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just_in_books's review
challenging
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
clara7's review against another edition
tense
fast-paced
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
catastrophe's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
casspro's review
3.0
I have a love/hate relationship with Miss Julie. I love the writing style and the language. But I hate the "Bird in a Cage" metaphor for a trapped woman that has followed this originator of the concept (looking at you Trifles).
star_witch's review against another edition
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
2.0
it was on the syllabus, and i fail understand why
casparb's review
i’m sure we’ve seen the awful article floating about from the times doing the usual universities banning texts thing aren’t they all woked up. It’s a bad article don’t bother but the “head of investigations” at the Times was proud enough to discover two texts that have been BANNED from uk universities (& I ought to mention, this follows from the Times sending 300 yes three hundred foi requests to uk unis literature departments & they managed to find two texts which have been removed from reading lists in Essex & Sussex).
THIS PLAY is one of the two texts which has been BLACKLISTEDNEEMFWD from the university of sussex and my god I am jealous of the people at the uni of sussex because Julie here is a fascinating blend of both misogyny and classism it’s really something to see the copulation between an upper class woman and her servant described as bestiality. silly article alleges it has been removed due to the discussion of suicide which in all honesty I doubt it seems to me more likely that whoever was organising the module at Sussex said this is not a popular nor especially illustrative play let’s find a different one.
I do find it possible to salvage a feminist reading of this text if one can be bothered & the speech Julie delivers once her pet bird has been killed is pretty banging -
Don't you think I can stand the sight of blood? You think I am weak. Oh, I should like to see your blood flowing—to see your brain on the chopping block, all your sex swimming in a sea of blood. I believe I could drink out of your skull, bathe my feet in your breast and eat your heart cooked whole. You think I am weak; you believe that I love you because my life has mingled with yours; you think that I would carry your offspring under my heart
- though it’s a shame it ends with aspersions about one’s lowly family. The speech is also such an exception to Julie in the rest of the play who so loves being swayed - “JULIE. Oh, how I repent all this. If at least you loved me!”
anyway fun to have stage directions demanding “womanliness”
Look I’d put money on nobody from The Times having read this play it doesn’t speak truth to power it doesn’t bear some kind of overwhelming truth that would inconvenience the presumably woke literature faculty at the uni of sussex it’s mostly just a kind of not great play or at least one which has been done better elsewhere and it’s pretty unremarkable it’s been taken off the syllabus
THIS PLAY is one of the two texts which has been BLACKLISTEDNEEMFWD from the university of sussex and my god I am jealous of the people at the uni of sussex because Julie here is a fascinating blend of both misogyny and classism it’s really something to see the copulation between an upper class woman and her servant described as bestiality. silly article alleges it has been removed due to the discussion of suicide which in all honesty I doubt it seems to me more likely that whoever was organising the module at Sussex said this is not a popular nor especially illustrative play let’s find a different one.
I do find it possible to salvage a feminist reading of this text if one can be bothered & the speech Julie delivers once her pet bird has been killed is pretty banging -
Don't you think I can stand the sight of blood? You think I am weak. Oh, I should like to see your blood flowing—to see your brain on the chopping block, all your sex swimming in a sea of blood. I believe I could drink out of your skull, bathe my feet in your breast and eat your heart cooked whole. You think I am weak; you believe that I love you because my life has mingled with yours; you think that I would carry your offspring under my heart
- though it’s a shame it ends with aspersions about one’s lowly family. The speech is also such an exception to Julie in the rest of the play who so loves being swayed - “JULIE. Oh, how I repent all this. If at least you loved me!”
anyway fun to have stage directions demanding “womanliness”
Look I’d put money on nobody from The Times having read this play it doesn’t speak truth to power it doesn’t bear some kind of overwhelming truth that would inconvenience the presumably woke literature faculty at the uni of sussex it’s mostly just a kind of not great play or at least one which has been done better elsewhere and it’s pretty unremarkable it’s been taken off the syllabus