Re-reading after many years - different perspectives?

[rosabud]

I am re-reading Orwell's 1984 after nearly 30 years. Being such an iconic book, I remember most of the detail although some of my emotional responses have altered slightly. There is one detail that I had not remembered at all. When Winston thinks that O'Brien is offering him a chance to join the 'resistance movement,' he seems to 'blindly' accept a number of conditions such as being willing to join in blowing people up/killing people etc. One of these conditions is that he might have to throw acid in a child's face. My older self is shocked by this and how desperate and robotic Winston seems at this point. Also, I am slightly shocked that this didn't stand out to me first time around. Why do I not remember this detail? Was it acceptable to my teenage self? Did I mentally award it some sort of poetic licence?

Are there any things you've re-read after a sigificant period of time which have particularly stood out to you?

V good question and yes I recently reread Antonia White's Frost in May which is a sort of coming of age/loss of innocence story set in a convent school. I was obsessed with it in my late teenage years - read it many times and knew every scene intimately. I could quote some of them off by heart and for an atheist I have a good working knowledge of some of the more obscure Catholic saints as a result.

When I reread it I was struck by the cruelty of the school regime and the pointless self-sacrifice that was required in the name of religion. It's an abusive environment that's being portrayed but I'd read it as just another school story. I wonder if, as a child/teenager you come to expect rules and regimes and you don't judge them as you don't set them. They are just like the weather - something that just is. Whereas as an adult with a degree of agency and autonomy you see the shocking cruelty and deliberateness of it.

Maybe this is the same with your 1984 experience. I think sometimes younger people are not shocked by things because they are still learning about norms. Even though obviously you knew then that throwing acid in a child's face was wrong you might not have appreciated how transgressive it is even to describe it.

Yes, that's an interesting point about the school regime and younger people still learning about norms. That reminds me of another book which I loved as a teenager but read with a different perspective many years later, Brideshead Revisited. When I re-read it in my 30s, I was far more aware of Sebastian's alcohol addiction and how the family attempts to 'deal' with this. As a teenager, I had focussed more on the coming-of-age idealisation of Sebastian's and Charles' relationship whereas, as an adult, I had more sympathy for the family and how the situation impacted on them. I also had far more sympathy for Charles' abandonned family in the second part of the novel!

Much more frivolous, but these days when I read The Diary of a Provincial Lady I absolutely sympathise with her comment that mothers will put off anything, even death, until after the end of the school holidays!

I adored The Great Gatsby as a young teenager. I loved the descriptions of the parties and imagined that is how my adult life would be (yeah, right). But it was only when I re-read it in my 30s that it struck me that Jay Gatsby is a criminal, or at the very least, involved in shady dealings. Quite how this detail passed me by in my teens is astounding. Did I just think that he became suddenly wealthy by working hard or by winning the lottery?

Also his relationship with Daisy is worryingly stalker-ish. But in my teens, I just accepted it as "lurve". It makes me worry for my younger self. Luckily, my boyfriend (now dh) is very normal and not at all Gatsby-ish

We read Cranford at school and I found it boring and uninteresting. Last year some one in my book group selected it for us to read and I was dreading it. I actually loved it on second reading and found so much more in it, including humour and some very poignant moments. Wasted on a fourteenyearold!

Really obvious one as it's 'other side' has been discussed so much in 20th Century criticism, but Jane Eyre.

At 9/10 just loved following the character of Jane, a bookworm with mean cousins goes on to have an adventurous and successful life.

At 14/15 was completely into the romance, Rochester needs Jane to make him happy, only she can be his perfect companion.

25+ whaaaaaat?! RUN, Jane, RUN!

Its, rather.

The Girl In The Swing

As a teenager I thought this a profound and wonderful book. As a woman with children I found it shocking in the extreme, especially given the protagonist's insistence that Kristen should not be blamed because she was so so special.

Wuthering Heights is the main book that does this for me.

I don't remember ever being too won over by the romance of it as a teenager when I first read it, but despite that it still gets worse every time I read it (have read it 5-6 times now). I think it is being an adult which does it. I've been in love, I've experienced life, and every time I read that book I've learned something else which sheds more light on how dark and twisted that story is.

I also remember absolutely hating To Kill a Mockingbird as a teenager, and finally rereading it in my mid-twenties and realising what an amazing story it is. Probably says a lot about how blinkered and naive I was as a teenager

And on a much shallow note, I've just started reading Winnie the Pooh to the DC and I'd forgotten how funny it is. As in proper, adult humour funny.

