Day 29 - Saddest character death OR best/most satisfying character death (or both!)
I have already blogged about Vera Brittain's books Testament of Youth and Chronicle of Youth. Well, they get another guernsey here too, for the saddest death scene.
I have read both of these books repeatedly and was obsessed with Vera Brittain for many years. Many, many years. I'm feeling a bit better now but I will probably reread them again int he next year or so.
Roland Leighton dies on his last day at the front before coming home on leave. It's bad enough in
Testament of Youth, where the image of Vera waiting by the phone in a seaside hotel to hear news of his arrival, and the eventual phonecall, reduces me to floods of tears every time I read it. But it is even worse in Chronicle of Youth, which is the (presumably edited) diary she was keeping at the time, and is much rawer. In this we discover that she fully expected him to whisk her off and marry her hastily, and that a desk job had been fixed up for him.
EVERY SINGLE TIME I READ ONE OF THESE BOOKS I HOLD MY BREATH WAITING FOR HIM NOT TO DIE THIS TIME.
I am pathetic. Who cares!
1 comment:
I am like that with Moreta's Ride by Anne McCaffrey. I know what is coming but every time it is just too awful. I also have to watch some films to the end every time: The Long Kiss Goodnight, The Shawshank Redemption, You've Got Mail, ID4 etc, to make sure they finish properly and happily ever after!!
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