InsaneJournal

The Mysteries of Udolpho, enumerated
I'm not finished with it yet, but will be soon.

1. Exactly how many travelogues did Ann Radcliffe read before writing this book?

2. Is Emily the first example of a Mary Sue?

3. Did Radcliffe not know any other word for "verdure"?

4. How long does it take them to get to Udolpho?

5. Were there really only three good people in the entire world not living in convents or monasteries?

6. Radcliffe was paid by the word, right?

7. Really, how long before they get to Udolpho?

8. Well, there's another one in love with Emily. Evidence for her Mary Sue status is mounting...

9. When do they get to Udolpho? (Honestly, I'm reminded of elusis's posts [on LJ] when she was reading The Fellowship of the Ring and asking post after post, "When does Frodo leave the Shire?")

10. Where does she get the idea that urban types don't like art?

11. Exactly how much verdure is there in Europe?

12. So they finally get to Udolpho...

13. Of course, a secret passageway into Emily's room. Nothing's going to come of that...

14. This is a classic, right?

15. What, no verdure inside the castle?

16. And another one in love with Emily, whose only flaw seems to be naiveté, and I can think of a couple of characters who'd willingly deprive her of that.

17. Okay, she also doesn't think things through, but that's probably because she's too naive to be able to anticipate her evil step-uncle's duplicitous actions. Still, she knows he's not to be trusted.

18. So naturally she's going to trust this other guy just because he's French and claims to be in love with her and was a prisoner of her evil step-uncle. (And no, none of those is a reliable reason to trust a total stranger.)

19. Oh, God, more verdure.

I understand this book was popular in its day. I'm reading it because I really want to read Northanger Abbey and I want to understand as many of the references as possible, so that pretty much means reading Udolpho. I'm not going to bother with The Monk, which I understand was also popular in its day and useful for Northanger Abbey, but not quite as crucial. I also understand that other people today might not have the same difficulties with it that I'm having, and that's fine. What a boring world it would be if we all enjoyed the same things.

I've got more of this one to read. If there are any more mysteries to be enumerated, I'll do them in a later post. I've also got other books to review, and I'll get to them later this week. School update in another post as well (for now, let's just say that for the school year so far, I've hit the snooze button only once, and that was this morning because I stayed up too late last night doing homework and that's another post).