Waren chapter 6

[cesarioviola]

Feeling kind of proud of Harding for his slight increse in backbone this chapter, except it's undermined by his motivation--it's as much about not being bothered with public scandal as about doing right.  Is that bothering you?

I think that may have been from 5, actually.  Here's 6:

The party went off as such parties do.  There were fat old ladies, in
fine silk dresses, and slim young ladies, in gauzy muslin frocks; old
gentlemen stood up with their backs to the empty fire-place, looking
by no means so comfortable as they would have done in their own
arm-chairs at home; and young gentlemen, rather stiff about the neck,
clustered near the door, not as yet sufficiently in courage to attack
the muslin frocks, who awaited the battle, drawn up in a semicircular
array.  The warden endeavoured to induce a charge, but failed
signally, not having the tact of a general; his daughter did what she
could to comfort the forces under her command, who took in refreshing
rations of cake and tea, and patiently looked for the coming
engagement: but she herself, Eleanor, had no spirit for the work; the
only enemy whose lance she cared to encounter was not there, and she
and others were somewhat dull.

I always love a good extended metaphor, but are these people twelve?

Comments

[redrose]

Didn't really see backbone.

I didn't think it was about public scandal, so much as it was about the bother of dealing with the issue; he likes a quiet life, and this will disrupt it.

I find the archdeacon more annoying, in his absolute sureness of his rightness in protecting the financial institution of the church.


The authorial tone sort of weirds me out. I am not used to the author being so obviously there, more the author blending into the background.