Les Misérables, Part One, Book Five, Chapter III

I'm still (slowly) reading Les Misérables, the first time for this particular translation and an unabridged edition.  Recently, I read Chapter III ("Sums Deposited with Laffitte") of Part One, Book Five.  This chapter contains one of my favorite lines, but I was a bit disappointed with how it's rendered in this translation:  "Books are remote but reliable friends."  I much prefer the other translation I read, where this line is "Books are cold but sure friends."  I lookt up the original French (which I got as a free e-book years ago) and found that it's "les livres sont des amis froids et sûrs."  I would translate this as "books are cold and sure friends."  "Et" is usually translated "and," but apparently both translators felt that the context permitted a more adversative conjunction.

A couple weeks after I read this, I was still thinking about the original French sentence, and I realized that there's assonance between "livres" and "amis" and that this emphasizes this type of clause.  "Livres" ("books") is the subject nominative, and "amis" ("friends") is the predicate nominative.  Both words have the same semantic weight, so to speak (nouns on opposite sides of a copulative verb), and the assonance between them indicates this balanced relationship.

---&---

Almost as a side-note, I'll add this:  the entire sentence (describing Jean Valjean in the guise of Monsieur Madeleine) is "He loved books; books are remote but reliable friends," and this provides a direct contrast with Javert, described two chapters later (in Chapter V. "Dim Flashes of Lightning on the Horizon"):  "In his rare spare time, although he hated books, he would read...."

Arthur Conan Doyle's "A Scandal in Bohemia"

On 1 January, I started re-reading (for the first time) The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes, which contains facsimiles of thirty-seven Holmes stories and The Hound of the Baskervilles as they originally appeared in The Strand magazine.  As I was reading the second part of "A Scandal in Bohemia," I discovered that Watson is not a very reliable narrator.

As Irene Adler's carriage arrives at Briony Lodge, Watson describes how "a fierce quarrel broke out [between loafers trying to earn a bit of money by opening the door for her], which was increased by the two guardsmen, who took sides with one of the loungers, and by the scissors grinder, who was equally hot upon the other side... Holmes dashed into the crowed to protect the lady; but, just as he reached her, he gave a cry and dropped to the ground, with the blood running freely down his face."

After the rest of Holmes' plan had been carried out and he has located the photograph that the King of Bohemia had hired him to retrieve, he returns to Watson and explains some of the particulars of his plan:

"The matter was perfectly simple.  You, of course, saw that everyone in the street was an accomplice.  They were all engaged for the evening."

"I guessed as much."

"Then, when the row broke out, I had a little moist red paint in the palm of my hand.  I rushed forward, fell down, clapped my hand to my face, and became a piteous spectacle.  It is an old trick."

"That also I could fathom."

In his description above, Watson writes that "the blood [was] running freely down his face," yet here he claims that he knew all along that it was merely red paint.  Either he's lying to Holmes and trying to save face (apparently not willing to admit that he, a medical doctor, mistook red paint for blood), or he purposely misled his readers earlier in an effort to sensationalize his account.

Edward FitzGerald's The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

One of the books I've been reading lately is Edward FitzGerald's The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám.  Recently, I finished the actual Rubáiyát, but I still have about half a book's worth of notes and "critical responses" to wade through.  I noticed one minor point though, and I thought I would note that, at least.

In the introduction, FitzGerald explains that "The original Rubáiyát... are independent Stanzas, consisting each of four Lines of equal, though varied, Prosody, sometimes all rhyming, but oftener (as here attempted) the third line suspending the Cadence by which the last atones with the former Two."  Basically, the usual rhyme scheme is AABA.

In the first edition (which is what my copy follows), stanza LXIII, located amongst a string of stanzas about clay pots, reads:

None answer'd this; but after Silence spake

A Vessel of a more ungainly Make:

"They sneer at me for leaning all awry;

What! did the Hand then of the Potter shake?"

The AABA rhyme scheme emphasizes the incongruity of that "awry."  The other lines all rhyme with each other ("spake," "Make," and "shake"), but the third line stands out in the same way that this particular pot is ostracized because of its form.

Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream

I recently finished reading Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream in The Norton Introduction to Literature (fifth edition).  I noticed a detail in Act II, Scene 2 that may be significant.  After Puck applies love-in-idleness to Lysander's eyes, Helena notices him and says, "Lysander, if you live, good sir, awake," and Lysander replies, "And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake" (II.ii.102-103).  This section of the play is written in verse, so it's not unusual that Lysander's line rhymes with Helena's, but I think it may be significant that the resulting couplet is formed by two characters.  Helena is the first living thing that Lysander sees when he wakes up, and because of the love-in-idleness, he becomes enamored with her.  That his first line after waking rhymes with hers indicates his desire to be with her.  He complements her poetically in the same way that he wants to complement her romantically.

