Claude Lantier in The Masterpiece: Character Thursday (58)

Claude is the main character in Zola’s The Masterpiece; he was a shy guy who liked painting but disliked women. One day Claude met Christine, fell madly in love with her, then married her. But it turned out that Claude could not control more than one passion at the same time; that when he was enjoying his love with Christine, he could not drag himself to produce any serious painting. Then, when Christine offered herself to model for his painting, Claude began to stay away from his wife, and began fallen in love with his painting—or in this case, the woman in his painting. Seems that, in Claude, one passion would dominate another; but it was a madness which dominated Claude to his end.

I am still wondering whether it’d be much better if Claude has never been in love with Christine at all, or it would be all the same whether he married her or not, because the madness was already there? Maybe Claude was right after all for not liking women, maybe that way he could focus only on painting. But would have it altered his future to the better? I don’t know, maybe not…..

Claude seems to be a man with an unbalanced emotion. He was, in fact, a talented and skilled painter—all his friends admitted that—and he was genius too. Claude with several of his friends—young painters—started a new generation of impressionism. He had set a new style of painting, and although his paintings kept being refused by the Salon (a public exhibition which influenced the public taste of arts), many young artists followed his example in putting natures in their paintings. But strangely, he who had set the style, could never produce any single masterpiece till the end. Why? Again….I put the blame to his unbalanced emotion.

It’s a pity to see such a talented young man must meet a sad end. Claude was always very kind to his friends, and in a way he still loved Christine till the end. His only problem was he could not cope with himself, he could not control his emotion—when his paintings were refused, he would be so enraged, and when he poured out his feelings in painting, he became severely obsessed. Claude did not possess self-control of himself, and at last his repeatedly failure ruined him completely.

Bernard Fresson as Claude in L'oeuvre, 1967

That is my Character Thursday of this week, an analysis of book character of my choice, who is yours?... Just put your post URL in the linky below. Do you like to join us in discussing characters from books you read? See the details of Character Thursday first.

[Classics Movie] The Three Musketeers

The first book-to-movie I picked for Maria’s Books into Movies Monthly Meme is the 2011 adaptation of The Three Musketeers. I have just re-read the book last month , so the story and character are still vividly lingering in my mind. This movie was directed by Paul W.S. Anderson, and intended from the beginning to be an adventure film. Let me break down my thoughts into these categories….

Characters and Castings

This is my first complain for this film (there would be few more… :D). I always believe that classics literature (as in literary fiction) was built from its characters. Consequently, if you want to make a movie adaptation from a certain classics, you must at least keep the original characters as they were created by the author. You can change the setting, you can alter or simplify the plot, you can erase some minor characters, but DO NOT change the personalities of the main characters, because they are who drive the story. Once you do that, you are ruining the author’s great work, and that is an insult!

Actually, I did not even finish this film. I stopped abruptly after the scene of d’Artagnan giving in the Queen’s diamonds to be exchanged with Constance’s freedom. It’s too much for me that I was too angry to continue watching. First, it’s Athos; played by MacFadyen who actually fits the character. D’Artagnan is confused when Rochefort is holding Constance as a hostage, and will release her if the Three Musketeers give in the diamonds. Athos advises d’Artagnan to ‘fight for your love, and let France fight for itself’. Hellooo…did I hear correctly? Athos—the most loyal nobleman in France, who sometimes can become unreasonable; who is willingly to sacrifice his life for his blind loyalty to the King or Queen? How could he advise d’Artagnan to prioritize personal matters before Queen’s life and honor?

Then, it’s d’Artagnan himself. I can forgive the boyish face of the star, but what annoyed me is that the brave, smart, and masterful fencing player d’Artagnan looks so stupid and helpless in this film. The real d’Artagnan—as Dumas created him—would never just walk in enemy’s trap like the fake one in this film walks in to Rochefort’s cabin to give in the diamonds, only to be captured inside. That’s so stupid and absurd! Still more, when finally d’Artagnan can escape and is fighting with Rochefort, he is fencing so unskillfully, that Rochefort wounds him several times very easily. That’s it, I stopped my DVD player right at that scene!

Speaking of the other castings, Cardinal Richeliu’s is the only one from the main characters that satisfied me. The King Louis XIII is too boyish and ridiculous, Anne of Austria doesn’t have the elegance and beauty which said to be the most beautiful lady in France (her maid Constance is much more beautiful than her), Duke of Buckingham looks more like a rocker to me than a romantic lover and a skillful fighter he should be. Porthos here loose his high gentleman fashion, and become like a villain with harsh manner and bald head. Aramis turns to be a macho man, who is originally more polite and ‘beautiful’.

