Scan barcode
A review by reidob
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
4.0
Another in my effort to read as many as I can of the classic novels of other centuries. This is a delightful romp satirizing early 19th Century Great Britain and is particularly brutal to the upper classes of that era. The subtitle of the book is "a novel without a hero", precisely because Thackeray cannot find a single person worthy of that distinction among his characters.
Of course, this could easily become a grind in the hands of a lesser artist, but Thackeray is truly a master of his craft. Whenever the story begins to flag, you can almost feel him understanding this, and the gears of the story shift to another scene or another character.
The plot revolves around a group of friends, young people who are stratified entirely on the basis of their economic well-being. All of these wealthy, spoiled, mostly shiftless creatures are seemingly incapable of real work and provide, at best, a drag on the working world. Unfortunately, their parents also control the working world and pay most of the salaries of the working class, so there is very little choice but to serve them. Some of these are the nouveau riche, made rich in the early industrial age, and portrayed as crude and grasping. Others are a sort of aristocracy subdivided by titles and fortunes into distinct strata that one can only hope to ascend.
Though I thoroughly admire Thackery's mastery of the form, the sheer, deep cynicism of his vision is so venomous as to be somewhat off-putting. There is truly no one to love here, and even the most innocent of his characters is entirely oblivious of the sufferings of others. Perhaps some segments of British society of the time resembled this group of narcissists, but one would hope the author found a least a few kind and decent people around him, because I have to believe they existed somewhere.
Still, a fine and well-written book and well worth the investment of time and emotional energy involved. Give it a look!
Of course, this could easily become a grind in the hands of a lesser artist, but Thackeray is truly a master of his craft. Whenever the story begins to flag, you can almost feel him understanding this, and the gears of the story shift to another scene or another character.
The plot revolves around a group of friends, young people who are stratified entirely on the basis of their economic well-being. All of these wealthy, spoiled, mostly shiftless creatures are seemingly incapable of real work and provide, at best, a drag on the working world. Unfortunately, their parents also control the working world and pay most of the salaries of the working class, so there is very little choice but to serve them. Some of these are the nouveau riche, made rich in the early industrial age, and portrayed as crude and grasping. Others are a sort of aristocracy subdivided by titles and fortunes into distinct strata that one can only hope to ascend.
Though I thoroughly admire Thackery's mastery of the form, the sheer, deep cynicism of his vision is so venomous as to be somewhat off-putting. There is truly no one to love here, and even the most innocent of his characters is entirely oblivious of the sufferings of others. Perhaps some segments of British society of the time resembled this group of narcissists, but one would hope the author found a least a few kind and decent people around him, because I have to believe they existed somewhere.
Still, a fine and well-written book and well worth the investment of time and emotional energy involved. Give it a look!