The World of Letters

CANNIBALISTIC OKONKWO: A DECONSTRUCTIVE PERSPECTIVE OF CHINUA ACHEBE’S THINGS FALL APART

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 10 Jun 2014 00:53:00 -0700

Abstract

This essay is an attempt to a deconstructive interpretation of Okonkwo in Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart”. It begins by reviewing literary comments on Chinua Achebe and later dovetails an explication of the meaning of deconstruction as a way of enabling to grapple with the realities of this post structuralist critical formulation. This essay observes that Okonkwo is not only a brutal cannibal but also a barbarian. This refers to the backdrop of his penchant for killing as shown in the novel. This opinion is buttressed by Okonkwo’s ruthless habit of drinking from his first human head, which is a tilled smack of cannibalism. Based on the theory of deconstruction, it concludes that the scientific reading relies only on the text which functions as the real mirror of society which literature is all about.

Keywords: post-structuralism, deconstruction, criticism, signifier and signified

I. INTRODUCTION

Chinua Achebe’s popularity among literary critics, especially literary historians of the novel genre, draws elaborately from his aptitude to use the novel to popularize the African cultures and ways of life. He broached this feat through his realistic presentation of African life-style.

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SALIENT FEATURES OF ROMANTICISM IN GRAY’S "ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD"

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Mon, 2 Mar 2009 20:32:00 -0800

Abstract

Gray’s “Elegy written in Country Churchyard” is a product of Transition period. Therefore it is a blend of two literary trends; Classicism and Romanticism. This article deals with elements of nature, melancholy and sympathy for the poor which are the main characteristics or Romanticism.

I. INTRODUCTION
Gray is no doubt a classicist, but was sensitive to impending trends of Romanticism which soon came to eclipse classicism. Gray began to shift his attention from suffocated town to pristine country side with its green pasture, where cattle graze, rivers run, birds chirp, breezing winds blow that create peaceful atmosphere of rural area. The setting of country side opens our eyes to simple life of poor people. They live in poverty and this has crushing effect on their life. They are never able to get rid of the poverty. In fact humble, people of country side have innate gifts and latent ability but because they have no opportunity to develop their potentials, remains undeveloped.

II. DISCUSSION
2.1 Return to Nature

One of the most conspicuous features of Romanticism is nature. The sights and sounds described in the opening stanzas create a rural atmosphere and suggest the interest in many sides of nature.
“The curfew foils the knell of parting day
The lowing herd wind slowly o’er the lea
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me”
(Lines: 1-4)

In the very opening lines, the poet builds up an atmosphere of evening in rural area. The sheep are returning to the village over the pasture land. They are walking in winding course as is their habit and they walk, they produce their natural sound. The farmer is also walking heavily homewards, tired of the days labours. The dark is descending upon the world and the poet finds himself all alone. The above lines are meticulous observation of Gray towards nature.

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SEXUAL PERVERSION DEPICTED IN ELIOT’S “THE WASTE LAND”

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 18:12:00 -0800

Abstrak

Hubungan sex merupakan kegiatan sakral yang dilakukan dengan penuh kasih sayang oleh pasangan suami istri untuk melanjutkan keturunan. Namun pada “The Waste Land” karya T.S.Eliot, sex telah berubah fungsi. Sex digunakan sebagai alat pemuas birahi, obat menghilangkan stress dan bahkan diperdagangkan sebagai barang komersial untuk memperoleh keuntungan materi. Penyimpangan sex tersebut menyebabkan kemandulan peradaban modern. Eliot menyerukan pembersihan spiritual sebagai solusi masalah tersebut. Namun masyarakat modern tak terketuk hatinya karena terbius oleh kenikmatan duniawi semata.

Keywords: sexual perversion, moral values, guilty love, sex exploitation

INTRODUCTION

According to Eliot, sex is an important aspect of life. It is an expression of love and a means of procreation. But in modern society, sex has been perverted from its proper function and is utilized for animal pleasure and monetary benefits. Easy sexual relation could be found among all sections of the society.

Eliot cites the instances of guilty love in the first section of the poem with reference to Waqner’s opera Tristan and Isolde. Then he goes to another guilty love of the hyacinth girl.

In the section of Game of Chess we are introduced to sexual violation in high-class society where a lustful duke seduced a young married-woman. Sex also prevails among the lower class of society. Eliot mentions the story of Lil and the experience of three daughters of Thames. Another example is that of mechanical sex relation between the typist girl and her boy friend. A homosexual relation is exemplified by Mr. Eugenides. Eliot sums up the story of European lust through the words of St. Augustine.

To carthage then I came
Burning burning burning burning
(Lines 307-308: The Waste Land)

Eliot means that the whole of Europe is being destroyed by the fire of sexuality.

DISCUSSION

Guilty Love

Sex occupies a very prominent place in human life. At one time sex was considered as a means of human development. Unfortunately in modern time, sex has become an animal urge without any moral or social commitment.

Eliot gives two examples of guilty love or the pain of satisfied love. The poet refers to the story of Tristan who had a guilty passion for Isolde in Waqner’s opera Tristan and Isolde.

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SALIENT QUALITIES OF ROMANTICISM IN EDGAR ALLAN POE’S “THE RAVEN”

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 20:36:00 -0700

Abstract

The Raven, written by Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849), was published in ‘’The New York Paper’’ in 1845. It is entirely the dominant sentiment of Poe’s life, the longing and regret for a beautiful love whom he had known. The poem consists of 18 six-line stanza, the first five-lines of each being in trochaic octameter, and the sixth line trochaic tetrameter. The rhythm is varied frequently, caused by effects of double rhyme and alliteration. The rhyme scheme is abcbb, wherein the b rhymes are based on the constant refrain, Nevermore, which are merged in Poe’s favourite theme of grief occasioned by the death of a beautiful woman, and the sonorous sound of the ‘’o’’ and ‘’r’’ in the refrain itself. The poem contains salient qualities of Romanticism. The poet, steeped in melancholy memories of a lost love, is haunted by the death in the guise of a raven. With the learned imaginative literature, The Raven has taken rank over the whole world, especially in the American Continent.

Keywords: Romanticism, Nevermore, Restraint, Classicism, Rhymes, Alliteration, Simplicity, Directness, Nobility, Achievement, Communion with Nature, Imagination

I. INTRODUCTION

Romanticism is a style in fine arts and literature. It emphasizes passion rather than reason, and imagination and inspiration rather than logic. Romanticism favors full expression of the emotions, and free, spontaneous action rather than restraint and order.

(The World Book Encyclopedia, 1983. Vol. 16. p. 142)

Romanticism is the sweeping revolt against authority, tradition, and classical order that pervaded western civilization over a period that can be roughly dated from the later eighteenth century to the mid-nineteenth century. More generally, Romanticism is that attitude or state of mind that allies itself with the individual, the subjective, the irrational, the imagination, and the emotional and the most often takes for its subject matter history, rational striving and the sublime beauties of nature.

(The New Encyclopedia Britannica. Chicago:

Encyclopedia Inc. 1768. Vol. X. pp. 160-61)

The above illustrations on Romanticism transparently can be used as a guide to identify the qualities of Romanticism in Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven.

The essential elements of romantic spirit are curiosity and love of beauty; and it is as the accidental effect of these qualities only that it seeks the effect, of a strange beauty to be won by strong imagination out of things unlikely or remote.

Curiosity and the love of beauty, these are certainly the integral factors of romanticism, the one intellectual, and the other emotional. But romanticism is certainly not limited to such a simplification; it also includes a subtle sense of mystery, an exuberant, intellectual curiosity and in instinct for the elemental simplification of life.

Thus the characteristics of this period can be summed up as: The protest against the bondage of rules, the return to nature and the human heart, the interest in old sagas and medieval romances, the sympathy with the poor, the oppressed and the lowly, and the emphasis upon individual genius. Romanticism cannot be restricted into one certain corridor.

Though it is a little bit difficult to seek a satisfactory definition of Romanticism, it is still possible to point out a number of important elements which can be regarded as the Romantic Qualities. Here the term ‘’qualities’’ is used to name the romantic elements instead of ‘’aspects’’ or ‘’characteristics’’.

