Reading the Chunksters discussion

This week's section covers the final chapter of Part II and the first two chapters of Part III.

TO SERVE THEM ALL MY DAYS – 3rd Week - PART II, Chapter 4; PART III, Chapters 1 – 2

Due to this week’s dramatic events, I put the summary in spoilers to avoid any inadvertent reveals to someone surfing through the TSTAMD threads who glances at the page.
(view spoiler)[ PART II
CHAPTER 4
SubCh.1 – The story skips through 1922, 1923, 1924 as David continues to grow as a teacher, dealing with the sullen students called the “Lumps and enjoying seeing some former students at the Old Boys Reunion in the summer term. Beth again innovates with setting up a wives’ room during the Reunion and continues to shine in each annual musical. The November 11th parade round the War Memorial erases any memories of the tussle surrounding its creation. Both Beth and the boys help erase David’s battle-induced pessimism and bring him hope for the future. While walking in the woods David observes a female teacher named Julia with a student named Blades lying with his head on her lap reciting poetry to her in an obvious romantic tableau. Beth advises David to cease his urge to report Julia and to instead talk to her first.
SubCh.2 – There is no Subch.2 but Subch.1 is the length of two subchapters.
SubCh.3 – David talks to Julia who describes the as-yet chaste romance. The circumstances along with her life situation convince David to not report it and let her handle it. She intends to tell Blades they can’t see each other that way and to leave the school at term’s end.

PART III – THE BELL IN THE BRAIN
CHAPTER 1
SubCh.1 – When Bat Ferguson dies, David inherits his role as house master of his old house of Havelock and also Bat’s faithful Airedale Towser. Beth enjoys the space, modern kitchen and convenient location of their Havelock residence. David makes the spirited Boyer as house prefect and it definitely sobers him. David buys a three-wheeler car mainly for Beth’s ease, and she is delighted.
SubCh.2 – Young ‘Spats’ Winterbourne’s parents are in a very public divorce as his mother, the outgoing party-loving Viola, is a famous actress, and his father a successful businessman. After another student shows him a newspaper article on his mother, the sensitive ‘Spats’ goes missing. Boyer assists David in getting info from other students about Winterbourne’s reason to leave. David talks to Mr. Winterbourne about the search, who does not want to notify the police yet, and David is surprised by his calm and cool attitude to both the divorce and his son’s disappearance. The senior students and David search but can’t locate Spats.
CHAPTER 2
SubCh.1 - The next day, the police are notified and an Inspector comes to take statements. Beth takes the twins to the town of Challacombe for their inoculations. While searching through Spats’ belongings, David discovers Spats’ high-quality artwork and admires it before going to talk to the policeman who has comes to see him. On Quarry Hill, a lorry driver emerging from Venn’s quarry loses control over it and drives it through the copse, down a slope and onto the road, ramming into the three-wheeler with Beth, Joan and Grace in it as it returns from Challacombe. The policeman at the school is there to tell David about the accident, with resulted in the lorry driver, Beth and one twin dead and the other badly injured. David is stunned. Horwath helps David who, wanting to be alone, walks out across the adjoining moor.
SubCh.2 - Rain is pouring as David continues to walk across the countryside. While standing above a valley full of brushwood David recognizes the landscape and follows faithful Towser down into the valley to hide in the brushwood where Spats comes out of nowhere to lead him to the cover of a cave in the rockface by the stream where Spats has a fire going. David and Spats converse about their respective disasters and David realizes this is where Spats has been hiding out and is also the scene of his painting landscapes. Spats tries to comfort David and motivate him to return to his responsibilities. The two of them start to walk back followed by Towser. (hide spoiler)]

When author used the term 'unclouded happiness' , i guessed right that some trouble will shortly appear but my imagination was not ready for the drastic change in David's life as well as the book itself.

What struck me as unusual, was the sudden change in writing style, which now i think is psychological realism (i have yet to confirm this). This style author has used in the very beginning of the book to describe the war. It got me worried because i thought that if whole book is written in that style, this big read will be more challenging for me than Ulysses.
In describing David's second crisis in his life author himself has explained that during the trauma brain is only registering the happening without perceiving and conceiving, that makes sense , and we can very well understand.

The description, as i have written in my first post is chaotic as if describing a nightmare which is out of control and has to be finished once began irrespective of whether we want it or not.

I first encountered this style in Joyce's A Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man: 1916 Classic Novel. During the football match where Stephan gets injured. Though the book is written in stream of consciousness style, that particular incident was psychological realism.

I was not acquainted with the term "psychological realism and am just checking into it today. Authors such as Henry James or Dostoevsky in Notes from the Underground get mentioned. It has been described as:
- "a type of realism that focuses on why a character does what they do. It was popularized by Henry James." and
- "a literary genre that came to prominence in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It’s a highly character-driven genre of fiction writing, as it focuses on the motivations and internal thoughts of characters. A writer of psychological realism seeks to not only show what the characters do but also explain why they take such actions."

It seems to be more of a storytelling method than a writing style in itself as this excerpt from Wikipedia seems to indicate:
"Psychological realism is achieved with deep explorations and explanations of the mental states of the character's inner person, usually through narrative modes such as stream of consciousness and flashbacks."

Based on what I've read, it seems psychological realism and stream of consciousness could go hand-in-hand, which explains you running into it with Joyce and why, when confronted with it in this book, you feared this book could turn into Ulysses, heaven help us.

I confess to not noticing any change in style during this book but then I never knew the term before and wouldn't have been alerted. With James and Dostoevsky as the examples, I think I get it and wonder why I wasn't aware of the term before. It pretty much explains James.

I admit to being shocked with Beth's death especially so soon, at the 1/4 mark. I anticipated many vignettes involving Beth's wise advice to David and popular interaction with the students.
While the tragedy does open other plot lines, I also admit to being disappointed with the development, For the first time, the book felt like it could become overly long.

I am enjoying the book so far, plot is good. I wish David would be able to adjust in new circumstances, above all I want to see his ambitious book completed before the story ends.
(I don't think we read books just for enjoyment, some books I have read with studious diligence because they are worth reading, we get something to think about and something which becomes part of our personality. Books affect the way we see the world and also the way world sees us.)

Nidhi wrote: "I am enjoying the book so far, plot is good. I wish David would be able to adjust in new circumstances, above all I want to see his ambitious book completed before the story ends.
(I don't think we..."

Yes! Then we can read The Royal Tigress after this!

(True!)