Tuesday, April 03, 2012
Lady Eustace
Now completed 'The Eustace Diamonds' for the second time, following the mentions on March 27th this year and April 11th back in 2008.
It is often alleged that both my speech and my writing are apt to be obscure. But I also take pride in their being sound. If I say something, there will usually be a reasonable point lurking underneath somewhere, possibly despite appearances. So I am a bit annoyed about my comment on the Trollope of 2008 about one of the themes of 'The Eustace Diamonds' being, to quote, 'the unsuitability of the truth in all sorts of social situations'. This is something that I sign up to, but I can't see why I should have thought that it was a theme of this book. It is true that the principal character, Lady Eustace, while bright and beautiful is also a liar, a lady who lies all the time about matters large and small, to the point where she lies when there is little or no point. There is also a passage when Trollope, through the mouth of the male lead, tells us how drab and dreary it is to be telling the truth the whole time and extols the virtues of puffing things up a bit. And then there is a rather longer passage when Trollope, this time through the mouth or mind of Lady Eustace, explains how important puffing is in wooing. It is no good for a wooer to be drab and dreary as that is a right turn off. The lady needs a lot of puffing, and the fact that part of her might know full well that she is being fed a lot of nonsense if not worse does not detract from that need. So while the book does indeed say something about lying, it does not do it in quite the way that my 2008 post suggests. Whatever did I have in mind?
I close with an honourable mention for Nandos and Wetherspoons. Both outfits make a strong showing in the RADAR book of disabled toilet facilities. Not the only such outfits present in the book but certainly the most prominent. I did not spot any McDonalds at all, which I found odd given their long standing reputation for the provision of clean and decent facilities for ordinary folk. Maybe we shall reward Nandos with our first visit, having been somewhat deterred hitherto by their having been described to us as chicken flavoured McDonalds.
It is often alleged that both my speech and my writing are apt to be obscure. But I also take pride in their being sound. If I say something, there will usually be a reasonable point lurking underneath somewhere, possibly despite appearances. So I am a bit annoyed about my comment on the Trollope of 2008 about one of the themes of 'The Eustace Diamonds' being, to quote, 'the unsuitability of the truth in all sorts of social situations'. This is something that I sign up to, but I can't see why I should have thought that it was a theme of this book. It is true that the principal character, Lady Eustace, while bright and beautiful is also a liar, a lady who lies all the time about matters large and small, to the point where she lies when there is little or no point. There is also a passage when Trollope, through the mouth of the male lead, tells us how drab and dreary it is to be telling the truth the whole time and extols the virtues of puffing things up a bit. And then there is a rather longer passage when Trollope, this time through the mouth or mind of Lady Eustace, explains how important puffing is in wooing. It is no good for a wooer to be drab and dreary as that is a right turn off. The lady needs a lot of puffing, and the fact that part of her might know full well that she is being fed a lot of nonsense if not worse does not detract from that need. So while the book does indeed say something about lying, it does not do it in quite the way that my 2008 post suggests. Whatever did I have in mind?
I close with an honourable mention for Nandos and Wetherspoons. Both outfits make a strong showing in the RADAR book of disabled toilet facilities. Not the only such outfits present in the book but certainly the most prominent. I did not spot any McDonalds at all, which I found odd given their long standing reputation for the provision of clean and decent facilities for ordinary folk. Maybe we shall reward Nandos with our first visit, having been somewhat deterred hitherto by their having been described to us as chicken flavoured McDonalds.
# posted by Jim @ 12:23 AM 
