David Copperfield: “blew away the old familiar feeling like a feather”

1/ Why am I in the 19th century again? You ask. Am I not supposed to be in the 18th century? I took just one book with me to Leeds, is my answer. But reading Dickens right after Tom Jones is also a good idea. The English novel was developed along two major tracks—the Fielding track and the Richardson track—and Dickens came out of the Fielding track. 

Dickens is such an inventive writer. Love his imagination.

“As the elms bent to one another, like giants who were whispering secrets, and after a few seconds of such repose, fell into a violent flurry, tossing their wild arms about, as if their late confidences were really too wicked for their peace of mind, some weatherbeaten ragged old rooks’-nests, burdening their higher branches, swung like wrecks upon a stormy sea.” (ch.1) 

Like the sentient trees in Chekhov. 

We see the elm-trees again later: 

“The days when my mother and I and Peggotty were all in all to one another, and there was no one to come between us, rose up before me so sorrowfully on the road, that I am not sure I was glad to be there—not sure but that I would rather have remained away, and forgotten it in Steerforth’s company. But there I was; and soon I was at our house, where the bare old elm-trees wrung their many hands in the bleak wintry air, and shreds of the old rooks’-nests drifted away upon the wind.” (ch.8) 

Dickens’s imagination is always a bit strange—here he may even have more freedom because the first part of the novel is seen through the eyes of a child: 

“The carrier’s horse was the laziest horse in the world, I should hope, and shuffled along, with his head down, as if he liked to keep people waiting to whom the packages were directed. I fancied, indeed, that he sometimes chuckled audibly over this reflection, but the carrier said he was only troubled with a cough.” (ch.3) 

See how David describes Miss Murdstone, the sister of his stepfather Mr Murdstone: 

“She brought with her two uncompromising hard black boxes, with her initials on the lids in hard brass nails. When she paid the coachman she took her money out of a hard steel purse, and she kept the purse in a very jail of a bag which hung upon her arm by a heavy chain, and shut up like a bite. I had never, at that time, seen such a metallic lady altogether as Miss Murdstone was.” (ch.4) 

With just a few strokes, Dickens conveys the first impression, the coldness and hardness of Miss Murdstone. Here, again, he quickly conveys the effect of the Murdstones on the boy and the whole house: 

“It appeared to my childish fancy, as I ascended to the bedroom where I had been imprisoned, that they brought a cold blast of air into the house which blew away the old familiar feeling like a feather.” (ch.8)

2/ I’m not sure if it’s because David Copperfield has a first-person narrator or because it’s personal, semi-autobiographical, but there’s a tenderness in the tone that makes it feel quite different from other Dickens novels I have read. 

“Of course I was in love with little Em’ly. I am sure I loved that baby quite as truly, quite as tenderly, with greater purity and more disinterestedness, than can enter into the best love of a later time of life, high and ennobling as it is. I am sure my fancy raised up something round that blue-eyed mite of a child, which etherealized, and made a very angel of her. If, any sunny forenoon, she had spread a little pair of wings and flown away before my eyes, I don’t think I should have regarded it as much more than I had had reason to expect.

We used to walk about that dim old flat at Yarmouth in a loving manner, hours and hours. The days sported by us, as if Time had not grown up himself yet, but were a child too, and always at play.” (ch.3)  

I love that last sentence. 

3/ Who says Dickens is sentimental (in a derogatory sense)? Some passages in David Copperfield are among the most moving things I’ve ever read. David’s fear as he’s imprisoned in his bedroom by Mr Murdstone, his exchange with his nurse Peggoty through the keyhole, his love for his mother, his grief after his mother and baby brother die—it’s all delicate and deeply moving. 

I especially love this passage: 

“I thought of our house shut up and hushed. I thought of the little baby, who, Mrs. Creakle said, had been pining away for some time, and who, they believed, would die too. I thought of my father’s grave in the churchyard, by our house, and of my mother lying there beneath the tree I knew so well. I stood upon a chair when I was left alone, and looked into the glass to see how red my eyes were, and how sorrowful my face. […]

If ever child were stricken with sincere grief, I was. But I remember that this importance was a kind of satisfaction to me, when I walked in the playground that afternoon while the boys were in school. When I saw them glancing at me out of the windows, as they went up to their classes, I felt distinguished, and looked more melancholy, and walked slower. When school was over, and they came out and spoke to me, I felt it rather good in myself not to be proud to any of them, and to take exactly the same notice of them all, as before.” (ch.9) 

Who says Dickens is not subtle? That’s a great detail. 

Now look at this passage, when David is on the way home after the awful news and he is the only one feeling miserable: 

“I do not think I have ever experienced so strange a feeling in my life (I am wiser now, perhaps) as that of being with them, remembering how they had been employed, and seeing them enjoy the ride. I was not angry with them; I was more afraid of them, as if I were cast away among creatures with whom I had no community of nature. They were very cheerful. The old man sat in front to drive, and the two young people sat behind him, and whenever he spoke to them leaned forward, the one on one side of his chubby face and the other on the other, and made a great deal of him. They would have talked to me too, but I held back, and moped in my corner; scared by their love-making and hilarity, though it was far from boisterous, and almost wondering that no judgement came upon them for their hardness of heart.” (ibid.) 

That is something you find in Chekhov. 

