Macbeth

Macbeth is a play written by Shakespeare in 1605-1606. So that's before the other tragedies. It's pretty awesome. You know what's great about Shakespeare? It's that he wrote in this beautiful language but didn't get boring or pompous because of it. I mean, take Milton. Sure, I love Milton, but I find it a lot easier to enjoy Shakespeare as entertainment in addition to intellectual stimulation. So Macbeth is full of action and drama. Lots of psychological stuff, lots of interesting, interesting stuff. Fun stuff. Let's go! Macbeth.

So plot. Umm. K it's in Scotland and Macbeth is the Thane of Glamis, which is a high title, like Duke. He was a hero in a recent war and you see that the King Duncan likes him and respects him, as he's a good ol' likeable, respectable, cool tough soldier guy. When you first see Macbeth, he's with Banquo, his best friend, and they run into the three witches, and they say that Macbeth will be Thane of Cawdor, that he'll be king, and that Banquos won't be king but his descendents will be. They're both pretty spooked and grow more so when they find out that Duncan actually assigned him thane of Cawdor. So Macbeth pretty quickly starts contemplating killing Duncan, and tells his wife, Lady Macbeth, about the witches. She's a pretty ferocious person and pushes good-but-tempted Macbeth to go through with the patricide. Banquo grows suspicious and when Duncan comes to Macbeth's house, and he falls asleep, Macbeth kills him and Lady Macbeth frames it on two guards by getting them drunk asleep and putting bloody knives in their hands. Macbeth feels super guilty but Lady Macbeth keeps him clean and they buy it, but Macbeth ends up killing the two guards when they awake. He becomes king and Banquo, super-suspicious, goes into the woods with his kid, Fleance. Macbeth sends three murderers to kill them, but Fleance escapes. At the supper for Banquo later on, Macbeth sees Banquo's ghost and gets very paranoid. Meanwhile, Malcolm and Donalbain, Duncan's sons, had fled to England and Ireland after Duncan's death, since they didn't want to seem like usurpers, and so everyone, naturally, believes that they killed Duncan. Then there's a random supposedly-added scene with Hecate, goddess of withes, saying they've got a plan. Then from messengers, you find out that Macbeth sent Macduff to find Malcolm, whom King Edward, the very good and just king of England, likes and is housing. Edward is prepared to help Malcolm in a war to dethrone the now tyrannous Macbeth. The witches then show up again, as Macbeth seeks them out. They tell him that he doesn't have anything to fear until the Great Birnam woods meet the high Dunsinan hill, and no one born of a woman can hurt him. They also show him that Banquo's descendents will still be king, which annoys him. Macbeth at this point decides that Macduff is not a threat, since everyone is born of a woman, but decides to kill him and his family anyways, sending murders. Macduffs wife and kids are murdered. That's the last of Macbeth you see for a while, as you focus on other people. Malcolm explains that he'd make a terrible king since he's a bad person, and Macduff finds out about his family and they prepare for war. Then you find out that Lady Macbeth has been having sleepwalking nightmares about what she and Macbeth have done, and seems very remorseful, I think. The English are marching now, and Macbeth's still not that fussed because of the forest thing. He hears a woman cry and ignores it but then fins out that it was Lady Macbeth committing suicide. Right after that, he's told that the Birnam woods are moving. He gets armed and goes out to fight, fearless of anyone born of a woman. He kills young Siwar, the kid of an English war-head-guy and then is killed by Macduff who was cut out of his mother through C section, so wasn't born. An iffy explanation, I think. Macduff carries his head out and everyone hails the king sarcastically.

Alright. This is my second shakespeare blog. Other was King Lear. Then I just decided to do one speech by Lear. I think I'll just do that again. Or hm.........Lady Macbeth.

Alright I have a plan. I'm going to very very relatively briefly sketch out the character, as characters are the most important aspect of a book, of Lady Macbeth concerning guilt in comparison to Macbeth. I know it seems like a huge topic, and it definitely is, but briefly sketch! I have so many quotations for Macbeth that this may just be more of a quotation blog with groups and one-sentence connectors. Let's see how it goes.

So my friends had been pushing me to read this for a while and they all described Lady Macbeth as a terrible person, which led me to assume that Macbeth was better. I don't really agree. Sure Macbeth's early speeches, the one about killing her baby and the unsex me speech make her seem super scary, and sure Macbeth probably wouldn't have gone through with murder if it weren't for her, and sure she kept her head beer than him, but I guess I have a way of seeing how things turn out rather than start, and in that sense, Lady Macbeth seems more remorseful, and Macbeth more brutal.

This is their attitudes at the beginning.

Macbeth: Stars hide your fires!
Let not light see my black and deep desires:
The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be
Which the eye fears , when it is done, to see. (I, iv)

So there Macbeth is trying to look away from his act because he is disgusted by it. He wants Duncan dead but he doesn't want to kill.

Macbeth: Is this a dagger I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? (II,i)

Macbeth starts hallucinating a bit too here, haunted by the idea of killing. He's really scared. On the other side...

Lady Macbeth: Give me the daggers: the sleeping and the dead
Are but as pictures: 'tis the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. (II,ii)

Lady M's not scared at all. She thinks the lifeless are harmless, and the physical connects directly to the psychological. However, they end up switching. Macbeth, after the first kill, gets rather paranoid and has Banquo killed, Macduff's family, and a bunch of other people, until he is desensitised towards it.

Macbeth: Who wear our health but sickly in his life,
Which in his death were perfect. (III,i)

He says this of Banquo. That he can't rest until Banquo is dead. Now B was his best friend and he moral anchor of the play, so it's rather terrible killing him. M, in seeing B's ghost after he murder, is haunted and still shaky, but as the massacre continues, his opinion on death becomes less and less, as seen in the Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow speech. Life becomes worthless to him. This called to my mind the bit about the murderers Macbeth hires to kill Banquo.

Murderer 2:I am one, my liege,
Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world
Have so incensed that I am reckless what
I do to spite the world.

Murderer 1:And I another
So weary with disasters, tugged with fortune,
That I would set my life on any chance,
To mend it or be rid on ’t.

M becomes like them. He too is so thrown about that he becomes cruel to the world, and careless towards his own well-being. Strange huh. It's a bit like the Hamlet killing Polonius carelessly. Or Romeo killing Paris, which is often excluded in interpretations of the play because it paints Romeo as too much a killer. Macbeth becomes a killer. Hence the tragedy. However, instead, LM becomes less cruel but very remorseful.

Lady Macbeth: Naught’s had, all’s spent,
Where our desire is got without content.
'Tis safer to be that which we destroy
Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy. (III,ii)

Here she says she tried all but in the end, all spent, is still unhappy. Thus it really is better to be the dead than the so discontented killer. She'd take it back. This haunts her dreams and she is seen as always waning to clean herself, particularly her dirty, bloody hands.

Lady Macbeth: Out, damned spot! out, I say! (V,i)

Lady Macbeth: What, will these hands ne'er be clean? (V,i)

This idea of washing your hands clean is very classical, isn't it? You have Pontius Pilate, for one, after condemning Jesus to crucifiction, asking for water to wash his hands of it. Then it also is seen in Hamlet, of course, with the Queen saying 'Thou turn’st mine eyes into my very soul,/And there I see such black and grainèd spots/As will not leave their tinct.' to Hamlet. She's dirtied. And you have others, like Blanche in The Streetcar Named Desire, who is constantly bathing so as to cleanse herself after her vivacious past. So this obsession is very useful since it carries so much already, and you see people using this over and over.

