I just finished The Scarlet Pimpernel in my English lit class. I want to know what others thought of it: the plot, the characters, the title, whatever.
Have you read it? Tell me what you thought.
The Scarlet Pimpernel
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I liked it, but I didn't love it. It didn't stay with me afterwards for very long; unlike the film adaptation with Lesley Howard. It doesn't really matter but I went in with higher expectations, because I've had friends of mine adore the book and the play. I think part of it was that the other book I recently read about the Terror was so good, or at least spoke to me more.
The biggest problem was that the Scarlet Pimpernel himself was not that engaging, and his daring exploits were talked about rather than seen for most of the book. It did pick up near the end, though, and the last few chapters were quite good. If the whole book had been that engaging I would've liked it better.
There was one thing that I found very intriguing, though, and that was the fact that the story is more or less told from the vantage point of the heroine. It was refreshing to read a story with a human, fleshed-out, prominent woman character. I love old books that feature daring, interesting men, but the women in those stories are almost always bland and are either swoony or Evil. The woman in this story, while occasionally lovesick, is fully human. We get to see her thought processes, her weaknesses, and her ingenuity. It's really quite a treat. Other minor characters are treated similarly.
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