The development of English literature in the eighteenth century was strongly influenced by France and French writers. Lately there has been an attempt to belittle the French influences. It is true that in the past the Gallic influence has been exaggerated, but it really cannot be overlooked. Historically it is true to treat England and France as one country in respect to their literary activity between the middle of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Roughly, there were about 100 years, between the execution of Charles I in 1649 and the execution of Louis XIV in 1793, during which there was a solid block of Franco-British or Anglo-French literary achievement. The Civil War in England gave the English political exiles in Paris a chance to acquire French taste, but this Entente Litteraire was ended when the French Revolution through Trafalgar and Waterloo caused a revulsion from the French example.
The main concern of this study is the artist's vision of society; its major theme is the relation between the individual and society resulting from the impact of social and political upheavals on individual life. By criticism of society I mean the novelist's awareness of the social reality and of the individual's response to it; the writers I deal with all proved alive to the changes that were taking place in English society between the two World Wars. Though the social attitudes of the inter-war years as well as the writers' response to them were shaped by lasting and complex influences, such as trends in philosophy and science, the two Wars stand out as determining factors in the development of the novel: the consequences of the First were explored by most writers in the Twenties, whereas in the following decade the novelists felt compelled to voice the anxiety aroused by the threat of another conflict and to warn against its possible effects. After the First World War many writers felt keenly the social disruption: the old standards, which were thought to have made this suicidal War possible, were distrusted; the code of behaviour and the moral values of the older generation were openly criticized for having led to bankruptcy. Disparagement of authority increased the individual's sense of isolation, his insecurity, his disgust or fear. Even the search for pleasure so widely satirized in the Twenties was the expression of a cynicism born of despair. The ensuing disengagement of the individual from his environment became a major theme in the novel: his isolation was at once a cause for resentment and the source of his fierce individualism.
Expressed in simplest terms Nova Scotia law, generally speaking, is an amalgamation of English common law, English statute law and the provincial statutes which evolved following the convening of the first representative government at Halifax on October 2, 1758. From the capture of Port Royal in 1710 (which by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 guaranteed Acadia to the British), to the establishment of an elected assembly 48 years later, law and order were maintained at first by military law and, following the appointment of Richard Philipps as governor at Annapolis Royal, by the issue of royal instructions dated June 19, 1719. When Halifax was founded in 1749 Governor Cornwallis' instructions from the Lords of Trade, April 29, 1749, granted him more sweeping powers, with the result that the colonists were governed in large measure by executive acts and royal instructions until the first assembly was called nine years later.
Differences in attitude among adult English-speakers towards "English" are so radical as to suggest that they represent other differences, more far-reaching and deeper-seated than we customarily assume. Some prostrate themselves before the crudest command to be correct in language; others revere and practise subtle plays of meaning in literature or speech. Such a difference in values surely has a moral dimension. Willinsky has explored the roots of these differences in a study of the different streams in a Canadian high school (reported elsewhere), and discusses here its implications. Not only different practices but also sharply different attitudes were reflected in the declarations of both teachers and students at the "academic" and the "general" level English classes. He points out that the real consequence of the way this streaming is currently being interpreted by many Canadian teachers of English is that one group of students probably acquires a moral authority that has been denied to the other. He becomes specific about the means by which teachers must rid their program of popular misconceptions about language, if it is not to continue to divide the population not only on the topic of literature, but also in social, political, and moral terms. RÉSUMÉ Les différences d'attitude qu'on note chez les anglophones à l'égard de "l'anglais" sont si radicales qu'on pourrait supposer qu'elles reflètent d'autres différences plus profondes qu'on ne l'estime généralement. Certains se prosternent devant les régles les plus grossières afin de s'exprimer correctement; d'autres par contre favorisent et pratiquent des jeux de mots subtils en littérature ou dans la conversation. De telles différences au niveau des valeurs reflètent Sûrement une dimension morale. Willinsky a exploré les origines de ces différences dans une étude sur les différentes tendances observées dans une école secondaire canadienne (dont il est fait état ailleurs), et expose ici ces répercussions. Non seulement différentes pratiques, mais également des attitudes fondamentalement divergentes sont apparues dans les déclarations des instituteurs et des etudiants aux cours d'anglais "littéraires" et "généraux". L'auteur souligne que le véritable conséquence du mode d'interprétation de ces courants par de nombreux professeurs d'anglais canadiens réside dans le fait qu'un groupe d'étudiants acquiert probablement une autorité morale qui a été refusée à l'autre. L'auteur propose des moyens spécifiques auxquels doivent recourir les enseignants pour débarrasser leur programme des conceptions populaires erronées au sujet du langage, pour que ce courant ne continue pas de diviser la population non seulement au chapitre de la littérature mais également dans les questions sociales, politiques et morales.