Interesting thing here is, remember how I said that LM separates physical from mental? Well, here they're reversing, aren't they? She is mentally affected, and connects it to physical, as opposed to finding physical effects to be translatable to mental. Right?

So Macbeth obsesses over cleansing near the beginning too, and they switch.

Macbeth: Whence is that knocking?
How is't with me, when every noise appals me?
What hands are here? ha! they pluck out mine eyes!
With all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
clean from me hand? No; this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine,
Making the green - one red. (II,ii)

So he's jumpy, and, unlike LM, instead of trying to cleanse himself, he rather quickly assumes that he'll never be clean again. He expresses the idea of hiding things too, early on, like...

Macbeth: False face must hide what the false heart doth know. (I,vii)

So there's the connection of how bloody hands and a bloody conscience is not only harmful for you personally and your self-respect, but for your image, and he separates here the physical and mental, thinking of at least preserving the physical.

In the beginning, LM is convinced, however, that it could wash off easily:

Lady Macbeth: Go get some water,
And wash this filthy witness from your hand.(II,ii)

But then there, she's talking of actual blood on Macbeth's actual hands. Her hands are also physically red, but she m=mentally is only later afflicted:

Lady Macbeth: My hands are of your colour; but I shame
To wear a heart so white. (II,ii)

She is not capable of feeling remorse at that point. She instead takes on her physical bloodiness as something that was necessary and so not worth fussing over:

Lady Macbeth: Things without all remedy
Should be without regard: what's done, is done. (III,ii)

This seems somewhat healthy in context, killing Duncan, but later on, she says something similar.

Lady Macbeth: what's done, cannot be undone: to bed, to bed, to bed. (V,i)

This again is about killing Duncan, but also, about killing all those other people, and contributing greatly towards making a tyrant out of Macbeth. Then she wishes for undoing, can't, but can't live with it either. Hence suicide. Now Macbeth's idea of suicide is a bit different.

Macbeth: Why should I play the Roman fool and die
On mine own sword? Whiles I see lives, the gashes
Do better upon them.

He thinks it's ridiculous to kill yourself, when you could still kill others, which is infinite;y more noble and productive and meaningful, according to him, because he'll die with his harness on, as he argues. But that just shows again the gruesomeness of his adopted logic. Now, he does not imagine daggers, because he has a dagger, and his hands are ever bloody bu he worries not of them. Instead, people say for him:

Angus: Now does he feel
His secret murders sticking on his hands (V,ii)

There Shakespeare likens Macbeth's situation to LM's, both with bloody, dirty hands. The difference is though, that only one is trying still to cleanse themselves. Macbeth seems no longer to understand the grasp of remorse and the foreverness of remorse as he had known. Instead, he asks the doctor to help LM in her nightmares, expecting a solution where once he may have known there wouldn't be one.

Macbeth: Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
Raze out the written troubles of the brain
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart? (V,iii)

So conscious reverses and I feel sorry for LM. If it had ended with LM still cruel an M still remorseful, it wouldn't be a very fun play, but I'd sympathise for M as opposed to LM. Instead, as it is, I always support the remorseful. That was a weird way of blogging. Alright there. Here are a ridiculous amount of quotations.

Read, folks, read.

Witches: Fair is foul, and foul is fair:
Hover through the fog and filthy air. (I,i)

Macbeth: So foul and fair a day I have not seen, (I,iii)

Macbeth: Come what come may,
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day. (I,iii)

Macbeth: Prithee, peace:
I dare do all that may become a man;
Who dares do more, is none. (I,vii)

Macbeth: Whiles I threat, he lives:
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives. (II,i)

Lady Macbeth: A little water cleans us of this deed (II,ii)

Macbeth: To know my deed 'twere best not know myself.
Wake Duncan with thy knocking! I would thou couldst! (II,ii)

Macbeth: Had I but died an hour before this chance,
I had lived a blessed time; for, from this instant,
There 's nothing serious in mortality:
All is but toys: renown and grace is dead;
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of. (II,iii)

Donalbain: where we are
There's daggers in men's smiles (II,iii)

Old Man: God's benison go with you; and with those
That would make good of bad, and friends of foes! (II,iv)

Macbeth: After life's fitful fever he sleeps well (III,ii)

Macbeth: And make our faces vizards to our hearts, Disguising what they are. (III,ii)

Macbeth: O, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife! (III,ii)

Macbeth: Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill (III,ii)

Witches: Double, double toils and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble. (IV, i)

Witch 2: By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way come (IV, i)

Lady Macduff: He wants the natural touch: for the poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds, will fight,
Her young ones in her nest, against the owl.(IV, ii)

Son: Then the liars and swearers are fools,
for there are liars and swearers enow to beat
the honest men and hang up them. (IV, ii)

Macduff: each new morn
New widows howl, new orphans cry, new sorrows (IV, iii)

Malcolm: I think our country sinks beneath the yoke;
It weeps, it bleeds; and each new day a gash
Is added to her wounds

Macduff: Not in the legions
Of horrid hell can come a devil more damn'd
In evils to top Macbeth.

Malcolm:Nay, had I power, I should
Pour the sweet milk of concord into hell,
Uproar the universal peace, confound
All unity on earth.
Macduff: O Scotland, Scotland!

Macduff: O my breast,
Thy hope ends here!

Malcolm: Macduff, this noble passion,
Child of integrity, hath from my soul
Wiped the black scruples, reconciled my thoughts
To thy good truth and honour.

Ross: Alas, poor country!
Almost afraid to know itself. It cannot
Be called our mother, but our grave, where nothing,
But who knows nothing, is once seen to smile;
Where sighs and groans and shrieks that rend the air
Are made, not marked; where violent sorrow seems
A modern ecstasy. The dead man’s knell
Is there scarce asked for who, and good men’s lives
Expire before the flowers in their caps,
Dying or ere they sicken.

Ross: Would I could answer
This comfort with the like. But I have words
That would be howled out in the desert air,
Where hearing should not latch them.

Malcolm: Give sorrow words. The grief that does not speak
Whispers the o'erfraught heart and bids it break.

Malcolm: let grief
Convert to anger; blunt not the heart, enrage it.

Malcolm: Receive what cheer you may;
The night is long that never finds the day. (IV, iii)

Macbeth: I have lived long enough. My way of life
Is fall'n into the sere, the yellow leaf,
And that which should accompany old age,
As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have, but, in their stead,
Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honor, breath
Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare not. (V,iii)

Macbeth: I will not be afraid of death and bane
Till Birnam forest come to Dunsinane. (V,iii)

Macbeth:I have almost forgot the taste of fears.
The time has been, my senses would have cooled
To hear a night-shriek, and my fell of hair
Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
As life were in ’t. I have supped full with horrors.
Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts
Cannot once start me. (V,v)

Macbeth: She should have died hereafter.
There would have been a time for such a word.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. (V,v)

Macbeth: There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.
I 'gin to be aweary of the sun,
And wish th' estate o' th' world were now undone.—
Ring the alarum-bell!—Blow, wind! Come, wrack!
At least we’ll die with harness on our back. (V,v)

Siward: Let us be beaten, if we cannot fight.
Macduff: Make all our trumpets speak; give them all breath,
Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death. (V,vi)

Macbeth: I bear a charmèd life, which must not yield
To one of woman born. (V,viii)

Macduff:Then yield thee, coward,
And live to be the show and gaze o' th' time.
We’ll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
Painted on a pole, and underwrit,
'Here may you see the tyrant.' (V,viii)

