Writing Styles

I was thinking about this earlier in the day and as I was writing my previous post.  Whenever I write, I tend to be chaotic and let my thoughts wonder aimlessly.  It was always how I started the process to writing my papers.  I’d start with a general few pages of what I wanted to say loosely based on my notes.  Then as I became serious I’d rewrite sections that were complete crap and edit sections I was on the mark but missing the point on and be inspired by my few random lines of genius.  It also becomes a problem for me that sometimes as I write about something I’m having an intense thought about, I’ll get winded halfway through and lose track of what I was trying to say.  So if you notice my posts being quite hare-brained, here’s a tiny insight as to why. 

The End!!!!

I finally finished Of Human Bondage.  If I were to recommend this book to anyone, I would add that I felt that quite a few of the chapters in the middle bored me to tears.  But other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the book.

I found the character of Philip Carey to be quite a bit of a whiner.  Nothing was ever good enough for what he imagined life to be.  He felt as if life should give him a break because he was born with a club foot.  No one ever showed him how to not be self-conscious, but in the manner of his family’s piety, he should have learned not to care and to accept it.  But maybe that’s a lesson you don’t learn ’til you’re older and more experienced in life.  School children can be terribly cruel and I do sympathize with him on the point of feeling so out of place that you wanted to go rampaging through the halls.  I don’t think that anyone truly understands how heart-wrenching it can be to have your peers pick on you so mercilessly and without regret.

It seems to me that instead of outgrowing that awkwardness associated with his clubfoot, it perverted his personality.  Within himself he grew biter at not having what others have because he felt himself unworthy.  I think this is how and why he subconsciously chooses to love Mildred.  Mildred refuses to be civil to him.  She ignores his attempts at social interaction and ignites a passion for revenge in him.  Curious about her nature, he finds himself drawn to her distasteful personage and becomes obsessed.  Now that I think about it, it really reminds me of the ‘relationship’ between Spike & Buffy in “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”.  All throughout Season 6 Spike is following Buffy, digging through her personal belongings and being a nuisance.  He wants her to notice him whether it’s through beating his ass down or confiding in him because there’s no one else she can turn to.  At the end of Season 6 she has had enough of their affair and calls it off.  Spike, unable to contain his obsession for her, breaks his way into her bathroom and tries to rape her all the while begging her to love him and asking why she doesn’t love him.  The two situations run parallel.  For Philip he allows himself to be made fool of time and time again because he can’t stop thinking about Mildred.  He spends all of his money on her because she asks and tells him that she’s in trouble.  On days when she breaks dates with him, he oftentimes goes and follows her and asks why she had to lie.  He knew that she didn’t want to have anything to do with him in the romantic way, but yet he persisted.  I was pleasantly surprised when Mildred came to work for Philip that she was consumed with a similar passion for him but refused to acknowledge it as anything but revenge.

Philip’s time spent in poverty was portrayed very well.  I felt terrible for him to have to give up his dream and be driven away from his home because his uncle refused to lend him money.  Being in debt is one of the more distressing and depressing things that can happen to a person.  At this point his loathing for human weakness was so great that it prevented him from ever asking for help or even confiding to one of his close friends.  While he held his certain beliefs of them, it is evident that they would not have thought any less of him for his foolish decisions.  Each and every one of his friends have been in a position where they felt lowly.  Finally the Athenly’s take him in and help get him back on his feet.  While the job wasn’t something to brag about, it was keeping him living and giving him something to do while England was at war.

I loved the portrayal of the Athenly family.  They seemed so down to earth and hard-working.  It reminds me of a family we know.  The quirky dad with a random assortment of thoughts constantly running through his mind and then out through his mouth; the superbly matronly mother and eldest daughter, knowing what’s best for the family; and then the rambunctious children themselves.  Philip is taken in with the family quite naturally.

I’m very glad that there wasn’t an emotional departure between Philip and his uncle.  That kind of a scene would have been so out of place for their history and especially for their personalities.  I wished much more that there was some dark secret in the Vicar’s past, but there was none mentioned.  It wasn’t surprising to me to see the difference of feeling between Aunt Louisa and the Vicar in regards to Philip.  When Philip left to pursue his last dream of becoming a doctor, it was Aunt Louisa who gave him quite a bit of money to help with the costs.  She couldn’t bear to think of him without any help and did it out of a maternal love for him.  Later when Philip asks the Vicar for money, he answers quite conservatively about it.

At the end Philip proposes to Sally, the Athenly’s eldest daughter.  Even though he originally intended it to be because of a possible impregnation, he asks all the same.  He notes to himself that he does not love her, but she makes him happy.  I think this is important because there was one other woman in his life (Norah Nesbit) who made him happy and yet he blew her off for Mildred and that ended ever so badly.  When Philip went to reconcile with Norah a year or so after the fact, he kicked himself when he learned of her engagement to the journalist.  At least here with Sally he knew that happiness and comfort might be the only thing that will make him happy as his love for/with Mildred has only brought bitter disappointment and intense hurt.

I’m going to put this book on my list of books that I’ll probably never read again unless I get laid up in a hospital.  Or unless something piques my interest about it.  It honestly didn’t captivate me the way books usually do and too much of it was caught up in descriptions of places and things.  If you’re into that kind of thing, I strongly suggest you read it.  But if you are more into the action and dialogue, I don’t think this will be your cup of tea.