Tom Jones: why you should read this tale of “bastardism, fornication, and adultery”

1/ I can see why Coleridge thinks Tom Jones has one of the most perfect plots in literature, alongside Oedipus Tyrannus by Sophocles and The Alchemist by Ben Jonson. Exciting plot, cleverly constructed, brilliantly told. 

As I wrote in an earlier blog post, the novel is sharply divided into three parts: 

• Fielding introduces the story of Tom Jones as a foundling on Mr Allworthy’s estate in Somersetshire and the conflict between him and Mr Allworthy’s nephew, Master Blifil; Jones and Sophia Western grow up together as neighbours and fall in love (in the background: Jones shags some trollop)
• Tom Jones is turned out of doors and soon accompanied by Partridge; Sophia, forced to marry Master Blifil, runs away from home; this part is about all the adventures and encounters on the way to London (in the background: Jones shags another trollop) 
• The characters are now all in London (in the background: Jones shags yet another trollop)

(I know, there’s a lot of shagging). 

Whereas Joseph Andrews feels episodic and nothing quite holds it together, Tom Jones has two things that hold our interest for the entire book: the mystery of Jones’s parentage and the love story between him and Sophia. And even if you generally care more about characters or writing style or metaphors, I think anyone would still be in awe of how well Fielding constructs the plot. 

I saw some blogger remark (but not in a derogatory way) that, like Dickens, Fielding stays on the surface and doesn’t dig deep into the characters’ minds but, like Dickens, creates many vivid and memorable characters—an endless examination of every character’s thoughts and motivations would have robbed the novel of its vitality. I would go further. It actually serves the plot that Fielding, for example, doesn’t enter Master Blifil’s mind—he withholds information from the reader and surprises us later. 

2/ Fielding is one of the writers with the pleasantest and most lovable authorial personae, though he’s more visible on the page than Cervantes or Chekhov. 

“Mrs Waters had, in truth, not only a good opinion of our heroe, but a very great affection for him. To speak out boldly at once, she was in love, according to the present universally-received sense of that phrase, by which love is applied indiscriminately to the desirable objects of all our passions, appetites, and senses, and is understood to be that preference which we give to one kind of food rather than to another.

But though the love to these several objects may possibly be one and the same in all cases, its operations however must be allowed to be different; for, how much soever we may be in love with an excellent surloin of beef, or bottle of Burgundy; with a damask rose, or Cremona fiddle; yet do we never smile, nor ogle, nor dress, nor flatter, nor endeavour by any other arts or tricks to gain the affection of the said beef, &c. Sigh indeed we sometimes may; but it is generally in the absence, not in the presence, of the beloved object.” (B.9, ch.5) 

How could anyone not like him? 

“We would bestow some pains here in minutely describing all the mad pranks which Jones played on this occasion, could we be well assured that the reader would take the same pains in perusing them; but as we are apprehensive that, after all the labour which we should employ in painting this scene, the said reader would be very apt to skip it entirely over, we have saved ourselves that trouble.” (B.12, ch.3) 

He is witty and good-humoured and tolerant—his moral compass is firmly established, he has no naïveté or delusion about human nature, and we can see his abhorrence for tyranny, hypocrisy, and cruelty—but he never comes across as harsh or judgemental as we sometimes notice in George Eliot or Tolstoy. I also like that Tom Jones is divided into 18 books and each one begins with the author talking about the very novel we’re reading and his techniques. Meta?  

If you like Jane Austen, you would also like Fielding, because he also deals with appearance vs reality, hypocrisy, prudence, self-perception, and growth. 

If you like Dickens, you would also like Fielding, for his energy and vitality, and Fielding also deals with poverty, hardship, and charity. 

Fielding creates Mr Allworthy to be the moral centre of the novel, and wisely keeps him in the background for most of it. Throughout the book, Fielding often argues for mercy, forgiveness, and generosity, but he is not naïve—I like that towards the end, Mr Allworthy gives this speech when Jones is soft on people who have wronged him:  

““… Such mistaken mercy is not only weakness, but borders on injustice, and is very pernicious to society, as it encourages vice. The dishonesty of this fellow I might, perhaps, have pardoned, but never his ingratitude. And give me leave to say, when we suffer any temptation to atone for dishonesty itself, we are as candid and merciful as we ought to be; […] but when dishonesty is attended with any blacker crime, such as cruelty, murder, ingratitude, or the like, compassion and forgiveness then become faults…”” (B.18, ch.11) 

3/ The best female characters in the book, as written in my previous blog post, are Mrs Western (Sophia’s aunt) and Lady Bellaston (a manipulative but enthralling woman who fancies Tom Jones and would fit right in Dangerous Liaisons). 

Sophia Western as a character is hard to do right—how do you write a character who is pure and basically perfect? People complain about Fanny Price from Mansfield Park. People complain about Esther Summerson from Bleak House. Do they criticise the depiction of Sophia? Not sure. I do like Sophia (though I also like Fanny and Esther): she is not quick-witted and assertive like Elizabeth Bennet, but she knows her mind and has the strength of Fanny Price—I especially like that she’s firm with Jones and doesn’t accept him easily after what he has done—she’s no doormat.  

4/ I struggled a bit with the second third of the book, though I’m not sure if it’s because it’s in the mould of Joseph Andrews and I didn’t particularly care for the character of Partridge, or because I was visiting Edinburgh and then fell ill and half of my skull was in pain. 

