New book "The Independence of Mary Bennett" - any thoughts?

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New book "The Independence of Mary Bennett" - any thoughts?

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1ryn_books
Oct 15, 2008, 5:18 am

Hi there

My weekly borders email offers a preview pdf extract of Colleen McCullough's * The Independence of Mary Bennett.

Borders url to see the pdf extract is here: http://email.borders.com.au/au/2008/20081010/pdf/excerpt-independence-mary-benne...

I read about 10 pages, but have kind of gone 'meh'. I won't do spoilers but my initial feel is that the author has taken the 'what happens next' thinking in a direction that I personally don't want to think happens.

Or maybe it's this particular author? I suspect I've always been prejudiced against her since she rewrote a favourite Lucy Maud Montgomery of mine called The Blue Castle and did a horrible job of in her Australianised title and version.

What do others think?

Sigh - stupid touchstone - here's the urls: http://www.librarything.com/author/mcculloughcolleen&norefer=1 and http://www.librarything.com/work/6052938

2atimco
Oct 15, 2008, 8:08 am

Somebody rewrote The Blue Castle? WHY??? It was perfect as is.

I usually don't bother with rewrites and fanfics like this. If you're going to write something, at least be original. Piggybacking off some other writer in such an obvious way is just not good.

3ryn_books
Modifié : Oct 15, 2008, 8:14 am

Yeah. it was about 20 years ago, I recall there being quite a fuss at the time when her book came out.... I remember reading it and thinking I know this story, but it wasn't credited or acknowledged. Then lots of readers (pre-internet - they had to write letters ) complained to the publishers. She then issued a statement I think saying she accidentally must have read The Blue Castle years previously and unconsciously echoed it in her book.
Basically, the rewrite to me felt like a very unsublte and kind of crass variation of the original. Hence my prejudice (grin) about her writing this (acknowledged) one....

edited to fix a couple of obvious typos. The ones left are just tiredness.

4ryn_books
Modifié : Oct 15, 2008, 8:17 am

total sidetrack, sorry, but here's the Blue Castle rip-off so you know to avoid it ... The Ladies of Missalonghi

edited to fix bad copy paste. Sigh

5atimco
Oct 15, 2008, 1:23 pm

I'll avoid it. Thanks for the info. What a low-class thing to do, rip off a dead author's work and hope nobody notices...

6TheUpturnedKnows
Juin 9, 2010, 6:29 am

She rewrote The Blue Castle because she recognized there was something going on beneath the surface of The Blue Castle that had not been previously recognized by anyone else.

7KateWentworth
Modifié : Juin 16, 2010, 5:59 am

The actual topic was "The Independence of Miss Mary Bennett"... I've started reading it but I couldn't go through with it. After about 50 or 70 pages I gave in because I had the feeling that Colleen McCullough turned all the characters from P&P up-side-down. In her version of "What happend to them..." everyone seems to have become the very opposite of what Jane Austen described them in Pride & Prejudice.
Speaking of avoiding books: I would advice you to add that one to the list.

8TheUpturnedKnows
Juin 16, 2010, 9:00 am

Kate,

You are completely correct, that is exactly what McCullough is doing in her book. But has the possibility ever occurred to you that McCullough did not concoct this approach entirely out of her own imagination, and that perhaps Jane Austen herself planted the seeds for that topsy-turvy approach?

Cheers,
Arnie Perlstein
sharpelvessociety.blogspot.com

9KateWentworth
Juin 16, 2010, 2:17 pm

Hi Arnie!
I'm sure you're right - that is cleary a way of putting it that I hadn't thought about. Some say that a woman, when getting older, becomes more and more like her own mother. Maybe an idear similar to this one had been on McCullough's mind when she wrote "The Independence of Miss Mary Benntt"?!
But it's still hard to "see" the characters like this... But maybe it's only me.
But thanks for bringing that idea up. It made me think about giving it another try - seeing now a new aspect ...
y. Kate

10TheUpturnedKnows
Juin 16, 2010, 7:01 pm

Kate, You are to be commended for your open mindedness and flexibility--while I don't agree with all of McCullough's interpretations of what I call the "shadow story" of Pride and Prejudice, she shows me by this current book, and also by her similar approach to The Blue Castle, that she is a serious student of shadow stories in the novels of writers like Austen and Montgomery, who wrote those shadow stories

11ryn_books
Modifié : Juin 17, 2010, 11:52 pm

>6 TheUpturnedKnows: What are the sources where McCullough explains that actually was her approach for writing the Ladies of Missalonghi?
My recollection of press at the time that fuss occurred was that she first claimed she had not copied the Blue Castle at all, then later said that she must have read it as a child and subconsciously referenced it when she wrote her book.

It would be nicer to think of her that she was referencing the Blue Castle as part of a planned approach, so I'd be interested to read any interview or source where she says that.

Of course - the references to P&P in the "shadow story" (nice phrase) are more overt and clear at the time of publication... which makes it easier to see that a continued story/rewrite approach is being used by the author.

(edited to remove a typo)

12TheUpturnedKnows
Juin 18, 2010, 7:59 am

The source for my claim about McCullough's approach for writing the Ladies of Missalonghi is myself--I think it's completely obvious that she was being completely disingenuous when she claimed it was unintentional and subconscious. And her doing EXACTLY the same thing with P&P ought to make it doubly obvious!

A few years ago, when I first became aware of that controversy, I read both TBC and LOM for the first time, and subjected them both to the same sort of "literary sleuthing" analysis I have been using for 6 years on Jane Austen's novels, and I confirmed to my own complete satisfaction that McCullough had done a very very clever rewriting of TBC, picking up on the "shadow story" (as I define it) of TBC and amplifying it.

"My recollection of press at the time that fuss occurred was that she first claimed she had not copied the Blue Castle at all, then later said that she must have read it as a child and subconsciously referenced it when she wrote her book."

Total utter b.s.! She must have been laughing non-stop that she was believed by anybody!

"It would be nicer to think of her that she was referencing the Blue Castle as part of a planned approach"

I agree, it is is much nicer.

"Of course - the references to P&P in the "shadow story" (nice phrase) are more overt and clear at the time of publication... which makes it easier to see that a continued story/rewrite approach is being used by the author."

Take a peek or three at my blog and you will get a better idea of what I mean by a "shadow story".

Every one of Jane Austen's novels has a fully developed, coherent shadow story.