Thursday, July 3, 2014

Belgian Musings


As mentioned previously, I recently went to a conference in Belgium.  To get to Belgium from the US, one takes a plane…which means one takes a plane book.  (Note the two senses of the word “take” in that sentence.  This reminds me of the old question, which has been falsely presented as a test of logic: “Do you walk to school or take your lunch?”  The test is whether you notice the implied oddity of using your lunch as a means of transportation.  But, noticing that hinges on a certainty that the person asking the question is not prone to combing incongruous things in a sentence.  It would, for example, be a perfectly appropriate English sentence to ask “Do you write with a pencil or live on a busy street?”  The failing would then be with the person asking the question, not with the person who looks puzzled about the question.  I have been pondering this matter since I was first asked the question in 7th grade.  I was totally unsatisfied with being told the question was the teacher's way of finding out which students understood basic logic.  That is a long time to be thinking about a question.  Indeed, it is one of the few things I remember from 7th grade.  Which probably says a lot about my 7th grade education.  It also says a lot about how annoyed I was when I said “I take a lunch” because I rode the bus and did take a lunch to school and was then implicitly told I had failed a test of logic.  That is a long time to be annoyed about something so seemingly trivial.  Determining why I was so annoyed is left as an exercise for the reader (and not a very difficult exercise).)

All of which is not a bad segue to the plane book mentioned above (far, far above):  Henry Fielding: Tom Jones.  I decided to read this book on this particular trip two years ago.  That is a long time in advance to choose a plane book.  There is a story there (but of course).  The conference was the regular, every-two years (herein lies a problem of English language:  Is “biannual” twice a year or every two years?  You think you know?   Look it up.  Here, for example.  Very, very, very annoying.) conference on the English Financial Revolution of the 18th century which I have been attending for years.  It is a small interdisciplinary conference—historians and English literature types and economists and even a law professor.  Tom Jones is one of the Big Novels of the era.  The English professors regularly mention it.  I had never read it.  It is long.  So, after the conference two years ago, I thought I should read it.  And then I thought, “Well, since the next conference is in Belgium, which is a long plane ride, why not use the occasion to read Tom Jones? And it was so.

All of which is yet again a good segue to Tom Joes. The book is a novel.  Of that there is no doubt.  Depending on how you define “novel,” it may be the first “novel.”  Probably not, though.  I define “novel more broadly, so Robinson Crusoe get the honor.  Richardson’s Clarissa might also qualify (at least according to Frank Kermode—I haven’t read Clarissa, so I have no means of judging the matter, which is moot anyway because Robinson Crusoe predates Clarissa so it is only benighted people like Frank Kermode who would talk about Clarissa anyway (who is Frank Kermode?  Why do you care?  He doesn’t think Defoe wrote novels (but for the insatiably curious (or those who want to know whom they should henceforth vilify), he wrote the afterword in the copy of Tom Jones I read.))).  The novel is divided into 18 books, and the first chapter in each book is an address from the Author to the Reader in which all sorts of asides and digressions and commentary are supplied.  So, in discussing Tom Jones, it is perfectly appropriate to begin with a digression having nothing to do with the actual substance of the story at hand.  Sadly, in order to truly be true to the spirit of Tom Jones, the digression at the outset must be both a) amusing and b) followed by an interesting tale.  The sadness arises from the fact that the digression here fulfills neither of those two characteristics.  But, I digress.

What would happen if you crossed David Copperfield with Tristram Shandy?  You would get Tom Jones, well expect that Tom Jones predates both of those other two books so you would have to add in some sort of time travel to make this all work out. 

I enjoyed reading Tom Jones. I can certainly see why professors specializing in 18th century novels are quite fond of it—compared to the other novels from that time period, this one is easily among the best.  But, the 18th century was not a good time period for novels.  How does to compare to Dickens?  Honestly, it isn’t that close.  Tom Jones has the scope of a Dickens novel, it has all the characters and odd coincidences of a Dickens novel.  But, it does not have quite the charm of Dickens.  Don’t get me wrong; there is charm here.  But, the difference is easily seen when thinking about the characters.  Dickens is littered with memorable charters.  Tom Jones?  Well, there is the perfect heroine Sophia; but she is only memorable from the worship bestowed upon her by the author (not by Tom, though he worships her too—she is memorable because the author keeps telling us how amazing the author thinks she is—she isn’t even memorable even in and of herself—it is really the heroine worship which is memorable.)  Mr. Western, Sophia’s father, is amusing.  But nobody else in the novel really rises to something interesting.  The story is good, the characters are nice, it is surely a Good Novel, and probably a Great Book.  But, it’s no Dickens.

Which leads to an interesting problem.  Is it a fault to not be Dickens?  Surely not.  And surely, we would never say that only Dickens should be read.  There are lots of great novels written by people who were not named Charles.  But, in this case, the connection is just too strong; Everything Fielding has done, Dickens has done better.  That doesn’t make Tom Jones a bad novel at all.  I would even recommend it if I wasn't immediately afflicted with the thought that really, instead of Tom Jones, you will probably enjoy one of Dickens’ novels more.



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