Yesterday on my way back to Columbia after the break, I was reading "Great Expectations" on the plane, and three different people asked me if I was reading it as an assignment. They were incredulous when I said it was pleasure reading. It made me laugh. It also made me feel bad for poor "Great Expectations," which must have been assigned in high schools for decades now to the point where no one believes a person would read it for pleasure. But, oh, I do. What a book. Here's one bit I liked so much:
"Pip, my dear old chap, life is made of ever so many partings welded together."
-Joe Gargery
That Joe. He knows a thing or two about a thing or two.
5 comments:
Funny. Way to leave people feeling incredulous. :)
I *was* assigned _Great Expectations_ in 9th grade. But the funny thing is, it's the only Dickens I was ever assigned that I actually liked. I have fond memories of reading it while lying in the grass under a tree outside the classroom door. Aaah.
I love Joe Gargery
i read it in 9th grade too! loved it. would read it again. poor charles, he gets such a bad rap. i think he was brilliant...understanding his times & the nature of man.
I love Dickens in general and GE in particular. I like that apron full of pins and needles the sister wore and how she would get hold of Pip. And those spotted tombstones that are his spotted siblings in his memory. And Miss Havesham, of course. I hate that there are two endings. That Dickens gave in in that way.
I used to read a Dickens every winter and a James every summer. Then, somehow, I had babies and quit that habit. Never did get around to these Dickenses: Pickwick Papers, Dombey and Son, Nicholas Nickelby, Little Dorrit(!), and Our Mutual Friend. Makes me want to read one now, while the snow's still on the ground. But I'm thick in recommended and required books just now. And a copy of The End of the Affair someone left lying around.
I'm stumbling around on Darby's blog links and found this one! Nice! I love Great Expectations and all of Charles Dickens. Funny think. I first read it while I was pregnant with Linnea. ha! Great Expectations....
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