What the Dickens? Victorian Idealism Versus French Realism: Insight into Two Prolific Authors

Women, death, and money are ubiquitous in writing. Throw legacy in and we have the whole of the Balzac-Dickens tome. In the following essay we explore these themes from the two aforementioned perspectives: that of Victorian eminence, and of French social realism. The title of Honor De Balzac's novel The Girl with the Golden Eyes already preludes the rapacity with which the male-female intercourse proceeds. The very description of a buoyant spring day draws forth luscious want: "[It is] one of those beautiful spring mornings when the leaves, though uncurled, are not yet green." (327) It is a sensual, robust novel written by a man for a man.

Enter Charles Dickens' Bleak House, domain of gentleman's prose; prepare to sleep. Feign to palpitate through archaic references of bosoms "when Richard turns his eyes upon me, there may be something lying on my breast more eloquent... " (768) Victorian modesty doesn't lift its veil for plausibility's sake. Instead, it is left to us, the readers, to fill in the cliffs wherein Dickens leaves off. Esther, our narrator, gives great testimony to social work and public discourse, but wholeheartedly fails to inform us of her love interest until "full seven happy years" has passed. (Dickens 813)

The spoils are great in both novels, with Henri de Marsay leading the tide in squandering family fortunes. Drinking away half-yearly interests and abandoning children a mere child's play in Balzac's world. Henri's father sold off his own name in order to propitiate his debts. This parlay becomes a celebratory ritual as de Marsay warms up before conquering Paquita by jostling at the Salon des Étrangers. All of this vice is laid flat in solid form with not judgment more or less a summary: "loss and gain which are all than tensely-keyed organisms have to fall back upon when they are constrained to function in a vacuum."

If only the same could be said for Chesney Wold, a world of its own that collapses of its own impotence. Lackluster characters gloom about in this grand castleCharacters in Dickens' novel take on caricatured exaggeration. None lesser than Mr. Smallweed demonstrates: "[The] old gentleman's nails are long and leaden, and his hands lean and veinous, and his eyes green and watery; and, over and above this, as he continues, while he claws, to slide down in his chair and to collapse into a shapeless bundle." (361) While his grand-daughter pokes him and Samaritans hoist him like a decrepit king, the hilarity of the situation is lost in the effort. If not for amusement, these shenanigans may be intended as a tool for discriminating between the host of characters. By the end of the novel, we have over fifty characters to contend with, most of whose character development is scarce. George Brimley dubs it Dickens' novelty of style, though it quickly wears thin, "his public wearied by the repetition of effects in which truth of nature and sobriety of thought are largely sacrificed to mannerism and point. (Brimley 282)

Chapter One of Bleak House prefaces "for I know I am not clever" -an admission on Esther's part, or omission, if you will. (1) Aside from being off-putting, we find ourselves deceived when we realize Esther's sharpness. Comparing that on its face with Balzac's novel, "De Marsay was not a scatterbrain," we have here the layout of as diametrically opposed plots as ere there was. (342) Balzac's novel is fueled by self-satisfaction; Bleak House, self-denial. Tenets are heaped upon us from dear characters and near: . The self is nothing, and others, everything. Paying it forward fuels a system quite the opposite of Parisian etiquette, "Woe to him who is not ready to take one black eye in order to give his adversary two in return!" (Balzac 334)

The Gemini twin paths culminate in an innocent maiden's death. How we are to approach this matter is cued by the protagonists. De Marsay mocks Paquita's passion by referring to her murder as "a chest ailment," as if she were afflicted for loving him. (391) De Marsay's tryst was over as soon as it started; death did not wring higher meaning unto their lovers' relationship. Lady Dedlock's sacrifice is immortalized in a farewell letter extolling her hardship before her crucifixion: "Cold, wet, and fatigue... Forgive." (753) Prayers and a mausoleum lay tribute to her magnanimous character. The reason for this fanfare, ludicrous on both sides, is the point the authors' are making as a sign of their times. Balzac is letting bygones be bygones, and Dickens is romanticizing the inevitable. He injects meaning into what otherwise are just the facts of life, likewise Ms. Flite imparting classical thought onto her birds "Hope, Faith, Youth, Beauty, Peace" etc.