This paper briefly explores some of the ways in which Mikhail Bakhtin reaffirms the principle of the non-identity yet inseparability of theory and practice in literary criticism. The lesson is one which stresses the need to disentangle the critical discourse from idealistic theoretical issues and engage in a materialist practice of criticism. If polyphonical dialogism (especially with respect to contemporary polyphony) is not to be confused with dialectics, then the most urgent and perhaps the most difficult task for the critic facing a polyphonic narrative is to negotiate the text in terms of the socio-historical actuality of the transformation which that text proposes. An analysis of D.M. Thomas' The White Hotel illustrates the ideological problems that arise when the operative system of the polyphonical narrative structure is stretched to the limit—as is moreover the case with many contemporary novels. And if the critic is to engage in a form of praxis, then he has to re-dialecticize the political (unconscious?) consciousness, in short, to politicize and not merely theorize its anticipated actualization.
Bibliography: pages 330-359. ; The essence of this thesis is a critique of the structure and form of the military chaplaincy in South Africa in terms of theological presuppositions that can generally be associated with Karl Barth's understanding of ministry. It focuses on the military chaplaincy of the English-speaking churches of South Africa: the period selected is the past ten years. After surveying the rather scarce literature on the military chaplaincy in South Africa and several Western countries, the author briefly outlines those aspects of the theology of ministry of Karl Barth pertinent to this thesis. In addition, the author explains his own position on war and conscientious objection, which is generally speaking in keeping with what may be referred to as the Barthian perspective on ministry. The author then examines the South African Chaplains' Service. He finds several aspects incompatible with the theology of ministry outlined in Chapter 2: rank, uniform, military appointment of senior staff, command influence of the military over chaplains, the hierarchical structure of the Chaplains' Service, in-house training of chaplains, security clearance and secrecy. He argues that the real test of the freedom of the military chaplaincy is whether chaplains are free to convey the church's message of peace. The author concludes that the English-speaking churches cannot yet be assured of the freedom of their chaplains, and shows that the "complete freedom" to which most of the Permanent Force chaplains lay claim is illusory.
A Passage to India can be regarded as a historical document, a philosophical statement and a work of conscious literary art. Its criticism has got to focus on its political~ ethical and metaphysical implications as well as such features as its comedy, characterization, symbolism, organization and esthetic qualities. ; N/A
"Literature thrives in the lived world as part of the process of human communication." There has always been recognition of that emphasis on "part," and in acknowledgment of the Greek and Renaissance humanist tradition in modem education, Donald Theall recalls the awareness among the outstanding literary figures of those eras - long before English literature became a study - of the importance of the non-literary milieux of which their art was a most intense expression. But it is the awakening of an acute modern consciousness of the need to understand the disorders of communication, within what should become a democratic society, that has challenged English studies in his view either to meet that need or, surrendering the task to the social sciences, to go the way of classical and rhetorical studies into near extinction.
The purpose of the thesis is to demonstrate that the pessimism exhibited in the themes of The Mysterious Stranger is evident in the themes of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1874-1876), The Prince and the Pauper (1877-1882), The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1876-1885), A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1888-1889), and Pudd'nhead Wilson (1891-1894). The thesis also demonstrates that the pessimism becomes more dominate as the novels progress chronologically through the repetition of the themes and the increasing number of themes being treated. The introduction briefly discusses the arguments over the origins of Twain's pessimism as set forth by Van Wyck Brooks, who credits Twain's pessimism to Twain's mother, wife, and Elmira, Edward Wagenknecht, who credits Twain's pessimism to Twain's personal experiences, and E. Hudson Long, who credits Twain's pessimism to Twain's personal experiences and observation of man's history. The body of the thesis begins by citing The Innocents Abroad and Roughing It to exhibit the seeds of Twain's pessimism in his earliest works in which he criticizes the corruption of the church, man's treatment of minorities, and man's prejudices. Twain's pessimistic themes treated in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer are man's manipulation of man and man's self-deception. Twain's pessimistic themes treated in The Prince and the Pauper are the effects of the multi-class system and the inequality of classes, criticism of monarchical government, man's inhumanity to man, and the benefits of death over life on earth. Twain's pessimistic themes treated in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn are man's inhumanity to man through meaningless feuding, cowardly mob violence and mob behavior, man's disregard for human life, and effects of slavery. Twain's pessimistic themes treated in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court are the corruptive effects of monarchical government and the aristocracy, the effects of the multi-class system and slavery, man's disregard for human life, the corruptive effects of religion and the Established Church, cowardly mob behavior, and the power of laughter to destroy. Twain's pessimistic themes treated in Pudd'nhead Wilson are the effects of slavery, determinism, the bad-seed theory, man's inferiority to other animals, the evil of money, and the benefits of death over life on earth. All of the above themes are treated in The Mysterious Stranger in which Twain condemns man's oppressive institutions, man's behavior, man's image of himself, man's belief in life and after-life, and man's fate in life. The comparisons of the previous novels to The Mysterious Stranger are made throughout the body of the thesis as the novels are treated in chronological order.
