Ohhh, Scriven - another really lovable character (and Jack giving him away as a gift... classic!)
My, what a case you´ve set up for understanding and liking Maturin - fans of him are usually quite impassioned about it, but seldom find so many valid grounds to substantiate it :) I *still* can´t stand the man (guess it´s his bitterness and self-hatred, his complex of inferiority with his "how sorry and defensive I feel for myself for my poverty and bastardy and ugliness, blah blah" whereas Jack is far healthier and devil-may-care about that or his own corpulence and disfiguring scars; it´s also those frequent sarcastic barbs at the casualties of his cold turkey fits - even those people he likes best, like Jack, Sophie and Diana), but you´ve raised several excellent points of behaviour that redeem him (his deep respect for Dil as a worthy human being - so true!). His emotions usually are found in the negative range, and are strongest when he´s most angered or suffering - not attractive! And even when he´s (infrequently) happy, it´s either despite himself (though there´s nothing in Catholicism about happiness being sinful) or else it´s tinted with that ever-present, underlying bitterness. There´s no innocence and no undiluted, spontaneous joy de vivre in him; his little twisted demons sneak him and spoil even the light moments (for instance when he´s singing "cleanse me, etc" in the chains in HMSS and letting the sea spray over him - the verses immediately after that (which he doesn´t get to sing, but it gave me chills anyway) say, "for in sin I was conceived". Always bittersweet, too knowing, freighted with hidden guilt or remorse. When Jack´s happy, it´s like the whole ship takes off the water :D ).
I still think Maturin calculated exactly how to hurt Canning worst - he *was* as good as making love to Canning´s mistress under Canning´s own roof and anyway, Canning´s relationship with Diana was a mutually consented arrangement between adults and none of Maturin´s business (if he so loved Diana, why didn´t he propose in PC already? But no, someone *else* has to own her for him to take a renewed interest in her: first Jack, then Canning, then someone else I´m not giving away because you haven´t read that far along yet ;) Jealousy and rivalry are his prime amorous motivators, not selfless love for Diana´s own sake, she´s just some trophy to wrestle from the alpha male du jour, and that´s another trait I dislike in Maturin).
Mi piace anche molto parlare di questi caratteri, nonché vorrebbe amazzare il Dottore perchè mi rompe le scatole :p
Aww, but! It's not fair to dislike someone for being unhappy! Sure, you can dislike someone for being negative or cynical or hateful, or for actively causing unhappiness in others, or for moaning and complaining to get sympathy. But Stephen doesn't do that. He's very private about his deepest emotions. We only get to see them because POB shows us his innermost thoughts and his private journal. But being depressed is just part of Stephen's nature, the poor dear! (Like me, sigh.) And you don't dislike Dillon or Diana for being unhappy! As you say, it's Stephen's little twisted demons sneaking in, but everyone has their demons, and they rarely get to choose them.
Yes, he does make sarcastic barbs sometimes, though I've only seen him do it in retaliation. Aww, he's sarcastic with Sophie? I haven't seen that yet. Don't tell me about it though. But Jack and Diana can be just as unkind, and Stephen only gives as good as he gets, in terms of hurt. But he's usually very good about keeping an even temper even when provoked. Aww, I was just reading about him being sick in bed, and someone drunk and obnoxious was singing an anti-Catholic song to him very loudly, and it was annoying him more than usual (since he was still feverish). But he didn't say anything to the man, and thought "He probably doesn't know that I'm Catholic." I thought that was rather generous in him.
(Now if that had been Dillon in the sick bed...! Heehee.)
Yes, Diana and Canning did have a mutual agreement, which is why she's blameworthy too. But she did say to Stephen that it was almost unbearable, and she sometimes thought of breaking with Canning, but that would leave her penniless and friendless in India, her reputation ruined, and who would ever help her or want her then? Stephen wrote in his diary that he liked Canning, in spite of being jealous, and I think he was always polite and civil until he realized how unhappy Diana was, and how little Canning seemed to care.