I feel I must admit, though, that earlier in this scene, a line of Demetrius's dialogue rhymes with a line of Helena's.  She says, "O wilt thou darkling leave me?  Do not so," and he replies, "Stay, on thy peril!  I alone will go" (II.ii.86-87).  Because Demetrius is not at all interested in Helena, however, this instance of rhyming dialogue between two characters doesn't carry this extra meaning.

Edward Johnson's "Poem for Thomas Hooker"

Near the end of last year, I started reading the Heath Anthology of American Literature again, after having set it aside for four years.  Recently, I've been reading a section titled "A Selection of Seventeenth-Century Poetry."  One of the poems is "Poem for Thomas Hooker" by Edward Johnson.  I noticed a slew of Biblical allusions (appropriate since Hooker was a "Puritan preacher and theologian"), and since the anthology doesn't cite any of them, I thought I'd note them here.

Here's the poem:

Come, Hooker, come forth of thy native soile:

    Christ, I will run, sayes Hooker, thou hast set

My feet at large, here spend thy last dayes toile;

    Thy Rhetorick shall peoples affections whet.

Thy Golden Tongue, and Pen Christ caus'd to be

    The blazing of his golden truths profound,

Thou sorry worme its Christ wrought this in thee;

    What Christ hath wrought must needs be very sound.

Then looke on Hookers workes, they follow him

    To Grave, this worthy resteth there a while:

Die shall he not that hath Christs warrier bin;

    Much lesse Christ Truth, cleer'd by his peoples toile.

Thou Angell bright, by Christ for light now made,

    Throughout the World as seasoning salt to be,

Although in dust thy body mouldering fade;

    Thy Head's in Heaven, and hath a crown for thee.

"Christ, I will run, sayes Hooker, thou hast set / My feet at large" seems to be a reference to Isaiah 52:7:  "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness, who publishes salvation, who says to Zion, 'Your God reigns.'"  The same idea also appears in Romans 10:15:  "And how are they to preach unless they are sent?  As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!"  The poem may also incorporate Hebrews 12:1 ("let us run with endurance the race that is set before us").

"Thou sorry worme" bears some resemblance to Psalm 22:6:  "But I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people."

"Thou Angell bright, by Christ for light now made, / Throughout the World as seasoning salt to be" contains two elements from the Sermon on the Mount.  In successive verses (13 and 14) in Matthew 5, Jesus says, "You are the salt of the earth" and "You are the light of the world."

The lines "Although in dust thy body mouldering fade; / Thy Head's in Heaven, and hath a crown for thee" include multiple allusions.  "Although in dust thy body mouldering fade" could refer either to "for you are dust, and to dust you shall return" in Genesis 3:19 or the similar "All are from the dust, and to dust all return" in Ecclesiastes 3:20.  As in the poem ("Thy Head's in Heaven"), Christ is called "the head" in 1 Corinthians 11:3 and Ephesians 5:23.  The "crown for thee" could refer either to Revelation 2:10 ("Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life") or James 1:12 ("Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him").

Les Misérables, Part One, Book One, Chapter IV

On 1 January, I started re-reading Les Misérables but in a different edition from what I've read before; this is a different translation (by Julie Rose) and unabridged.  I recently read Chapter IV of Book One, Part One (getting through the introduction took some time), and I realized that some of Monsieur Myriel's behavior has Biblical precedent.

The narrator explains:

A tragic event occurred in Digne.  A man had been condemned to death for murder.  It was some poor unfortunate who was not quite literate, but not completely illiterate; he had been a tumbler working the fairs as well as a public letter-writer.  The trial was the talk of the town.  The day before the date set for the condemned man's execution, the prison chaplain got sick.  A priest was needed to attend the prisoner in his last moments, so they went for the local curé.  Apparently this curé refused, saying, "That's not my problem.  Not my job.  Besides, I don't want anything to do with that circus monkey.  I'm sick, too.  And anyway, it's not my place." 

When the bishop [Monsieur Myriel] was told of this response he said, "The reverend father is right.  It's not his place, it's mine." 

And with that, he sped off to the jail, rushed to the cell of the "circus monkey," called him by his name, took his hand and talked to him.

Monsieur Myriel's "call[ing] him by his name" is a significant detail.  The primary purpose may be simply to illustrate the contrast between Monsieur Myriel and the curé (one is compassionate where the other is rudely dismissive), but there's also an echo of the Good Shepherd discourse from John 10, specifically part of verse 3:  the shepherd "calls his own sheep by name."  Myriel cares for the man in the same way that the Good Shepherd cares for his sheep.

