Posted by Sterling on 16/9/2009, 21:23:15, in reply to "Re: The Vicar of Wakefield"
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I have to say that I am taken with the idea of the latter half of the book being a satire of the Book of Job.
It is not too surprising that biblical satire would be published and accepted at this time. After all, this was also the age of Voltaire. Goldsmith's circle was certainly acquainted with Voltaire's work; Boswell visited him in France around the period of the writing of TVOW.
Job is one of the most disturbing books in the Bible. There is something profoundly unsettling about the idea of God making a bet with Satan. To me, however, the most mind-bending aspect of the book is Job's children. At the beginning, one of Job's chief misfortunes is that all his children are killed. At the end of the book, when everything has been restored to him, God sends him another set of children. The book seems to blithely suggest that the children are as replaceable as the sheep and cattle. Further, there is a definite sense that the hard times are over and that everything is just jim-dandy again.
In my view, the sufferings of the Vicar are not meant to be funny, any more than are the sufferings of Job. What may be intended as funny, because I suspect it seemed as absurd in the 1760s as it does today, is the restoration of everything to the Vicar at the end of the novel. Just as calamity piled on calamity throughout the second half of the novel, at the end good fortune tumbles around the Vicar and his family to a ridiculous extent. Exactly as in Job, everything that was taken away is restored with interest. Also as in Job, the implication is that the restoration makes everything fine and that the suffering is unimportant if everything comes right in the end. At least Goldsmith didn't send him a new batch of children.
--Previous Message--
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: and then it went crazy with head-spinning
: catastrophes. Quite late in the story I stopped to
: say "It is not 'he's gotta be kidding,' it is 'he
: is kidding.'"
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: That was pretty much my response. And I didn't make
: the Job association on my own either. I first read The
: Vicar years ago, before I'd ever read Job, though I
: grew up going to church and did know the story of Job.
:
: I guess if The Vicar were satirizing anything in Job,
: it would have to be Job's friends, because Job himself
: does question God. I am not all sure I think any
: satire of Job was actually meant. I would have to
: reread both works, and I don't feel like it.
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