But it's not true that he needs jealousy and rivalry for his love for Diana! It's true that I think she's rather an odd choice for his passionate love (since I'm more like Sophie myself, and I like Sophie, and she's sweeter and kinder, so naturally I want him to love HER instead). But if he had wanted a trophy to wrestle from someone, he could have tried for Sophie. She was beautiful, rich, and hard-to-get, plus she liked him very much, and he could have rivalled Jack. At times he even did look at her and think that she was absolutely lovely BUT, he would remind himself that she was Jack's, not his. (Jack should have had the same courtesy regarding Stephen and Diana! But unlike the carefully observant Stephen, Jack willfully chooses not to see what he doesn't want to see.)(Not that we must bash Jack to redeem Stephen or vice-versa. Just saying that Stephen is no better or worse than Jack. Their vices and flaws are just different.)
And Stephen didn't propose right away because he was certain she would refuse him! A penniless nonentity (and an ugly Catholic bastard). Sophie would have been contented to marry Jack and be poor in a cottage, even when Jack refused to answer her letters (awwww, jaaaack!!!) but Diana had specifically told Stephen "Love in a cottage be damned!"
Ah, ora penso che capisca. Ho cercato la frase. Stephen ti irrita, semplicemente? Capisco. Ci sono caratteri popolari che non mi piacciano. Come Heathcliff di "Wuthering Heights..."
Amo Scriven! Mi piace che Stephen lo alimenta con un cucchiaio. Povero Scriven! E tanto impaurito!
LOL si, Maturin m´irrita *molto* (anche Heathcliff, he he - e Rochester. Perchè gli caratteri più "romantici" ci sono anche sbagliati nel amore, se ne trovano piacere di fare soffrire così i sui amici? o.O He was less penniless than Diana, and it was only when Jack made her his mistress, though he was even poorer than Maturin - no castles in Spain or near-royal connections there! - that Maturin began to sneak up on her and spy on Jack. Also he was dishonest towards his best friend; Jack went after Diana quite openly, and when he finally realised Maturin might have a problem with that, the first thing he did was confront Maturin about her, laid his cards on the table frankly and asked him to do the same... and what did Maturin do? Refuse, deny, shy away like a coward - would have spared the foursome a lot of pain if he´d been as direct and said, "Jack, I know you´ve been fooling around with her and that you don´t love her anymore than she loves you, but I´m crazy for her and want to marry her", then Jack would have broken with Diana and everybody´d be happy. Why, even Sophie and Diana had an open fight about Jack to decide who would have him, remember? ;) But then I guess Maturin´s just the sneaky tormented mean alter ego of the sneaky tormented mean author who had a big skeleton in his own honesty/loyalty/love closet and he just dumped his unfinished business of guilt on the Doc :p
You´re so right that Sophie would have been better for Maturin than Diana in every way (he´s happiest when he´s with her, and tells her more and lets her get closer to him than he ever lets Jack). And Diana would be ideally matched with Jack. Diana has the commom sense to flee from Maturin for nearly ten years, at least, because she knows he´s bad medicine. It´s not just the money, but she doesn´t really see him as a soulmate, and he knows that too - yet insists on making himself even more miserable by pursuing her even after he fully realises he no longer loves her or desires her... that´s what I meant by my disliking of his being "unhappy", he´s hellbent on being as unhappy as he can, sorry that I couldn´t put it clearly. He´s such a "bottle´s half empty, and what´s there ain´t mine anywhere, and if it is then it´s sure poison, boohoo" type of fellow (very un-Spanish, in that!)
I don´t know how to explain it... but I have the feeling wherever he goes, he is the unwitting cause of unhappiness and dicord.
But Jack wasn't open about pursuing Diana. He would leave the cottage on some pretext, and then Stephen would arrive at Diana's house and see his own horse that Jack had taken to go visit her.
And yes, it would have spared the foursome a lot of pain if Stephen had been direct with Jack, but it would have spared them a lot of pain if JACK had been direct with Stephen, and with Sophie and Diana and himself. Jack obstinately refused to think rationally about the relationships, thinking that logic should only be involved in a mercenary marriage. He refused to order his thoughts about "Do I prefer Diana or Sophie?" because it was just too confusing, so he pursued both at once. And he likewise chose not to believe that Stephen was really interested in Diana. He would look at Stephen and think to himself, "No, he doesn't love Diana. I thought he did, but no, maybe not, probably not..." Stephen could have been direct and TOLD Jack, but Jack also could have asked Stephen.