Macbeth: Though Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane,
And thou opposed, being of no woman born,
Yet I will try the last. Before my body
I throw my warlike shield. Lay on, Macduff,
And damned be him that first cries, 'Hold, enough!' (V,viii)

Ross: But like a man he died. (V,ix)

Siward: Why then, God's soldier be he! (V,ix)

All: Hail, king of Scotland!(V,ix)

Malcolm: Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen (V,ix)

The Moon and Sixpence

The Moon and Sixpence is a novel by Somerset Maugham, published in 1919. It's rather largely based on the life of Paul Gauguin. This book gave me nightmares but I'm probably very rare in having that effect. I'm a bit of a extremely amateur artist and I write novels that are symbolically connected to this, so yeah, the very ending of this book had a terrible effect on me. But the terribleness of it is awesome. Great book. Let's go. Simple style, but effective, and conceptually large enough. I mean, it's a very fun read, and rather easy, I mean, not dense or tricky. It's simply very very conceptual, profound, exciting and intriguing. Read it for fun, and study it if you wish, worth your while studying but not thus extricating it from the purpose of entertainment.

Summary: So the narrator is kept nameless, and he's a writer who takes an intellectual interest in the artist Charles Strickland, who represents Gauguin. Strickland is so intriguing because he is very passionate about his art and in pursuit of art, he is not afraid to be extremely cruel. He's a normal stockbroker but at age forty, suddenly decides to leave his wife and kids to be a painter, and throughout the book destroys people's lives, like Blanche, who attempts suicide after he leaves her, and Dirk Stroeve, who was husband to Blanche before Strickland steals her away. Despite his terrible character, the author sympathises with him because he is intriguing, and eventually, Strickland leaves for Tahiti after being very poor for a long while, and there marries, paints, and dies of leprosy, still unacknowledged, and almost entirely regarded as a talentless painter. Years after his death though, the world decides upon his genius.

The writing is very clear. No extremely long sentences or flamboyant descriptions, with a few exception when the narrator is speculating on Strickland's character and art. He does get very philosophical and preachy, but Maugham points out repeatedly that he narrator is meant to be a romantic, though this may be following the 'accusers-are-innocent' logic. Nothing ever fails to be interesting though. Despite the simplicity of the writing, the story is very peculiar because of the Strickland character, leaving very much to be said with such matter-of-fact writing.

Another thing about the writing is that, it's written very much as though it is all true, as in Maugham is the narrating character. This isn't true; it's not autobiographical, it's biographical, but the effect is very helpful. I think this is because Strickland's character, for the majority of the readers, I suppose, is difficult to understand and grasp. Therefore the idea that the character is being explained by one that is bewildered like us, is comforting. You could relate largely with the narrating character, which I think is essential, as it may be difficult to relate with Strickland.

Some ways by which Maugham accomplishes this, are through reported speech. As the story is in first person, all speech is reported, but often he begins by reporting exact speech and then switching to paraphrases, which I think is more realistic. Also, often after reporting exact speech, the narrator admits that these actually weren't the words, but he, for the sake of the story, was expressing what was expressed in gestures and expressions and broken words, more skilfully.

Also, the plot unfolds most usually chronologically so that you could watch the narrator slowly discover Strickland, be astonished and slowly change his opinions concerning the character. For example, though in the very first chapter, Maugham reveals that Strickland was to be a very famous post-mortem painter, when he first appears in the active plot, the narrator expresses how he finds him a boring stockbroker like any other somewhat comfortable suburban business man. This judgement slowly changes, and as the narrator comes to understand Strickland, the reader is allowed time to discover Strickland very methodically, to the extent he can be.

It is interesting too, how the plot revolves around understanding this one character, but who you are, as a reader changes, very much, how much you will understand of him. I would be very different from a more left brain person, for example.

Right, so should I do characters? Well that seems obvious now doesn't it....Dirk is interesting. What could I say of him other than I see myself in him. I'm like Strickland's mind in Dirk's body except thankfully not quite spherical. Right, I'll go with Dirk. Characters are the most important aspect of a book. Almost forgot that time.

So Dirk is this character who is a bumbling fool. He is an artist and paints images of Italy, mostly for people that wish to go there but can't be bothered. He has an amazing sense of art and knows especially what beauty is. He is the first to recognise Strickland's genius and defends him against everyone else who laugh at Strickland's paintings. However, he himself has little talent. He is exceedingly kind, but due to this kindness, cannot defend himself against ridicule. He gets ridiculed often, for he is bumbling and often shares stories of his bumbles, and when ridiculed for it, often very harshly, as to tears, by Strickland, he simply absorbs and forgets. When he is ridiculed, he looks ridiculous and is then laughed at, often by the narrator. His kindness extends so, however, that he can actually show generosity to Strickland, nursing him when he's starving and dying, taking him into his house, sharing, or rather allowing Strickland to steal his studio, and stuff. Though he practically saves Strickland's life, and artistic life, cruel Strickland, whom his wife originally hated but feels extremely attracted to, begins an affair with her. Dirk is deep in love with his wife, and when she announces that she is leaving them, he is heartbroken, but loves her so that he gives her half his money and the house in order to save her the privations of living with Strickland with his savage lifestyle. He then sticks around so that his wife could return to him with all forgiven when inevitable, Strickland would ruin her, for e does not love her but only resentfully lusts her. This is a momentary lust and Strickland eventually leaves Blanche (Dirk's wife), causing her to attempt suicide by drinking acid. Dirk goes to the hospital where she is but she rejects him, and it is very obvious that she is weak, wounded, and there is no chance of her ever returning. She dies, and Dirk goes to his house for the first time and finds it empty of Strickland but for one painting of his, a nude of Blanche left solely to torture Dirk. Dirk tries to destroy it, but it is Strickland's and thus genius, and e does not, and instead, seeks out Strickland to invite him to go to Holland, his home-country, with him. Strickland rejects him and Dirk, prideless, broken, and alone, yet believing in Strickland's art, and resigned in his conception of the promises of life, goes away to Amsterdam and disappears from the book. In a later meeting between Strickland and the narrator, Strickland explains that he did not expect Blanche to come with him, but allowed it because it amused him that she both hated him and loved him. He feels no remorse and no gratitude for Dirk's help. The narrator had been strenuously despising Strickland but in speaking finds that he cannot hate him, for Strickland is too interesting and the narrator is a writer, meant more to observe than to judge. He agrees reluctantly with Strickland that he does not really care about Blanche's death. However, to himself, he assures that Dirk will find happiness again in Amsterdam.

Quite a story huh. So I guess I'm discussing the point of having Dirk in here. But wait. Here are some quotations that I think capture him well.