Could very well be the latter. 

But the first and the last part I thoroughly, utterly enjoyed. 

What a wonderful novel. I think Tom Jones may now be my favourite 18th century novel, beating Hong lou meng and Dangerous Liaisons. 

The headline of this blog post comes from some contemporary detractor of the novel. 

Tom Jones: “English women […] are no slaves”

1/ One of the readers of this blog, who prefers Richardson to Fielding, once said he thought Tom Jones was… cute. I don’t agree. Tom Jones is a comic novel, but there is nothing affected or superficial or naïve about it. Fielding doesn’t shy away from evil or misery. 

He begins the novel as a world of warmth and kindness but very quickly lets us see that humanity is not all Mr Allworthys: we see Dr Blifil scheme his brother’s way into Mr Allworthy’s family and fortunes, and we see Captain Blifil turn into a despot once he’s married to Mr Allworthy’s sister. And throughout the novel, Fielding depicts brutal husbands and tyrannical fathers.

“… He was indeed as bitter an enemy to the savage authority too often exercised by husbands and fathers, over the young and lovely of the other sex, as ever knight-errant was to the barbarous power of enchanters; nay, to say truth, I have often suspected that those very enchanters with which romance everywhere abounds were in reality no other than the husbands of those days; and matrimony itself was, perhaps, the enchanted castle in which the nymphs were said to be confined.” (B.11, ch.8)

The novel also depicts hypocrites and liars and mercenaries and trollops and thieves and rakes and manipulators and so on. Not at all a rosy view of life. Fielding may present himself as a warm and witty man, a large-hearted man, a man forgiving and tolerant of people’s moral failings, but he makes a clear distinction between foibles and callousness or cruelty. For example, Tom Jones, despite his love for Sophia, sleeps with lots of women and cannot say no to those who throw themselves at him—that’s a foible—but Fielding makes a clear distinction between him and the men who play with women’s feelings, who deliberately use women for pleasure then discard them once done. 

2/ Let me quote my friend Himadri (Argumentative Old Git) on Fielding and Richardson’s Pamela: 

“… However, for all the rumbustiousness, Fielding’s moral compass is very firmly established. His principal argument with Richardson is not, after all, that Richardson was too serious in his morals, but that he wasn’t serious enough – that allowing Pamela to be “rewarded” for her virtue with marriage with her former tormentor made virtue itself but a commodity.” 

3/ Fielding is progressive—the word is now rather tainted but I mean it in the good sense—he’s strongly in favour of marrying for love and against forced marriages or mercenary marriages.

I also like the range of female characters in Tom Jones. 

Mrs Western for example is a great character. Sophie’s aunt, she’s much more severe and cruel than Lady Russell from Persuasion, but the similarity is that she wants to persuade Sophia into a marriage with Master Blifil out of prudence—or what she perceives as prudence—not out of cruelty or a tyrannical will. There is a great contrast between her and her hot-headed brother. Fielding also gives her some great lines: 

““… While I have been endeavouring to fill her mind with maxims of prudence, you have been provoking her to reject them. English women, brother, I thank heaven, are no slaves. We are not to be locked up like the Spanish and Italian wives. We have as good a right to liberty as yourselves. We are to be convinced by reason and persuasion only, and not governed by force…”” (B.6, ch.14) 

She’s much more intelligent than Squire Western—contrast their reactions upon finding out that Sophia’s hiding at Lady Bellaston’s: 

““… Do you really imagine, brother, that the house of a woman of figure is to be attacked by warrants and brutal justices of the peace? […] Justices of peace, indeed! do you imagine any such event can arrive to a woman of figure in a civilised nation?” (B.15, ch.16) 

Lady Bellaston is also a great character, a lascivious and manipulative and enthralling woman, one who would fit right in Dangerous Liaisons. 

““Doth not your ladyship think,” says Mrs Fitzpatrick eagerly, “that it would be the best way to write immediately to my uncle, and acquaint him where my cousin is?”

The lady pondered a little upon this, and thus answered—“Why, no, madam, I think not. Di Western hath described her brother to me to be such a brute, that I cannot consent to put any woman under his power who hath escaped from it. I have heard he behaved like a monster to his own wife, for he is one of those wretches who think they have a right to tyrannise over us, and from such I shall ever esteem it the cause of my sex to rescue any woman who is so unfortunate to be under their power…”” (B.13, ch.3) 

She is scheming and deceitful, but Fielding gives her charming qualities—the only pity is that she doesn’t have a lot of room to develop, being one of the supporting characters—I wonder if Thackeray later borrowed a bit of Lady Bellaston for Becky Sharp in Vanity Fair. Lady Bellaston is more sophisticated than Lady Booby in Joseph Andrews, though that’s also a brilliant character. 

Molly Seagrim (Tom’s first lover?) is not a badly written character either. She’s vividly drawn, a rugged and sexual and feisty woman, very different from the equally lustful Lady Bellaston. 

I’m gonna have to read and think some more before writing about Sophia, the heroine of the book. 

Tom Jones is more and more engrossing. The last third is exciting! 

Tom Jones: “Jones meditating all the way on Sophia, and Partridge on the bank-bill”

1/ Once I came across a review of Tom Jones that complained of Henry Fielding’s “relentless flow of words”. But I love that about Fielding! 

