Bleak House Readalong: March 2018 - Sept 2019

[ScribblyGum]

Some of us are doing this on the 50 books thread so I thought I would start a separate discussion thread.

Inspired by Books and Things on YouTube, aim is to read Bleak House in the time frame in which it was published, so reading 3-4 chapters per month starting in March this year and finishing in September of next.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=W-DYX4lyw1M

I’ve linked the original YouTube video (she is really really excited about Bleak House ), Katie also has chapter discussion threads on her good reads page, and a picture of the chapters and the months in which they are to be read.

I am still here, just about keeping up, it's the last day in July and I started the July chapters yesterday, hopefully will read the rest of them later today
I have never read a book like this before and I think I have probably already forgotten a lot of the details from earlier in the book!

I have managed to finish this month's chapters by the end of the month for a change

I enjoyed July's chapters. I read the first two in one sitting as they were Esther and then read the Lady Deadlock chapter. Still can't really remember the first two chaps all that well, but that may be because I find the Lady D chapters more compelling/ mysterious. I like all the cavalcade of Dickensian eccentric chapters but wish my book had a dramatis personae at the front : that would be genuinely helpful!

I liked the July chapters too, definitely some mystery going on with Lady Deadlock and the dead legal writer.
I have the Penguin Popular Classics version it does not have notes but it does have a list of characters at the front which comes in handy at times. It does not contain every single character but has most of the ones we have come across so far.

Oh I wish I had that one! I have Wordworth Classics : the cheapest, and does have notes but very small print!!

I have not read my July chapters yet.

I will have read my chapters by this weekend.

I don’t feel too bad as Katie has been getting later and later with her videos and has set a very bad example. I might read July and August all in one big dollop and then will be back on track again.

I know : I checked on Katie today. I feel a bit teacherly about her tardiness!

July read. Agree about the Lady D chapters. OMG at the description of having to stamp on poor Nemo's body to get him in the hole on top of the rest of the bodies. No wonder she had a mini fit of the vapours.

Yet more characters introduced in the Esther chapters. Enough already now Charles. I sadly don’t have a list of characters in my book (I have maps ) so had to google who this poor dead Coavinses was only for Google to helpfully give me a massive unrelated spoiler before the requested information. Humph. Maybe I should embrace the Victorian way and just look back in the book to find out information.

I made that mistake too when I checked Sporcle. I am just going with the flow as I reckon even if I read at normal speed all these new characters and reintroduced charcaters would confuse me. I feel like it needs some sort of Baz Luhrman treatment - like the book equivalent of a freezeframe and an intertile on screen. Perhpas Dickens shoud have used bold for a newly introduced character or event you are paying no attention to but will end up being Very Important

Just interruptig to say how much I love this book! I can see why some are finding it a slog reading it slowly though. I struggled with it on and off for years before finally taking it on holiday. Once I had the time to just immerse myself in it, I could not put it down! I would be boring DH with the latest twists every day over lunch until I finished it.

It was my first Dickens and a good one!

Piggy, yes I am rather concerned that a character or event subtly embedded in the corner of a chapter is going to turn out to be desperately important and I'm going to be madly flicking backwards trying to work out what the hell is going on. Mr Turveydrop for instance, surely a dancing and deportment teacher is to going to be a key player but who knows? At least his name fits his profession which helps the memory. I'm imagining Turveydrop is a Victorian word for a technique to combat the teenage slouch.

Hushabye that’s good to know. I'm half expecting that very soon the whole thing is going to take off, now Dickens has done the ground work of establishing the main characters and what’s what with the plot.

Now, you see, I had altogther forgotten Turveydrop, even with his brilliant name!

Another poor unfortunate soul whose parent is a total arsehole. The book is littered with them.

Oh yes, I remember him now!

Tbf , my parents are arseholes on the whole , so it's very observant of Dickens!

It does seem to be an ongoing theme. Trying to remember if any of the characters have a standard non-abusive/non-arsehole/non-dead-in-mysterious-circumstances parent. Coming up blank.
Wonder if Bleak House was the inspiration for Larkin's This Be The Verse?

not that I'm inferring that you are fucked up Piggy. You sound extremely normal and not at all arseholey.

I do frequently think of Larkin!

Still no July chapters video from Katie. She seems to have fallen down an Austin rabbit hole.

I might tweet her and see what gives!

Well whatever you said it worked Piggy.

Completely missed the tiny but I gather rather important references to Mr Woodcourt. Oh Esther you dark horse you.

I just politely enquired and told her how much I enjoyed her insights...!

I need to watch this now. I have no idea who Mr Woodcourt is!

I watched it but kept turning it off to hear if the sirens were outside my house! was some kind of international incident unfolding outside Katie's windows of which she was blissfully unaware, or have I got terrible tinnitus!?

Anyway, I am reminded now of Mr Woodcourt. I ahd actaully recalled him , but not his name.

She was suitably chastened by her tardiness!

I struggled to remember who coavinses was as well, I think I he was the debt collector who tried to get money off the child-man (have not got the book with me and I can't remember his name right now) at Bleak House and was paid off by Esther. Is that right?
I am on holiday at the moment so can't watch the video until the end of the month when I get home. I don't like to read the next chapters until I have watched the video of the previous ones otherwise I get confused. I find the videos do help with highlighting what is important and helping to remember who characters are.
ScribblyGum what do the maps in your edition show? I like a good map but I can't see how it is needed here.

Maps off London and the Inns of Court and Inns of Chancery

Maps of London obviously.