The Narrator giving a sketch of his character before anything tragic happens:

It was an ideal that he painted - a poor one, common and shop-soiled, but still it was an ideal; and it gave his character a peculiar charm...He was very emotional, yet his feeling, so easily aroused, had in it something absurd, so that you accepted his kindness, but felt no gratitude...He writhed under the jokes, practical and otherwise, which were perpetually made at his expense, and yet never ceased, it seemed wilfully, to expose himself to them. He was constantly wounded, and yet his good-nature was such that he could not bear malice: the viper might sting him, but he never learned by experience, and had no sooner recovered from his pain than he tenderly placed it once more in his bosom. His life was a tragedy written in the terms of a knockabout farce. Because I did not laugh at him he was grateful to me, and he used to pour into my sympathetic ear the long list of his troubles. The saddest thing about them was that they were grotesque, and the more pathetic they were, the more you wanted to laugh. (XVIII)

Last words to Blanche after giving her and Strickland his house and money:

Goodbye, my dear, I'm grateful for all the happiness you gave me in the past. (XXVIII)

Dirk explaining to narrator how he could be so void of resentment:

I knew she didn't love me as I loved her. hat was only natural, wasn't it? But she allowed me to love her, and that was enough to make me happy. (XXIX)

The narrator explaining why Dirk stayed:

He preferred the anguish of jealousy to the anguish of separation. (XXIX)

Dirk explaining the conclusion he comes to of the world after Blanche dies:

The world is hard and cruel. We are here none knows why, and we go none knows whither. We must be very humble. We must see the beauty of quietness. We must go through life so inconspicuously that Fate does not notice us. And let us seek the love of simple, ignorant people. Their ignorance is better than all our knowledge. Let us be silent, content in our little corner, meek and gentle like them. That is the wisdom of life. (XXXVIII)

Dirk's response to narrator asking if he resents art because of Strickland:

Art is the greatest thing in the world. (XXXVIII)

Narrator's conclusion about what will happen to Dirk in Amsterdam:

I felt that his chance was to put all the past behind him. I hoped that the grief which now seemed intolerable would be softened by the lapse of time, and a merciful forgetfulness would help him to take up once more the burden of life. He was young still, and in a few years he would look back on all his misery with a sadness in which there would be something not unpleasurable. Sooner or later he would marry some honest soul in Holland, and I felt sure he would be happy. I smiled at the thought of the vast number of bad pictures he would paint before he died. (XXXIX)

All amazing, aren't they? Now, I could do an in-depth analysis about these bits, but that, I think, would largely be superfluous, considering how straight-forward most of this is, and if I were to find worth in any of it, it'd most likely be through third and fourth meanings to the words through references to other bits of the book, and other characters, but as you, my invisible reader, possibly have not read the book, as I'm reluctant to rewrite the whole thing in extended quotation form, I will focus on the broader question of Dirk's purpose.

The quotations explain him, don't they. He's a simple guy, simple and good, and the one thing that makes him special, other than his the sheer simplicity of his kindness, is his taste for beauty. Oh, and the simplicity and purity of his love for Blanche. Alright, how am I going to tackle this? Alright, I'll go with first explaining why he is need concerning beauty, and then why he is needed concerning Blanche and his kindness, and lastly, why he exists as a character if he's just going to drift off, like Mrs. Strickland. Sounds good.

Right. Beauty: So this, I think, you get a lot from the plot, with his special treatment of Strickland. I mean, it's weird hoe both his wife and him develop an infatuation for Strickland, but for all the infatuations that Strickland ignites, Dirk's is the only one that is purely based on his art. It's shown well in that first sketch by the narrator too, I think. It's essential that Dirk not be a very revolutionary artist because otherwise, you'd be comparing between him and Strickland more. No, Dirk paints hotel art and he sees meaningful art in Strickland. This helps along our narrator, who has no great sense of art, and helps the reader hat cannot see the art. People like Dirk are necessary because they are the fundamental makers of movements in art, when a tide changes and nobody notices but the very subtle, who graciously direct the rest of our ways.

So Dirk is necessary get us to understand Strickland's artistic side, technically, as opposed to the narrator who helps us see Strickland's personal side, social side, emotional passionate side, and more confusing side. Dirk is the only person that seems unconfused by Strickland and I think that is because he understands the most essential thing about Strickland: his art. If it weren't for Dirk, you wouldn't find out he is amazing until the after Strickland's death, which in retrospect is very interesting, but in the live action, is very difficult to write with any interest and you are forced to keep so many secrets.Dirk's loyal love for art also adds to his own character, and Dirk thus is not artistic solely for the purpose of the Strickland story.

His 'Art is the greatest...' line is inspirational, as he knows full well what he is capable of and more importantly, incapable of, and yet he bears no resentment and pushes on, without ambition but in complacency. Is this resigned? Like his last conclusion? No, I don't think so, because I believe he enjoys his art. If you see beauty truly, you could hate it or love it, and he loves it. His painting an ideal says a lot of his character because this book was written in 1919, that is, the same year as the great war ended, and so concerns itself with the disillusionment era, and in such an era, ideals become all the more important, and passion, and security, and fear. Strickland has passion, Dirk has more of a cling on security. He is afraid, like most of us, but has not folded to the cynicism of the time, the growing menace of emptiness and disfiguration. I don't know, but as I do, I think Dirk sees that there is no shame in loving the perfect and wanting and wilfully believing in a beauty that possibly doesn't exist, and trying to create it yourself, because we are not capable of absolute truth, and we should embrace our weaknesses and try to shoulder on in brightness, rather than throwing ourselves 'sincerely' and passionately into a truth that may ruin us, as Strickland did. And then you have Strickland, who can appease those who agree with him, and interest and educate those that don't, like me, and maybe even persuade, like me. So I suppose Dirk is the ying to Strickland's yang concerning the concept of art in this book. Foils, if you will. If Dirk is Peter Pan, who knows of an outside world and a Wendy but chooses to remain in fantasy, Strickland is Peter who leaves Neverland, and there changes into an unrecognisable being.



Kindness and Blanche: Why so you have the other side of Dirk then? Well, as I said, there's the point of showing his clinging to security and the hold that society has on people, whether you see that as a bad or good thing. This draws also the foil theory again. Strickland is very very very cruel, and Dirk is very very very kind. How do you make somebody seem very very cruel and very very kind? Well you can just have some guy kick a puppy and another one feed some pigeons, but that's a bit Disney, isn't it? So neatness!!! Have the cruel guy be very cruel to the kind guy and the kind guy forgive the cruel guy, and then the cruel guy even more cruelly be cruel to the kind guy, and the kind guy even more kindly be kind to the cruel guy! Brilliant! Now we already know Strickland's cruel because he leaves his wife and kids randomly. And you already like Dirk a little because he speaks well of Strickland's art the moment the narrator introduces him. It's very neat, isn't it? So that, I think is the significance of the kindness concerning Strickland: provide contrast.

But contrast is such an easy answer, isn't it? I mean, it gets very annoying how often bullshitting English students say, 'Well this provides contrast'. Yeah, it's demeaning to the contrasting thing because it hardly ever is so boring in itself that it only exists to be compared with an eclipsing issue. So yes, in itself, the kindness is important because it provides an escape from the Strickland lifestyle. You don't have to agree with Strickland and engage in a life of cruelty for your aim. There's a quotation about this later on (check it out!) You learn from Dirk too. He is painted as ridiculous, called a fool, and the narrator disagrees with his actions, thinking them prideless and shameful even. But looking beyond that, Dirk is a very noble character. Dirk is a turn-the-other-cheek type that stays so until he is practically emotionally crucified. Applause for that and he's certainly going up to heaven. Maybe don't be a pushover to his extent, but certainly learn from him. I'm afraid rather a lot of people would learn more from Strickland than Dirk from this book though, which is slightly worrying.

And how better to cause such emotional turmoil than through a woman to be fought over? Blanche at once shows both Dirk's kindness and Strickland's cruelty, potential and dangerous charisma. She's sort of like the narrator in a way, as she and the narrator are both fond of Dirk in a 'you're so nice' way but drawn to Strickland by his excitement and away from Dirk by his weakness. Don't know where to go with Blanche. Interesting character, she. Very mysterious and surprising and a plot-mover. A classic pawn in the Strickland-centric novel. But that's another essay.



