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Photo © Katherine Cox >> Classics Journal << My new blog for writing about Classic Literature, mainly because the ... -
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7 comments:
Apparently BBC is going to show it on Fridays. Can't wait to watch it! Btw the period costumes look gorgeous. Though not as exciting as Victorian costumes, of course =)
@Caroline: It looks like it will be a wonderful production! :) So many great actors as well as the director, I liked her work in Jane Eyre (2006).
I must wait a little longer, the US air date hasn't been announced yet but I'm guessing October/November.
So many interesting ideas--even in the first book. So: Sylvia & Love.
Her parents' marriage was not good. Mrs Satterthwaite admitted to being indifferent--a stylish young matron with servants need have little to do with a child; then little Sylvia was sent away to school. Her father was "a good man"--but we know nothing else about him. How long had he been dead?
Drake's first encounter with Sylvia was brutish; "date rape" was not in the language back then. Sylvia learned about passion, drama & pain from him. Her fear she might be pregnant led her to a quick seduction of Tietjens--& marriage. Knowledge of her deceit & her continual taunts that the child he loved might not be his did not inspire the drama she thought she needed. Her casual affairs didn't work, either--so she ran away with a stupid man, thinking to insult Tietjens. Then she realized she was stuck with a stupid brute.
Against Macmaster's advice--hoping to protect his son--Tietjens took her back. She barred him from her bedroom--probably expecting pleas; after all, she was The Beautiful Sylvia, Whom All Men Desired. Or perhaps she hoped he'd kick down the bedroom door. But he didn't play along. We'd been informed that Tietjens didn't like competing. Or maybe, to use another anachronism, he thought that no meant no...
So she tried to get his attention by destroying his reputation. And met his outrageous statements with stunned disbelief. At least he wasn't boring! Sylvia was bright but her education hadn't taught her how to think. (Valentine's idiosyncratic upbringing prepared her to answer him back; Mark thought she was made for his brother.)
Then The War interrupted Sylvia's wrongheaded campaign. When she saw him & Valentine at the soiree, she realized they were in love--but that they had never done a thing about it.
Love? That last day in London, we see Sylvia asking Tietjsns just how he'd been wounded. We hear her surprise that both his middle brothers had died. She wonders why, with his talents & connections, he'd done no better in his career. Mark sees them together & thinks she is sloppily in love with his brother. This possibility leads Chrissie to refuse a London job--better return to France than face Sylvia in Love. How well will she do? Tune in to the next novel.
HBO will probably show Parade's End in 2013--possibly as late as March. Amazon.UK will ship DVD's on October 1st--for those with all-region players....
I love Benedict Cumberbatch but not liking him so much as a blond, it really washes him out.
I hope the series will get people to read the book! I still haven't read FMF but The Good Soldier is on my Classics Club to-read list. Maybe I should add Parade's End as well. . . .
@no-bridget: You mention her fears of being pregnant? That brings a whole new level to her taunting, I thought it was a certainty? That Mrs. Satterthwaite knew, but now... I can't remember anything definite being said. That really is terrible. But of course although she realizes the pain it would give Tietjens she knows so little of real family affection that I suppose she doesn’t realize how wrong it is of her to cause that kind of anguish, just as she clearly doesn’t know how to express love. So that’s what Mark meant by her being ‘clumsily in love’ with Tietjens.-- not knowing how to express it.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on Sylvia. I was being rather hard on her in my post.
Oh dear, 2013? Well, my comfort until then will be the novels. :)Started No More Parade's this evening.
@Karen: He is a wonderful actor! So talented.
I'm pretty certain it will, I've already run across a few posts on twitter and tumblr about the books. For me, personally, that's how I heard about Parade's End and many of the Classics I've read and love-- through the adaptations. But I'm so glad in this case I'm reading the books first. :)
I'm so glad I put some Ford Maddox Ford on my Classic Club list :-)
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