Mark Twain in his travel narrative Roughing It presents a naive, innocent narrator from the East who ventures forth into the largely uncivilized Western frontier during the exciting silver mining boom of the 1860's. In his sojourn the innocent narrator encounters many people, places, customs, values, and experiences that are unfamiliar to him, and because of his status as a tenderfoot unacquainted with the frontier, he is often made a dupe by the mischievous old-timers in the West. The innocent narrator must go through numerous initiations before he is accepted as a member of the vernacular community. In these various confronting experiences with Western values and customs, he cannot help but feel like a misplaced outsider unaccustomed to the freedom inherent in an uncivilized society. Often the tenderfoot is ridiculed and made ludicrous for pretentious behavior, an inflated opinion of himself, as in the sketches involving animal similes, metaphors, and anecdotes. These sketches are of the bootblack, the Sphinx, the coyote, the genuine Mexican plug, and the governmental official. Often the old-timers in the community make sport of the greenhorn for his own education and for their amusement, as in the sketches of the bootblack, Jim Blaine and his grandfather's ram, and the horse auctioneer. Twain manages the narrative from the perspective of a first person narrator who assumes the two-fold stance of a veteran looking back upon his days as a tenderfoot in the West. The naivete of the narrator is deliberately exaggerated for the sake of comedy; he is presented as an individual who seldom confronts any outside force which he thinks he cannot recognize, distinguish, and overcome, and it is the juxtaposition of these innocent, romantic views with reality that is a prime source of comedy for Twain in Roughing It. The education of the innocent narrator is desirable and necessary, for not until he is initiated into the customs and values of the West is he able to enjoy the varied and vast freedoms that the frontier has to offer. Before his education he was ignorant and naive, but after his transformation from greenhorn to old-timer, he learns the sciences necessary in order to survive in the West, and he is now able to fully participate in the glories that the frontier has to offer.
The purpose of this thesis is to examine V.S. Naipaul's view of the human condition as it develops from a local and comic perspective to a more universal and tragic awareness. The first group, entitled "The Mystic, the Politician, and other Eccentrics," is comprised of his first three novels--The Mystic Masseur, The Suffrage of Elvira, and Miguel Street. Each work is a highly satiric examination of a society in which the author perceives no sign of any intellectual depth as he moves rapidly from one humorous episode to another. The characters are generally of the lower class and uneducated. Their reactions are the result of a picaresque instinct for survival rather than thought. The second group, entitled "The Assertion of Hope," contains his next four works--A House for Mr. Biswas, Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion, The Mimic Men, and A Flag on the Island. These books represent a period when Naipaul asserts hope and sees positive indication of inner strength. The structure of these works is less episodic, and the humor changes from mere literal play on words to more sophisticated irony. The characters impose meaning in their lives and are aware of the human dilemma, of boredom, and of uselessness. The third group, "The Darker Vision," includes the short story collection In A Free State and Naipaul's latest novel, Guerrillas. The characters of this last have more depth and act on a level other than mere instinct. From a perspective that is not limited by ignorance or illiteracy, and therefore similar to that of the second group, they face the question of human existence. What differentiates the third group from the second is that Naipaul's later characters have no positive resolution to their problems. The optimism of the second group is not enduring. One detail which emerges in examining the thesis is that Naipaul's female characters fail to develop the inner cohesion of men. Like the Hemingway heroines they fall into two distinct categories: the wife/mother, and the man-eater/dragon lady who, robbed of the natural functions of motherhood, is a confusion of values. Brought up in the Hindu religion until his departure for England in 1950, Naipaul writes from memory about women who are necessarily weak and submissive. His non-Hindu female characters are less submissive but also noticeably less happy. The method used to examine this thesis is an analysis of the main characters. In attempting a thesis such as this, one must of necessity deal chiefly with the characters of the longer fiction work. Though some mention is made of some key short stories, these are treated in far less detail. Reference is made to Naipaul's nonfiction works, The Middle Passage, An Area of Darkness, and The Overcrowded Barracoon.