And then Diana and Sophie wouldn't have had to fight over Jack!
And then when the sailors and even officers were making lewd comments about Jack and Diana, and Stephen mentioned it to Jack, Jack was the one who exploded with "any bastard can cowardly evade the issue by a flood of words." Jack was already getting angry and defensive when Stephen warned him not to go to Dover (because of creditors, because of naval gossip), even before Diana was even mentioned.
Sigh, as much as I love Jack, I couldn't quite forgive him for the way he acted with Diana, Sophie and Stephen. Poor Sophie!! If I had been Sophie, I think I would have finally convinced myself that Jack indeed didn't care about me, and I would have married the pleasant dull vicar. Or Stephen if he asked me.
But aieeee, quit giving me spoilers! I feeeeear them so terribly! I mean about Diana and Stephen. And stop being so meeeeean to Stephen! :O He is not a sneaky tormented mean man! If he were, why would people like Sophie, Jack, Bonden, Pullings, Sir Joseph, etc. all love him?
Heathcliff, on the other hand - nobody loves him except Cathy. I like Mr. Rochester, though. Heathcliff is just evil! But Stephen is nicer, much kinder, than Mr. Rochester. Rochester is rather manipulative.
Non puo scrivere in italiano oggi. Sono quasi morte, umm, nella testa. Nel cervello.
Il tuo favorito e Mowett? Non ho scrivato molto di Mowett. Ritornera' presto?
Si, Mowett ritornerà, ma non fera gran cosa ormai :(
I´m sorry about the spoilers! You have such insights about Jack and Maturin, I thought you had at least leafed through the later books and so knew a lot of what was going to happen *whacks self*
Umm yes, Jack wasn´t honest with Sophie *shuffles* But then, Sophie knew well Diana had ensnared Jack, and questioned her about it, so she did know she had a serious rival in her, and if she played ladylike innocent and ignorant she, too, was pretending very hard nothing was amiss, and that it was just Jack´s poverty and lack of prospects which kept him from courting her openly.
There´s so much hypocrisy in Post Captain, in every single character, it´s a fantastic book because each in the foursome is so ambiguous and realistically "fallible", so human you can sympathize with each of them (ok, well, almost) and their reasons for cheating on everybody else. Talk about a ménage à quatre...
But enough of this Stephen talk. Unless you particularly want to carry on? I don't think we will ever agree!
But apart from your being one of the rare species of Greater European Maturin Hater discovered in Madrid, I know very little about you! Do you work? Do you live with family, friends, alone? I'm 28, live alone with two cats, and I work as a paper conservator, una restauratrice dell'arte sulla carta. Hmm, I should just look at your LJ interests!
Do you like Ralph Fiennes movies? I ask because I love his movies, but I've also noticed that many of them are sad love stories. He often plays depressed intelligent men who are unhappy in love. I seem to be attracted to those characters! I want to comfort them! Ralph Fiennes actually played Heathcliff, and that made the character more bearable. ;D But I still dislike Heathcliff. RF just made me feel a little more sympathetic. But RF's characters aren't nearly as kind and content as Stephen.
What about Mr. Darcy in "Pride and Prejudice"? He's brooding. I don't LOVE him like many people do, but I like him. It took me a while to like him, though.
Hello again, Grace, I lost track of this discussion - I´m sorry, thanks for reviving it!
I *still* think Jack was way more obvious, sincere and direct in his interaction with Diana than Maturin was (he DID have the chance to propose in the carriage scene, remember? And he did guess it was the right moment to propose. But he missed the chance, and Diana, seeing no outspoken interest and a lot of self-conflict instead, chose to have fun with Jack instead.) So obvious were the hints Jack went about dropping that the whole Admiralty and his friends knew about it, and even that master at reality denial that is Maturin knew they were already lovers, whereas Maturin never even hinted to Jack (or Sophie) he was interested in Diana, to marry her or to... er, otherwise.