Semantically, in accordance with the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary of Current English, ‘’quality’’ means something that is special in, or that distinguishes a person or thing whereas ‘’aspect’’ means particular part and ‘’characteristic’’ means special mark or quality. Thus the words ‘’quality’’ and ‘’characteristic’’ have the same meaning but the word ‘’quality’’ gives a better accuracy in this study and has more sense to refer to Romanticism. There are some special points in Romantic literary works that distinguish them from other literary movement, especially those of classicism. This term is also used in the World Book Encyclopedia, volume 16, 1983.

Many writers have undertaken to point out and explain the qualities of Romanticism which tend to be contrasted with the classicism. The main marks of classicism are simplicity, directness, and nobility, and perfection in achievement. In a classic work of art there is no evidence of a lack harmony between the ideas and the medium. As a consequence, the personality of the artist is not expressed; the artist is lost in his work, which stands impersonal and objective. The artist’s own attitude, his emotional struggles and the play of his life are not shown towards the subject matter. The Romanticist, on the other hand, puts himself into his work; it is not a separated idea of beauty that he seeks to express, but his own personality, the longings, hopes and ideals of a spirit that has a tendency toward the Infinite, and which, therefore, can never express itself in any limited and objective medium. Classicism is thus always definite, objective and complete, while Romanticism is always touched with subjectivity, and thus with a suggestion of incompleteness, which is due to the fact that it seeks to convey the mystery of spirit for which no objective mode of expression is adequate, and which, therefore, can only be symbolized and vaguely suggested.

As Romanticism tries to express what is strange and mysterious in the life of spirit, it naturally seeks its material in the past and feels itself especially in sympathy with the Middle Ages. Thus a sympathy with the past, a new interest in humanity as such, marks Romanticism.

Romanticism gives expression to a deep and enduring vision of Nature as an immediate personal experience, the supernatural, night, death, ruins, graves, the macabre, the dreams and the subconscious. The Romantic hero is either an egocentric devoured by melancholy or boredom, in either case often a man of mystery. The emotion is preferred to the reason. Romanticism proclaims freedom from rules and conventions, emphasizing spontaneity and lyricism.

Just because Classicism seeks express the idea of beauty in definite and objective form, it is possible to lay down fixed procedure and so to render the result formal, precise and almost mechanical. Romanticism, however, aims to represent what is inner and subjective, and, therefore, necessarily protests against making art stiff and formal by the application of external rules and mechanical standards. Art, the Romanticism, declares, must spring from the untrammeled expression of the free spirit of the man of genius.

And some of the salient qualities of Romanticism that are going to be discussed in Edgar Allen Poe’s ‘’The Raven’’ are: Imagination, Relationship to Nature, and Interest in the lowly subject.

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Three Unities in "Volpone" by Ben Jonson

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 20:52:00 -0700

Abstract

This article is an attempt to observe Ben Jonson’s adherence to the Greek concept of Three Unities as a means to contribute to the realism of a play. It begins by introducing the three unities, i.e The Unity of Time, The Unity of Place, and The Unity of Action, and later fits together an explication of the meaning as well as the significance of the three unities as the actual practice of the Greek dramatists. This article observes that Ben Jonson obviously holds on the formula of the Three Unities in the play. It is seen in the play that the story takes place only in one place, that is in a city named Venice. The action confines to a single day, and has no digression. It goes directly to the climax of the plot.

Key Words: The Unity of Time, The Unity of Place, The Unity of Action, Poetics, Renaissance, drama, tragedy, plot

I. INTRODUCTION

Greek and Latin drama are strict in form. The stage represents as a single place throughout the action; the plot recounts the events of a single day; and there is very little irrelevant by-play as the action develops. The formula of the practice to which the Greek and Latin dramatists adhered in general is known as the Three Unities, i.e. the unity of time, place and action. Therefore, the Three Unities were conventions which ancient Greek playwrights were expected to adhere to. Every play was to adhere to these rules, according to their originator, Aristotle. In the name of Aristotle, the three unities were emphasized by the English, the Italian, and the French critics, and especially by the Italians and the French. The English critics of the Renaissance, especially Sir Philip Sidney, regarded the observance of the three unities as obligatory for dramatists. However, in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, some English critics, especially Dryden and Dr. Johnson, declared that the observance of the three unities was not essential, though Dryden thought that the unity of action was a necessary condition of a successful play.

Aristotle means three unities as a description of the norm, not that of an ideal. Three unities are supposed by critics to be useful in contributing to realism of play. Aristotle describes the drama of an earlier age in his important work On the Art of Poetry; those who follow his precepts call this disciplined structure the “Three Unities”, i.e. the unity of place, the unity of time, and the unity of action.

Dealing with the unity of action in some detail, under the general subject of "definition of tragedy", Aristotle wrote:

Now, according to our definition, Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is complete, and whole, and of a certain magnitude^[1] … As therefore, in the other imitative arts, the imitation is one when the object imitated is one, so the plot, being an imitation of an action, must imitate one action and that a whole, the structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed. For a thing whose presence or absence makes no visible difference, is not an organic part of the whole.^[2](^[^1] Aristotle's Poetics, XVII, ^[^2] Aristotle's Poetics, XVIII)

His only reference to the time in the fictive world is in a distinction between the epic and tragic forms:

Epic poetry agrees with Tragedy in so far as it is an imitation in verse of characters of a higher type. They differ, in that Epic poetry admits but one kind of metre, and is narrative in form. They differ, again, in their length: for Tragedy endeavours, as far as possible, to confine itself to a single revolution of the sun, or but slightly to exceed this limit; whereas the Epic action has no limits of time.^[3] (^[3] Aristotle's Poetics, V)

On place he is less explicit, merely saying that ‘tragedy should be confined to a narrow compass’.

Based on the consideration of the dramatic unities of action, time, and place above, it can be inferred that the classical unities or three unities are rules for drama derived from a passage in Aristotle's Poetics. In their neoclassical form they are as follows:

1. The unity of action: a play should have one main action that it follows, with no or few subplots.

2. The unity of place: a play should cover a single physical space and should not attempt to compress geography, nor should the stage represent more than one place.

3. The unity of time: the action in a play should take place over no more than 24 hours.

Ben Jonson, one of the great dramatists in Elizabethan period as well as the greatest English critic between Sidney and Dryden, had a strong masculine intellect, a sound deep basis of classical learning and an abundant fund of common sense. He obviously applied the formula of the Three Unities in most of his plays.

In this article, the writer analyses Ben Jonson’s adherence to the concept of Three Unities in his play entitled Volpone. In the play, the place in which the story takes place is only in one place, that is in a city called Venice. The action of the play is restricted to one day, and the action of the play also has no digression. The action goes directly to the climax of the plot.

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ARISTOTLE’S CONCEPT OF TRAGEDY AND TRAGIC HERO

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 20:51:00 -0700

Abstract

Things Fall Apart is an epic; it resembles stories about heroes in many cultures. In such stories, the heroes are extraordinary individuals, whose careers and destinies are not theirs alone, but are bound with the fortunes and destinies of their society. They become heroes by accomplishing great things for themselves and their communities, winning much fame as a result. In an epic story, the hero undergoes many tests, which we can see as rites of passage. This article presents how far this novel can fulfill Aristotle’s concept of tragedy as well as tragic hero through its tragic hero, Okonkwo. Okonkwo, the hero of the novel, fits this pattern. In Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo undergoes such tests, including the wrestling match with Amalinze the Cat, his struggle with the negative legacy of his father, and the struggle to succeed on his own.

Keywords: tragedy, tragic flaw, hamartia, pity and fear, tragic hero, poetics, protagonist, catharsis

I. INTRODUCTION

The word tragedy can be applied to a genre of literature. It can mean ‘any serious and dignified drama that describes a conflict between the hero (protagonist) and a superior force (destiny, chance, society, god) and reaches a sorrowful conclusion that arouses pity and fear in the audience.’ From this genre comes the concept of tragedy, a concept which is based on the possibility that a person may be destroyed precisely because of attempting to be good and is much better than most people, but not perfect. Tragedy implies a conflict between human goodness and reality. Many feel that if God rewards goodness either on earth or in heaven there can be no tragedy. If in the end each person gets what he or she deserves, tragedy is impossible.

In the century after Sophocles, the philosopher Aristotle analyzed tragedy. Aristoele defines “tragedy” as an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude; in language embellished with each kind of artistic ornament, the several kinds being found in separate parts of the play; in the form of action, not of narrative, through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation of these emotions.”

