sydney is wearing a towel again.
• "Stryver the portly".  Ha.
• Ha ha:

"Sydney, I rather despair of making myself intelligible to you, because you are such an insensible dog."

"And you," returned Sydney, busy concocting the punch, "are such a sensitive and poetical spirit."

Oh, hell.  I know where this is going.  I realize that a lot may have happened over the past year, but does Stryver really think he has a chance with She-Of-The-Perfect-Forehead?  Really?

• Yep.  Yep, he does.
• And Sydney takes it, well, sort of stoically:

Sydney Carton drank the punch at a great rate; drank it by bumpers, looking at his friend.

"Now you know all about it, Syd," said Mr. Stryver.  "I don't care about fortune: she is a charming creature, and I have made up my mind to please myself: on the whole, I think I can afford to please myself.  She will have in me a man already pretty well off, and a rapidly rising man, and a man of some distinction: it is a piece of good fortune for her, but she is worthy of good fortune.  Are you astonished?"

Carton, still drinking the punch, rejoined, "Why should I be astonished?"

"You approve?"

Carton, still drinking the punch, rejoined, "Why should I not approve?"

• Stryver is a jackass:  "The prosperous patronage with which he said it, made him look twice as big as her was, and four times as offensive."  Sydney should totally break up with him.

Chapter Twelve:  The Fellow of Delicacy
In which Stryver is an ass.

• Oh, he's SO HORRIBLE AND STUPID!!:

Mr. Stryver having made up his mind to that magnanimous bestowal of good fortune on the Doctor's daughter, resolved to make her happiness known to her before he left town for the Long Vacation.  After some mental debating of the point, he came to the conclusion that it would be as well to get all the preliminaries done with, and they could then arrange at their leisure whether he should give her his hand a week or two before Michaelmas Term, or in the little Christmas vacation between in and Hilary.

He's just as bad (if not almost worse) than Mr. Collins.  If Lucie hits him with a parasol, I will never mock her again, I SWEAR.

• Oh, phew.  Thank heavens for Mr. Lorry.  Even with a beating-by-parasol, I don't know if I'd have been able to survive the horrible awkwardness of a Stryver proposal.

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*Oh, God.  I blame the boys for that.

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Previously:

The Reading Schedule
Book the First, Chapters 1-3
Book the First, Chapters 4-6
Book the Second, Chapters 1-5
Book the Second, Chapters 6-9

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Other reader/bloggers:

TadMack @ Finding Wonderland
Heidi @ Adventures in Multiplicity

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Free copies of A Tale of Two Cities are available at Project Gutenberg and Librivox.

Comments

[TadMack]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!
Stryver... really... is... INSUFFERABLE.

[TadMack]

...although, I do think Biz-Arf is going to make a foray into my vocabulary...

[Heidi]

oh, I am so behind.

I'm almost caught up with reading, but not the blogging.

I wonder if you are right about Darnay. He's really just a little too perfect in his wooing of the father, and yet the father is still unconsciously disturbed. If Charles did assassinate the Marquis, it would scare me if he did end up with Lucie.

Maybe tomorrow I'll get my next post up. Then another delay...I'm reading some de Tocqueville for an alumni gathering Saturday. Here's hoping I get caught up with that.

[chehiladire]

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