tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post7893874297854285619..comments2023-06-21T18:53:11.897+10:00Comments on Pykk: 'twas for himselfUmbagollahhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14556344092820711893noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-34331215966311426602016-03-15T03:02:25.953+11:002016-03-15T03:02:25.953+11:00Most of the other characters in that masquerade ch...Most of the other characters in that masquerade chapter do dress up in the way that you suggest, though. Just not Briggs. Cecilia's friend (who is secretly betraying her with bad advice) dresses up as the devil that he really is, and no one knows the joke except us. But the secrets that other people try to keep hidden or deny in themselves are the things that Briggs will tell you about himself immediately: you can't ironically shame a man by revealing that he's a stingy miser who lives in filth when it's his main topic of conversation already.Umbagollahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14556344092820711893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-78021080349491307242016-03-10T09:56:34.588+11:002016-03-10T09:56:34.588+11:00That's very good, soap as a thief, dirt as per...That's very good, soap as a thief, dirt as personal growth.<br /><br />I am so used to irony as a personal writerly tool that I misread a lot of scenes I read, looking for the irony. Surface truths are sometimes hard for me to see.scott g.f.baileyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05726743149139510832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-7944408309196902952016-03-04T03:26:51.509+11:002016-03-04T03:26:51.509+11:00That's true, Briggs the stockbroker seems to b...That's true, Briggs the stockbroker seems to be the only really rich worker in the book. There's also Mr Hobson, a London landlord, but he's well-off rather than rich. Mr Morrice the lawyer has an ambiguous amount of money and Burney only made him a lawyer so that she could have a social-climber character: he "owed his success neither to distinguished abilities, nor to skill-supplying industry, but to the art of uniting suppleness to others with confidence in himself." Most of the working people are poor. <br /><br />Briggs, though, isn't revealing anything new when he dresses in dirt. He's dirty in his normal life as well because he never uses soap -- "never use soap; nothing but waste" -- other characters point out that his everyday clothes are tatty and old -- so the coal smell and the sweep rags are functioning as an exaggeration of the Briggs that people already see, more than as a revelation of anything he keeps hidden. You could call it honesty but maybe a perverted and hyperbolic honesty, not someone who keeps their dirt to themselves but something closer to a Star Wars fan who puts Millennium Falcon stickers all over their car and then goes to a Hallowe'en party as a Jedi. <br /><br />There's another useful Doody moment when she says that Briggs' "own physical dirt is what has accrued to him, a painless increase from the world of nature," which recasts bars of soap, in the Briggs world, as <i>thieves</i>.Umbagollahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14556344092820711893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-27035135203525154892016-03-03T06:23:20.569+11:002016-03-03T06:23:20.569+11:00So is Briggs the only rich man who actually works ...So is Briggs the only rich man who actually works for his wealth, his sweep clothes actually more a revelation of truth than a costume? Another inverted form of honesty, or another level of honesty, maybe, in the masquerade theme?scott g.f.baileyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05726743149139510832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-89880861110470980912016-02-26T13:21:08.706+11:002016-02-26T13:21:08.706+11:00Burney is good at narcissists. She has trouble let...Burney is good at narcissists. She has trouble letting herself enjoy them though, the way Dickens does. Umbagollahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14556344092820711893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-26050312216422304732016-02-26T12:17:03.265+11:002016-02-26T12:17:03.265+11:00I want to read all of her novels now. That should ...I want to read all of her novels now. That should take a bit. Umbagollahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14556344092820711893noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-44435625024549160332016-02-26T09:20:29.663+11:002016-02-26T09:20:29.663+11:00Burney-blogging has been great. I hope the series...Burney-blogging has been great. I hope the series goes on for a while.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5424364424049242300.post-84701013578546202812016-02-26T06:25:59.564+11:002016-02-26T06:25:59.564+11:00peculiar how allure and ugliness can occur in the ...peculiar how allure and ugliness can occur in the same package; human interactions remind me of geology. stratigraphy studies layers of earth and rock and how they blend into or overlay each other, and what kind of forces and/or events caused the observed configuration. not so easy, of course , analyzing the history of present human interactions, but perhaps more rewarding, socially speaking. narcissism is kind of like a basalt flow, sweeping in and covering up other, milder formations, sediments, and often hiding structural upheavals that might have indicated former violent occurrences which jumbled up the geologic record. interesting and confusing simultaneously...Mudpuddlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17194891656971454279noreply@blogger.com