{"id":1514,"date":"2021-09-08T11:06:08","date_gmt":"2021-09-08T15:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/?p=1514"},"modified":"2021-09-08T12:52:21","modified_gmt":"2021-09-08T16:52:21","slug":"the-scandalous-nature-of-lucys-black-ribbon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/2021\/09\/08\/the-scandalous-nature-of-lucys-black-ribbon\/","title":{"rendered":"The Scandalous Nature of Lucy’s Black Ribbon"},"content":{"rendered":"

Passage: \u201cIt was neither a locket, a miniature, nor a cross: it was a ring wrapped in an oblong piece of paper – the paper partly printed, partly written, yellow with age, and crumpled with much folding\u201d (Braddon 17).<\/span><\/p>\n

The first thing I notice is the cluster of words used in the middle of the passage by Braddon to elicit the importance of the paper previously enveloped in the ring. The repetition of the letter \u201cp\u201d was likely not an accident either (i.e., \u201cpiece of paper – the paper partly printed, partly\u2026\u201d) as it draws the reader\u2019s attention to the piece of paper more so than the ring (Braddon 17). The age of the piece of paper is quickly made apparent to readers, but Braddon does something interesting here by contrasting words like \u201coblong\u201d (the rectangular nature of which I interpret as showing elements of care) with words like \u201ccrumpled\u201d or \u201cfolded\u201d (Braddon 17). Perhaps this is indicative of how Lucy\u2019s feelings towards the contents of this piece of paper and the ring have not changed (or become stronger) with the advancement of time, in that this once neatly kept paper has become worn with age. Another interesting element is the way in which the passage opens: \u201cIt was neither a locket, a miniature, nor a cross\u201d (Braddon 17). I interpreted these as being commonplace items worn by women in the Victorian era, which when juxtaposed against Lucy\u2019s paper and the ring may subtly imply that there is a sense of scandal, secrecy, or longing in Lucy\u2019s actions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Contextually, this passage is introduced in the novel directly after Michael Audley\u2019s proposal to Lucy (which she is obviously not elated during). Braddon also makes readers aware of the fact that Lucy is \u201cclutching\u201d a \u201cblack ribbon about her throat\u201d during the proposal (Braddon 16). This passage reveals what Lucy keeps at the end of her black ribbon. Collectively, these may foreshadow a scandalous event in Lucy\u2019s future, which may result in her death or some sort of equivalent social ousting.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Passage: \u201cIt was neither a locket, a miniature, nor a cross: it was a ring wrapped in an oblong piece of paper – the paper partly printed, partly written, yellow with age, and crumpled with much folding\u201d (Braddon 17). The first thing I notice is the cluster of words used in the middle of the … Continue reading The Scandalous Nature of Lucy’s Black Ribbon<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4754,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[169398],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2021-blog-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4754"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1514"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1514\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/secretlives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}