Hey hey, what a great coincidence, my best friend in Spain is also a paper conservator/restaurator!! she studied in Firenze and worked for the Laurentiana and other famous archives (mainly the Santiago de Compostela cathedral) Yes, I work in Vienna for an international disarmament/peacekeeping organisation (which I dearly love, he he, I think I posted elsewhere my job description should be "glorified parrot and punching bag" :p), live in a house I built in the countryside in Hungary, I´m also a professional painter and writer too - live with my family, and am owned by a retriever. My home is regularly invaded claimed as theirs by friends from all over the world :p
Alas, I´ve seen little of Ralph Fiennes but he´s eerily fabulous (his Almássy was rather very close to truth, says Gran who knew him). Ohh, spot on about Heathcliff, I began to grok the character and sympathize with him only after I´d seen him play it so ambiguously - and wasn´t Ralph Fiennes the totally scaring climber-murderer in "Killing Me Softly", too? Also - don´t hurt me - I found his psychopath Goeth downright moving and tragic, not just boo-scary. Very few could pulled that off and he probably did that feat going even against Spielberg´s grain. I should love Fiennes to play Caligula some day. I didn´t know he´d played Darcy, too. I still like Olivier´s love-to-hate-him version best, he he, though Colin Firth is marvellous. I liked Darcy from the first glimpse we get of him; he´s my third literary love after Prince Bolkonsky and Sydney Carton (and how similar those three are at heart... self-scrutinising with zero tolerance, but so lovable and easy to relate to!).
(I´m not owning to a total infatuation with Austen and Brontë broody ooky cooky spooky characters. SO very not *g*)
Maturin is content at some point in the books? o.O Now I´m really curious how PO´B manages to do that about-turn for him convincingly. Must read faster!
Ooooh, your best friend in Spain is a conservator too??? Where does she work? That is quite a coincidence! Was she in Florence after the flood in the 60s? So many conservators had the start of their career there, including my boss. I wish I had been alive then. It must have been so exciting.
No, I didn't mean Ralph Fiennes played Darcy, but I was just mentioning other brooding characters. Who is Prince Bolkonsky? And yes, I love Sydney Carton too. *tsk* I just can't believe you don't love poor noble-hearted Stephen!
And I won't hurt you at all. Amon Goeth was amazing in "Schindler's List"! He was... human! Except a very frightening human. But he wasn't a monster. He was a man! And a man tormented in his mind, too (for instance, by his lust for the Jewish girl...) Poor Ralph Fiennes always seems to fall in love with the wrong woman, the one he can't have. (Ahem like STEPHEN.) You must see "Onegin," too!
Gran, meaning your grandmother? She knew Almasy? Wow! And Ralph Fiennes was like him? How interesting!! Did she know Almasy well?
Aww, I read about him in his Nazi costume meeting a lady who had been in Goeth's concentration camp, and while he was talking excitedly and happily about what a privilege it was to meet her, she was trembling with terror because he was so much like the real man! (And he didn't even seem to notice because he was just so excited.)
Speaking of Olivier, have you seen "Rebecca"? I love that film. I love Hitchcock, too.
She lives and works in A Coruña (province of Galicia), and she spent some years in Florence around the mid-nineties, IIRC :) Alas, well after the flood *blushes in shame at ignorance and goes a-googling* why, was it so devastating?
Oh my, who is Prince Bolkonsky? Drop everything you´re reading and start "War And Peace". If Prince Andrei Bolkonsky doesn´t break your heart by page six (and then again, repeatedly, in about almost every scene he´s in), then I´ll eat my fangs. If you like brooding, insightful noble, intriguing, doomed, nearly otherwordly characters he´ll be irresistible (just remember I saw him first :p)
Haven´t seen Onegin, if it the movie which you´re referring to... just seeing the opera in St Pete and then walking down the same strees and bridges was such a shattering emo experience; although, if the movie was filmed *there*, I´ll just have to see it.
Yes, Grandmother knew him and his family from meeting socially so often (when he wasn´t abroad fleeing from cuckolded husbands, that is :p), and she said Fiennes´ way of playing him was about the only bearable thing about that movie.
