The Dodds

[nickwhit.livejournal.com]

Found this discussion on AF elsewhere, in which someone said how much they'd hated the Dodds. And I suddenly thought 'yes! me too!'. Whilst I loved certain things about RMF (Nicola collecting The Idiot, riding home and the fight with Lawrie; the bathroom conversation after Kay's dropped her bombshell), I invariably speed-read through all the Dodds episodes (especially the rescuing-Fob-from-the-wreck episode), even the climactic rescuing of Rose. I felt the same about the Edward storyline in RAH - the more that takes off, the less I'm interested.

For me, AF is at her best not when she's driving forward a plot, but for the way in which she manages to convey her characters' inner life. (Sometimes I think my favourite book is Falconer's Lure, where there is no one major story arc.) And the Dodds, for me, in both books where they feature at any length, are essentially plot devices.

Am I being unspeakably harsh? How does everyone else feel about them?

Comments

[lobeliaqueen.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't say that I hated the Dodds but as I read your post I realised that, on my recent reread, those were the parts I skipped too. I enjoy the interaction of the Dodds with the Marlows - the scenes at the breakfast table and, later, when we see them with Karen in their own home.

Peter's Room is my favourite book, I think but it's a close call with Falconer's Lure which IIRC was the first non-school story I read. I like Run Away Home but, as you say, for the character. I love the different reactions to the prospect of spending Christmas without Mrs Marlow and then to the proposed picnic on the beach. And, of course, the way they each deal with the Edward situation.

So, I think i'm saying that, for me, it's about character too.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I do rather dislike Fob, and Rose is a bit wet but understandably so, I suppose. RMF's not a favourite book, but I like RAH less.

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

First, I think the whole point of AF's fiction is that no one, however awful they seem, is wholly and unremittingly bad. So to 'hate the Dodds' seems to me to miss that altogether.

Second, I'm not sure why the Dodds deserve to be lumped all together in that way. There are four of them and they are all very different.

Third, we are introduced to them (as are the Marlows) in circumstances which are specifically geared to show anybody's worst side. The children's mother has just died, their father has remarried and they have come to live with a bunch of strangers. I'm prepared to cut anyone some slack in that situation. Even for Edwin, his former wife has just died and it can't be much fun for him suddenly living in someone else's home, with their rules and their hordes of teenagers predisposed to resent him.

[robvic.livejournal.com]

Funnily enough, have literally (i.e. 10 min ago) put down RMF having read the bathroom scene.

I think the line 'I suppose it was the way she said it - as if we were bound to think it was hopeless' is quite telling - we're already slightly prejudiced against them.

As above, I do feel a bit sorry for Edwin - starting married life with his in-laws and he's obviously not much of a 'people person' - while I don't think Peter totally deserved to be slashed across the face, I do think he was asking for it - although Edwin, as the adult, should have been able to restrain himself a bit better!

But I like Chas and Nicker-Nacker's relationship with him - Fob I could do without though...

[colne-dsr.livejournal.com]

Rose is OK. In RMF she's 10 years old, she's just had a parental split, a dead mother and aunt, she's left her home to move miles away, lost touch with grandmother, and got a new stepmother. She's entitled to be not at her best. Especially as she is perhaps not really convinced that her mother is dead (Uncle Gerry finds it easy enough to persuade her it's not true). By RAH, she seems a fairly nice ordinary but perhaps colourless child.

Edwin - wants to do the right thing, doesn't know how. He's from a different world to the Marlows. But remember it's Kay that more or less forces Mrs. Marlow to let them stay at Trennels, Edwin was willing to rent a house or commute; and it's Kay who leans on Mrs. Tranter to get out so they can have the house - Edwin didn't seem to know about that until Rowan sprung it on the family. I think if the Marlow children hadn't been so down on him from the start, they'd have been OK.

Fob - very irritating child, but Peter likes her, so I'll trust his judgement. I think I'd take Nicola's side if I knew her, though. Probably a very interesting person to know if you didn't have any responsibility for her.

Chas - seems to have the same personality as his puppy. I like him, but I'm sure he could get wearing after a time.

[ankaret.livejournal.com]

I don't hate them, but I read the school books before the holiday books, so when I first encountered them I was slightly perplexed by them in the same way that I was perplexed by the Rosina - Rupert talk between Ginty and Patrick at the beginning of The Attic Term.

[tabouli.livejournal.com]

I like the Dodds, myself. Don't know that I'd like them in RL (not keen on brusque controlling types like Edwin, and Fob's wilful stubbornness is a bit daunting in so young a child), but as characters they're interesting, especially in terms of their contrast with the Marlows. I'd even go so far as to list RMF as one of my favorite AF books. I put this down to my Sinister Social Scientist tendencies: the situation AF sets up in it is wonderfully fraught, and I love watching how everyone handles it.

[antfan.livejournal.com]

I do like the Dodds, and I like RMF a lot (not RAH though). the Dodds all seem very REAL in RMF and I do like the scenes with them although they are younger children, and we don't really experience their inner lives in the books, so I don't think it's possible to identify with them in the same way as Nicola etc. Rose seems like somebody who might turn out very interesting - the developed fantasy life, the obsessive reading, the various fears and phobias - but she's a very reserved child at this stage in her life.

I also like Edwin, to some extent - and I don't really understand why everybody is so down on him! The point with him, I think, is that underneath an extremely brusque, awkward manner he does have integrity, strong feelings and a passionate interest in his work - even a sense of humour. Nicola comes to see his value in the end.

The Dodds do do seem like plot devices in RAH, but so unfortunately does everybody else IMO. I don't like anybody in this book very much, or the plot....and it feels peculiarly dated to me, a sort of madcap holiday adventure Swallows and Amazons thing going on in the eighties. There's a lot more character complexity in RMF - it's such an interesting situation, whereas the whole Edward Oeschli story is pretty flat. And Giles is a real problem for me in this book....he just seems a type to me, bold, dashing young naval officer, and AF lets him dominate her other characters completely, which makes the Marlows much less interesting as an ensemble.

[tabithabun.livejournal.com]

When I first read the Ready Made Family, I loathed Fob. Her stubbornness on the wrecked boat put Nicola in danger and I just wanted to give her a slap! But by Run Away Home I love her. The whole rescue of Edward depends on Fob giving him the message and she comes up trumps. She feels no need to please anyone unless she chooses to and I find her glowering at strangers and deep cross voice hilarious in such a young child. She has a strong sense of herself - "I'm going home now" - and I sense her observing everything that goes on around her.