254
PHILIP L. GREENE
He accused her of lacking any distinction as a human being. He said
he couldn't live with a girl so obtuse about the world around her.
So
Lil
and Ben are back together, and they have decided to attend
Murray's husband-and-wife therapy team. They are not going to
think
about a baby for a while. Murray recommended that Lil go back
to
dancing classes with me in order to get back to her primal
self."
Although it was late when I left them, I wandered over to
the
Cedar Street Bar thinking that despite the problems people seem
to
have, they were alive to the possibilities of existence. It was
alm<m
closing time. Two fairies were standing at the bar having a furious
argument. The only other person was Tibby.
She was sitting at a table in the comer, looking disconsolate.
"I just broke up with Ben," she said, before I could sit down. I
ordered two beers, and after a quiet cigarette I asked her if she would
like to stay at my place. She agreed.
DICKENS
From Pickwick to Dombey
STEVEN MARCUS
For the common reader, Dickens has
always been the greatest novelist in
the English language. In this book,
Steven Marcus mobilizes the re–
sources of textual analysis, intellec–
tual history, and social theory to ex–
plain why the common reader is
right. In a highly original explora–
tion of the main themes of Dickens'
"[This is a] penetrating book on the
first half of Dickens'career. . . .
Steven Marcus manages to combine
an intuitive sureness about the lines
of Dickens' development
with
a con–
fident sense of what each novel
achieves in and for itself.... To be
able to disentangle achievement and
promise and to give due and vivid
praise to each argues unusual gifts
as a critic" - CHRISTOPHER RICKS,
The New York Review of Books.
"Mr. Marcus has done the job very
389 pages
BASIC BOOKS, Inc., Publishers
first seven novels
innocence in
Pickwick,
antiprudence in
Nicholaa
N ickleby,
change in
Dombey
and,
Son,
etc. - Mr. Marcus illustrates
the or igins, the evolution, and the
meaning of Dickens' genius. He also
demonstrates how Dickens
reflec~
t he society of his day while pro–
f oundly altering its sensibility.
well: he is penetrating, persuasive,
and soaked in his subject. He has
something original and revealing
to
say about each of the books he dis–
cusses, and at the same time he es–
tablishes a firm sense of Dickens'
st eady growth, of the way in which
one work runs on into the next....
[Marcus'] achievement is considera–
ble and should send anyone back
to
those wonderful novels
with
re–
newed eagerness or fresh under–
standing"-JOHN GROSS,
Book Week.
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