okay. i'm effectively done with 'Oliver Twist'.
Quite a disappointment for someone who's read 'Great Expectations' and loved it. This one is as witty, but for some reasons, less funny. it's also less exciting/thrilling. doesn't really capture and engage the reader as well or as consistently as GE.
the difference is obvious when you compare the start of the two novels. GE grabs your interest within the first twenty pages. Oliver Twist is more descriptive and less action-packed at the start, so i got a little bored. it's probably also partially because Pip is a much more lovable character than Oliver, and GE is written in first-person narrative (as compared to the annoyingly overly-sarcastic narrator in OT) so you feel more "into" the story. I say Pip is a more interesting and lovable character, because we know what he's thinking, and because he says funny, witty things himself. he is very human and accessible to the reader. He is a nice, respectable character, but he is human. We don't know much about Oliver. Most of the time, the narrator tells us how Oliver feels/thinks, but we don't see it ourselves. Most of the time, the narrator isn't even talking about Oliver!! Half the novel is about the events concerning Oliver (in which Oliver has no active part. he's only at the receiving end) And Oliver is portrayed to be so pure, so squeaky clean and so maligned and victimised that it kind of got on my nerves at some point. he is a rather not believable character. I don't like Oliver because he freaking does NOTHING. throughout the entire novel, the only thing he did that made an impact in his life was running away from the undertaker's and going to london. ok i understand that he was held captive so he couldn't do much, but still..
you could probably tell i was pretty sore about this disappointment. LOL.
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