THE BEHEMOTH and the SLEUTH Metaphysics of the Contemporary Encyclopedic Novel
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THE BEHEMOTH AND THE SLEUTH Metaphysics of the Contemporary Encyclopedic Novel Vesa Kyllönen Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies University of Helsinki Academic dissertation to be publicly discussed, by due permission of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Helsinki in auditorium XIII, on the 11th of January, 2019, at 12 o’clock. © Vesa Kyllönen 2018 ISBN 978-951-51-4588-8 (paperback) ISBN 978-951-51-4589-5 (PDF) http://ethesis.helsinki.fi Unigrafia, Helsinki 2018 Abstract The Behemoth and the Sleuth: Metaphysics of the Contemporary Encyclopedic Novel explores the integration of the metaphysical detective story into the maximalist narrative forms of twenty-first century. More specifically, I study how the encyclopedic novel after Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow (1973) produces its unique, abundant mode of representation, that is, its encyclopedism. I have picked four contemporary narratives for closer scrutiny, namely Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum (1988), Richard Powers’s The Gold Bug Variations (1991), David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest (1996), and Mark Z. Danielewski’s House of Leaves (2000). Through close reading of these works, I argue that the postmodern genre of the metaphysical detective story has become a dominant genre of fictional encyclopedias. Although the heyday of the genre has passed, it has found a new home in the literary environment where multiple plot lines and characters, unnecessary lists and digressions, centrifugal narrative structures, and the excess of narrative material are common. Thus, on the one hand I study the literary phenomenon of maximalist storytelling on the brink of the new millennium, but on the other, I aim at outlining a possible future for the metaphysical detective story. What in particular is at stake is the shared epistemology between the postmodernist detective story genre and the encyclopedic modality. Both being descriptions of the learning process, I specify and analyze three key narrative elements that are used in all discussed novels. First, the main character, the narrator, and the reader are epistemological agents, who, on their separate levels of narrative, work with some investigation or quest. Second, the world around the detective character, or the literary milieu he or she is working with, forms a maze-like, ambiguously epistemological environment. The epistemological agents also do what they can to conceptualize and tame this environment that is out of control, and usually this encyclopedic aim to create a comprehensible system characterizes the bulk of the narrative. Third, also the narrative as such is epistemologically composed, and typically it has a geometrical design of order. I call this order a radicle system, that is a form of pseudotree consisting of the base and the network. In consequence of these three components and their dynamics, each narrative, I argue, frames a set of philosophical, usually ontological questions. Furthermore, in the heart of each encyclopedic novel, there is a metaphysical mystery that fundamentally concerns the subject investigating it. Hence, the absolute merger between the self and the world is also included in each fictional encyclopedia studied in this dissertation. These framings of question are, in my view, a legacy from Edgar Allan Poe and Jorge Luis Borges, two key authors of the metaphysical detective story. While adopting narrative ideas from Pynchon and other encyclopedic authors, Eco, Powers, Wallace, and Danielewski are then very aware of the legacy of the iii metaphysical detective story and do not hesitate to take advantage of it. The main argument of the dissertation is to show that the key elements of the metaphysical detective story both expand and control the typical modality of the encyclopedic novel, that is, its simultaneously centrifugal and centripetal nature. iv Acknowledgements Accomplishing this project has taken seven years, and during this period quite a number of people have helped me. Above all, I want to thank my wonderful supervisor, Professor Heta Pyrhönen. Ever since I entered the University of Helsinki in 2011, she has patiently, firmly, and always in the most inspiring way supported me, and, when necessary, directed me away from digressions and dead ends. Every single meeting I have had with her has been a pleasure. Indeed, one of the main reasons for applying for a doctoral student’s position at the University of Helsinki was Professor Pyrhönen’s expertise in the metaphysical detective story, and not once during these years have I felt let down in my expectations. I also wish to thank Professor Klaus Brax, who, during the last stages of this project, read the manuscript through, and took care of practicalities concerning the preliminary examination. With a calm and kind grasp, he helped me over one of the most trying phases of this project. Docent Mark Shackleton did a wonderful job