I don't know. It was a book fraught with interpretation and role-play, so it seemed to behoove the narrative to say something about that particular instance of it. It's one of the few established facts of Andrew's life that is never under question or made more complex than it seems when it's introduced.
I also suspect that my background in formal psychology made it harder for me to surrender to the book's own pattern. I have too much experience in the idiotic pop-psych aspects of DID, and the debunking of same, to approach the topic with as clean a slate as the author seemed to want from me.
I guess, in the end, there were too many things that were simple, and the story seemed to promise complexity, and I was disappointed that the promise wasn't kept.
I so want to take part in this discussion in a more meaningful way, but I would really need to reread to do so. It's been a couple years now, and my memory is pretty pathetic on the best of days. I do remember also feeling like something wasn't quite right with the reveal; I agreed with Nutty's whitefont about the explanation seeming a little mealy-mouthed, but in the end I bought it. I do remember really and truly enjoying the book and loving the "house", especially when its inconsistencies become apparant toward the end.
Dissociative Identity Disorder -- the official (newish) name for multiple personality.
Aha, thank you. I thought it must be something like that but I had never heard that acronym.
Has anyone read/is anyone reading
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
right now? I'm about 200 pages into it and enjoying it muchly. Currently, I kinda-sorta think (unspoiled speculation) that
Mr. Childermass is actually the Raven King.
The book as a whole reminds me very, very much of Thackeray, and I can't help but think that Thackeray would have enjoyed reading it.
Has anyone read/is anyone reading Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell right now?
Me! Me! I'm quite enjoying it.
I have a feeling I'll finish it over the weekend. In a way, I wish that I had acquired this as an audiobook, since the prose is of the sort that would sound wonderful read aloud, preferably by a member of the RSC.
In a way, I wish that I had acquired this as an audiobook, since the prose is of the sort that would sound wonderful read aloud, preferably by a member of the RSC.
I heard the writer read a section of it on the Diane Rehm show last week and it was completely mesmerizing! I'm so looking forward to reading it but I have a big, newly purchased TBR pile and so am restraining myself. Right now I'm reading the Time Traveller's Wife. It's pretty good.
Has anyone read/is anyone reading Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell right now?
DH bought it and has started it, but I'm waiting until I've caught up a little more on my library books. (Also, it just doesn't work for us to read a book at the same time. We've been known to buy two copies of new Harry Potters to lessen marital bickering.)