According to Aristotle, the central character of a tragedy must not be so virtuous as such a character, instead of arousing the feeling of pity and fear at his or her downfall, will only give shocked to the readers, or simply caused outraged. Aristotle also claims that a hero should not be so evil that for sake of justice we desire his or her misfortune. Instead, the ideal hero is someone “who is neither outstanding in virtue and righteousness; nor is it through badness or villainy of his own that he falls into misfortune, but rather through some flaw [hamartia].” The character also should be famous or prosperous.

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Deconstruction (2)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 01:03:00 -0700

For the deconstructionist, all literary texts deconstruct themselves via binary oppositions that destroy each other.

Deconstruction can be described as a theory of reading which aims at undermining the logic of opposition within the text.

In the deconstructive reading, binary opposition must be identified.

The deconstructionist always locates the point of contradiction imposed by its own realistic form within the text.

For deconstructive criticism, nothing happens outside the text.

Deconstruction is aimed at what goes on inside the text.

Post-structuralism is of the view that text serves as the critical mirror for society.

Otherwise, if we accept the system of reading whereby the reader’s knowledge of the author’s socio-political and cultural background informs our reading, then literature rather than being a mirror becomes a shadow.

Deconstruction (1)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 00:57:00 -0700

Deconstruction is a term in contemporary philosophy, literary criticism, and the social science, denoting a process by which the texts and languages of Western Philosophy (in particular) appear to shift and complicate in meaning when read in light of the assumptions and absences they reveal within themselves. Jacques Derrida coined the term in the 1960s, and proved more forthcoming with negative, rather than pined-for positive, analyses of the school.

Subjects relevant to deconstruction include the philosophy of meaning in Western thought, and the ways that meaning is constructed by Western writers, texts, and readers and understood by readers. Though Derrida himself denied deconstruction was a method or school of philosophy, or indeed anything outside of reading the text itself, the term has been used by others to describe Derrida's particular methods of textual criticism, which involved discovering, recognizing, and understanding the underlying—and unspoken and implicit—assumptions, ideas, and frameworks that form the basis for thought and belief, for example, in complicating the ordinary division made between nature and culture. Derrida's deconstruction was drawn mainly from the work of Heidegger and his notion of destruktion but also from Levinas and his ideas upon the other.

The Study of English Novel

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Thu, 22 May 2008 18:58:00 -0700

Rise of the English Novel

King Alfred who ruled West-Saxon (Wessex) from 871 up to 901 was the founder of the English prose or the person who laid the cornerstone of the English prose. At the end of 8^th century, King Alfred tried to save the English culture in Northumbria due to the attack of Scandinavians. He asked his scholars to translate the important works. Some of the important works translated in his age are:

1. Pastoral Care by Pope Gregorius

2. Ecclesiastical History of the English People by Bede (The original was in Latin)

3. Universal History and Geography by Orosius

4. Consolation of Philosophy by Boethius

He also instructed his scholars to write and collect the important events and notes in his kingdom, and later known as Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.

The next important person to note is that John Wyclif (± 1324-1384). He was a scholar as well as a priest. He was well-known as the translator of Bible. His famous translation was Voyage and Travail of Sir John Maundeville or known as Mandelville’s Travell (the original language was French).

Novel’s Origin in Medieval Stories

Medieval romances and collections of ballads, especially those concerned with The Legends of King Arthur (Morte d’Arthur: 1470) by Sir Thomas Malory, were the germinal sources of the modern novel. They were fiction of a picturesque and lively kind, though rambling stories. They were peopled by stock characters such as the wicked wizard and the damsel in distress. But they catered to the human longing for fiction and imaginative stimulation.

Development in the Elizabethan Age (1550-1600)

The Elizabethan Age saw the rise of the prose romance. Euphues, the Anatomy of Wit by John Lily (1554-1606) and Arcadia by Philip Sidney are the good examples. Their prose styles, however, are too fantastic. Characters are rudimentary and there is little attempt at an integrated plot. There is too much of moralizing.

Picaresque Novel in the Seventeenth Century

A new type of embryo novel of Spanish origin, namely Picaresque Novel, made its appearance at the end of the sixteenth century. It remained popular till the days of Fielding and Smollet. The name derives from Spanish word, ‘Picaro’, which means a wandering rouge. Its hero is a rascal, who leads a wandering life full of rather scandalous adventures. Cervantes’ Don Quixote is the best-known of picaresque tales in Spanish. Le Sage’s Gill Blas is a French example of this mode of writing.

The picaresque novel in England began early with The Unfortunate Traveller or The Life of Jack Wilton (1594) by Thomas Nash (1567-1601). The English Rogue (1665) by Richard Head is another of the type.

End of the Seventeenth Century and Beginning of the Eighteenth Century Novel is Assuming Shape

The novel dimly took shape by the end of the seventeenth century. Aphra Behn’s Orinooko or The Royal Slave shows power of description, and some claim to plot, characterization and dialogue. It is an experiment in the infancy of the novel. Bunyam’s The Pilgrim Progress (1668), though intended to be an allegory shows a smoothly working plot, a variety of characters, impressive descriptive passages, and simple, dramatic dialogue.

Daniel Defoe (± 1661-1731) represents the culmination of the seventeenth century tendencies in English fiction. He emerged as a novelist with the publication of Robinson Crusoe. Some of his other novels are The Memoirs of a Cavalier, Captain Singleton, Moll Flandors, Colonel Jacob, and Roxana.

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) is also well-known with his work Gulliver’s Travels. He is a well-known English satirist.

Novelist of the Eighteenth Century: “Four Wheels of the Wain”

In the early eighteenth century, the two prominent essayists Steele and Addison reflected some traits of the novel in their essays which were published in The Spectator and The Coverley Papers. There is little plot in their essays but the character sketches are very entertaining and reveal the spice of delicate humour.

Professor Saintsbury designates Tobias George Smollet (1721-1771), Laurence Sterne (1715-1768), Samuel Richardson (1689-1761) and Henry Fielding (1707-1754), as the “Four Wheels of the Wain” of the English Novel in the eighteenth century.

(i) Richardson, as the creator of the Novel of Sentiment, drew his strength and inspiration from national and middle class material. His first novel, Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded (1740) came into existence out of a purely commercial undertaking. It was a poplar success because its matter, manner, and morality were new. His other novels were Clarissa or The History of a Young Lady and History of Sir Charless Grandison.

(ii) Henry Fielding goes with Samuel Richardson. Though both were reformers of ‘a depraved age’, their literary methods were different. Fielding was a satirist, whereas RichardsonThe History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews and His Friend Mr. Abraham Adams (1742). His other novels were Jonathan Wild the Great (1743), The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling (1749), Amelia (1751). As a novelist, Fielding marked the rise of a new school was a preacher. Fielding’s first novel was of fiction. He created the Novel of Realism.

(iii) Smollett’s novels—Roderick Random (1748), Peregrine Pickle (1751), Ferdinand Count Fathom (1753), Sir Launcelot Greaves (1762), Humphrey Clinker (1771)—contain his observations and experiences as surgeon, sailor and hack-writer.

(iv) In Sterne’s novels—Tristram Shandy (1760-1767), Sentimental Journey (1762)—were the sentimental novel which reached the extreme limits of its principle.

Sir Walter Scott called Fielding “the father of English Novel”. He said that Fielding had “high notions of the dignity of art which he may be considered as having founded.

Some have attributed this title to Richardson. Some critics go to the extent of saying that if Fielding was the father of English Novel, Richardson was its grand father. W.J. Dawson offers this honour to Daniel Defoe, the author of Robinson Crusoe. There are some writers who even confer this greatness on John Lyly, the author of Uephues or Sidney, the author of Arcadia, or Bunyan, the author of Pilgrim’s Progress and Life and Death of Mr. Badman.

What is Novel?

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Wed, 21 May 2008 01:40:00 -0700

What’s Novel?

Novel may be roughly defined as a long story in prose, meant primarily for entertainment, and presenting a realistic picture of life.

Baker defines the novel as a literary form whose “medium is prose, not verse; as to content, it is a portrayal of life, in the shape of a story, wholly or in the main fictitious”. W.E. Williams defines it as “a long narrative in prose detailing the actions of fictitious people”. The term is now applied to a large number of writings that have in common only the attribute of being works of fiction written in prose.