In The Girl with the Golden Eyes, Henri disparages Paquita, "Dear innocent! You know nothing about things of this world!" (383) Paquita readily accedes this but more than makes up for it with her sexual prowess. Mr. Skimpole, however, has no such recourse, not even in his "fine...manner, and his engaging candor, and his genial way of lightly tossing his own weaknesses about." (83) The viability of Skimpole is compromised by the sheer combination of traits that have no more in common than Jarndyce's knick-knacks: "They agreed in nothing but their perfect neatness, their display of the whitest linen, and their storing up wheresoever the existence of a drawer, small or large." (79) At some point I seriously weighed whether I would be missing anything if Skimpole were altogether meted out of the novel. Plots and personalities alike are molded like puddy into where they fit the moral of the story. Indeed this was common practice in Gothic and Picaresque novels, the stories of Dickens' times.

Mr. Jarndyce alternates between "Mother Hubbard", "Dame Durden", "little woman", and "our dear girl." If that is his highest appraisal of her, imagine what heights Esther would soar to as the mistress of Bleak House. The nursery rhyme comes to mind:'Little old woman, and whither so high?'-'To sweep the cobwebs out of the sky.'

(Dickens 97) Names such as these, spoken at serious moments, take away from Esther in her own right. HWilliam Axton in his essay "The Trouble with Esther" takes it a step further, linking Esther's lack of identity to her father's namelessness. Her foresight to sequester herself in illness is poo-pooed as stubbornness. Her commitment to duty is likened to a children's limerick that does no credit to her initiative. As a woman who has steadily developed character, her status is readily diminished by Mr. Jarndyce's patronization. The little-womaning has a dehumanizing aspect, as writer Nicola Bradbury touches upon: "The 'little woman'... compromises her own sexual development in dutiful submission to her guardian's needs." (Dickens XIV) If she is not "little" then she is then "old", both far off the mark of a woman in her prime. Axton points out the grotesque commonality of all her nicknames: "They all refer to the witches, hags, spinsters, widows, and comic old dames of folklore." (Axton 551) Whereas Paquita's sexuality is the eminent draw, Esther is stripped of all desirability, literally losing her face in Dickens' endeavor to retain her asexual status.

Less fantastical yet more captivating is the symbiotic bond between De Marsay and his protégé Paul who "[basks] in the light his friend reflected, [takes] shelter constantly under his umbrella, trod in his footsteps and gained a luster from the sunlight he emitted." Paul reaps the benefits of Henri's social status and stands as his lackey boy. The pairs emerging from Bleak House, Esther and Jarndyce, Ada and Richard, Phil and George, Lady Dedlock and Sir Leicester move on a totally different axis. Phil's servitude is so complete that there can be no reasoning comprehensive enough to account for it, so Dickens abandons trying altogether by gracing Phil with subhuman traits akin to a loyal pet: "a dirty-faced little man, standing at the trooper's elbow, and looking up, with an oddly twisted figure and countenance, into the trooper's face," (Dickens 601)

About a third of Dickens' characters are demonized in some form or another. Jo's repertoire is limited to mad dashes and gnawing on things. Mr. Guppy flounders like fish back and forth between the two ladies. Is is not easy to feel the satisfaction Dickens' attempts to elicit as Mr. Jarndyce escorts the Guppy's out of his house when we aren't even clear why Mr. Guppy loved her in the first place. All we can count on is for Dickens to classify his characters as disposable or worthy, the very machine he is railing against throughout the book.

