Musings of the Obsessive Kind

This is one of my favorite scenes in the entirety of Dickens. It's from Our Mutual Friend *waves her John/Bella flag*


Sooth to say, Mr Rokesmith not only passed the window, but came into the counting-house. And not only came into the counting-house, but, finding himself alone there with Bella and her father, rushed at Bella and caught her in his arms, with the rapturous words 'My dear, dear girl; my gallant, generous, disinterested, courageous, noble girl!' And not only that even, (which one might have thought astonishment enough for one dose), but Bella, after hanging her head for a moment, lifted it up and laid it on his breast, as if that were her head's chosen and lasting resting-place!

'I knew you would come to him, and I followed you,' said Rokesmith. 'My love, my life! You ARE mine?'

To which Bella responded, 'Yes, I AM yours if you think me worth taking!' And after that, seemed to shrink to next to nothing in the clasp of his arms, partly because it was such a strong one on his part,and partly because there was such a yielding to it on hers.

...

'Mr Wilfer,' said John Rokesmith, excitedly and joyfully, 'Bella takes me, though I have no fortune, even no present occupation; nothing but what I can get in the life before us. Bella takes me!'

'Yes, I should rather have inferred, my dear sir,' returned the cherub feebly, 'that Bella took you, from what I have within these few minutes remarked.'

'You don't know, Pa,' said Bella, 'how ill I have used him!'

'You don't know, sir,' said Rokesmith, 'what a heart she has!'

'You don't know, Pa,' said Bella, 'what a shocking creature I was growing, when he saved me from myself!'

'You don't know, sir,' said Rokesmith, 'what a sacrifice she has made for me!'

'My dear Bella,' replied the cherub, still pathetically scared, 'and my dear John Rokesmith, if you will allow me so to call you--'

'Yes do, Pa, do!' urged Bella. 'I allow you, and my will is his law. Isn't it--dear John Rokesmith?'

There was an engaging shyness in Bella, coupled with an engaging tenderness of love and confidence and pride, in thus first calling him by name, which made it quite excusable in John Rokesmith to do what he did. What he did was, once more to give her the appearance of vanishing as aforesaid.


Here it is from the 1998 adaptation:

My favorite British period adaptation is North and South. See this fun MV for why :)



NS is my third-favorite 19th-century novel (behind Jane Eyre and Our Mutual Friend, both of which also had excellent adaptations).

I am lucky in my 19th-century novel loving soul: most of them have excellent adaptations, from various Trollipe novels (Pallisers! OMGLOVE), wonderful abundance of great Dickens stuff, Austen overkill, Jane Eyre and other Bronte works, Gaskell novels, Wilkie Collins stuff, Hardy etc.

In fact, if they ever adopted Bronte's Shirley and Gaskell's Mary Barton, I'd be set forever.

My favorite British period adaptation is North and South. See this fun MV for why :)



NS is my third-favorite 19th-century novel (behind Jane Eyre and Our Mutual Friend, both of which also had excellent adaptations).

I am lucky in my 19th-century novel loving soul: most of them have excellent adaptations, from various Trollipe novels (Pallisers! OMGLOVE), wonderful abundance of great Dickens stuff, Austen overkill, Jane Eyre and other Bronte works, Gaskell novels, Wilkie Collins stuff, Hardy etc.

In fact, if they ever adopted Bronte's Shirley and Gaskell's Mary Barton, I'd be set forever.

1. After this clip, The Lakes just moved way up my viewing list. Yeah, I know it's a gritty and intelligent drama but I am afraid I am shallow and all my brain ic capable of processing is 'Guuuuhhh...John Simm...guhhh...making out.' I have yet to figure out how someone who is, objectively, not good-looking, manages to be so hot.

2. I found this Casanova MV with David Tennant. It looks scrumptious. Must be my weekend viewing then. I realized, however, that I am totally allergic to seeing DT upset: I begin to feel upset myself.



3. You know my mad love for Our Mutual Friend, the novel and the 1998 adaptation? And John/Bella and Eugene/Lizzie, the two mainc couples? Well, imagine my delight when I found MVs about them. Seriously, if you watch these, I dare you not to want to watch OMF.

( MVs here )

4. Does anyone else love the 1990s BBC adaptation of Tess of the D'Urbervilles with Justine Waddell and Oliver Milburn as much as I do? Clearly some people do, because look what I found on youtube. So much angsty OTPishness.

( Tess vids )

5. I adore Henry Tilney from Northanger Abbey. Am about to watch the 2007 version. Found this MV and am pleased to announce he seems acceptable :)

( MV here )

6. And because I cannot end this post, largely about lit adaptations, without mention of my favorite adaptation hero, Mr. Thornton from North and South, here is a vid.