Difference between a Novel and a Short Story

Its extended narrative, distinguishes it from the short story and from the work of middle length called the “novelette”. It also permits:

a. Greater variety of characters.

b. Greater complication of plot or plots.

c. Greater development of milieu (setting).

d. Greater analysis of the motives of characters than the shorter modes.

Novella (Italian) is “a story,” “a little new thing.” It is a brief prose tale. (Though the English word, novel designates an extended narrative, it derives from this term). Occasionally, the term novella is used as a synonym for the short novel.

Short Novel is a prose narrative briefer than the novel but longer than the short story. It is also called the “novelette” and occasionally “the novella”.

Short Story is a prose narrative briefer than the short novel, more restricted in characters and situations, and usually concerned with a single effect. The short story does not develop character fully; generally, a single aspect of personality undergoes changes or is revealed as the result of conflict. Within this restricted form, there is frequently concentration on a single character involved in a single episode.

Prose is a literary expression not marked by rhyme or by metrical regularity. Prose is the type of language used in novels, short stories, articles, etc.

Essay is a short composition which is usually in prose and which discusses either formally or informally, one or more topics. The word “essay” means “an attempt” or “effort”. The Oxford Dictionary defines it as “a composition of moderate length on any particular subject, originally implying want of finish, but said of a composition more elaborate in style, though limited in range”. Francis Bacon (1561-1626) is generally regarded as the father of the English essay, for he was the first to use the word “essay” in England, and his volume of Essays published in 1597.

The Chief characteristics of the literary essay are:

1. It is a prose composition, brief or of moderate length.

2. The essay is incomplete. The essayist does not say all that is to be said on the subject. He writes only on those aspects of the subjects which he considers most significant, and leaves out the rest.

3. It is personal in nature. It is more or less a personal affair. Thus, the essay expresses the personal likes and dislikes, prejudices and predilections, of the essayist.

4. It is informal and unsystematic. There is no formal or logical development of thought in an essay. The various points or arguments are not systematically arranged.

5. A good essay should be attractive and charming so that it may be easily retained in the mind. It should have a touch of humour.

Novel is Different from History and the Essay.

As fiction, the novel is distinguished from history, which undertakes to be a narrative of facts, and from the essay, which often presents characters and incidents, but only as brief illustration of a concept or point of view.

The Four Essential Attributes of a Novel

The four essential attributes of a novel are: Theme, Plot, Characterization, and Style. These are not separable parts. They are interrelated and a novel is their sum.

a. Theme sums up the novel’s abstract meaning. The theme of a novel defines its purpose. It is used to indicate the subject of a work, and more frequently employed to designate its central idea or thesis.

b. Plot is the organization of incidents. It is a purposeful progression of rationally interlinked events which end in the resolution of a climax. This means that a novelist must create a logical structure of events, in which nothing is irrelevant. In a good novel, its theme and its plot must be integrated. According to Aristotle, in the Poetics, plot is of two kinds, i.e unified plot (organic plot) and episodic plot (loose plot). A unified plot has a beginning (that which is not necessarily caused by something else but which produces other events), a middle (which derives from what has gone before and which something else must follow), and an end (something that depends on what has happened but which needs be followed by nothing else). An episodic plot is a plot which consists of a series of disconnected incidents, even though it may center on one figure.

c. Characterization is the portrayal of those essential traits which form the unique distinctive personality of an individual human being.

d. Style necessitates choice of words and choice of content.

The Chief Elements of a Novel are:

1. It deals with events and actions which constitute its plot.

2. It has characters i.e. men and women which carry on its action and to whom things happen.

3. The conversation of these characters constitutes the element of dialogue.

4. It has a scene and time of action i.e. the place and time where different things happen to different characters. It may be some limited region or its action may range over large number of places, cities, even countries.

5. Its treatment of life and its problems are realistic. Thus, it is realism which distinguishes it from the earlier prose romances. The novel does not provide escape from life and its problems, but rather a better understanding of them. It also reflects the very spirit of the age in which it is written.

6. It exhibits the author’s views of life and of some of the problems of life. It thus gives the author’s criticism of life or his philosophy of life.

Kinds of Novel

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Wed, 21 May 2008 01:33:00 -0700

Kinds of Novel:

1. The Picaresque Novel

It is the tale of the adventures or misadventures of a picaro (the Spanish word) or rogue who wanders from one country to another, from one setting to another, from the town to the country, from one inn to another, and in this way the novelist gets an opportunity of introducing a variety of characters and incidents, of painting society as whole realistically.

The Novelists of the Picaresque Novel are:

1. Mark Twain: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1816)

2. Thomas Nash (the first writer of this type of novel): The Unfortunate Traveler or The Life of Jack Wilton (1594)

3. Richard Head: The English Rogue (1665)

4. Daniel Defoe (1659-1731): Moll Flanders (1722), Robinson Crusoe (1733)

5. Henry Fielding: Tom Jones, Joseph Andrews

6. Charles Dickens: Great Expectations, Pickwick Papers, David Copperfield, Oliver Twist

2. The Panoramic Novel

Henry Fielding, the father of English Novel, is the creator of the panoramic or the epical novel. In this kind of novel the novelist ranges over a wide ground and provides a comprehensive picture of the live of the times. The picture which he presents of contemporary life, society, dress, habits, and manners, is epical in its range, sweep and variety.

The Novelists of the Panoramic Novel are:

1. Henry Fielding: Tom Jones

2. Thackeray: Vanity Fair

3. The Historical Novel

It seems to be a contradiction in terms. The word novel designates a work of fiction; and facts are the underlying basis of history. The historical novelist takes certain events and characters from history and weaves around them a fictitious enchantment. In making use of the facts, the novelist does not follow the method of historian but of the artist. He takes into account what may be described as the spirit and atmosphere of history. He reconstructs imaginatively the life of the past. Thus The Historical Novel is a mixture of fact and fiction, an imaginative treatment of history, and such an imaginative treatment which would necessarily select, order, and arrange its material is not congenial to the rational and scientific temper of the age.

The Novelists of the Historical Novel are:

1. Sir Walter Scott (the creator of the Historical novel): Ivanhoe, Quentin Durward

2. Bulwer Lytton (1803-1873): Rienzi, The Last Days of Pompeii

3. Thackeray: Henry Esmond

4. William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882): Road Wood, Jack Shephard, The Tower of London, Old St. Paul’s, The Lancashire Witches

5. Charles Reade (1814-1884): The Cloister and the Heart (1861)

6. Charles Kingsley (1819-1875): Westward Ho (1855)

4. The Novel of Social Reform

The novel of social reform is associated with the name of Charles Dickens. He was the first English novelist who consciously used the novel-form to focus public attention on the many social evils prevalent in his age. In this way, he tried to cure some of these evils which caused great suffering to the poor. In this way, he rendered great service to society, and contributed much to the well-being of the underdog of society. Thus he made the novel an instrument of social reform.

His famous work in this novel-form is David Copperfield.

5. The Regional Novel

The Regional novel is the novel which depicts the physical feature, life, customs, manners, history, etc. of some particular region of locality.

Some important novelists of the Regional novel are:

1. Thomas Hardy (Wessex): Tess of the d’Urbervilles, The Mayor of Casterbridge

2. The Brontes: Charlotte, Emily, and Anne (The Yorkshire)

3. Maria Edgeworth (Irish) (1767-1849): Castle Rackrent, The Absentee

4. Susan Ferrier (Scottish) (1782-1854): Marriage (1812), The Inheritance (1824), Destiny (1831)

5. George Eliot (the Midland Counties of Warwickshire): Adam Bede, Mill on the Floss, and Silas Marner.

6. Arnold Bennett (1867-1931): The Old Wive’s Tale, Clayhanger, Imperial Palace

6. The Psychological Novel

The psychological novelist analyses the motives, impulses and mental processes which move his characters to act in particular way. He depicts the inner struggles of his characters and thus lays bare their souls before his readers. Thus in a psychological novel there is much soul-dissection, as in the dramatic monologues of Browning, and the novel acquires a broad intellectual tone.

Some great novelists in this type of novel are: Samuel Richardson, George Eliot, and George Meredith.

7. The Stream of Consciousness Novel

The stream of consciousness novel carries the analysis of motives and mental processes a step further. It depicts the flux of emotions and sensations passing through the consciousness of a character, without any organization or ordering on the part of the novelist. The novelist places us within the mind of his characters and shows what is happening in his soul at the sub-conscious or even the unconscious levels. The action moves backwards and forwards in harmony with the though-process, and the complete soul of the characters is laid bare.