Story and Plot

From the scenes I watched, several of the plot follows the book with slight alteration: d’Artagnan comes to Paris and got troubled with Three Musketeers, the fight with Cardinal’s guards, the mission of getting Queen’s diamond necklace. But the rest is so absurd. The Three Musketeers together with Milady (yes!) and Duke of Buckingham is competing to get Leonardo da Vinci’s blueprint of an airship; Milady double-crosses Athos (they seem to be lovers here) and gives the blueprint to Buckingham.

But like I said, the plot alteration was not annoying me too much. From the beginning I’d already knew that this would be a typically Hollywood’s action movie with guns and airships battles besides swords fencing. I did not care about the story, but cared more in the characters, which failed me in the end.

Setting and Costumes

I’m just wondering how people can even come to this idea, combining ‘Da Vinci’ thing with guns battle and airship technology? And with lasers too! (the scene of Milady’s stealing the diamond necklace). If they want to make a modern adaptation, why don’t they put modern clothes and modern settings all together? Weird…. :(

I rate this four to ten, and I believe I have been fair enough for that. Why on earth did Matthew MacFadyen and Milla Jovovich ever play in this film anyway??

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I watched this for Books Into Movies Monthly Meme #1

The Taming of The Shrew

After being touched by a Greek tragedy on last March, this month we ought to read a Shakespearean comedy for Let’s Read Plays. The Taming of The Shrew has been my choice since the beginning of this event, and now I’m glad I have chosen it. It is perhaps the most satisfying and entertaining comedy I’ve ever read so far (the other was The Merchant of Venice, yet it didn’t feel like comedy in the end). This play uses play within a play structure, and the play within has a much bigger portion than the opening one, that you might even forget that you were inside another play when the whole plays ended.

A drunkard tinker named Sly was asleep outside an alehouse when a Lord and his group passed by in their hunting. Seeing Sly, the Lord had an idea to bring the drunkard secretly home and treated Sly as if he was a rich Lord. The Lord made a serious effort of mocking Sly, he even invited a group of players to play a fine comedy to entertain ‘Lord’ Sly. And here was the original play….

Gremio and Hortensio were both suitors of Bianca—a fair lady, daughter of Baptista, a gentleman of Padua—however they could never won Bianca, as Baptista won’t let Bianca marry before her elder sister—a shrewd lady named Katharina—got a husband. Gremio and Hortensio then raced to find a husband for Katharina to achieve their goal.

Lucentio also fell in love with Bianca, and to compete with Gremio and Hortensio, he would disguise as a school-master, so that he could court Bianca while teaching her. On the other hand, Hortensio’s friend Petruchio was looking for a rich lady as a wife, and liked the idea of taking a shrewd lady. Then Hortensio, Gremio and Tranio—Lucentio’s servant who disguised as his master—decided to support Petruchio’s expenses to woo Katharina.

So, when Lucentio, Hortensio (disguised as a music teacher for Bianca) and Gremio were competing to win Bianca’s heart, Petruchio was in a harder mission to tame the shrewd Katharina. The most entertaining part came from the way Petruchio tamed the shrew. Shakespeare, as usual, was a genius in making us laugh by words-playing—and that’s why it is hard to translate most of his comedies in other languages, because English have so many words with double meanings, that when you just translate them as it is, there might not be any comical situation left. And here is one of the words-playing from Katharina and Petruchio:

Katharina: You were a moveable.

Petruchio: Why, what’s a moveable?

Katharina: A joint stool.

Petruchio: Thou hast hit it. Come, sit on me.

Katharina: Asses are made to bear, and so are you.

Petruchio: Women are made to bear, and so are you.

And this is another one (rather more slapstick than smart, actually) from Petruchio and his servant Grumio when they were in front of the door of Hortensio’s house, and Grumio mistakenly thought he was instructed to knock down his master instead of knocking the door for him:

Petruchio: Here, sirrah Grumio, knock I say.

Grumio    : Knock, sir! Whom should I knock? Is there man has rebused your worthy?

Petruchio: Villain, I say, knock me here soundly.

Grumio    : Knock you here, sir!

