Vanity Fair

1848, 1963 Holt, Rinehart and Winston edition
William Makepeace Thackeray
Vanity Fair: A Novel without a Hero
Original price unknown, bought used for $1.95
Split in half, also water-damaged
B+

A very witty journey through almost two decades with a variety of characters, although mainly the two women Amelia and Becky and the men in their lives.  There is pathos, too, but it's never overwhelming.   Like most of my 1840s books (Martin Chuzzlewit excepted), it's set in the past, and there's definitely a sense of contrast between the time of Waterloo and the early Victorian period.  Even more than Charlotte Brontë, Thackeray likes to address the reader (in one case specifying strong-minded "Miss Smith"), and sometimes he asks that reader to look back to the times of their shared youth.  The moment when a not as sophisticated as she will be Becky first eats a chili, and finds that it's much hotter than it sounds, is a delightful one.  Becky herself is an admirable anti-heroine.  The way she treats her husband and child is unforgivable, but otherwise it's fun to see her getting the best of almost everyone around her.  And I love the moment when she lets Amelia know that George is not worth pining for fifteen years after his death.

Amelia is in some ways the stereotypical Victorian heroine:  sweet, sentimental, and helpless.  Dobbin probably deserves better, as he does realise eventually.  And yet, she's impossible to dislike because she is genuinely well-meaning and not a bit sanctimonious (unlike some Victorian heroines).  I've always had a soft spot for Miss Swartz because she appreciates Amelia, even if I could've done without Thackeray invariably describing her as "wooly-headed."  As with Scott and the Jews in Ivanhoe, Thackeray is a product of his time and can't describe a black character (like the unfortunately named Mr. Sambo) without mentioning that the person is black.    On the other hand, he does also keep mentioning Becky's sandy hair, so he's not racist per se.

Much of the humour of the novel comes from characters being caricatures, often with obviously symbolic names, like Lady Bareacres.  The broader humour, and the best action scenes, come in the first half of the novel.  After George dies, the novel is not as good, although it is interesting to watch Becky's further ups and downs.  It's notable that, as in Jane Eyre, a charade (in the sense of scenes acted out in costume to indicate syllables of a word or phrase) figures into the plot, in both cases with a scheming woman showing off her talent and beauty.

The previous owner underlined and bracketed much of the book, plus putting a couple notes about point of view.  One of these is when Thackeray himself makes a cameo late in the novel, telling of how he first met Dobbin, Amelia, and her brother Jos.  Even before that, he has come across as a generously omniscient narrator.  It is that feeling that the author is sharing something with us, to the point that I actually thought, "Oo, goody, gossip!  Oh, wait, these characters are fictional," that is the true charm of this story.

The breakdown of the first 100 posts is as follows:
1 F
2 F+s
2 D-s
3 D's
7 D+s
6 C-s
12 C's
21 C+s
16 B-s
19 B's
9 B+s
2 A-s

It's odd that I have more B's than B-s.  We'll see if that continues.  There are no A's or A+s, but I don't know if there will be.