That Myriel goes to visit the man in prison at all is also an example of the behavior that Jesus commends in Matthew 25, where He describes the final judgement and says, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world... [for] I was in prison and you came to me."

Later in the chapter, the narrator explains that "Widowed or orphaned families didn't have to ask, he [Myriel] came of his own accord."  Here again, Myriel follows examples from the Bible.  In the Old Testament, the widowed and orphaned are often mentioned as those who need to be cared for.  Psalm 146:9 says that the LORD "upholds the widow and the fatherless."  In the New Testament, James writes that "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this:  to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world" (James 1:27).  This is exactly what Monsieur Myriel does.

The Canterbury Tales: The Pardoner's Tale

I've been re-reading The Canterbury Tales lately, but this is the first time I've read this specific edition.  Last year, I found The Norton Critical Edition of The Canterbury Tales at a Half Price Books in Kansas.  I recently re-read The Pardoner's Tale, and I was puzzled by these lines:

I yow assoile [absolve], by myn heigh power -

Yow that wol offre - as clene and eek as cleer

As ye were born.

What the Pardoner is describing is not actually a sufficient absolution.  Because of original sin, everyone has an inherited guilt even when he's born.  (Psalm 51:5:  "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.")  No one is born "clene and... cleer."

Earlier in the tale, the Pardoner explains that his main motivation is money:  "For myn entente is nat but for to winne, / And nothing for correccioun of sinne."  He's not genuine in his position, and therefore it seems doubtful that his absolutions would carry any benefit, so he may mean exactly what he says:  he will "absolve" you, but you will still be as filthy and sin-stained as before.  He uses "clene and... cleer" ironically.

There's also the simple possibility that he doesn't understand these religious matters properly and he fully believes both that his all-consuming avarice can sit well alongside his occupation and that the absolution he offers will indeed cleanse the penitent.

---&---

In his prologue, the Pardoner says that his theme is "Radix malorum est Cupiditas."  In The Norton Critical Edition, there's a footnote for this that reads, "Avarice (the love of money) is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10)."  This is not entirely accurate.

The Pardoner's Tale and 1 Timothy 6:10 both have genitive plurals ("malorum"); it's "of evils."  The Norton also pulls in "all" from 1 Timothy 6:10 ("radix enim omnium malorum est cupiditas" in the Vulgate, ῥίζα γὰρ πάντων τῶν κακῶν ἐστιν ἡ φιλαργυρία in the Greek) without making it clear that this is not present in what the Pardoner says.  "Radix malorum est Cupiditas" is simply "Avarice is a root of evils," not "Avarice is a root of all evils."

The Lord of the Rings

I've been re-reading The Lord of the Rings.  Near the end of The Fellowship of the Ring, the elves in Lothlórien give lembas to the members of the fellowship, and this lembas is mentioned again near the beginning of The Two Towers (which I'm reading now).  In one of his letters (#213 in The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien edited by Humphrey Carpenter), Tolkien writes (apparently approvingly) that a reader "saw in waybread (lembas) = viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will (vol. III, p. 213) and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the Eucharist."  I don't disagree with this, but I think 1 Kings 19 provides a closer analogue, at least in a more prosaic sense.

4 But he [Elijah] himself went a day's journey into the wilderness and came and sat down under a broom tree.  And he asked that he might die, saying, 'It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life, for I am no better than my fathers.'  5 And he lay down and slept under a broom tree.  And behold, an angel touched him and said to him, 'Arise and eat.'  6 And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water.  And he ate and drank and lay down again.  7 And the angel of the LORD came again a second time and touched him and said, 'Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.'  8 And he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God.

Like the cake God gives to Elijah, lembas sustains travellers.  When the elves give it to the fellowship, they say, "One [cake] will keep a traveller on his feet for a day of long labour, even if he be one of the tall Men of Minas Tirith" (Book II, Chapter VIII).  This is borne out at the beginning of The Two Towers where "Often in their hearts they [Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli] thanked the Lady of Lórien for the gift of lembas for they could eat of it and find new strength even as they ran" (Book III, Chapter II).  When they meet Éomer, he's surprised at the great distance they've covered in such short time.  Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli are able to sustain this pace because of the lembas in the same way that Elijah "went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights."

Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice #6 The Uncertain Path

I recently started re-reading the Star Wars: Jedi Apprentice series.  I read this a handful of times as a kid, but I haven't read it since at least 2002 or 2003, and it's interesting to see what I remember.