As most of Shakespearean comedies, the wittiness of his plays came also from the complexity of disguising situation; the misunderstanding caused by it and how they were revealed. And as you might have guessed from the title, Petruchio finally succeeded in taming Katharina. But it’s not the end result which was important, but more on the process itself which was smart, comical, and acted as a satyr to reflect what women suffered during that era.

From Katharina we can see how an Italian young woman at that time, no matter how smart and ambitious she was, did not have any choices for her future besides waiting for her parents to get her a husband, and all around the complicated of dowry businesses which I have never understood… :) In short, women could not pursue her own ambition and to be distinguished in the society by herself; and without a marriage, there would not be any future for a young woman. I think this injustice which has made Katharina the shrewd she was. From her smart conversations with Petruchio, I believe she was actually a very smart woman, but she was forced to get marry very soon by her parents.

Four stars for The Taming of the Shrew.

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I read the ebook version from Feedbooks dot com

This book is counted for: 

April theme: Shakespeare’s comedy

39^th book for The Classics Club

Weekend Quote 19: The Masterpiece

The Masterpiece is called the most autobiographical novel of Zola’s Rougon-Macquart series. Zola’s personage was reflected from Pierre Sandoz, a kind hearted novelist, a best friend of Claude Lantier—the protagonist of this book—who represented Paul Cézanne or Claude Monet. The quote I am featuring this week is from Sandoz,

“So long as you can say to yourself that you’ve put your whole life into your work, that you expect neither immediate justice nor even serious appreciation, that you’re working without hope of any kind, simply because the urge to work beats in your body like your heart, because you can’t help it, you can let yourself die happy and console yourself with the illusion that you’ll be appreciated one day…”

I can’t agree more with it. Sandoz here wanted to console Claude who was depressed because the world rejected his works, and he felt himself useless. The fact is, we might be different from others, we might not be with the mainstream, but that doesn’t mean that we are not as good as they are. I believe that success comes not from the world’s appreciation, but from the happiness which our work had brought us. As long as we can do what we want which came from our heart, make the best of it, to achieve what is right for us, then I’ll call that ‘success’. To be praised by others would be a bonus, but without that, we can claim that we have served our purpose very well…. and die happily, as Sandoz put it…

Do you agree?

Weekend Quote is a meme hosted by by Half-Filled Attic. Feel free to join. You can:

• Give the context of the quote
• Give your opinion whether you agree or disagree with it
• Share your experience related to the quote
• Share similar quotes you remember
• Or anything else. Just have fun with the quote.

Sunset Views From Zola's The Masterpiece

In The Masterpiece, Émile Zola spoiled me with his beautiful descriptions of Paris in the end of 19^th century landscapes. As I always amazed at nature beauties, I am trying to capture here some images which transform the beauties from Zola’s words to more vivid imagination. These passages were taken from chapter 3 (p. 95-96) where Claude was enjoying afternoon strolls together with Christine. While the pictures might not represent the scene accurately, they could still help us to imagine the scenes, while savouring Zola’s beautiful words….

“The lovely sunsets they watched on those weekly strolls along the Seine, when the sun shone ahead of them all the way through the many lively aspects of embankment life: the Seine itself, the lights, and shadows dancing on its face, the amusing little shops, each one as warm as a greenhouse, the pots of flowers on the seedsmen’s stalls, the deafening twitter from the birds-shops, and all the joyous confusion of sounds and colours that makes the waterfront the everlasting youth of any city.”

[source]

“One evening, in an unexpected shower, the sun, as it reappeared through the falling rain, lit up every cloud in the sky, making the rain overhead glowed like liquid fire shot through with pink and blue.”

[source]

 “On days when the sky was clear, the sun like a ball of fire would sink majestically into a waveless lake of sapphire."

[source]

"For a moment, as it passed behind the black dome of the Institut, it was horned like a moon on the wane; then as its disc reddened to deepest purple it would pass out of sight in the depths of the lake transformed into a pool of blood.”

[source]

“But the most theatrical effects, the most magnificent transformation scenes were only produced in a cloudy sky. Then, according to the whim of the prevailing wind, they would see waves of sulphur breaking on boulders of coral, palaces, towers of buildings piled up in a blazing heap or crumbling down as torrents of lave poured through the gaps in their walls.”

[source]

“Or, at other times, the sun already out of sight, hidden by a veil of mist, would suddenly break through with such a mighty thrust of light that a tracery of sparks would be sent shooting clear across the sky like a flight of golden arrows.”

