First Entry (creative, eh?)

It's Friday?

So, why am I here. I'm here because . . . I followed a link posted to one of my mailing lists (Runagate Rampant, about the writer China Mieville), to a livejournal community, and through that list found several other links to communities that interested me -- neovictorians and anachrotech. So, I asked a friend who does livejournal more about it, and she sent me an invitation. (She'll be easy to recognize, as she's the only "friends" listing at present. )

Because I'm bad about keeping a journal. There's something about the act of setting pen to paper that makes things seem someone . . . permanent? Unworthy? Not quite sure there.

Anyway, who's going to read this? Having trouble imagining

Dreamland, Kevin Baker; Miss Marjoribanks; Adam Bede

Just finished this prequel to the astonishing *Paradise Alley* (which is the better and more historically accurate counterpart to the film version of *Gangs of New York*). I was not as blown away by it, though it was still well-written, rich with detail, and full of interesting characters. Still, it's already fading in memory, while Paradise Alley, which I read months ago, is much fresher in my mind. Hmm. Esse was a strong character, but at the same time, her romance with Kid Twist and her role as idealistic union organizer didn't really match up. On the one hand, most of us in real life *do* have those sorts of contradictions in our characters. On the other, Esse wasn't developed effectively enough that I entirely believed it here. The Freud bits felt a bit gimmicky, like Baker wasn't ready to let go of *Ragtime* as a model quite yet.
Well worth reading, but *Paradise Alley* is much more so.

Other recent reads: Miss Marjoribanks by Mrs. Oliphant. A Victorian novel about a strong young lady who orders society to her liking and looks on men as rather to be managed. This is the first time I picked up a recommendation for a new Victorian novel by a woman writer at a Superbowl party, and from a man. Without knowing Oliphant's background, it's difficult to place this. Lucilla is not pretty, she is pushy, and many of her plans end in disaster. Perhaps this is meant to be an antifeminist satire? But I have some difficulty seeing it that way -- she's a strong young woman making the best of what society was willing to allow her, and she's rather an infectuous character. Could see writing on this someday.

Adam Bede. For my dissertation chapter. If only Eliot weren't so overdetermined. As I said to a friend, after awhile, I wanted to see her interventions in the text as something postmodern and interested. Alas, it was really that she was just being preachy and obvious. I do hope my beloved Middlemarch and Daniel Deronda don't suffer the same fate when I reread next . . . eep. Meanwhile, I find myself in the odd position that I am probably going to be comparing Walter Scott favorably to Eliot in this chapter. Huh, and huh again.