![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Flight of the Heron read-along: Part V chapters 1-2
Tha's bahn' to catch thy deeath o' cowd...
Welcome back, everyone, and happy new year! We embark on the final Part...
Next week we'll continue with chapters 3 and 4 of Part V.
Welcome back, everyone, and happy new year! We embark on the final Part...
Next week we'll continue with chapters 3 and 4 of Part V.
no subject
The passage about Ewen's love and grief for the Highlands as he thinks he's seeing them for the last time is an utterly gorgeous piece of writing, and one of my favourite parts of the book. Strongly written, significant relationships between characters and places are something I always like in fiction, and my goodness, this is a good one. Aaargh. And, as Broster points out, chapter 5.1 follows much the same route along which we met Keith back in 1.1—and what a contrast in the style of the descriptions that provides. We're a long way from those elephants...
And the paragraph where Ewen is thinking about Keith is very lovely too. '...already as a friend, and with wonder', awww. Ewen's ongoing bewilderment at Keith's actions almost seems like a parallel of Keith's own failure to understand his own motivations earlier on—which is interesting, when Ewen understands very simply and naturally what was for Keith the key realisation which made sense of everything, that he feels friendship for him. In any case, I quite agree with Ewen's 'all honour to him for it'—indeed!
The meeting with the girl who gives Ewen the sgian is such a powerful moment. We've already seen Keith's reactions to what the victorious Government forces did to their defeated enemies after Culloden—now we see it from the other side, both for the Highlands generally and for Ewen personally.
A general 'oh, poor Ewen!' for everything he goes through in these chapters—all that pain and exhaustion and heartache. But impressive feats of physical endurance under highly discouraging conditions are a feature throughout Broster's writing, and it was surely something she knew about from her own experiences of war.
Mr Fosdyke and Mr Prescott! I love them—they're some of my favourite minor characters in the book. And Lassie too, of course. :) The combination of good nature, sympathy and independent-mindedness expressed by Mr Fosdyke in explaining his motivations for helping Ewen is great, and says so much in a short space. And they're funny, although Fosdyke's joke about the heads on Micklegate Bar is rather a dark one. The line about Alison's prayers and Ewen's 'simple and straightforward faith' is very sweet—but this time through the book, it struck me that perhaps there's a parallel here with Keith's painful struggle with prayer after he parts from Ewen in chapter 4.7. If these angelic Englishmen—who provide another demonstration of the power of kindness, compassion and personal honour even amidst political divides and cruelty—are indeed an answer to prayer, it seems fitting that it might be 'the prayer in [Keith's] heart' as he thought, as far as he knew, so fruitlessly of Ewen two chapters ago.
And there's even more lovely, beautiful sense of place towards the end of chapter 2! The description of Ewen's return to Ardroy while he thinks the house has been burnt, followed by the revelation that it hasn't been and Ewen's entry into the house like a 'ghost', creates such a strong and evocative mood, with its slow, almost dreamlike progression and its careful abundance of detail. The sparing of Ardroy from the devastation might perhaps have been a little convenient and/or indulgent on Broster's part as an author, but between the beautiful writing and, again, the already-established themes of individual compassion and honour amidst brutality, I think she makes it work. And Aunt Marget! Their reunion is such a lovely moment. <3
no subject
So what comes across is not "our protagonist's house is protected by the special forces that protect protagonists and their things," but the sense that for once the chances of war have turned in Ewen's favor rather than against him - after a long string where they've turned over and over against him.
Also, I love the description of Aunt Margaret and company tending the smoking fires so that it would look to all the countryside as if Ardroy is good and burnt. It seems so in character for her, and also very characteristic that she might touch off a spark of humanity in an English officer so he'd purposefully set the fire badly.
no subject
And Lassie is such a good girl to find Ewen! I know Ewen wouldn't have hurt the dog, but I could still very much feel Fosdyke's distress that Lassie might get stabbed by the rebel she flushed. Why that fear should be so agonizing to me given everything else, I don't know, but it was very important to me that in all this desperation and heartbreak, this one happy creature should be allowed to keep her happiness.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Aww, yes <3
Lassie is great. Amidst all the difficulties of these chapters, a dog simply being a good dog and showing kindness and liking towards Ewen, and being shown kindness in return, does stand out as a terribly important thing—I think because, as you say, it's so simple and straightforward a piece of goodness.
no subject
Yes, Aunt Margaret and the household spending the day tending the fire of damp wood is a great bit of description—I'm sure she enjoyed it!
no subject
And I said much earlier in rot13, so I'll say it again here: it's a beautiful bit of writing to have Ewen traveling the same route Keith did. Not only as an exercise in contrasts between how the two characters see the landscape, but it ALSO beautifully sets up Ewen's escape. Broster didn't just randomly declare that you can't see the bridge from the road, exactly where it would be most convenient for Ewen's escape: she materially demonstrated it for us right back at the very beginning of the book. Beautifully, elegantly done, that.
no subject
no subject
no subject