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| NN is on top of this growing pile |
Wie geht's?
Happy happy joy joy!!
Nicholas Nickleby (the novel) was a beast. A massive 831 pages of pretty small print in my edition. Phew!
The ending was satisfying, and yes, worth waiting for, but I feel Dicken's third novel was at times, a struggle.
Being so epic, there were loads of characters to keep in my brain over a fairly decent period of time (I can't actually remember when I started reading this one).
I must admit when Brooker comes back into the novel in the latter stages, I'd completely forgotten when he'd been introduced and, indeed, who he was. The Dickens Encyclopedia ($5 well spent from The Little Red Bookshop) was helpful - and if you've forgotten too, Brooker was a former clerk and confidant of Ralph Nickleby who is sent away as a convict earlier in the story.
It has to be said, Nicholas is a pretty wet hero. He doesn't appear to have any faults or human foibles. Instead he's the prim and proper epitome of virtue. For an audience in 2021, in an age of the anti-hero, he's a tad difficult to take. Deadpool this ain't!
Wackford Squeers, Ralph Nickleby and Arthur Gride are odious stage villains, although Gride feels like a necessary plot contrivance to give the last third a focus.
The ebb and flow of the plot wasn't that fulfilling 600 or 700 pages in. Just as Nicholas comes out on top you realise that with 200 more pages to go, there will need to be another villainous act for him to vanquish by page 800.
Still. It's Dickens innit. Characters like John Browdie, Sir Mulberry Hawk, Mrs Nickleby, Newman Noggs, the Squeers clan, Peg Sliderskew, The Cherryble brothers, the Crummles troup, Tim Linkinwater, and so on are so skillfully written. I feel like I've met them and now must say au revoir.
If you're keeping score - Nicholas Nickleby is my fifth Dickens' novel. Bleak House is up next, but not for a while. I need something less weighty and impacting right now.
Love and peace - Wozza