He actually was so much like Goeth? *is getting seriously freaked out now*
I LOVE Rebecca the movie and the book! Can´t say the same about the musical, though... maybe it´s the crappy non-music (the kind of elevator music without even a catchy tune to it), although the visuals are stunning. It´s an original Vienna production which opened just two months ago in the Raimundtheater, Uwe Kroger plays Max and Susan Rivava-Dumas is fantastic as Mrs Danvers.
"Rebecca" is a musical??? How bizarre!! But then... do you like "Turn of the Screw," the Henry James novella? There's a Britten opera of it, and I like it quite a lot. (It's not one of his best operas, but I still like it. It does manage to capture some of the terrifying ambiguity of the story. Britten is good at ambiguity.) So if they can make an opera of "Turn of the Screw," I suppose they can make a musical of "Rebecca." And I adore the Daphne du Maurier book too!
Hee, and most of the music I love best has no tune to it, so maybe I'd like this musical of which you speak. I can't remember, have you heard "Billy Budd"? Hmm, probably not, because I think only weeboopiper and esteven have.
Wow, so did your Grandmother like Almasy? Was he handsome and suave and brooding and remarkably intelligent?
I ADORE The Turn Of The Screw, both the James novella and the opera by Britten!! It was filmed by the BBC, I think, can´t remember the singers but it was a very naturalistic approach, and the governess´ dress, which as snow-white at the beginning, developed a kind of growing, creeping black ivy lace border that gradually took over her whole dress and at the end it was black, and she looked indeed like death. Very lovely and scary fairytale!
Of course I know Billy Budd. My stepdad sang Vere once, many years ago. Every time they play it in Vienna I try to go see it, it´s *such* a good production.
According to Gran, he was short, awkward, unpredictable and very sarcastic, but he seemed to have that je ne sais quoi which drew women to him (or rather, made other men believe he was a chick magnet and thus made them jealous!) And he seems to have been intelligent enough to hide his smarts in society...
My, what a case you´ve set up for understanding and liking Maturin - fans of him are usually quite impassioned about it, but seldom find so many valid grounds to substantiate it :) I *still* can´t stand the man (guess it´s his bitterness and self-hatred, his complex of inferiority with his "how sorry and defensive I feel for myself for my poverty and bastardy and ugliness, blah blah" whereas Jack is far healthier and devil-may-care about that or his own corpulence and disfiguring scars; it´s also those frequent sarcastic barbs at the casualties of his cold turkey fits - even those people he likes best, like Jack, Sophie and Diana), but you´ve raised several excellent points of behaviour that redeem him (his deep respect for Dil as a worthy human being - so true!). His emotions usually are found in the negative range, and are strongest when he´s most angered or suffering - not attractive! And even when he´s (infrequently) happy, it´s either despite himself (though there´s nothing in Catholicism about happiness being sinful) or else it´s tinted with that ever-present, underlying bitterness. There´s no innocence and no undiluted, spontaneous joy de vivre in him; his little twisted demons sneak him and spoil even the light moments (for instance when he´s singing "cleanse me, etc" in the chains in HMSS and letting the sea spray over him - the verses immediately after that (which he doesn´t get to sing, but it gave me chills anyway) say, "for in sin I was conceived". Always bittersweet, too knowing, freighted with hidden guilt or remorse. When Jack´s happy, it´s like the whole ship takes off the water :D ).
I still think Maturin calculated exactly how to hurt Canning worst - he *was* as good as making love to Canning´s mistress under Canning´s own roof and anyway, Canning´s relationship with Diana was a mutually consented arrangement between adults and none of Maturin´s business (if he so loved Diana, why didn´t he propose in PC already? But no, someone *else* has to own her for him to take a renewed interest in her: first Jack, then Canning, then someone else I´m not giving away because you haven´t read that far along yet ;) Jealousy and rivalry are his prime amorous motivators, not selfless love for Diana´s own sake, she´s just some trophy to wrestle from the alpha male du jour, and that´s another trait I dislike in Maturin).