in checking the language of the manuscript, and I am grateful to him as well. The seminars of the Doctoral Programme in Philosophy, Arts, and Society, and the Finnish Literary Research Society, as well as the Comparative Literature research seminar have been my strongest links not only to the University of Helsinki but also to the scientific community in general. Among the many participants in the first two, I am especially grateful to Sanna Nyqvist, Kaisa Kortekallio, Merja Polvinen, Juha-Pekka Kilpiö, Laura Piippo, and Jouni Teittinen for their insightful suggestions and comments. As for the third group, I salute my bright and encouraging colleagues, particularly Hanna Mäkelä, Tero Vanhanen, Matti Kangaskoski, Hannasofia Hardwick, Laura Oulanne, Lauri Niskanen, and Pekka Raittinen. I am also deeply grateful to Professor Emeritus Hannu Riikonen, who was particularly helpful in my transition from the Licentiate to the Doctoral Degree programme, and will always be remembered for his witty and sophisticated comments, anecdotes and jokes. For the practical help I received during these years, I also would like to thank Päivi Väätänen, the coordinator of the Doctoral Programme. Through the Doctoral Programme and Comparative Literature seminars I have also met my pre-examiners, Professor Susan Elizabeth Sweeney and Professor James Collins. In addition to their warm presence and insightful comments, I cannot stress enough how crucial their thorough examinations – the readings of my readings – have been for me; how extraordinarily supportive it has been to receive such reviews after seven years of different degrees of self-doubt. A long-term project like this almost inevitably produces feelings of insufficiency and inferiority, and thanks to Professors Sweeney and Collins, these sentiments are now fading. v Of course, without peer support during the process, I would not have been capable of bringing this project to its conclusion. Besides my colleagues in Comparative Literature, I also wish to thank others who have encouraged me, and for this Vappu Kannas, Mika Pekkola, Antti Rimpiläinen, Lassi Jakola, Miska Saarvanto, and especially Lauri Kemppainen deserve all my gratitude. The same applies to my sister Marja Kyllönen without whom I would not be where I am today. Thanks to her, I ended up studying Comparative Literature sixteen years ago, and it was she who showed me what the magic of literature really is. And since words – dialectal words in particular – are the most crucial living legacy me and my sister share, I also want to thank my parents, Erkki and Alli for their encouragement of wordplay and idiosyncratic usages. That is, the attachment for words has taught me to operate within the boundaries of academic English very differently compared the way I operate within the vernacular or my native language, a joy that the family environment provided me with. I also want to thank my father and mother for their continued support. Though our spheres of interest have not always been the same, their encouragement has always been felt. To my beloved wife, Eeva, I can truly say that I would not be where I am today without her. During these years, I have been quite reserved in talking about my project to others – do the dentists converse about teeth in the evenings? – but I have always felt that Eeva was there beside me, no matter what. Lastly, my efforts would have been at least twice as hard without the possibility of advancing the project full-time. Unlike many others in the same position, I have been extraordinarily fortunate to receive several research grants from several different foundations. Therefore, I wish to express my thanks to the University of Helsinki Research Foundation, the Alfred Kordelin General Progress and Education Fund, the Emil Aaltonen Foundation, as well as the Ella and Georg Ehrnrooth Foundation. Also, a one-year salaried position in the Doctoral Programme of Philosophy, Arts, and Society has supported a crucial stage for this project. In the future, my hope is that more doctoral students – the underdogs of contemporary academia – will be in a better and more financially secured position than hitherto. vi Contents Abstract iii Acknowledgements v Contents vii Abbreviations ix Introduction 1 PART I 9 1. The Encyclopedic Novel, and the Metaphysical Detective Fiction 11 1.1. The Encyclopedism of the Encyclopedic Novel 14 Totalization, Synecdoche, and Epic 17 1.2. Enter the Metaphysical Detective Story 22 From Detective Adventures to Hermeneutical Delirium 25 1.3. The Metaphysics of Encyclopedism 30 Epistemological Labyrinths: the Base and the Network 31 Ontological Consequences 37 Metaphysical Detectives 43 2. Duplicating Borges: Eco’s Maximalist Web of Mutual Resemblances 49 2.1. Clues, Victims, and Armchair Detectives 51 Casaubon as the Sam Spade of Culture 57 2.2. The First Clue and the Standards of a Lunatic: Ardenti’s Message and His Interpretation 63 The Reading Strategies of an Obsessed Detective 70 3. Cruft, Information, and Order 77 3.1. The Nuptials of Tradition and the Electronic Machine 80 A Coalition of Reasoning Machines 87 3.2.