Vanity Fair by William M. Thackeray

     "As the manager of the Performance sits before the curtain on the boards and looks into the Fair, a feeling of profound melancholy comes over him in his survey of the bustling place. There is a great quantity of eating and drinking, making love and jilting, laughing and the contrary, smoking, cheating, fighting, dancing and fiddling; there are bullies pushing about, bucks ogling the women, knaves picking pockets, policemen on the look-out, quacks (OTHER quacks, plague take them!) bawling in front of their booths, and yokels looking up at the tinselled dancers and poor old rouged tumblers, while the light-fingered folk are operating upon their pockets behind. Yes, this is VANITY FAIR; not a moral place certainly; nor a merry one, though very noisy. Look at the faces of the actors and buffoons when they come off from their business . . .
     "And with this, and a profound bow to his patrons, the Manager retires, and the curtain rises."
                                                                                         LONDON, June 28, 1848*

With these words, Thackeray opens his tale of life in Vanity Fair.  What is Vanity Fair?  The term itself comes from John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress":

   "Then I saw in my dream, that, when they were got out of the wilderness, they presently saw a town before them, and the name of that town is Vanity; and at the town there is a fair kept, called Vanity Fair. It is kept all the year long. It beareth the name of Vanity Fair, because the town where it is kept is lighter than vanity, and also because all that is there sold, or that cometh thither, is vanity . . .
    "This is no newly begun business, but a thing of ancient standing. I will show you the original of it.  Almost five thousand years ago, there were pilgrims walking to the Celestial City, as these two honest persons are; and Beelzebub, Apollyon, and Legion, with their companions, perceiving by the path that the pilgrims made that their way to the city lay through this town of Vanity, they contrived here to set up a fair; a fair wherein should be sold all sorts of vanity, and that it should last all the year long. Therefore at this fair are all such things sold as houses, lands, trades, places, honors, preferments, titles, countries, kingdoms, lusts, pleasures, and delights of all sorts, as wives, husbands, children, masters, servants, lives, blood, bodies, souls, silver, gold, pearls, precious stones, and what not."**

Not a very pleasant description.  And not a pleasant place - Thackeray never appears to set out to make this world of Vanity Fair welcoming or beautiful.  No, indeed.  To Thackeray his society was merely a modern version of Bunyan's Vanity Fair.  However, while Bunyan's protagonist Christian makes it through Vanity Fair and continues to the Celestial City, Thackeray's characters are caught in Vanity Fair and must survive its heartless cruelty, duplicity, and greed.

Like a Dickens tale, "Vanity Fair" follows many characters, makes many detours to keep the reader up-to-date with the activities of its numerous players.  Its principle characters are Becky Sharp, Amelia Sedley, and William Dobbin.  Other key people are George Osborne, Rawdon Crawley, and Lord Steyne.  It may be necessary to take notes while reading this book to keep track of who is related to whom.  It is a tangled web of familial relations.

The story is set during the Napoleonic Wars and covers several decades.  Becky Sharp is a resourceful, clever school mistress.  She has been teaching French at Miss Pinkerton's academy, a school that teaches young ladies.  She occupies a low station in the social world because her father was a poor and a painter.  To make her situation worse, Becky's mother was French and performed on the stage.  In those times, a woman who was a performer was assumed to have loose morals.

The story begins with Becky Sharp leaving the school with her friend Amelia Sedley.  Amelia, beloved of her schoolmates, is young, beautiful, innocent, and wealthy.  Everything Becky is not, with the exception of beauty.  Becky is quite beautiful.  Amelia is taking Becky to her home where the two friends will stay for a few weeks before Becky begins her job as a governess.

In the arts of flirtation and flattery, Becky quite outshines gentle Amelia.  Amelia, who looks for the best in people, is blind to Becky's dark nature.  She does not realize that Becky's affection for her as a friend is merely a ploy to enable her to move among her superiors.

From the beginning, Becky is unconventional.  She is a superb actress but a terrible schemer.  She does not want to accept the lowly station of governess.  She eyes the success, money, property, and popularity of the rich with a cunning, lustful eye.  However, the only way that she can achieve her desired position in society is through matrimony.  But who will this remarkable, ambitious woman woo?

