Hello Victorians,
Sketches by Boz:
Illustrative of Every-Day Life and Every-Day People is a collection of
short prose pieces Charles Dickens wrote sporadically between 1833 and
1836. Unlike the novels in the class, Sketches was not composed as a single
text. Originally, the sketches were
written piecemeal and published in several different magazines and
newspapers. Also unlike our novels, many
of the sketches are non-narrative.
Instead of a series of interlocking events, the three sketches we are
reading present descriptions of people, places, or events in London, as
witnessed by the pseudonymous “Boz.”
As you read, you might consider two interrelated
points. First, how are the sketches
organized? Is there temporal
progression? Are there compositional
patterns akin to those of verse? As we
mentioned in class, these little pieces are like “Victoria Bridge on a Saturday
Night” in that they rely heavily on lists.
What is the effect of this? Are
lists a means of imparting order? Or do
lists have no order at all?
Secondly, what is the role of Boz? Is he a narrator in the same sense that Jane Eyre is? Is he an objective reporter of whatever happens across his path? Can we tell whether he is invested in what he is sketching, or is he always looking at London from a critical distance?
Secondly, what is the role of Boz? Is he a narrator in the same sense that Jane Eyre is? Is he an objective reporter of whatever happens across his path? Can we tell whether he is invested in what he is sketching, or is he always looking at London from a critical distance?
In addition to being Dickens’ first published work, the
sketches also represent the beginning of a long collaboration between him and
the illustrator George Cruikshank. I've included the illustrations to the three sketches in the handout; enjoy further illustrations below.
All best,
Prof. M.
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| Cover illustration |
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| Illustration of "Gin Shops" |
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| Illustration of "Seven Dials" |
Chapter One opens and closes with fleeting descriptions of working girls: "scarcely less unfortunate pursuits of business" and later, "poor girls!-the hardest worked, the worst paid, and too often, the worst used class of the community." While there is a definite twinge of condescension: in the first line, which implies that the prostitutes are not in an entirely separate category of distress and difficulty than the gross men who are their customers, and in the second line, with its patronizing exclamation of "poor girls!" However, by beginning and ending his piece on Morning with these women - not only prostitutes, but all women who work, be it in a millinery, a tailor's, or a brothel - Dickens does display an observational sensitivity to the hopeless, cyclical position of so many of the gender; whatever the work, the work women are put to is always a form of exploration, and Dickens is sure not to romanticize their harsh realities. Also, fascinatingly, Dickens writes "Mr Todd's young man, who being fond of mails, but more of females," including the obvious double entendre of the homonyms "mail" and "male" with is suggestions of the ambiguities of gender norms.
ReplyDeleteSimilarly, in "Greenwich Fair," he rips into the rapacious, predatory behaviors of the masculine in supposed romance, while the women are allegedly eager to be conquered/overpowered. Dickens's description of the man's thinking of playing the game of hard-to-get reveals the disturbing essence of that mentality, without overtly passing judgement on the scene. He writes "Lucretia ejaculations" - hands-down, the best line in today's reading - so it seems pretty clear that Dickens is not praising the male's perspective of, "enhance the value of stolen kisses, by a vast deal of struggling," etc. However, the language, though violent, and, even with the inclusion of the allusion to Lucretia, still avoid pounding the reader atop the head with Social Commentary.
Of course, Dickens as an enlightened, progressive thinker is always cut off at the knees any time the dude mentions Jews; there is no redeemable way of reading "the usual crowd of Jews and nondescripts," and, as is well documented, this is far the Dickens only foray into uncomplimentary, if not outright antisemitic, descriptions of the Jew. So, as a Jew and a woman - jackpot! - every Dickensian moment is constantly informed by these sort of dichotomous feelings towards and author who is offering an honest perspective of his world which is constantly marred by glaring missteps; the blind/dumb Dickens gets in the way and dulling the credibility of the intelligently aware author. Though one could not presume to name Charles Dickens the only author who wrote disparagingly, atrociously on Jews, the sort of whiplash between his insight with his racism is distinctly disturbing, and aggravating. This was actually quite a therapeutic working out of a mosh of aggravated feelings towards the guy.
Also:
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/84/9f/9c/849f9c1c79629ac02021c42198aca545.jpg
Sketches reads like a journalistic account of the goings-on in London. I imagine Boz to be a sort of Flaneur, walking down the streets observing the people, content to be removed from the rush.
ReplyDeleteThe general effect of the pieces was very much, “the world next door to ours,” a look at places and people that are not considered worthy of attention. Dickens does this by dipping into the consciousness of the people he is describing. You don’t get middle-aged men walk down the street, but “middle-aged men whose salaries have by no means increased in the same proportion as their families,” in a sort-of Homeric way, Dickens gives us a small look into the lives of the people he is writing about, just enough for us to see that the people he is listing are complex.
