74
Donovan observes that 'generally speaking, the society of BLEAK HOUSE
is one in which the normal responsability of parant for child has
most often been abused or shirked' and he gives examples of depart
ures from 'the virtuous mean of parental devotion' both toward excess
Mrs Pardiggle and toward deficiency - Mrs Jellyby, Harold Skim-
pole he also deals with inversion of relationships, pointing at
Skimpole, Charley Neckett, Esther, the Smallweeds and especially the
Turveydrops^
Though most of these authors see the link with the main theme of the
novel, responsibility^, we do not find a comprehensive approach
which deals systematically with parents and children in the book, and
more important even relates responsibility in the family to
responsibility in society. In the treatment of parent-child relations
we come across all but a few of the characters of the novel and if the
theme of responsibility or the lack of it turns out to be prominent
here this is bound to mean that responsibility plays an important
role in the whole novel. But if we only say this we miss an important
point. For the analysis of responsibility in the family is explicitly
related to what is found to be wrong in society at large.
I hope to show this after a thorough treatment of parents and children
in BLEAK HOUSE. All this will add up to a clear illustration of
Dickens's narrative method.
Irresponsible parents in BLEAK HOUSE. There are degrees, of course,
but the number of parents that are up to the mark is really quite low.
Total neglect is not even the worst that can happen to children,
though it is bad enough. The Jellyby children remain the outstanding
literary covmterpart to the proverbial Jan Steen household in painting
and the situation in the jellyby home is characterized fully by the
image of Peepy tumbling down a flight of stairs with a bump on every
0
one of seven stairs. (Ch. 4, p. 84-5 Mr Jellyby's opinion that
his children are 'Wild Indians' and that the best thing that could
happen to them was their being all Tomahawked together' sobbingly
related by Caddy (Ch 30, 472), show him as a pathetic figure; but
though we tend to feel for him and almost like him, sitting there
with his head against the wall, he shares the responsibility with
his wife for doing nothing to improve things.