There is Amelia's well-to-do older brother Joseph Sedley.  He is a government employee who works in India.  He is shy around women and not at all handsome.  However, Becky discovers his weak point: flattery.

There is George Osborne, Amelia's fiancé.  He is in the military and the son of a wealthy businessman.  His weakness is his pride and selfishness.

There is William Dobbin, George's good friend and fellow officer.  He is humble and selfless, unlike his friend.  He worships the ground Amelia's walks on and feels that George doesn't value her as he ought.

There are the Crawleys; the father and two sons.  The father's wife is sickly and the old man comes to rely on Becky's strong nature and resourcefulness.  The older son, Pitt, finds her attentions and subtle flattery pleasing.  The younger son, Rawdon, is a dashing, careless soldier.  In spite of his reckless nature, he is the favorite of his rich aunt, Miss Crawley, and, it is assumed, stands most likely among his family to inherit her considerable fortune.

Becky plays for high stakes, risking everything for a chance to climb to the top of society.  Her struggle is critically chronicled by William Thackeray, as are the adventures of the rest of the characters and players who make up Vanity Fair.

"Vanity Fair" is an attack on society - an all out attack on its ways, habits, and life.  No one escapes Thackeray's barrage.  To him, everyone lives in Vanity Fair and we all participate in its useless, purposeless existence.  I think Thackeray could agree with Solomon and say "vanity of vanities; all is vanity." (Ecclesiastes 1:2, KJV)  It is this hopelessness that I found most discouraging in the book.

Thackeray reminded me of his contemporary Dickens.  Both critiqued society; both created stories with large casts; both wrote serialized novels; both were fluent in their use of the English language; both created stories based on the complexities of their characters.  Despite the similarities, however, I find Dickens more pleasing to read than Thackeray.  Why?  Dickens has a special sense of humor.  Even when he was describing something morbid or some horrid social injustice, he said in with a wry smile.  Many times I'd find myself chuckling or smiling at something that, upon further reflection, I realized wasn't a bit humorous.  Thackeray does this but not with the same comic effect as Dickens.


Wilkins Macawber

Many of Dickens's characters are memorable, pitiable, loveable, and laughable.  That's not to say he didn't create horrible villains.  His villains are evil and frightening: Uriah Heep, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Ralph Nickleby, Mr. Murdstone, Madame Defarge, Monks, to name a few.  But he contrasts these dark characters with the light of other characters: Joe Gargery, Miss Pross, Jarvis Lorry, Wilkins Micawber, Betsey Trotwood, Mr. and Mrs. Crummles, and the brothers Cheeryble.  These loving, humorous, loyal friends of the heroes and heroines cheered the darkest moors and warmed the bleakest London street.  Characters of these types are absent from "Vanity Fair."  Thackeray's work lacks the themes of redemption, love, and hope  - ones that you find more easily in Dickens's work. 
The subtitle to "Vanity Fair" is 'A Novel Without a Hero.'  This is very true.  After reaching the middle point of the book, I realized that I only liked one character out of the entire host.  Becky is too cruel and heartless for me to root for her, and the others were too blind, greedy, and selfish for me to like or wish them well.  Becky and her compatriots are a far cry from the sympathetic protagonist of a Dickens tale. 

If you love Thackeray or are purposefully exploring famous works of literature, then you may enjoy this lengthy novel.  That's why I picked it up - I love classical literature.  If, though, you are looking for an uplifting, pleasant novel, classical in nature, I would recommend Dickens or Elliot.  Vanity Fair is a lonely, sad place.

*Vanity Fair.  Thackeray, William Makepeace. 1848.
**The Pilgrim's Progress.  Bunyan, John.  1678.

