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III. Pamela, Part 2

I'd like to apologize for the tardiness of this post. It was meant to go up last night, but it has been a rough week and I must confess that even now, I'm not sure how productive or insightful I can be regarding the completion of the novel Pamela.

The second half of Pamela is as unrewarding to this reader as the first. I'm not sure why I have been so put off by this novel, because even though the language and the nature of the novel seem appealing and attractive and easy to read, I've really struggled with this book in more ways than I would have ever imagined. I'm not finished with it and I don't know if I'll ever be finished with it. At this point, I've read as much of it as I can bear to read. And that's not to say that it isn't a good book, it's just to say that for whatever reason, I've felt this struggle and this desire to just throw the book away and never approach it again. It's not a common feeling for me. I love reading. But the characters! My god, I hate Pamela. And I hate Mr. B even more.

There's this controlling aspect of the novel that really bugs me. I can't stand the fact that Pamela seems unwilling to defend her own sense of worth (outside of her refusal to give it up. I mean that's pretty much a defense, but it's troublesome as well that she'd fall for this guy. I mean come on!). There's the imprisonment and then the later Mr. B / Pamela falling in love / marriage thing that seems so beyond the realm of reason or possibility, that I can't imagine how any reader could have taken the text all that seriously. And yet I guess they did? I don't know. It bothers me. The possession of her writing is equally bothersome, and I feel the entire time that Pamela is knowingly giving in to abuse, and yet she seems to be borderline happy and in touch with whatever sense of virtue Richardson is trying to express to the readers. I don't get it. I just can't see it and maybe I'm being harsh because I am unfamiliar with novels and writing of this era. Whatever the case, I don't know.

I think that's where I leave things. I simply don't know what to think or make of the text.

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