Mi piace anche molto parlare di questi caratteri, nonché vorrebbe amazzare il Dottore perchè mi rompe le scatole :p
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Yes, he does make sarcastic barbs sometimes, though I've only seen him do it in retaliation. Aww, he's sarcastic with Sophie? I haven't seen that yet. Don't tell me about it though. But Jack and Diana can be just as unkind, and Stephen only gives as good as he gets, in terms of hurt. But he's usually very good about keeping an even temper even when provoked. Aww, I was just reading about him being sick in bed, and someone drunk and obnoxious was singing an anti-Catholic song to him very loudly, and it was annoying him more than usual (since he was still feverish). But he didn't say anything to the man, and thought "He probably doesn't know that I'm Catholic." I thought that was rather generous in him.
(Now if that had been Dillon in the sick bed...! Heehee.)
Yes, Diana and Canning did have a mutual agreement, which is why she's blameworthy too. But she did say to Stephen that it was almost unbearable, and she sometimes thought of breaking with Canning, but that would leave her penniless and friendless in India, her reputation ruined, and who would ever help her or want her then? Stephen wrote in his diary that he liked Canning, in spite of being jealous, and I think he was always polite and civil until he realized how unhappy Diana was, and how little Canning seemed to care.
But it's not true that he needs jealousy and rivalry for his love for Diana! It's true that I think she's rather an odd choice for his passionate love (since I'm more like Sophie myself, and I like Sophie, and she's sweeter and kinder, so naturally I want him to love HER instead). But if he had wanted a trophy to wrestle from someone, he could have tried for Sophie. She was beautiful, rich, and hard-to-get, plus she liked him very much, and he could have rivalled Jack. At times he even did look at her and think that she was absolutely lovely BUT, he would remind himself that she was Jack's, not his. (Jack should have had the same courtesy regarding Stephen and Diana! But unlike the carefully observant Stephen, Jack willfully chooses not to see what he doesn't want to see.)(Not that we must bash Jack to redeem Stephen or vice-versa. Just saying that Stephen is no better or worse than Jack. Their vices and flaws are just different.)
And Stephen didn't propose right away because he was certain she would refuse him! A penniless nonentity (and an ugly Catholic bastard). Sophie would have been contented to marry Jack and be poor in a cottage, even when Jack refused to answer her letters (awwww, jaaaack!!!) but Diana had specifically told Stephen "Love in a cottage be damned!"
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Amo Scriven! Mi piace che Stephen lo alimenta con un cucchiaio. Povero Scriven! E tanto impaurito!
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You´re so right that Sophie would have been better for Maturin than Diana in every way (he´s happiest when he´s with her, and tells her more and lets her get closer to him than he ever lets Jack). And Diana would be ideally matched with Jack. Diana has the commom sense to flee from Maturin for nearly ten years, at least, because she knows he´s bad medicine. It´s not just the money, but she doesn´t really see him as a soulmate, and he knows that too - yet insists on making himself even more miserable by pursuing her even after he fully realises he no longer loves her or desires her... that´s what I meant by my disliking of his being "unhappy", he´s hellbent on being as unhappy as he can, sorry that I couldn´t put it clearly. He´s such a "bottle´s half empty, and what´s there ain´t mine anywhere, and if it is then it´s sure poison, boohoo" type of fellow (very un-Spanish, in that!)
I don´t know how to explain it... but I have the feeling wherever he goes, he is the unwitting cause of unhappiness and dicord.
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And yes, it would have spared the foursome a lot of pain if Stephen had been direct with Jack, but it would have spared them a lot of pain if JACK had been direct with Stephen, and with Sophie and Diana and himself. Jack obstinately refused to think rationally about the relationships, thinking that logic should only be involved in a mercenary marriage. He refused to order his thoughts about "Do I prefer Diana or Sophie?" because it was just too confusing, so he pursued both at once. And he likewise chose not to believe that Stephen was really interested in Diana. He would look at Stephen and think to himself, "No, he doesn't love Diana. I thought he did, but no, maybe not, probably not..." Stephen could have been direct and TOLD Jack, but Jack also could have asked Stephen.
And then Diana and Sophie wouldn't have had to fight over Jack!
And then when the sailors and even officers were making lewd comments about Jack and Diana, and Stephen mentioned it to Jack, Jack was the one who exploded with "any bastard can cowardly evade the issue by a flood of words." Jack was already getting angry and defensive when Stephen warned him not to go to Dover (because of creditors, because of naval gossip), even before Diana was even mentioned.