“Now the little trembling hare, which the dread of all her numerous enemies, and chiefly of that cunning, cruel, carnivorous animal, man, had confined all the day to her lurking-place, sports wantonly o’er the lawns; now on some hollow tree the owl, shrill chorister of the night, hoots forth notes which might charm the ears of some modern connoisseurs in music; now, in the imagination of the half-drunk clown, as he staggers through the churchyard, or rather charnelyard, to his home, fear paints the bloody hobgoblin; now thieves and ruffians are awake, and honest watchmen fast asleep; in plain English, it was now midnight; and the company at the inn, as well those who have been already mentioned in this history, as some others who arrived in the evening, were all in bed.” (B.10, ch.2) 

He does the same thing later on: 

“Twelve times did the iron register of time beat on the sonorous bell-metal, summoning the ghosts to rise and walk their nightly round.——In plainer language, it was twelve o’clock, and all the family, as we have said, lay buried in drink and sleep, except only Mrs Western, who was deeply engaged in reading a political pamphlet, and except our heroine, who now softly stole down-stairs, and, having unbarred and unlocked one of the house-doors, sallied forth, and hastened to the place of appointment.” (B.10, ch.9) 

2/ I love that Fielding has absorbed Shakespeare into his bloodstream and constantly references him: Othello, “green-eyed monster”, Desdemona and Cassio, “much ado about nothing”, “dogs of war”, “bloody Banquo”, Macduff, and so on and so forth (unless I’m mistaken, Othello is referenced the most). 

There are also lots of allusions to Don Quixote. 

“Having scoured the whole coast of the enemy, as well as any of Homer’s heroes ever did, or as Don Quixote or any knight-errant in the world could have done, he returned to Molly, whom he found in a condition which must give both me and my reader pain, was it to be described here. Tom raved like a madman, beat his breast, tore his hair, stamped on the ground, and vowed the utmost vengeance on all who had been concerned.” (B.4, ch.8) 

Fielding directly mentions Cervantes (and Shakespeare and other writers he likes): 

“Come, thou that hast inspired thy Aristophanes, thy Lucian, thy Cervantes, thy Rabelais, thy Molière, thy Shakespear, thy Swift, thy Marivaux, fill my pages with humour; till mankind learn the good-nature to laugh only at the follies of others, and the humility to grieve at their own.” (B.13, ch.1) 

Tom Jones may be divided into three parts: Tom Jones on Mr Allworthy’s estate in Somersetshire, on the way to London, and in London. The second part, when Jones is travelling and accompanied by Partridge, is essentially like a picaresque novel in the mould of Joseph Andrews (and Don Quixote). They also stop at one inn after another, they also have adventures and meet different sets of characters along the way, and they sometimes get these characters to tell their own stories. The difference between Tom Jones and Joseph Andrews or Don Quixote is that Tom Jones has three different groups of people on the roads: Jones and Partridge going on their way to join the army and then hearing about Sophia Western and looking for her; Sophia running away from home and heading to London, accompanied by her maid Mrs Honour; and her father Squire Western chasing her. 

Another influence of Don Quixote is in the character of Partridge. Fielding has learnt from Joseph Andrews—its main flaw is that he concentrates all his energy on Parson Adams and gives Joseph no personality—in the later novel, Jones and Partridge are both vividly drawn characters and they do interact and bounce off each other, like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza. 

“They soon arrived at the door of this house, or cottage, for it might be called either, without much impropriety. Here Jones knocked several times without receiving any answer from within; at which Partridge, whose head was full of nothing but of ghosts, devils, witches, and such like, began to tremble […]. 

The poor fellow, however, had no sooner warmed himself, than those thoughts which were always uppermost in his mind, began a little to disturb his brain. There was no article of his creed in which he had a stronger faith than he had in witchcraft, nor can the reader conceive a figure more adapted to inspire this idea, than the old woman who now stood before him. She answered exactly to that picture drawn by Otway in his Orphan. Indeed, if this woman had lived in the reign of James the First, her appearance alone would have hanged her, almost without any evidence.” (B.8, ch.10) 

Later on, Partridge is terrified hearing the noise of a drum, thinking that’s the rebel army. 

“… And now Partridge, who kept even pace with Jones, discovered something painted flying in the air, a very few yards before him, which fancying to be the colours of the enemy, he fell a bellowing, “Oh Lord, sir, here they are; there is the crown and coffin. Oh Lord! I never saw anything so terrible; and we are within gun-shot of them already.”  

Jones no sooner looked up, than he plainly perceived what it was which Partridge had thus mistaken. “Partridge,” says he, “I fancy you will be able to engage this whole army yourself; for by the colours I guess what the drum was which we heard before, and which beats up for recruits to a puppet-show.” (B.12, ch.5) 

Fielding gives Partridge the superstition, cowardice, and loquaciousness of Sancho Panza. But if Sancho is illiterate and ignorant and constantly pumping out proverbs in his talks, Partridge scatters around Latin sayings (possibly all non sequitur, I have no idea what he’s saying). Fielding also gives Partridge a fertile imagination, but it’s the imagination of a superstitious coward, not of a lunatic (as in the case of Don Quixote).  