Drifting off: This book is written rather strangely as the narrator mentions to you at times, you the reader, that he wishes the story were different as it'd lend itself into a novel better, but he must be realistic, and thus lots of flawed reported action and characters dropping away. Dirk goes away somewhat far from the end, only shortly preceding, Strickland's exit from live action. GOsh that must sound confusing. Well, I mean, Dirk isn't mentioned after he goes to Amsterdam but in one conversation.

Now, the way he exits is rather strange because he neither starts something new, like Mrs. Strickland's business, or dies like Blanche, or was temporary enough of a character as to serve his purpose and just leave, like the later storytellers of Strickland in Tahiti. He has no big character change either. He just drifts off to Amsterdam, far less idealistic, but still kind, still weak, still believing in Strickland, still in love with Blanche, and still in love with art. Why end this way? Well, actually, I think it's the single normal ending to any of the characters in the book. He has his resigned purpose in life, and then leaves, and you get the narrator's guesses at what will happen, but you never find out. At the end of the book, you see the early characters, Mrs. Strickland, and his kids, again, changed. Maugham might have mentioned Dirk here, but he doesn't, and it's as though he entered a black hole in Amsterdam. But you come to trust the narrator so much that you assume his guesses are right and you love the guesses he make because they are so sweet.. The bad pictures Stroeve will paint. So he is human and will not be thus downtrodden forever, but rebuild himself effortlessly, for nature pucks up spirit and all living things must have life. He will forget graciously and begin again his ideals.

It again contrasts with Strickland, who lives his life forcedly, in pursuit of a vision that he will die for and does, pursuing until the end until he achieves his masterpiece. Dirk, instead, lives on a lower plane, surviving as he knows how, psychologically, with an array of defence mechanisms, and family, and his profession. Thus runs the mercy of a regular life, and the security of normality and society. Strickland is the moon and Dirk is sixpence. The sentence of Maugham, supposedly, that If you continue to search for the sixpence at your feet, your'll never see the moon, suggests he loves Strickland, but look who he is: the writer, observer, admirer, muser, it seems. Prefer Strickland, or Dirk? Well, the amazing thing about this book is that it doesn't exactly command to you which to go with, though maybe more Strickland, but really, I don't know. A mixture of the two. Again, they are foils, and Dirk is a very useful character by providing this second course to the reader. He drifts off realistically and you see that there's a way out. Personally, I think I am Strickland, but with too much cowardice, and I see my future as a life of Dirk silently wishing to be a Strickland. I will write Stricklands for the rest of my life. My books always have two characters. Well, usually, and usually, one is a Strickland and one is a Dirk, and either hey both learn to become Dirks together, or one learns from the other to become a Dirk. My books have no real answer, probably because I do not know. I hardly understand myself and my work reflects it, though I wish not ruinously, but pleasingly, honestly and suggestively, and intriguingly, though that is a lot to ask for. If I turn out as either, I should be frightened though. I shall be the narrator.

That was weird.

Read, folks. Read.

But I should be thrice a fool if I did it (wrote novels) for aught but my own entertainment. (ChII)

I tell you I've got to paint. I can't help myself. When a man falls into the water it doesn't matter how he swims. well or badly: he's got to get out or else he'll drown. (XII)

When I left Rome I corresponded with him, and about once in two months received from him long letters in queer English, which brought before me vividly his spluttering, enthusiastic, gesticulating conversation. (XVIII)

Beauty is something wonderful and strange that the artist fashions out of the chaos of the world in the torrent of his soul. And when he has made it, it is not give to all to know it. To recognise it you must repeat the adventure of the artist. (XIX)

Sometimes I've thought of an island lost in a boundless sea, where I could live in some hidden valley, among the strange trees, in silence. There I think I could find what I want.(XXI)

It's only right that you shouldn't disapprove of me. You have a despicable character. (XXI)

Life isn't long enough for love and art. (XXI)

It was not strange that he should so heartlessly have betrayed his friend's confidence, nor that he hesitated not at all to gratify a whim at the cost of another's misery/ That was in his character. (XXX)

The nurse looked at him with her calm, kind eyes, which had seen all the horror and pain of the world, and yet, filled with the vision of a world without sin, remained serene. (XXXV)

I wondered what an abyss of cruelty she must have looked into that in horror she refused to live.(XXXV)

It is one of the defects of my character that I cannot altogether dislike anyone who makes me laugh. (XL)

The writer is more concerned to know than to judge. (XLI)

The absurd little man enjoys doing things for other people. That's his life. (XLI)

It may be a lack of sympathy in myself if it does not make any great difference to me that she is dead. Life had a great deal to offer her. I think it's terrible that she should have been deprived of it in that cruel way, and I am ashamed because I do not really care. (XLI)

Each of us is alone in the world. (XLI)

'I think your courage failed. The weakness of your body communicated itself to your soul. I do not know what infinite yearning possesses you, so that you are driven to a perilous, lonely search for some goal where you expect to find a final release from he spirit that torments you. I see you as the eternal pilgrim to some shrine that perhaps does not exist. I d not know to what inscrutable Nirvana you aim. Do you know yourself? Perhaps it is Truth and Freedom that you seek, and for a moment you thought that you might find release in Love. I think your tired soul sought rest in a woman's arms, and when you found no rest there you hated her You had no pity for her, because you have no pity for yourself. And you killed her out of fear, because you trembled still at the danger you had barely escaped.' He smiled dryly and pulled his beard. 'You are a dreadful sentimentalist, my poor friend.'(XLI)

forsake all and follow the divine tyranny of art. (XLIII)

He was a single-hearted man in his aim, and to pursue it he was willing to sacrifice not only himself - many can do that - but others. He had a vision. Strickland was an odious man, but I still think he was a great one. (XLIII)

He seemed to see his fellow-creatures grotesquely, and he was angry with them because they were grotesque; life was a confusion of ridiculous, sordid happenings, a fit subject fr laughter, and yet it made him sorrowful to laugh. (XLVI)

both were trying to put down in paint ideas which were more suitable to literature. (XLVI)

I suppose no artist achieves completely the realisation of the dream that obsesses him (XLV)

It is like the sadness which you may see in the jester's eyes when a merry company is laughing in his sallies; his lips smile and his jokes are gayer because in the communion of laughter he finds himself more intolerably alone. (XLV)

And here he lived, unmindful of the world and by the world forgotten. (LIII)

'I shall stay here till I die.' 'But are you never bored or lonely?' I asked. He chuckled. 'Mon pauvre ami,' he said. 'It is evident that you do not know what it is to be an artist.' (LIII)

I think Strickland knew it was a masterpiece. He had achieved what he wanted. His life was complete.He had made a world and saw that it was good. Then, in pride and contempt, he destroyed it. (LVII)

Maurice

Maurice is a novel written by E.M. Forster in 1914 and published in 1971. So, why so late? Because it's totally gay. But we're beyond that fuss now, aren't we. Therefore, let's dive in! I read this a week ago. It took me far less time than the book before that, largely because it's summer now and was exam previously, but also gargantually because my last book was written by Conrad and this is a lot more in the subject-predicate style. I liked it but, like with Jim but more, I preferred the first half. I'll explain. Also, the style is a bit bland. I'll explain. Anyways, on the whole, I liked it, but as a story, not like a poem, as with a lot of the other books on this blog.

