Well, in spite of all of the other more pressing things I need to get done over the next few days I decided to spend the last five hours finishing my eighth Wharton novel. Although I can see why so many critics think it is "her most sentimental" I am not sure that I completely agree. While there is a romantic happy ending that verges on sappy there are elements in the language that complicate the "sentimental" reading. For example, the last glimpse of the moon, the last line of the novel, is: "a few drops were already falling, the moon, labouring upward, swam into a space of sky, cast her troubled glory on them, and was again hidden". How this should be read is perplexing.
For my thesis purposes this text might work nicely. It is another novel where water is a significant presence. Ironically it also has characters who hail from Apex City, which is the fictional birthplace of the Spragg fortune in
The Custom of the Country. The presence of water in this text however is not strictly as a commodity but is valued more for its aesthetic beauty and emotional associations. I am not sure if this is something I want to really get into, although it is a fact that people in the business of managing natural resources now take
aesthetic value very seriously in their planning.
I suppose now I need to consider what to read next. The search is on.
In the meantime I have to revamp my Eco-Historical Reconstruction proposal for my Columbia Basin class. This is most trying since I feel as though resources are limited and instruction sorely lacking. Oh well. That is due by tomorrow night. I also have six page paper that is due on Monday. Fortunately six pages is not all that daunting, and I have a good plan for what to write. The real wrench in the works is the fact that I have every intention of spending this weekend in Bastendorff with Bird and confirming our handfasting vows at the ocean's edge. I suppose that means I should be writing and not blogging.
