I think it would be instructive to look back over this blog and see how we all speculated on the end of this novel. No one, I'm sure, expected this! I admit it is a little cruel to make you spend so much time with a story that has no ending, but I wanted you to feel, as much as possible, how it might have felt to Gaskell's readers in 1866 when part 18 was not followed by part 19. This is certainly an interesting way to study serial fiction--and maybe wonder why its popularity waned.
Sure, we can speculate, but we can never know for sure, how Gaskell intended this to end.
Now that the whole class knows how the novel ends--and I do want to thank those of you who DID know for keeping it to yourselves, because I see that some of you were surprised--I want to know how you feel about it. How much of reading a novel is connected with the closure that ending provides? Think about all the other novels we have read in this class. Do they all aim for the last pages to be a conclusion rather than an end?
This discussion has been excellent, even when the prompts have been pretty lame. You faked interest well, if you were faking it! I think that you all got invested in the characters and story and the reading of this novel required much more of you, perhaps, than the others.
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I think that the books we have read in class all rely on the last pages to wrap everything up. They ever so politely place a big red bow on the end of their stories, giving all of the characters and their plot lines finishing touches. It is a nice change from the multiple volume novels that are popular now.
I believe that the point of reading a novel is enjoying the story it tells and a great piece of that story is knowing the end. No matter how good a story is, it really can only be as good as its ending. (In my opinion, anyways.)When there is no ending it gives you a sense of urgency, a need to understand what it all means. And no matter how some people love this particular suspense, I really cannot stand it.
As obvious by my strong opinion on how mad I was finishing Wives and Daughters. I really wanted Roger and Molly to live happily ever after. I'm a hopeless romantic... I can't help it.
I confess, I knew about Gaskell’s dying before concluding the novel and it did not affect me at all. I knew around chapter 38 when I left my novels at the democratic convention and searched online for a copy. However, I kept that bit of information to myself.
Nevertheless, I continued reading because the novel had grasped my interest and I wanted to know more of the in betweens. I’ll admit that in the beginning it was boring, but towards the middle, well after Hyacinth and Mr. Gibson marry, the curtains were drawn and the book actually begins.
But I agree that an ending to any literary piece provides closure and satisfaction to its audience. All of the novels that we have read in class seem to have ended with closure, though some may have alluded to a sequel. Nonetheless, each novel did not leave any loose ends to be connected or tied. I guess that’s the difference between Victorian reading and novels thereafter. Victorian reading then is what a soap opera is now. However, that same Victorian suspense can be achieved in modern-day novels with advanced knowledge and writing techniques.
I would just like to say what a rewarding experience I have received from class this semester. The blog participation was excellent. No one purposely offended the other and everyone seemed to enjoy one another’s comments. Thank you and have a blessed, happy literary life!
It is a shame that EG died before finishing this long book. Such time and energy put into a book to only be dissapointed. The beginning of the book was quite slow and uninteresting, only to pick up in the middle then continue to keep your interest until the dissapointing end! But i did hear or read or both, that EG did have a wonderful ending planned for the final chapters. The ending that most were looking for....
The other books read in class did for the most part have an ending or an ending that was left open (for part 2 perhaps). An ending that didn't leave you frustrated as heck, at least.
I enjoyed being taken back to another time and place in history. That is what all of the
novels did for me.
Continued happy reading to you all!
I have to admit, that the beginning was slow. But once my interest was peaked, it was hard to stop. I found this book very enjoyable, even though it was never completed. It reminds me of cliffhangers on television. Unfortunately, it won't picked up where it left off next season.
This is a book that I, hopefully, will be able to allow my students to read. I'm curious on what their reactions will be about the ending. It's always nice to get different prespectives.
I have enjoyed this class and the readings we have done. The blogs, even though at times became a pain to do, were fun and it was great reading everyones opinions.
I hope everyone has a great summer and a fulfilling future.
Sailorgirl,
It is a shame that EG died before finishing. But then the mystery about the ending would prevent us from discussing what might have been.
It was different from all the other books we read that had an ending and I think that that is was made this one, for some, so frustrating.
I know this one isn't meant to be a comment on a post, but to the 'original post,' I would like to say that this HONESTLY has been the first novel I have read in a while that I haven't been able to put down. It was as if I was watching an episode of 24; the end of each chapter was a cliffhanger that lured me to read on.
I think that putting us in the shoes of readers in Gaskell's time is genius. Most of our novels had something to say at the end. They all relatively tied all the ideas together at the finale to form some kind of moral suggestion/conclusion. However, we are kept from this 'closure' in Wives and Daughters. Although she died and it would have been nice to know what the h happened to some of the other characters, I think the fact that this novel doesn't have a 'true' ending makes it even better. It induces responses like the ones we've had, and it makes us continually speculate what might happen (even till the end!) The questions are limitless and the possibilities infinite. I think there could have been a semester-long blog about how Gaskell could have ended this novel.
And I guess that's the beauty of literature; we have ideas, we can back them up, but we can never actually know the real answer. It's kind of like 'perspective' on a work of art...but that's another conversation in itself.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading and bogging with all of you.
