"Sylvie and Bruno"
Aug. 9th, 2006 12:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stoutfellowSylvie and Bruno is Lewis Carroll's longest work; it was originally published in two parts, each of which is roughly as long as the Alice books combined. It's an odd book, a melange of disparate and, sad to say, discordant elements. There is Carrollian whimsy, complete with fairies, two über-cute children, a couple of absurd Professors, silly songs and talking animals. There are political machinations, discourses on science and mathematics, meditations on Christianity, a touch of satire, a light romance and a large dollop of melodrama.
Unfortunately, it's not a very good book. There's a reason why it's less well known than the Alice books or "The Hunting of the Snark": it simply doesn't hold together well. The whimsy never reaches the level of the Alice books; the depiction of the children is infected with the Victorian propensity for child-worship; the shifts between Fairy-Land and 19th century England are disconcerting; and the resolution is an over-hasty attempt to make everything Come Out Right.
Still, I don't regret taking the time and effort to read it. Embedded in the dross are lumps of gold, or at least high-grade copper ore. In addition to the discussion of free fall I quoted earlier, there is an impromptu demonstration of the properties of the Möbius strip and the Klein bottle. There is a brief meditation on the shortcomings of punctuation and the uses of white space. Some of the philosophical passages are thought-provoking (though some are simply sophomoric), and the silly songs are, if not on a par with, say, "The Walrus and the Carpenter", entertaining enough. The discussion of dinner-table conversation, and the techniques adopted in Mein Herr's homeland to encourage it, is hilarious.
I think the best I can say, in rating Sylvie and Bruno, is to call it an interesting failure.
Unfortunately, it's not a very good book. There's a reason why it's less well known than the Alice books or "The Hunting of the Snark": it simply doesn't hold together well. The whimsy never reaches the level of the Alice books; the depiction of the children is infected with the Victorian propensity for child-worship; the shifts between Fairy-Land and 19th century England are disconcerting; and the resolution is an over-hasty attempt to make everything Come Out Right.
Still, I don't regret taking the time and effort to read it. Embedded in the dross are lumps of gold, or at least high-grade copper ore. In addition to the discussion of free fall I quoted earlier, there is an impromptu demonstration of the properties of the Möbius strip and the Klein bottle. There is a brief meditation on the shortcomings of punctuation and the uses of white space. Some of the philosophical passages are thought-provoking (though some are simply sophomoric), and the silly songs are, if not on a par with, say, "The Walrus and the Carpenter", entertaining enough. The discussion of dinner-table conversation, and the techniques adopted in Mein Herr's homeland to encourage it, is hilarious.
I think the best I can say, in rating Sylvie and Bruno, is to call it an interesting failure.
