The biggest lesson I learned was if you are going to read a book in grad school make sure you can pick it up and be able to put it down again. I was only able to do this because I had watched the mini series of it a few months ago(for my blog post on that click here). I knew the plot and basically what was happening but sometimes I did get lost in Higgins dialect. I don't know factory workers actually talked back then but Elizabeth Gaskell did a good job I felt of being authentic. It wasn't until after I read the book I saw a little glossary in the back of all the slang.... so maybe that would have helped too.
I cannot decide if this is a spoiler alert or not... but for the most part the love story between Mr. Thorton and Margaret Hale is a lot like Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett. They both have assumptions about how the world should be. Margaret is kind of idealistic but her life has been kind of sheltered so it makes sense that she is shelter. Mr. Thorton though now he is on top, he has a hard life and that has made him hard. But Margaret's beauty, her idealism and even the way she stands up for the things that she sees as wrong make Mr. Thorton attracted to her. Then when she stands up to the crowd of picketers for Mr. Thorton every one is convinced she loves him. So he goes and proposes to her, like Mr. Darcy, she refuses him but still Mr. Thorton can't stop loving her. But both are very wrong in their perception of each other. Of course North and South is not as rosy as Pride and Prejudice, Margaret must go through a lot of heart ache before the end of the story. But some how through it all she still has her ideals intact. She also learns to love Milton, a place she thought she would never love. She also discovers she loves Mr. Thorton.
Since I have already written about this story in my Love some Melodrama post you can read the plot there. Plus I don't want to give too much away.
Over all while I enjoyed reading the book I think the movie is a must watch before trying to read. As a lot of things happens, there are a few different characters to keep track of and there are a few twist to follow. I can't yet tell if this a book I will read over and over again (like I do with my Austen's) or if this is a one time read. Maybe one day when I am not in grad school it won't take me so long to get through it.
But now on to my next book A Jane Austen Education. It was recommended to me by roommate who shares a love of Jane Austen. It is about a guy reading Jane Austen and discovering life truths in her novels. So far he is anti-Jane Austen but from his first paragraph he seems to turn into a Jane Austen fan (more proof that men can like Jane Austen). It is not a novel so I look forward to some non-fiction.
" I was twenty six, and about as dumb, in all human beings, as any twenty-six-year-old has the right to be, when I met the woman who would change my life. That she'd been dead for a couple hundred years made not the slightest difference whatsoever. Her name was Jane Austen, she would teach me everything I know everything that matters."- William Deresiewics (first paragraph).
