read: Miss Brooke

it's the 'first book' in the Middlemarch novel...don't know if i should call it the Middlemarch series..

i know, i'd told a lot of my friends (that asked me what kind of books i read) that i read non-fiction books, but i do have my days where fiction and fantasy were the only things i would read,

and thus the Charmed,Harry Potter, Diane Wynne Jones and other books with stories of magic and mythical creatures on my bookshelf...

anyway...

Middlemarch isn't one of the more recent books that i'd purchased.

in fact,i had this book for 7 years now,didn't think i'd pick it up until a couple of days ago,'cause apparently it's like one of the must read books in English literature..(i was lost in my random Googling quests again)

who knew i had good taste in books even at a young age of 14! XD

(by the way...i felt like i'm typing in a more formal manner today :s blame the English classics)

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okay so Middlemarch might be the kind of title of a book that we(Malaysian i'd say) don't usually come across when we talk about famous classic novels..

it's actually a long story about feminism,education,political economics and stuff that we don't give a damn until we move out of our family home and grow up.

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i have only read the 1st book of the 8 books in Middlemarch,kind of like the first 'babak' of the whole play,and this is what i know about the story so far:

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there's this 2 sisters in the little village-like place called Middlemarch: Dorothea and Celia Brooke.

they live with their uncle,Mr.Brooke,who was rather stingy,but nevertheless quite well off.

Dorothea is pretty,confident,impatient,and like to speak her mind whenever she's in a discussion...not something young ladies(they're not yet 20) at the time should behave like...

people say she's too much to handle,but those who knew her personally would say she's interesting.

then there is Celia,Dorothea's younger sister.

she's more ladylike,though not as pretty as Dorothea.

quiet and agreeable most of the time,but she has this secret hatred towards her sister for her loudness and all...although sometimes she admires Dorothea's tenacity.

so all in all, the people of Middlemarch would say that if a man is finding for a wife and has to pick between them,Celia would be the better choice than the elder Miss Brooke.

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then came this two other character: Sir James Chettam and Mr.Edward Casaubon.

Chettam is young,rich,and to me,quite tolerant.

Casaubon is about middle-age, has money also but not as rich and high profile as Chettam i think, and more knowledgable as he's a scholar.

now,

both these men are bachelors.

Chettam is more up front that he wants to have Dorothea is his wife(hasn't proposed though),

but Dorothea finds him too boring...(if SinYong is reading this:Chettam is too much of a 'kuai kia' guy)

everything Dorothea says Chettam would agree with her,sometimes he's even say things that you don't know what to reply him with (now this i know how frustrating it is).

everything Chettam does,Dorothea hates, except this one project that Chettam proposed to Dorothea,which was to build some cottages on his land(or something) that finally extinguished some of the hatred Dorothea has for him...

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okay now about Casaubon.

his name too long lah,so i'll address him as Ed...short and sweet.

Ed's old...27years older than Dorothea.

but he has all this knowledge and experience from his travels and manuscripts he made about sciences,Greek,Latin etc..

and this has attracted Dorothea to him,'cause Dorothea is thirsty for knowledge.

she realizes that she know very little of the world and wants to learn the truth about things,feel what it feels like to be one of those men who knows what exactly is going on in the world and stuff.

so she's attracted to him,she's attracted to her, finally,with Mr.Brooke's consent sent her a letter to propose.

i find his letter too irrelevant,'cause he wrote one full essay filled with words so deep i don't even bother to search up the meaning because there are too many of them,like 80% of the 'letter'....

all that words just to say:i know i'm old and ugly,but will you marry me?

like..swt. =='''''

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and Dorothea's reaction was weird anyway..she wasn't even jumping with joy or whatever a girl should react when a guy she like proposed to her...all i know is she's glad Ed proposed and she said yes lah,which,literally crushed Chettam's heart.

but Celia was apparently in love with Chettam so maybe they'll get together somewhere in the story later.

Chettam pulak finds Celia boring though...hmmmmmm.

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and so the not-so-in-love birds got married in 6weeks,and headed off to Rome for honeymoon.

i think they went there for Casaubon's research rather than honeymoon...but whatever.

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then the story move on to another pair of sibling: Rosamond and Fred Vincy, the mayor of Middlemarch's kids...

Rosamond is supposedly even more pretty and graceful than Dorothea..sort of like the number1 woman to marry in Middlemarch...guys literally fall head over heels for her...

then the brother,Fred is a bum.

he didn't finish his degree,and plans to do nothing but living off other people's money..

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Rosamond is currently trying to pikat this one new-comer in the village,a doctor named Mr.Lydgate.

it's going well i'd say..she so pretty,by merely looking each other for 2seconds he's fall for her lah...

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i don't feel like mentioning the other little parts of the story so far...

there's not much to talk about,only the usual aunties gossiping, uncles worry about their money getting cheated,this sort of thing...

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i find myself more atttached to Dorothea's character..

sometimes i felt so relatable to her.

the thirst for knowledge...the urge to speak up...the boredom and frustration one gets when you have all these ideas and things to say but when you say it,the other party just go:'exactly' or 'i agree with you' and the whole conversations just ends 'cause since there's no contradiction or a second opinion on something we're talking about...

the wanting to find a guy whom you find interesting to spend time with..and the desire to go places...

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nevertheless i disagree with her,marrying Casaubon so suddenly....

i see her 'love' for him as a simple, young girl's lust for adventure and education.

and i dislike how she made herself seem smaller than anything when Casaubon's around,

i know how knowledgable the man is,but she's not that stupid to agree with him all the time...

it's like suddenly she became this bimbo that doesn't even know logic and common sense...

a bimbo when she's not even blonde to begin with...

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i do feel that in some areas Casaubon really tried to compromise to Dorothea,and that is nice to see,but the problem is Dorothea's obsession of blending into Casaubon's lifestyle.

i mean,people ask you to be picky about something,be your usual self and be picky lah!

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as much i feel relatable to Dorothea, i'm not the sort who would want to find a man so much more superior than i am that i let myself lost my sense of dignity,and forgot that although i might not have learnt as much as he did,i'm still an educated woman myself.

i don't want to marry only to become a helper/assistant/maid to my husband's needs.

i don't mean that i want solitude in my marriage,

it's just that i want to find someone who is as clingy as i am,but in a different aspect,

as in we have the need of something from each other that we ourselves do not have.

the whole point of relationships is to find someone that completes you,no?

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yea.

lots of opinions about this book.