tailieunhanh - Vanity Fair by william makepeace thackeray

William Makepeace Thackeray (pronounced /ˈθækəri/; 18 July 1811 – 24 December 1863) was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society. Thackeray, an only child, was born in Calcutta, India, where his father, Richmond Thackeray (1 September 1781 – 13 September 1815), held the high rank of secretary to the board of revenue in the British East India Company. His mother, Anne Becher (1792–1864) was the second daughter of Harriet and John Harman Becher who was also a secretary (writer) for the East India Company | Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray Prepared and Published by Ebd BEFORE THE CURTAIN As the manager of the Performance sits before the curtain on the boards and looks into the Fair a feeling of profound melancholy comes over him in his survey of the bustling place. There is a great quantity of eating and drinking making love and jilting laughing and the contrary smoking cheating fighting dancing and fiddling there are bullies pushing about bucks ogling the women knaves picking pockets policemen on the look-out quacks OTHER quacks plague take them bawling in front of their booths and yokels looking up at the tinselled dancers and poor old rouged tumblers while the light-fingered folk are operating upon their pockets behind. Yes this is VANITY FAIR not a moral place certainly nor a merry one though very noisy. Look at the faces of the actors and buffoons when they come off from their business and Tom Fool washing the paint off his cheeks before he sits down to dinner with his wife and the little Jack Puddings behind the canvas. The curtain will be up presently and he will be turning over head and heels and crying How are you A man with a reflective turn of mind walking through an exhibition of this sort will not be oppressed I take it by his own or other people s hilarity. An episode of humour or kindness touches and amuses him here and there a pretty child looking at a gingerbread stall a pretty girl blushing whilst her lover talks to her and chooses her fairing poor Tom Fool yonder behind the waggon mumbling his bone with the honest family which lives by his tumbling but the general impression is one more melancholy than mirthful. When you come home you sit down in a sober contemplative not uncharitable frame of mind and apply yourself to your books or your business. I have no other moral than this to tag to the present story of Vanity Fair. Some people consider Fairs immoral altogether and eschew such with their servants and families .