Last month, I re-read the sixth book of the series, The Uncertain Path, written by Jude Watson, and I noticed a number of interesting elements.

This post contains spoilers.

The series follows Obi-Wan Kenobi when he first becomes a Jedi apprentice.  At the end of the previous book, however, he decided to leave the Jedi to join the cause of the Young, a group of children on the planet Melida/Daan.  For centuries, the planet has been in civil war between two tribes (the Melida and the Daan), but in recent years, some of the children have abandoned the older generations' causes and sought refuge underground.  At the end of the previous book and for the first few chapters of this book, the members of the Young are fighting their own campaign to take the planet back from both warring tribes.

At the end of the previous book, Obi-Wan became close friends with Cerasi and Nield, the leaders of the Young.  The first chapter of this book details a mission they go on in order to disable the starfighters that the Elders have acquired.  Before they head out, they exchange words that are part of "a ritual they'd developed through the many battles over the past weeks":

"All we need is timing and luck," Cerasi said.

Obi-Wan grinned.  "Who, us?  We don't need luck."

"Everybody needs luck," Nield shot back.

"Not us."

In chapter 5, Obi-Wan and Cerasi again exchange these words, but the formatting is such that it's ambiguous who speaks what words:

"Good luck."

"We don't need luck.

"Everybody needs luck."

"Not us."

This ambiguity illustrates the depth of the relationships that Obi-Wan has formed.  He has become so much like the other members of the Young that at this moment his dialogue is indistinguishable from theirs.

The Young end up winning the war against the Elders of the Melida and of the Daan, but soon rifts begin to appear in the new system of government.  Nield, who has been elected governor, is adamant about destroying the Halls of Evidence that both tribes have.  These buildings house the remains and hologram messages of the dead.  Nield's view is that the Young must destroy these buildings in order to stop the hate that each tribe encourages toward the other.  Others oppose him, albeit for varying reasons.  Wehutti, the leader of the Melida, doesn't want the memories of his ancestors to be destroyed, and some of the Young feel that rebuilding the war-torn city should take precedence over destroying the memorials.

In chapter 9, there's a showdown between the Elders, who are trying to protect the Halls, and Nield's squad, which has started to destroy them.  Obi-Wan and Cerasi arrive and try to persuade Nield that other problems in the city also require his attention and that the destruction of the Halls can wait.  After Cerasi urges Nield to compromise, "he shook his head violently."  I think the adverb here is significant.  It illustrates a nascent change in Nield.  Before this, he was striving for peace, but from this point on, he is bent on destroying the Halls of Evidence and anyone who would stand in his way.  After Cerasi is killed during a protest concerning the Halls, Nield's view is even more extreme.  In chapter 14, he says, "I won't rest until every filthy Elder is dead.  I will avenge her or die!" and Obi-Wan notes that "Nield sounded like a hologram in the Halls that he detested."  That one adverb - "violently" - foreshadows this change.

For most of the book, the chapters alternate between storylines:  the odd-numbered chapters are about Obi-Wan Kenobi, and the even-numbered chapters are about Qui-Gon Jinn, who is investigating thefts and an intruder at the Jedi Temple.  This alternating pattern is broken at chapter 14, however, and I think there are two reasons for this.  At the end of chapter 13, Cerasi is killed in a protest over the destruction of the Halls of Evidence, and this break in the consistency of the alternating storylines mirrors the disrupting effect that Cerasi's death has on Obi-Wan.  Additionally, Cerasi's death starts a series of events that eventually brings Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon back together.  Nield blames Obi-Wan for Cerasi's death, claiming that as a Jedi, he ought to have been able to protect her.  Nield brands Obi-Wan as an outsider to those on Melida/Daan and strips away Obi-Wan's command and the Young's loyalty to him.  (This is illustrated even on the book cover, which shows Obi-Wan and Nield facing opposite directions.)  With no one left to turn to, Obi-Wan finally contacts the Jedi, and at the end of chapter 16, Qui-Gon arrives on Melida/Daan to help Obi-Wan sort through what happened.  Their storylines merge, and from this point on, the chapters are about both of them.

Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud"

A couple months ago, I happened to think of Wordsworth's "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud."  I re-read it and noticed a couple small features, but I forgot to write about them until recently.

"Vales and hills" in the line "That floats on high o'er vales and hills" is a merism, a rhetorical device that gives a sense of a range by naming opposite ends.

At the beginning of the third stanza ("The waves beside them danced; but they / Out-did the sparkling waves in glee"), the clause "but they out-did the sparkling waves in glee" extends past the "boundaries" of a single line, so the daffodils' uncontainable exuberance is illustrated even in the poem's structure.