As the summer moves forward, our three kids continue to hang out. Dill asks Scout to marry him and then, according to the Scout, starts to ignore her. She tries everything she can think of to regain his attention, including beating him up twice, but nothing seems to work. I doubt anybody is reading To Kill a Mockingbird for relationship advice, but if you are for some reason, be wary of following Dill's and Scout's examples. You probably shouldn’t ignore someone after proposing to her, or beat someone up after he proposes to you. But what do I know? Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
I’d like to address some angry emails I’ve been getting. Yes, the title of this blog is “Blogging To Kill a Mockingbird.” This doesn’t mean that I am blogging about killing an actual mockingbird. How would that even work? A hit counter attached to some sort of electrical device on top of a birdcage?
Also, before I get any more angry emails, no, I am not actually getting any angry emails from people who thought that I was blogging about killing an actual mockingbird. On to the book!
Chapter Two
Summer passes quickly (like it always does), and Dill heads back home. Scout gears up for her first year of school, which she's very excited about. But once she gets there, she realizes that she kind of hates her teacher, Miss Caroline Fisher.
Miss Caroline is a young teacher. It seems that everything she does annoys Scout. When she finds that Scout already knows how to read very well, she tells her to tell her father not to teach her anymore. Classic lazy teacher move ("I don’t want to have to think of things that will keep you interested, so stop being smarter than everybody else.").
First things first: Yes, I will now be blogging To Kill a Mockingbird. No, I will not be making fun of this classic book. I will be making jokes about the plot and asking stupid questions about the events but I will not, I repeat, not make fun of this classic work of literature that I genuinely like. (Please put your hammers down now.)
We've already arrived at the last Blogging The Scarlet Letter post! Stay tuned for Ramsey's next blog on a classic book.
Chapter 23 – The Revelation of the Scarlet Letter
Well, apparently Hawthorne named his chapters backwards, because as we all know, the scarlet letter was revelated (a word I just made up) all the way back in the second chapter, after that terrible part about the prison door (this is my last chance to complain about that, and I have to make the most of it). So, if you ask me, I would have to say it’s pretty dumb to have a chapter about the revelation of the scarlet letter in the second to last chapter of a book called The Scarlet Let—what’s that? I should read the chapter before I start complaining? Well, I hardly see what good that will do, but if you insist…
Ramsey is reading The Scarlet Letter and blogging about his experiences. Catch up on past posts here.
Chapter 21 – The New England Holiday
I knew from the last chapter that there was a state holiday coming up, but I keep thinking Hawthorne is using “holiday” in the British sense of “vacation.” Maybe it’s all the talk of Dimmesdale and Hester’s European Vacation. Hang on—that sounds like an awesome movie title.
Ramsey is reading The Scarlet Letter and blogging about his experiences. Past posts are collected here.
Chapter 19 – The Child at Brook-Side
Before we move forward with The Scarlet Letter, the book nerd in me needs to point out that the title of this chapter could double as the title of a forgotten novel in the Anne of Green Gables series.
Intrepid contributor Ramsey is reading The Scarlet Letter and blogging about it. To catch up on past posts, go here!
Chapter 17 – The Pastor and His Parishioner
Hester calls out to Dimmesdale to get his attention. (That, ladies and gentlemen, is what we in the writing-jokey-plot-summaries-of-classical-literature-industry call “picking up right where you left off.”) Dimmesdale is shocked because he is not used to people calling his name in the middle of a wooded area.
As you may be able to tell from my earlier plot summaries, I love a lot of the language used in this book, and this chapter gives us another doozy. When Dimmesdale realizes that Hester is calling out to him, he replies: “Art thou in life?” or, to translate, “Hester? You’re still alive?” That is a fantastic way to greet someone. I’m going to start assuming that everyone is dead when I can’t see them, just so I can start using that phrase.
Ramsey is reading The Scarlet Letter and blogging about it. His past posts are here, and the SparkNotes lit guide is here.
Chapter 15 – Hester and Pearl
Instead of jumping ahead seven years into the future, this chapter picks up immediately where the last one left off. Chillingworth walks away and Hester realizes something very important that makes her feel kind of guilty (wait for it): she hates her husband.
Reading The Scarlet Letter? So is Ramsey! To catch up on his past posts, check out the index page.
Chapter 13 – Another View of Hester
When we last left Colonial Boston, we saw Hester Prynne and Reverend Dimmesdale accepting their sin together as Roger Chillingworth looked on, his suspicions now confirmed, ready to exact his revenge on the man who cuckolded him ("cuckold" is such a great word). If you’re anything like me, you were probably shivering with anticipation, wondering what would happen next. It was no longer a matter of when—for the secret was out—but how? How would Chillingworth strike at our heroes who had wronged him so?!
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