So Maurice is the main character, as you'd assume, and Clive is the other big character. It's a love story though also a criticism of Edwardian society and, as applies to today as well, of the emptiness of suburban morality and pursuits. But mostly lovey-dovey-and-sometimes-troubly romance. Maurice gets the sex talk in the first scene at age fourteen and then later in Cambridge is still confused about his sexuality, when he meets Maurice, who knows he's gay but is tentative. They're very close friends and after a lot of drama concerning denial, rejections, avoidance and standing alone in the rain, they get together. After a day being together, Maurice gets kicked out of Cambridge but they stay together. Maurice stays at Clive's for a while and it's jolly until things get rocky when Clive goes to Greece and begins, rather spontaneously, feeling straight. Clive, who's higher in society than Maurice, more intelligent, politically ambitious, and who's pressured towards a lot of things - like getting married- by his family, eventually breaks up with Maurice and gets married to a woman called Anne. Maurice takes it badly and goes to the doctor and hypnotist to be cured of his homosexuality, and meanwhile goes to Clive's occasionally as a welcome guest. Clive grows increasingly distant. That's when Alec Scudder becomes more important. He's been mentioned occasionally, one of Clive's servants, but becomes more frequently mentioned and interacts with Maurice. In his psychological sufferings, Maurice gets with Alec, who turns out to be a really nice guy. After some Maurice-Scudder drama, Scudder gives up his plans to emigrate and a guaranteed job in trade of staying with Maurice. Maurice plans on giving up his job and position in society for Alec, and he finally speaks to Clive, who is shocked, disappointed - he thought Maurice was cured (straight now) - and he also might still have feelings for Maurice. They never meet again.

Just one thing random that I want to point out: on the dedication page, Forster wrote BEGUN 1913 FINISHED 1914 Dedicate to a Happier Year

Isn't that nice???

Moving on. So let me just get style out of the way because I have something to say about it. Not a criticism, but I didn't underline all that much in this book, and what I did underline was at the beginning. Perhaps that means the writing is a bit more noticeably flourished in the beginning to depict the growing in age and the calming of romanticism, but actually, Maurice remains rather the same throughout, I think, so that I find it rather more of a coincidence. I am one that quite likes decadent writing, so that wasn't tailored specifically towards me, since the writing is rather direct. The sentences are regular, paragraphs short, chapters regular and everything conventional, chronological and downright logical entirely. I could probably do something on style if I was assigned it. Give me a section and I'll analyse. For all I know, many may find this book stylistically brilliant. However, as the point of this blog is that I could do whatever I want with these books, I'm doing characters!

The characters are the most important aspect of a book. The reason as to why I preferred the first half of Maurice to the second is because my favourite character is Clive Durham. However, the character acts rather differently in the first than the second half, and whilst this could have made me like the character all the better, as I could certainly see it being spun that way, Forster write him out in a way that seemed as though he was nearly becoming annoyed with the character. I'll try to justify that claim later. Now, let's focus on Clive.

Clive doesn't come out until Maurice meets him, and this story, as I said, is very chronological. It's told by an omnipotent third person narrator but you usually find out things as Maurice does. Maurice, looking for fellow Cambridge-homosexual Risley, finds Clive in Risley's room instead, and there instantly feels attracted to him, as Clive does towards Maurice. Clive at this point is only called Durham. They become very close and you learn that Durham is very ascetic, loving books, music, and being very good at all of it. He holds his own rather well and is in no way socially awkward. He can play like a boy when he wishes, but usually holds an air of sophistication. He also goes through a row with his family concerning his self-proclaimed atheism. Maurice seems to be in love with him when Durham, after a moment of special closeness, tells him that 'I love you', to which Maurice (who he still calls Hall) replies 'O, rot!' and then scolds that homosexuality is immoral, criminal, and completely out of place. This sends Durham into a self-cleansing mode for three weeks, returning to his solitary lifestyle, and interacting with Hall accordingly, whenever the situation demands it, but avoids him as much as he can. Hall, when confronting him, torn with guilt for lying about his feelings, finds that Durham is not angry at him for the rejection, but feels ashamed and sinful for his own curse of homosexuality and is grateful to Hall for his kindness in not reporting him. He finds himself completely in the wrong and Hall in the right. Later that night, after the confrontation, Hall enters his room as he dreamt of him and when he whispers in his sleep 'Maurice' he wakes to find Maurice there and they confess to each other their love.

At this point Clive seems like a rather decent guy right? Respectable, and personally my type since above selfless decency, I always enjoy, in books, when a character holds this decency with a tragic irony, like Phineas in A Separate Peace. His bright artistic qualities are a bonus yet. Well, then Forster dedicates a chapter to distancing from Maurice's perspective, and sketching out Clive's life thus far. It proves him to have been only slightly interested in Maurice at first, and convinced that Maurice was completely straight. As he began consciously testing his attractions towards Maurice physically, for he is supposed to be handsome and fit, he grows closer to him and finds himself in love with him. He explains that he approached his life and situation with a scientific, compromising state of mind, and that included his vision of Maurice. However, the rejection to his confession of love sends him, for once out of control. He exiles himself to a life half awake, never allowing himself to feel so much again, and Maurice's confession was to him an utter surprise.

......I have things to say. It'll make sense later though. Alright, let me lay out the Clive timeline then.

Now we have Clive as Clive and Maurice as Maurice, together for a day and then separated with Maurice returning home. They write each other, but on their first awkward reunion, they find things changed, and it seems their love is founded only on Cambridge floors. They learn to stick it through though. In their relationship, Maurice is more physical, but Clive seems to be controlling it, as we know he is more intelligent and directed whilst Maurice is 'muddled'. He believes in a platonic love so the physical relationship doesn't advance much. Maurice and Clive's time together is intimate at Clive's house, but you see dangerous waves coming when Maurice hears from the others that Clive shall inherit their mansion when he marries, and that he therefore must. Clive confirms this and sends Maurice into quiet worries.

Clive then goes to Greece for vacation and neglects Maurice's letters. We have another just Clive chapter as he describes a physical change occurring, bringing a sudden interest in women and disgust towards Maurice physically. He meets women in Greece and likes it, but fears hurting Maurice and attempts to recapture the fading love. Failing, he returns and immediately has a friendly interaction with Maurice's two sisters. Talking with Maurice afterwards, he discusses with him the perks to marriage rather suggestively, and suggests also an end to their sneaking about. He mentions an interest in Ada, Maurice's sister, which causes Maurice to have a break down. Clive gets sick, influenced by his worries, and due to illness, has to move away from Maurice's house, refusing Maurice's care, presence, and love. They meet less and less frequently and in his letters, Clive confesses that he no longer loves Maurice and that he has married Anne.

The story focuses on Maurice's struggles alone then, whilst Clive works on his social rise and becomes more and more brainwashed by it to fit social expectations. When Maurice meets him, he observes that Clive seems changed and inhospitable. Clive indeed leaves Maurice out of his presence despite he being a guest at his house. When hearing that Maurice is looking to marry, he is delighted and reveals, with some old intimacy and charm, that he hadn't forgotten the old days and wants Maurice to be happy and to move on too, kissing Maurice's hand as closure to their relationship. He is displayed also as something of a posh douchebag, mean to his servants and consciously superior. In their final meeting, Clive is disappointed that Maurice is not going to marry, and is shocked about Alec not only because he is a man but because he is of lower status than Maurice. Finally, he sacrifices his political engagements to attempt to save his friend and arranges a dinner engagement with Maurice. They never meet again though, portrayed in the end as opposites; the one who began muddled but now sees, and the other that has always seen so much but is blinded now by his enslavement to society.

