Criterion: a Journal for Literary Criticism (2014)

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism Volume 7 Issue 2 Article 10 9-1-2014 Criterion: A Journal for Literary Criticism (2014) Criterion: A Journal for Literary Criticism Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/criterion Part of the English Language and Literature Commons BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Criticism, Criterion: A Journal for Literary (2014) "Criterion: A Journal for Literary Criticism (2014)," Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism: Vol. 7 : Iss. 2 , Article 10. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/criterion/vol7/iss2/10 This Full Issue is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism by an authorized editor of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. Criterion Just as telling stories that get at the truth of the war are acts of reverence, the custom o ing the dead with ceremony is a type of custom that Woodruff says belongs to re custom “by which human beings distinguish themselves most importantly fr prey” (Reverence 97). Although Kiowa died like an animal in the most repuls through ceremony and the truthful telling of his story, his death is grante ence. O’Brien’s detailed telling of “story-truth” elevates the metaphysic the war and invites a sense of reverence to the narrative. Just as the crete, tangible object that the men carry lends weight to the symbo they carry, a story with gruesome details of the brutality of wa and metaphysical meanings beneath the concrete facts. Ti the Deeper Meaning:’ Exile and the Embodied Poetics o Things They Carried” says: “The close attention to th lays bare the paradox that characterizes any recou horror of death even while elevating it into an a ror to an aesthetic moment is an act itself of truth of beauty and the sublime as anothe language of storytelling accesses the t ates an attitude of reverence toward ence: Human Language and the attitude of reverence are basi O’Brien tells may be profan truth through storytelli Through stories, O’B his stories of Viet both by the bru instinct Criterion A Journal of Literary Criticism Criterion A Journal of Literary Criticism “If you compare several representative passages of the greatest poetry you see how great is the variety of types of combination, and also how completely any semi-ethical criterion of 'sublimity' misses the mark. For it is not the 'greatness,' the intensity, of the emotions, the components, but the intensity of the artistic process, the pressure, so to speak, under which the fusion takes place, that counts.” T. S. Eliot, "Tradition and the Individual Talent" Criterion is published by the BYU Department of English. The contents represent the opinions and beliefs of the authors and not necessarily those of the editors, staff, advi- sors, Brigham Young University, or its sponsoring institution, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. See criterion.byu.edu for more information. © Copyright 2014. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, record- ing, or others, without written permission of the publisher. Printed by Brigham Young University Press. Provo, Utah, USA. Design by Christina Johnson and Joseph Post Criterion A Journal of Literary Criticism Staff Editors-in-Chief Adam Anderson Kristen Soelberg Sarah Barlow Jenna Peterson Katelyn Bean Melinda Fox Faculty Advisor Chelsea Lee Emron Esplin Tyler Moore Contents Editors’ note ii Kristen Soelberg & Jenna Peterson A Saintly Epic 1 Reading Beowulf as Hagiography Jordan Jones Archiving Art 9 The Value of Nostalgia in Hemingway's A Moveable Feast Jared Michael Pence Foregoing Intellectual Powers 19 Exploring Social Instincts in "The Old Gentleman" Brittany Strobelt The Joker, The Blockbuster, and Mass 28 Shootings Watching the World Burn Connor Race Davis The Motifs of Water and Death in 36 Rudyard Kipling's and Joseph Conrad's Short Stories Shane Peterson The Profane and Reverent in The Things 44 They Carried Tamara Pace Thomson Redircting the Disney Rants 53 The Real Angst Fueling the Negative Obsession with Disney Tales Laura Randle Editors’ Note This year, we as editors-in-chief were excited to be working on a new kind of issue for Criterion. The essays that you are about to read were presented in the 2014 English Symposium, a conference that included some of the best work produced by English students at Brigham Young University. We were also excited to work with Emron Esplin, our new faculty advisor. Finally, we were thrilled for the chance to help Criterion become a biannual student journal. We have been able to build off of the work of pervious editors and staff members, and continuing their work has been a privledge and a learning experience. As we have worked through the process of taking over and running a student journal,we have encountered both obstacles and support. There were a lot of changes for Criterion this semester, but the hard work of various parties has allowed our first English Symposium issue to be a success. Our marvelous staff members have worked hard, reading and editing essays. Professor Esplin has been very involved and has put in just as much work as any staff member. As always, members of the library staff have gener- ously given their time to help us learn the ins and outs of the online journal system. And, of course, we must thank our writers, who have worked so hard on their papers and helped so much during the editing process. We hope that you are as proud of this edition as we are. Jenna Peterson and Kristen Soelberg A Saintly Epic Reading Beowulf as Hagiography Jordan Jones In his book Genre, Jonathan Frow asserts that genre is “a matter of discrimination and taxonomy: of organising things into recognisable classes” (51). He explains that science has inspired us with the desire to classify and systematize everything so we can understand the world around us. However, Frow points out that the theoretical practice of classify- ing things in the real world is very complicated and that entities share characteristics of multiple classes or genres—especially in literature. He identifies several criteria used to determine a text’s genre: semiotic medium (how a text is delivered to the reader/listener), radical of presentation (first- or third-person narration, delivery through song, etc.), mode (the themes and motifs present in the text), genre (the specific elements required by a particular genre), and sub-genre (themes and elements that restrict a text’s classification even fur- ther) (67). After discussing these criteria, Frow concludes that instead of focusing on assigning texts to static genres we should recognize that “there are never any ‘correct’ answers” to such questions; we should focus on how people actually use different genres to interpret texts and see what they gain as a result (55). I intend to use Frow’s criteria to show how Beowulf (traditionally considered to be an epic) can be read as a hagiography. After briefly describing what hagiographies are and what characteristics they tend to have, I will compare elements of Beowulf to those of several hagiographies contemporary with the text. I will Criterion compare them in terms of storyline and the different aspects of genre as defined above. In doing so, I am not claiming that it was originally written to be a hagiography; I am simply attempting to demonstrate the value of analyzing texts from different perspectives. By comparing Beowulf to canonical hagiographies, I will show how our understanding of texts and the cultures in which they are produced can deepen if we consider the conventions of various genres in our analysis. Before looking at Beowulf as a hagiography, we must know what hagio- graphic texts look like. In the introduction to her book Roads to Paradise, Alison Godard Elliott explains that hagiographies tell the stories of saints’ lives and are written to edify readers or listeners. She points out that hagiographies are more concerned with being inspiring than historically accurate; as a result, many of them seem fantastical. She reminds us, however, that we need not discard them simply because they are not completely factual: “Hagiography is not history” (7). This is a telling statement because it informs the way we should read hagiographies—not as histories, but as spiritually significant texts that encourage normal people to live faithfully. After cautioning us against approaching them as we approach other texts, Elliott introduces the formulaic plot that many hagiographies employ: Saints were heroes, no different in the popular imagination from many other beloved figures of story and legend. They worked wonders, defeated the forces of evil, and earned their just reward at the end of a life of trial. Moreover, while every man might not realistically aspire to winning the hand of a princess and acquiring a kingdom, all might hope to resist the wiles of the devil and attain the kingdom of heaven. (7) In providing this general formula, Elliott tells us what to expect as we read hagiographies; she goes on to explain that there are generally two directions these stories can take: they can focus on the death of the saint (these stories are called “passions”) or they can focus on the life of the saint (these stories are called “vitae”). I propose that Beowulf shares characteristics with both: the beginning of the work resembles a vita because it discusses Beowulf’s marvelous physical triumphs over evil monsters, and the end resembles a passion by presenting Beowulf sacrificing himself for the good of his kingdom.

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