Knowing nothing about the story except what I have seen on the tv Martha from Doctor Who's role seems pointless. All she does is running round getting angry at the family she lives with and has now run off with that weird stalker woman. Does she have an important role or is she just a pointless character??
shareShe is pretty pointless, perhaps that it why she was left out of the 1988 production.
Cats rule, dogs drool!
If you want to know, there are plot spoilers below:
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She is the servant who initially gets ideas above her station, gets cross with her betters for their patronizing manner towards her, and runs off.
Later she returns, full of regret and remorse, begs to be taken back and vows never to have dangerous thoughts (like wanting to be treated with respect by the Meagles family) ever again.
She also serves as a plot device to thwart Miss Wade and redeliver something important back to the Meagles family - but yeah, Dickens was being ultraconservative when he wrote her rebellion and subsequent squashing. "Five-and-twenty, Tattycoram! Coram orphan! Know your place!"
Maybe Andrew Davies is going to rewrite the Tattycoram/Miss Wade subplot for this series? Couldn't hurt!
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but there were definite lesbian undertones between Tattycoram/Miss Wade as written by Mr. Davies. I guess maybe he's trying to "update" the story? Other than that (not having read the book) I can't really see a point to either character as the narrative now stands.
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Oh no, you're not reading "too much" into it! Not at all!
I'd really like it if Tattycoram managed to have a positive effect on Miss Wade in the Davies rewrite - because currently Miss W. is somewhere between "ice queen" and "lesbian-as-corrupting-influence"!
She is a bit of a plot device, helping all the characters linked. She is a link between the Meagles (and therfore Arthur) and Miss Wade, who is friends wth Riguard. She does do one important thing later in the narrative which is quite important though. Read on if you want to know the spoiler
She returns the documents which Miss wade is looking after for Riguad, which he tries to use to blackmail Mrs Clenham.
I'd really like it if Tattycoram managed to have a positive effect on Miss Wade in the Davies rewriteI think Davies has managed to balls up two of my favourite characters in fiction (especially Miss Wade) -- he thought he'd be a bit clever, a little hip and happening and try to out-caricature Dickens: he failed.
I agree with the above...I too had hoped that Davies would make Tattycoram and Miss Wade's relationship more positive than in the novel. But so far it's not looking good. Miss Wade is more obviously lesbian than in the book (just do a google search on 'Miss Wade Little Dorrit lesbian' and you will see that this idea of her sexuality is not new), but far from making her more positive, Andrew Davies has made her seem more creepy, more predatory, more negative, than Dickens did! (The stalking - was Miss Wade living opposite the Meagleses or what? In all weathers?) In the last episode so far, Tattycoram is 'free' from the Meagleses, she is with Miss Wade, and she still seems angry and/or scared....this relationship cannot have a positive end.
****SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOILER ALERT!!! SPOLIER ALERT!!!*****
At the end of the book, Tattycoram left Miss Wade and returned to Mr Meagles, begging his forgiveness and saying she was 'bad, but not as bad as she once was'. Not a hint that she may have been justified in wanting to escape the condescending, patronising, exploitative treatment meted out to her. Tattycoram even wilfully reclaims her silly, made-up name! Mr Meagles shows no sign of humility, never accepts that he and his family caused Tattycoram's rebellion and are sorry for it. Indeed, he gives her a stomach-churning lecture about Duty, citing Little Doormat (sorry) as an example. I can only hope that if this ending is kept in any shape or form, that Tattycoram at least insists on an apology and better treatment from the Meagleses.
[deleted]
citing Little Doormat (sorry)
Never be sorry for saying the truth wittily
And, looking at it again, yes, I have to admit you're right about the Miss W./Tattycoram relationship ending badly. Miss W. has just hired Rigaud (RIGAUD!!!) to do some unspecified but probably fatal damage to Henry Gowan. How likely is it that an associate of Rigaud's, used to hiring him for contract killing, is going to turn nice later on?
Also, a huge "word" to everything you've said about how unfair it is that the Meagles never get an authorial reprimand for treating Tattycoram that way. That she's being played by a black actress in this production makes it simply imperative that Meagles publicly admits he was wrong.
I am glad the TV version did not have Tattycoram kissing ass to the Meagleses to be taken back. And we are spared Mr Meagles stomach-churning speech about Duty. Mr Davies has improved in this regard.
However, I would have liked her to demand and receive an apology for the way they treated her in the past. Instead, we see her and the Meagleses, at the wedding, playing happy families. Can't she see they're just using her as a replacement for Pet who is now lost to them?
Okay, I'll calm down, count five-and-twenty....
That she's being played by a black actress in this production makes it simply imperative that Meagles publicly admits he was wrong.
Haven't read the book so I was just wondering whether Tattycoram was black in the book?