Despite how I may sound sometimes, I have enjoyed everything we’ve read in class, if only for the simple fact that I thoroughly enjoy the act of reading (I’ve never claimed not to be a dork). True, I have had issue with how some of the works were written (no need to go into all that, I’m sure you all have heard me gripe and complain enough), but I have nothing bad to say about Gaskell. I, like my effeminate friend Martin, truly enjoyed the story, which I had no such intention of doing when I initially laid eyes on the book’s bright pink cover. You know the old adage, can’t judge a book without a proper book-judging mechanism… or something like that. My point is, Gaskell’s style is easy to read and easy to follow. Her characters were identifiable and sympathetic, even the more annoying ones had redeeming qualities (I’m looking at you, Mrs. Gibson) There is a clear shift of voice when the pov changes and the story focuses more on the continuation of plot and progression of story instead of backpedaling and spending pages and pages, or even whole chapters, on back story. Gaskell did provide back story, but only in easy to swallow portions, which were necessary for plot or character development. So, in a novel that moves in this manner, seeming to race towards an end or climb to a peak, a story like that would almost certainly have to have an ending, right? That’s what we’ve been building towards, that’s what everything has been leading up to, that’s why the end of chapters leaves us with questions we want answered, tempting us to read on, all this to lead up to a final conclusion which we, the readers, are ultimately denied.
But, are we really?
I’m personally a little bothered that the story doesn’t have a proper ending. I finish everything I start reading, even if it sucks, even if it pisses me off, even if I have to hold back my hand from grabbing a nearby spoon and digging my eyeballs out so I CAN’T read anymore, I still continue on and read the damn thing to completion. Since I can never really do that with W&D I do feel a little irked, but the author died so I suppose I’ll have to give myself a pass. Point is, in today’s serial stories (such as Lost, which gets way off point with unnecessary story lines and unrelated flashbacks, much like I’m doing now) there are plot twists and turns of a much higher caliber than what is found in a typical Victorian novel. These plot twists, which can completely change the nature of the story, lead to a surprise ending that blows us out of our seat (sometimes by just blacking out the screen), this is the level of storytelling that an American audience expects today. In the Victorian time, and especially in a novel like W&D, I think we all pretty much know what is going to happen. Unless Gaskell was going to take a sharp left turn in the last unwritten chapters, everything was going to get wrapped up in a nice little package. Cynthia gets married to someone she feels is neither below nor above her, Molly and Roger will be together, like we’ve all seen coming since they met, and Mr. Gibson, having no further use for Mrs. Gibson, will viciously, but precisely, hack Mrs. Gibson up into tiny pieces and feed her remains to the various woodland creates inhabiting the area. Her soul will then possess the weak minded creates, allowing Mrs. Gibson’s spirit to raise an unholy army of small but dedicated forest creatures to do her bidding and get bloody revenge on Mr. Gibson. I mean, come on, who didn’t see that coming?
I saw W&D going in a Jane Austenesque sort of ending (no disrespect) in that everything was heading for the wrapped-up-in-a-neat-little-package ending. I wish I could know for sure what happened to at the end of the novel, but I think I can draw enough conclusions from context clues to imagine it pretty close.
P.S. I will miss posting on this blog. I have enjoyed this project very much, and enjoy our collective discourse. It will be missed.
Nothing makes me madder than an incomplete story. It's like when the Harry Potter books first started and I got so frustrated when I finished one because I knew there were more to come, and then they seemed to take forever to come out! But a story that never gets wrapped up tops it on my pet peeves list when it comes to literature. Then again, maybe it's better that she left the rest of the story untold. After all of the climax, it would've been a letdown if she had ended it a way other than what we were hoping. For example, in the Harry Potter series (yes I know I'm obsessed), I was so excited when the last book came out. It was an excellent book, but the epilogue was a letdown. I felt as if I could've wrote a better one. Maybe Gaskell gave us all the opportunity to write our own ending to wives and daughters. She died before it was finished, and maybe it was meant to be that way.
As for the other books, everything was tied up in the end. Nothing was really left to the imagination. But think about it this way: any of those authors could've died before completing the book. Just because Wives and Daughters was a serial fiction, it doesn't mean that reading completed books are any better. I'm sure that there are other novels out there that are either incomplete, or there have been others who completed a novel for an author if the original author died before finishing the story.
In response to everyone,
aren't we all being sentimental?
Oh well, I guess I'll succumb to this "awwww" moment, seeing as even chuck did.
It was definitely interesting reading everyone's comments (those of you who actually commented). I also liked doing blog responses because I felt they were an easy grade as well as a nice and informal way of carrying on the discussion outside of class.
I stick to my impression of all english majors: You are all weird. But hey, that's what makes it so exciting...
(i think theater majors are absolutely strange...)
I did not particularly like all the books we read because it was hard to relate to some of them. However, I did like this book because it kept my attention because there was a constant flow of change.
I am shocked and almost mad because there was no true ending. It's almost like being told a series of secrets that lead to someone saying, "I was just kidding". We can all speculate on what we think about the ending but without Gaskell, nobody will ever really know what she was thinking.
I was honestly quite shocked to find there was no ending. Considering the size of that book, you'd think all parts would be present! I suppose I also would have never suspected for an unfinished Victorian book to be such a classic and one that is still published today. That right there is quite a tribute to Gaskell! I too enjoyed this book -- it was by far my favorite from this course. True, there were parts it seemed a little slow, but I loved the suspense Gaskell created around Cynthia's "scandalous" past and Molly's destiny. I must add too, that if there were a spot where the novel must abruptly end, Roger waving to Molly outside the window as a sign of his love is not too bad. At least we know that Roger came to his senses and is going to pursue Molly as his bride one day! Though the ending was not told to us, Gaskell did leave us with enough material to surmise the type of ending she had in mind. I still wish she could have told us herself though!
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