( N and S vid )

Watching 'Doomsday' bits in the morning (for screencapping) is a bad BAD idea. Your face will end up blotchy like hell. FUCK. Starting with end of S2, the Doctor's arc is losing what he cares about: woman he loves in Doomsday, more and more of himself in S3, culminating with the last person of his kind, a friend/foe in LotTL. It's all about how completely isolated and lonely he is, isn't it? A catalogue of loss.

My new show to watch is Life on Mars with John Simm. After being involved in a car accident in 2006, DCI Sam Tyler wakes up to find himself in 1973. Is it real, is it a coma? Who knows. But he has to adjust.

MV:



Oh, and it seems I have to lay off the word 'soulmate,' at least in the Who fandom, as they have TPTB on their side. I found some quote where Russell T. Davies referred to Doctor/Rose as 'soulmates.' But I still hate that word the way Cybermen hate Daleks. *sticks tongue out*

In other news, Does anyone else have a favorite rainy weather book? It’s been rainy and gloomy here today (though I had an awesomely geeky lunch with Mr. Mousie, eating soup and discussing Doctor Who. Few better ways to spend your lunch).

But anyway, my favorite rainy-grey-day book, the book that I want to curel up with on the couch, drinking tea, is Charles Dickens’ Nicholas Nickleby (I am a huge Dickens fan, and it’s proof of how much I love Mr. Mousie, that I still married him despite his dislike of Dickens :P).

( Rambles on NN and OMF )

In other news, I am amused that amazon.co.uk keeps trying to suggest Touching Evil to me as a DVD I might like (probably because I have other Robson Green series in there). Heh. Fat chance. I saw some of it because fire_snake liked it, and it was very very excellent, and it is one of the very few things I have up because it was much too depressing and angsty! True, the subject matter (the characters work in a serial killer type investigative unit) wasn’t chirpy to begin with, but the whole modus operandi for the show seemed to be to punish Robson Green’s character for any happiness he might have had. Sort of a ‘hah! You forgot for a second the utter desolation and horror of your existence! Time to do something horrific to remind you of it, like killing a cute child you feel responsible for. You need to know life’s not sunshine and puppies. Unless it’s puppies boiled by sunshine into a gloopy mess. Forget any hopes you might have had for surcease of pain for longer than two seconds, puny mortal!’

Seriously. I got off the angst train shortly after they killed a character I liked in some season because seriously, it was fictional equivalent of fingernail pulling. Excellent series, but enough to make you hit your head on a wall.

Watching 'Doomsday' bits in the morning (for screencapping) is a bad BAD idea. Your face will end up blotchy like hell. FUCK. Starting with end of S2, the Doctor's arc is losing what he cares about: woman he loves in Doomsday, more and more of himself in S3, culminating with the last person of his kind, a friend/foe in LotTL. It's all about how completely isolated and lonely he is, isn't it? A catalogue of loss.

My new show to watch is Life on Mars with John Simm. After being involved in a car accident in 2006, DCI Sam Tyler wakes up to find himself in 1973. Is it real, is it a coma? Who knows. But he has to adjust.

MV:



Oh, and it seems I have to lay off the word 'soulmate,' at least in the Who fandom, as they have TPTB on their side. I found some quote where Russell T. Davies referred to Doctor/Rose as 'soulmates.' But I still hate that word the way Cybermen hate Daleks. *sticks tongue out*

In other news, Does anyone else have a favorite rainy weather book? It’s been rainy and gloomy here today (though I had an awesomely geeky lunch with Mr. Mousie, eating soup and discussing Doctor Who. Few better ways to spend your lunch).

But anyway, my favorite rainy-grey-day book, the book that I want to curel up with on the couch, drinking tea, is Charles Dickens’ Nicholas Nickleby (I am a huge Dickens fan, and it’s proof of how much I love Mr. Mousie, that I still married him despite his dislike of Dickens :P).

( Rambles on NN and OMF )

In other news, I am amused that amazon.co.uk keeps trying to suggest Touching Evil to me as a DVD I might like (probably because I have other Robson Green series in there). Heh. Fat chance. I saw some of it because fire_snake liked it, and it was very very excellent, and it is one of the very few things I have up because it was much too depressing and angsty! True, the subject matter (the characters work in a serial killer type investigative unit) wasn’t chirpy to begin with, but the whole modus operandi for the show seemed to be to punish Robson Green’s character for any happiness he might have had. Sort of a ‘hah! You forgot for a second the utter desolation and horror of your existence! Time to do something horrific to remind you of it, like killing a cute child you feel responsible for. You need to know life’s not sunshine and puppies. Unless it’s puppies boiled by sunshine into a gloopy mess. Forget any hopes you might have had for surcease of pain for longer than two seconds, puny mortal!’

Seriously. I got off the angst train shortly after they killed a character I liked in some season because seriously, it was fictional equivalent of fingernail pulling. Excellent series, but enough to make you hit your head on a wall.