Haven't read the book so I was just wondering whether Tattycoram was black in the book?Nope. Dickens describes her as a 'handsome girl with lustrous dark hair and eyes'. This does not equate to her being black as that would've been mentioned and made much more of in the novel. If people want to dispute this, then read Dombey and Son to see the language Dickens employs in describing people of a darker skin tone, and how society and its attitude and perception is illustrated and conveyed in accordance. share
I thought she was meant to be - her black eyes and hair are referred to, and someone refers to her as a "full colored girl". I assumed that was what was meant.
Rose: How was that sentence going to end?
Tenth Doctor: Does it need saying?
Me: YES!!!!
It's many years since I read the novel, but that's what I thought too. Not black, but mixed-race. Vaguely Creole, like Mr. Rochester's wife in 'Jane Eyre'. I thought that also explained her turbulent temperament: the English had these prejudices about people (women, especially) with foreign blood. They figured it produced all sorts of un-English characteristics, especially a hot temper and tendency to exaggeration and drama.
Flat, drab passion meanders across the screen!
I agree with the above...I too had hoped that Davies would make Tattycoram and Miss Wade's relationship more positive than in the novel. But so far it's not looking good. Miss Wade is more obviously lesbian than in the book (just do a google search on 'Miss Wade Little Dorrit lesbian' and you will see that this idea of her sexuality is not new), but far from making her more positive, Andrew Davies has made her seem more creepy, more predatory, more negative, than Dickens did! (The stalking - was Miss Wade living opposite the Meagleses or what? In all weathers?) In the last episode so far, Tattycoram is 'free' from the Meagleses, she is with Miss Wade, and she still seems angry and/or scared....this relationship cannot have a positive end.
"Mr Meagles shows no sign of humility, never accepts that he and his family caused Tattycoram's rebellion and are sorry for it."
That's not true at all. Did you even read the book?
"'Tattycoram well, Miss Wade?'
'Harriet well? Oh yes!'
'I have put my foot in it again,' said Mr. Meagles, thus corrected. 'I can't keep my foot out of it, here, it seems. Perhaps, if I had thought twice about it, I might never have given her the jingling name. But, when one means to be good-natured and sportive with young people, one doesn't think twice. Her old friend leaves a kind word for her, Miss Wade, if you should think proper to deliver it.'"
(Book 2, Chapter 33)
Mr. Meagles certainly isn't perfect, but he's not the monster people like to make him out to be, either. Because he's a little narrow-minded doesn't mean he didn't try, to the best of his ability and knowledge, to be kind.
'Mr. Meagles certainly isn't perfect, but he's not the monster people like to make him out to be, either. Because he's a little narrow-minded doesn't mean he didn't try, to the best of his ability and knowledge, to be kind.'
I did read the book, thank you. And that's why I know about the puke-inducing speech he made to Tattycoram about 'duty' at the end of the book.
Dickens obviously intended him to be likeable, and most commentaries have him down as being 'kind-hearted'. I would put him at more than a 'little'
narrow-minded, but that's obviously a matter of opinion.
I am re-reading Book 2, Chapter 33 'Going'.When Tattycoram is reunited with the Meagleses, Mr M has every chance to repeat the 'apology' he made to Miss Wade, and he does not do it. Instead, rather than acepting some fault in Tattycoram's revolt, he accepts HER apology - indeed her self-abasement. And he says:
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‘You see that young lady who was here just now—that little, quiet, fragile figure passing along there, Tatty? Look. The people stand out of the way to let her go by. The men—see the poor, shabby fellows—pull off their hats to her quite politely, and now she glides in at that doorway. See her, Tattycoram?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I have heard tell, Tatty, that she was once regularly called the child of this place. She was born here, and lived here many years.
I can’t breathe here. A doleful place to be born and bred in, Tattycoram?’
‘Yes indeed, sir!’
‘If she had constantly thought of herself, and settled with herself that everybody visited this place upon her, turned it against her, and cast it at her, she would have led an irritable and probably an useless existence. Yet I have heard tell, Tattycoram, that her young life has been one of active resignation, goodness, and noble service. Shall I tell you what I consider those eyes of hers, that were here just now, to have always looked at, to get that expression?’
‘Yes, if you please, sir.’
‘Duty, Tattycoram. Begin it early, and do it well; and there is no antecedent to it, in any origin or station, that will tell against us with the Almighty, or with ourselves.’
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Patronising or what? Tattycoram's desire for some respect is equated with 'constantly thinking of oneself.'
I never loved your mind, Dewey Daniels, I never loved your mind!
You're kidding? That speech makes you puke? It's the whole point of what makes Little Dorrit an admirable character. She didn't pity herself in her life. She did what needed to be done. She was a hard worker. She was good. She is exactly what Harriet/Tattycoram (and others) should emulate - smart, compassionate, has self-control, humility but not self-abasement, she knows who she is but is not prideful to the ridiculous degree her family is.
