10-17-2018, 07:34 PM | #31 | |
cacoethes scribendi
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But I do really like your emphasis of comparing Vita to Isolda. I'd been thinking "life" was some relevance to Vita's relationship to Dick, and didn't see it as very significant, but I think you're right, its relevance is in comparison to Isolda. This led me to look up Isolda, which is apparently the Welsh form of Isolde, which is either "fair lady" or (according to babynames.com) "she who is gazed upon". Ha! It's almost corny in its directness, the author having her little joke with the story. |
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10-17-2018, 08:02 PM | #32 | ||
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The Cornish landscape was very important to du Maurier, and something she cared about greatly. One of her non-fiction books is called Vanishing Cornwall. |
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10-17-2018, 08:07 PM | #33 | |
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So ... I just looked up Roger, which means "famous spear," and then there's Dick ... |
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10-17-2018, 10:27 PM | #34 |
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@gmw. Good catch. I think the author was indeed having a private joke with Isolda.
I did not take the view that Dick was homosexual or even asexual, though this is certainly arguable. I took his attraction to Isolda as a genuine yearning for a love totally beyond his reach. How could Vita, a creature of his dull everyday life possibly compete with her. My impression was that he was frustrated with this rather than revelling in it. I think he would have swapped his dull life for Roger's life in a heartbeat if he had the opportunity to do so. And probably live to regret it. |
10-17-2018, 11:07 PM | #35 | |
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Now, if du Maurier had set the story in Australia the journeys could have been epic! Last edited by gmw; 10-18-2018 at 03:09 AM. Reason: typos |
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10-18-2018, 05:21 AM | #36 |
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True enough about Cornwall, and no doubt even more so nearly 50 years ago, when the book was written.
Australia would be a very different story, though of course there would still be plenty of places in which to get into trouble. Nice find on the meaning of Isolda’s name by the way. |
10-18-2018, 09:48 AM | #37 | |
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Did Magnus knowingly encourage Dick to take the potion, knowing it was a paralytic? Perhaps as a means either of asserting final control in his battle for Dick or else out of love?
I found this comment in Dick's last trip to be suggestive. Quote:
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10-18-2018, 10:39 AM | #38 | |
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10-18-2018, 11:18 AM | #39 | |
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Maybe the suggestion is only that Magnus's drug has come from a recipe that Roger left somewhere in the old part of the house. Perhaps we are supposed to note: "How to make men dream and conjure visions,[...]", without assuming poison and murder. Or maybe she wanted to keep us guessing. |
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10-18-2018, 05:13 PM | #40 |
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I think part of it for me is that I can't see the name "Magnus" without also thinking "Magus" with the n as a null character. It fits with Magnus as a continuum of a long priesthood in darker activities. Dick also specifically invokes the image of the alchemist.
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10-18-2018, 07:15 PM | #41 | |
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It’s an interesting thought that he might have found some sort of old recipe in the house. We have no idea how he came to concoct the drug, but I can well believe it was accidentally, and also that he sampled it just to see what effect it had. There are many stories of scientists trying things out themselves. |
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10-18-2018, 07:20 PM | #42 |
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I've written Magus a few times while posting here and had to correct myself. Given some of the other names, I wouldn't put it past du Maurier to intend this association.
I kept wondering why Roger seemed to have no obvious association. I mean "famous spear"? I see that Wikipedia says: From c. 1650 to c. 1870, Roger was slang for the word "penis", probably due to the origin of the name involving fame with a spear.[6][7][8] Subsequently, "to roger" became a slang verb form meaning "to have sex with", "to penetrate". I always wondered where "to roger" came from. Anyway, this does mean that Roger now has two associations, one with the name Dick, and the other - perhaps - in his role with Isolda? |
10-18-2018, 09:16 PM | #43 | |
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10-19-2018, 07:36 AM | #44 |
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How and why was the time jump forward achieved in Dick's last trip? Presumably something tweaked in potion C tied into different, more tragic elements in the ether. Certainly it put a far different cast on dabbling in the past; the Black Death doesn't have the same theme park aspect Dick's earlier visits had. The deficient little girl also seemed significant in the same way that art was symbolic as well as representational, but symbolic of what?
(It was admittedly touching to see how her father loved her and cared for her in the midst of such crushing tragedy.) |
10-19-2018, 08:07 AM | #45 |
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You mean other than being a convenient way to close off the story?
It sort of argues for the whole thing to be a hallucination: Dick knew his trips were coming to an end so he hallucinated an ending. At first I thought that if it was made up then he'd have made up a happy ending for Isolda, but maybe he didn't want her to have a happy ending without him. But if we accept the effect of the drug as real - which, within the story, I did - then it seemed possible that maybe whatever it was in formula A and B that tied us to Roger (and jumped us to a certain age rather than growing up with him), that maybe formula C did this with Robbie. (Thinking of a polyjuice-like potion with a dash of hair to tie us to a particular person - but something not so flippant as that sounds.) Bookpossum's first post on this thread includes a quote suggesting that du Maurier liked irresolution, and perhaps that's what we're seeing here: a twist calculated to open such questions in the reader's mind. |
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