'Little Dorrit' readalong

[Piggywaspushed]

Hello and welcome to our next proposed Dickensalong after the success of our previous readalongs!

On our previous thread I suggested our first month as commencing in April and convening on June 1st to discuss the first instalment : gives everyone time to get copies and get settled down.

Everyone is welcome! We always start with about 10 people and end up with about 5...

Instalments I have chosen follow Dickens' shorter 19 instalments (which were all exactly the same number of pages originally - that must have taken considerable planning and editing!) but come in pairs or trios:-
The novel comprises only two Books, which forces a break at a particular point, too.

May 2021 - Book One , Chapters 1-11
June - Chapters 12-18
July - Chapters 19-25
August - Chapters 26- 36
September - Book Two Chapters 1-11
October - Chapters 12-18
November - Chapters 19-26
December - Chapters 27 - 34

So finished by 2022. I think that suits reading speed of most.

Happy Reading!

Started reading today but am going to be more prepared than with previous readalongs and keep a note on the characters and the main goings-on as my memory is too dodgy to be able to remember it all, especially if there is a couple of weeks between reading sessions.

Oh me too Cludgie - I like Dickens, but I have to keep notes!

And I’m off - read the first two chapters last night :) Happily a less baffling opening than OMF!

I haven’t started yet, must get cracking!

I've read up to chapter 11 and am really enjoying it!

Reactivating the thread to remind people it is June in a couple of days! I have just have three chapters to go.

Same here Piggy!

I'm ready to start

I’ve done all my chapters

Morning All!

I accidentally read an extra chapter. Silly me! End Chapter 11 would have been a much better place to end it for this month too...

In common with those who recently read Our Mutual Friend, I have found this clearer and more followable. I have nothing much deep to say , however : not sure Dickens has hit his peak descriptive powers yet.

He did , however, hit his peak satirical powers in the circumlocution office chapter which was joyously silly yet menacing. Anyone who has worked in Whitehall or even the civil service generally will, I am sure, recognise the farcical how not to do it ness. It also reminds me of years working in the bureaucracies of education. If anyone has seen Gregory's Girl it reminded me of the penguins endlessly being dispatched around the corridors to mythical rooms to do goodness knows what!

Am currently a bit confused by the French subplot. Had to skim reread Chapter One when I got to Chapter 11. Am also not really very sure who Clennam actually is, other than an apparent good egg.

I'm enjoying it. Little Dorrit was the first Dickens I read about 25 years ago when I was at university so it's nice to be rereading it. I think the Dickens I have read since is better and it's not surprising that books like Great Expectations, Oliver Twist and David Copperfield are better known.

I'm also finding the circumlocution office entertaining. At 18 I hadn't dealt with utility companies, councils or any of the organisations with a tendency to send you around in circles to resolve something fairly simple!

Also trying to think back @Piggywaspushed to remember the relevance of the French subplot but can't recall it at the moment.

Morning all!
I enjoyed the first installment very much. I hadn't read Dickens in years, and I was a bit daunted at the thought of it, but I'm finding it entertaining and the story is skipping along at a good pace.
I thought the first chapter was very atmospheric. Rigaud is a classic cloak and dagger villain. It made me laugh when John Baptist sneaked out on meeting him again and ran away, loath to renew his acquaintance with him at the end of chapter eleven.
I also enjoyed the description of the Circumlocution Office and the endless ineptitude and red tape, He wound and wound folds of white cravat round his neck, as he wound and wound folds of tape and paper round the neck of the country.

Oh that is indeed a good line!

I really enjoyed it too and wanted to read on! I liked the parallels between Arthur and Amy - both good children who are trying to sort out the missteps of their parents. Both Arthur’s mother and Amy’s father are imprisoned in their own ways. I was (pleasantly) surprised by Dickens’ criticism of Mrs Clennam’s harsh judgemental brand of Christianity - I tend to think of Victorians as generally approving of that sort of thing (Dickens lived a couple of thousand years after my main era of historical interest ).

Circumlocution Office v good and I wonder if Dickens had perhaps had experience of university administration... I also suspect he was being deliberately rude with the line ‘Its finger was in the largest public pie, and in the smallest public tart.’ Tart already meant attractive woman in the c19th, and by the end of the century in definitely meant what it means to us.

I liked it

I am enjoying it so far.
I liked the Circumlocution office description as well - Dickens at his finest.