3/ Here’s another Don Quixote allusion: 

“Sophia was very soon eased of her causeless fright by the entry of the noble peer, who was not only an intimate acquaintance of Mrs Fitzpatrick, but in reality a very particular friend of that lady. To say truth, it was by his assistance that she had been enabled to escape from her husband; for this nobleman had the same gallant disposition with those renowned knights of whom we read in heroic story, and had delivered many an imprisoned nymph from durance. He was indeed as bitter an enemy to the savage authority too often exercised by husbands and fathers, over the young and lovely of the other sex, as ever knight-errant was to the barbarous power of enchanters; nay, to say truth, I have often suspected that those very enchanters with which romance everywhere abounds were in reality no other than the husbands of those days; and matrimony itself was, perhaps, the enchanted castle in which the nymphs were said to be confined.” (B.11, ch.8) 

One can tell, reading Tom Jones, that Fielding hates more than anything else the hypocrite and the tyrant. The hypocrite: Master Blifil, Thwackum, Square… The tyrant: Captain Blifil, Squire Western, Mr Fitzpatrick… 

The characterisation of Squire Western is especially good. At the beginning, he appears a merry, easy-going man who loves Tom Jones with a generosity of spirit and whose only weakness seems to be his love for hunting above anything else. But gradually Fielding removes the layers and reveals that this is not a warm, open man; Squire Western is thoughtless, hot-headed, and cruel, a monster to his late wife, a tyrant to his daughter. This is an excellent creation. 

Can we comment on a translation without knowing the original?

1/ Amidst all the shock and horror on twitter over people never having heard of The Odyssey, arose a new quarrel about Emily Wilson’s translation (is it woke? is it badly written? or are detractors simply ignorant?). A few white knights have come to the rescue, saying that those who don’t read ancient Greek don’t get to have an opinion and call it a bad translation. 

Isn’t that just a way to shut down conversation?  

Of course, the opinions of people who can read the original are more valid—they can talk about accuracy and fidelity (or lack of)—but others can still comment on other aspects of the translation: how it reads in the target language, whether it’s good prose/ poetry, if it ends up being translationese, and so on and so forth. After all, do we not make a judgement when we compare passages in order to pick a translation to read? 

Also, we may not be able to criticise Emily Wilson if we only have her and Fagles (who I have heard has a habit of embroidering the text), but why can’t we if we have multiple passages in multiple translations—by Lattimore, by Fitzgerald, by Fagles, by Rouse, by Butler, by her? 

2/ So I’m not going to feel guilty about taking a dislike to, and telling others not to read, Washburn’s translation of The Tale of Genji. I don’t speak Japanese, true, but having compared Waley, Seidensticker, Tyler, and him, I can see what Washburn’s doing and I don’t like it. 

3/ Nor am I going to feel bad about my dislike of Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. But it’s not an entirely ignorant view—Gary Saul Morson has pointed out what’s wrong with their literalist approach. 

4/ Knowledge is sometimes a hindrance, though. I would never be happy with any translation of Truyện Kiều. Would any Vietnamese? 

5/ I guess Chinese speakers feel the same about translations—especially of Chinese poetry—into Western languages. 

I don’t speak Chinese, but I read Hong lou meng in a Vietnamese translation and occasionally glanced at the English text by David Hawke and could see some of the changes he made—Bảo Ngọc’s (Baoyu) building “Di hồng viện”, “hồng” (“hong”) meaning red, became “Green Delights” because of different connotations of the colours in the two cultures; his nickname “Di hồng công tử” in the poetry club became Green Boy.  

6/ I know a Vietnamese intellectual whose translations I would never criticise to his face. I know what he would say. He would ask about inaccuracies and I would have no responses. He would talk about the two schools of translation (that John Rutherford calls the cavaliers vs the puritans) and I would have no arguments. But no amount of rhetoric will persuade my ears that his translations are well-done, because his sentences in Vietnamese would follow the sentence structure and order of English or Spanish or whatever the source language—it ain’t natural Vietnamese. 

7/ I do think we should not criticise a poet if we cannot read them in the original. My friend Himadri (Argumentative Old Git) is irritated by Nabokov casually dismissing Tagore as a mediocrity, and I can see why. Criticise novelists and playwrights and other prose writers if you like; but I don’t think we can dismiss poets who wrote in a language we do not read. More is lost in translation. 

(I am of course talking about poets who are highly esteemed and influential). 

Anyway, Happy New Year!

On picking a translation

Under my last blog post, I got a comment from Thomas Parker asking how I selected translations, so let’s jot down some thoughts. 

1/ Anyone who loves Russian literature knows about the translation wars. Anna Karenina and War and Peace each have about a dozen translations—how do we choose? Here are my rules: never Constance Garnett (except her Chekhov); never Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. Garnett, because she has a reputation for being fast and making mistakes and throwing out difficult passages. Pevear and Volokhonsky, because their sentences are clunky and I’m no fan of the literalist school of translation (nor am I a fan of their pumping out one translation after another of books that have been translated a million times—how convenient—contrast them with Robert Chandler, who introduced the Anglophone world to Vasily Grossman). 

Anna Karenina I’ve read in two translations—Aylmer and Louise Maude, and Rosamund Bartlett—both were enjoyable, I preferred the latter’s prose. 