 

Five Children & It by E. Nesbit

  

                                                             TO JOHN BLAND

                                                My Lamb, you are so very small,
                                             You have not learned to read at all.
                                            Yet never a printed book withstands
                                            The urgence of your dimpled hands.
                                             So, though this book is for yourself,
                                                Let mother keep it on the shelf
                                              Till you can read. O days that Pass,
                                              That day will come too soon, alas!*

And with this sweet dedication, Edith Nesbit begins her tale about five children and a Psammead (little wonder she refers to the creature as "it" in the title).  What is a Psammead, you might ask?  A Psammead is a Sand Fairy - a creature quite rare nowadays.

The five children are Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane, and the Lamb.  The four older children are the main protagonists, while the Lamb, their two year old brother, is a minor player in most of the adventures.  Another recurring character is Martha, a servant who takes care of the house and the Lamb.  The children's parents do not feature prominently in the story.

The children meet the Psammead (or Sammyadd, as they call him) on holiday in the country.  They are digging in the gravel pit - trying to reach Australia - when they unearth this strange, little creature.  The Psammead is not your typical fairy - sweet and with wings and a magic wand.  He is a small, furry creature, with "snail-like eyes."  He lives buried in the sand away from water, because water kills sand fairies.  As he tells the children, a long time ago people used to build sand castles for Sand Fairies.  The Psammeads enjoyed these delightful homes - until people began digging moats to go with the castles.

Just like beautiful fairies, the Psammead can grant wishes.  But his method is quite unorthodox.  He inflates himself and then lets out his breath.  Granting a wish exhausts the fairy and aggravates his already sullen nature.  The girls, though, treat him kindly.  In one touching scene, Anthea offers to let him sit in her lap to keep warm.  He does.  It's sweet, but I can't help but shudder at the thought of a warm, little, furry creature with "snail-like eyes" sitting in my lap.

The Psammead grants the children nine wishes over the course of the book.  Each wish turns into a misadventure as best and danger at worst.  But is it the children's naivety or the Psammead's sullen nature that causes the trouble?

I am a fan of E. Nesbit's books for children.  Her style is child-like.  She pictures things as children do and includes only the details that would appeal to children.  Her humor it witty and her tales imaginative.  She is very honest about the motives that drive us to do and act as we do.  I think it is this honesty that I particularly find real in her style of writing.

Her characters differ very little from story to story.  Anthea is quite like Bobby, from "The Railway Children", and Jane is just like Dora from "The Treasure Seekers."  The personalities alter little, but they are such fun to begin with that it makes little difference to me.  The pure, innocent fun is refreshing; the stories original; the setting always a delight.

I wish I had a first edition of this story - the cover is gorgeous.  But as the likelihood of finding a first edition of an E. Nesbit book is rare or way beyond the reach of my pocketbook, I found a very modern nice edition.  It is from the "Looking Glass Library", published by Random House.  It features the original illustrations by H.R. Millar.  Some may find the pictures outdated, but I love the Victorian artwork.

There are film adaptions of this story.  I haven't seen the 1991 BBC miniseries, but I did watch the 2004 version starring Freddie Highmore and Kenneth Branagh (in a very "un-Shakespearean" role).  The story is based during WWI, and tells the story of five children sent to the country because of the war.  Their father (Alex Jennings), is a pilot serving his country overseas.  The story has more of a feel of "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe," with Freddie Highmore's character a bit like Edmund Pevensie, as interpreted in the 2005 a film adaption of the C.S. Lewis classic.  However, the screenplay writers borrowed from Lewis; Lewis did not borrow from Nesbit.  I enjoyed this version, though it is nothing at all like the book, so I would not recommend it as a substitute to reading the original story.  I would like to see another adaption - one that tells E. Nesbit's story.

Five Children and It is the first in a trilogy.  The following works are The Phoenix and the Carpet and The Story of the Amulet.  Before I finished the book, I had logged onto the library's website and requested the sequel.  This may show you how much I enjoyed the story!  It's a tale for all ages, but whether all ages will enjoy it, I don't know.  If you enjoy the adventures, magic, and cleverness of "Peter Pan", "Winnie the Pooh", or any other E. Nesbit tale, you will not be disappointed in this choice.  After reading the story you may find yourself wondering If I were to unearth a Psammead, what would I wish for?

*Five Children and It.  Nesbit, E.  1902.