Through the Postmodern Looking-Glass Notes on Jeff Noon’s Automated Alice 2013-2014 Faculty of Translation and Interpretation T-ANGL-014 — Command of the Written Language School of International Interpreters T-ANGL-015 — Command of the Spoken Language UMONS (Belgium) ByJustine Houyaux ([email protected]) Introduction CONTENTS According to the Oxford Dictionary, of Gilgamesh that dates back to at least the literature is a mass noun originating from 18th century BC. Middle English (in the sense 'knowledge of Although there are many different books'): via French from Latin litteratura and ways to shed a light on literature, depending referring to on the literary criticism current to which one (1) written works, especially those might refer, it is important to keep in mind considered of superior or lasting that literature is both a personal (subjective) artistic merit: a great work of and universal experience. literature In order to bring order to chaos, MODERNISM Page 3 (2) books and writings published on this introduction comes with a general a particular subject: the literature overview of the main literary movements of on environmental epidemiology the 20th century (next page). (3) leaflets and other printed Automated Alice was first published matter used to advertise products in 1996 by Doubleday. It is “supposed to be” or give advice: advertising and a trequel to Alice’s Adventures in promotional literature Wonderland (1866) and Through the In the context of this course on Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There Automated Alice, we will obviously only (1872) by British author Lewis Carroll2. In the POSTMODERNISM Page 5 be focusing on the first meaning of the introduction, or in the inner cover word and it is sister-discipline, literary (depending on the edition), it is written: criticism: In the last years of his life, the the art or practice of judging and fantasist Charles Dodgson wrote a commenting on the qualities and third Alice book. This mysterious character of literary works1. work was never published or shown Even though the art of telling stories is to anybody. It has only recently probably as ancient as language, the been discovered. Now, at last, the AUTOMATED ALICE Page 11 oldest known literary work is the Epic of world can read of Automated Alice and her fabulous adventures in the 1 future. That’s not quite true. In order to understand what Automated Anyhow, Postmodernism – regardless of the Automated Alice was written by Alice is all about, we need to go deeper into suffix “-post” that generally implies a Lewis Caroll, Lewis Caroll was the the field of theory of literature and take a chronology – did not really appear at the nom de plume of Charles Dodgson. closer look at the concept of end of the modernist period. The suffix has No, that’s not even slightly true Postmodernism. to be understood as a reaction and not as a either. Automated Alice was written [Postmodernism is the] rejection of new sequence of time. Hence the next by Zenith O’Clock, the Writer of traditional mimetic fiction in favour question, “What is Modernism?” Wrongs. *…+ Oh dear that’s not at of a heightened sense of artifice, a all right. This book was written by delight in games and verbal Jeff Noon. Zenith O’Clock is only a pyrotechnics; a suspicion of DEFINITIONS character invented by Jeff Noon. absolute truth and a resulting Mimesis: imitation of reality (Noon, 1996) inclination to stress the fictionality Pyrotechnics: a show of great skill, 3 The book is divided into twelve of fiction . especially by a musician or someone giving chapters, just like Alice’s Adventures in While many literary critics claim that the a speech Wonderland: (1) Through the Clock’s beginning of the postmodern literary Workings, (2) The Wriggling of a Worm, (3) movement dates to the murder of John F. Alice’s Twin Twister, (4) Adventures in a Kennedy (1963) or even the early days of the Garden Shed, (5) The Long Paw of the Law, American involvement in the Vietnam War (6) Languishing in Gaol, (7) The Stroke of (1962), placing de development of the Noon, (8) Alice Looks up Herself, (9) The movement in the 60’s, some other argue Hunting of the Quark, (10) Snakes and that it might have been born earlier than Leaders, (11) Dorothy, Dorothy and Dorothy, that – at the end of World War II. While (12) ‘What Time Do You Call This, Alice?”