This is a rather depressing story of the life of Iron peddlers in the mid eighteenth century. Wolfe, who is Welsh, is the center of attention for the novel. He is described as a thin ghastly, and very feminine man. He is young and rather unpopular among his co workers since he has been slightly educated and has a hobby for creating sculpture. Deborah is also a main character in the story. She is a disfigured hunchback that is in love with Wolfe. She brings food to him every night as a token of her love. Wolfe is disgusted by her physical qualities yet never the less treats her kindly.
One Saturday night, just before his shift is over, a small group of educated men take shelter from the pelting rain in his work station. As he is closing up, they notice his sculpture of a naked muscular working women. When they inquire to the name of it, he replies Hunger. This puzzles the group and they discuss his work and potential for factory workers with"souls".
Wolfe recognizes the group as being a the overseer, Clarke,Kirby, one of the mill owners, and one of the local physicians May. There are two he does not recognize but is completely fascinated with. One appears to be a newspaper report and more notably is Michell. For some reason Wolfe can not keep his eyes of Michell. He must study him to see how a man of a nobler class and stature could be different from himself. HE feels hopeless and realizes that he could never get out of his condition. When they do ask him about his statue, the tiniest hint hope to get out begins to form.
I find this story so far to be really depressing in the condition of the mills in which the story takes place. I'm sure that the book is targeted to aid in the reformation movement and working class rights and eventually labor unions. The first part of the book told a history of the author and the time period to help us understand the context of what the book was written under. The author grew up in close proximity and first hand could describe these conditions so they are pretty accurate.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
This is all true but how do you think in this dark and depressing place these characters develop? Would things be different if they lived in a small town working on open farms instead of in cramped mills? The concept of Hunger in this story which is represented by the women could also be applied to some of these workers. Especially when you see how they watch the upper class men they seem to wish to figure out how to be like them.
Post a Comment