ENG322Y1 Lecture Notes - Ordinary Language Philosophy, Tobias Smollett, Southern Gothic
ENG322 – Fiction Before 1832 (or: The Rise of the Novel)
September 15
-Narrative before the Novel (handout)
oBunyan: The Pilgrim’s Progress (1678-9)
Hero falls asleep beneath a tree, story is the dream
Archaic type of writing
Repetitions, alliterations, biblical themes,
“noun of the noun” pattern
From the Hebrew pattern, used since the first translation of the bible
into the vernacular
Archaisms – “I laid me down”
No names, or called “Mr. Blind-man”
Types not fleshed out characters
Not realistic characters
oLa Calprenede – Pharamond (1661-3)
“Florid” late-medieval romance
“Blazon du Coeur” – highly ceremonial introduction of the heroine
Highly comparative description of each body part (above waist)
Impossible beauty and idealized body, opposites
Artificially ornate language
Building up, more and more beautiful
oVirgil – The Aeneid
Epic poetry was the only form of literature
Epics begin with a question
Rhyming, fancy language
Ceremonial
-The Rise of the Novel
oFormal characteristics
Fictional
Narrative (story)
Prose
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Proper length
Subject matter (real life, plausible)
Causality (no supernatural)
Realistic setting
Characters (everyday people, usually not of high status)
Ordinary language
oInnovation of the novel
Types of narrative before the novel:
Biblical stories
Saint’s lives
Allegorical tales
Myths and folk-tales
Epics
Romantics
oRise of the Novel
Industrialization, modernization, urbanization
New kinds of lives, different from parents and traditional
communities
“economic individualism” (self-supporting)
People become more worldly and rational, rejected idealizations and
implausible traditional narratives, wanted more realistic representations of
everyday life – Ian Watt, Rise of the Novel (1957)
Wanted to read “guides”
Middle class = more to spend on books, literate
The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders
-ECCO has the original copy online
-Moll Flanders is a pseudonym
oMakes her mysterious, but also frees her to tell the truth
-Newgate = biggest prison
-Bio: promise of all of the events she goes through, “variety” = very interesting, needed to
have a happy, orthodox, moral ending
-“Written from her own memorandums”
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find more resources at oneclass.com
oTypical of the time, presented fiction as a collection of original works, diary of a
person, etc.
-Puns on hanging
-She is slightly unreliable, doesn’t remember everything and refuses to tell everything, but
open about these things
-Mystery of identity/personal identity – popular in novels, esp. 18th century
-Grand syntax of who she’s been is different than who she is
-Ambiguous, “they” are not named but instrumental in her story
oGives you a sense of confusion, being lost, appealed to readers of the time
-Uses a lot of “as they call it” qualifiers, draws attention to the naming of things and language
-Detailed about certain facts
oHolland her mother stole, but glosses over other things (used in legal record)
Claims it’s not worth mentioning but is very detailed – type, shop
Stealing this cloth was like stealing a car, people got hanged for stealing a
handkerchief, Moll says it was just an “opportunity to borrow”
But qualifies all this with unreliable information
oDoes not know how she stayed alive, someone did it but she does not know who
Enormous favour in these times
oParish tried to send her away and give her back to the gypsies
No parish wanted to feed another bastard, women were kicked out if they
were pregnant and died just outside the town borders
Miracle she survived, almost mythical/folkloric
-Colloquial
oPleaded the Belly
oThe Steps and the String
-Stylistically:
oUses long sentences with lots of clauses
oIf/then sentences
oCapitalization of nouns
oAddresses reader directly
oFirst person
oLegal langauge
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Eng322 fiction before 1832 (or: the rise of the novel) Narrative before the novel (handout: bunyan: the pilgrim"s progress (1678-9) Hero falls asleep beneath a tree, story is the dream. From the hebrew pattern, used since the first translation of the bible into the vernacular. Not realistic characters: la calprenede pharamond (1661-3) Blazon du coeur highly ceremonial introduction of the heroine. Highly comparative description of each body part (above waist) Building up, more and more beautiful: virgil the aeneid. Epic poetry was the only form of literature. The rise of the novel: formal characteristics. Characters (everyday people, usually not of high status) Ordinary language: innovation of the novel. New kinds of lives, different from parents and traditional communities. People become more worldly and rational, rejected idealizations and implausible traditional narratives, wanted more realistic representations of everyday life ian watt, rise of the novel (1957) Middle class = more to spend on books, literate.