War and Peace I’ve also read in two translations, and I tend to recommend Aylmer and Louise Maude, revised by Amy Mandelker. Other versions may modernise the language or anglicise the names or remove the French passages or remove the feminine endings in names—the Maude-Mandelker seems to be the best option—I want something close to the original without being clunky or awkwardly literal. 

My choice of Ignat Avsey for The Brothers Karamazov went against my general preference and habit (I’m full of contradictions), largely because of my struggle to get into Dostoyevsky in the translation of David McDuff. Next time will be a different version. It flowed well and I ended up loving the book, but once in a while something stuck out like a sore thumb, such as the phrase “my ex”. 

2/ It’s because of my wish for something close to the original that I read The Tale of Genji as translated by Royall Tyler. Madness. But Murasaki Shikibu referred to her characters by title or nickname or relation to someone else—the characters have no names—Royall Tyler retains the same effect and it reflects the world in which Murasaki and her characters live.  

As for you, read Seidensticker if you wish. No strong opinion there. But I would advise against Washburn—I know I’m no expert, but The Tale of Genji is a very subtle novel and Washburn removes all subtlety—he explicitly states that he incorporates explanations into the text itself rather than use notes. 

3/ If I read Chinese literature, which you may have noticed I don’t often do, it’s a matter of course that I would always go for a Vietnamese translation rather than an English one. 

So I might not be able to read Hong lou meng in the original, but at least I’m closer, much closer to it than an English speaker is. 

4/ More is lost in translation of poetry. Perhaps all is lost. Nguyễn Du in translation is no longer Nguyễn Du. Is Hàn Mặc Tử? Is Bùi Giáng? 

People ask me what I recommend for Truyện Kiều and I never know what to say except to stay away from Timothy Allen. 

5/ I haven’t read Pushkin, but then I also don’t read poetry in translation. 

But I don’t read poetry anyway, you’re going to say— but I do a little and will do more—even if I am to take the extreme position of never reading poetry in translation, there’s still a world of Vietnamese poetry and English poetry to read. 

6/ I might contradict myself and read Tang poetry in (Vietnamese) translation. 

7/ I’m sad I can’t read Cervantes, Flaubert, Proust, Pushkin, Homer… in the original. English native speakers complaining about Shakespeare’s English and saying that the rest of the world have the “advantage” of reading/ watching his plays in translation is something I could never understand.  

Between languages

1/ I have just finished reading another book of my uncle’s, a kind of memoir. Makes me sad about Vietnam, about writers in exile, about a myriad other things. 

My uncle’s a (retired) literary critic and professor of Vietnamese Studies in Australia. And a dissident. Denied entry twice into Vietnam, at the airport. 

(You see, I’m from a family of “difficult people”). 

2/ The book also makes me feel the acute pain that I have lost my roots. I still write in Vietnamese, I still speak it, my tongue is not robbed from breathing its native breath, and yet I have lost my roots. I immerse myself in English-language literature; I aim, like A. C. Bradley or Henry Fielding, to absorb Shakespeare into my bloodstream. Shakespeare rather than Nguyễn Du. Rather than any of our writers. 

3/ And yet English will never fully be my language. I can read Shakespeare, I can read Melville, some day I may read Joyce, but it will forever be a foreign tongue. 

I still sound like an outsider, still stumble over multi-syllabic words, still lose grammar together with my temper. 

4/ Past Lives is not a good film—most of the dialogue is banal—but there is one great scene. In it, the main character, a South Korean woman who in childhood migrated to Canada and then to the US, is in bed talking with her American husband and he says she dreams in Korean—“You dream in a language that I can’t understand. It’s like there’s this whole place inside of you where I can’t go.” 

5/ Studies have shown for years that multilinguals have different personalities in different languages, but it was only during my time visiting a Vietnamese writer and her family in Berlin a few months ago that I realised I was different and felt different as I switched between languages in conversation with her. In English, the hierarchy ceased to exist, the sense of intimidation disappeared. I was free. 

Against philistinism—reading ideas for 2025

Over the past 10 days, I’ve been having a few arguments on the hell-site (still) known as Twitter. Foolish, I know. First, because a “former English major” and a few others said Shakespeare was “inaccessible and alienating to students” and should be dropped from school. Then because one said Shakespeare’s considered a genius only because “there was a lot of low-hanging fruit,” and another said Shakespeare and Mozart were “both very usual” and “The Artistic Genius is a myth that is forged by cultural institutions over decades and centuries.” Some of you are surely glad you’re not on social media. But no, it got worse. A couple of days ago, the news of Christopher Nolan’s new project revealed that a few film youtubers had never heard of The Odyssey; there were strong reactions; numerous philistines appeared in defence of ignorance, asking if people are supposed to know “every single piece of literature” and calling others pretentious; a few appeared to think The Odyssey was American or written in English (one for example asked “How do they expect people who don’t speak English as their first language to know this book?”, but there were others). 

Dismal.

Even if there is little impact, I can’t help feeling an urge to fight against anti-intellectualism and inverted snobbery, against identity politics and Critical Race Theory, against philistinism and the School of Resentment. 

One of the ways to fight is reading and analysing and promoting classic books.

So next year, I’m gonna read The Odyssey. It would be a sudden jump, but that shouldn’t matter—I’m curious about George Steiner’s comparison of Dostoyevsky to Shakespeare and Tolstoy to Homer. The question is which translation. 