In defense of myself and the Honors Committee I accept this assignment as a tribute for something, possibly for setting a new record as a hunger artist or for simply staying in town and reciting the penitential psalms daily for over 40 years. I have a sneaking suspicion that they may be exposing me for not being creative in the Greek sense of fulfilling the promise of one's birth. If I had got around to writing Pericles' funeral oration, Dostoevsky's "Grand Inquisitor," or E. E. Cummings' "What if a Much of a Which of a Wind," as I fully intended to do, they surely wouldn't have asked me to give this speech. But they did, confirming my aphorism that life is what we fail to make it. I'll seek comfort in the observation of one of my students, that the nice thing about being mediocre is that you are always at your best; also in the realization that even the seven wise men of Greece would have made serious errors in judgment had they been functioning as a committee. I have always been awed, and even disheartened, by the achievements, scholarship, and insights of many of my colleagues; and I wish that r could utter some memorable profundities on the mystery of it all, as they do so lucidly and finally. I would like to come up with even one thought worthy of being carved in stone. I know enough about politics to agree with the notion that Prometheus gave man all except political wisdom, which he reserved for the gods. I know enough about the social sciences to be aware of the changes in jargon that so often signify progress. I know enough about religion to sanction Kafka's belief that it is an inescapable fact of life and to add that it isn't any worse than we deserve.
The M. H. Ross Papers contain information pertaining to labor, politics, social issues of the twentieth century, coal mining and its resulting lifestyle, as well as photographs and audio materials. The collection is made up of five different accessions; L2001-05, which is contained in boxes one through 104, L2002-09 in boxes 106 through 120, L2006-16 in boxes 105 and 120, L2001-01 in boxes 120-121, and L2012-20 in boxes 122-125. The campaign materials consist of items from the 1940 and 1948 political campaigns in which Ross participated. These items include campaign cards, posters, speech transcripts, news clippings, rally materials, letters to voters, and fliers. Organizing and arbitration materials covers labor organizing events from "Operation Dixie" in Georgia, the furniture workers in North Carolina, and the Mine-Mill workers in the Western United States. Organizing materials include fliers, correspondence, news articles, radio transcripts, and some related photos. Arbitration files consist of agreements, decisions, and agreement booklets. The social and political research files cover a wide time period (1930's to the late 1970's/early 1980's). The topics include mainly the Ku Klux Klan, racism, Communism, Red Scare, red baiting, United States history, and literature. These files consist mostly of news and journal articles. Ross interacted with coal miners while doing work for the United Mine Workers Association (UMWA) and while working at the Fairmont Clinic in West Virginia. Included in these related files are books, news articles, journals, UMWA reports, and coal miner oral histories conducted by Ross. Tying in to all of the activities Ross participated in during his life were his research and manuscript files. He wrote numerous newspaper and journal articles on history and labor. Later, as he worked for the UMWA and at the Fairmont Clinic, he wrote more in-depth articles about coal miners, their lifestyle, and medical problems they faced (while the Southern Labor Archives has many of Ross's coal mining and lifestyle articles, it does not have any of his medical articles). Along with these articles are the research files Ross collected to write them, which consist of notes, books, and newspaper and journal articles. In additional to his professional career, Ross was adamant about documenting his and his wife's family history in the oral history format. Of particular interest are the recordings of his interviews with his wife's family - they were workers, musicians, and singers of labor and folk songs. Finally, in this collection are a number of photographs and slides, which include images of organizing, coal mining (from the late 19th through 20th centuries), and Appalachia. Of note is a small photo album from the 1930s which contains images from the Summer School for Workers, and more labor organizing. A few audio items are available as well, such as Ross political speeches and an oral history in which Ross was interviewed by his daughter, Jane Ross Davis in 1986. All photographic and audio-visual materials are at the end of their respective series. ; Myron Howard "Mike" Ross was born November 9, 1919 in New York City. He dropped out of school when he was seventeen and moved to Texas, where he worked on a farm. From 1936 until 1939, Ross worked in a bakery in North Carolina. In the summer of 1938, he attended the Southern School for Workers in Asheville, North Carolina. During the fall of 1938, Ross would attend the first Southern Conference on Human Welfare in Birmingham, Alabama. He would attend this conference again in 1940 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. From 1939 to 1940, Ross worked for the United Mine Workers Non-Partisan League in North Carolina, working under John L. Lewis. He was hired as a union organizer by the United Mine Workers of America, and sent to