Esther gives up her one true love in order that she may faithfully serve out her avowal to "devote [her] life to [Mr. Jarndyce's] happiness." (575) The endeavor of the Victorian writer to dictate a comprehensive form from birth to marriage, introductions to partings is done at the price of real-time development. Esther's narrative is a confessional that disregards emotional rapport to expedite plot development. Key elements of identity establishment are passed over summarily in statements like "I will not repeat what I said to Richard." (585) or "I proceed to other passages of my narrative." (758) This is hardly the way to discharge the climax of the story wherein Esther's own mother dies! Maybe it was for the better, as Dickens could not afford any more waterworks since the melodramatic parting of the housekeeper. This choppy interjection of facts and proceedings was more the style of the first narrator "LONDON. Michaelmas term lately over... Fog everywhere." (1) We have echoes of Dickens himself through his idiosyncratic personification of animals and vice versa. In American Notes one of Dickens' favorite topics is the pigs-more specifically, what the pigs might be thinking about us odd humans. Again, this compatriotism with animal-life shows itself in Mr. Snagsby's sentiments for the rooster: "What question this enthusiastic fowl supposes he settles... or why he should thus crow (so men crow on various triumphant public occasions, however)... is his affair." (Dickens 156) According to psychologist Henry Murray, themes unconsciously pop up in storytelling, revealing the author's affiliation, motivation, and expectation of others. Whether it is Mr. Snagsby's crow or the American pig, the dual perspective is actually just one, and so can be said of the two narrators of Bleak House. This one voice speaks sometimes to the Queen and muses about life's hard knocks.

Mr. Jarndyce's crediting of Esther in changing his life is similarly abrupt. On the one hand we have a grumpy old man who chucks a perfectly good cake out the window, and the next we see an engaging, sweet host who thinks nothing of inviting three strangers into his own home. "Confound [it]!" is right as we try to establish the basest of congruence in personality. The reason why Mr. Jarndyce couldn't just be Mr. Jarndyce is because he would be a lesser man if he were not touched by the graces of Esther in a Victorian world. There needs to be an elevation of character that sanctions the righteousness of this type of relationship between a man and a woman. Dickens is saying that a woman nurtured in turn completes the home and blooms everything within. This is stated in plain terms by George's musings that "a family home, however small it is, makes a man like me look lonely." (375) When George reunites with his family, he deflects their efforts to rehabilitate him and further separates himself by requesting a formal exclusion from the will. Not imposing upon others has been such the focal point of his life that he has wasted away to the bare minimum, living on boards and plywood. In line with Dickens' justice, George's austerity is rewarded with an idyllic life at Chesney Wold.

Affiliations in Bleak House are high. They are magnets waiting to happen- in death, in birth, in secret, in ostentation-they are dying to embrace each other. Jenny's best friend comforts her as her child lies dying, which incites a fresh round of tears from Ada who is comforted by Richard. In 19^th century France, however, we have a cooling of settings, and it is explained by a jadedness throughout a city that has seen and been it all. Men like de Marsay and Paul walk arm in arm "with that air of apparent affection which, as between young Parisians, means nothing at all, either for the present or for the future." (Balzac 332) They are invested in nothing at all: not Waterloo, not love, maybe vanity. Everything is just a passing thought, as one is inclined to be "so interested in everything that he ends up by being interested in nothing... He passionately takes up a cause and drops it without a further thought." (Balzac 310)[give] By analogy, this is Richard Carstone's case in Bleak House, but the particulars are so fanciful here as to be a lost notion altogether, especially when he just dies by the end of the chapter. Whereas Richard's folly was a good riddance, Balzac's commentary rings a bell. His portrayal of friendships and relationships reflected trends actually taking place in France. A constant revolutionizing of philosophy and fashion forms a malleable public that lives for the next, and the next. From plummeting marriage rates to French notoriety, Balzac's discourse reflects the inner workings of an ambitious French mind.