Some great novelists in this type of novel are: Henry James, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Richardson, etc.

Oedipal Love in D.H. Lawrence's "The Rainbow"

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 13 May 2008 21:51:00 -0700

In The Rainbow, D. H. Lawrence discusses Oedipal love in three relationships. In the first generation, Tom Brangwen has a mother-fixation which results in his sexual insufficiency. He is so much haunted by the mother image that he is not able to push his relationships with his girls to their desired development. Next we find it in the Tom-Anna relationship. During Lydia’s pregnancy and later during her preoccupation with the newborn child, Tom diverts his love towards his step daughter Anna. The relationship is charged with great intensity, but only momentarily. After Tom’s satisfactory adjustment with his wife, the undesirable intensity of this relationship automatically fades away. It is in the case of Will-Ursula relationship that we find a detailed discussion of the Oedipus complex. Frustrated in his marriage, Will looks to the child Ursula for his emotional fulfillment. Since it is a very strained and perverse kind of love, it sustains him all right, but it has a ‘deadening’ effect on Ursula’s sensibility. She becomes too moody and sensitive.

(For complete essay, plz email me)

The Rainbow by D. H. Lawrence as a Social Document

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:52:00 -0700

One of the important themes of the novel is the dissolution of a rural community spread over three generations. When the story of the novel begins about 1840, we meet Tom Brangwen as a representative of the rural community of England with its life rooted in the soil. But some changes that have already taken place are suggested through the construction of the canal, the coming of the railways and the roar of the engines that can be heard from time to time. The second generation lives in a different environment. Will works as a draughtsman in a lace factory. His interests are other than agriculture—church architecture, wood-carving, clay-modeling. When he shifts to the mining town of Beldover, the agricultural community is totally left behind. By the time Ursula grows up and joins college, the environment and its values have changed all the more. Industrialization has given a fatal jolt to the rural way of life. Life in general, its values and its institutions have been commercialized. The mining town of Wiggiston where Ursula’s uncle Tom becomes the manager of a colliery is described as ‘an inferno of the modern mechanistic spirit’. The Nottingham College is a temple converted to the most vulgar, petty commerce. Attitude to sex has also changed. Ursula, the modern emancipated woman adopts the teaching profession and makes no scruples of indulging in pre-marital sex. All these changes have been depicted so convincingly that F. R. Leavis regards The Rainbow as an important social document.

HERO, BYRONIC HERO, AND PROTAGONIST

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Thu, 3 Apr 2008 23:53:00 -0700

Hero or Heroine is the principal male or female character in a work of literature. The term carries no connotation of virtue or honor. Hero or Heroine is, traditionally, a character who has such admirable traits as: courage, idealism, and fortitude. The hero embodies the cultural values of his time and functions as the defender of his society. The earliest heroes, as revealed in myth and literature, were frequently favoured by gods or were themselves semi-divine; such were Achilles and Odysseus.

Byronic Hero is a type of hero modeled after Byron’s central figures in his works: Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1812-1818), Manfred (1817), and Cain (1821). The Byronic Hero is a rebel, proudly defiant in his attitude toward conventional social codes or religious beliefs, or an exile or outcast hungering for an ultimate truth to give meaning to his life in a seemingly meaningless universe. In the Renaissance, for example, Marlow’s tragic hero Dr. Faustus challenges existing religious doctrine by bartering his soul for divine knowledge.

Protagonist is, in Greek drama, the first actor, who played the leading part. However, the term now refers to the most important character in a play or story.

Antagonist is the major character in opposition to the hero or protagonist of a narrative or play.

Deuteragonist is the second actor in Greek drama, often synonymous with Antagonist. The term now has been applied to the character of second importance such as Claudius in Hamlet.

Tritagonist is, in Greek Drama, the third actor. Generally the third actors assumed various roles in the play by changing masks and costumes.

The Concept of Death and Afterlife in W.B.Yeat's "Byzantium" and "Sailing to Byzantium"

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 05:56:00 -0700

I. INTRODUCTION

Every soul shall have a taste of death. That brings us to a question of what death really is. Generally speaking, the basic concept of the process so called death is build up on the facts that this process starts when the heart stop its work to pump the blood which leads to the brain damage and the failure of the whole systems of human body. When all the system or the functions of human organs are out of work, the body itself becomes lifeless or dead.
Furthermore, according to the religious points of view, being dead, as we mention above does not mean that the journey of human soul has come to an end. On the contrary once the soul left the body, it will transform into another living form and will live until the judgment day arrives.

“When all sequence comes to an end, time comes to an end, and the soul puts on the rhythmic or spiritual or luminous body and contemplates all the events of its memory and every possible impulse in an eternal possession of itself in one single moment. That condition is alone animate, all the rest is phantasy, and from thence came all the passions, and some have held, the very heat of the body”.
(Norman, A. Jaffares. 1984, p.333)

Apart from religious definition of death above, in fact Yeats is neither orthodoxy religious nor orthodoxy scientific. He has his own science, which is an occult one, and his own religion or sophisticated lower mythology and in prose he sometimes reconciles them at the level of mystic. His tolerance in religions resulted in inconsistent and ambiguous attitude as reflected in his Byzantium and Sailing to Byzantium.

II. RELIGIOUS DOCTRINES INVOLVED
2.1 Christian Doctrine
On the matter of death, according to Christian doctrine of man, God created human souls to be immortal, but placed them in physical bodies with which they become essentially connected. At death, the soul left the body and was immediately judged. For the majority of mankind this judgment resulted in the soul’s consignment to purgatory, to expiate its sins. At the second coming of Christ, the decomposed bodies of the dead would be reconstituted and their soul would reenter them for the final judgment. The Christian doctrine of man involved the doctrine of original sin. It was taught that Adam had implicated all his descendants in his original act of disobedience to his creator. Consequently, all subsequent generation deserved of God’s wrath from the moment of birth, quite apart from the guilt the later acquired by their own actual sins. Being thus a fallen race, mankind was predisposed to evil. This meant, according to Christian theologians, that man wasn’t only unable to save himself from the state of perdition into which he was born; but he could not even desire to repent without God’s grace. This means that God provided salvation for mankind is expounded in the doctrine of the Atonement, and constitutes an essential part of the foundational teaching of Christianity. Through the atonement, those who repented of their sins and accepted Christ as their savior could hope that, after enduring the cleansing fire of purgatory, they would be reunited with their bodies, and justified at the last judgment, would pass on to the eternal bliss.

A sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall.
Come from the holy fire, perme in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of.
My soul
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is, and got her me into the artifice of eternity.
(Sailing to Byzantium. The fourth stanza)

And W. B. Yeats seems to emphasize that it is only human body which dies but the spiritual body that is the very soul will be last forever. In his poem Sailing to Byzantium in which Yeats imagines his soul after his body’s death, as golden bird in the Emperor’s palace, singing of all times-past, present and future (forever)

..................................................................
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths
Make
of hammered gold and gold enameling
To keep a drowsy Emperor a wake;
or set upon a golden bought to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
of what is past, or passing, of
to come
(Sailing to Byzantium. The fourth Stanza)

2.2 Buddhism and Hinduism
On the other hand, Yeats’ reluctance to accept the orthodox Christianity is also reflected in his belief in Samsara, the cycle of life which belongs to the Hinduism doctrine. And this belief was reflected in Yeats’ poem Sailing to Byzantium.

That is no country for old men. The young
in one another’s arms, birds in the trees,
-Those dying generations-at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
whatever is begotten, born, and dies
Caught in that sensual music all neglect.
Monuments of unaging intellect.
(Sailing to Byzantium, the first stanza)

In this stanza, Yeats described that in that country the dying generations of birds and young lovers celebrate things which are a slave to the natural cycle of birth and death. The young lovers who are in each other’s arms, the birds who are in the trees and the salman falls and the mackerel-crowded seas, fish, flesh and fowl all sing only one song—the song of the senses. All these at the same time, are creatures who are very much subject to death.

In fact, Yeats’ belief in the after life was much influenced by the Hinduism or Buddhism. Hinduism is doctrinally tolerant and includes many different, even contradictory beliefs, but in spite of the immense regional and sectarian variations of religious, beliefs and practices, there are certain essential characteristics that are typical of the Hindu view of life. One of the most distinctive features is the belief in Samsara, the revolution of birth, death, and rebirth, understood as a cycle of transmigration from one living form into another. This belief is not found in the Vedas but it is first mentioned in the Brihadaranyaka Upanisad where it is said that after death a human being may be reborn in transmigration which is closely related to a cyclical view of life and of the universe.