Saltville, Virginia and Rockwood, Tennessee. In 1940, Ross ran for a seat on city council on the People's Platform in Charlotte, North Carolina. During this time, he also married Anne "Buddie" West of Kennesaw, Georgia. From 1941 until 1945, Ross served as an infantryman for the United States Army. He sustained injuries near the Battle of the Bulge in the winter of 1944. From 1945 until 1949, Ross worked for the International Union of Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers, then part of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), as a union organizer. He was sent to Macon, Georgia, Savannah, Georgia and to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he worked with the United Furniture Workers Union. He began handling arbitration for the unions. In 1948, Ross ran for United States Congress on the Progressive Party ticket in North Carolina. He also served as the secretary for the North Carolina Progressive Party. Ross attended the University of North Carolina law school from 1949 to 1952. He graduated with honors but was denied the bar on the grounds of "character." From 1952 until 1955, he worked for the Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers as a union organizer, first in New Mexico (potash mines) and then in Arizona (copper mines). From 1955 to 1957, Ross attended the Columbia University School of Public Health. He worked for the United Mine Workers of America Welfare and Retirement Fund from 1957 to 1958, where he represented the union in expenditure of health care for mining workers. By 1958, Ross began plans for what would become the Fairmont Clinic, a prepaid group practice in Fairmont, West Virginia, which had the mission of providing high quality medical care for miners and their families. From 1958 until 1978, Ross served as administrator of the Fairmont Clinic. As a result of this work, Ross began researching coal mining, especially coal mining lifestyle, heritage and history of coal mining and disasters. He would interview over one hundred miners (coal miners). Eventually, Ross began writing a manuscript about the history of coal mining. Working for the Rural Practice Program of the University of North Carolina from 1980 until 1987, Ross taught in the medical school. M. H. Ross died on January 31, 1987 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. ; Digitization of the M. H. Ross Papers was funded by the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.
Most current studies of Gordimer concern themselves with her novels, and her short stories have not received significant critical attention as stories in their own right, worthy of study both for their structural and formal qualities, and for the contribution they make as social, political and historical comment on their time. This study begins with a general discussion of the artistic demands of the modern short story, and then proceeds to a close study of all Gordimer's published short stories, concentrating on the developments that occur in the characteristic structures and themes of her stories. Each of her collections is dealt with, chronologically, in a separate chapter. In the course of the study, it became clear that two critical approaches were needed in order to explain satisfactorily developments of structure on the one hand, and theme on the other. The basic approach has been close textual reading, which has been enhanced especially after her fifth collection by consideration of the stories' socio-historical dimensions as well. Gordimer's early stories deal with what are later seen to be characteristic themes, race and racial differences, self-deception, illusion, or the stripping away of illusions, turning points in childhood and marriage. Later stories show the developments in these thematic areas, most notably in the field of race. Other stories reveal a growing interest in the role and position of women, and also a preoccupation with betrayal. Gordimer's stories are seen as occupying a position firmly within the tradition of the modern short story. Her characteristic treatment of her material results in what this study sees as a typical Gordimer short story structure. The story starts with an introductory passage which presents the necessary background and characterisation, or sets the atmosphere. It then moves into a high focus during which a number of insights or revelations occur, which interact with each other to produce, at a higher level of abstraction, the central or unifying revelation which is the essence of the story. In these early stories, she shows a self-aware and self-regarding concern for questions of form. After Friday's Footprint, she devotes less attention to the formal qualities of stories, and gives more attention to questions of social and political comment. However, she does attempt some stories that could be labelled experimental short fiction, and she constantly explores the limits of the traditional artistic demands of the modern short story. After Not For Publication, she seems to turn her attention more towards longer works in order to find a suitable genre for her material. Her consistent use of critical realism, her special ability to capture the nuances and minutiae of experience and character are well suited to the short story form. This study shows the extent to which the short story serves as a vehicle for the expression of her perceptions of and interaction with her society as she develops from the pre-liberal to the committed radical writer and commentator on her society and its people.