. being essentially a post-war movement, Most of those titles are wordplays, most of 1941 is also often taken as the date of birth which are references to other works or of Postmodernism, being the year during cultural items. In the context of a which both Irish novelist James Joyce and postmodern work of literature, this English authoress Virginia Woolf passed phenomenon is called intertextuality. away. Virginia Woolf Timeline of literature in English in the 20th century 1Literary criticism, The Oxford Dictionaries Online [http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/literary-criticism?q=literary+ criticism, last accessed 06/12/2013] 2Penname of mathematician and Oxford don Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898) 3Unless stated otherwise, all definitions in the text come from OUSBY, Ian (1996). The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 2 Modernism 1. Definition The aim of the use of this technique is to try the sea from the sky and the grey Modernism was distinguished by its to reproduce the inner workings of the cloth became barred with thick opposition to traditional forms and to mind. strokes moving, one after another, the aesthetic perceptions associated beneath the surface, following each with those forms. It was persistently 2.2. Subjectivity of the other, pursuing each other, experimental. A common quality was narration perpetually. the highly self-conscious manipulation Instead of using a so-called objective (Woolf, 1931, p. 1) of form, together with an awareness of narration with a fixed point of view and an 2.4. Fragmented forms and pioneering studies which were omniscient third-person narrator, the discontinuous narratives contemporaneous in other disciplines. modernists move away from all As Modernism basically is the deconstruction 2. Characteristics consideration of objectivity and give their of all literary boundaries, one of its main The main characteristics of Modernism are texts a subjective dimension by writing in features is fragmentation, not only in the (1) impressionism, (2) subjectivity of the the first person or by having an insight in form (one style to another) or in the narration, (3) blurring of the distinction one or more characters’ feelings and narrative (flash-backs, alternative realities), between genres, (4) fragmented forms and impressions: but also in the language, as in the excerpt discontinuous narratives, (5) reflexivity of In my younger and more vulnerable from Joyce’s Finnegans Wake6: the work of art, (6) blurred boundaries years my father gave me some Sir Tristram, violer d’amores, fr’over between "low" and "high" culture. advice that I've been turning over in the short sea, had passen-core my mind ever since. rearrived from North Armorica on 2.1. Impressionism "Whenever you feel like criticizing this side the scraggy isthmus of Because they were widely influenced by the any one," he told me, "just Europe Minor to wielderfight his contemporary discoveries in psychology and remember that all the people in this penisolate war: nor had topsawyer’s by the invention of psychoanalysis, the world haven't had the advantages rocks by the stream Oconee modernist authors were interested in the that you've had." exaggerated themselse to Laurens way their characters perceived the situations He didn't say any more but we've County’s gorgios while they went instead of the factual way things could always been unusually doublin their mumper all the time: happen. This vision of literature is communicative in a reserved way, nor avoice from afire bellowsed interdependent with the Impressionist and I understood that he meant a mishe mishe to tauftauf movement in painting. The process through great deal more than that. In thuartpeatrick not yet, though which these authors expressed such consequence I'm inclined to reserve venissoon after, had a kidscad perception is called the stream of all judgments, a habit that has buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, consciousness. opened up many curious natures to though all’s fair in vanessy, were The stream of consciousness is a me and also made me the victim of sosie sesthers wroth with twone technique used by novelists to not a few veteran bores. *…+ And, nathandjoe. represent a character’s thoughts after boasting this way of my (Joyce, 1939, p. 1) and sense impressions without tolerance, I come to the admission syntax or logical sequence. that it has a limit. NOTE Here is an example from one of the greatest (Fitzgerald, 1925, p. 1)5 The mind (psych.) is the element of a person novels of the twentieth century, Ulysses4 by that enables them to be aware of the world the Irish novelist James Joyce: 2.3. Blurring of distinctions and their experiences, to think, and to feel, A quarter after what an unearthly between genres the faculty of consciousness and though while the soul(rel.)is the spiritual or immaterial part hour I suppose theyre just getting With the modernist authors, the genres of of a human being or animal, which is up in China now combing out their literature collapse. What was clearly regarded as immortal. pigtails for the day well soon have separated now melts together. Poetry seems the nuns ringing the angelus theyve more documentary, more realistic, while nobody coming in to spoil their novels seem more poetic.