Some have criticized Balzac's take on French society as immoral, and justly so. There is no love or fidelity in his stories. Why should one strive for happily ever after if he can have his cake and eat it too? No woman, married or maiden, is off limits from male speculation, as Balzac stands at the floodgates with his treatise on monogamy. At one point he brinks upon feminism by suggesting that a chastity in young women is overrated when put in perspective of disillusioned marriage. In Balzac we have a no-holds-barred farce of mating rituals, right down to slumber-party shenanigans of boarding school girls.

Bleak House maintains discipline by sorting the good from the bad and pureeing both to the nth degree, laying out black and white implications for both paths. Virgin girls for arranged marriages are blessed with health and wealth. Wayward women with illegitimate children are banished from the good life and die in cold alleys. With such imposed justice, it is a wonder that Dickens busied himself with rebutting the plausibility of spontaneous combustion, going to Veronese depths to corroborate the plot. Lady Dedlock's fealty is furthered when the gratuitous letter from George arrives attesting that Nemo corresponded with her under no uncertain terms during the time that she was unmarried. There are many boundaries in Bleak House, fastidiously maintained like Sir Leicester and Boythorn's lane. Honor is a constant theme in Bleak House. Offhand remarks like "He might have done worse... He might have undertaken to do it, and not done it." (Dickens 210) Rules are made to be broken in The Girl with the Golden eyes. No blindfold can stop de Marsay from having his way with Paquita, in the Marquise's own home, no less. Even though he was clearly instructed not to remove the bandage, he dodges it and wrestles his guard down until he is quite hapless. These are the makings of a capable fellow in French high society.

Between women and women in Victorian society, affection that borders upon servility is endorsed by Dickens assumption that such impulse bursts forth from an ingrained set of DNA. Despite virtually no contact between the two, Esther immediately assumes the daughter role and professes that her heart was overflowing with love for her mother-"that it was a natural love, which nothing in the past had changed, or could change." (484) A similar spirit shines in Caddy's interactions with her mom: " 'I could never be happy without [your blessings]. I never, never could!' sobbed Caddy, quite forgetful of her general complaining, and of everything but her natural affection." (Dickens 325) In The Girl with the Golden Eyes, natural affect is expressed by "Ah! What a pity!" compliments of de Marsay's father. Paquita's mom also saves her tears for gold to recompense her daughter's life. The deadbeat dad character is much more viable than Paquita's lingering mother, though both are cold to the bone. Perhaps the embellishing of a parent dynamic that neither author holds and ground on, namely the mother-daughter aspect, is too far of a reach.

What is not farfetched for either men is a fetish for Spanish flies, exoticized to the max for full effect. Roman frescoes have not the depths that Paquita plunges Henri's heart into. To reach such unattainable heights, Balzac pulls for a piece that not many have had a sample of and pinpoints her origin in a faraway land, making exclusive "the ideal woman one sometimes really finds in Spain and Italy, but scarcely ever in France." (Balzac 339) The entrance of Rosa in Bleak House is no less dramatic. Lady Dedlock, of renowned beauty herself, stops in her tracks, draws Rosa out for a closer look, then says, "Why, do you know how pretty you are?" Of course "child" is added in there as the usual buffer in Victorian etiquette, but the effect is complete.

There we have it. Money gone wild and two contemporary societies with divergent gender roles in unsparing endings. What does each teach the reader? C'est la vie for Balzac, in his shrug of the shoulder caricature of life and death. Dickens aims high with characters that fall flat, but not before they run us through Chancery sludge from A to Z, leaving the reader with a very real sense of having half his life wasted away.

Axton, William. "The Trouble with Esther." Rev. of Bleak House. Modern Language Quarterly 26.4 (1965): 545-66. Web.

Balzac, Honoré De, and Charlotte Mandell. The Girl with the Golden Eyes. Hoboken, NJ: Melville House Pub., 2007. Print.

Collins, Philip. Charles Dickens: the Critical Heritage. London: Routledge, 1995. Print.
Dickens, Charles, and Tatiana M. Holway. Bleak House. New York: Barnes & Noble Classics, 2005. Print.