[source]

Don't those gorgeous views make you want to visit Paris? In 19th century?.... I do!

Katharina in The Taming of The Shrew: Character Thursday (57)

Katharina is the eldest daughter of Baptista, a gentleman of Padua, who represented women’s despair at the time Shakespeare wrote this play: The Taming of the Shrew. Katharina was a shrewd and scornful young lady; she was famous for that, and that made her difficult to get a husband. I don’t know which one must have come first, whether young men were terrified of her because of her bad reputation, or her shrewdness came from worrying because no young men had made any approach to her. But I think, it’s her own nature that made her different from other girls of her age.

There’s no doubt that Katharina was an intelligent, smart and independent woman; and she had just lived in the wrong era. Katharina would be happier if she has lived in modern era, where women have an equal opportunity to pursue her dream and to decide what she’s going to do in life by her own. In her era, Katharina suffered from the injustice the society had put on women. Then, a woman must put her future in her parent’ hands to get her a husband; as if getting a husband was a matter of life and death for a woman. And what her life would be in the future would depend on what kind of husband they would get. A marriage (with all the dowry aspects) had become a kind of business, don’t you think?

I imagine Katharina as an independent and self-esteemed woman who was confined by the values set by the society, that a woman should be sweet, shy, fool and submissive in order to attract men. I could feel how Katharina longed for having an equal relationship with men; how she would love to share her opinions on things which men usually discussed: politics, social, literature, etc. In the despair of not being able to do that, Katharina must have felt lonely and desperate. Then the shrewdness began to appear. It got worse because Katharina hasn’t found any men who would propose her because of her temper; while she knew that the only hope to get more freedom was when she has got married. Those tortured Katharina even more, and her tongue got sharper and sharper.

What’s more interesting is the ending. After Petruchio married her, Katharina has completely changed. Do you think she was afraid because Petruchio could become sharper than her? I guess not, it’s because Katharina came finally to realize that there’s nothing she could change in her life. She lived in the wrong world, and what she could do was either take it or leave it. She had chosen to be happy by accepting her role as a wife, and thus seemed that she had been tamed by Petruchio. Well, it might be true in one point, because Petruchio knew better than anybody else, that the shrewdness in Katharina came from unhappiness. And when he made her see the reality, Katharina was too clever not to change herself.

That is my Character Thursday of this week, an analysis of book character of my choice, who is yours?... Just put your post URL in the linky below. Do you like to join us in discussing characters from books you read? See the details of Character Thursday first.

Happy Birthday Émile Zola! (Mini Bio & Bibliography)

On this date, 173 years ago, a baby boy was born in Paris. He was named Émile François Zola, the only child of an Italian engineer. “Zolla” in Italian means ‘cloth of earth’. He was four years old when his father died, leaving his mother as a widow with meager pension. His mother prepared him to have a law career, but Zola failed in his Baccalauréat exam. Before entering journalism and beginning his writing career, Zola worked as clerk in shipping firm and in sales department of a publisher. Among his first published works is Contes à Ninon, published when he was 24 years old. When the publication of his next semi-autobiographical novel: Claude’s Confession (1865) caught police’s attention, the publisher office fired him.

Zola’s first major novel was Therese Raquin (1867). In his 28 years of age, Zola started to build the complete layout of his future series of novels traces the "environmental" influences of violence, alcohol and prostitution which became more prevalent during the second wave of the Industrial Revolution during the second empire of France. Les Rougon-Macquart was the title of the series, depicted—or rather examined—two branches of a family: the respectable (legitimate) Rougons and the disreputable (illegitimate) Macquarts for five generations. Zola: "I want to portray, at the outset of a century of liberty and truth, a family that cannot restrain itself in its rush to possess all the good things that progress is making available and is derailed by its own momentum, the fatal convulsions that accompany the birth of a new world."

During the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 Zola and his newly married wife, Alexandrine moved temporarily to Marseilles. And during that period, Zola worked as journalist for several different newspapers. Right after that Zola began to write his Rougon-Macquart series.

