The Origin and Principles of Victorian Nonsense: Darwin's and Lyell's Influence on Lear's Limericks and Carroll's Alice Stories"
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DIPLOMARBEIT / DIPLOMA THESIS Titel der Diplomarbeit / Title of the Diploma Thesis „The Origin and Principles of Victorian Nonsense: Darwin's and Lyell's Influence on Lear's Limericks and Carroll's Alice Stories" verfasst von / submitted by Susanne Schramek angestrebter akademischer Grad / in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Magistra der Philologie (Mag. phil.) Wien, 2018 / Vienna, 2018 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt / A 190 347 344 degree programme code as it appears on the student record sheet: Studienrichtung lt. Studienblatt / Lehramtsstudium UniStG, UF Französisch UniStG degree programme as it appears on UF Englisch UniStG the student record sheet: Betreut von / Supervisor: Univ.-Prof. i.R. Dr. Ewald Mengel Mitbetreut von / Co-Supervisor: nicht zutreffend / not applicable Acknowledgements / Danksagung Vielen Dank an Herrn Professor Mengel für die Unterstützung bei der Themenfindung, die verlässlichen und raschen Rückmeldungen und den hilfreichen Input - ich habe mich durchwegs bestens betreut gefühlt. I also want to thank Fionnuala Dillane, whose seminar on literature and science at UCD Dublin inspired me to choose a topic I could not have been happier with. Ganz viel Danke auch an all die lieben Menschen in meiner Welt, die mich offenohriger, zuredender und tanzender Weise durch diese Zeit begleitet haben. Besonders danke ich meiner Familie: Mama und Papa, ich kann gar nicht ausdrücken, wie dankbar ich bin, dass ihr mich über all die Jahre in allem, was mir wichtig war, unterstützt, mir immer Halt gegeben und mich mit eurem Vertrauen angesteckt habt, dass schon alles gut so ist, wie es kommt und wie ich meinen Weg gehe. Und Fan, vielen herzlichen Buuh fürs gemeinsame Freuen über jeden Lustifortschritt und für die wohldosierte Ablenkung zwischendurch mit diversen Lustinarien. Und einfach fürs Da-Sein. ❤ Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................... 5 1. The impact of scientific development: Lyell and Darwin ......................................... 7 1.1. Discoveries and new perspectives .................................................................. 7 1.2. Impacts ......................................................................................................... 12 1.2.1. The scientific world ................................................................................ 12 1.2.2. Religion and beliefs ............................................................................... 14 1.2.3. Society and order ....................................................................................... 17 1.2.4. Literature ............................................................................................... 20 2. Literary reactions: Carroll's Alice and Lear's Limericks ............................................ 22 2.1. Man's place ...................................................................................................... 24 2.1.1. Man and other animals............................................................................... 24 2.1.2. The individual and society .......................................................................... 48 2.2. Rules and logic ................................................................................................. 62 2.2.1. The laws of nature and reality .................................................................... 62 2.2.2. Language ................................................................................................... 81 Conclusion .................................................................................................................. 96 Bibliography ................................................................................................................ 98 Primary Sources ...................................................................................................... 98 Secondary sources.................................................................................................. 98 Appendix: Summary in German / Zusammenfassung auf Deutsch ........................... 108 Introduction The nineteenth century, the time of natural sciences' emancipation as individual disciplines, witnessed not only an unprecedented accumulation of paradigm shifts, but also a wave of literary explorations of the resulting epistemic crisis in Victorian society. One genre where this search for answers is particularly striking is that of nonsense literature, created and made popular by Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll (Schramek 1). The present thesis therefore seeks to examine the manners in which these authors' nonsense echoes the implications of the scientific contributions made by two of the most important Victorian scientists, i.e. Charles Lyell and Charles Darwin. To that end, I will first discuss the impacts of Lyell's geological discoveries as well as those of Darwin's theory of evolution on nineteenth-century British society on four levels: the Victorians' scientific discourse community, their spiritual beliefs and moral convictions, their social structures and rules, and the methods and themes of their literature. Drawing on such monumental analyses as those by Beer, Dean, Levine, and Otis, I will illustrate that Darwin's and Lyell's work sparked a hitherto unparalleled enthusiasm and the further development of natural sciences, and that by promoting the secularization of science, these scholars provoked a skepticism among their contemporaries toward accepted authorities such as the Church or the wealthy. Subsequently, a link will be established between the resulting questioning of a godly-ordained order, the loss of spiritual purpose and moral direction, and the consequent reassessment of established social and natural hierarchies. At the end of the first main chapter, a brief overview will be given of the general manifestations of the Victorian epistemic crisis in the literature of the time, which will discuss the trend away from teleological linearity toward random multiplicity, as well as the growing presence of such themes as the (futile) search for 'objective truths' and man's connection to nature. The second and principal part of this thesis will focus on the ways in which Lear's limericks and Carroll's Alice books reflect the changes of perspective caused by the scientific progress during the Victorian age. Two main themes pervading these works will be identified and examined in detail: on the one hand, man's position, first among other animals, and subsequently within (Victorian) society; 5 on the other hand, the workings and value of rules and human logic, taking natural laws and reality as a first focal point before passing on to linguistic systems. It will be argued that both Lear's and Carroll's works in question include numerous satirical allusions to the food chain – e.g. with regard to the characters' body size, eating habits and (otherwise) predatory behavior –, frequently mock conventional hierarchies between man and other animals, and blur the physical and behavioral boundaries between them. Based upon this, the limericks and the Alice books will be interpreted as reactions to the scientific developments discussed, and it will be claimed that, while Lear appears to support Darwin's notion of a non- deterministic universe, Carroll's nonsense suggests a wish to hold on to the established order and ideas of benevolent design. This point will be further supported in my analysis of the poems' and novels' treatment of social conventions and the need to conform, which will illustrate that Lear promotes individuality first and foremost, while Carroll's books will be presented as indicating man as dependent on society and a certain order. Additionally, both authors will be shown to enjoy playing with their characters' and/or readers' notions of and expectations towards reality, suspending natural laws, calling attention to the subjectivity of interpretation and reasoning processes, and blurring the lines between fact and fiction. In this manner, so it will be argued, Lear and Carroll expose man's over-dependence on rules, and human logic as fallible. This becomes similarly evident in the last chapter of the thesis, which will examine the nonsense writers' treatment of language, i.e. their experiments with literalizations, strange collocations and the detachment of signifier from signified. However, it will be argued that, rather than constituting examples of complete anarchy (linguistic or otherwise), Lear's and Carroll's play with rules is ultimately embedded in the safe frame of an overall reliable grammatical and literary form, suggesting an attempt to accommodate the human need for stability. 6 1. The impact of scientific development: Lyell and Darwin The paradigm shifts and other drastic changes in nineteenth-century Victorian society arose primarily from game-changing scientific discoveries as well as the creation and re-evaluation of scientific fields and ideas (Paradis x). Some of the most important contributions in this context were made by Sir Charles Lyell (1797- 1875) and Charles Darwin (1809-1882) through their works Principles of Geology: Being an Attempt to Explain the Former Changes of the Earth's Surface, by Reference to Causes Now in Operation (3 vols., 1830-1833) and On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (1859), respectively: their theories regarding geology and evolutionary biology triggered