(At some point, I will get to Ovid because of his influence on Shakespeare and Cervantes, but perhaps not yet). 

In 2025, I’m gonna continue exploring the 18th century. At the moment I’m taking a tiny break from Tom Jones to read a book by my uncle the literary critic, and may pick up something else whilst in Leeds. Should also expand beyond novels—I know I’m narrow. 

I’m also gonna see more of the 17th century. Perhaps read some more Spanish Golden Age plays. Or just explore 17th century French drama. I haven’t read Molière. And of course reread a few Shakespeare plays and read some more Shakespearean criticism. 

Those are the main projects. 

There are also some loose ideas scattered around. For various reasons I’m now more interested in Ulysses, so I’m gonna have to build up for it—try Dubliners again and build up. 

I’d also like to read more Jewish literature. Over the past year, I read Primo Levi, Isaac Babel, Isaac Bashevis Singer. Tom of Wuthering Expectations gave me as birthday present a collection of classic Yiddish stories. Should read those. And perhaps more. 

Even if the philistines and authoritarians win, even if the public becomes increasingly ignorant of classic works because of tiktoks and a million other distractions, I will not lose—because these books I read are mine. 

2024 in reading and viewing

1/ I’m sure none of you are surprised to hear that the greatest novel I’ve read this year is Don Quixote, the funniest and saddest of novels. 

It blows my mind still that Shakespeare and Cervantes were contemporaries—I have seen Shakespeare everywhere, now I see Don Quixote everywhere. 

2/ My reading in 2024 discovered two interesting things. 

One was that Don Quixote led to the exploration of the Spanish Golden Age: 3 plays by Lope de Vega (The Dog in the Manger, Fuenteovejuna, The King the Greatest Alcalde), 3 plays by Pedro Calderón de la Barca (The Surgeon of Honour, Life Is a Dream, Love After Death), 1 play by Cervantes (The Siege of Numantia), 1 play by Tirso de Molina (The Trickster of Seville, the original Don Juan), 12 stories by Cervantes (Exemplary Novels). 

I have known a bit of 17th century Britain. Now I know a bit of 17th century Spain. Also went to the Spanish Gallery in Bishop Auckland (I know, it’s great to be an art lover in England). 

To sum up my impression, Lope de Vega has a better sense of pacing and structure, and his characters are more vividly drawn, but Calderón’s plays are the ones with complexity and depth. Neither of them is Shakespeare. Neither of them is Cervantes. But who is? Life Is a Dream is a great play, the best among these plays, and you should read it. The Dog in the Manger and Fuenteovejuna are also good fun. 

(Those of you who have often scolded me for only reading novels—you know who you are—where’s my cookie?) 

The other thing in 2024 is that I started filling my 18th century gap: Dangerous Liaisons, (part of) Pamela, Shamela, Joseph Andrews, Evelina, The Female Quixote, Candide, and now Tom Jones.

(Each of these, except Candide, got multiple blog posts).

Am I going to read Clarissa? Maybe. Don’t know. Perhaps someday. But right now there are plenty of writers to get to first: Sterne, Swift, Defoe, Goethe, etc. Enjoyed Dangerous Liaisons, Evelina, and Henry Fielding. 

3/ The best non-fiction I’ve read this year is Primo Levi: If This Is a Man, The Truce, and Moments of Reprieve. 

The best book of literary criticism is possibly What Happens in Hamlet by John Dover Wilson. Followed closely by The Imperial Theme by G. Wilson Knight, which has a couple of interesting essays about Antony and Cleopatra. 

4/ This year, I saw two Shakespeare plays onstage: Macbeth (2023-2024, dir. Simon Godwin, starring Ralph Fiennes) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2024, Royal Shakespeare Company, dir. Eleanor Rhode, starring Mathew Baynton as Bottom).

Both productions were enjoyable enough. 

The Macbeth production was the fourth version I saw (though the first Shakespeare onstage), after Trevor Nunn (Ian McKellen – Judi Dench), Joel Coen (Denzel Washington – Frances McDormand), and Orson Welles (Orson Welles – Jeanette Nolan). The Trevor Nunn production is the standard—Ian McKellen and Judi Dench are the Macbeths—everything else suffers in comparison. But I did enjoy Indira Varma’s portrayal of Lady Macbeth, and enjoyed the comic touch in Ralph Fiennes’s performance. 

My first complaint is that the production was too bright—Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a dark and murky play, a play in which night strangles the travelling lamp, a play in which darkness does the face of earth entomb—it didn’t quite work the same way when the performance was in full light. 

My second complaint is that Simon Godwin increased the presence and significance of the witches but they looked too… human—there’s nothing strange or eerie or frightening about them as though they’re not the inhabitants of the earth—look at the witches in the Trevor Nunn production or Kathryn Hunter in Joel Coen’s film. 

They also cut the porter scene. 

The production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream was the second version I saw, after the 1968 film (which had a spectacular cast: Ian Holm as Puck, Judi Dench as Titania, Helen Mirren as Hermia, Diana Rigg as Helena, etc). 

