from high atop the jackjack memorial reading thrown here in the Jill Schwartz

Memorial Library within the comfy,

of the wilds of Connecticut Kit.

This is obscure the podcast in which I read

Jude the obscure out loud and comment on it as I go. I am your host, your friend, your earlover, your literary

mansplainer in chief, Michael Ian Black. It is a joy to be with you. We've got just a tiny bit to go left in the book. Jude

the obscure to all of you who have accompanied me so far on this journey. I thank you and surely we are on

tender hooks, are we not? Jude has remarried Arabella. He is fading fast from this world, the light dimming in his eyes, his

passions only aroused when Arabella dares, dares, I say, to besmirch the good name of Sue Bridehead.

And when she does, he leaps up from his sickbed and throttles her. Well, look he doesn't throttle her, he pushes her back onto the

couch and says basically say it again, say her name again, say it again. Say it again. Say it again. Watch what happens. Say it again. Watch what happens. And she's like,

what are you going to do? Kill me. He's like, I will kill you here and now.

And then I will die and everything will be better. You'll be dead, I'll be dead. The world will be a better place.

Do you believe me? She's like, I don't believe you. He's like okay I wasn't going to

kill you but will you do me a favor will you bring her here just bring her here so that I can

essentially say my goodbyes and you know make peace with her and the world.

Just let me die in peace Arabella.

We don't even know why he's dying. I mean that's I mean or really if he's not he may just he might just have a cold but it seems like you know look we're at the end of the book. There's no point in Jude going on in living so let's just assume he's dying let's

assume he's got consumption or something of the sort again I don't know what

consumption is but I know that's what people die from.

That's one of the things people seem to die from all the time back then.

He caught consumption and he took to his bed and he never rose again.

...