Heaven forbid anybody should instruct anybody to think about duty & responsibility. If that's patronizing it's not any definition of the word I ever heard.
It's a completely separate issue from deserving respect. Yes, the Meagles should have gotten a clue and treated Tattycoram more like an adult and an equal person, but in their minds they were treating her with affection and familiarity like their own daughter Pet, (a far more belittling nickname in my opinion). They should have, to our modern minds anyway, have treated her less like a maid and more like an adopted daughter, but it was not unusual to the times for adopted children to be more like hired help than members of the family (I think of Mansfield Park, or Anne of Green Gables where the Cuthberts initially adopt to have an extra farmhand). They provided her with a home, food, clothing - and equal to their own, however they may have asked her to fetch and carry a few times.
We could just as easily say Tattycoram, out of appreciation for their adopting her, should have borne with their mode of treating her because it was well meant, as someone quoted Mr. Meagles saying above - out of familiarity. And I do think that the end of the film, at least, implies that perhaps they will finally treat her as a daughter now that their daughter has been removed from them. Better late than never.
As to the lesbian undertones of Miss Wade, I don't see that at all in the book (although I am not quite finished) though it's a little bit present in the film. Not much, in my opinion.
I have taken Miss Wade's interest in Tatty to be merely that she sees her as like herself, feeling out of place in the home she finds herself, and without real family. Miss Wade is bitter and has had her heart broken and somehow wants to keep Tatty from that... but perhaps selfishly, keeping her only to herself.
Rose: How was that sentence going to end?
Tenth Doctor: Does it need saying?
Me: YES!!!!
Yes, the Meagles should have gotten a clue and treated Tattycoram more like an adult and an equal person, but in their minds they were treating her with affection and familiarity like their own daughter Pet, (a far more belittling nickname in my opinion). They should have, to our modern minds anyway, have treated her less like a maid and more like an adopted daughter, but it was not unusual to the times for adopted children to be more like hired help than members of the family (I think of Mansfield Park, or Anne of Green Gables where the Cuthberts initially adopt to have an extra farmhand). They provided her with a home, food, clothing - and equal to their own, however they may have asked her to fetch and carry a few times.
But he could at least have the kindness and good manners to call her by her real name, Harriet, after he professes to realise that "Tattycoram" is silly. It is more than that, it's patronising and insulting.
shareOh right, she had come from Thomas Coram's orphanage in Bloomsbury - now I get it. But why Tatty - is it some version of Hatty, short for Harriet...
George... don't do that!
Oh, gosh, would it be politically incorrect to say that her role was expanded and changed to "a person of color" because the producer/director/writers didn't want to have to answer to the PC crowd?
Too bad Dickens doesn't have control over his own work; any story line can withstand only so much "tinkering."
[And, I don't dare hold the opinion that Freema Agyeman is a talentless hack, who needs her teeth fixed and an attitude adjustment as much as she needs acting lessons, because, if I did, Obama would have his goons at my front door.]
I am amazed at all of the postings I have read on this thread from folks who want to rewrite the plots, characterizations, and values of Dickens's story. Dickens did not live in the 21st century, he was born around the time Abraham Lincoln was. The idea that someone of his time would be inserting lesbian characters in his story must be from people who don't know what happened to Oscar Wilde who was years younger than Dickens. It is as ridiculous as the idea that he would have valued independence over duty.
If people want to have a play 'based on an idea by Charles Dickens' they should do that. If they want to have 'Little Dorrit' they should present Dickens.
"If people want to have a play 'based on an idea by Charles Dickens' they should do that. If they want to have 'Little Dorrit' they should present Dickens."
Couldn't agree more. Before seeing the whole series I want to sayu at this point that I hope I need not choose to say this version fits firmly in the former camp.
Are you under the impression that lesbians are a novelty or that Dickens wouldn't use his (limited) talent to imply characteristics, where censorship, hypocrisy and fashion intruded?
Marlon, Claudia and Dimby the cats 1989-2005, 2007 and 2010.
I remember her being more comic relief in the book (in that Dickens way) and not being so whiney. Like the "count to 5 and 20" thing was FUNNY in the book - not just at Tattycoram's expense, but how silly Mr. Meagles sounded saying it all of the time.
"You may very well think that; I couldn't possibly comment."
Haven't read the book (yet) but just watching the TV series in the US. We just saw the second installment, but I think the episodes may be devided differently then in the UK.
About Tattycoram, I just read the thread on this subject.
I was wondering about her part. And I was already expecting some slavery and abolitionist thread within the stoy. Kind of disappointed now.
At the period of 'Little Dorrit' slavery had long been abolished in Britain, which would have made an abolitionist plot totally anachronistic.
shareOther than delivering the box to Mr. Clenam at the end, I have no idea what her role was in the story. I found her whiney and the actor's performance bad. When watching the series I skip most of her scenes. I have yet to read the book, so I hope I liker her more in the book.
share