Additionally, there is a sense of monotony to all of these affairs, the men, have walked this street every day, the women have bought those same muffins, every day. Even the Greenwich Fair, which is supposed to shock London out of its endless routines is still prone to “perpetual bustle and noise.” Dickens breaks this mundanity by pointing out people or ideas that are rarely noticed. So included in a safe list describing cabs, coaches and stages is the line “for the question never is, what the horse can draw, but what the vehicle will hold.” There is a dichotomy between the words can and will, that seems to give the vehicle more consideration than the animal. Again and again Dickens includes jarring sentiments in an otherwise amusing list, “Imagine yourself in an extremely dense crowd, which swings you to and fro, and in and out, and every way but the right one; add to this the screams of women, the shouts of boys, the clanging of gongs…” When describing the overwhelming chaos of the fair Dickens points out that with all of the this is a loosening of the moral standards. The women and boys seem to be the ones getting shoved in directions they may not want to go (suggestive wink).
Finally, in the last sketch, there is a chilling moment in which Dickens, instead of pointing out the ignored, ignores them himself with “Seen one seen them all” flippancy. He states, “Our curiosity, however, was satisfied. The first group had left an impression on our mind we would gladly have avoided, and would willingly have effaced.” This line alludes to lists he doesn’t want to make, to people he has never met, whom he groups with people he has already seen and deemed not palatable.
The Sketches by Boz are reminiscent of poetry in the sense that they don’t feel the need to tell a story – they are more invested in creating a certain feeling, or atmosphere. They are organized as a description of a certain scene as it progresses through the day, from beginning to end. Yet since there no actual storyline, the “story” is more of a tour of the surrounding attractions, picking up and dropping characters as it pleases. These sketches don’t resemble a story, so much as a list (as mentioned) or collage of different stories, in the context of the larger story of London.
ReplyDeleteThe narrator is another interesting feature. In the first chapter, we have no hint that the narrator is a person at all – it seems to be a disembodied, mostly impartial observer. In “Greenwich Fair” and “The Prisoners’ Van,” we get a personal story from the narrator – but the narrator(s) describes itself as “we,” a sort of hive mind of people. This hive-mind exhibits an interesting balance between objectivity and partiality. Overall, its’ tone seems to be gently amused and slightly cynical about the people and circumstances it is describing, but it doesn’t favor any one over another, nor does it seem to be pushing any ideology or agenda. Every so often, the narrator will express the barest bit of personal opinion – it can’t help but sigh over the “poor girls” so mistreated by the workplace – but for the most part, it seems to be uncaringly and amusedly people-watching from a high window seat.
The result of the disembodied or collective narrator, combined with the impersonal nature of the narrative (a larger scope, uninterested in investing in particular people), creates the impression of a society where the individual is highly irrelevant, considering the whole. Each character is only seen for a second, getting no glimpse of any inner world, and then the narrator moves on to the next person or scene, last character forgotten. In Boz’s London, the individual is swallowed by the communal, and no one cares very much at all.
Firstly, I want to say that I feel these sketches very much represent "realism". Although they are maybe not as gritty as other writings we have read, they are also not shying away or covering up bad aspects (though the sketches do come across as a bit magical). With regards to the order, I definitely can see a natural shift from day to night, which when a narrator is giving an "unfocused" story, as in not following one particular character, is the natural progression of things. I didn't notice a particular order besides for the day progression, and that is perhaps connected to the lack of narrator. If the narrator wants an omniscient view, yet follows the street in an order as if he is walking down it, then the effect is kind of lost. Also, by listing different aspects I think the reader gets overwhelmed in a way, and that is the writer's point. The point of characters in a story is to perhaps give the story focus, and direction. We would only see where that character goes, and who is connected to them: only things to propel the story forwards. But when the entire city is your character, then there is no need to focus, or even whittle out aspects that may not relate, because the point is to get as broad of a sense as possible. Also with regards to Boz, about whether he is viewing the city from a distance: I feel like someone who writes with such detail cannot really be so distant. This hustle and bustle is not unusual to him, he is merely exploring it. But the fact that he almost knows where to look tells me that he is deeply connected to the city. Is he similar to Jane Eyre? I think he could be, if you count London as one single character.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteThe descriptions seem almost pastoral and romantic in their length and depth. The people on the street are likened to animals, almost as if they're the sheep on the rolling green hills.
Yet that's where such imagery seems to end. Even trivial individuals, mentioned only in passing, receive names. Placed are more understandable, as they are crucial to painting the landscape accurately as per realism's conventions. The names fall into this category as
well; it's just astonishing how he made up/included so many (although in the face of reading Greenwich Fair, individuals are really not the concern).
There's is an indistinct, yet personable omniscient narrator. The sketches are written in the present tense, which I don't think was all that typical? As per romantics, writing is about looking behind you (in a fictitious manner or not), but despite this London belonging to the 1800s, the scene is discernible today. The narrator has a distinct voice, yet I don’t think that it’s meant to be associated with Boz/Dickens specifically--can we attach the sprinkles of sentiment to the author,
or not?
But there is no... overarching plot to these sketches, though. They are not intended to be stories or self contained works: they are defined by their being a set, with each scene relating to those in the collection, as well as by their referencing real life. And I suppose that that's realism as well, because real life doesn't always have a plot-- sometimes (i.e. most of the time) people just wake up in the morning and go about the same routine without rising action or climaxes or any big surprises. There's nothing overtly astonishing about these sketches save for the textual style; Dickens shows us exactly what we expect to see and what we’ve been trained to look past.