I like Clive until the fuss about his getting married begins. Actually, that's still fine because he's muddled, but when Forster starts making him a douche it's so harsh and disillusioning. So here's how it could have worked.

The character development doesn't seem terrible when you consider him as a tragic figure who fell from the heights of awareness and integrity because of his hamartia, his position in society which felled him into the minions of the machine. Then you feel sorry for Clive in the end, who persuades Clive to marry because he is human and misery loves company selfishly. You feel sorry for his losses and wish he was more like Maurice. The problem is, though, that this requires a subtlety that Forster neglected, I think, and also recquires Maurice to be a lot more likeable than he was.

For example, concerning the first subtlety thing, the closure scene runs thus.

'The fact is, I'm hoping to get married,' said Maurice, the words flying from him as if they had independent life. 'I'm awfully glad,' said Clive, dropping his eyes. 'Maurice, I'm awfully glad. It's the greatest thing in the world, perhaps the only one-' 'I know.' He was wondering why he had spoken... 'I shan't bother you with talk, but I must just say that Anne guessed it. Women are extraordinary. She declared all along that you had something up your sleeve. I laughed, but now I shall have to give in.' his eyed rose. 'Oh Maurice, I'm so glad. It's very good of you to tell me - it's what I've always wished for you.' 'I know you have.' There was a silence. Clive's old manner had come back. He was generous, charming. 'It's wonderful, isn't it? - the - I'm, so glad. I wish I could think of something to say. Do you mind if I just tell Anne?' 'Not a bit. Tell everyone,' cried Maurice, with a brutality that passed unnoticed.

The next page, after Clive kisses Maurice's hand and Maurice shudders, Clive says 'Maurice dear, I wanted just to show I hadn't forgotten the past. I quite agree - don't let's mention it ever again, but I wanted to show you just this once.'

ALRIGHT, SO AS THIS BLOG HAS BEEN GOING A WHILE AND IT'S CLEAR THAT I'M FOCUSING ON HOW I HAD ISSUES WITH FORSTER CONCERNING HOW HE HANDLED CLIVE'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT, I THOUGHT I SHOULD STATE IT BECAUSE THIS IS GOING IN A RATHER BLURRY WAY. IN THE FILM, WHICH I WILL REFERENCE A LOT, CLIVE'S CHARACTER IS HANDLED WELL, I THINK, WITH CLIVE PLAYED WITH MORE SHADES OF REGRET AND HESITATION, THE EXTENSION TO RISLEY'S CHARACTER WHO GETS IMPRISONED FOR HOMOSEXUALITY, AND A STRONG ENDING TO THE FILM SHOWING CLIVE AT THE WINDOW, DISTANCED FROM HIS WIFE, GAZING OUT AND PICTURING MAURICE BACK IN CAMBRIDGE. I'LL FROM NOW RESTRICT MYSELF TO TALKING OF THE ABOVE QUOTATION IN CONTEXT OF PORTRAYING CLIVE'S INNER STRUGGLE TO MAKE HIM MORE OF AN INTERESTING CHARACTER AND I WILL ALSO DISCUSS DIFFERENCES IN THE FILM, WHICH I RECOMMEND.

Caps Lock is annoying, isn't it. Sorry about that. No editing though. Let's push on forwards.

Now, by the point in the story when the previous quotation occurs, Clive is already transformed, somewhat straight (possibly), and rather douchey. But this is one of the two scenes when Maurice observes similarities between pre and post-Maurice Clive., the other time being at the very end of the book, when it seems Clive may be a little jealous of Maurice concerning Alec. That's for later though. Does Forster accomplish the reversion?

Well, I think possibly, but it depends on how you read it, obviously. I don't think it would be the obvious interpretation and you may not even notice at all if Maurice Forster didn't actually say 'Clive's old manner had come back', which I personally take to be Maurice's thoughts, though it may not be. If it weren't it's just Forster blatantly telling the reader what to think. This was my issue with his subtlety. Really not, huh. Well, anyways, to test whether the interpretation works, I think it's good to pretend that sentence and the following were omitted. Then I think I would have still wondered as to how Clive was feeling because of some pointers, such as 'dropping his eyes'. Whenever somebody does that, they are either saying a lie that they can't tell with direct eyes, or their saying something profoundly honest that they are too shy to say again with direct eyes, or they're sleepy or bored or agitated. The film played it as bored a bit, and agitated, a little, but in reading, I would have thought of the first two. Is he lying or being sincere.

Now, remember, I've been reading the book with a special eye on Clive, so I'm bound to be alert for any possibility of Clive being the character I want him to be. There's my paradigm. So I'd probably obsess more than someone who preferred Maurice about the dropping. As what he says isn't embarrassing, I took his to be a lie. His disappointment later on about Alec says otherwise, but I liked to think that Clive was actually sad here. 'awfully glad'. Like terribly happy, you could work a negative adverb in there. What does it mean to be awfully glad? You're so glad that you feel terrible, like you ate too much ice cream? Well, I guess, but the point is that it raises ears to the possibility that this news makes him feel awful, not glad.

Now, the following sentence is awkward, right? How could here be more than one of the greatest thing? And who says that? What is Clive doing, saying random superfluous words, and he must notice Maurice's discomfort in this scene so why take sudden news in such a flamboyant light? Maybe I'm presumptuous, but I take this again as a sign for lying. A kid hates spinach (which is crazy. I love spinach) and when he gets it and makes a face and is asked if he doesn't like it, he says, 'Oh, no, I love spinach. It's the greatest thing, possibly the only one' and people look at him strangely because most honest people would say 'No, I like it.'

Clive speaks more, dominating the conversation, which is natural for his character since he dominated the relationship, whilst Maurice speaks less here and is a bit distanced with his vague, repetitive, non-committing answers. So, that made me think that this conversation means more for Clive than Maurice, because Maurice means more to Clive than the other way. That's really presumptuous, I realise, but hear me out. The conversation is one that will conclude any possibility of them ever becoming lovers again, and Maurice being silent at that means he's already given up, as he states at the end of the chapter, saying, 'Since coming to Penge he seemed a bundle of voices, not Maurice, and now he could almost hear them quarrelling inside him. But none of them belonged to Clive: he had got that far.' So Maurice is replying for the sake of politeness, for really, one must be polite, and Clive is therefore the only one participating. Why have a two-person conversation on your own? Because you care enough about it to go through the weird effort and to possibly not notice the weirdness of it. And when you care, you either love or hate. Maybe he's just that excited about Maurice getting married, but that implies a level of high care for him anyways. And if he hates the idea, which I personally find possible, then he definitely jealously loves him. The fact that he's speaking too much is acknowledged in the words 'I shan't bother you with talk' and the importance with the words 'I must say'

Now, why is Anne in the conversation? Maybe he really is grounded in her now and she's always in his mind. Probably, actually.But also, maybe she is just what he reverts to when he feels unstable because she in the story is essential for making Clive normal in society. Now, more importantly, this whole Anne thing is said whilst his eyes are still down!! Shocker! So maybe she belongs in the things he cannot speak of with direct eyes because she is surrounded with the deception of his sexuality.

When does he raise his eyes? Forster interrupts Clive's speaking to tell us when, right after he says that he couldn't take seriously the notion of Maurice having a woman. Did he think his friend was too gay or too shy and inept? Well he's handsome enough, isn't he? And he already had a thing earlier with Miss Olcott, which Clive knows of. So is Clive in denial? Was it a dismissive laugh masking his terror of Maurice moving away from him. Maybe! In any case, he turns to Maurice to say 'Oh Maurice, I'm so glad.'

