Count of Monte Cristo: Chapter 63
Nov. 17th, 2016 09:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerI have been zooming through The Count of Monte Cristo this week! The wheels in the Count's plans are beginning ever so slowly to turn and it's gotten ever so much more exciting; it began to drag a bit there during the interminable section in Rome.
A few more thoughts! Helpfully arranged in a list, because the plot has grown so diffuse that I'm not sure how else to organize them.
1. WHY ARE YOU ENCOURAGING VILLEFORT TO MARRY POOR VALENTINE TO FRANZ, COUNT? I mean, I'm sure that it's part of his larger plan and Valentine will not in the end actually have to marry Franz, but will instead get to marry her true love Maximilien Morrel, BUT STILL.
Also WTF Villefort, why so insistent on marrying your daughter to a man she doesn't want to marry so very much that she tried to enter a convent to get out of it. Is it really all weird displaced guilt from the time that Villefort's father Noirtier murdered Franz's grandfather?
2. The scene where Noirtier writes his will by means of blinking his eyes is all kinds of aces, though. (Noirtier has had a stroke and lost the ability to speak or move, aside from blinking his eyes I suppose.)
3. I'm worried about the telegrapher the Count used to transmit false information about political events in Spain. Of course the Count gave him an enormous pile of money, but how much good will that do him if he's prosecuted? And all he wanted to do was grow his nectarines in peace!
4. I hadn't realized that the clacks in Discworld were based on an actual telegraphy system in France that used semaphores rather than electrical impulses. That's super cool.
5. Is Dantes planning to spring Andrea Cavalcanti (née Benedetto) on M. Villefort and Mme Danglars, all "Ha! Here is your illegitimate child who you failed to kill as a baby!"? They might confess all in a state of collapse; but if they don't, then he's going to have a devil of a time proving it.
A few more thoughts! Helpfully arranged in a list, because the plot has grown so diffuse that I'm not sure how else to organize them.
1. WHY ARE YOU ENCOURAGING VILLEFORT TO MARRY POOR VALENTINE TO FRANZ, COUNT? I mean, I'm sure that it's part of his larger plan and Valentine will not in the end actually have to marry Franz, but will instead get to marry her true love Maximilien Morrel, BUT STILL.
Also WTF Villefort, why so insistent on marrying your daughter to a man she doesn't want to marry so very much that she tried to enter a convent to get out of it. Is it really all weird displaced guilt from the time that Villefort's father Noirtier murdered Franz's grandfather?
2. The scene where Noirtier writes his will by means of blinking his eyes is all kinds of aces, though. (Noirtier has had a stroke and lost the ability to speak or move, aside from blinking his eyes I suppose.)
3. I'm worried about the telegrapher the Count used to transmit false information about political events in Spain. Of course the Count gave him an enormous pile of money, but how much good will that do him if he's prosecuted? And all he wanted to do was grow his nectarines in peace!
4. I hadn't realized that the clacks in Discworld were based on an actual telegraphy system in France that used semaphores rather than electrical impulses. That's super cool.
5. Is Dantes planning to spring Andrea Cavalcanti (née Benedetto) on M. Villefort and Mme Danglars, all "Ha! Here is your illegitimate child who you failed to kill as a baby!"? They might confess all in a state of collapse; but if they don't, then he's going to have a devil of a time proving it.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-17 05:10 pm (UTC)It's usually pretty safe with Pratchett to assume it (whatever it is) is based on something, but it's still cool.
As for the rst, SPOILERS. But mainly, Dantes likes it complicated. :-)
no subject
Date: 2016-11-18 01:41 pm (UTC)Well what's the point of a good revenge if it's not complicated? Dantes is so over Cask of Amontillado type revenges.
no subject
Date: 2016-11-18 02:14 pm (UTC)