The Treatment of Setting Novels by Arthur Hailey Diploma Thesis
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MasarykUniversityBrno FacultyofEducation DepartmentofEnglishLanguageandLiterature The Treatment of Setting Novels by Arthur Hailey Diploma Thesis Brno2008 Supervisor: Writtenby: Ph.Dr.PavelDoležel,CSc.EvaMalíšková DECLARATION Iherebydeclarethatalltheliterarysourcesusedinthe thesisarestatedinthe bibliography. EvaMalíšková 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Iwouldlike tothankPh.Dr.PavelDoležel,CSc.,forhisadvice,helpand supportinthecourseof mywork. 3 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………………...5 1ARTHUR HAILEY……………………………………………………………………..6 2WORKAND WORKINGENVIRONMENTINTHE REALISTIC NOVEL…….…11 3TRENDS INTHEPOST-WAR NOVEL……………………………………………...17 4HOTEL…………………………………………………………………………...……20 4.1Americannotionofahotelimplies awayoflife……………………………21 4.2Thelocationandthe prospectsoftheSt.Gregory……………………....…...23 4.3Everydayduties andeverydayworries………………………………………25 4.4Theemployees……………………………………………………………….28 4.5Servicesandtroubles……………………………………………………...…31 5AIRPORT……………………………………………………………………………...35 5.1The placesandtheweather…………………………………………………..36 5.2Thedeparturelounge………………………………………………………...38 5.3Thewarehouse……………………………………………………………….39 5.4ThecommunityofMeadowood……………………………………………...40 5.5Airtrafficcontrol…………………………………………………………….41 5.6Services………………………………………………………………………43 5.7Preparationofaflightandaflight…………………………………………...45 5.8Stow-aways…………………………………………………………………..49 6INHIGHPLACES…………………………………………………………………….51 6.1Canada……………………………………………………………………….52 6.2TheColdWar………………………………………………………………..54 6.3The plotandsetting………………………………………………………….55 6.4ThePrimeMinisterandhisCabinet…………………………………………58 6.5Vastervikanditsstow-away…………………………………………………60 6.6Thesummit meetinginWashington…………………………………………62 CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………...…65 BIBLIOGRAPHY……………………………………………………………………....66 RESUMÉ……………………………………………………………………………….69 4 INTRODUCTION For this workwe shall explore the author Arthur Haileyandthree of his novels Hotel , Airport ,and InHighPlaces. EventhoughHailey is not consideredtobe a classic author, his books are renownedbestsellers.What has caused these novels toengage so manyreaders? Partlyit is the realistic andaccurate descriptionof the settings where his stories take place.He spent a lot of time researchingeachof the books in factories, hospitals, airports,etc. His aim was toobserve andrecord as muchdetail as possible from different settings and touse these findings inthe stories.We will observe indetail these settings, which are actually the main ‘heros’of his novels. These settings strongly influence the actionsandbehaviours ofthecharacterswhoareconnectedtothem. Haileybelongs tothe group of authors whoare knownfor realism intheir works. He wrote novels which decribe real life inbig companies or enterprises. Readers find themselves in settings whichare describedinsuchdetail that theylearn muchabout the operations andconditions infor example: a hotel,anairport, the Americancar industry,a broadcastingcompanyorwhendrawnintoa political scene. Haileybelongs toa group of writers whowrote socalled‘profession‘ novels.He wrote eleven novels, each of them has a different setting. He is occupied mainly with places which affect our daily lives, like hospital care,banking, the média,politics, the hotel industry, aviation and others. The location plays the main role in his novels, the plots and the characters are simple, added almost tocompliment the story rather than playanintegral part. Havingread all his novels choosingjust three of them was not easy. The chosen reflect the diversity of settings concerning three essentially different topics; the accommodation,services andboardinginhotels; the staff,security,andresponsibility in airlines; and, the cold war, politics, a government and its members with all their ambitionsandintrigues. Hailey’s novels rankhighlyamongst socalled‘relaxationliterature‘ andtheyare often termed as nonfiction or sociological novels. His books are intended for a wide sphere of readers; for this reason and their popularity they were translated into many languages andsoldinlarge quantities all over the world.The commercial success of his worksisaresultofaskilful mixoffictionandafact. 