A straddle on the dolphin’s mire and blood,
Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood,
The golden smithies of the emperor!
Marbles of the dancing floor
Break bitter furies of complexity,
Those images than yet
Fresh images be get,
That dolphin—torn, that gong—tormented Sea
(Byzantium, the last stanza)

It is also connected with the belief in Karma, which denotes both an action and its good or bad effect. The karma is accumulated through the acts done in a previous life in a determining factor towards the condition of the present life, which in turn affects the rebirth in the next life. Such an overall balance in Karma can help explain injustices and suffering—as well as good fortune—in a person’s life. The law of Karma governs the universe and all beings within it. It acts in personally and binds each individual soul (atman) to the work and in addition to the cycle of transmigration.

Before me floats an image man of shade
Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades’ bobbin bound in mummy cloth
May unwind the winding path;
A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
Breathless months may summon;
I hail the superhuman;
I call it death-in-life and life-in-death
(Byzantium, the second stanza)

All world existence is subject to the cycle of Samsara, which is thought of as having neither beginning nor end.
In other word, The Indian view of man is certainly a sophisticated estimate. It maintains that the individual self, or atman, is really identical with Brahman, the source or principal of existence. But owing to a vidya, or ignorance, the atman believes itself to be an individual self-conscious person. In turn it takes the phenomenal world for reality, and involves itself in it. Consequently, it becomes subject to the process of time, which is manifested in unceasing cycles of creation and destruction, for the Atman or self this means Samsara, or rebirth, which is likewise a ceaseless process of dying and being reborn, with all the attendant suffering. Together with Samsara operates the law of Karma, which causes the Atman to work out in each incarnation the consequences of its actions in past incarnate lives. This process conditions the form of each of the several periods of rebirth. Thus, according to the Indian doctrine, at any given moment every living being is in the state of fortune, be it good or ill, which his past Karma has entitled. However, this situation is not hopeless and Hinduism, in its various forms, offers a way of deliverance.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths
Make
Of hammered gold and gold enameling
To keep a drowsy Emperor a wake;
or set upon a golden bought to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
of what is past, or passing, or to come
(Sailing to Byzantium, the last stanza)

Basically this involves the effective apprehension of its own true nature by the man. Such apprehension implies the recognition, as the chandagya Upanisad tersely puts it, that The self of mine within the heart, this is Brahman. But the recognition is not just a mental act, it if is to be effective, it involves an effort to abstract the self from fatal attachment to existence in this world, which it has taken for reality. Such abstraction is difficult and can be achieved only by a hard discipline. When moksa salvation is finally achieved, individual existence in this world ceases, and the atman absorbed into Brahman as a drop of rain merges into the sea.
Actually reincarnation may not be universal. The intensity of a man’s faith may ultimately determine what happens to his soul in the next world.
Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades’ bobbin bound in mummy cloth
May unwind the winding path;
(Byzantium, the second stanza)

III. A MIX OF HINDUISM AND CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE
To the Christian the cycle of birth-death-rebirth, is broken by Christ’s atoning sacrifice. Faith in its redemptive power not only dissolves the bonds of Satan but also releases the soul from the wheel of eternal return.
W. B. Yeats in his poem Sailing to Byzantium and Byzantium, however, described his belief in reincarnation or the cycle of birth and at the same time he also reflected his belief in the purification of soul in purgatory. Thus, the writer tends to regard Yeats’ attitude towards the concept of the after life is in between the Hinduism’s doctrine and the Christians’.

At midnight on the emperor’s pavement flit.
Flames that no faggot feeds, or steel has lit,
Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame,
Where blood, begotten spirits come
And all complexities of fury leave,
Dying into a dances in hand,
An agony of trance
An agony of home that cannot singe a sleeve.
(Byzantium, the fourth stanza)

A sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall.
Come from the holy fire, perme in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of.
My soul
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is, and got her me
Into the artifice of eternity.
(Sailing to Byzantium, the third stanza)

The two stanzas describe Yeats’ symbolic opinion of the need of suffering and purification. Life is full of complexities of misery or blood. But the process of purification is an agony of trance. This idea of his is in agreement with the Christian’s doctrine.
On the other hand, Yeats clearly expresses his idea of reincarnation or the cycle of birth in the last stanza of the poem Byzantium.

A straddle on the dolphin’s mire and blood,
Spirit after spirit! The smithies break the flood,
The golden smithies of the emperor!

W.B.Yeats presents the scene of Purgatory in his poem Byzantium as a place where the souls are purified by an unearthly and endless fire. And spirits from the physical world and by dreaming their former experiences expatiate for their sins. This internal fire of remorse and repentance purifies these spirits. After purgation, the souls become pure again and would be reunited with the flesh and blood and be rebirth again. And this is what he believes as the continuing cycle or reincarnation of human life.

Unlike the Christian belief that after the purgation the souls will reunited with their bodies, and justified at the last judgment, would pass on to the eternal bliss.

Nor storm disturbs, flames begotten of flame,
Where blood, begotten spirits come
And all complexities of fury leave,
Dying into a dances in hand,
An agony of trance
And agony of home that cannot singe a sleeve.
(Byzantium, the fourth stanza)

Those images than yet
Fresh images be get,
That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented sea
(Byzantium, the fourth stanza)

Thus, as a Christian, Yeats attitude towards death is a very ambiguous one. It seems that he wants to compare between his belief and Buddhism/Hinduism, in contracting moods, two-apparently quite contradictory kinds of assurance: one, that we are in fact bound, as the Buddhists tell us the great wheel of existence shall reappear upon this stage in various roles again and again:

Before me floats an image man or shade
Shade more than man, more image than a shade;
For Hades’ bobbin bound in mummy cloth
May unwind the winding path;
A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
Breathless months may summon;
I hail the superhuman;
I call it death-in-life and life-in-death
(Byzantium, the second stanza)

.....................................................
Those images than yet
Fresh images be get,
That dolphin-torn, that gong-tormented Sea
(Byzantium, the last stanza)

The other that, as the Buddhists/Hindus also tell us, we can escape ultimately from the great wheel – not to nonbeing, a concept that never attracted Yeats, but to some kind of timeless perfection. He was not sure that he really wants to escape from the wheel. Thus, in the face of his Symbolic phantasmagoria, he retains the freedom of inconsistency. His images of a Byzantine heaven in which he would be transformed into a golden bird (the artist becoming an eternal work of art) symbolize his desire to escape from the disorder, the irony, the failure of life; but so also other symbols—as when he says he would like to live again, even in a foul ditch, as a blind man battering blind man—stand for a craving for life at any level, the lust and rage of which he speaks in his last poems, that grew stronger in him as he grew older. Often he hates life for not being perfection. Sometimes, also, he rears perfection for not being life.

IV. CONCLUSION
William B. Yeats is one of the English poets who is so interested in oriental mystical religion, especially those which are concerned with the concept of the afterlife in the form of Reincarnation. Yeats believes that after death human soul will go through relieving its earthly life and will be purified in purgatory. All the evil deeds in human soul will be cleansing so that the soul becomes good and pure again and after that the soul will be united with the body again and he rebirth to lead on earthly life. All the evil deeds and good deeds done in the previous life will done in the previous life will determine the condition of the present life, be it good or bad.
The above concept of Yeats no doubt is idealized by him from mixing up the two doctrines: Christian and Hinduism. In fact there is no incarnation in Christian doctrine of man. When a man dies he will go for spiritual journey to heaven (of course after cleansing in purgatory) as suggested by the title Sailing to Byzantium. But W. B. Yeats is so impressed and influenced by Hinduism and may be his love for earthly life so he wants to be incarnated.

Shakespeare: The Greatest Dramatist in the World

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 01:18:00 -0800

Why is Shakespeare called the greatest dramatist in the world?

His Universality:
Shakespeare is not of one age, but of all ages, not of one country but of all countries. His freshness is perennial, his appeal is universal. He is world’s immortal writer. He wrote in the Elizabethan stage and audience; but he is read and enjoyed even today not only by Englishmen, but by the English speaking people all over the world. His works have been translated into all the important languages of the world; and the films based upon his dramas continue to draw packed houses. His freshness and appeal seem to grow the more he is read.