The complete twenty series of Les Rougon Macquart (the years are years of publication):

#1 (1871) - The Fortune of the Rougons

#2 (1872) - The Kill (La Curée)

#3 (1873) - The Belly of Paris

#4 (1874) - The Conquest of Plassans (La Concuête de Plassans)

#5 (1875) - The Sin of Father Mouret (La Foute de l'Abbé Mouret)

#6 (1876) - His Excellency Eugène Rougon (Son Excellence Eugène Rougon)

#7 (1877) - L’Assommoir (The Drinking Den)

#8 (1878) - A Page of Love (Une Page d'Amour)

#9 (1880) - Nana

#10 (1882) – Pot Luck (Pot-Bouille)

#11 (1883) – The Ladies’ Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames)

#12 (1884) – The Joy of Life (Le Joie de Vivre)

#13 (1885) – Germinal

#14 (1886) – The Masterpiece

#15 (1887) – The Earth

#16 (1888) - The Dream

#17 (1890) – The Beast in Man (La Bête Humaine)

#18 (1891) – Money (L'Argent)

#19 (1892) – La Débâcle

#20 (1893) – Doctor Pascal (Le Docteur Pascal)

Paul Alexis reading a manuscript to Zola,
painted by Paul Cezanne

During those years, Zola had became a political reporter (1871); held his First Impressionist exhibition (1874) and Second Impressionist exhibition (1876); took Jeanne Rozerot as his mistress; got a baby girl from Jeanne, named Denise (1889); got a baby boy—Jacques—also from Denise (1891). On 1894, at the same year that Alfred Dreyfus—a Jewish artillery officer in French army—was found guilty by a court martial, Zola published his first novel of Three Cities trilogy: Lourdes. It was followed soon by Rome on 1896, and Paris on 1898.

On January 13^th, 1898 Zola published his article J’Accuse in defense of Dreyfus who was wrongly convicted as treason which was caused by anti-semitism in the highest levels of French Army. J’Accuse was an opened letter addressed to the President of the Republic which was published in the front page of L’Aurore newspaper. By publishing J’Accuse, Zola has brought his career to a major risk. On the other hand, as Zola was a leading French thinker at that time, J’Accuse formed a major turning-point on the affair, and it had divided France deeply between the reactionary army and church and the more liberal commercial society. The article is also widely marked in France as the most prominent manifestation of the new power of the intellectuals (writers, artists, academicians) in shaping public opinion, the media and the state.

Streets in Paris named after Emile Zola & Alfred Dreyfus

Zola was brought to trial on 7 February 1898 and was convicted on 23 February; however he fled to England rather than went into jail. After his return to Paris, Zola immediately published first novel in his new series Four Gospels: Fecundity (Fécondité); followed by Toil (Travail) on 1901. The third novel, Truth (Vérité) was published posthumously in 1903, while Justice would have become the fourth if only Zola have survived then to finish it…..

J’Accuse was proved to bring huge risk to Zola, as he was found dead on September 29^th from carbon monoxide poisoning caused by an improperly ventilated chimney. Decades later a Parisian roofer claimed on his deathbed to have closed the chimney for political reasons, which was believed to be instructed by Zola’s enemies. He was buried in Montmartre cemetery; however on June 4^th 1908 his remains were relocated to the Panthéon, where he shares a crypt with other French big authors: Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas.

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It was a kind of mini biography of Émile Zola, one of the most prominent contributors of Naturalism in 19^th century and a major figure in the political liberalization of France. Looking at his bibliography, I was amazed by how productive Zola had written his books; he published one book every year on average, to say nothing of his persistence to write the twenty novels of Rougon-Macquart series based on his layout for twenty years! Zola wrote each of his books after thorough researches to describe the settings in details. For Germinal, for example, he went to a mining, interviewed the miner and witnessed their risky lives, and examining their livings. No wonder, we would feel as if we were presence in every scene of his books.

In comparing between his work and Balzac’s, Zola said: “I don't want to describe the contemporary society, but a single family, showing how the race is modified by the environment. (...) My big task is to be strictly naturalist, strictly physiologist.” Jim, one of Zoladdiction participant, posted an interesting analysis over the taxonomy aspect in Zola’s Rougon-Macquart series. If you could not decide which book you should read first at a start, or whether you must read them in publication order or not, Jim’s post would help you to consider. For you who, like me, decided to read in random order, the post provides information you need to know in order to see Zola’s whole perspective in writing the series.

I am a fan of Zola, although I have only read three of his novels so far. That’s why I host the Zoladdiction event, to encourage myself to read more (and to buy more in the end) of Zola. I plan to read at least all of the twenty novels in Rougon-Macquart series, and hopefully all the others too.

JOYEUX ANNIVERSAIRE MONSIEUR ÉMILE ZOLA!

2 April 1840 – 2 April 2013