Sigh, as much as I love Jack, I couldn't quite forgive him for the way he acted with Diana, Sophie and Stephen. Poor Sophie!! If I had been Sophie, I think I would have finally convinced myself that Jack indeed didn't care about me, and I would have married the pleasant dull vicar. Or Stephen if he asked me.
But aieeee, quit giving me spoilers! I feeeeear them so terribly! I mean about Diana and Stephen. And stop being so meeeeean to Stephen! :O He is not a sneaky tormented mean man! If he were, why would people like Sophie, Jack, Bonden, Pullings, Sir Joseph, etc. all love him?
Heathcliff, on the other hand - nobody loves him except Cathy. I like Mr. Rochester, though. Heathcliff is just evil! But Stephen is nicer, much kinder, than Mr. Rochester. Rochester is rather manipulative.
Non puo scrivere in italiano oggi. Sono quasi morte, umm, nella testa. Nel cervello.
Il tuo favorito e Mowett? Non ho scrivato molto di Mowett. Ritornera' presto?
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I´m sorry about the spoilers! You have such insights about Jack and Maturin, I thought you had at least leafed through the later books and so knew a lot of what was going to happen *whacks self*
Umm yes, Jack wasn´t honest with Sophie *shuffles* But then, Sophie knew well Diana had ensnared Jack, and questioned her about it, so she did know she had a serious rival in her, and if she played ladylike innocent and ignorant she, too, was pretending very hard nothing was amiss, and that it was just Jack´s poverty and lack of prospects which kept him from courting her openly.
There´s so much hypocrisy in Post Captain, in every single character, it´s a fantastic book because each in the foursome is so ambiguous and realistically "fallible", so human you can sympathize with each of them (ok, well, almost) and their reasons for cheating on everybody else. Talk about a ménage à quatre...
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But apart from your being one of the rare species of Greater European Maturin Hater discovered in Madrid, I know very little about you! Do you work? Do you live with family, friends, alone? I'm 28, live alone with two cats, and I work as a paper conservator, una restauratrice dell'arte sulla carta. Hmm, I should just look at your LJ interests!
Do you like Ralph Fiennes movies? I ask because I love his movies, but I've also noticed that many of them are sad love stories. He often plays depressed intelligent men who are unhappy in love. I seem to be attracted to those characters! I want to comfort them! Ralph Fiennes actually played Heathcliff, and that made the character more bearable. ;D But I still dislike Heathcliff. RF just made me feel a little more sympathetic. But RF's characters aren't nearly as kind and content as Stephen.
What about Mr. Darcy in "Pride and Prejudice"? He's brooding. I don't LOVE him like many people do, but I like him. It took me a while to like him, though.
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I *still* think Jack was way more obvious, sincere and direct in his interaction with Diana than Maturin was (he DID have the chance to propose in the carriage scene, remember? And he did guess it was the right moment to propose. But he missed the chance, and Diana, seeing no outspoken interest and a lot of self-conflict instead, chose to have fun with Jack instead.) So obvious were the hints Jack went about dropping that the whole Admiralty and his friends knew about it, and even that master at reality denial that is Maturin knew they were already lovers, whereas Maturin never even hinted to Jack (or Sophie) he was interested in Diana, to marry her or to... er, otherwise.
Hey hey, what a great coincidence, my best friend in Spain is also a paper conservator/restaurator!! she studied in Firenze and worked for the Laurentiana and other famous archives (mainly the Santiago de Compostela cathedral) Yes, I work in Vienna for an international disarmament/peacekeeping organisation (which I dearly love, he he, I think I posted elsewhere my job description should be "glorified parrot and punching bag" :p), live in a house I built in the countryside in Hungary, I´m also a professional painter and writer too - live with my family, and am owned by a retriever. My home is regularly invaded claimed as theirs by friends from all over the world :p
Alas, I´ve seen little of Ralph Fiennes but he´s eerily fabulous (his Almássy was rather very close to truth, says Gran who knew him). Ohh, spot on about Heathcliff, I began to grok the character and sympathize with him only after I´d seen him play it so ambiguously - and wasn´t Ralph Fiennes the totally scaring climber-murderer in "Killing Me Softly", too? Also - don´t hurt me - I found his psychopath Goeth downright moving and tragic, not just boo-scary. Very few could pulled that off and he probably did that feat going even against Spielberg´s grain. I should love Fiennes to play Caligula some day. I didn´t know he´d played Darcy, too. I still like Olivier´s love-to-hate-him version best, he he, though Colin Firth is marvellous. I liked Darcy from the first glimpse we get of him; he´s my third literary love after Prince Bolkonsky and Sydney Carton (and how similar those three are at heart... self-scrutinising with zero tolerance, but so lovable and easy to relate to!).
