Dude, did you even READ the books?

The New York Post recently ran this jawdropper of a passage, quoting George Orwell:

"In George Orwell’s essay on Charles Dickens, he wonders what the Victorian novelist’s heroes get up to after the books end: 'The answer evidently is that they did nothing . . . That is the spirit in which most of Dickens’ books end — a sort of radiant idleness. His heroes, once they had come into money and "settled down," would not only do no work; they would not even ride, hunt, shoot, fight duels, elope with actresses or lose money at the races. They would simply live at home in feather-bed respectability, and preferably next door to a blood-relation living exactly the same life.'"

(Full quote available here.)

I hope it doesn't look like I'm trying to detract from Orwell's undisputed greatness, if I ask what on earth he was smoking when he wrote that. I can think of maybe THREE Dickens novels that ended this way. And if you take a novel like Hard Times or Great Expectations or Little Dorrit, or any one of a number of others I could name, that's almost the exact opposite of the way that they ended.

Yes, Orwell was undoubtedly a great writer . . . but as a Dickens critic, he may have left a little something to be desired.

Responses

Marian

April 20, 2011

Agreed–Little Dorrit is definitely the opposite. Certainly, they ended up living near their relations, but I seriously doubt even Amy looks forward to babysitting her sister’s kids, all the time. 😛
“…fight duels, elope with actresses or lose money at the races”
Great way to end. Just what everyone wants in life.

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Nina

April 20, 2011

And….the Dickens hate continues. WTHeck?

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carolyn

April 20, 2011

He must have been gotten Dickens confused with Austen.

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Gina

April 21, 2011

Actually, Orwell liked Dickens! Which makes this passage all the more incomprehensible.
Carolyn, I had the same thought. That hypothetical ending he describes sounds much more like Austen than Dickens.

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Christy

April 21, 2011

That’s what I was thinking as well, Austen rather than Dickens. I can think of many Dickens characters who would do that, like possibly Eugene Wrayburn, definitely Prince Turveydrop’s father, Mr. Skimpole, Richard Carstone (if he had lived), Mr. Dorrit (if *he* had lived). But certainly not the majority of the main characters, who all had great energy and a great desire to live and do good and work hard at whatever it was they were doing. Dickens had lazy characters, but he certainly didn’t excuse their laziness.
I think Orwell was smoking nutmeg, which has certain hallucinatory qualities in large doses (if I remember correctly).

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