I love watching award shows; the current WGA strike notwithstanding, the shows always bring to light some interesting illuminations - things I think about on a regular basis, though not necessarily in relationship to an awards ceremony. I see the glitz and the glamour, the beautiful dresses, the dapper men, the flawless skin, and the happy smiles.

But what I generally don’t see is the truth. I don’t doubt the joy at being included in such a ceremony, at being recognized for one’s work, but beyond that moment of joy lies the lives we, as outsiders, never much see. The tabloids do their best to rectify that, but even their efforts are based mostly on speculation and a terribly need of our society to drag those on top down. The truth hides in a place we will never see. Hidden beneath the smiles are the everyday lives, the bad hair days, the blemishes concealed, leaving behind a sense of flawless perfection. Now, I think about that each time I watch an actor accept his or her award(s).

Dicken’s Bleak House is much the same as the awards ceremonies. Bleak House is a world where things are hidden. It is “…a world wrapped up in too much jeweller’s cotton and fine wool, and cannot hear the rushing of the larger worlds, and cannot see them as they circle round the sun” (11).

In keeping with the hidden theme, fog plays a large role in Bleak House. “Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river where it rolls defiled among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city” (5). The entire second paragraph of the first chapter is entirely about fog, which implies very early on that all is not as it seems.

Fog, depending on how thick it is, can hide many things. The way it’s described in Bleak House suggests that it is a very thick fog, capable of hiding just about everything. Even from where the Lord High Chancellor sits “…he can see nothing but fog” (6). Considering he’s in charge of the High Court of Chancery, the implications are obvious: this is a man who doesn’t have a clue.

It also implies that the other characters of Bleak House are going to be the same, though some more than others. Mrs. Pardiggle is the perfect example. She states, in reference to her children, “They attend Matins with me (very prettily done), at half-past six o’clock in the morning all the year round, including of course the depth of winter, and they are with me during the revolving duties of the day” (94). “My boys have contributed to the African project” (94). She is essentially insinuating that her children are the epitome of perfection.

It is out of the mouth of her son, Egbert, that his mother’s true character, as well as his own, is seen when he states: “What does she make a sham for, and pretend to give me money, and take it away again? Why do you call it my allowance, and never let me spend it?” (97). I think it ironic that children speak the truth when it is adults who are the ones old enough to know better. But, then again, children haven’t necessarily been taught to hide. Egbert knows his mother is hiding what really goes on for the sake of propriety.

Esther Summerson is the one most kept in the dark. Not by her doing so much as by everyone else’s. Her godmother states: “Submission, self-denial, diligent work, are the preparations for a life begun with such a shadow on it” (19); a shadow that casts its darkness over most of her life. She is, however, one of the few characters to whom illumination comes. It is revealed that Lady Dedlock was Esther’s mother - that Esther was born an illegitimate child. Something that most certainly would have been required to be hidden in Victorian England.

Esther also learns of Mr. Woodcourt’s love for her. “I learned in a moment that he loved me. I learned in a moment that my scarred face was all unchanged to him. I learned in a moment that what I had thought was pity and compassions, was devoted, generous, faithful love. O, too late to know it now, too late, too late” (731).

By the end of Bleak House many things are revealed; the most important being Esther’s happiness. She’s married with a family and a loving husband. She has friends around her. She has discovered the most important of things hidden - that love can melt away even the densest of fogs.