The Causes of the Failure of the Animals' Rebellion to Bring About an Ideal Society in George Orwell's "Animal Farm"

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Thu, 3 Jan 2008 18:51:00 -0800

The animals’ rebellion fails for several reasons. They are as follows:
Major has too idealistic and an abstract idea of the perfect society, and he has not explained how it is to be put into practice.

The rebellion comes unexpectedly, without giving the animals the opportunity to work out a really democratic system.

There is a wide difference between the intelligence of the pigs and the other animals, that the pigs begin to control the society without opposition. The remaining animals are too stupid to realize what Napoleon and other pigs are doing to them.

It also fails because Snowball cannot compete with Napoleon’s brutal and selfish purpose to gain power. Napoleon is selfish and power-hungry. He concentrates his energies in winning power

It also fails because the other animals are either too stupid or too weak to fight Napoleon, or they are too vain and selfish to contribute to their society. Several animals (Moses the Raven, the Cat, and Mollie) do nothing to help the revolution, and so contribute to the failure.

Spenser as The Poets’ Poet

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 21:22:00 -0800

It was Charles Lamb who called Spenser ‘The Poets’ Poet’. At least there are two reasons why Spenser is regarded as the poets’ poet and the second father of English Poetry. Firstly, Spenser rendered incalculable service to English poetry in a variety of ways and left behind him models of poetic excellence to be imitated and followed by a host of poets who came in his wake. He is also called the “Prince of Poets of his time”. He coached more poets and more eminent ones than any other poets. Besides, he is the poets’ poet because he is not the poet of the common man, but only of the scholars and poets with well-versed in classical tradition and humanistic studies. During the Renaissance, Spenser’s poetry could really be appreciated by those who were familiar with classical writers and authors of the Renaissance. Since only scholars and poets had that necessary equipment to understand Spenser, and the common man had not that facility to understand him, Spenser is called the poet of poets and not the poet of the ordinary man. Throughout the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, a host of poets followed him, called him their master, and exalted him as their guide and mentor. Dryden acknowledged him as his master and added that, “No man was ever born with a greater genius or more knowledge to support it”. Pope is all praises for him, and James Thomson referred to him as “my master Spenser”, Shelley, Byron and Keats wrote their best poems in the Spenserian stanza (a long stanza of nine lines with the rhyme a-b-a-b-b-a-b-a-a). He is the poets’ poet in the true sense for he is the fountain-head of al those excellencies and beauties which are scattered in the works of subsequent poets, and for which they expressed their indebtedness to him and called him their master.

The Age of Renaissance (1550-1600)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 19:30:00 -0800

The Age of Renaissance or The Age of Shakespeare or The Elizabethan Period is considered as "The Golden Age", especially in the history of English Literature, because of some reasons, such as:

During the Elizabethan age, England was a nest of singing birds. The song was everywhere, in the street, in the court, and on the stage. Everybody wrote lyrics, down from the flowery courtier to the man in the street. It was the age in which the writers were free to write so that there were abundant productions in every branch of literature; literary works reached their prosperity.

There was a Renaissance (revival or rebirth or reawakening) of ancient Greek and Roman literature, mythology and culture, and this served as a source of inspiration to the countless writers of the period. The Renaissance came to full flowering.

There was also an awakening of the human mind to the vastness, beauty and wonder of the world. It was the age of great discovery; the discovery of America and the voyages of adventure undertaken by the sailors of England or other countries of Europe.

Full religious freedom was granted to the people.

Chief Characteristics of Romantic Poetry (2)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Sun, 4 Feb 2007 20:20:00 -0800

d. Melancholy
A romantic is a dissatisfied individual. The poet may be dissatisfied with the circumstances of his own life, with his age, with literary conventions and traditions of the day, or with the general fate humanity. Romantic poetry is, therefore, often pessimistic in tone. A romantic may revolt against the existing conditions and may seek to reform them, or he may try to escape into an imaginative world of his own creation. Often the poet escapes into the past. The middle ages have a special fascination for him for they not only provide him with an escape from the sordid realities of the preset but also delight his heart by their colour pageantry and magic.

b. Love of Nature
Zest for the beauties of the external world characterizes all romantic poetry. Romantic poetry carries as away from the suffocating atmosphere of cities into the fresh invigorating company of the out-of door world. It not only sings s of the sensuous beauty of nature, but also sees into the ”heart of things” and reveals the soul that lies behind.

c. The Democratic Note: Emphasis on the inherent dignity and nobility of man
‘The romantics have an instinct for the elemental simplicities of life’. Their hearts overflow with sympathy for the poor and the down-trodden. They glorify the innocence and simplicity of the common man. They try to see the divine in Man, plead for this emancipation from all bondage, and claim equal rights and liberties for the humblest ‘The romantic poetry is democratic’.

d. A revolt Against All Artificiality: It stands for simplicity in theme and treatment
Not only do the romantics treat of the common man, they also use his language for their purposes. Thus, Wordsworth raised his voice against the inane and artificial diction of the 18th century classics, and advocated the use of the language of the common man for purposes of poetry. Wordsworth went to extend of remarking that there is no essential difference between the language of poetry and that of prose.

e. Their Interest in the Past Leads the Romantics to Experiment with Old Metres and Poetic Forms
The 18th century had confined itself to the use only of one metre, i.e. the Heroic Couplet. With the coming of the romantics there is a revival of a number of ancient metres, such as: the Spenserian stanza, the ballad metre, the blank verse, the lyric, the ode, and the sonnet. The revival of ancient metres is accompanied with a renewed interest in ancient English masters, Chaucer, Spenser, Milton, etc. who had suffered an eclipse during 18th century

English romanticism is thus both a revolt and a revival; it is a revolt against 18th century tradition and convention; it is a revival of old English literary models of the poets.

Chief Characteristics of Romantic Poetry (1)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 30 Jan 2007 21:18:00 -0800

The term ‘Romanticism’ has been variously defined by various writers. Peter, for example, calls it the “addition of strangeness to beauty”. And Watts Dunton defines it as, “the renaissance of wonder.” Herfood calls it extraordinary development of imaginative sensibility. Legouis and Cazamian emphasize both the emotional and imaginative aspects of romanticism and call it, “an accentuated predominance of emotional life, provoked and directed by the exercise of imaginative vision”. All such definitions are, however, unsatisfactory and partial, for they emphasize one or the other element of this type of literature instead of giving a composite view. It would therefore, be more profitable to consider the salient features of English Romantic poetry instead of wasting time in defining Romanticism.

The chief characteristics of romantic poetry are:

a. Subjectivity
All Romantic literature is subjective in nature. It is an expression of the inner urges of the soul of the artist. The poet does not care for the rules and regulations, but gives free expression to his emotions. Emphasis is laid on inspiration and intuition rather than on the observance of set rules. The poet writes according to his own fancy, and is often guilty of wild excesses. Romantic poetry is fanciful, introspective and is often marked by extravagance. Hence it has been criticized as irregular and wild. As the poet is free to write any theme, and in any for he likes, we have the immense variety of Romantic poetry

b. Spontaneity
Romantic poetry is spontaneous overflow of powerful passions. The romantic poet is gifted with strong organic sensibility, he feels more than there is to feel and sees more than there is to see. Even ordinary objects and incidents excite his imagination and set up in his powerful passion. When the mood is no him, he signs in strains of unpremeditated art. Poetry for him is not craft but inspiration. Carried away by his powerful passions and excited imagination, the poet does not care for the perfection of form or clarity of perfection of form or clarity of expression. The result is much vagueness and obscurity. Substance is more important for him than the form.

c. Love of the Supernatural
The romantic is extraordinarily alive to wonder, mystery and beauty of the universe. He feels the presence of unseen powers in nature. The unseen, transcendental world is more real for the poet than the world of the senses. The supernatural has a special charm for him; he is attracted by the stories of fairies, ghosts and witchcraft. His poetry of the universe. Supernaturalism is an important element in Romantic inspiration. This often makes romantic poetry mystical and removed from the everyday experiences of life.

(To be continued...)