Is he suddenly sincere, and so he really is glad? Maybe, but first, he says his name, which is always a sign of intimacy. He did say exactly 'Oh Maurice, Maurice' when he found Maurice before him the night they first kissed and got together. And hat he is so glad is already known. It is the third time he is saying glad. Maybe he is so happy that he's repeating himself uncontrollably, but maybe he's just insisting on it to make it true.

'Good of you to tell me' because he wants a strong closeness remaining between them. They tell each other of heir feelings and secrets.

'What I've always wished for you' I've always wanted you to be happy, even if not with me. How sweet.

Silence is always intimate too, no? When people are silent, often, they think in other's presence, often uncomfortably, but if comfortably, because they are close, they are friends.

They two sentences I choose to ignore.

Now, glad for a fourth time, stuttering because he cannot control his speech, speechlessness because he's overwhelmed with a vortex of feelings, Anne because it's the only stability, emotionless, sterile, conventional marriage.

Brutality unnoticed because Clive is too messed up to notice.

Maurice dear later on again, blatantly intimate. No need to say his name, hey're alone together.

'just to show' because it's all he wants to think of the past and all he wants concerns Maurice and he also needs to excuse his extended presence with Maurice, since Maurice is acting dismissively, and shuddering. He made him shudder, and sad, he is explaining himself, feeling vulnerable and inferior.

'hadn't forgotten the past' because he knows how he has been acting, he knows that he's been trying to forget the past, because it's too painful, and he doesn't now have the strength to allow Maurice to think it and move further away.

'I quite agree' to make clear that he's not opposing Maurice because this could save him quarrelling which will hurt him.

'don' let's mention it' because he is afraid. he is a poor, scared boy pretending to be strong for society and family. Having too much to lose.

'but I wanted to show you just once' again a repetition. A wish to return to the past for but a moment. Laying significance that he feels in his fleeting closeness with Maurice. This isn't flippant, this is serious and intimate and he is emotional. Excusing himself to make himself seem straight to Maurice, who is straight again, like back in Cambridge. Memories of Maurice's rejection. 'O, rot!' in his vulnerable sate. 'O, go to hell, it's all your fit for' to Clive when he felt just so dirty. Back in Cambridge, Clive saying, 'You ought to know that to be alone with you hurts me. No, please don't reopen. It's over.' Clive had run away before in pain. Clive had been too scared to try again. 'Get married quickly and forget.' Marriage is the escape. He hadn't forgotten though.

You see how sad a character Clive can be??? I love it! Am I just the best bullshitter so that I can create some weird circus tent of flawed logic to misinterpret totally clean stuff? Am I giving Forster a lot more credit than he deserves, omitting the sentences. Maybe. Maybe I just really want Clive to be a deep and tortured character. But as you see, I read into every sentence, and read it in my way for the sake of Clive's plight which I love.

Alright, so there's an inside look as to how with such prejudice I read. Now, what do I make of it? Well, on the whole, reading the book, you get the vibe that Clive's a douche. This is but one of two scenes where it seems possible that he isn't, but you need that crazy way of reading it that you just witnessed for that to be convincing. So in conclusion, Forster, if read generously, is incredibly skilled and incredibly subtle. If any less generously, which seems far more reasonable, he's on a vendetta against Clive.

Maurice, on the other hand, he gives a glorious ending as he runs off with Alec. But really, I don't think Maurice changes very much and I never grew a liking to Maurice. I'm not going to do a whole other thing for Maurice, but let me just say that Maurice was a bumbling fool from beginning to end, fickle and weak, crying far too often, and difficult to watch at times. If it weren't for is physical beauty, I don't think Alec would have been interested in him, and he fell in love so suddenly with Alec that it seems rather that he'd just go for anybody, like with Clive too. He fell in love instantly. My reading of Maurice is harsh, and Clive is generous. Oh well. Art counts for a lot. My reading of Maurice made my reading of Forster a lot more harsh too, since Clive being portrayed as a douche wouldn't have been that bad if it was about people going in opposite moral directions, Maurice being good, and Clive bad. But such a black and white book is boring, and as I decided against Maurice for Clive, this book suffered under me.

Now, film, and then we'll be done. This is already passed 4000 words. How I spend my life. So there are three points about the film that strike me about Clive.

First is that he generally seems very much more kind and worrying in the film. Perhaps because you could actually see it. I know you could say that about any book, but the writing of this book is so much more simple than in other books that you can't visualise it in the book very much, so good job, Hugh Grant.

Secondly, there's the thing about Risley. He gets caught and is sentenced six months in jail with hard labour, and will forever be marked and thus professionally crippled. he asks Clive specifically for help but Clive apologetically refuses because of how much he could lose by just testifying, and he shamefully watches Risley's trial imagining them in opposite situations, which is very possible. So, this was very helpful, I think, because it allows Clive to appear to have more of an excuse for the drastic changes he makes than in the book, where it really comes out of no where. You really feel sorry for Clive in the film and he seems far more reasonable in making his decision.

And thirdly. The final scene of the film is Clive closing up the curtains as he re-enters the house after speaking with Maurice. He speaks to his wife in lies, denying seeing Maurice, protecting him, and then ignores her, showing the flakiness of their marriage. Then at the last window, he gazes out of it and Anne comes to his side but he seems unaware. Clive wears a terribly spaced face, as though in an entirely different place, nostalgic. A short clip of Maurice waving at him in Cambridge from earlier in the film plays and the screen fades on Clive's face reliving his days with Maurice as he sees his friend go off into a brave life with Alec, as he's refused to do for Maurice, and as he may now wish he had. What did he have left? The wife at his side.

The film, through there three points, made the ending seem as though the film should have been called Clive rather than Maurice. It ends with glorious regret. Well, I guess I got a good story out of it on a whole then, didn't I? I just cut snippets and interpreted like crazy. Well, what's wrong with that? Here are some of the earlier bits of the book that are more quotable.

Read folks. Read.

because they never married and seldom died. Celibate and immortal, the long procession passed before him (ch1)

Beneath it all, he was bewildered. He has lost the precocious clearness of the child which transfigures and explains the universe, offering answers of miraculous insight and beauty. (ch2)

Maurice forbore to define his dream further. He had dragged it as far into life as it would come. (ch3)

No, they too had insides. 'But, O Lord, not such an inside as mine.' (ch5)

But his heart had lit never to be quenched again, and one thing in him at last was real. (ch6)

You think I don't think, but I can tell you I do. (ch7)

The worst part of him rose to the surface, and urged him to prefer comfort to joy. (ch9)

Pain had shown him a niche behind the world's judgements, whither he could withdraw. (ch11)

He had awoken too late for happiness, but not for strength, and could feel austere joy, as of a warrior who is homeless but stands fully armed. (ch11)

Those who base their conduct upon what they are rather than upon what they ought to be, always must throw [religion] over in the end (ch12)

But books meant so much for him he forgot that they were a bewilderment to others (ch12)

and retire as absurdity (ch27)

Maurice had disappeared thereabouts, leaving no trace of his presence except a little pile of the petals of the evening primrose, which mourned from he ground like an expiring fire. To the end of his life Clive was no sure of the exact moment of departure, and with the approach of old age he grew uncertain whether the moment had yet occurred. The Clue Room would glimmer, the ferns undulate. Out of some external Cambridge his friend began beckoning to him, clothed in the sun, and shaking out the scents and sounds of the May term. (ch46)