That's interesting rosabud about your changing sympathies with Brideshead, I'm trying to think of an example as I know I've had this recently, an awareness that once I would have been completely on the side of the disaffected teen, but since having (even still very young) children, find myself having more sympathy with the 'parent' characters and seeing situations in a more complex light. I guess it is just life experience.

I didn't read Winnie the Pooh as a child, Thurlow, was quite well-read on the whole but somehow it escaped me, then only really knew of it from Disney clips and merchandise so never thought much of it.

I am discovering it now as my ds is coming round to the age for it, and really love the humour.

Wuthering Heights for me too. I also find myself sympathising with totally different characters.

Mine is we need to talk about Kevin. Read it when it first came out (think I was around 16?) and very much blamed Kevin, thinking it's obvious some people are born evil.

It's only now I see how unreliable Eva is, and as a mother I cant accept the idea that some children are born evil.

I never used to blame Eva, but now I think I do.

I also used to think wuthering heights was romantic. I still love it now, but think cathy needs a slap and heathcliff is a sadist

to Kill a mockingbird is one I've changed views on since rereading as an adult

don't get me wrong - i still love it. But from a feminist perspective, I find Atticus'/the narrator's certainty that the poor girl from the bad family is making it up quite troubling.

Also Pride and Prejudice

Possible to read as Lizzie Bennett becoming much more of a pragmatist when she realises that Darcy is a much better option than those her best friend and her younger sister were forced into. Even if they fall out of love, there's enough space in that big house for them to lead seperate lives...

Wuthering Heights here too. In my teens was the idea the unrequited love, and tragedy being the most romantic. Similarly Tess of the Durbervilles.

D'Urbervilles even!

I read The L-Shaped Room as a teenager and was overcome by the tragedy of Toby and heroine not getting together in the end. I re-read it recently and was "plenty more fish in the sea love" about it.

I read Pride and Prejudice for a college course I was doing (had read it multiple times since a teen) and during our discussions I realised that Mr. Bennett was far weaker than I thought - basically a useless father (his wit distracted me the first few times reading it). A lot of women (we were an older group) felt the same about him. In fact there are very few strong male characters in that novel besides Darcy - and he has some problems himself.

I re read Anne of Green Gables recently and was amazed that it was still as fresh, lively, vivid as I remembered it - she leaps off the page as a whole distinct person ready to go down in the annals of literature.

dancing: "don't get me wrong - i still love it. But from a feminist perspective, I find Atticus'/the narrator's certainty that the poor girl from the bad family is making it up quite troubling."

That has long bothered me. Malcolm Gladwell recently wrote a critique of Mockingbird in which he mentions this as well as a few other problems with the book. It's an odd kind of novel in that it has this revered status in American literature - whereas most great American books (Great Gatsby, Grapes of Wrath etc) have reams written about them, and people who dissent from the general view of their greatness, Mockingbird just hasn't attracted that kind of critical attention. It's almost as if it's regarded as untouchable.

Less profound that some: the Adrian Mole books. I've grown up with him. When I first read the books, I took his descriptions of his parents at face value, but now that I'm their age, I see it differently - still funny, but in a different way.

A agree with the changed reading of Pride & Prejudice and Mr Bennett's weakness. Also, I have increased sympathy for Charlotte Collin's pragmatism.

This thread makes me feel that I need to go back and do more re-reading!

That's a very interesting point re To Kill A Mockingbird - reading it from a feminist perspective. I need to read it again now! I wonder if I would also read the Atticus-Jem-Scout relationships differently?

I love the idea of reading Adrian Mole from the parents' perspective! I think there are many children's books that this would apply to from amusing examples like Adrian to more serious ones. When I was little, I loved the Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder and, told from Laura's child's viewpoint they are exciting adventures, but, reading them to my children, I now appreciatte how they are a tribute to what, for her pioneer parents, must have been a very challenging life-style.

I struggled to read any classics at school. I recently reread Pride and Prejudice and realised how witty Austen's observations are. Am now reading more of her books.

The What Katy Did books.

Aged ten, they were lovely stories about a happy family and its adventures.

Aged now, I see an anti feminist agenda, suffering as noble (the fetishisation of the invalid) and the punishment of any woman who deviates from the norm. The selfishness of the family towards Aunt Izzy and the insufferable Clover and Helen who didn't read the bit about pride in their fortitude and piety being a sin.