Marxist Criticism (5)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 9 Jan 2007 19:53:00 -0800

Marxist criticism in Britain has not flourished to the extent it has elsewhere. The first English Marxist critic of note was Christopher Caudwell (1907-37). In “Illusion and Reality” (1937) and “Studies in a Dying Culture” (1938), he attempted definitions of Marxist theories of art. It is more important since Raymoond Williams (1921-88) attempted an historical assessment of culture and literature in Marxist terms. His relevant works are, notably, “Culture and Society 1780-1950” (1958), “The Long Revolution” (1961), “The Country and the City” (1973), and “Marxism and Literature” (1977). The principal theorist of Marxist criticism in Britain is Terry Eagleton, who has developed various views of Althusser and Macherey and suggests that a basic problem is to make clear the relationship between an ideology (e.g. Marxism) and literature. In his view, texts do not reflect reality but influence an ideology to produce the effect or impression of reality. By ideology, he does not necessarily mean political or Marxist ideology but all systems and theories of representation which help to make up a picture of a person’s experience. He examines ideologies ‘outside’ the text and also the ideology of the text. In developing his ideas he has displayed flexibility and tactical open-mindedness and revises his position. Apart from “Literary Theory” (1983), a witty and challenging exposition of and commentary on many modern ideas and “-isms”, some of his main books have been “Marxism and Literary Criticism” (1976), “Criticism and Ideology” (1976), and “Aesthetics and Ideology” (1990).

The leading exponent of Marxist criticism in America is Fredric Jameson, who makes eclectic use of a range of theories (Including structuralism, deconstruction, archetypal criticism, qq.v., allegorical interpretation and Jacques Lacan’s interpretations [or reinterpretations] of Freud), any of all of which he may find useful in the critical interpretation of a literary text, and which he does use in “The Political Unconscious: Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act” (1981). It is his contention that Marxism ‘subsumes’ other interpretative modes when it comes to a political interpretation which exposes the ‘political unconscious’ of a text. Like Macherey, he is concerned with the ‘sub-text’ but more specifically with that sub-text which historically and ideologically constitutes the ‘unspoken’, the concealed and suppressed. Thus a Marxist interpretation looks for levels of meaning in the mode of allegory (q.v.).

Marxist Criticism (4)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 9 Jan 2007 01:54:00 -0800

The French Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser (1918-1990) developed a theory of different ‘levels’ within the social formation and argued that these ‘levels’ possess no overall unity. They have a ‘relative autonomy’.

‘Relative autonomy’ is a recent attempt by Marxists to get round the problem posed by Marx’s view that Greek art was eternally beautiful. This ‘idealist embarrassment’ can be overcome if we recognize that art is relatively autonomous.

Althusser argues that at any point one ‘level’ may be dominant and that level is determined (in the last instance) by the economic level; or’ it may be free of it as well – hence it is relative. Althusser’s views on literature differ from those of any traditional Marxist. In his opinion great works of literature do not express an ideology nor do they provide a ‘conceptual understanding of reality’. He sees literature as an ideological form/state apparatus. In “Letter on Art to Andre Daspre” and “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses” (in his book “Lenin and Philosophy, 1971), he attempts to who (with the help of Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalytic theory) how ideology works in society. Althusser, Pierre Macherey (see below) and Etienne Balibar all emphasize that literature is part of an ideological imposition (cf. P.Macherey and E. Balibar in “On Literature as an Ideological Form” in “Untying the Text, 1981”).

Macherey, a follower of Althusser, in “A Theory of Literary Production” (1966) advances the idea that a literary text, by virtue of its form and its fiction, distances itself from its ideology and also, by the ‘silences’ or ‘gaps’ in the text, by what is not said. These silences/gaps, he contends, not only conceal but also expose ideological contradictions. Such absences are suppressions, so to speak, within the text of its own ‘unconscious’. As he puts it: ‘There is a conflict within the text between the text and its ideological content.’ In Macherey’s view, the task of the Marxist critic is to make vocal those silences and expose the text’s unconscious content. Thus, he is concerned with a kind of ‘sub-text’ (q.v.).

(To be continued...)

Marxist Criticism (3)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 18:33:00 -0800

Walter Benjamin, for a while associated with Adorno, took a contrary view to him and was pro-Brech. He surveyed the importance of technology in 19th and 20th century urban and industrialized society, and also the enormous development of the media. As a Marxist he is interested in ‘mass culture’ and in the way in which culture is packaged and consumed by the masses. In his view the media – in close contact with reality – have the power to eliminate the ritual and bourgeois elitism of art and literature and give it a kind of political ‘freedom’. He is more concerned with technique and with artistic forces at work than with the correct position of art and literature socially and economically. So, the emphasis is on the relation of a work of art to the ever changing conditions of production of art itself. In his essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” he suggests that modern technological innovations (e.g. the cinema [especially], radio, photography and the gramophone) have radically transformed the whole idea of a work of art: the very concept, status and value of such an object. Technology enables individual works of art to be reproduced in various ways, by various means, indefinitely, thus making them ‘available’ to the masses rather than to a minority elite.

Yet other theories and attitudes were expressed by the Romanian critic Lucien Goldmann, who developed a theory of ‘homologies’. The term ‘homology’ is more commonly used to denote a concept in the natural sciences. For example, the pectoral fins of a fish, a bird’s wing and a mammal’s forelimbs are ‘homologous’ because they occupy morphologically equivalent positions in the body and are genetically cognate. Thus, it denotes affinity of structure and origin apart from form or use. Goldmann’s ‘homologies’ are structural parallels between literature, ideas, and social groups. In his view literary texts are not the work of individual geniuses but are based on ‘transindividual mental structures’ which belong to groups or classes. The ideas which exist in these structures are discovered and then re-created in literary form by outstanding writers. Goldmann elaborates this theory through “The Hidden God 1964” in a discussion of Racine’s tragedies, Pascal’s philosophy and the social group called “noblesse de la robe”. In his book “Towards a Sociology of the Novel (1964) he pursues the ‘homology’ idea in an analysis of the structure of the modern novel in relation to the structure of market economy.

(To be continued...)

Marxist Criticism (2)

noreply@blogger.com (PURWARNO) — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 20:11:00 -0800

A key figure is the fist major Marxist critic, namely the Hungariar, Georg Lukacs (1885-1971). He developed the critical theory of ‘reflection’, seeing literary works as reflections of a kind of system that was gradually unfolding. In his view, the novel, for instance (and he had much to say about this genre), revealed or ought to reveal underlying patterns in the social order and provide a sense of the wholeness of existence with all its inherent contradictions, tensions and conflicts. Like many Marxist critics he was mainly concerned with content; hence his adverse comments on writers who were preoccupied with form, technique, literary ingenuity and innovation. Lukacs created his own idea of realism and failed (or declined) to see that modernist writers were also capable of realism—albeit of other and different kinds. Hence his disagreement with the modernist techniques of Brecht (and with Theodor Adorno, too), another Marxist and a didactic dramatist who was at pains to show social injustice. Brech made clear his attitude to socialist realism thus: “We shall take care not to ascribe realism to a particular period, Balzac’s or Tolstoy’s, for instance, so as to set up purely formal and literary criteria of realism.” He rejected anything formulaic on the grounds that reality changes, and in order to represent it the means of representation must also change. Thus, it follows that Lukacs and his followers would hardly approve of formalism, futurism, epic theatre (qq.v.) and many other innovative theories and developments.

The Frankfurt school of Marxist aesthetics is associated with the Institute of Social Research founded in 1923 and affiliated to the University of Frankfurt. During the Nazi period it was exiled (in 1933) to New York, from which it returned to Frankfurt in 1949-50. This school (whose chief spirits were Theodor Adorno, Max Horkheimer and Herbert Marcuse) rejected realism more or less completely and developed what is known as ‘Critical Theory”. They were much influenced by: (a) their experience of a totalitarian regime and Fascism; (b) their experience of American mass culture, capitalism and commercialism. Both the Nazi and American societies were regarded as “one-dimensional”.

Adorno advanced the theory that literature does not have direct contact with reality. He favored modernism in literature because it is ‘distanced’ from the reality it seeks to describe, and this ‘distancing’ enhances its critical reality. Thus, knowledge of reality is achieved indirectly or obliquely. As he put it: “Art is the negative knowledge of the actual world”. Horkheimer was in favor of the avant-garde (q.v.) and modernism because they are hostile to passivity, acquiescence and submission to the political and artistic status quo, and thus to any form of inhibitive or repressive ideology. Their views were worked out in terms of Marxist beliefs and principles. Marcuse works through the idea that the autonomous work of art negates a repressive society.

(To be continued ...)