Victober 2020 ~ In Memory of Vivianne ~

[Vivianne]

Yes, I started by reading her biography on the Poetry Foundation’s website and was really impressed by her! I tend to have favorite authors and not branch out...

I really like analysis because it adds perspective. I’m not great at literary analysis, so I often need a boost in understanding.

Did you finish your book?

[MissAutumn]

I'm a bit like that too. It took me ages to give new authors a read. Discovering book reviewers on YouTube and joining Goodreads this year has started me to branch a little bit more.

I don't know how people are good at literary analysis. It's so easy to miss details. I tend to read analyses after reading the work because far too many of them have spoilers.

I'm close. Just 20 pages left to go! I've not spent much time reading today. I've mostly been catching up with a couple of TV series since I've had the house to myself.

[Vivianne]

I don’t think there’s such a thing as a ‘comprehensive’ literary analysis - an author’s intention is rarely fully known.

That’s a pleasant way to spend time. I’m taking a break from reading and working on a plot instead.

[MissAutumn]

That's true. I think you can over analyse works too.

What are you writing about if you don't mind me asking?

[Vivianne]

I consider analysis sometimes like those ink blot tests, reflecting more the mind of the person doing the analysis.

I’m trying to write a fairytale-ish comedic murder mystery, but not quite.

Reading for Victober has reminded me to get back to it.

[Lemon Cheesecake]

I have to say the Victorian era shows I have been watching for this month's Victober have stimulated my curiosity for that time period and caused me to reflect on the conditions and situations that people lived in and had to deal with during that time.

[MissAutumn]

That sounds intriguing, Vivianne. It sounds like an original idea for a story. Do you take part in that writing challenge that's held every November? I can't remember the name.

It makes you wonder how people lived and survived in such conditions. I was reading the Time Traveller's Guide series earlier this year. The Restoration Britain book had a very interesting closing chapter. The author looked at the suicide rates of not only that period but from the last few hundred years to the present day.

It is obvious that our ancestors suffered many hardships that do not affect us in the modern world. It is equally obvious that the vast majority of them enjoyed very few comforts and freedoms that we do not. Yet although life was so much harsher, only half as many people killed themselves as do today.

I find that intriguing. I'll have to see if I can find any documentaries on the social history of the Victorian period.

So I finished my book. I'm now re-reading Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë. Since I've originally read it, I've done quite a bit of research on the Brontës and I can see where Anne took events from her life as a governess and wrote about them in her book. The children of the first family Agnes works for are so horrible! I shudder to think that they were based on real children that the author taught.

I also binged watched North and South. I remember why I love that show. I also forgot that some scenes where filmed in a town that I used to live close to. The actress that played Esther in Bleak House is in it as well.

[Vivianne]

It takes over my brain sometimes.

I only casually participate in NaNoWriMo; I try to write more, but I’m definitely too inefficient to produce a novel in a month. An output of 1k in a day is a very good day for me.

I think their values may have been conducive to a lower suicide rate. I know Elizabeth Barrett Browning had health issues, but she was taken care of and allowed the freedom to pursue her literary career.

I also remember reading about a discovery of a disabled skeleton from maybe hunter-gatherer times? She had tooth decay, leading to the hypothesis she was fed lots of sweets. I wonder how social structures have changed and affected how people take care of each other.

[MissAutumn]

I thought it was called NaNoWriMo! Writing 1k in a day is pretty good - most people would struggle with that for their good writing days. I think my good writing days was a 500 word output when I was at university.

That's a good point. Communities where tighter knit and most people didn't move away so you had that network of support that we're lacking in the modern age. I also wonder if religious belief had any impact.

I'm going to have to look into that disabled archaeological find. The general view was that people with disabilities where left to die. This could change that view and show they were cared for. That would make a good research project.

[Vivianne]

I’ll have to make a thread when November gets closer!

Haha, 1k is my absolute best. My average is 400 or so.

Here’s the article! Soft paywall.

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/scie ... ssion.html

Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal is a good look at modern care for the aged. I think in the Victorian era, daughters and wives would’ve had the responsibility, though the book doesn’t discuss it specifically. There are trade offs to every freedom.

[Lemon Cheesecake]

MissAutumn I think you are right, religious belief's probably did have an impact since most people in the earlier time periods were of the belief that if you committed suicide you went straight to hell.
I think the morals laws/rules of people's faith's/beliefs also require them to reach out and help their neighbors. Although, from what I can see in the Victorian programs I have been watching, that meant those in your "social class." The rich might donate some money to the church to help the poor but they really didn't actually help them themselves, even those employed under them.

[MissAutumn]

I look forward to it, Vivianne.

Thanks for finding the article. That was a good read. It's amazing what you can learn from bones. I didn't know fetal burials where odd for that part of the world during that age. In Europe you find quite a few ancient burials with people having been laid to rest in that position.

From what I know of the upper classes in history, they tended to help the poor as part of ceremony or to receive pardons for their sins (I forget the technical word - it was before the reformation of the church). Most poor people received help from the monasteries before the Dissolution of the Monasteries happened in the 16th century.

[Lemon Cheesecake]

I forget the term as well but it was like "paying" to have your sins forgiven. I guess it was one way of getting people to help out the poor.
I liked how the Jewish faith had a gleaning program for the poor...if you were poor or hungry you could go through the fields after they had been plowed etc and pick up grains that were left behind.I wonder if they still have that?
I know our area has a program where people give their abundant vegetables or fruit to the food banks to hand out or let groups come in and pick for free.

[MissAutumn]

I found the word. It's "indulgence".

I never knew the Jews had that. You learn something new every day. That sounds like a nice idea. The local church collects donations for food banks - most people just give away canned and dried food. Giving fruits and vegetables would give the receivers more variety.

[Lemon Cheesecake]

There is so much that goes to waste! Restaraunts used to donate end of day food but people protested that it is food that sat so it should not be given away..so I think most throw it out now. Shouldn't you let the people you are giving it to decide?

My Mom used to be able to get old lettuce and veggies for the animals/livestock from the grocery store for free. We didn't have a lot of animals but it gave them variety in their diet rather then just alfalfa and grains.

In one of the Dickensian episodes Bob Cratchet goes looking through the market at the end of the day to see what he could find for scraps.