It's early days yet, but I am struggling a bit with the French subplot, and with so many characters to keep track of anyway, why on earth do they have to have multiple names for the same character - John Baptist/Cavaletto - are they the same person? not even that sure.

I also love the random characters that turn up by coincidence and give a full character rundown or story update.
Like when Mr Clennam is stalking Little Dorrit and just HAPPENS to run into her uncle outside the prison, who spills the whole story quite happily to a random guy asking after his niece.

I am assuming we will meet Mr Meagles again, apart from the meeting about the non-specific invention. And his daughter Pet (name makes me shudder a bit)

I agree about the too many characters. Already forgotten Mr Meagles! Wouldn't be a Dickens without a bewildering cast of characters though!

@rc22

Also trying to think back *@Piggywaspushed* to remember the relevance of the French subplot but can't recall it at the moment.

When we were considering LD a possible read, I was keen (I like the book) but worried that others might find the French-based opening-chapter off putting. Rather foolishly, I said something along the lines of "Don't worry, you don't see any of these characters again". I was wrong, of course, as I can see, having gone back to the book, but I can understand why the 7-hour movie(s) of LD, which I love, excised Monsieur Whatsit/Wossname/, though reviewers on IMDB argue persuasively that the novel's denouement is thus ruined.

As with so many 'plot' books, I'd suggest that most of the fun is enjoying the trip,, rather than the "Gosh, so the butler done it" moment. Though I've read some Dickens' novels several times, I'd be pressed to remember what the 'startling revelation' is at the end of most of them. (With notable exceptions for Great Expectations, which had a new revised ending added by the author, and The Mystery of Edwin Drood, which was uncompleted on his death; I'm not sure that even Dickens knew at that stage who'd done the murder...if there was a murder).

If anyone's on the verge of starting Little Dorrit, I'd urge them not to be put off by a few foreign phrases, or characters dropping out of the story for a while. There's a very good Penguin edition which explains all the then-topical allusions and foreign phrases. Well worth getting that rather than the bog-standard Penguin.

Mr Meagles makes an unflattering reference to 'La Marseillaise' in chapter two. It wouldn't exist without allonging or marshonging to something or other this would be 'allons' and 'marchons' I suppose.

Yes, 'Pet' was more than a bit grating, not to mention the renaming of her maid from Harriet to Tattycoram. No wonder she doesn't like the Meagles!

@LadybirdDaphne

I really enjoyed it too and wanted to read on! I liked the parallels between Arthur and Amy - both good children who are trying to sort out the missteps of their parents. Both Arthur’s mother and Amy’s father are imprisoned in their own ways. I was (pleasantly) surprised by Dickens’ criticism of Mrs Clennam’s harsh judgemental brand of Christianity - I tend to think of Victorians as generally approving of that sort of thing (Dickens lived a couple of thousand years after my main era of historical interest ).

Circumlocution Office v good and I wonder if Dickens had perhaps had experience of university administration... I also suspect he was being deliberately rude with the line ‘Its finger was in the largest public pie, and in the smallest public tart.’ Tart already meant attractive woman in the c19th, and by the end of the century in definitely meant what it means to us.

In 'Sunday under Three Heads, Dickens had a go at Sabbatarians, who were trying to make Victorian Sundays even gloomier. He concludes that some of these people: "turn their eyes and not their thoughts to Heaven, and delude themselves into the impious belief, that in denouncing the lightness of heart of which they cannot partake, and the rational pleasures from which they never derived enjoyment, they are...establishing a good set claim upon their Maker." www.gutenberg.org/files/922/922-h/922-h.htm

Mrs.Clenham's isn't the sort of Christianity that Dickens held in high regard.

I’m enjoying this so far. I’m glad Rigaud and Cavaletto popped up again, even though we still don’t really know who they are, or why they’re in the story. I wonder if/when we will meet Mrs Wade again. I liked the contrasting descriptions of a very depressing sounding London straight after the chapters describing the very hot and sunny Marseille. And agree with the others that the circumlocution office chapter was very funny. It reminded me of trying to deal with my company’s IT department. I’m looking forward to the next chapters.

Remind me who Mrs Wade is ??

I had to look her up! She befriended Tattycoram after her outburst. She is 'a sensitive woman of sullen and ungovernable temper' according to the index of characters in my edition.

Ah! Thanks!