It was enjoyable enough, largely thanks to Mathew Baynton as Bottom, and was especially funny towards the end. As it’s a modern-dress version, some of the costume choices were questionable and I didn’t particularly like the couples—my friend Zena Hitz thought the best of the four was Boadicea Ricketts as Helena and I think she’s right—Ryan Hutton was too camp as Lysander and the other two were forgettable—but unfortunately for Boadicea Ricketts, I had seen Diana Rigg in the same role. Mathew Baynton was the one who carried the production—I never thought of A Midsummer Night’s Dream as Bottom’s play—but this production belonged to Mathew Baynton. 

5/ Over the past few years, I’ve been complaining about contemporary cinema. But this year, I watched quite a few good films—cinema is not dead, baby, cinema is not dead—Anatomy of a Fall, La chimera, The Zone of Interest, The Holdovers, The Taste of Things—all from 2023. 

Anyway, enjoy the holiday, folks. In case I don’t write another blog post by then, Merry Christmas!

Tom Jones: “an impudent slut, a wanton hussy, an audacious harlot, a wicked jade, a vile strumpet”

1/ I like the sexual frankness of Tom Jones. 

“… Nor was her mind more effeminate than her person. As this was tall and robust, so was that bold and forward. So little had [Molly] of modesty, that Jones had more regard for her virtue than she herself. And as most probably she liked Tom as well as he liked her, so when she perceived his backwardness she herself grew proportionably forward; and when she saw he had entirely deserted the house, she found means of throwing herself in his way, and behaved in such a manner that the youth must have had very much or very little of the heroe if her endeavours had proved unsuccessful. In a word, she soon triumphed over all the virtuous resolutions of Jones; for though she behaved at last with all decent reluctance, yet I rather chuse to attribute the triumph to her, since, in fact, it was her design which succeeded.

In the conduct of this matter, I say, Molly so well played her part, that Jones attributed the conquest entirely to himself, and considered the young woman as one who had yielded to the violent attacks of his passion.” (B.4, ch.6) 

Henry Fielding is so likeable because he values goodness and virtue but he is tolerant and forgiving of human frailty—next to him, George Eliot and Edith Wharton and even Jane Austen may occasionally come across as rather harsh. 

“… Molly Seagrim approached. Our hero had his penknife in his hand, which he had drawn for the before-mentioned purpose of carving on the bark; when the girl coming near him, cried out with a smile, “You don't intend to kill me, squire, I hope!”—“Why should you think I would kill you?” answered Jones. “Nay,” replied she, “after your cruel usage of me when I saw you last, killing me would, perhaps, be too great kindness for me to expect.”

Here ensued a parley, which, as I do not think myself obliged to relate it, I shall omit. It is sufficient that it lasted a full quarter of an hour, at the conclusion of which they retired into the thickest part of the grove.” (B.5, ch.10)

Hahahahaha. You can probably see why I love Tom Jones. No wonder some contemporary critic called it a tale of “bastardism, fornication, and adultery” (if that doesn’t make you want to pick up the novel, I don’t know what can). But it’s fascinating to see sexual frankness and an embrace of horniness in the 17th century (like Shakespeare) or the 18th century (Tom Jones, Dangerous Liaisons) after being used for years to the reticence and prudishness of the 19th century. 

(Did Tolstoy ever read Fielding? My quick googling told me nothing. I’m rather amused imagining his shock and outrage upon reading Tom Jones). 

I like the warm, good-humoured persona of the author: 

“… I question not but the surprize of the reader will be here equal to that of Jones; as the suspicions which must arise from the appearance of this wise and grave man in such a place, may seem so inconsistent with that character which he hath, doubtless, maintained hitherto, in the opinion of every one.

But to confess the truth, this inconsistency is rather imaginary than real. Philosophers are composed of flesh and blood as well as other human creatures; and however sublimated and refined the theory of these may be, a little practical frailty is as incident to them as to other mortals.” (B.5, ch.5)

The novel has a comic tone, but Fielding has no illusions about humanity. He depicts the greed and misogyny of Captain Blifil, the hypocrisy of Thwackum, the artful and dishonest behaviour of Master Blifil, the wantonness of Molly Seagrim, the carefree egotism and thoughtless cruelty of Squire Western, the deceit of Black George… but, like Tolstoy or Chekhov, he depicts all these characters with compassion. 

2/ It is good to read Fielding’s masterpiece after Joseph Andrews. Both are full of warmth, wit, and good humour, but one can see the improvements. 

First of all is the main character. Like Joseph Andrews, Tom Jones is handsome, “one of the handsomest young fellows in the world.” But if in his first novel, Fielding concentrated most of his energy on Parson Adams (and some on Lady Booby and Mrs Slipslop) and didn’t give Joseph a personality, he now does a good job with the characterisation of Tom Jones, who is impulsive and has a wild streak but who is nevertheless good-natured, loyal, generous, and lovable.  

Another difference is the plotting. I have written that Joseph Andrews, as a picaresque novel, is episodic and doesn’t have anything that holds it together—it is loose and drags on sometimes—Tom Jones in contrast is tightly plotted and I can see why Coleridge said it’s one of “the three most perfect plots ever planned.” 

I probably won’t say much about the plot and the characters till I’m close to finishing the book though. 

What a romp! 

PS: I’ve just read that Samuel Johnson said about Tom Jones: “I am shocked to hear you quote from so vicious a book. I am sorry to hear you have read it; a confession which no modest lady should ever make. I scarcely know a more corrupt work.” 

Hahaha.