(I´m not owning to a total infatuation with Austen and Brontë broody ooky cooky spooky characters. SO very not *g*)
Maturin is content at some point in the books? o.O Now I´m really curious how PO´B manages to do that about-turn for him convincingly. Must read faster!
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No, I didn't mean Ralph Fiennes played Darcy, but I was just mentioning other brooding characters. Who is Prince Bolkonsky? And yes, I love Sydney Carton too. *tsk* I just can't believe you don't love poor noble-hearted Stephen!
And I won't hurt you at all. Amon Goeth was amazing in "Schindler's List"! He was... human! Except a very frightening human. But he wasn't a monster. He was a man! And a man tormented in his mind, too (for instance, by his lust for the Jewish girl...) Poor Ralph Fiennes always seems to fall in love with the wrong woman, the one he can't have. (Ahem like STEPHEN.) You must see "Onegin," too!
Gran, meaning your grandmother? She knew Almasy? Wow! And Ralph Fiennes was like him? How interesting!! Did she know Almasy well?
Aww, I read about him in his Nazi costume meeting a lady who had been in Goeth's concentration camp, and while he was talking excitedly and happily about what a privilege it was to meet her, she was trembling with terror because he was so much like the real man! (And he didn't even seem to notice because he was just so excited.)
Speaking of Olivier, have you seen "Rebecca"? I love that film. I love Hitchcock, too.
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Oh my, who is Prince Bolkonsky? Drop everything you´re reading and start "War And Peace". If Prince Andrei Bolkonsky doesn´t break your heart by page six (and then again, repeatedly, in about almost every scene he´s in), then I´ll eat my fangs. If you like brooding, insightful noble, intriguing, doomed, nearly otherwordly characters he´ll be irresistible (just remember I saw him first :p)
Haven´t seen Onegin, if it the movie which you´re referring to... just seeing the opera in St Pete and then walking down the same strees and bridges was such a shattering emo experience; although, if the movie was filmed *there*, I´ll just have to see it.
Yes, Grandmother knew him and his family from meeting socially so often (when he wasn´t abroad fleeing from cuckolded husbands, that is :p), and she said Fiennes´ way of playing him was about the only bearable thing about that movie.
He actually was so much like Goeth? *is getting seriously freaked out now*
I LOVE Rebecca the movie and the book! Can´t say the same about the musical, though... maybe it´s the crappy non-music (the kind of elevator music without even a catchy tune to it), although the visuals are stunning. It´s an original Vienna production which opened just two months ago in the Raimundtheater, Uwe Kroger plays Max and Susan Rivava-Dumas is fantastic as Mrs Danvers.
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Hee, and most of the music I love best has no tune to it, so maybe I'd like this musical of which you speak. I can't remember, have you heard "Billy Budd"? Hmm, probably not, because I think only weeboopiper and esteven have.
Wow, so did your Grandmother like Almasy? Was he handsome and suave and brooding and remarkably intelligent?
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Of course I know Billy Budd. My stepdad sang Vere once, many years ago. Every time they play it in Vienna I try to go see it, it´s *such* a good production.
According to Gran, he was short, awkward, unpredictable and very sarcastic, but he seemed to have that je ne sais quoi which drew women to him (or rather, made other men believe he was a chick magnet and thus made them jealous!) And he seems to have been intelligent enough to hide his smarts in society...
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Wow, Almasy sounds like quite a character. Haha, that description (minus the chick magnet) sounds like Stephen!
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