5 1 ARTHUR HAILEY Arthur Haileywas aninternational author ineverysense.He was Britishbybirth, Canadianbynationality,andfinally,anAmericanresident.His novels are published in allmajorlanguages.Throughoutthe worldhehasanenthusiasticfollowingofreaders. Arthur Haileywas borninLuton,Bedfordshire,in1920.Since childhoodhe was anenthusiastic reader whopreferred readingat home or visitingthe librarytoplaying with other children outside. He dreamed of becoming a reporter, his mother was ambitious for him succeed,but his father discouragedhim.He was not verygoodat maths,buthewastalentedandlikedwritingstories. When he was fourteenhe had to leave school because his parents didnot have enoughmoneytopayfor his futher education. He started toworkasa messanger boy in a real estate agencyandhis wage was onlyfive shillings a week.At the same time he attended evening classes where he learned shorthand and typing. All the time he enjoyedwritingdifferent genres, for example,poetry,essays, one-act plays,stories but nothingwas published. Whenthe WorldWar II broke out, youngHaileywas mobilizedandhe spent the war as a flight lieutenant of Royal Air Force inthe Middle andFar East andin1947he movedtoCanada.At first he triedhis luckas anestate agent there,later as aneditor of a business paper andas a sales andadvertisment director.From 1965 to1969he lived inCalifornia andthenhe movedtothe Bahamas toavoidCanadianandU.S.income taxes,whichwereclaiming90%ofhisincome. In 1944 he married to Joan Fischwick, an English girl, who worked at the Embassy.He hadthree sons withhis wife but their marriage was not happy.The family sufferedfromArthur’s obsessionwithwritingandin1949it brokeup. He met his second wife in Canada and in 1951 they married. They were constantlyonthe move –Canada,California, London,New York,Hollywoodand at last, Hailey made his home in Lyford Cay, an exclusive residential resort on New Providence Islandinthe Bahamas.He livedthere withhis secondwife Sheila (who wrote about her marriage inthe book,I Married aBest-Seller in1978) andwiththeir three children–Jane,StevenandDiane. Inthe last years of his life he sufferedfrom healthproblems,underwent twoheart operations; one monthbefore his deathhe hada stroke,his next stroke was probably thecauseofhisdeath.HediedonNovember24,2004. 6 Haileydidnot write academic literature but his descriptions are highly realistic and he did extensive research into the settings of his stories. His works are often classified as nonfiction or sociological novels. He also used a multi-plot technique, changingscenes just as the suspense inthe storyreachedits peak. The environment, describedin great detail, becomes the main‘hero‘ of the prose.These twotraits make hisworksidealforfilms,suchasfor The Airport (1968). His literaryfame beganin1956whenhis adventure story Flight intoDanger was publishedandmade intoa film.He wrote this booktogether withJ.Castle,the plane expert. Finally,the storysatiated readers’ longingfor modernadventure reading.His debut novel canbe summarisedbythe film style strapline; anemergencyona board a planeofTranscanadianAirlinesdragseachreaderintothethrillingactioninsucha way that thereaderliterallyspendsthe momentsof extremedangerwithhis heroes. In 1959 the first bestseller The Final Diagnosis appeared. In this novel Hailey showedhimself tobe an artful author whoknows his readers demands - the posibility tocandidlyandsecretly penetrate - at least inspirit withthe writer –the gatewayto workplaces fullofexcitement,perhapsfullofsecrets. This novel of Americanhospital life appeared in fifteenlanguages,another novel, InHighPlaces ,was translatedintofive languages.The bothnovels were selected by the Literary Guild. Hailey’s plays have been performed throughout the world on television,andmanyof hisstorieshave beenmadeintosuccessfulmotionpictures. During the writing of Hotel , the author spent many months in New Orleans studyinghoteloperationsatfirsthand. A hailmarkof anyHaileystoryis painstakingresearchintothe backgroundhe is writing about. Before beginning Airport he spent almost a year criss-crossing North America andEurope,interviewing hundreds of airport andairline officials,air traffic controllers, pilots, and others. One such interview took him to the little Northern California town of St. Helena, nestled in the beautiful Napa Valley wine producting region.Hefell inlovewiththe placeandlivedtherewithhis familyforsometime. Critics often dismissedHailey’s success as the result of a formulaic style inwhich he centered a crisis on an ordinary character, then inflated the suspense by hopping among multiple related plotlines. However, he was so popular with readers that his bookswere guaranteedtobecome bestsellers. 7 Hailey canbe also considered as a founder of so called the professional novel. Eachof his books describes a settingindetails andthese details spring from intimate knowledgewhichHaileyaquiredbydintofresearch. He would spend about one year researching a subject, followed by six months reviewing his notes, and finally, about 18 months writing the book. This aggressive style of research – tracking rebel guerrillas in the Peruvian jungle at age 67 for The Evening News (1990),or reading 27books onthe hotel industryfor Hotel –gave his novels a realism that appealedtoreaders,eventhoughsome critics complainedthat he usedit tomaskalackofliterarytalent. His books have oftenreached#1onthe New YorkTimes bestseller list andmore than 170 million